LAFF 2013: ALL TOGETHER NOW

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A scene from All Together Now.

Into the woods they go

By Miranda Inganni

All Together Now narrates roughly 24 hours at a noise-rock concert in the woods (with a parking lot), where the teens and young adults have gathered to navigate through their aspirations, sexual inclinations and lots of libations.

Co-written and directed by Alexander Mirecki, All Together Now intertwines the tales of numerous attendees at this decidedly indie event that Ron (Lou Taylor Pucci) has cobbled together. Underage, gothy Ashley (Hannah Sullivan) and her friends are dropped off by her dad, Bruce (Hal Dion). Before heading to the parking lot to wait for his daughter and aliens, Bruce leaves Ashley (who is documenting the scene with her phone) with his trusty employee, Richard (Will Watkins), and his girlfriend, Tegan (Monika Jolly), to keep an eye on the youngsters.

Meanwhile, Michelle (Lindsey Garrett) muses about what she wants to be when she grows up while falling for Ron. Additionally, young Gulliver (Jerry Phillips) screams along to his father’s instrumentation as the first performers of the evening. When his father, George (James C. Burns), tries to kill the soundman, and is himself subsequently subdued, Gulliver is taken under the wings of two attractive twenty-something year old groupies to party the night away. Anon (Luke Stratte-McClure) hitches in -- looking out of place in his clean suit – until he is confronted by Able (Tucker Bryan), who doesn’t seem to know when to quit. Most excitingly, however, Ron’s overwhelmingly enthusiastic friend, Zeke (James Duval), has shown up with two anvils and enough gun powder to send one of them flying into the night sky. (What could possibly go wrong?)

Shot by Zoran Popovic in gritty super 16, the film feels like footage from a makeshift outdoor concert, and the lighting leaves a lot to be desired. (Who is the mysterious third person holding the flashlight on Anon and Able as they walk away from the show?). Mirecki does a good job of weaving the music in and out of the story -- the audience never spends too much time in the corrugated tin shack in which the bands actually perform, but there are too many moments of meandering in the film.


All Together Now screens at Los Angeles Film Festival June 20, 7:10 p.m., Regal Cinemas; June 22, 9:50 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: ATN at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2013: PURGATORIO

A scene from Purgatorio.

Over theirs

By John Esther

Two men stand outside a large fence waiting for the right time to climb over, leaving a family behind. Another man leaves water for those who have made it over the fence while another man goes around picking up what he thinks are clues for people who have crossed the border unannounced. Others are imprisoned by drugs, violence and vengeful fantasies. Borders as large prisons.  

Bullets litter automobiles, kill three policemen, and a local drug dealer. Deadly currency. Automobiles, planes and buildings rust in the dessert sun. Scrapyards of paradise lost. (Forever?)

Drug gangs rule the land, abandoned dogs roam the land while others just run to wreck it. To be sure, a few good men and women remain, but the ugly weight of a divine comedy has turned into a human tragedy. It is hard to strive when one can barely survive.

These are ideas, attitudes and illustrations of Rodrigo Reyes' Purgatorio: A Journey Into the Heart of the Border. An intellectually impressive and refreshingly angry documentary -- which also happens to be the best thing I have seen at LAFF 2013 hitherto -- Reyes moves around an undisclosed part of the Mexican-U.S. border casting his eyes toward unnamed men and women beaten by the system while lending his ears to people who have not been beaten by the system, yet.

Between the interviews, Justin Chin's cinematography captures the haunting landscape where our "hero" shakes his tongue, trying to find salvation in a cold and indifferent universe. If this is purgatory, how can the inferno be worse?

Highly recommended.


Purgatorio screens at the Los Angeles Festival June 20, 7 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: Purgatorio at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2013: CONCUSSION

Abby (Robyn Weigert) in Concussion.

Homo superior

By Don Simpson 

Sure, some of the situations in Stacie Passon’s Concussion may seem a bit ridiculous at times, but Robin Weigert is always convincing as Abby. Consistently intense with intent, Weigert’s Abby is a woman on a mission. Passon thankfully never sexualizes Abby; instead, she develops Abby into a complex and thought-provoking character. Despite the tangled web of a secret life that Abby weaves, she remains empathetic. We feel for Abby, we want her to have a happy sex life; all the while, Abby wants to help make other women happy as well. This is precisely Passon’s true genius — her ability to portray prostitution as a social service. Abby is neither skanky nor sleazy, poor nor desperate; she is an intelligent, talented and successful woman who just so happens to rediscover her love of sex by way of prostitution. If she can teach other women how to have healthy and happy sex lives — and make some decent cash while doing so — why the heck not? What other choice does she have? Would it be better for her to never experience sexual pleasure with another woman?

