Three Imaginary Girls - SIFF 2007

SIFF 2007 film scorecard

imaginary embracey — Sat, 23 Jun 2007 23:00:03 +0000

405 films. Record ticket sales and a 5% year-over-year revenue increase. And one very tired imaginary boy.

SIFF '07: it's a wrap.

This page lists each of the 107 non-archival, feature-length titles screened by the accredited TIG SIFF review staff (of one). The "»" symbol ahead of a title indicates a SIFF award winner.

Brief comments or links to extended coverage follow star ratings:

**** stellar
*** good
** mediocre
* shite

Aachi & Ssipak | *** | week 1
American Shopper | ** | week 2
» Angels in the Dust | ***½ | awesome doc on South Africa humanitarian org
The Art of Crying | **½ | week 2
A Battle of Wits | ***½ | week 1
The Bet Collector | ***½ | week 3
Big Rig | *** | week 2
Black Irish | **½ | week 2
The Bothersome Man | ***½ | Droll, riveting not-so-sci-fi; think urban Norwegian Lost
» The Bubble | ** | cutesy gay Israeli-Palestinian rom-com tragedy. Yeah.
Children | ***½ | well-paced B&W Icelandic angst
Children of the War | *** | startling PBS-y MS-13 expose
Christmas Tree Upside Down | ** | snoozy, PETA-unfriendly Bulgarian tales
The Cloud | *** | intense German nuke-power cautionary yarn
Crazy Love | *** | blog
Cthulhu | ** | blog
DarkBlueAlmostBlack | *** | nicely paced Spanish drama w/ sexy gaptoothed janitor
Daespo Naughty Girls | **½ | comic-booky Korean film gets good in second half
Day Watch | *** | Worthy 2nd episode of Bekmambetov's hi-octane trilogy
» Death at a Funeral | *½ | week 1
Delirious | **½ | week 3
Doubletime | *** | mouth-dropping skip moves; wanted more from Japanese teams
Drama/Mex | *** | Fun interlocking triptych about hot, ill-behaved Acapulcans
Eagle vs. Shark | ***½ | week 2
The Elephant and the Sea | *** | quietly compelling, more sea than elephant
» Emma's Bliss | ***½ | blog
Expired | **½ | week 3
Falkenberg Farewell | **½ | gets good 'round the 70-minute mark
The Fever of '57 | *** | week 2
» Four Minutes | ** | Frustrating, not just b/c jailed pianiste obviously isn't really playing
A Friend of Mine | *** | cute Daniel Brühl + object of Emma's Bliss = naked Fahrvergnügen
Frozen City | *** | week 3
Girls Rock! | *** | most of the time this film rocks, too
Glue | ***½ | HOT. Slightly perverted. And I'm hungry for Nacho.
The Golden Door | *** | week 1
Goya's Ghosts | *** | week 3
Great World of Sound | ** | Dumb, depressing, frustrating record label swindle story
Grimm Love | ** | Heavily-mascara'd Felicity gets obsessed with German cannibals
The Guardian's Son | *** | week 3
I Don't Want to Sleep Alone | ***½ | brilliantly hushed man-love à la maverick Tsai
I Have Never Forgotten You | *** | doc props to Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal
Interview | *** | Buscemi (no SIFF '07 stranger) directs engaging Theo Van Gogh tribute
» In the Shadow of the Moon | *** | nicely produced God-bless-America space-doc
Invisibles | *** | sobering portraits of developing-world crises we rarely see
I Really Hate My Job | **½ | Tiring restaurant Britcom, best when AMM's on
It's Winter | *** | week 3
Joshua | **½ | what begins as a crackerjack demon-seed flick falls apart in act 3
» King of Kong | **½ | week 1
Knocked Up | *** | week 1
La Leon | ***½ | Plaintive, lovely B&W Argentinian loneliness
» La Vie En Rose | ** | week 2
The Life and Times of Yva Las Vegass | *½ | horrible execution of local doc is not her fault
Life In Loops | ***½ | week 1
Like Minds | *** | Great perfs in Donna Tartt-ish school-murder drama
Little Book of Revenge | ** | week 3
Love Conquers All | ***½ | ironic title, harsh events - good but messed me up
Lovesickness | **½ | Telanovela-y Rican tales. Love the old folks.
Made In China | *** | finally, a good local film: touching dad/son legacy story
Man in the Chair | *½ | treacly, preachy, poorly-conceived dud
The Man of My Life | ** | Way-too-long narcoleptic-meets-homo-en-vacances film
Manufactured Landscapes | ***½ | stunning images of ugly industrial realities
Moliere | *** | week 3
Monster Camp | **½ | better for the LARP faithful?
Mushishi | *** | week 3
My Best Friend | *** | even light-side Patrice Leconte is elegant and grand
My Friend & His Wife | **½ | Slightly gay Korean drama, all-over-the-place plotwise
Never on a Sunday | **½ | one too many Amores Perros-y twists
Noise | *** | Engaging Oz drama re tinnitus-suffering cop & thwart-attempting criminal
No Regret | ** | fair Korean gay quasi-softcore
Nu | **½ | more naked Fahrvergnügen, but dongier, sadder, Beneluxier, less good
Offscreen | * | week 3
Once | ***½ | blog
One Day Like Rain | ** | end-of-the-word drama that attempts/fails to be Lynchian
One of Our Own | ** | Leap-of-faith pregnancy yarn w/ Lillard annoying as always
On the Road with Judas | *** | another refreshing 4th wall breaker
Opera Jawa | *** | Long, weird, magnificently original Indonesian musical
» Out of Time | ***½ | blog
» Outsourced | ** | week 2
Paprika | **½ | week 1
Paris je t'aime | ***½ | J'aime aussi ce film
A Parting Shot | *** | Learning not to self-destruct en Suisse
The Pervert's Guide to Cinema | ***½ | Zizek's spirited cine-losophy is hardly pervy at all
Red Road | ***½ | creepy Scottish voyeur intrigue I still haven't quite shaken
Red Without Blue | *** | solid doc re identical twins (gay boy and trans sis) and their fam
Rescue Dawn | **½ | week 1
Rocket Science | **½ | week 2
Running on Empty | ** | week 2
» 7 Years | ***½ | Low-key French drama with moral complexity of a Decalogue ep
Severance | ** | week 1
» Sex and Death 101 | * | ridiculous shite-pile not even worth this single-line review
The Signal | **½ | Po-mo pulp starts great, loses way at halfmark
The Singer | **½ | week 1
Son of Rambow | *** | I want to be Didier Revol: Bonjour angleterre!
Still Alive | *** | touching but incomplete docu-bio on cinema god Kieslowski
Strange Culture | *** | Tilda's great in this enjoyable po-po-pomo doc hybrid
Syndromes and a Century | ***½ | another wondrous story-in-halves by Thai master
Tekkonkinkreet | **½ | Yin/yang symbolism amok in nice-looking but dull anime
» Tell No One | *** | convoluted, entertaining, star-studded French intrigue
The Ten | **½ | Ten good belly laughs, ten kinds of stupid
Them | *** | Keep "true story" in mind to be scared shitless
This is England | **½ | Best when murderous thug Stephen Graham pops round
Trail of the Screaming Forehead | ** | B-movie homage doesn't even succeed as camp
2 Days in Paris | ***½ | week 2
Waiter | *** | miserable fictional Dutchman effectively breaks 4th wall
A Walk Into the Sea | *** | week 1
The Yacoubian Building | **½ | homophobic but otherwise fun Egyptian trash-soap
Yella | ***½ | week 3

