Review: Fighting Fear

Fighting Fear

Dir. Macario De Souza

Year: 2011

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 85mins

The worlds of mixed martial arts and competitive big wave surfing come together in wildly melodramatic and frequently homo-erotic ways in Macario De Souza’s Fighting Fear. Coming from one of the co-director’s of Bra Boys and featuring a couple of that high-grossing documentary’s featured personalities, you surely already know what you’re getting into and we more or less get it. Whether that’s a good thing or not is ultimately up to you. To say that there are a lot of biffo, bonza, brooding, brawling, bogan blokes in Fighting Fear is an understatement, but their so-called larrikin charm quickly wears out its welcome. It’s easy to grow tired of these leather-skinned, thick-necked, scruffy-faced surfer dudes talking about “taking chances”, “confronting death” and, yes, “fighting fear” as they try and catch the ultimate wave or swing the proverbial killer right hook.

De Souza’s film was never going to be an evenly balanced portrait of the lives of Mark Mathews and Richie “Van” Vaculik – he is their friend after all – but the obvious manner with which he goes about sprinkling his film with odious platitudes is startling. It’s disconcerting when Fighting Fear spends more time stroking sympathy for Vaculik’s thuggish character (he rushes to be by the bedside of his ex-girlfriend’s cancer-stricken mother) than recognising that he, um, ya know, tried to beat a guy to a bloody pulp. That they have tried to make amends is commendable, but by pushing the film’s legitimately interesting subject matter to the side in favour of repetitive like whoa look at him surf that big wave moments is frustrating and tiresome.

Beginning with rather naff childhood re-enactments – not to mention the ridiculous torn photograph imagery that elicited stifled laughs out of my friend and I – Fighting Fear sadly goes nowhere unexpected. Written with all the finesse of a child editing a Wikipedia entry and narrated with monotone dullness by its heroes, this documentary is rarely enlightening enough about anything other than the ever-changing length of Vaculik’s chest hair. Occasional narrated by Joel Edgerton (in a nice bout of cross-promotion with the mixed martial arts themed Warrior) with barely an ounce of self-awareness – these men are labelled “heroes” and “super-human larrikins” – it’s as if it’s all just one big circle jerk that somebody got projected onto a cinema screen.

I guess because they’re such true blue blokes – they surf with an inflatable crocodile to commemorate the death of Steve Irwin, I am not making that up! – I’m meant to dismiss their roguish nature, but I can’t. Especially when they’re as dull as this. Many of the men that pop up throughout Fighting Fear may be good looking if you’re into that sort of look (hey, I certainly am), any appear is quickly erased the moment they speak.

Perhaps if the film had any interest in really investigating why they became that way, rather than blithely papering over it with weak excuses (divorce!) and glossy camerawork I could forgive some of its less obvious faults. The surfing footage is impressive, that’s a fact, but by the time an excessive epilogue pops up at film’s end it has long since lost its novelty value. Much like the media in general, Fighting Fear just glazes over the bad times in the mad rush to hail sporting personalities as the closest thing to the second coming of Jesus Christ we’re ever likely to see. By all means, I’m sure the story of Mathews and Vaculik would make a great tale for these guys to tell their mates as they sit around a barbecue in their quieter years, but as a feature length documentary it lacks the pizzazz and the spunk required to be anything more than a glorified slice of misguided idol worship masquerading as cinema. D

Review: Moneyball

Moneyball

Dir. Bennett Miller

Year: 2011

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 133mins

Baseball and boxing have, for whatever reasons, become the most cinematic of sports, with filmmakers routinely fixated by the two. We recently had Warrior, and now we’ve got Moneyball. Australia may not exactly be mad for the game, but I suspect – I hope – that the latest film from Bennett Miller will inspire a few more people to become immersed in it.


Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Review: Warrior

Warrior

Dir. Gavin O'Connor

Year: 2011

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 140mins

Let’s face it – Rocky has been done to death! And yet its simple underdog tale gets routinely trotted out due to its unwavering success at moving audiences, most notably big manly men, to tears. Director Gavin O’Connor tries sprucing up the material by swapping out boxing for mixed martial arts, but it’s still the same old story told the same old way. At least Real Steel had robots.


Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

And just in case that review doesn't make it clear enough? I'm on Team Edgerton. For everything.

Yes please.

Review: Dragonslayer

Dragonslayer

Dir. Tristan Patterson

Year: 2011

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 75mins

Debut director Tristan Patterson has teamed up with legendary film producer Christine Vachon to create bring forth this evocative documentary, Dragonslayer. A film that ducks, weaves and swoops through its world of low-stakes skateboarding competitions as if the camera is as lost as its protagonist. Watching this beautiful film is like being transported to another generation, one soaked in grunge aesthetics straight out of the early 1990s. Dragonslayer looks absolutely nothing like the vision of youth that we so regularly see on film today and if Gus Van Sant says his favourite film of 2011 is anything else then I will be surprised.

The subject of Dragonslayer is Josh “Skreech” Sandoval, a skater who Patterson follows around America (they met at a party at which Sandoval claims to have been on five squares of acid) as he aims to skate through as many empty swimming pools as possible before the chilling realisation of life (he is a divorced father) finally get to be too much. He and his girlfriend sell items in period garage sales to pay for road trips to Oregon, California and everywhere in between, sleeping in a tent in their friends’ backyards and taking advantage of cheap hot chip offers available at roadside diners. The glamourous life this is not, but what comes through thanks to the gorgeous cinematography, rhythmic editing and hypnotic music is a story of this rather simple man living a rather simple life and somehow being more satisfied than any of us could ever imagine.

My initial scepticism of the project – a 75-minute doco about skateboarders hardly sounds promising – were very much put to rest once I actually laid eyes upon it. Eric Koretz’s award-winning cinematography manoeuvres about the American landscapes, both natural and unnatural, with a flowing beauty that was like magic to an Americana tragic like myself. Capturing moments of bliss and hardship without ever succumbing to clichéd representations of either, something that is certainly aided by the fantastic soundtrack. Ace rock tracks that harkens back to grunge, punk and the rise of indie rock with modern day incarnates like The Germs, Bipolar Bears, Best Coast and Little Girls. During scenes of house parties filled with gangly-faced young adults wearing flannel and tee shirts unadorned with popular labels, I actually forgot I was watching a film from 2011. Perhaps funny that this film should come out just a couple of weeks after Nirvana’s Nevermind album celebrated its 20th anniversary.

Dragonslayer drifts about amidst its hypnotising haze despite the hectic editing of Lizzy Calhoun and Jennifer Tiexeira. Despite lacking the initial visceral thrill of Senna, it’s form of vibe and atmosphere is just as potent. Echoes of the aforementioned Gus Van Sant’s Paranoid Park are perhaps too obvious, and yet pertinent with skating sequences that are crafted like stunning musical sequences and allow the athleticism to be truly appreciated. The way Patterson nestles himself in the culture is just so wonderful; these people never once talk about being “outsiders” or “losers” and the film works hard to show why they’re idols to an entire swath of people who have nobody else to look up to. These people know their future will ultimately not be the brightest, but they’ll be damned if they’ll let that get in the way of life. Dragonslayer is a superb film, a rich breakthrough and ultimately a transcending look at a culture that society (and, yes, even Hollywood) is letting slip away. It’s absolutely one of the best films of the year. A-

Dragonslayer is screening at ACMI until 16 October.

MIFF Blogathon: Day 5 (Pianos and Chess in Littlerock)

This blogathon is an initiative of MIFF for their 60th anniversary year. I am one of six bloggers given the mission of seeing 60 films in 17 days and writing, reporting, reviewing and wrangling my way through the tiredness and hunger to bring the festival experience to your computer.

The Piano in a Factory

Dir. Zhang Meng
Running Time: 105mins

China's answer to the American indie quirk genre, Zhang Meng's The Piano in a Factory [Gang de qin] is a surprisingly charming and goofy examination of a band of performers living amidst a dying industrial town as they go about building a piano for their leader's daughter. After divorce has left this troubadour, Wang Quin-yuan's Chen, with no money, the only way to buy the affections of his daughter over those of her materialistic mother, is to build a piano alongside his band mates in a disused factory. Wonderfully lensed by Shu Chou in a series of steely greys, the wintery landscapes of snow and mud are fabulously intertwined with the factories, pipes, tunnels, pillars and traffic sounds of this industrial wasteland.