 

We have watched plenty of films over the decades in which a husband strays from a sexless heterosexual marriage to enjoy sex with prostitutes. When a man does that to a woman that is bad, right? At least that is what the history of cinema has taught us. That is what I find most interesting about Concussion, because Abby seems to be in the right. So, why is Abby so different than her male predecessors in cinema? Is it because she is a woman? Is it because she is having sex with other women? Or, is it simply because Passon adequately justifies Abby’s actions?

 

 

Concussion screens at LAFF 2013: June 19, 7:30 p.m., Regal Cinemas; June 21, 4:30 p.m. Regal Cinemas. For more information: Concussion at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2013: MY SISTER'S QUINCEANERA

Silas (Silas Garcia) in My Sister's Quinceanera.

Slow summer days

By Miranda Inganni

Set in a small town in Iowa, writer-director-producer Aaron Douglas Johnston's My Sister’s Quinceanera details the daily life of one Mexican-American family. Johnston uses the real-life Garcia family (non-professional actors) in this film that mixes fiction with reality.

Big brother Silas (Silas Garcia) is the de facto man of the house, but dreams of escaping the dreary life of his home town. Helping his single mom, Becky (Becky Garcia), with the cooking and care of his younger siblings, Silas is a considerate and compassionate older brother. The film focuses on his especially close relationship with younger sister, Samantha (Samantha Rae Garcia), as the whole family prepares for his sister Elizabeth’s (Elizabeth Agapito) big birthday.

While the movie is a work of fiction, the casting of the family makes it feel almost like a documentary told in a narrative format. Some could argue that the movie is a soft-spoken meditation, simply taking a glance at the Garcias as they go about their lives. But nothing really happens in the film. Silas wants to leave town and go to college, but one senses that this will never happen, and he and his buddy (Tanner McCulley) seem way too old to get into the teenage-like mischief they do around town. Samantha, while young and silly, is exceptionally bratty toward her older sister, who in turn, like many a moody teen, is completely self-absorbed.

Boring and trite, this is vulgar naturalism. Who cares for or about any of these people? They are not interesting enough to warrant our attention. Moreover, I would imagine that My Sister’s Quinceanera might make a lot of kids believe they should have movies made about them, too. It is not enough to just turn on cameras and record the banal.

As my "teachy" said, "Of course the director and writer is also the producer. You could not sell this script to somebody else."


My Sister's Quinceaneara screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival, June 18, 7:50 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: MSQ at LAFF 2013.

 

 

LAFF 2013: CAPITAL

A scene from Capital.

You cannot bank on it

By Ed Rampell

Costa-Gavras, arguably the greatest living progressive filmmaker still shooting political pictures, is back with a new thriller about the banking industry, Capital. This behind-the-scenes expose of the banksters and their nefarious high finance manipulations and machinations is a fictional, highly entertaining counterpart to Charles Ferguson’s Oscar winning 2010 documentary, Inside Job, about Wall Street’s massive defrauding of the people -- at taxpayer expense. Capital is in French with some English, with Gabriel Byrne co-starring as an American-style banker seeking to impose U.S. policies on a European-based bank headed by Moroccan-born actor Gad Elmaleh, who has a penchant for quoting, of all people, Chairman Mao. “Let 1,000 flowers bloom,” and all that. Ethiopian supermodel Liya Kebede plays an elusive runway beauty -- the stuff that capitalist fantasies are made of.

Prior to the 8:00 p.m. June 17 screening of Capital Costa-Gavras will be interviewed by the screenwriter of the rightwing agitprop Zero Dark Thirty, which glorifies the CIA and justifies torture, as well as of the Iraq War movie The Hurt Locker. In 1969 Costa-Gavras’s classic Z -- about the assassination of Greece’s peace candidate and the overthrow of the government by the Greek colonels -- was nominated for the Best Picture Oscar and won the Oscars for Best Foreign Film and Best Editing. Costa-Gavras went on to make many leftist films, such as 1972’s State of Siege, about South American urban guerrillas, and 1982’s Missing, with Jack Lemmon and Sissy Spacek, about the aftermath of the U.S.-backed coup against Chile’s democratically elected socialist President, Salvador Allende. Sparks may fly as the filmmakers at the opposite ends of the ideological spectrum encounter one another at the LA Film Festival extravaganza. “And in this corner…!”

In any case, the stylish, briskly paced Capital shows that at the age of 80, Costa-Gavras remains a master of political cinema and is at the top of his game.