405 films. Record ticket sales with a 5% year-over-year revenue increase. And one very tired imaginary boy. SIFF '07: it's a wrap.

SIFFlog, days 21-23: a mixed bag of local produce

imaginary embracey — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 14:56:28 +0000

Made in China and Cthulhu are opposite ends of the quality spectrum in the mixed bag of local offerings this year.

Tonight's Recommended Show: Viva Voce, Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter, Siberian at Neumo's

imaginary liz — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 15:29:11 +0000

Speaking of popcorn(!) and music... we love it when folks combine our favorite things into one night of fun. The super-cool SIFF folks have taken their pledge to Find True Film out of the theater and into the rock club with their Face the Music program.

SIFFlog, days 16-20: the century mark

imaginary embracey — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 15:43:34 +0000

I've seen 100 films at SIFF. As such, it's possible that this blog entry makes no logical sense at all.

Tonight's Recommended Show: "Out of Time" at Pacific Place Cinema

imaginary embracey — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 07:52:05 +0000

This moving, melancholy little Austrian documentary about four old-world businesses struggling to survive gentrification is my favorite non-fiction flick of SIFF '07.

SIFFlog, days 11-15: feeling animated

imaginary embracey — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 02:31:47 +0000

SIFF 2007's animated shorts program was the best in years.

240 dollars worth of puddin' will make it all better

imaginary char — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 01:23:47 +0000

We had the 240, we had to have the puddin'.

SIFF 2007 highlights: week 3

imaginary embracey — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 16:48:07 +0000

SIFF07-betcollector.jpg

Highlight films from Germany, Greece, Iran, France, Japan, Austria, and the Philippines put the "I" in SIFF's final week/ends (6/8-17).

Don't miss 'em:

The Bet Collector
(6/15 6:45p Lincoln Square, 6/17 1:30p Pacific Place)
Micro-budget Filipino drama about a slum-dwellin' gossip-mama (Gina Pareno, in an amazing performance) working a nefarious Quezon City numbers racket as a fateful All Saint's Day approaches. The story meanders like the endless alleyways we walk with Pareno, but the film's strong characters and slight supernatural intrigue (spectral visits from her dead, hot soldier son) make this a strong entry for rising-star director Jeffrey Jeturian.

