Nightcrawler

The underbelly of overnight freelance videographers - stringers - is not what I would usually consider a viable film topic.  Nightcrawler attempts it with some level of success.  Incredibly uncomfortable at times, weak in others, the film portrays Lou Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal), a thief and general creep, who stumbles into a new business selling video to the local news, the gorier the better.  Lacking any morals, the role is seemingly perfect for him, and yet its hard to not be continually disgusted as he shows just how far he'll go for the story.  Overall the film is not horrible, but it's not excellent, and I'm very surprised a major studio picked it up for release.

Nightcrawler
2014, 117 minutes, directed by Dan Gilroy

During the Q&A, director Dan Gilroy added a few interesting tidbits:

• The film was shot in 28 days with an $8M budget.
• Jake Gyllenhaal lost 38 pounds in 10 weeks prior to shooting.
• They followed a real stringer around in prep to get a feel for the business, and were generally horrified at what they saw.  Much of what happens in the film is real. 

The Duke of Burgundy

Evelyn, the most domineering sub ever learns not to abuse a GGG partner Cynthia during a summer of love and entomology.  From the director of Berberian Sound Studio, this slow melodrama feels like a BBC/PBS miniseries with a overbearing score and many, many stills of pinned moths.

The Duke of Burgundy

2014, 104 minutes, directed by Peter Strickland

Tommymer (Tommy)

Continuing on the theme of Northern European crime dramas, Tommy focuses on the aftermath of a big heist.  Things didn't go well, Rikard's dead, and Tommy and his wife and daughter fled with the money - or so everyone thinks.  A year later, Tommy's wife Estelle returns to Sweden, daughter in tow, looking for the cash on Tommy's orders.  Everyone is plenty afraid of him, but of her?  What happens when they stop believing Tommy will return?

Tommymer (Tommy)

2014, 95 minutes, directed by Tarik Saleh

Fasandraeperne (The Absent One)

Two murders, twenty years ago.  A missing girl.  Powerful tycoons.  And detectives Carl and Assad, driven to solve the case and bring the guilty to justice.

Based on a book series, the film plays out like a novel, with a rich background that implies more than it shows.  There's a second film and more to come, so if you're looking for a new crime series to love be ready to dive in.

Fasandraeperne (The Absent One)

2013, 119 minutes, directed by Mikkel Nørgaard

An Adventure in Space and Time

This made-for-TV BBC movie dramatizes the William Hartnell era of Doctor Who, from the creation of the series through his departure, primarily from the point of view of Verity Lambert, the show's original producer, and from the good Doctor himself.  I found the series surprisingly well done; they went to good effort to recreate the early sets, costumes, and looks, now cheesingly-shot in glorious HD.  If anything distracted me, it was the appearance of Matt Smith in one scene, which was simultaneously an anachronism for the 1960s and dating what would otherwise be a "timeless" story to the 2010s.  Obviously it's not interesting unless you're a fan of early Doctor Who, but if you are and want more meta in the stories, grab one of the many repeats and enjoy it.

An Adventure in Space and Time
2013, 90 minutes, directed by Terry McDonough

The Zero Theorem

Closing out Fantastic Fest is the latest from Terry Gilliam, another somewhat existential tale of the odd and bizarre.  Qohen is a mathematician, tasked with calculating the meaning of existence, and yet his work is constantly interrupted by Management, who just can't seem to leave him alone.  As with many films of this genre, I'm left more scratching my head than satisfied.

The Zero Theorem
2013, 107 minutes, directed by Terry Gilliam

Blue Ruin

Revenge can be sweet.  Revenge can be cold.  Revenge can be tasty.  In the case of Blue Ruin, revenge is senseless.  Dwight is a ruined man, devastated by violence against his family, wasting away his life as a drifter.  When the killer is released from prison, Dwight embarks on a homecoming of sorts for revenge.  Things immediately go awry when he neglects to consider that even the killer, too, has a family...

This film exemplarizes the pointlessness of revenge.  I appreciated it.

Blue Ruin
2013, 92 minutes, directed by Jeremy Saulnier

Coherence

I greatly enjoyed this film, despite having seeing it as a silly teen drama at SXSW a few months ago.  This time, though, the theme is wrapped into a legitimate sci-fi puzzler.  As a comet passes near Earth, reality shifts, throwing a dinner party into disarray.  That house down the block still has its light on - and wow, doesn't it look eerily familiar?

