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. 

Child of God

Fantastic Fest's legendary secret screenings provide opportunity to screen horrible films I'd never voluntarily walk in to see.  This time, though, it's James Franco's latest experiment, a biopic tale of a very sad, shy & mentally impaired man in the 1930s, descending into madness as the rural society of Sevier County, Tennessee, rejects him.

It's a really, really good film.  It really is.  But its also sad, creepy, and depressing, and speaks to our nation's - or species' - atrocious history of treating mental illness.  Much of the glory of this masterpiece has to be placed at the feet of Scott Haze, whose portrayal of Lester Ballard is outstanding.

Child of God
2013, 104 minutes, directed by James Franco

The Dirties

The director and star of the film summed it up best: "It's the story of everything leading up to the point where they're immediately and forever portrayed as monsters."

Matt and Owen are picked on.  By everyone.  They escape into the world of cinema, making films for their multimedia class.  Their latest, The Dirties, is a police drama, where they hunt down and punish bullies for their crimes.  As the bullying gets worse and their friendship suffers, Matt decides to film a remake...

The camera man is really distracting.  Someone - two people actually - follow Matt and Owen around and film everything, but these characters are never seen, never say a word, and only occasionally referenced.  In the Q&A Matthew says he originally wrote characters for them ("Jared"), but ended up cutting it as it distracted from the plot.  Meh.

The Dirties
2013, 80 minutes, directed by Matthew Johnson

Yes, this was actually filmed in a high school, using high school students as extras, and most of the time the kids didn't even know they were on film.  But it was in Canada, where they're less crazy about these sorts of things.

The Bounceback

Being a hopeless twenty-something, Stan hops a plane from LA to Austin to "run into" his ex, who is spending the weekend there from New York. Keeping them apart are their friends Jeff and Kara, who have both broken up with each other and desperately want them all to move on. With a backdrop of the raunchy Air Sex championships, the two former lovers have one weekend to decide if they're meant to be together or if its truly time to move on.

The Bounceback
2013, 92 minutes, directed by Brian Poyser

ABCs of Death

In what I think is the first Drafthouse Films-funded venture, Tim League and Ant Timpson enlist 26 genre film directors to each produce a short, each based on death and a letter of the alphabet.  As is usual, I don't review shorts except when they are produced together to form a feature film.  I'm not going to attempt to review every story; it's sufficient to say some were funny, some were bizarre, and some were downright disgusting.  I can't recommend it for anyone with a stomach or conscious.

ABCs of Death
2012, 123 minutes, directed by Angela Bettis, Hélène Cattet, Ernesto Díaz Espinoza, Jason Eisener, Bruno Forzani, Adrián García Bogliano, Xavier Gens, Noboru Iguchi, Thomas Cappelen Malling, Jorge Michel Grau, Yoshihiro Nishimura, Banjong Pisanthanakun, Simon Rumley, Marcel Sarmiento, Jon Schnepp, Srdjan Spasojevic, Timo Tjahjanto, Andrew Traucki, Nacho Vigalondo, Jake West, Ti West, Ben Wheatley, Adam Wingard, Mikael Wulff, Yudai Yamaguchi, and Lee Hardcastle




The list of deaths below is for my own reference.  I don't recommend reading it, whether you plan to see the film or not.
Apocalypse
Bird
Cycle
Dogfight
Exhumed
Far
Gravity
Hydro-Electric Diffusion
Itchy
Jidai-Geki
Kapoo
Libido
Miscarriage
Nature
Orgasm
Parama Ribo (Pressure)
Quack
Rice
Speed
Toilet
Unsuspecting
Vagitist
XXL
Yeti
Zymosis

Compliance

Stupid, gullible people do uncomfortable things when told to by someone they perceive to have authority. It would be inane if it wasn't based on true events. Based on how everyone out here is talking about it, though, I think it's a cinematic success.

Compliance
2012, 90 minutes, directed by Craig Zobel

Gayby

In this uncomfortable but funny situation comedy, Jenn and her best friend Matt decide to have a baby.  Except Matt is gay and Jenn isn't.  And they decide to try the old-fashioned way.  Dating and sex hilarity ensues.

I'm not sure if they were trying to direct it just towards an LGBT audience, but it plays well for a general crowd of open-minded people.

Gayby
2012, 88 minutes, directed by Lonathan Lisecki

See Girl Run

Emmie, a married 30-something, isn't sure her life is heading in the right direction. What if she wasn't supposed drift away from her first love, the one where she "never broke up, just moved away?" What if he thought the same? What if?

"You can't live your life on 'what ifs'. Eventually they make you crazy," says her father. It also doesn't help that her ex is a friendly yet creepy stalker who never figured out the best way to show how you feel is to get the hell out of her life and let her be happy her own way. I thought this film would be insightful but instead it was just uncomfortable and sad.

I'm going to find a horror film to watch and forget about this.

Run Girl Run
2012, 89 minutes, directed by Nate Meyer

Keyhole

The director of this film describes it as "gangsters meet ghosts" turned into an autobiography of a house. Ulysses returns to his family home, determined to reach his wife Hyacinth on the top floor. To get there, though, he must navigate the other rooms of the house and their unearthly inhabitants.

Or at least that's how it's billed. I describe it more as surreal experimentation. Or a black & white cinematic study of how many actors (young and quite old) you can get full nude and acting like a crazy ghost on film.

It's not really for me.

