WFF 2004: Thursday Night Round-Up

Well, the 6th annual Wisconsin Film Festival kicked off yesterday afternoon with it's traditional opening event, a higher profile version of the Film Studies weekly colloquium. This time it was a short, yet rambling, presentation by noted film historian Douglas Gomery, on the subject of film festivals and independent cinema. Didn't learn much; surprise, surprise, film festivals are often driven by tourist and economic concerns, etc. The big news, David Bordwell is apparently retiring, so the entire presentation was peppered with asides praising the brilliancy of David Bordwell. Get a room, Gomery (just kidding)!

I'd barely just arrived at the presentation, there was a snafu with my tickets which I had to get resolved first. Plus, if you haven't heard already, I'm covering the festival for Flak Magazine, so I also got to pick up my press credentials. Now I got me a shiny, laminated pass that hangs around my neck; I feel like Homer Simpson. Hmm, maybe I should use the lady's room, "All Access..."

Lucky I had the pass, because the biggest ticket package that the festival offered was for 16 programs and I had scheduled 17. I usually make a point to include some programs by both Wisconsin and avant-garde filmmakers (though some fit into both categories, it's killing two birds with one stone), and this festival was no different. I attended the "Wisconsin Own Shorts I: Documentary, Experimental, Narrative," program, a collection of 7 short films, ranging in length from 4 minutes to 32 minutes, all by filmmakers who were either born in Wisconsin or attended school here. Among the selections, were a short, rough hewn documentary about a drug-addicted drifter, a rather weird self-described "eco-fable," a short portion of a future PBS documentary on Wisconsin-born poet Lorine Niedecker, and a slickly professional noirish film about a female investigator spying on an cheating, yet abused, wife. There were three particularly notable entries in the program:


*Not Color Blind, Just Near-Sighted (d. Aaron Greer) - A short video piece that points out the absurdism of categorizing people by color, it is based on the director's real life experiences at the Alabama DMV. Greer, who is biracial, is faced with a mini-existenstial crisis when the state only allows the choices of "W," "B", "H", or "X" (for foreigners) for racial classification. Despite being motivated by anger, the video is playful and ironic, playing with ability to digitally manipulate video color. Eventually, after hemming and hawing, Greer comes to an expertly timed conclusion, "Fuck It, I'm Honeydew..."

*Old Night (d. Molly M. Mann) - A beautiful example of stop motion animation, shot in 35mm, in a 1.85:1 frame. Mann, using what appears to be construction paper cut-outs, creates a gothic and haunting atmosphere. A man, who emerges from a pool of water, finds a lost love and dances the night away in an abandoned mansion, before disappearing in the water again.

*I'm Bobby (d. Xav Laplae) - I kind of had some trepidation before viewing this film, as I disliked the director's last feature, The Foreigners, which I saw at the 2002 WFF (remember that one McBain?). Still, this one was much, much better, an entertaining, and faithful (despite it?s truncated 32 minute running time, compared to the original three hours) recreation of Raj Kapur's famous 1973 Bollywood film Bobby. The whole thing is rather absurd, as the filmmakers use streetchildren from Bombay and Goa, often in ridiculous wigs and early 70s sunglasses, to recreate key moments from the film, all of which is badly lip synched to Bobby's original soundtrack. Even more bizarre, problems with the authorities forced the filmmakers off the streets, so they completed the story with crudely animated, and frankly, kind of creepy, paper-cut outs, filmed in their hotel rooms (other, more technically challenging parts of the film, were actually filmed in the Bombay studio system). It took me about five minutes before I realized that I've actually seen Bobby over three years ago. I'm not exactly sure what the point of the film was, other than a loving tribute to a Bollywood classic, but it sure was entertaining.