“An Evening with Costa-Gavras,” followed by Capital, begins tonight, 8:00 p.m., June 17, Regal Cinemas.

 

 

 

LAFF 2013: ALL OF ME

A scene from All of Me.

The weight of the girls

By Miranda Inganni

Director-producer Alexandra Lescaze’s documentary film, All of Me, chronicles the trials and tribulations of a group of friends as they struggle with weight loss. But this is no small feat – the majority of the women in this film are morbidly obese.

Zsalynn, Judy and Dawn and the rest of the “Girls” rely on their Austin, Texas-based group of BBW, or Big Beautiful Women, for support and friendship. Most of the women have tried traditional diets, pills and other measures to reduce their sizes, yet to no avail. While some of the gals are comfortable with their size and appearance, they are all tired of the stigma and “fat shaming.” The obese women in All of Me want to find “normal” men to date and hopefully marry, only to end up with men who fetishize obese women. And, most importantly, the women want to live long, healthy lives. That is when some of them turn to surgery. Be it gastric bypass or gastric-band surgery, the ladies strive to lose hundreds of pounds. But there is no quick fix and surgery, when available as an option, is not a guarantee. With the failures and successes come some unexpected psychological ramifications. While some of the women may gain confidence as they lose weight, confidences are broken as the group’s numbers dwindle.

Over 200,000 Americans have weight loss surgery every year often at a great financial and psychological cost. All of Me does not try to tackle why so many Americans are overweight, nor does it delve into the mental anguish with which this group of women all seemingly struggle. While it touches on some of the ladies’ backgrounds on why they are obese, it mostly reports the weight loss surgeries that Judy and Dawn go through and Zsalynn’s effort to find the balance between what she wants and what is attainable. All of Me sensitively shines the light on one group of overweight women and how they try to adjust not only their bodies, but their self-images as well.


All of Me screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival, today, 4:40 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: All of Me at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2013: TAPIA

Johnny Tapia in Tapia.

Sparring with life

By John Esther

Like most professional boxing champions, Johnny Tapia came from a very poor neighborhood where kids loved to fight. Although Tapia was a relatively small guy -- as an adult he stood around 5'6" 114 lbs -- he was extremely quick, strong and, more importantly, a naturally smart fighter. He knew how to psyche out his opponents while pumping up a crowd, especially if it was a local crowd. While I am not much of a fan of boxing, Tapia's boxing skills are very entertaining.

Unfortunately, for director Eddie Alcazar, they are about the only entertaining elements in his documentary, Tapia, which made its world premiere last night at the Los Angeles Film Festival to a semi-filled theater. (Reports of a sold out crowd for the screening are an exaggeration.)

Raised by his grandparents after his father was murdered when Tapia was in the womb and his mother brutally raped and murdered when Tapia was 8, Tapia grew up on the toughest streets of Albuquerque, New Mexico. At a very young age it was clear he was a natural fighter. He beat everybody in his weight bracket (sometimes larger guys, too). But just when his career was about to really take off cocaine held him down.

After rehabilitating himself, Tapia got back into the ring, rose through the ranks, eventually earing five world championships before retiring. He won three of them in different weight divisions.

Yet the sadness and anger over his mother's vicious death (other family members would die along the way) coupled with his addiction to cocaine would keep pulling Tapia back down into a whirlpool of despair and near death experiences. He was declared clinically dead five times.

While such trials and tribulations will probably help Alcazar's upcoming feature adaptation of Tapia's life (Shiloh Fernandez will play Tapia), Tapia's religious, determinist attitude in the documentary gets boring after a while. Tapia keeps going on and on about his purpose in life as if there was some great creator fashioning some important grand narrative on earth and Tapia was merely playing his part. Tapia also talks about how he does not want to hurt anyone one moment then makes it clear how violently he would respond if he ever met his mother's killer. And, of course, he is a boxer. Pugilists do not win fights by not hurting another human being.

Simpleminded and tedious after a while, Tapia may have benefited from interviews with others who knew Tapia or perhaps a few psychiatrists. Then there is the issue with his father's supposed murder. That gets raised and dropped way too quickly in the documentary. A thorough examination of his death may have helped, too. Death by heart failure at 45?

There are some big questions here, but Alcazar does not subject audiences to any truths behind the basic bouts of this boxer in and outside the ring.

Tapia screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival: June 19, 7:40 p.m., Regal Cinema. For more information: Tapia at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2013: THE CRASH REEL

A scene from The Crash Reel.