Keyhole
2012, directed by Guy Maddin

Klovn (Clown: The Movie)

I'm seeing this based on my sister-in-law's wholehearted recommendation.  As I've said many times before, the uncomfortable-situation genre of film comedies are difficult to watch.  To the credit of Clown's nationality, though, it's much easier to handle when the actors are European.  Based on a smash hit television series, the story is about two friends - one creepy, one hapless - who embark on a weekend of debauchery to escape their "boring" normal lives.  Except the hapless one brings along his 11-year-old nephew so as to prove to his girlfriend that he's ready for a family.  Significant crude hilarity follows.

Is the film funny?  Yes.  Does it deserve the fanboy-adoration I saw last night when it won the Gutbuster award for best comedy?  Not really.  I prefer the humor of Carre Blanc.  Watch this if you can tolerate stupid funny and lots of uncomfortable situations.

Klovn (Clown: The Movie)
2010, 90 minutes, directed by Mikkel Nørgaard

My Sucky Team Romance

Here it is, my last film of the festival.  The director and nearly the entire cast is still here, which shows dedication.  (Also, it shows most of them live locally.)  I've heard of director Emily Hagins from the documentary of her first film, made when she was 12.  This is her third film, the last one she hoped to fit in before she graduated from high school.  Vampires are real, they are in town, and they've turned Paul and his coworker Allison.  They're only hope to reverse the conversion lies at the local sci-fi convention.  For Kate, it's her last weekend in town, and she heads to the convention with her friends, not expecting to find her crush Paul...

Still drawing talent mostly from her own school, some of the acting is amateur, and I note some dubbing problems and an unusually low-budget set.  But Emily herself is very well-spoken, has put tremendous effort into the film through more roles than any one person should, and is already planning for her future.  I think, with a good mentor or time spent at college, it will be a very bright future for her indeed.

My Sucky Teen Romance
2011, 77 minutes, directed by Emily Hagins

Leaving the Rollings Theater after the film, I discover that the shuttle system has completely broken down.  The shuttle stop - supposedly moved to be a block away, is unlabeled and unstaffed - so it's a long walk back to S. Lamar and my car.  If they plan to keep using this theater, SXSW better fix this for next year.

Little Deaths

I don't usually review short stories.  If I went down that path, what's next?  A pointless micro-blog review of each TV show and YouTube click I watch?  So you won't find mention of short-film collections on here, like the Futurestates series I quite surprisingly enjoyed at last year's SX (and will be seeing the second season premiere of tomorrow).

Little Deaths, though, was conceived and executed as a single "anthology" film.  And I stayed up pretty late for it so I feel like I need to get something out of the effort, like a blog post.  Because - and let me be very honest - I didn't get much out of the film.

The three tales interweave the themes of sex and death.  If you want to read promo blurbs, go find the official film site.  All I can add is that "House & Home", the most satisfying of the three, goes off the crazy end.  "Mutant Tool" starts in crazy and keeps going, and "Bitch" is, well, pretty sad.

I really hope to see something I like at SXSW this year.  Here's hoping for Saturday.

Little Deaths
2010, directed by Sean Hogan, Andrew Parkinson, and Simon Rumley

 

Tim League in a dog suit, shortly after (almost) setting himself on fire.

 The beef stroganoff chugging contest.  Mr. Faceintheglass (next to Tim) won.

Cyrus

I saw this film based solely on my faith in the Duplass brothers, having seen and liked the Puffy Chair when it showed at SXSW several years ago.  And while their latest film has strong points most noticeably Marisa Tomei's wonderful performance, the bulk of the film was dominated by the type of creepy uncomfortable comedy that makes me shield my eyes from the screen.  That finally ends as the plot switches to a tit-for-tat rivalry of affection, but then it simply ends with a wholly abrupt and insufficient serious resolution.

I'm nonplussed.

Cyrus
2010, 92 minutes, directed by Jay and Mark Duplass

Gentlemen Broncos

This Fantastic Fest, I wanted to see one of the big gala premieres. It would be Zombieland except Harry scheduled a secret screening on top of it, something I can't resist. So instead I'm here at the beautiful Paramount theater, a wonderful place to look at ... the place, but an awful place to watch a movie. As usual, all four good seats are reserved for cast and crew. My view is only partially blocked, and at least I'm on the end of a row so I can breath and move my legs.

So, Gentlemen Broncos. Small town kid in uncomfortable situations finds himself and wins big. If you liked Napolean Dynamite, well you'll get to see part two. If you didn't, like I didn't, well meh.

Gentlemen Broncos
2009, directed by Jared Hess

Afterschool

I was rather impressed with the interesting imagery chosen to tell this story. From long camera takes to not filming the actors to curious use of focus, their choices made my cringe less at the uncomfortable coming-of-age story. The film leads you through quite a build up towards a controversial end.

Afterschool
2008, 120 minutes, directed by Antonio Campos

Creative Nonfiction

This morning I delved into the world of true zero-budget film, for a "comedy/drama" of brief proportions. I can blame no one but myself for this transgression, as I failed to watch the trailer, and gave myself very different expectations based on the promo blurb.

Despite how good this film may or may not be, I am not partial to uncomfortable situational drama. The very cringe-worthy bits are broken up slightly by solid comedic insights into life and relationships. I wish them all the best, but it's just not for me.

Creative Nonfiction
2009, 60 minutes, directed by Lena Dunham