Review: In Darkness

In Darkness

Dir. Agnieszka Holland

Country: Poland / Canada / Germany

Aus Rating: MA15+

Running Time: 145mins

The title says it all, really. In Darkness – the absence of light. This rather bleak, Oscar-nominated WWII drama (is there any other kind?) from Agnieszka Holland (Europa Europa) very literally presents a world that is so dark there are times where it appears we have no hope of ever seeing the rays of the sun again. Thankfully, despite an excessive runtime, over nearly two and a half hours, the way darkness is shown on the screen is at least captivating and mesmerising. The real star of this Polish/Canadian/German co-production is cinematographer Jolanta Dylewska, who performs a delicate dance of shadow and light within the claustrophobic confines of the Polish sewer system in the final year of German occupation. Even when the work of Holland screenwriter David F Shamoon – adapting In the Sewers of Lvov: A Heroic Story of Survival from the Holocaust by Robert Marshall – feels like it’s stretching itself too thin, In Darkness never loses its visual strength.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

MIFF 2012 Review: Holy Motors

Holy Motors

Dir. Leos Carax

Country: France

Aus Rating: N/A

Running Time: 115mins

Like the lyrics of the Kylie Minogue song that humorously pops up midway through this French odyssey oddity, I can’t quite get Holy Motors out of my head. Using this 2001 pop phenomenon on the soundtrack – especially for a film that errs so far from the mainstream that it will actually hurt some of the gay audiences who attend purely for the Minogue factor – was a particularly inspired choice and just one of the many moments that pepper Leos Carax’s wholly original return to cinema. Some 13 years after his last feature-length enterprise, Pola X, Carax’s much ballyhooed film is one that genuinely inspires claims of true originality and is done with such panache that it’s hard not to be impressed simply by pure virtue of its existence.

Holy Motors is many things: maddening, confounding, joyous, “the magic of the act”. It shares much in the realm of unexplained mysteries as David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive - and I don’t just mean the shots of limousines cruising around darkened boulevards – in that to find the “meaning” of the film is probably to go about watching it the entirely wrong way. And yet there’s fun to be had in extracting reason out of the series of events that Carax presents and just how the puzzle, and that’s most definitely what it is, fits together. It’s straightforward, but hardly straight, and that’s a pleasure to behold.

Denis Lavant stars as Monsieur Oscar, a man who, from the scant clues scattered about throughout Carax’s screenplay, spends his days being chauffeured around Paris in the back of a stretch limousine that is driven by the Céline, played by Edith Scob dressed in a white pantsuit from heaven. He sets out on a series of appointments where he portrays characters for the entertainment of invisible watchers, like a real world Big Brother. While it’s hard to determine what the sewer-dwelling Merde who kidnaps passive supermodels has to do with the father picking his daughter up from a party, all ten identities appear to represent facets of the human condition that somebody somewhere is apparently willing to pay to watch. It’s a fascinating concept that makes for fun real world considerations. Is that crazy person barking down the street at 11pm just an actor? What fun to imagine. Furthermore, the implications that Oscar himself is a performance begs the question of whether this man really exists. A prologue suggests that Carax’s entire enterprise is some grand cinematic prank, but who can really tell? Certainly not I after just a single viewing.

Soon enough it appears that Carax is playing his latest film as a sort of modern day Jacques Tati. Using the concept of this man adopting disguises and characters to shed light on the lunacies of the modern world, whether that be passerbys in the street ignoring a old beggar lady or the ridiculous nature of motion capture. The black and white silent film that occasionally pops up throughout the proceedings recalls the nostalgic notions of Hugo and The Artist as Carax uses a vast array of technical abilities from captivating and transformative make-up to perplexing visual effects to turn his vision into reality. Scob donning a mask ala Eyes Without a Face at film’s end feels like Carax turning cinema in on itself like a full circle, perhaps hoping for a blessed melding of the current and the modern with the vitality of the past. One of the most curious moments sees Oscar’s world turn into a ugly mix of pixellated nonsense, while another sees him (perhaps) showing genuine admiration for what computers can do.

It’s a film of juxtaposition and dichotomy and no more is this evident that in the way Carax turns his rather jovial and playful first half on its head and gives his post-musical interlude sequences a mournful sensibility. It’s almost as if Carax himself is doubting his own hypothesis as a splendidly cast Kylie Minogue croons lyrics of a torch ballad: “Who were we / when we were / who we were back then.” That Holy Motors’ final scene (one that must be seen to be believed) is a very definite indictment on the callous nature that film has been replaced by digital, the mere fact that Carax has been able to make such a beautiful, sumptuous, almost endlessly intriguing film using the digital medium is certainly a cause for thought. He certainly couldn’t have made this film with its playful take on structure and narrative in the so-called good old days, and Carax is surely aware of the irony to be found in the loss of one medium forging his own acceleration of creativity in its replacement.