Head games

By Don Simpson

Director Lucy Walker’s amazing documentary is studiously compiled from hundreds of hours of archival footage shot by snowboarder Kevin Pearce’s family and friends – luckily Pearce is from a generation that dutifully records anything and everything that they do and say. Walker also fully immersed herself into the Pearce family, recording incredibly intimate moments and conversations. Not only do they seem incredibly comfortable around Walker and her production crew, but they seem to be totally unaffected by the presence of the camera. This allows Walker to provide us with an unfiltered window into their hearts and souls; so, we are able to observe the Pearce family as they experience one of the most harrowing events that will probably ever happen to them. As they are put through the emotional wringer, we are too – especially those of us with little to no memory of Kevin Pearce’s recent past.

The Crash Reel is not just a documentary about a family that bonds together during a recovery process, but it also serves as a condemnation of extreme sports. Walker observes athletes who are addicted to high risk activities, who are willing to put their lives at stake in order to feel a rush of adrenaline. These athletes are revealed to be incredibly selfish, not thinking about the effect that their risky hobbies or careers may have on their families and friends. The blame does not all rest upon the athletes though; society is also to blame. Sports continue to become bigger, faster and more dangerous because the audience demands it.


The Crash Reel screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival: June 16, 4:30 p.m., Regal Cinemas; June 17, 7:10 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: The Crash Reel at LAFF 2013

LAFF 2013: AIN'T THEM BODIES SAINTS

A scene from Ain't Them Bodies Saints.

Miss take

By Don Simpson

Writer-director David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints is a cinematic meditation on poor, rural Texas life in the 1970s (though it often feels like the 1920s or 30s). It is Bob’s (Casey Affleck) desperate economic situation and intense desire to support Ruth (Rooney Mara) that has driven him to become an outlaw. There is presumably very little work available, so Bob’s only available option is to steal from others. These perceived external pressures at work against Bob are somewhat similar to Kit’s situation in Terrence Malick’s Badlands (1973). Both films also allude to psychological issues at play within the minds of their male antiheroes. The men are blindly obsessed with their girlfriends to disastrous proportions.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints ain’t just about obsession; it is also about the deteriorating effects of guilt and secrets on one’s soul. Unlike Bob, Ruth seems to understand the grim reality that she and Bob will never be together again, so Ruth has sentenced herself to a loveless life of chastity to punish herself for the crime for which Bob is doing time. Ruth will never be happy because she knows that Bob has offered up his life for her freedom, while Bob will not be happy until he is reunited with his family. All because of one simple mistake — for which nobody died — Ruth and Bob are destined to be unhappy for the rest of their lives.

Like that of an early Malick film (Days of Heaven), cinematographer Bradford Young showcases iconic rural landscapes in transcendent magic hour photography. Lowery’s film is obsessed with the textures and degradation of rusting metal, peeling paint and splitting wood. Everyone and everything is covered with a thick layer of dirt.


Ain't Them Bodies Saints screens at LAFF 2013: June 15, 7 p.m., Regal Cinemas; June 17, 4:50 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more info: www.lafilmfest.com

FILM REVIEW: PANDORA'S PROMISE

A scene from Pandora's Promise.

Radioactivity-ist

By Don Simpson

Sure, it seems pretty strange for a devout environmentalist to take a pro-nuclear energy stance, but after seeing Robert Stone's documentary Pandora's Promise, it seems like a perfectly logical switch. It is difficult to debate Stone's assertion that if nuclear energy was made safe from contamination and theft, then it essentially becomes the ideal energy resource. Stone and the like-minded subjects of his documentary believe this is a possibility. They believe nuclear energy has been given a bad rap, both by disasters such as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, and by nuclear weapons. They also believe that we have been spoon-fed misinformation by corporations with ulterior motives and they believe that wind and solar are not practical solutions because of their over-reliance upon back-up resources such as oil.

Stone and his subjects make several compelling arguments, but the greatest strength of Pandora's Promise is its ability to avoid political party lines. Granted, Stone's primary objective is to convince liberal democrats to become more open to the concept of nuclear energy as a feasible environmental solution, but he also shows that this perspective should have no political affiliation. Stone obviously understands the political roadblocks when climate change is discussed by the House and Senate, so he does his best to flatten any obstacles.

That said, Pandora's Promise will be a bitter pill for many environmental activists to swallow, especially after decades of negativity towards this energy resource. As of now, Stone's documentary has not yet convinced me of the cleanness and safety of nuclear energy, although I will admit that I am more open to the concept of nuclear energy, if (and that is a mighty big IF) it can be done right.