The Guardian's Son (6/9 6:15p Pacific Place, 6/12 9:30p Lincoln Square)
An inauspicious sequence of events leads a tabloid TV prankster (chubby-faced hottie Nikolas Aggelis) to his mother's birth village in rural Greece -- and, yeah, it's one of those "forced to confront his past" yarns. But it's a lot of fun, with surprising impressionist strokes and an odd little narrative that loops around at its own droll pace.

It's Winter (6/15 7p Pacific Place, 6/17 4:15p Lincoln Square)
Raw Iranian drama with a Scandinavian sensibility: snowy, distant, and at times unbearably bleak, with an own-worst-enemy male hero. The story involves several poverty-stricken dwellers of a dreary Tehran suburb, and focuses on a fuckup mechanic who just can't catch a break... and that's often his own damn fault. This probably sounds more depressing than It's Winter actually is, because the film's visual splendor and emotional heft provide more than glimmers of hope.

Molière (6/17 6:30p Cinerama)
Lavish, very fun costume drama about what might have transpired during an early blank period (c. 1644) in the titular satirist's known whereabouts. Director Laurent Tirard (see 2005's criminally underrated The Story of My Life) imagines, beautifully, that an impoverished young Molière found himself in the (very Molièresque) throes of romance and subterfuge after agreeing to provide acting lessons to a rich, clueless Monsieur who bailed him outta the clink. Sexy Gallic hijinks ensue. Funny, accessible, and foreign: think Shakespeare in France. Good choice for closing night.

Mushishi (6/8 9:30p Lincoln Square, 6/10 6:45p Egyptian)
It takes anime auteur Katsuhiro Ôtomo (Akira) a while to tell an enchanting live-action fantasy story here, but patience is rewarded. A Mushishi is a wandering shaman who rids humans of malevolent spirits; Ginko (well-played by Jô Odagiri, who is hot even when wearing an Andy Warhol wig) is a very good one... even though he has no memory of critical pieces of his troubled past. The story's mythology gets muddled at times, but the film's emotional drive and glorious visuals keep it afloat through the lovely, lonely conclusion.

Out of Time (6/11 9:30p Pacific Place, 6/13 2p Pacific Place)
The pull of consumerism meets the grip of legacy in this sweet, melancholy Austrian documentary about four old-world businesses struggling to survive gentrification. The film finds its heart and soul, of course, in the people behind the counters as they go about their daily lives and recall the good (and bad) old days. And though only one of the shops is still in business by the end, the proprietors' stories and hurdles reveal unimaginably rich lives that hold wisdom and insight for us all.

Yella (6/13 7:15p Pacific Place, 6/16 1:45p Pacific Place)
The titular heroine (unbelievable Nina Hoss) is trying to make a fresh start -- new job, new town, new life. Problem is, voices and images from her past keep entering her consciousness. Is she psychic? Is she off her meds? Does she see dead people? Director Christian Petzold tells her tale via a languid, occasionally jolting series of events, and doesn't let you in on the deal until the stunner of a final scene: it's nothing new, but it's told in a very new way, and whether you choose to buy it will affect your view of everything that came before. (I bought it, and I'm dying to buy it again.)

Take 'em or leave 'em:

Delirious
The title doesn't make much sense, and neither does the song "Bohemian Like You" playing over the opening scenes, but this uneven New York story of a homeless youth (Michael Pitt, hot), a teeny-pop music diva (Alison Lohman, good) and a shady paparazzo (Steve Buscemi, doing his usual thing) ends up being a fun and occasionally insightful look at the absurdity of (and obsession with) celebrity culture. The film is at its best after Pitt's character gets flash-in-the-pan famous and Gina Gershon starts spinning bitter comedic gold as his manager-with-benefits. Surprise celeb cameos are fun, too.

Expired
Samantha Morton and Jason Patric are both good as hard-to-like characters in this odd, inconsistently-paced comedy. She's a timid, mousy type living with her invalid mom (Teri Garr); he's a seething prick with a personality disorder and a porn habit. Oh, and they're both L.A. meter-maids. Thus the title, I guess. The film doesn't achieve everything it seems to be shooting for, but it's definitely not the worst quirkfest of SIFF '07.

Frozen City
If you haven't had your fill of raw, painfully realistic Scandinavian films, this Finnish offering is a good bet. In it, a problem-addled taxi driver (excellent Janne Virtanen) flees the mean streets of Helsinki for an apartment in the suburbs. And then more problems present themselves. And that's just the beginning of a big-time downward spiral. Whew. Heavy, but good.

Goya's Ghosts
When not taken seriously, Milos Forman's latest, an oddly cast film about Francisco Goya (Stellan Skarsgård) and the Spanish Inquisition, is a hilarious, trashy hoot. Javier Bardem (as a villainous clergyman turned resistance leader) and Natalie Portman (first as a young woman who goes crazy in jail, and later as her horse-teethed prostitute bastard daughter) get the lurid, campy tone right. Or wrong, depending on your perspective.