In frequent collaborater Denis Lavant, Carax has found a wonderful partner in crime. Much like the film itself, Lavant never goes truly overboard in any of his portrayals, and yet the madness is most definitely there. Scob and Minogue are lovely, with the popette proving surprisingly well versed in her role as a mirror to Oscar. Jeanne Disson as an unpopular schoolgirl in one of the film’s more restrained sequences is particularly impressive, while Elise Lhomeau’s scene is perhaps the one that viewers should pay most attention to. It’s Holy Motors’ “Club Silencio” in a way.

As it stands, Holy Motors is sure to be the most maddeningly examined film of 2012. An experience in every sense of the word, and yet one that never tailspins into tiresome drivel. I don’t claim to know anything about the rest of Carax’s career – nor the personal life that I have since discovered finds a very definite place in the film’s narrative – but I found Holy Motors to be a very engaging film that will likely surprise people. It’s rich, but never extravagantly so, told from an important voice. A-

Holy Motors screens at the Melbourne International Film Festival (2 Aug-19 Aug) and is released theatrically on 23 August.

Equalize This!

So, they're rebooting The Equalizer. Or, more to the point, they're adapting the original CBS television series, which ran from 1985-1989, into a new feature film. We're already off to a bad start as it is by pure virtue of this movie being made in the first place, but then consider that it's not a period piece, it's going to be filmed in Boston, and it already has 8 (EIGHT!) producers listed. While the chosen star, Denzel Washington, doesn't quite fit the same mold as Edward Woodward's original grey-haired baddie slayer, I can actually at least see him in the role as a modern day equivalent. Shame that "The Equalizer" of The Equalizer is just one quarter of why the original series worked so well.

Completely by coincidence I have actually been watching series one of The Equalizer for the past week. I've always had a particular fondness for the series, without ever being able to recall much about it other than it was set in New York City and starred a man with a really funny name. I remember being a wee tyke and when I should've been in bed I was spying on my parents watching The Equalizer in the living room. The images stuck. It's curious that this show was surely the first known existence of New York City and I happening upon one another and yet I grew an instant love for the city. I mean, The Equalizer doesn't exactly paint the rosiest of portraits for the greatest city in the world, and yet still something about those analogue city lights must have really gotten to me. I have distinct memories of the images, if not the stories. Of course, there is that blue fog shot from the opening credits that strikes me as rather iconic, too.

I'm not sure if The Equalizer could be made as a series today. The fact that it deals with rapists, murderers, kidnappers, fraudsters and stalkers certainly seems like prime time material in 2012, but the filming style and the evocative sense of time and place is - quite frankly - something that can't be replicated. The New York City of 2012 is a much different one to that of 1985. Sure, there are still all sorts of nasty crimes and villainous creeps out there, but the city, from a purely visual standpoint, had an aura that makes for some truly skeazy viewing. The opening credits (below) alone are a thrilling piece of decaying Manhattan imagery. It's just not going to be the same to see "The Equalizer" (whatever back story he may take) cleaning up the human trash of a city that's actually really sparkly. A city where a late night stroll down the street - hell, even under the Brooklyn Bridge! - is a picturesque night out rather than a terrifying, traumatic experience for all. The Equalizer in a city where looking behind you ever thirty seconds once the sun as set doesn't quite make sense. He was essentially cleaning up a dying city one scumbag at a time, but does the city need him that badly anymore? Wait, are we talking about The Equalizer or Christopher Nolan's Batman movies? In episode four a character walks through Times Square passed a theatre that is playing Bordello starring Linda Lovelace!


Similarly, one of the great aspects of the series is its frequent and recurring use of New York locations. Within the pilot episode alone we see the following shots. It's a glorious show to look at if, like me, you're a bit obsessed with New York City of all eras. Could a current television series even afford to do this? Girls is mostly Brooklyn, the Law & Order franchise don't make much use of big New York imagery, nor do any others that I can think of. There's a car chase on the Brooklyn Bridge for crying out loud!

Sorry, I got carried away. But what character, what atmosphere. That blue white light that the buildings have in the night sky is entrancing.

After Woodward, Manhattan, and 1985, the final element that truly made The Equalizer what it was was the music of Stewart Copeland. I think we can all agree that his work on this series was by far the greatest thing anybody associated with The Police ever did (okay, maybe "El Tango de Roxanne" from Moulin Rouge!, but oh my lord how much do I hate Sting and The Police? SO MUCH!) Much like Jan Hammer's work on Miami Vice before it, and Angelo Badalamenti's Twin Peaks afterwards, Copeland's score was the pulsating, electric beat that kept this dangerous city moving. And yet despite all of the blaring synthesizers and electric drums, there are unique and surprising instruments scattered about to make it really interesting. Love it.