The other program (the Thursday night program is composed of two blocks) that I attended was a screening of festival favorites Chris Smith, Sarah Price (directors of American Movie, btw Mark Borchardt and Mike Schank were in attendance), and Dan Ollman's new documentary The Yes Men, a comical portrait of the anti-WTO activists also known as "The Yes Men." After operating a satirical WTO parody site (www.gatt.org), the Yes Men were invited to several conferences by confused organizers as actual representatives of the WTO . There they lampooned WTO policy with increasingly outrageous, yet mock-serious, riffs on globalization policy. Though it's pretty much preaching to the choir, The Yes Men is a consistently playful and hilarious look at these merry pranksters, who manage to hoodwink just about everyone (it's actually kind of disturbing to see how these corporate managers seem nonplussed by these absurd stunts, such as controlling workers with electroshocks or selling US Presidential votes), before turning relatively serious at the end. Look for the film to be released by United Artists in August (I've got more to say about the film, but I'm going to reserve it for my Flak Magazine review, but if anyone has questions, I'll answer them in comments).

The festival starts today at 5pm. Here is my schedule for the rest of the festival:

Friday, April 2nd
5pm - Angel on the Right (d. Djamshed Usmonov, 2002, Tajikistan/France)
7pm - Me and My White Pal (d. S. Pierre Yameogo, 2003, Burkina Faso/France)
9:30pm - Goodbye, Dragon Inn (d. Tsai Ming-liang, 2003, Taiwan)
11:30pm - PTU (d. Johnny To, 2003, Hong Kong/China)

Saturday, April 3rd
11am - The Watershed (d. Mary Trunk, 2003, USA)
12:45pm - Patriot's Day (d. Marian Marzynski, 2003, USA)
3pm - Eyes Without a Face (d. George Franju, 1959, France)
5:30pm - S21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine (d. Rithy Panh, 2003, Cambodia/France)
7:15pm - Forget Baghdad (d. Samir, 2002, Switzerland)
9:30pm - Khorma (d. Jilani Saadi, 2002, Tunisia/France)
11:30pm - Ju-On: The Grudge (d. Takashi Shimizu, 2002, Japan)

Sunday, April 4th
The Price of Freedom (d. Bruce Norfleet, 2002, USA) & Human Shield (d. Debra Hussong, 2003, USA)
Since Otar Left (d. Julie Bertuccelli, 2003, France)
Last Life in the Universe (d. Pen-ek Ratanaruang, 2003, Thailand)
Sumo East & West (d. Ferne Pearlstein, 2003, USA)

Anyone interested in learning more can take a glance at the WFF website.

Personal Plea

Just a quick plea to anyone who likes quality television. Check out the FOX series Wonderfalls, which recently moved to Thursday nights at 9pm EST. Its quirky, in the best sense of the word, well-written, intelligent, and funny. And of course, its ratings are very, very low. Please give it a try before its too late.
Posted By Anonymous at 11:23:00 AM 0 comments

 
Best Actress in a Leading Role

And the Droogie goes to.... Uma Thurman for Kill Bill: Vol. I, with a whopping 25 points. Uma's win came as no surprise to this vote-counter. Of the 15 ballots submitted, Uma's name appeared on 12 of them. Congratulations, Ms. Thurman. Those great roles are going to start pouring in now.

The runners-up in the Best Actress in a Leading Role category are: Keisha Castle-Hughes for Whale Rider with 16 points; Zooey Deschanel for All the Real Girls and Charlize Theron for Monster, tied with 15 points each; Samantha Morton for In America with 7 points; and Naomi Watts for 21 Grams with 4 points.

But here at Milk Plus, they're all winners! Thanks to everyone who nominated and voted, and thank you copywright for reposting the nominees last week when I was languishing in The Land Without Internet.

Posted By stennie at 5:49:00 PM 0 comments

 
The winner of the Droogies for Best Actress in a Supporting Role is: Miranda Richardson, in Spider, with 21 points.

Runners up: Shohreh Aghdashloo (House of Sand and Fog), and Holly Hunter (Thirteen), both with 17 points.