Skip 'em:

Little Book of Revenge
A French-Quebec jewelry-store accountant is prone to making poor life choices, including the one to plot revenge against his asshole coot of a boss. What result are a dumb downward spiral, a series of pains in the ass, and a consistently annoying film that manages to seem half-assed and overdone all at once.

Offscreen
This big disappointment from Danish director Christopher Boe (Reconstruction, Allegro) finds actor Nicolas Bro (playing a crazed version of himself) making a video diary of his faltering relationship, and eventually becoming a murderous psychopath. I'll spare you the details. Just know that this film is ugly, preposterous, and just plain gross. Check the photo to the right: do you want to look at *that* for 96 minutes?

Highlight films from Germany, Greece, Iran, France, Japan, and Austria put the "I" in SIFF's final week/ends (6/8-17).

Tonight's Recommended Show: Sean Nelson and Julien Temple @ SIFF Cinema

imaginary embracey — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 14:42:22 +0000

Musician, critic, and all-around Renaissance man Sean Nelson chats with director Julien Temple about Joe Strummer at this Face the Music event tonight at SIFF Cinema.

SIFFlog, days 8-10: the unmissable "Emma's Bliss"

imaginary embracey — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 07:31:01 +0000

The brilliant, heartfelt, masterfully produced German film Emma's Bliss is my favorite of the 60ish films I've seen at SIFF '07 thusfar.

SIFFlog, days 5-7

imaginary embracey — Thu, 31 May 2007 13:22:10 +0000

Tuesday my SIFF companion asked me: "Why do we always end up sitting in front of people who feel they have to make noise?" Good question.

Tonight's Recommended Show: "Crazy Love" at Pacific Place

imaginary embracey — Wed, 30 May 2007 15:13:37 +0000

SIFFgoers get their first of two chances to see a brilliantly messed-up documentary about some not-so-brilliantly messed-up folks.

SIFFlog, days 1-4

imaginary embracey — Tue, 29 May 2007 14:16:05 +0000

SIFF's Memorial Day weekend screenings went remarkably well, all things considered.

SIFF 2007 highlights: week 2

imaginary embracey — Tue, 29 May 2007 05:42:37 +0000

SIFF07-bigrig.jpg

All-American docs, short pieces from Deutschland, and Julie Delpy's directorial debut highlight SIFF's second week (6/1-7).

Don't miss:

Big Rig (6/1 9:30p Egyptian; 6/2 3:15p Egyptian)
This populist doc portrait of modern America as seen through the eyes of long-haul truck drivers -- people who know this country in ways you never will -- is patriotic in the best sense. The team that brought us Scratch and Hype! have made a hip, insightful, slickly-executed road movie spanning 45 states and 21,000 miles, with first-rate graphic designs (by Tomorrow's Brightest Minds) and original music (by Canadian hip-hop artist Buck 65) that serve the truckers' stories beautifully.

Crazy Love (5/30 9:30p Pacific Place, 6/1 4:30p Pacific Place)
Truth can be stranger, and stupider, than fiction. Cases in point: the two subjects of this documentary about an obsession-triggered maiming case (ambulance-chasin' lawyer hires thugs to throw acid into ex-girlfriend's face post-breakup) that held New York in thrall in the late '50s, mid-'70s, and mid-'90s. I had trouble caring about the subjects for the first half-hour, and wished for a bit more narrative thrust to add much-needed momentum during the occasionally draggy proceedings, but the eccentric talking heads and the bizarro situation they created for themselves (not to mention a resulting series of media maelstroms) gets fun. And crazy for real.

Deutsch in Miniature shorts (6/3 1:45p SIFF Cinema)
I enjoyed most of these eight fiction shorts by German up-and-comers, especially the enigmatic psycho-gothic fairytale Wolf's Dream; the dreamy and elusive animated film Close Your Eyes and Do Not Breathe; See You at Home (quietly shocking story of a 15-year-old trick-turner and her momma facing up to some long-buried family secrets); and Wigald (about a troubled young man's humorously ill-timed suicide attempts).

Eagle vs. Shark (5/31 7p Neptune, 6/1 4p Neptune)
This irresistibly charming New Zealand quirkfest, a chronicle of the courtship of a socially-challenged fast food clerk and a grandeur-delusional computer store geek, could very well become the buzz flick of SIFF '07. Delightful story, full of quote-worthy awkward exchanges, peppered with fun stop-motion animation sequences and a shimmering soundtrack by The Phoenix Foundation. Inevitable comparisons to Napoleon Dynamite, Me and You and Everyone We Know, and the films of Wes Anderson will be well-earned by gifted first-time feature director Taika Waitiki.

The Fever of '57 (6/1 7p SIFF Cinema; 6/3 11a Neptune)
Far From Heaven-era Americans freaked out after Russia beat us into space with Sputnik I. This enthralling, well-researched and -produced film documents the aftermath in the year that followed: media-fueled nuclear paranoia, a crushing failure at the first launch of our own puny satellite, and Eisenhower getting screwed by the burgeoning military industrial complex. Don't worry if this all seems PBS-y at first -- Peter Thomas' familiar narration sometimes had me wondering when the next pledge break would begin -- because before you know it you will be riveted, and, if you're like me, you'll be calling your parents afterward to ask if they were sad when space-dog Laika died.