"The Equalizer Busy Equalizing" | "Lurking Solo"
This new spin on The Equalizer being filmed in Boston is just crazy. Perhaps this new version, based on a script by Richard Wenk, will be set in Boston and they can utilise that city's look to their advantage, but then why bother even calling it The Equalizer? I know the series has a cult following, but I wasn't aware of it being all that much of a brand. Certainly not as much as some other series of the time that have already been turned into modern day features.

It's always good to see a classy thriller, and with a budget of just $50mil (Washington apparently getting $20mil of that so you can do the maths) it will fall into that mid-range sweet spot that studios seem to be finding themselves attracted to more and more as the budgets for their action blockbuster tentpoles skyrocket leaving less money to be spent elsewhere. Washington usually delivers the goods in these type of projects and perhaps whoever they assign to direct will be able to lend it a visual style that works in harmony with the memories of the original series. One name brought up in the linked article up top is Nicolas Winding Refn and I think we all know where I stand on him and his own retro masterpiece, Drive.

The odds, as Robert McCall might say, are certainly against them.

Review: Magic Mike

Magic Mike

Dir. Steven Soderbergh

Country: USA

Aus Rating: MA15+

Running Time: 110mins

Once you get past the thongs, the uniforms, and the sleek choreographed stripping dance routines–admittedly, the main attraction of Magic Mike for most audiences–it’s just another day at the office for Steven Soderbergh. Lensed with a typical bleach blond colour palate, Soderbergh’s dramatisation of the life of star Channing Tatum is actually a very solidly told, frequently hilarious, cheekily sly drama about a man trying to make the most for himself in trying times. That there are a whole bunch of sexy men gyrating for the thrill of us all is just one of the ways that Soderbergh and screenwriter Reid Carolin smartly rewrites the script of this shoulda-been-clichéd seen-it-all-before story. Why wasn’t this in 3D?

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

A Chair for No Seasons

For all of the criticisms that social media - specifically Twitter and Facebook - get for the way they actually make people less social, I really can't agree. I feel they just put a spotlight on the fact that so few people in our day-to-day lives have the same degree of interest in things and that there are actually a whole tonne of people out there who we may not have necessarily met (or will ever get the chance to given some live in such far off places as Guyana and South Africa), but whom we're able to form surprisingly strong bonds with.

Of course, it's also a great way of realising that no matter how niche you think an opinion is, there are always plenty of people out there who hold it too. Take, for instance, the chair from Like Crazy. I had no idea that people hated that god damned piece of shit construction as much as I did, but after mentioning it I got some wonderful reactions like:

"WORST CHAIR EVER"

"I think of that rubbish chair Anton Yelchin made in LIKE CRAZY and I burst out laughing"

"The chair was appalling"

"it actually looks like the chairs we would have in the play area in pre-school. And they were awful."

"How was his furniture business doing so well? He seemed only capable of making the one item."

"So ugly!"

"I just remembered furniture making was a plot point in a film and my heart shrank three sizes"

It's like a whole community of people who thought that damn chair was just the most heinous piece of shit. Of course, it doesn't help that the film it appears in just gets worse and worse every time I think of it. I like that you can see Anton Yelchin's face (presumably from a poster in the same exhibit at the Arclight Theater in Hollywood (an exhibit! featuring THE CHAIR!) hovering about in the top right corner like a ghost, chained to the bloody chair for the rest of his ghostly existence. It's as if he's saying "Why did I dumb Jennifer Lawrence for Felicity freakin' Jones?!?!" Even if death his character can't escape that retched woman and that hideous chair.

Review: The Dark Knight Rises

The Dark Knight Rises

Dir. Christopher Nolan

Country: USA

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 160mins

When it comes to discussing Christopher Nolan’s Batman universe, one almost doesn’t even need to bother recapping. Batman (Christian Bale) has been shunned from Gotham City for a crime he didn’t commit and his alter ego Bruce Wayne has become a reclusive cripple. It’s best to enter the trilogy-ending The Dark Knight Rises knowing as little about the substantial plot (at 160 minutes there is A LOT of plot, you guys!) as possible so we’ll leave it at that. The Dark Knight Rises is indeed long, but Nolan never fails to fill the screen with exciting flights of fancy. As somebody who has major issues over his previous two Batman film – not to mention knowing next to nothing about comic book lore –I was surprised at just how much of a great, thrilling time I had. It’s a film that genuinely earns its stripes as a grand, epic work of cinema.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Ice Nymphs, a Branded Brain, and a Keyhole.

