apr 14 + 17 | wizard of oz

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mar 30 + apr 3 | ten commandments

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criterion 50% sale | ends tue 9am pacific time

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Promo Code = FLASHY

Here's a batch of Soul Food picks you might want to check out.  Many favourites here...

Au Hasard Balthazar $15
Andrei Rublev $20
Ikiru $20 / $10
Close-Up $20
Days of Heaven $20
George Washington $20
Day Of Wrath / Ordet  $40
Man Escaped $15 / $20
Metropolitan $20
Last Days Of Disco $20
La Promesse $15 / $20
Last Temptation of Christ $40
Night of the Hunter $20 / $25
On The Waterfront $20 / $25
Wings of Desire $20
Vanya on 42nd Street $15 / $20
Paisan / Rome Open City $40
Seventh Seal $15 / $20
Passion of Joan of Arc $20
Flowers of St Francis $15
Au Revoir les Enfants $15 / $20
Last Wave $15
Les Miserables $20
The Idiot (Kurosawa) $35
Homicide $20
Leon Morin, Priest $20
La Strada $15 / $20
King Of Kings $20
Androcles & The Lion / Major Barbara $22.50
Through A Glass Darkly / Winter Light / The Silence $40
Solaris $15 / $20
Magnificent Obsession $20
12 Angry Men $15 / $20
The Quatsi Trilogy: Koyaanisqatsi / Powaqqatsi / Naqoyqatsi $40
Make Way For Tomorrow $15

magdalene / silent night

IMDb: Father Joseph Mohr, a newly appointed priest in the town of Oberndorf (near Salzburg), meets the beautiful prostitute Magdalene. He struggles to change her situation and make a new life for her, and while doing so, they fall in love. Mohr struggles with his feelings for her, versus his commitment to God. Meanwhile, the Prior, Mohr's superior, whose corrupt dealings with the Baron von Seidl are threatened by Mohr's integrity and honesty, works (unsuccessfully) to falsely accuse Mohr of sexual misconduct with Magdalene, and thereby remove him from office. Meanwhile, Mohr and local schoolteacher Franz Gruber compose the hymn "Silent Night".

1989, Germany
Writer/Director: Monica Teuber
Cast: Nastassja Kinski

 There's a trailer you can view here. At least for marketing purposes, it seems they've chosen to downplay the "this is how the beloved Christmas hymn came to be written," and emphasize certain other aspects of their story.

The Wrong Man (1956, Hitchcock, Maxwell Anderson)

I just watched The Wrong Man. Very fine little film. My friend Doug Cummings recommended it to me years ago, in the context of my Soul Food Movies project, and now I see why.

 Even apart from that aspect of the film, it connects with me in a way some other Hitchcock's don't: it seems less cold, more compassionate (or at least empathetic). I like the aesthetic, too: there is the suggestion that it's influenced by the new awareness of foreign film in the mid-fifties - particularly the post-war realism of Rossellini, Satyajit Ray, perhaps Bresson.

 I find it intriguing to notice that all three of those film-makers were very interested in spiritual questions, even as their aesthetic emphasized unvarnished reality.  And fascinating that this sparse, essentially realist film should also be Hitchcock's most explicitly religious - though in a complex way.

Some of that faith element must be credited to the screenwriter (which is so often a glaring oversight in film criticism): playwright Maxwell Anderson, son of a Baptist preacher, whose plays include Journey To Jerusalem, Miracle of the Danube, The Eve of St Mark, Joan of Lorraine (connected with St Joan of Arc), and Lost in the Stars (based on Cry The Beloved Country).

It's easy to over-emphasize (or over-simplify) Hitchcock's Catholicism, as it is Anderson's Baptist background, but there's clearly something going on here.

*

Thinking about the film's connection to the Italian Neo-Realists or Robert Bresson, and their use not only of real locations but also non-professional actors (or "models," Bresson's preferred term), I found these notes from the TCM website:

In a February 1957 American Cinematographer article, Hitchcock was quoted as saying, "I want it to look like it had been photographed in New York in a style unmistakably documentary." According to reviews and contemporary news items, Balestrero's 74th Street home in Jackson Heights, the Stork Club, the 110th and Roosevelt Avenue police stations, Ridgewood Felony Court, and the actual courtroom used for Balestrero's trial at Queens Felony Court were used as location sites in the film. The Greenmont Sanitarium in Ossining, NY and Edelweiss Farm in Cornwall, NY were also real locations from Balestrero's story. In addition, Hitchcock filmed on Queens and Brooklyn streets at cafeterias, delicatessens and liquor stores. The American Cinematographer article reported that O'Connor's office in the Victor Moore Arcade was also used as a shooting site.