2 Days in Paris (6/2 8:30p Egyptian; 6/5 7p Lincoln Square)
I like Adam Goldberg, but up to now I've never considered him "hot". Julie Delpy's delightfully funny directorial debut, in which he plays her neurotic boyfriend (and in which he appears, briefly, with balloons tied to his schlong -- no kidding), has changed all that. I shouldn't concentrate on Adam, though, or the balloons, because La Delpy is the real star here: in addition to starring and directing, she wrote, produced, edited, and scored the music for the film. The results of her efforts: whip-smart dialogue, Adam Goldberg naked, and irresistibly charming bits of Woody Allen-ish comedy.

Take 'em or leave 'em:

The Art of Crying
Well-acted, morally ambiguous Danish tragicomedy about familial child abuse in '70s small-town Jutland. If you don't mind another depressing Scandinavian flick (there are plenty on the SIFF sked this year), then enjoy.

Outsourced
This middling-to-OK local-ish film falls squarely (and I do mean squarely) into the "crowd-pleaser" category, and if you enjoy seeing the Space Needle on screen I guess you could do worse. It's about a clueless Seattle call-center manager whose department is outsourced to Bombay. He's redeployed there, and oh wow it's a different world, and he's a jerk at first because he's so American, and the locals call him "Mr. Toad", because his name is Todd and I suppose Indians are just funny that way. The moral of the story is that Mr. Toad has a lot to learn. Well, so does this movie. If you're looking for some true insight on the subject, check out this documentary and leave Outsourced alone.

Rocket Science
Spellbound director Jeffry Blitz makes his narrative feature debut, and he's definitely seen him some Election, Gilmore Girls, and Rushmore. The first half of his zippy, brainy script, which sets up the dilemma of a New Jersey high-school stutterer convinced to join the debate team, is as promising and funny and (almost to a fault) quirky as our young hero. The second half, though, finds the characters searching in vain for the sharply-drawn creations they might have been. To quote one of them: "It's charming, no question -- but is it persuasive?"

Satellites of Planet Cinema shorts
This nice mix of international non-fiction shorts about global environmental issues isn't exactly a thrill-a-minute, so grab a (fair-trade, shade-grown) coffee before you go. Highlights include the creepy but enlightening God Provides (about several New Orleans dwellers and their varied responses to Katrina) and Greetings from Death Valley (three stories about the titular area's inhabitants, in the wake of an unprecedented rainfall and flower burst there). And a tad too long (at 31 minutes), but still very interesting, is Chocolate Country, about an organic cacao cooperative in the Dominican Republic.

Skip 'em:

American Shopper
A misguided quasi-doc about a competition in "aisling", a sport (I guess) in which people in Missouri fancy up their wheely-carts (and themselves) to creatively complete routine supermarket shopping tasks. Promising premise, with ultimately annoying, quirked-to-death execution.

Black Irish
Considering the weaknesses of what he has to work with, Michael Angarano (the kid who played Jack's son on Will and Grace) does fine in the role of a South Boston teen trying to save his disintegrating Irish-Catholic family. Blustery Brendan Gleeson, who apparently doesn't turn down any role, plays the drunk dad (wow, that's new) and Everwood's Emily Van Camp is good as the knocked-up sis. But, well-intentioned as it is, this is a dreadfully routine (and old fashioned in a bad way) coming-of-age story... as if we needed another one of those.

La Vie en Rose
Nice-looking biopic on legendary songstress Edith Piaf, the iconic songstress who made world-weary standards like "Je ne regrette rien" famous. I looked forward to what I'd heard was an amazing performance by Marion Cotillard as Piaf, but I didn't find one in this film: to me she looks like she's doing mime, especially during scenes of the chanteuse's sad final days. The film tells us that the great tragedies Piaf endured contributed to her great artistry, but (due in large part to Cotillard's exaggerated turn) it's not quite effective at showing us.

Running on Empty
This wannabe-creepy, aptly-titled German film about an insurance salesman's endless Autobahn outings is more annoying than enigmatic. It's also uneven, amateurish, and very forgettable. (Seriously. I hardly remember seeing it.)

All-American docs, short pieces from Deutschland, and Julie Delpy's directorial debut highlight SIFF's second week (6/1-6/7).

Tonight's Recommended Show: "Once" at SIFF Cinema

imaginary embracey — Sun, 27 May 2007 20:52:41 +0000

Sweeping and swoony, the Irish film Once is probably the most {imaginary} musical ever.

Tonight's (Today's?) Recommended Show: Girls Rock Fest at Chop Suey

ChrisB — Sat, 26 May 2007 13:52:55 +0000

This show is a benefit to coincide with the documentary Girls Rock!, which premiered at SIFF last night (and plays again tomorrow afternoon). The film profiles a camp that brings young girls all over the country to Portland for a week to teach the campers about rock and/or roll. One of the regular instructors is Carrie Brownstein, the amazing guitarist for Sleater-Kinney (my favorite band ever).