We routinely hear of China being in an economic resources boom, so it's interesting to see this film's portrayal as less than so, with dank and decaying fashion. The director has thankfully used a light touch with the material and does a lot that stops it from descending into maudlin, depression territory, while skirting the twee, cloying tone that could come from using the Super Mario Bros theme music. The Piano in a Factory proves to be far less obvious and manufactured here than it would be in an American film of the same variety. Combined with utterly bizarre musical sequences, a fantastic lead performance by Qin Hai-lu make this film, despite being too long for sure, an endearing surprise. B+

Littlerock
Dir. Mike Ott
Running Time: 83mins

America through the eyes of two Asian tourists, Littlerock features an evocative sense of place mere minutes into its short running time, but a pair of strange lead performances dulls the experience. Atsuko Okatsuka stars as Atsuko, a young girl travelling through America with her brother. Stuck in Littlerock, California (not to be confused with the actual city of Little Rock, Arkansas), Atsuko finds herself enamoured with the small town Americana vibe (or perhaps just enamoured with anything that isn't a staunch Japanese upbringing) and chooses to stay on as her brother heads to San Fransisco. She makes friends with a curiously fey - yet staunchly heterosexual - drug pusher and wannabe model (Cory Zacharia as Cory), as well as Jordan (Brett L Tinnes), a cute boy who proves hipsters can be found anymore!

The camera of cinematographer Carl McLaughlin (also a co-writer) is the real star of Littlerock, as it latches on to the sights of America that so endear it to many travellers. Okatsuka's performance as Atsumo, unfortunately blank and empty as a tourist with no knowledge of the local language, is not one of the things that the camera appears in awe of. Occasionally piping up with flat narration in the form of letters written home to her father, Okatskuka never seizes upon any emotional reading of her face when given a close-up. She just sits there and she makes for a difficult entry into the story. The character of Cory is the opposite, as there is so much of him given to us that I actually wished they put him away. Why he was written as an obvious homosexual who's willing to pull Zoolander model faces and perform his runway walk at the drop of a hat is beyond me. Was Ott trying to say something about homosexuality in a small town? If he was, I think I missed it. C+

Bobby Fischer Against the World
Dir. Liz Garbus
Running Time: 90mins

Chess: It's not the most exciting sport, is it? Especially when your prime subject has a rule in his big matches that there be no filming allowed. So, what we have here with Liz Garbus' documentary Bobby Fischer Against the World is a movie about chess' greatest player and yet we never actually get to see the man play. Must be a joke, yeah? Unfortunately, no.

Bobby Fischer Against the World is what I called a "wikipedia film". It even goes so far as to divide its (thankfully brief) run time into separately themed chapters of easily digestible themes. Garbus' subject is an interesting one, that's for sure, but where is the punch, where is the excitement? Something to have enlivened this documentary would have been greatly appreciated. As it is it's a standard history lesson that doesn't dig all that deep. C

Michael
Dir. Markus Schleinzer
Running Time: 96mins

It's curious. The banality that I found numbing and dull in Michael is the exact virtue that many others (including fellow blogathon buddy Thomas Caldwell) found in the piece. Was debut director Markus Schleinzer's plan to show that not only are paedophiles evil, but they're also incredibly boring? Sadly, I suspect this was in fact the case, but Schleinzer has gone about the material with the vagueness of blanched brussel sprouts.

The daunting prospect of watching a film about a paedophile who keeps a child locked in the basement is blunted by Schleinzer's desire to do absolutely nothing with it. There isn't anything particularly shocking or daring going on here; we've heard far worse coming out of the mouths of actual dungeon abuse victims. All Michael has is a static camera that thinks its being observational about the world, but instead - from my perspective - came off as scared and uninterested.