I know to call a Guy Maddin movie strange is completely beyond the point, but his movies can be really strange. I've been lucky enough to catch (read: find the time) three of this Canadian auteur's films that were previously unseen by me at the "Nocturnal Transmissions" retrospective of the director's work here in Melbourne. Screening at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, I've been disappointed that many of the titles I really wanted to see were only screening on Saturdays and Sunday evenings that are generally no go zones for me due to work. Still, considering there are next to no other ways to see these films that don't involve importing them from overseas on DVD, I've felt lucky enough to have been able to see the small amount that I have. And on the big screen no less.

Twilight of the Ice Nymphs was hailed as Maddin's first "full-colour.... 35mm 'big budget' picture" and, well, I guess you could say that it is. I mean, it's in colour and while I'm unsure as to its budgetary figures it certainly looks feasible that it may have cost more than some of his other, earlier work. Unfortunately the version I saw was not screened off of a 35mm print, but beggars can't be choosers and I certainly appreciated the exceptionally rare opportunity to watch Twilight on a big screen.

I'm not entirely sure what on Earth the film was trying to say and, I have to admit, a lot of the film (which I only saw last week) has exited my brain without leaving much of an impression. Having said that, however, it's truly a fascinating viewing experience and part of its interest lies in the way that Maddin's almost trademarked confusing oddness was translated to the world of colour film. He had - and continues to to this day - madee films in black and white, and given how strange most of his films are, it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that the upgrade (if you want to use that word) didn't blunt his significant voice. The action itself isn't all that interesting, but the method with which it is presented is a treat.

Visually, Maddin made Twilight of the Ice Nymphs into an experience that shares many similarities with Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 1982 candy-coloured queer classic(?), Querelle. The sky is a permanent kaleidoscope of red, orange, yellow, pink, and purples, colours that frequently reflect off of the bright, lush sets. Elements of arts and crafts as well as a very obvious artificiality fill the frame whilst the actors strut about and recite their ridiculous dialogue in a very Shakespearean manner. Nigel Whitmey and Alice Krige in particular could be mistaken for having thought they were performing on a stage in front of a crowd. Furthermore, the story has elements of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, whilst the score at moments evokes Prokofiev's "Romeo and Juliet - Dance of the Knights". I have no idea what any of this means, but Maddin's next film was Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary (which I recently wrote about for the Canadian "Possible Worlds" film festival) so maybe there was something here that Maddin needed to get out in order to get to a period of his filmmaking life that has come to be seen as, arguable, his most rewarding and mature phase.

A day later I went along to see one of those very films, the 2006 silent fantasy Brand Upon the Brain! While far from the excellence of Dracula or My Winnipeg, this was a very entertaining film. Alas, my body got the better of me and I dozed off for a bit at the start and then spent chapters 6-11 desperately needing to pee oh so desperately. So, really, not the best of viewing circumstances, but that only proves that it was good. In the grand scheme of things, Maddin is certainly one of the more accessible names in experimental/avant garde cinema and Brand Upon the Brain feels like a melding of his more esoteric work and his more commercial work.

"Commercial". Heh.

The third Maddin film that I've been lucky enough to see Keyhole, his latest work that is receiving its Australian premiere during the retrospective. Screening this Sunday the 22nd and then Tuesday the 24th and in 35mm, Keyhole is at times like a defiant rebuke to anybody who thought he'd gotten too arthouse mainstream with recent works. It's a maddening feature, one that appears to make little sense with its noir detective tale of ghosts and haunted houses (I think that's what it about, but I'm hardly going on the record). I don't think it's successful - and judging by this interview he gave with fellow Melbourne filmy type, Martyn Pedler, it wasn't quite what he had envisioned it to be, calling it "far more abstract". Make of that what you will - but as with all of Maddin's films, they are made for cinema viewing. It's easy to see one getting mindlessly distracted by a work like Keyhole if watching in the confines of your home. At least in the cinema there's no real escape and so even when Maddin is being an impenetrable scamp I was forced to admire the staccato editing and the rich, slippery performances of Isabella Rossellini and Jason Patric (Guy Maddin's version of an all-star cast).

I really wish I'd been able to find the time to see Archangel, Cowards Bend the Knee and Tales from the Gimli Hospital, but work and illness conspired against me.

Review: The King is Dead!

The King is Dead!

Dir. Rolf de Heer

Country: Australia

Rating: MA15+

Running Time: 107mins

Neighbours… everybody needs good neighbours.

