MIFF 2009 Day 14 - 6/8/09

• Singularidades de uma Rapariga Loura (Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl, Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal/France/Spain, 2009)
• La barbe bleue (Bluebeard, Catherine Breillat, France, 2009)
  

Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl
There's a timelessness to this relatively short (63 minutes) story by the world's oldest working film-maker (100 years old). A man is narrating to a stranger on a train the story of his meeting and breaking-up with the titular girl. It's based on a novel that the director makes a point of crediting. I have no idea how old the novel is, but I sense it could be several decades old. And yet, the story also works well as a contemporary story. At this stage of the festival, I find both the length and the nature of the story quite enjoyable.

Bluebeard
I'm not familiar with the story of Bluebeard though apparently this is a fairly faithful retelling by Breillat. The period setting is like a continuation of her previous film, An Old Mistress, though both are completely different films. Bluebeard doesn't have quite the same richness of visuals that An Old Mistress does and the stories are very different.

Breillat superimposes the telling of Bluebeard with another more contemporary story of two sisters, set in the recent past. One of the sisters is called Catherine and I suspect it may be semi-autobiographical.

The film seems a minor work for Breillat. There's some obvious social commentary at the start when the girls are removed from their strict Catholic private school as a result of the death of their father. Other than that, it's pretty much pure story-telling that I found worth-seeing on its own merits as well as being part of Breillat's body of work.

MIFF 2009 Day 13 - 5/8/09

• Eastern Plays (Kamen Kalev, Bulgaria, 2009)
• Villa Amalia (Benoît Jacquot, France/Switzerland, 2009)
  

Eastern Plays
The cliched MIFF blurb for this film didn't give me high expectations and yet I was surprising satisfied by this small film that contains a little bit of a lot of elements that I like about festival films. The ideological divide between brothers fortunately wasn't the main thrust of the film and consequently didn't intrude on the overall narrative.

The protagonist, Itzo, is a likeable enough guy - it seems. Then, inexplicably, he becomes a real asshole, the result - we discover - of his being a recovering junkie. The film deals with the nature of relationships, communication, cultural acceptance, politics and violence. The story doesn't seem to dwell too much on any one issue, avoiding any overt didactism but clearly making some points to be pondered.

Coming from a country I know next to nothing about, and covering many of the universal social issues that appeal to me and in a skillful manner, this is a very enjoyable film and worth seeing.

Villa Amalia
A woman (Isabelle Huppert) walks out of her man, her house, her life when she discovers her lover of 15 years is cheating on her. The plot seems to share common threads with Three Colours: Blue, one of my two favourite films, or Haneke's The Pianist (also starring Huppert) but is not as strong as either of those two films. I initially thought that Huppert's character may be suffering mental illness, as her reactions to her infidelity seem very extreme. But there are mysteries that need to be unearthed.

I've often mentioned my appreciation for Huppert as an actress and this role seems like it's cut out for her. Perhaps too much so, to the extent that it seems a little cliched, as if the part were written especially to showcase the talents we know so very well. I tried not to dwell on these thoughts while watching the film, but they sometimes haunted me, which I found a little distracting. Which is not to say that the performance isn't good, because it is. The story keeps an air of mystery which, shrouded in the film's gorgeous visuals, works quite well.

I enjoyed the film. It doesn't aim particularly high, but nor does it need to. What it sets out to achieve, it does it well. In that respect, I could describe it as another 'quietly satisfying' film like, Still Walking.

MIFF 2009 Day 12 - 4/8/09

Due to illness, I dropped Yuri's Day and The Nun from my schedule but watched Morphia in the comfort of my own lounge-room, thanks to a preview screener for the Russian Resurrection Film Festival. As for The Nun, I generally love Rivette, though I heard the print was at best ordinary. I finally ventured out for the 9:15PM screening of The White Ribbon and was questioning my sanity - sick as a dog and staying up to midnight for the screening. But I'm glad I did - it remains my favourite film of the festival so far. Coincidentally, both films I saw are set in the same period.

• Morfiy (Morphia, Aleksey Balabanov, Russia, 2008)
  
• Das weiße Band (The White Ribbon, Michael Haneke, Austria, 2009)
  

Morphia
Morphia is a technically impressive film – the period reproduction in particular is awesome. Set in Siberia at the outset of the Russian Revolution, a talented young doctor is sent on his first assignment to a small provincial hospital in which he is the sole doctor. After an allergic reaction to a diphtheria vaccination, he is given morphine, to which he gradually becomes addicted.

Despite obvious strengths, the film may be a challenge for some audiences. An amputation and a tracheotomy are particularly gruesome. The constant snow and blizzards also have a chilling effect. Perhaps most significant is that there are virtually no redeemable characters and the main protagonist is a lying drug addict, and we never really get insights into his inner world. The director seems intent on keeping us out in the cold, in more ways that one. I couldn't warm to it, I found it disturbing and had to watch something light afterwards.