This is an early show (starting at the very rock and roll time of 2pm) at Chop Suey. The cover is $10 (or more - it is a benefit).

The details come from the film's MySpace page:

Now, we're getting ready for our even bigger U.S. Premiere at the Seattle international Film Festival over Memorial Day Weekend! Not only will our premiere be at the very cauldron of musical movements that influenced the Rock Camp, but all four of the girls we focused on in the movie will be there! Plus, a bunch of camp staff, other alumni and the extended camp family. It was looking to be so festive, we decided to have a big party/concert to celebrate, and thus was born the third edition of Girls Rock Fest.

<snip>

Tonight's Recommended Show: SIFF opening night at McCaw Hall

imaginary embracey — Thu, 24 May 2007 15:32:19 +0000

SIFF 2007 opens in style tonight at McCaw Hall, with a gala and screening of the British coming-of-age flick Son of Rambow.

SIFF 2007 highlights: week 1

imaginary embracey — Tue, 22 May 2007 14:20:17 +0000

SIFF07-aachi.jpg

A sweet indie musical, a quirky Kiwi buzzmaker, and a fierce urban mindtrip are among the must-sees on tap for 5/25-31.

Don't miss:

Aachi & Ssipak (5/26 11:59p Neptune)
Rude, wicked, certifiably insane South Korean animated film about a corrupt (but candy-colored) future society that uses highly-addictive Juicypop treats to "reward" its citizens for producing the last remaining energy source: human poo. A black market (brown market?) has developed for the treats, and when street hoodlums Aachi and Ssipak encounter a cyborg cop out to stop a relentless gang of Smurf-like mutants, and a wannabe actress with a special ability (let's just say she's a top pop earner), high-octane calamities ensue. Far from high art, but very entertaining in its relentlessly crude way, and the ill-behaved 14-year-old in me loved it.

A Battle of Wits (5/26 6p Neptune; 5/28 3:30p Neptune)
The English title is better suited to a quirky Wordplay-esque indie documentary, but this is actually a stylish and elegant Hong Kong action epic that's a thrill of a different kind. Set during China's Warring States period, the story involves a series of attacks by the intimidating Zhao Nation against the humble (and poorly-governed) state of Liang. With the help of an unconventional military strategist (beautiful Andy Lau), the people of Liang set out to defend their turf... and hopefully prove that might is no match for reason. Electrifying action sequences and performances highlight this gorgeously-produced historical tale; visual wonders of the concluding battle are alone worth the time and ticket.

Crazy Love (5/30 9:30p Pacific Place)
Truth can be stranger, and stupider, than fiction. Cases in point: the two subjects of this documentary about an obsession-triggered maiming case (ambulance-chasin' lawyer hires thugs to throw acid into ex-girlfriend's face post-breakup) that held New York in thrall in the late '50s, mid-'70s, and mid-'90s. I had trouble caring about the characters for the first half-hour, and wished for a bit more narrative thrust to add much-needed momentum during the occasionally draggy proceedings, but the eccentric talking heads and the bizarro situation they created for themselves (not to mention a resulting series of media maelstroms) get fun. And crazy for real.

Eagle vs. Shark (5/31 7p Neptune)
This irresistibly charming New Zealand quirkfest, a chronicle of the courtship of a socially-challenged fast food clerk and a grandeur-delusional computer store geek, could very well become the buzz flick of SIFF '07. Delightful story, full of quote-worthy awkward exchanges, peppered with fun stop-motion animation sequences and a shimmering soundtrack by The Phoenix Foundation. Inevitable comparisons to Napoleon Dynamite, Me and You and Everyone We Know and the films of Wes Anderson will be well-earned by gifted first-time feature director Taika Waitiki.

Knocked Up (5/26 7p Egyptian)
If you can't wait for the early-June theatrical release of Judd Apatow's latest comedic gem, check out SIFF's sure-to-sell-out advance screening. You've seen the trailers -- Seth Rogen becomes Katherine Heigl's unlikely babydaddy -- but that doesn't get at much of the 132-minute story; watching it feels like sitting through a short season of ingenious TV. That said, Knocked Up is no 40-Year-Old Virgin, and definitely no Freaks and Geeks, but it's still funny shit à la Apatow.

Life In Loops (5/25 9:15p NWFF; 5/26 9p NWFF)
Surprising urban mindtrip that held me in its dizzy spell from the opening sequence to the closing credits. Footage from the 1997 doc Megacities is remixed, Nortec Collective style, with a new techno soundtrack by the Sofa Surfers, forming a fascinating look at the rhythms of city life in NYC, Moscow, Mexico City, Tokyo and Bombay.