So the theme song goes to perennial Aussie soap, Neighbours. This ditty that originated in the 1980s would certainly feel right at home in a sarcastic context for the latest episode of Rolf de Heer’s increasingly eclectic career. De Heer’s new film, The King is Dead! (exclamation point courtesy of the opening credits), sees him swerve back to a similar suburban landscape that he navigated with Alexandra’s Project, except in this case it’s less claustrophobic chills and anti-erotic thrills, and more giggles and lampoons. Taking the scenario of a loud set of buffoonish neighbours, something surely everybody has had to endure at least once in their life, and twisting it into a chucklesome quasi black comedy is just another day in the office for the man behind such diverse films as indigenous comedy Ten Canoes, perverse Bad Boy Bubby, jazzy Dingo, and retro silent throw-back Dr Plonk.

Read the rest at Onya Magazine

Review: I Am Eleven

I Am Eleven

Dir. Genevieve Bailey

Country: Australia

Aus Rating: G

Running Time: 90mins

What were you doing at the age of eleven? I’m going to hazard a guess and assume many of you dear readers didn’t have quite the same pre-teen existence as the subjects of Genevieve Bailey’s wonderfully spry documentary, I Am Eleven. The suburban Australian landscape of my early life was so far removed from elephant rides in Thailand, learning ballet at prestigious New York City academies, or rapping in the chilly air of a snow-covered Sweden. Still, no matter where we come from, there is something intrinsically similar to children of this age and it is something that Bailey exploits quite marvellously in this lush-looking documentary that premiered to great acclaim and audience word-of-mouth at last year’s Melbourne International Film Festival.

Read the rest at Onya Magazine

Review: Le Chef

Le Chef

Dir. Daniel Cohen

Country: France

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 83mins

France makes so many movies that it’s impossible for them all to get released. Of the seven Best Film nominees at the César Awards, the “French Oscars”, only four have received an Australian release. Amazingly, 70 French films have already been released into French cinemas this year, which makes it all the more galling that Australian Francophiles get such limp, lifeless fluff like Le Chef. So often these frothy French tales of (apparent) swoony romance are called “soufflés” for the way they remain lighter than air, except in this case the soufflé is flavourless and deflates in an instant. Even its bland, innocuous title seems disinterested and we haven’t even gotten to the actors, the editing, the writing, the… well, you get the picture.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Review: Rock of Ages

Rock of Ages

Dir. Adam Shankman

Country: USA

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 123mins

Will you wanna put another dime in the box office, or ask for a refund? It’s inevitable that the latest all-singing-sorta-all-dancing extravaganza from Adam Shankman (Hairspray), Rock of Ages, based upon the 2006 Broadway musical of the same name, will get compared to Glee – what with them sharing an affinity for bright-eyed moppets singing songs in squeaky, polished voices – but this being a big screen event audiences should be hoping for something more. More is certainly what they get, whether that’s any good…

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Review: Take This Waltz

Take This Waltz

Dir. Sarah Polley

Country: Canada

Aus Rating: MA15+

Running Time: 116mins

Cinema has taught us that it’s always the quiet ones that are most dangerous. That’s certainly the case for the seemingly unsuspecting Take This Waltz, a sunny dramedy that lulls its viewers with pseudo quirks, but which actually hides an altogether terrifying dead heart that clubs viewers over the head with its nauseating examination of an insufferable, unhappy woman. Oh sure, Hollywood can throw any number of whiz-bang special effects at me, but nothing in Battleship was as offensive as the dialogue in Take This Waltz. “I’m afraid of connections”, says Michelle Williams’ Margot as she strains to hide the metaphor in her ramblings. She’s afraid of airport connections, you see, but just try listening to that scene and not want to vomit from how obvious it reads. “I’m afraid of being… in between.” Oh please.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Review: Mabo

Mabo

Dir. Rachel Perkins

Country: Australia

Aus Rating: PG

Running Time: 103mins

Aboriginal history holds a vital position amongst the Australian film landscape. Movies that deal with the first Australians and their modern day descendants are frequently amongst the strongest that this country produces, and their makers are some of the absolute finest this land has to offer. One just has to think of Warwick Thornton’s Samson & Delilah, Ivan Sen’s Beneath Clouds, Rachel Perkins’ Radiance, or many others to see that these stories are special and their storytellers are gifted individuals. ABC’s telemovie, Mabo, is no difference, but while it never reaches the cinematic heights of its big screen cousins, this wonderfully acted and superbly designed television feature is a strong piece of work from its makers. It’s fitting timing, too, on the 20-year anniversary that this fine film should come into our homes.

Read the rest at Onya Magazine
Those who are interested, Mabo airs tonight on ABC1 at 8.30.