To call the lead character of Michael, played by Buster Bluth lookalike Michael Fuith, detached would be an understatement for the festival. As he keeps young Wolfgang locked in his basement, Schleinzer follows his mundane life as he goes to work, goes skiing, tries to have sex with a woman and fails, goes to hospital due to a car accident... and it all plays out in bland, Haneke-lite long shots with ambiguous beginning and end times. There is some interesting work done to imply that this boy has been there for quite some time and that Michael has helf other boys before, but it really does come off as a case of the director letting the subject matter do the heavy lifting and expecting some sort of meaning to bounce out because of it. Michael is arthouse filmmaking at its most maddening. Except, I guess, there's nothing particularly "maddening" about Michael. It just exists. Like brussel sprouts. D

MIFF TALES
I expected walkouts at Michael due to the nature of the plot, but the film's wishy-washy presentation - almost afraid to do or say anything about paedophiles or their victims - gave the large Tuesday night crowd nothing to get particularly huffy about, although I heard bad projection issues meant an earlier screening of Uzo and Scorsese's The King of Comedy meant viewers were left wanting.

Today at Bobby Fischer I had the pleasure of finally meeting Rhett Bartlett of Dial M for Movies. As we sat waiting for the movie to begin a lady began speaking to us. She had recognised me as one of the bloggers and began to explain how she thought it was a conspiracy as to who was chosen to take part. Apparently we'd all been published already (there's a difference between being published and making money, but I couldn't be bothered going into the depressing details right then and there) and how she wanted to be a blogger. Humourously, upon noticing me pull out a notepad and pen she all but screamed "I don't want to be blogger anymore! I don't want to be blogger anymore!"

Apparently all this "writing" stuff was a bit much for her. When I asked if she had been reading or following us on Twitter she said had not and then went about giving herself, Rhett and I popcorn related nicknames. The people you meet... :/

Is Bring It On the Greatest Sports Film of All Time?

Sure, some may immediately chide at a suggestion such as that and throw around stereotypical suggestions such as Raging Bull, The Wrestler or even Rocky. Maybe Pride of the Yankees or Bull Durham for baseball fans. While those people wouldn't necessarily be wrong per se, I don't believe they'd be right.

Peyton Reed's Bring It On is the greatest sports movie of all time. Have you watched it since it came out in the year 2000? I actually imagine a lot of people that read this blog have indeed seen it again because I know there's a very dedicated group of fans of that movie. Like Mean Girls, from 2004, it is a movie that shows up all the time on TV and so many people own it on DVD and quickly became an iconic movie for a generation (that's no hyperbole in case you couldn't quite tell). I don't know about you, but if I had to choose I'd rather watch Bring It On right now rather than Raging Bull, as good as the latter is.

From the opening dream sequence ("I'm sexy, I'm cute" - a cheer that entered pop culture) to the tooth brush and bed dancing moments of absolute cuteness to the really brilliant cheer routines and the bonza performance by Eliza Dushku (and, yes, even Kirsten Dunst), Bring It On is filled to the brim with amazing stuff. It has refreshing portrayals of not only gay characters, but also gay/straight relationships as well as broader gender issues. It even has unexpectedly forthright views on sex and the filthy edge it has is balanced perfectly.

Sure, it might not have the bravura filmmaking of Raging Bull or the grittiness of The Wrestler, but I'd wager and say that it's insights into the mentality of athletes as well as its representation of what will do to themselves to succeed is the match for any other sport film you can name. And with energy to spare. Besides, Field of Dreams may make grown men cry, but does it have Spirit Fingers? I think not.


I wanted to embed scenes for you, but I'm not allowed.

Review: Newcastle

Newcastle
Dir. Dan Castle
Year: 2008
Aus Rating: M
Running Time: 107mins

A couple of years ago there was an Australian film called Tan Lines. It was a fairly dreadful look at homosexuality and Aussie surf culture, a thoroughly interesting topic I might like to add, that treated its queer topic with a strange pitched level of surprising earnestness and poor execution and unrealistic storytelling. It was further hampered by amateur acting and bad writing. It did, however, provide endless opportunities for queer audiences to fawn over shirtless male bodies (although their age sure was cringe-worthy at times) and that seems to be about the maximum depth you will find in many GLBT-themed movies.