Once (5/27 6:30p SIFF Cinema)
A theatrical release is imminent, so don't worry if you don't make it into SIFF's lone screening of this enchanting indie film about a Dublin busker (Frames frontman Glen Hansard) and a Czech immigrant (Markéta Irglová) writing and recording music that may tell their love story. Hansard's songs are swoony and sweeping, and the leads' performances are almost documentary-like in their gritty simplicity. A brilliantly organic musical with nary a trace of Singin' in the Rain saccharine.

A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory
(5/26 6:30p NWFF; 5/27 9:15p NWFF)
The subject of this intimate, dream-paced documentary is filmmaker Esther Robinson's late uncle, Danny Williams -- former lover and protege of Andy Warhol, Factory filmmaker, and creator of the Velvet Underground's groundbreaking light show -- whose 1966 disappearance remains unsolved. If the mystery doesn't grab you, the interviews with Factory regulars (John Cale, Paul Morrissey, and Brigid Berlin among them) will.

Take 'em or leave 'em:

Golden Door
If you're a Charlotte Gainsbourg fan you're likely to delight in her lovely performance as the potential passport-wife of an early-1900s Sicilian man immigrating to the New World with his extended family. Otherwise, this is a long, occasionally engrossing story laced with pretty fantasy sequences that are never quite as effective as they hope to be.

King of Kong
This middling doc chronicles the unlikely rivalry of a bland Redmond schoolteacher determined to beat the world Donkey Kong record and a petty cockhole of a Florida condiment mogul whose high score has stood since 1982. Your level of fondness for classic arcade games (and for GLoW and album rock and artificially big hooters) may determine your degree of appreciation.

Paprika
Dream-lives merge with reality, and with each other, after an experiment in recording subconsciousness goes haywire. A tripped-out, highly visual anime by the director of Perfect Blue, and if you liked that film you'll probably dig this one too.

Rescue Dawn
I wish I could give Werner Herzog's latest, inspired by actual Vietnam War events around the escape attempts of a cocky American pilot (Christian Bale) and his fellow POW-camp prisoners, more props. (If you've seen Herzog's 1997 documentary Little Dieter Needs to Fly, this updated dramatization of the story will serve as a good narrative companion.) Jeremy Davies and Steve Zahn's emaciated/crazy characters are almost worth a full recommendation, but the film as a whole is executed with a bland stupor that I just didn't find enjoyable.

Skip 'em:

Death at a Funeral
How could a proper British funeral gone horribly awry be this unenjoyable, especially with Peter Dinklage playing the opportunist down-low gay lover of the recently deceased? Director Frank Oz (yes, the voice of Yoda and Miss Piggy) is obviously going for Fawlty Towers by way of Gosford Park here, but the film is just an offensively ludicrous piece of trash.

Severance
Director Nick Schager has called it a hybrid of The Office and Deliverance, a scenario that could have been twice as fun as this horrible exercise in tedium. It doesn't pay to overlook the stupid premise (Brit arms-firm coworkers go on a team-building exercise at a remote Hungarian lodge conveniently out of cellular range; locals with a grudge pick 'em off one by one) because the brain-dead story just doesn't earn its jump-atcha jolts -- and there are precious few of even those.

The Singer
This maudlin French film about an aging dance-hall chanteur (dangerously rotund Gérard Depardieu) and his attempts at romance with a flaky single mom (sapphic sprite Cécile de France) might have been more palatable with a half-hour shorn from its drag-ass 112-minute runtime.

A sweet indie musical, a quirky Kiwi buzzmaker, and a fierce urban mindtrip are among the must-sees on tap for 5/25-31.

SIFF is almost here!

imaginary char — Sun, 20 May 2007 19:18:57 +0000

It's the most wonderful time of the year.

SIFF 2007 preview

imaginary embracey — Thu, 17 May 2007 05:07:11 +0000

SIFF07_rambow.jpg

Has a year really gone by since Seattle's annual cinema megathon last took over the city? Yes, and get ready to start standing in queue, because the Seattle International Film Festival's 33rd edition kicks off 5/24 at Seattle Center's McCaw Hall with an opening-night gala and screening of Garth Jennings' buzz-heavy coming-of-age Britcom Son of Rambow. Flash forward to 24 days, several hundred movies, and countless pre-film projections of the freaky-pop animated "Find True Film" trailers later, and the festival concludes 6/17 at the Cinerama with Laurent Tirard's comedic French-language biopic Molière.

And I'll be there through it all, dear readers, covering the whole shebang just for you. Actually, SIFF started early for me this year: May 1, to be precise, when daily press screenings commenced at the fantastic new SIFF Cinema. And current circumstances being as they are, I'm able to represent TIG with full SIFF media participation for the first time ever, which means I'll have seen around 40 films by the time opening night rolls around, which means that this year I can give you rundowns and recommendations in advance.

More on that later. First, a topline overview of this year's slate.

2007's Weekend Gala Presentations include Julie Delpy's comedy 2 Days in Paris, Jacob Cheung's deceptively-titled war epic A Battle of Wits, Lars von Trier's office comedy (!) The Boss of it All, and the star-studded Evening, directed by Lajos Koltai and starring Meryl Streep, Glenn Close, Claire Danes, Toni Collette, and Vanessa Redgrave (one or more of whom may be here in person). And, I guess because these flicks just aren't homosexual enough, there's even a Thursday night "Gay-la" (!) this year, featuring something called Poltergay.