Here it is, the sci fi film of 2013.  Filmed with minimal script - just a note card with motivations - the actors didn't even know it was a sci fi film until days into shooting.  This shows what an excellent job you can do with a brilliant script, good actors, and - nothing else.

Coherence
2013, 89 minutes, directed by James Ward Byrkit

In the Valley of Elah

Mike Deerfield is missing, and AWOL after returning home from a tour Iraq.  As his father Hank (Tommy Lee Jones), a former sergeant and MP, goes looking for his missing son, the soldier is found dead, dismembered and burnt.  Working with a local detective (Charlize Theron), Hank tried to unravel the mystery and determine why his last surviving son was murdered.

The film lacks suspense.  It lacks drama.  It's a journey of discovery and acceptance.  But most of all its sad, not just for the characters but for all the real lives pointlessly destroyed by a pointless war.

In the Valley of Elah
2007, 121 minutes, directed by Paul Haggis

Hours

2005.  New Orleans.  Something is wrong, and Abigail and her husband Nolan rush to the hospital.  Abigail dies in childbirth, leaving Nolan lost and barely able to relate to the premature baby in a ventilator that the nurse insists is his.

Then, Katrina.  The hospital is evacuated, except for Nolan and his baby, still attached to the ventilator that can save her life - if it keeps running when power goes out, order decays, and desperation sets in.

Maybe it's because of where I am in life, but this film moves me, in a way that few have.  It's intimate, raw emotion, and it's the first film since The Fountain that made me cry.  For me, it's the best film of the year.

Hours
2013, 97 minutes, directed by Eric Heisserer

Kiss of the Damned

First and foremost, this is a love story. It is love at first site for Paolo when he encounters the reclusive Djuna, and not even her "condition" as a vampire keeps him away. As she relents, her destructive sister Mimi arrives, seemingly focused on destroying those around her.

The best parts of this film are the passion the young couple share, and their interaction with the local vampire community. The whole experience was pleasantly enjoyable.

Kiss of the Damned
2013, 97 minutes, directed by Xan Cassavetes

Burma

Seven years after last abandoning his family, Christian's father shows up unexpectedly on the eve of a family weekend. None of them - Christian, his brother, or sister - particularly welcome their father's arrival, but tepidly accept him to hear his explanation for his disappearance.

A dialog-driven drama, the film explores the bonds of family and the impact when those are torn apart.

Burma
2013, 81 minutes, directed by Carlos Puga

La cinquième saison (The Fifth Season)

When I saw that Casa Kafka was a sponsor of this French-Belgian production, I knew it would be hopeless, depressing, senseless. In a small Belgian town, nature simply...stops. Chickens no longer lay eggs, cows stop producing milk, field lay fallow, trees die but won't burn. Young Alice and her friend Tom suffer and cope, with traveling beekeeper Pol and his son Octave as the only ones who maintain their senses against the seemingly global calamity. As food grows scarce and desperation grows, even they can't stop the tide of insanity.

There's seriously nothing cheerful about this film. Be warned.

La cinquième saison (The Fifth Season)
2012, 93 minutes, directed by Peter Brosens and Jessica Woodworth

No habrá paz para los malvados (No Rest of the Wicked)

I've watched several films this week featuring good-cops-with-a-side-business, where they're put in a bad situation and need to bring forth their best side to save the day.  Santos is not one of those cops.  He's downright evil.  Set in Paris ahead of a G-20 summit, this feature finds him very quickly murdering three people late night at a strip joint.  A witness escapes, forcing Santos to ditch his G-20 surveillance responsibilities and take on investigation of the club's contacts.  Meanwhile, Chacón, a police investigator, takes on the murder case, forging ahead into the same investigation from a different angle, thinking terrorism.  Can she catch Santos before he eliminates the witness, or is something more going on here?

No habrá paz para los malvados (No Rest of the Wicked)
2011, 114 minutes, directed by Enrique Urbizu

Graceland

Marlon, driver for a dirty Congressman in the Philippines, is taking both his and his boss' daughters home from school when a kidnapping attempt goes wrong.  Rather than take the Congressman's daughter, the kidnappers kill her and take Marlon's by mistake.  He has to find a way to get his boss' help to get his daughter back without him knowing his daughter is already gone.