Another Australian film that wades through similar territory, released late in 2008, was Dan Castle's Newcastle, which is a far more successful - and yet, at times, just as frustrating - attempt at the surfer-via-homos theme. While the queer angle is clearly not the film's prime reason for existing, it is actually the one aspect that really shines brightest. The film predominantly focuses of Jesse (Lachlan Buchanan of TV's Blue Water High so surfing experience comes with the package), but it is the relationship between his gay twin brother Fergus, played by the rising star Xavier Samuel (September), and one of Jesse's alpha surfer buddies that provide the thrust of the movie.


The character of Andy (Kirk Jenkins in his acting debut) is one of those incredibly unrealistic fantasy character that every socially awkward gay teenager daydreams about. He is sensitive, caring, incredibly dreamy in the looks department and acts all nice to the outcast. It's a character that almost every gay coming-of-age tale has, and yet I didn't feel that it derailed Newcastle. It's never made explicitly clear whether he is gay or not - Fergus most definitely is since he has purple streaks in his hair and, apparently, hangs around at beach toilet blocks - but he sure does come off that way. There is a scene on the dunes of a beach that is actually quite tender and beautiful. It's a fine example of the sort of thing movies like Another Gay Movie just do not understand. Just because your characters are gay doesn't mean a gay audience is going to want to watch them. Here they are well-formed and well-acted. I'm sure plenty of the film's gay male audience will swoon.

The film as a whole, despite not being entirely queer-centric, is very much queer-friendly. Scene after scene shows the pack of lithe and muscular young men (apparently all supposed to be 16 and 17 years old) pictured above sans clothes. Nudity is prevalent as, apparently, skinny dipping is a popular past time in Newcastle's surfing community. There's even one scene involving nude underwater wrestling between the two brothers that will provide some viewers with naughty thoughts. Even a scene in which the straight Jesse masturbates in his bedroom is intercut with as many shots of shirtless surfers as it is with shots of sexy women running along the beach with their tits bouncing about. Further to that point, for a film that I presume was supposed to be aimed at a teenage male audience, there are more shots of male posteriors and flapping dicks than there are shots of attractive women in bikinis.


Of course, the filmmakers have other more predominant issues on their brain and as soon as the third act comes around it all but ditches the queer subplot except for a quick reminder here or there plus a post-credits scene that seems to confirm what the audience surely suspected. Outside of this angle the film doesn't hold up quite as well. It is a fairly routine coming-of-age tale - that horror term that all followers of Australian film have grown to cringe at - about a younger brother emerging out of the shadow of his more successful older sibling (Reshad Strik). Jesse isn't a very likeable character - he's either angry or angry - which is why the subplots seem to be more interesting. The film's climax is sudden and seemingly unfinished. We don't even get to see Jesse's big chance at the surfing competition he's been working the entire film towards achieving. It just ends. Did they run out of money?

The photography by Richard Michalak is impressive as most surfing cinematography seems to be these days. Editing by Rodrigo Balark is equally good and continues his trend of being amongst the highlights of all his work after movies such as Black Water and The Eternity Man. The acting, too, is definitely worthy of mention and is one of the film's high points. Far too often in Australian films of this variety, the acting is as amateurish as the writing, but the actors fill their characters with spirit, playfullness and all have moments of note even if it is just a laugh or a single line of dialogue.


That writer/director Dan Castle is openly gay (his queer-themed short films have won awards) actually makes Newcastle more disappointing. It's obvious that the gay storyline is the film's most powerful asset, but I suppose it wasn't in the financiers best interest to ditch the less interesting Jesse storyline to focus on the Fergus/Andy one. Films that focus solely on a gay romance are all but always pushed aside and resigned to the queer festival circuit. As it stands though Newcastle is an impressive feature debut and a hopeful sign of an interesting new voice in both Australian and queer cinema. B

PS; I'm not just being a perv. There are seriously next to no stills from this movie that aren't of it's cast minus shirts.