A newly-introduced Planet Cinema series, the first sidebar of its kind at any major film fest, kicks off the second week and showcases 16 films about the environment and global climate change issues. Our cinephile eco-citizenry can choose from offerings ranging from the mainstream (Arctic Tale, by the producers of March of the Penguins and narrated by, um, Queen Latifah) to the take-your-dad (NASA lovefest In The Shadow of the Moon) to the contemplative-arty (Jennifer Baichwal's Manufactured Landscapes).

Those three documentaries are part of a strong lineup of 60+ non-fic flicks, many of which will be featured in the three-year-old Face the Music program. The colon-heavy roster of titles includes Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten (directed by Julien Temple); Kurt Cobain: About a Son (yes, yet another Cobain doc, this one by Gigantic helmer AJ Schnack); Stephen Kijak's Scott Walker: 30th Century Man; Girls Rock! (about a Portland youth rock camp); and Clive Collier's Sanctuary: Lisa Gerrard, the 5/25 screening of which will include a discussion with the noted film composer and former half of Dead Can Dance. And in honor of the 80th anniversary of 1927 silent film Berlin: Symphony of a City, Kinski will perform its newly-commissioned live score during two special 6/15 screenings at the Triple Door.

Other nontraditional presentations can be found in the Alternate Cinema program, offering a boundary-pushing collection of features and shorts. Tsai Ming-liang's humanistic parallel-stories meditation I Don't Want to Sleep Alone, JJ Lask's computer-thief narrative On the Road with Judas, and Tropical Malady auteur Apichatpong Weerasethakul's seductively mysterious Syndromes and a Century are among the highlights.

Sir Anthony Hopkins' Slipstream, a multi-layered journey into the mind of an aging screenwriter, is also featured in the Alternate lineup. Speaking of Sir Anthony, he'll be presented with a SIFF Lifetime Achievement Award during a 5/30 tribute event which will include an onstage interview, film clips, and (to remind us that he actually used to make good shit) a screening of the 1993 Merchant-Ivory flick The Remains of the Day. (Whether or not fava beans and Chianti will be served at the post-event reception is TBD, but what has been confirmed is that Sir Anthony joins more than 200 actors, directors, and film pros scheduled to be in attendance at SIFF this year.)

And let's not forget the Shorts Programs, featuring 3- to 30-minute cinema nuggets that may rank among the best of the fest. Packages I'm most looking forward to: Deutsch in Miniature (German shorts); This Animated Life (various 'toon forms); Reduce, Reuse, Recycle (sequences and images reappropriated from their original contexts); FutureWave (international student filmmakers); and La Vida Homo (hopefully there's no explanation necessary).

All in all, SIFF 2007 will present 405 films (including more than 60 world, North American or U.S. feature premieres), representing 60 countries. Not being the nitpicky type, I won't make a big deal of some conspicuous omissions from the program -- from former festival darlings, no less -- like Wong Kar Wai's My Blueberry Nights, Catherine Breillat's Une Vielle Maitresse, Hou Hsiao-hsien's The Red Balloon, Kim Ki-Duk's Breath, and, most disappointingly, Guy Maddin's shot-in-Seattle Brand Upon the Brain!.

But, oh well, we'll have plenty to keep us occupied the next few weeks. And I'm here to help you navigate it all. Starting 5/22, and continuing each Tuesday during the festival, look for my picks (and warnings) for films scheduled in the upcoming weekend and week. And once the festival begins on 5/24, I'll also be blogging every single day, providing you a running record of one imaginary boy's cinema-induced bliss... or emotional demise. (Tune in to find out which. It should be entertaining either way.)

A constantly-updated scorecard of films I've covered will also be available. For this I'm sticking to the festival's 260+ non-archival, feature-length films only, because I can only do so much for you people.

Films screen daily beginning 5/25 at SIFF Cinema, the Egyptian, the Harvard Exit, Pacific Place Cinemas, the Neptune, and for the first week at the NW Film Forum. (No Broadway Performance Hall this year, and we all know it's for the best.) If you prefer the Eastside, bless your heart, there will also be 18 days of screenings (5/31 - 6/17) at the Lincoln Square Cinemas in Bellevue. Costs range from $5 for weekday matinees to $12 for Gala (or "Gay-la") films, and a variety of special package pricing is available -- find more how-to info at the SIFF site.

Three Imaginary Girls are among SIFF's proud media sponsors for the third year running, and we'll be among some 3,000 revelers present at the opening night of the festival's 33rd edition. I'm taking all these 3's as an auspicious sign. And given the strength of this year's lineup, so should you.

Get ready to start standing in queue, because Seattle's annual cinema megathon kicks off 5/24 with the coming-of-age Britcom Son of Rambow.