Weirdly Weird

This morning I read a nicely put piece on the issue of "weird for weirdness' sake" that argues people who make such complains about certain films are using a film's very unique quality as a scapegoat for their inability to like a film. I've seen films that are weird and liked them, and I've seen films that are weird and disliked them, but while I can sometimes understand a person's misgivings over a film due to some impenetrable oddness, I also don't think it's a filmmaker's responsibility to be coherent when they're not working in a familiar wheelhouse. Personally, I think to say a film by David Lynch is "weird for weirdness' sake" is to, quite frankly, not be paying any attention whatsoever, but I can certainly see where somebody could find his variety of weird cinema unpalatable. There's a big difference between personally not liking it and thinking the director has nothing to say. This all ties nicely together with a double feature that I attended this last past week of Alejandro Jodorowsky films at The Astor Theatre.

I'd never seen any of this famed Mexican director's work before, so the chance to his two most famous titles together on the big screen in 35mm prints was one I wasn't going to pass up (it meant skipping the press screening of Jennifer Westfeldt's Friends with Kids that I'm not terribly upset about). I had heard much about Jodorowsky's famed 1970 cult breakthrough, El Topo, but I know now that one can never know what to expect. If I see any of this man's other work I certainly won't make the mistake of thinking I know what I'm getting myself in for It's history as one of the original "midnight movies" was a definite lure, and in that regard I am certainly glad I got the chance to see it (one can't have an opinion on a film without actually see it, no matter what the internet tells us these days), but I can't say I enjoyed the film too much. Yes, it's quite strange, but it's strangeness isn't particularly interesting or portrayed in any visually arresting manner. The film's second half, with its exploitation of disfigured incest victims featuring quite prominently alongside its heavy religious iconography, proved to be a further tedious excursion into a rather uninteresting world that Jodorowsky had crafted. I'm sure Jodorowsky was going for something, but what that something was remains a mystery to me, hidden by laboured storytelling and an excessive run time.

Technically there's skill there, no doubt. I found particular fascination within the soundtrack that Jodorowsky constantly fills with noise despite the barren landscapes. Whether its an army of clucking chickens, gusty winds, mulling goats and the like, the speakers are certainly working overtime when other aspects are not. I got a kick out of the costume design by Jodorowsky himself that I could see had influenced the likes of Tarsem Singh's The Fall. Sadly, I found the film just never went anywhere potent enough to justify its crude stylistic flourishes and disturbing imagery.


The second feature, The Holy Mountain, on the other hand, was an entirely different experience. Dealing with a lot of the same issues as El Topo with its frequently confronting religious imagery and weird segues, I was instantly taken by it unlike its predecessor. The Holy Mountain was, I was surprised to discover, the next feature of Jodorowsky's career. A surprise because it feels like a rapid maturation and major advancement over the sloppy El Topo, but also because it proved that it wasn't just my distinct lack of pharmaceutical aid during the screening of El Topo that made me not enjoy it. The Holy Mountain is an awe-inspiring step for Jodorowsky and one that left me in a constant state of slack-jawed admiration. With its clean, assured direction, phenomenal art direction (truly some of the best I have ever seen), absurd imagery, bonkers descent into comedic oddity, and endlessly fascinating mythology I was entranced by The Holy Mountain.


I was disturbed, as one should be, by the very real animal cruelty as well as the questionable prepubescent child nudity and irksome representation of gay figures (all of which were also found within El Topo, and I suspect his later works, too), but at least this third feature of his came accompanied with such a strong, stylistic vision that I found it less troublesome. For the first hour, certainly, I just couldn't keep my eyes off of the screen as Jodorowsky threw dazzling image after dazzling image at me. From the opening scene of a robed man performing a religious act upon two women in a sterile white and black room I was hooked. I don't really know what any of it means, but I was fascinated nonetheless. Pockets of people amongst the audience were chuckling away at the odd imagery - the toad city for instance - but I mostly sat there with my serious face on, soaking it all in. This was powerful stuff and I was determined to not let Jodorowsky's obvious nods to El Topo's pot-headed legacy get in the way. Of course, by the time one character started humping a mountainside, followed by what can only be described as "tiger tits", something in my brain snapped. I ended up cackling for several minutes straight and then at frequent intervals thereafter until the ending. Oh, that ending? Yeah. Wow. I can't even, ya know? I don't even want to know what the director was smoking when he planned out The Holy Mountain. Something dangerous, no doubt. It's of little surprise that John Lennon and Yoko Ono helped finance the picture, also.