This is a very dark and gritty film, with almost no one coming out untainted.

Graceland
2012, 99 minutes, directed by Ron Morales

Grup 7 (Unit 7)

Late 1980s: Ceville, Spain.  The city prepares for the 1992 world expo.  A group of four narcotics detectives - from a rookie to a brutal, hard-nosed detective - work the streets to clear them of heroin ahead of the world's attention.  Their actions quickly get out of hand as they try to stay one step ahead of internal affairs and the drug traffickers.

The plot in this film is, let's say, subtle.  Think of it more as five-years-in-the-life of four detectives.  A strong, quality film.

Grup 7 (Unit 7)
2012, 95 minutes, directed by Alberto Rodriguez

Errors of the Human Body

Geoff (Michael Eklund) is a controversial geneticist due to his research into embryo screening, based on (and using) the death of his newborn son to a unique genetic defect.  Former student Rebekka (Karoline Herfurth) lures him to the Max Planck Institute in Dresden after he's forced out of work in the U.S.  Slowly he realizes that there's some Days-of-Our-Lives-style backstabbing and intrigue going on at the institute - I say slowly because it took me a while to realize that this was the real plot instead of more exposition - and he steps right into it, while also dealing with the loss of his ex-wife and rekindling of an old affair with Rebekka.  Then the plot wakes up and gets very personal for Geoff, and it seems like the climax has passed and the film will end.  Only at this point it doesn't; the denouement is stretched out for 30 minutes so the writers can make one final point before they let the film end.

There's very little sci fi at Fantastic Fest this year.  Vanishing Waves is the best of the two I've seen, with Errors of the Human Body a disappointing second due to pacing issues.  I shouldn't spend the first part of the film wondering when it will finally start, and the last part of the film wondering when it will finally end.  I totally wanted to love this film and I didn't.

Errors of the Human Body
2012, 100 minutes, directed by Eron Sheean 

Toata lumea din familia noastra (Everybody in the Family)

The description for this film said that I shouldn't know anything about it going in, and that I should stop reading right away.  My mistake was following their guidance.  Right off the bat they tell us that it was a all a trick; this isn't a genre film at all, but instead a family drama.

Marius, the father, wants to pick up his daughter for his brief custody week.  Only his ex-wife, Otilla, is a conniving schemer who wants to keep him away from his daughter.  Oh, Marius is also incredibly stupid when put into bad situations.  The only saving grace is their daughter, Sofia, who (played by five-year-old Sofia Nicolaescu) is put in the middle as her parents, her grandma, and her mother's boyfriend ratchet up the insane.  None of them should be allowed near children.

Toata lumea din familia noastra (Everybody in the Family)
2012, 107 minutes, directed by Radu Jude

Cold Blooded

Cold Blooded is a police crime drama centered around a strong female lead ("Lauren" in Lost Girl apparently, if you watch it), with a single bit of gore right in the middle to ratchet up the tension.  But that's not important.  What's important is that this is one of the best films I've seen in a good while, and all of you that would ever watch a police crime drama should find a way to see this.  The cinematography was great, the acting solid, the special effects amazing for a $2M film.  And in the Q&A, when the producer said that the actual budget was $275k and it was shot in just two weeks, the audience (myself included) was astounded.  It's after 2 AM and I just sat through the screening, but if I had a DVD of this I'd put it on again.  This film deserves nationwide release and it needs an audience of devoted fans to get one.

Cold Blooded
2012, 86 minutes, directed by Jason Lapeyre

The Negotiator

When a long-time cop and decorated hostage negotiator is framed for his partner's murder, and he holes up in a federal building with hostages, who do they call?  The OTHER NEGOTIATOR.

There's nothing wrong with this police crime action/drama.  Samuel L. Jackson, Kevin Spacey, and the rest of the cast do a fine job given the material.  There are just so very few films that can pull off a central character drama when they bring in a second character in the same role.

I really want to make fun of their pagers, but sadly I still have one just like 'em.  My employer's emergency response system requires them for some inane reason.

The Negotiator
1998, 140 minutes, directed by F. Gary Gray