The White Ribbon
The White Ribbon is perhaps Michael Haneke's most mature and entrancing film. That's quite some claim, given the awesome body of work he has created (in my mind, there is no such thing as a bad Haneke film). It encompasses or flirts with a number of themes and genres already covered in his earlier films (such as social realism, horror, crime, thriller, supernatural), perhaps playing with our expectations and yet subverting them, but never in a cheap, contrived manner. Haneke plays it straight with the audience, but you never really know where he's going. What's important with this film is to focus not on the destination, but the journey.

This is a film in which you really need to concentrate, take note of who is who (and there's a lot of people to keep a track of) and which children belong to who. There's also a lot of children, who play some stunning roles. Some of them may be victims, some of them innocent bystanders and some of them something more sinister. If evil exists, can you blame the children? Or the often well-meant but deluded parents. Some of the imagery used is amazing, in particular the chastised boy with the simple cross on the wall behind him. Many times the camera takes a point of view shot to very good effect. The characterisations, period detail and reproduction of mannerisms and social mores are all at the very highest levels of achievement and it's not hard to see why this film was awarded Cannes' highest honour.

The story is superficially much more conventional than one associates with Haneke. At first it seems a slightly rambling, rustic, rural tale. A subversion of expectations? Maybe.

Eventually, like Hidden, the film has something to say about politics, and more besides. There are broadsides at religion and society in general. At the outset of the start of World War I, Haneke seems to suggest that the brutality of the next two wars over thirty years could perhaps be traced to the cruel ways that humans treat each other on the micro level: within villages, communities and families. The film is shot in black and white, a bold choice by Haneke, but it works very well. It resembles a Carl Dreyer film (think Gertrude) or even Bergman.

MIFF 2009 Day 11 - 3/8/09

Still unwell, I missed Film is a Girl & a Gun and Dogtooth, and there was a no-show by Claire Denis for her talk with Philippa Hawker. On the strength of Beau travail, one of my favourite French films, I just couldn't miss 35 Shots of Rum.

• 35 rhums (35 Shots of Rum, Claire Denis, France/Germany, 2008)
  

35 Shots of Rum
I sense that there's a lot more I could write about this film than I will, because I don't have the time to ponder and research it. It's clearly a very personal film for Denis, who was due to introduce it and attend a Q&A, but didn't show. Apparently she's preparing her latest film for screening in competition at Venice. But Michelle Carey conveyed a few words about the film, and how the story basically is about her grandmother who died, leaving her grandfather to raise her mother.

This is another 'quietly satisfying' film that is observational and captures some of the minutiae within relationships. A father and daughter struggle to let go of each other, each pursues another or is pursued. People make advances, counter advances, there are rejections. Love, pain, it's all there.

MIFF 2009 Day 10 - 2/8/09

• Blind Company (Alkinos Tsilimidos, Australia, 2009)

Blind Company
I first discovered Tsilimidos' work with Tom White, a film that impressed me with it's beautiful visuals, humour and humanistic narrative. That film also changed the way I looked at the homeless. Coming soon after Candy and Little Fish, I didn't have high expectations for Em 4 Jay, a film about a couple of drug addicts. I was so over drug addicts and yet this film blew me out of the water. Again photographed by Toby Oliver, the visuals are just amazing but it's once again the deeply humanistic story-telling that won me over, and this remains my equal favourite Australian film. It may then be no surprise to hear that Blind Company was my most anticipated film at MIFF this year.

I never took much notice of Colin Friels until I saw him play the titular role in Tom White, in which he magnificently demonstrates frailty and an understated desperation. Once again he takes centre stage in Blind Company as Geoff Brewster, who is living in isolation at the family beach cottage, waiting for inevitable death. Geoff's quiet daily routine is thrown into turmoil when his nephew, Josh (Nick Barkla), arrives unannounced and consequently engages in antagonistic behaviour.

Tsilimidos is a competent and assured director. With Blind Company, he is in no hurry to reveal the secrets of its characters, but that shouldn't test the patience of the film's target audience. The story is basically a relationship slow-burn that reminds me a little of Nuri Bilge Ceylan's style of narrative in films like Climates or Three Monkeys.

The performances are, as expected, convincing. Friels is always good value and his role as a dying academic is full of ambiguity. Nick Barkla gets to show his range. He was completely convincing as the junky in Em 4 Jay. In Blind Company, he is almost as convincing as the Porsche-driving reckless son of privileged parents - somewhat a yuppy.