These two films seem like excellent mirrors to any debate about "weird for weirdness' sake". Both are weird, sure, but I found only The Holy Mountain did it in the context of a film with the gravity and the scope to give the impression of having a deeper meaning. In contrast, El Topo felt like little more than shenanigans. Even if I didn't entirely get what it was all about, it's a film of truly epic visual power - visuals that took my breath away - and one that really can't imagine experiencing on a small screen. Thank god The Astor Theatre (once again), hey?

Review: Persecution Blues: The Battle for The Tote

Persecution Blues: The Battle for The Tote

Dir. Natalie van den Dungen

Country: Australia

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 57mins

The sub-sub-genre of Melbourne social activism documentaries is certainly one that has sprung up with a vengeance within the local filmmaking community. Empowered by the ease with which these films can be built from the ground up thanks to affordable equipment, eager participants and built in audiences (at least at film festivals) make them an exciting prospect. While I wasn’t a fan of Rosie Jones’ The Triangle Wars, which blandly detailed the fight of rich NIMBYs against a new shopping complex on the St Kilda foreshore, there are others on the horizon that aim to put the spotlight on local institutions in trouble from becoming obsolete. With Natalie van den Dungen’s Persecution Blues: The Battle for The Tote we get a peek into the final days of a building that would come to symbolise an over-zealous government’s reactionary policies that are harming what gives this city its pulse.

Read the rest at Onya Magazine

Review: Bel Ami

Bel Ami

Dir. Donnellan & Ormerod

Country: UK

Aus Rating: MA15+

Running Time: 105mins

Bel Ami has an identity crisis: is it a frilly, comedic period piece romp about a dashing young upstart forced to choose between the love of an impish woman his own age or the giddy older lady who was instantly smitten?; or, is it a dramatic period romance about a motivated young upstart who woos a married woman to make a better life for himself, all whilst participating in a game of political class warfare? By the end credits it was still hard to tell. With two credited directors (Declan Donnellan and Nick Ormerod), two editors (Gavin Buckley and Masahiro Hirakubo), two music composers (Rachel Portman and Lakshman Joseph de Saram), plus a history of a revolving door casting (Nicole Kidman was cast, but subsequently dropped out) just make Bel Ami’s duel personalities a glaring problem and one that the film never recovers from.

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Review: Iron Sky

Iron Sky

Year: 2012

Country: Finland/Australia/Germany

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 93mins

Never again will you be able to say that nobody ever made a movie about Nazis living on the moon who then return to Earth and joined forces with a Sarah Palin-esque politician before waging intergalactic war. No you certainly cannot because Iron Sky is here and after years of development, crowd-sourced funding, and even filming just up north in Queensland, this comical sci-fi spoof is here on the big screen. How it conjured up a theatrical release I’m not too sure, but there it is in its entire goofy, oddball, space opera glory.

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Ten Homomoments in Vision Quest

Harold Becker's 1985 coming-of-age drama, Vision Quest, must have been a beacon for young gay men. Well, obviously apart from the scene where Matthew Modine discusses wanting to become a gynaecologist so he can "look inside a woman and find the power they have over me", which is just not really dialogue I'd expect to hear in any movie. Still, I can only imagine what it must have been like to be 16 and gay in 1985 and watching Vision Quest. No doubt there were fuzzy VHS copies in high circulation for the second half of the 1980s from all the pausing and rewinding. Teenagers will take anything they can get, haven't you heard? I know that I'm doing little to distinguish myself from the 16-year-old me of ten years ago to the 26-year-old me of today by snickering and giggling at a high school wrestling movie, but it's hard not to when the movie in question is just so out there.

10. Gay tai chi
Oh look, a gay panic scene! Louden Swain (how's that for a character name?), the hunky high school wrestler, gets groped by a patron at his work whilst being taught how to perform tai chi (yeah... it was the '80s, I guess) and he goes bolting outta the room and performs pushups (yeah... I have no reasoning for that). Still, before it leaves too bitter of a taste in the mouth, it's followed by a scene where Louden and his buddy (Michael Schoeffling as Kuch) talk about it in such nonchalant manner that it becomes almost comical.

9. Gay-baiting teenage boys
Do teenage boys really talk like this? Did they ever? If you're having a war of words with a guy at your school, would you tell the other "I'll give ya something to blow" whilst grabbing your crotch? Or are straight male teenagers only afraid of being the "bottom" of a gay joke? Still, Louden's retort of "First ya gotta find it, airhead" is both glorious and gloriously '80s. "Airhead" - not enough uses of that word in this day and age.