Other nominees:
Sarah Bolger (In America): 8 points
Patricia Clarkson (The Station Agent): 7 points

Also, here are the shortlist tallies for this category, from the nominations process (I hadn't posted them earlier, so as not to sway the voting):

Aghdashloo, Shohreh, in House of Sand and Fog: 12 points
Bolger, Sarah, in In America: 9 points
Clarkson, Patricia, in The Station Agent: 8 points
Hunter, Holly, in Thirteen: 14 points
Richardson, Miranda, in Spider: 18 points

The winner of the Droogies for Best Screenplay is: Lost in Translation, written by Sofia Coppola, which garnered 22 points.

Runners up: All the Real Girls (screenplay: David Gordon Green; story: Paul Schneider); and Bad Santa (written by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa), both films with 16 points.

Other nominees:
In America: 9 points
Kill Bill, vol. 1: 14 points
Whale Rider: 3 points.

Also, as promised, the point tallies for these Screenplay shortlist titles earlier, during the nominations process:
All the Real Girls: 9
Bad Santa: 27
In America: 8
Kill Bill: vol 1: 15
Lost in Translation: 21
Whale Rider: 8

Very many thanks to everyone who took part in the nominations and voting for these two categories!

- copywright.

Posted By CCP at 5:49:00 PM 0 comments

 

Well, here we go...

Best Foreign Droogies:

Tied for fourth place with 7 points... Divine Intervention and Whale Rider

In third place with 14 points... Whale Rider

In second place with 17 points... Dracula

And the winner, with 23 points....

Irreversible

Boy, someone has some 'splainin' to do.

Posted By Lady Wakasa at 5:49:00 PM 0 comments

 
2003 Droogies: Best Cinematography (a.k.a. Gimme Dat Envelope Already)

And the winner is....

HARRIS SAVIDES, for "Gerry"! [Insert applause.]

Here's the breakdown for those who care about these kinds of things:

Savides: 23 votes (6 first-place votes)
Robert Richardson (Kill Bill, Vol. 1): 19 votes (2 first-place votes)
Lance Acord (Lost in Translation): 19 votes (2 first-place votes)
Everyone and their mother (Winged Migration): 13 votes (2 first-place votes)
Eduardo Serra (Girl with a Pearl Earring): 11 votes (3 first-place votes)

So, what does it say about us that our only nominee to also pull down an Oscar nod finishes dead last?
Posted By Steve C. at 5:43:00 PM 0 comments

 
2003 Droogies - Best Director. And the Winner Is...

Well, I'll get this party started with the winner of the 2003 Droogie for Achievement in Motion Picture Directing. The winner of the Best Directing Droogie goes to....

Quentin Tarantino for Kill Bill, Vol. I, who takes the cake with 23 points.

Since I ain't Price Waterhouse, here is how the other nominees faired:

Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation - 17 points
David Gordon Green, All the Real Girls - 14 points
Gus Van Sant, Gerry - 11 points
Gaspar Noe, Irreversible - 11 points
Posted By Anonymous at 4:43:00 PM 0 comments

 

Question of the Week

In the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, much of the action takes place within the mind of it's central character, thus joining a long tradition that stretches back to the early years of film history. From the avant-garde to mainstream Hollywood, film has a long history of depicting mental processes or expression, whether literally within the psychic space of the mind, or in surreal intrusions into the waking world. In honor of the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, I ask the following question:

Name a film or television series (wouldn't want alienate any Twin Peaks fans out there) that literally depicts some sort of mental process or expression. Describe how the film depicts the mental process or expression, and why the film is so effective in doing so.

As usual, this question is open to all Milk Plus members and readers. Feel free to answer the question as many times as you wish, but I ask that you do not duplicate answers, though feel free to discuss other's choices and explanations.
Posted By Anonymous at 3:38:00 PM 0 comments

 
Absolute, total, 100-percent must reading for Kubrick fans.
Posted By Unknown at 2:53:00 PM 0 comments