I presume it was Adam Arkapaw's cinematography on Julius Avery's excellent award-winning (Cannes Jury Prize, no less) Jerrycan that caught the eye of Tsilimidos. His camera work has a very Eastern European aesthetic about it. The outdoor shots are reminiscent of Christopher Doyle's beach scenes in Paranoid Park and have the strongest visuals.

Indoors, however, is a different matter, and while there is a reliance on natural light, the camera exposure often leaves characters in silhouette. The effect is to shroud the film in darkness which distances the audience. This is the single-most flaw in the film.

I spoke to the director briefly after the film and he confirmed that Toby Oliver was unavailable. Being the film's premiere screening and Alkinos being pre-occupied post-screening, and me being sick, I didn't get the opportunity to discuss further. There was to have been a Q&A session which didn't happen because the film ran late. Apparently there will be one at a future screening, which I will aim to attend.

Overall, the film is worth-seeing and another fine addition to the country's body of work. It's especially worth seeing as part of the director's body of work, even if it isn't his best film. Tom White and Em 4 Jay were always going to be hard to beat.

More on 10 Conditions of Love

Thanks to the intransigent and bully-boy tactics of the Chinese government, the little film The 10 Conditions of Love, which might have otherwise flown under the radar, has received exposure that money cannot buy. Originally programmed with a single screening, Chinese protests raised its profile and it was given a second screening at Greater Union 6 on Saturday 8 August, 4:45PM, which promptly sold out. GU6 is the largest MIFF venue and has a capacity of about 763. Now MIFF has announced the film is being moved to a larger venue to accommodate the demand for the film. It's now screening same time at the Melbourne Town Hall (the capacity, I don't know).

Also, in today's Age, Uighur leader to launch film in spirit of peace.

A hiccup

MIFF-fatigue got a grip of me this year like no other. It started on Friday afternoon when I suddenly lost my voice, just as I was introducing myself to a well-respected local author. OK, I figured, I'm not getting enough sleep, and aimed to rectify that. Despite the best of endeavours, I've been pretty sick and since Sunday, only attending one screening per day. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and think it will be back to normal tomorrow. And hopefully I'll have a few reviews up. I've just got back from seeing Michael Haneke's The White Ribbon - the best MIFF 2009 film I've seen yet.

MIFF Ticket Sales

Anecdotally, I've been noticing that the mid-week daytime ticket sales have been looking strong. Most of my screenings during business hours have been at the Forum, where the house has been very busy indeed. My analysis of sold out sessions also looks pretty strong. So far, 43 sessions have sold out compared to only 15 for the same period last year. I realise that sold out sessions don't give a complete picture, but MIFF has got to be happy with numbers like that. Apparently, last year 185,000 sessions were booked; it'll be interesting to see how that compares with the final figures for 2009.

Coincidentally, 43 sessions have sold out for the last week of the festival (tomorrow to Closing Night), which compares to 23 for the same period last year. And the number can only increase.

MIFF 2009 Day 9 - 1/8/09

I'd planned to see the Roy Andersson shorts but MIFF-fatigue got the better of me and I took the early part of the day off. I wasn't impressed with either film I did see.

• Hansel and Gretel (Yim Phil-Sung, South Korea, 2007)
• Double Take (Johan Grimonprez, Belgium/Germany/Netherlands, 2009)
  

Hansel and Gretel
Koreans are great with horror, when they get it right. Unfortunately, this isn't one of them. It looks great, but the story is a narrative mess and is way too long. A man crashes his car on an isolated road and is lead by a child through the forest where he is taken to a remote cottage. The film re-imagines the Hansel and Gretel tale, subverting expectations along the way. It starts out almost farcical and perhaps would have been better had it stayed that way. When the story becomes darker, its horror never quite convinces. The story is all over the place and I found it very unsatisfying. It's my least favourite film at MIFF yet.

Double Take
I imagine there's a large festival demand for films like this one, but Double Take did nothing for me. Basically it's a visual essay with what I felt had very little to say and padded the film's very long 80 minutes much like a reality TV show - the way the same scene is repeated over and over again.

OK, Hitch had body doubles. OK, The Birds is a metaphor for the Soviet threat and tapped into people's anxieties of the era. And OK, JFK was assassinated because of his liberal stance on the Cold War. I could see it all coming a mile away, and it took so long to make its points, and it made them without substance. This is not my kind of film at all - neither satisfying as a documentary and nor for its playful manipulation of Hitchcock's signature image.

More Chinese shenanigans

"Online sales are currently offline due to a Denial of Service attack of Chinese origin."
- MIFF ticketing website

"China summons Australia over Uighur leader visit"
- ABC News Online

With ticketing information offline, I'm unable to update my 'sold out/selling fast' page.

[Update 1-Aug 11:43 AM]: the MIFF ticketing site went back up but is currently down again. The Age reports on a concerted effort to sabotage MIFF by the Chinese.