8. Jake Ryan
Not gonna lie: I spent a large chunk of Vision Quest's exceedingly lengthy runtime imagining this as a gay romance film about Matthew Modine and Michael Schoeffling (aka Jake Ryan himself) with Linda Fiorentino and nothing more than the sass-mouthin' best friend who ends up with the geek who has been in love with her for the whole film, but whom she kept ignoring. It was still about wrestling though. Sexy gay wrestling.


7. This:
"The girl of my dreams lives under the same roof, I see her every day, but she thinks I'm a kid, immature, a dumb jock, all of which is more or less true ... She's wonderful. She's got all the best things I like in girls and all the best things I (pause) like in guys."

6. Madonna and a gym workout
Yes, Madonna's "Crazy For You" plays over a scene where Louden lifts weights. So motivating, you guys! I presume the sauna is is that-a-way. :/

5. Forrest Whitaker as "Balldozer"
Need I say more?

Okay, I will. He's not even in the movie at all. I was surprised to find him listed amongst the cast with an actual character name. He has only one line of dialogue (that I noticed) and does nothing of any importance whatsoever to the plot so why they went and named him "Balldozer" instead of "Chris" or what have you I haven't the foggiest idea of. Still, it's amusing to see him in there. You can glimpse him in the first small image of #3.

4. Frank Jasper as "Brian Shute"
Ahem.

Ahem.

No, but seriously, I'm always surprised by American high school movies where all the guys are big and bulky like this. My guess from what I've seen of it from television and movies is that it is because the American school system puts such a high esteem on sports, and especially sports that requite size like wrestling or NFL what with scholarships and all that, plus there being a general larger amount of sports to persue that are lucrative (baseball for instance). Growing up in Geelong and attending a fairly normal high school, students were into sports, but unless there was a career in it it wasn't anything that was taken all that seriously. Nothing like Friday Night Lights or this that I'm aware of, but then maybe I just wasn't paying attention. That or my school just wasn't known for its athletic champions. Plus, if you do want a career in sport it's generally AFL and that leans less on massive muscles and size like, say, NFL. Anyway. It's nice to look at and maybe high school wouldn't have been so bad if there were gratuitous somethin' somethin's like this here Brian Shute. Also: teehee, "Shute".

One more? Okay!

Could they film him taking off that top any slower? Also, he attends Hoover High!

3. All of this:
Actually, it's not just Brian Shute up there that gets his body lovingly stroked by the camera, but eventually the entire wrestling team!

I'm sure this is all very true to life of high school wrestling - and, hey, they all have good bodies so they really shouldn't suffer from the same body issues as the rest of us - but that still doesn't make it any less surprising to see it put up on the screen in an otherwise innocuous teen drama. It bathes in skin and I'm sure many a viewer was all the more thankful for it.




And what do they do after he weighs in at the correct number whilst still standing there stark naked? Grab him and slap him around as congratulations, naturally.

Let the man get some jocks on, yeah? That locker room doesn't exactly look warm and inviting now does it?

2. Ain't love grand?
Wrestling is a very homoerotic sport, isn't it? All the scenes of actual wrestling in Vision Quest look like they could be from an athletics themed porno. Yes, yes, aren't I childish, but really... the people who invented the rules of this game shouldn't have made mounting the arse of an opponent as one of the positions one must pose. It's no wonder there are all those pictures out there of male wrestlers succumbing to the wills of their body's functions when there's so much, well, wrestling going on. Jeepers!



1. Madonna
Vision Quest? Vision QUEEN. Er...



It's as if the director just knew that both his film and the then 25-year-old singer hired to sing during one seemingly insignificant scene were destined for gay icon status. Madonna's brief cameo appearance as a bar singer who performs two tracks (the uptempo "Gambler" and slow, synth-driven ballad "Crazy For You") propelled the film to international recognition, something an American film about high school wrestling would never have been expected to do. The movie was, in fact, retitled to Crazy for You in Australia and the UK amongst others as a means of capitalising on the huge success of the titular song. "Crazy for You" went to number one in Australia and the USA and "Gambler" reached the top ten here and in the UK so it makes sense. Still, "Crazy for You" is iconic and something of an anthem and it fits into Vision Quest with ease, and I remember the video clip so well with its intercuts of Vision Quest. I surprise myself by having taken this long to actually get around to watching it. "Gambler" is considered more of a cult fan favourite than one of Madonna's most mainstream, well-known tracks so I guess it's fitting that it appears in a movie that is also considered a cult favourite in certain circles.

So, basically, Vision Quest is really, really gay whether you giggle at the homo moments of the wrestling or not. Not sure how many high school sporting movies were including gay references so willy nilly (granted, most are derogatory, but the fact that the lead character shrugs them off seems quite interesting). The film really isn't all that, but it has its moments. It's no Bring It On, but it's about as good as Stick It.