According to modern sources, Hitchcock joked that he needed to add to the film all the reality he could get, because the premise of the true story was so unbelievable. Therefore, he used real people from some of the incidents in Balestrero's life in the film. According to the American Cinematographer article, the husband-and-wife liquor store owners, a policeman, detectives and Cornwall resort owners were real people who portrayed themselves in the film. Sherman Billingsley, the well-known proprietor of the Stork Club, also appeared as himself in the film.

jan 31 + 16 | vertigo

Good choice, Cineplex. The movie that bumped Citizen Kane from top slot on the Sight & Sound once-a-decade poll, just this past summer. Makes me eager to see it again.

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nov 12 | big easy express | mumford & sons

Lots of Soul Food in Mumford & Sons. 
Roll away your stone, I'll roll away mine
Together we can see what we will find...
Cause you told me that I would find a hole
Within the fragile substance of my soul
And I have filled this void with things unreal...
It seems that all my bridges have been burnt
But you say that's exactly how this grace thing works
It's not the long walk home that will change this heart
But the welcome I receive with the restart
Here's a movie they're in.

BIG EASY EXPRESS
VanCity Theatre
Mon Nov 12, 8:50pm
(2012, USA, Emmett Malloy) 67 min

3 bands, 6 cities, 1 train, and thousands of miles of track… the Big Easy Express documents a cinematic musical journey. Directed by renowned filmmaker Emmett Malloy (The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights) this new film captures indie folk heroes Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, Tennessee’s Old Crow Medicine Show, and Britain’s acclaimed Mumford & Sons, as they embark on a beautiful vintage train in California, setting out for New Orleans, Louisiana on a “tour of dreams”. The resulting film from this journey is nothing short of magical. “An infectiously joyful account of a whistle-stop tour…” Variety “Full of warmth, good music and good vibes that will make you feel like a part of the party while sad that you missed it.” MTV News "Scintilating." Hollywood Reporter

the wrong man | richard brody

Richard Brody:
"In some ways, the Hitchcock film for people who don’t like Hitchcock films.
The Kafkaesque nightmare of a man who has done nothing wrong, and yet who finds himself caught in a seemingly inextricable web of trouble.
For all of its meticulous practicality, the ultimate subject of the film is metaphysical. Fate, and even God, seem to have conspired against this man. He may be innocent of the crimes of which he is accused, but he's certainly guilty of something, and he becomes aware of it very quickly. Retracing his steps in the attempt to find an alibi forces him to look at his life with an exceptional care, and find all of his flaws exposed.
In the scene where he's taken to the station house and fingerprinted, the ink on his fingers looks to an innocent man like the presence of the mark of Cain."

 excerpted from Richard Brody's New Yorker piece on The Wrong Man (Alfred Hitchcock, 1956)

viff | soul food options

Lots of nuns and priests and contemptible Evangelicals, but maybe not too much Soul Food among the Religion, Spirituality & Myth selections in this year's VIFF online program guide. I've flagged...

Virgin Tales - "Supplies Evangelical Christians with just enough rope with which to hang themselves..."

Apparition - "About nuns in a cloister convent. We explore this closed world, riven by manias and secrets... Less interested in questions of faith than in the issue of good governance."

Beyond The Hills - "Alina comes apart at the psychological seams, leaving the monastery’s authoritarian priest convinced that she’s possessed..."

Actually, the last of those may go beyond the obligatory Bad Priest angle: "What is remarkable about Beyond the Hills and the unexpected interrogations it awakens is the lingering sense of doubt it leaves you with.  Not merely as to the virtues of organized religion - that would be too simple - but just as much the facile condemnation of it..." (Film Comment)

And while there's not a lot to go on, these two at least catch my curiosity...

Jesus Hospital - "about a woman torn between her comatose mother, her alienated family and her secretive religious beliefs."

Consuming Spirits - "Garrison Keillor-like radio broadcasts in the rundown community of Magguson... While these three central characters may be bound by tragedy, they also possess the capacity to grant one another absolution and release.... A transcendent closing chapter."

So far, though, none of the Soul Food buzz of many previous years - though the Vancouver premiere of Jason Goode's film Late is certainly cause for celebration among Soul Foodies. Other VIFFs have had two or three really exciting SF prospects - Son Of Man and The Mill & The Cross come to mind immediately - but nothing stands out so far in this year's line-up. That said, the most interesting films from a faith perspective often don't show up on the programmers' "Spirituality" list anyhow. A scan of Jewish Interest films may reveal more of interest, for example. But what's really needed is a film-by-film close reading of the full VIFF program. I'll let you know what I find. If you promise to return the favour.

viff | late | jason goode

There's a day this past spring that Jason Goode won't forget. He was at the Cannes Festival showing his latest film when he got word that he'd been nominated for a Jessie Richardson award for his first foray into stage directing, on DANNY & THE DEEP BLUE SEA at Pacific Theatre. The movie was the beautifully filmed, poetic short film LATE, part of Telefilm's "Perspective Canada" program promoting Canadian films at the prestigious international festival. 

LATE
Two strangers struggle for an honest connection in a chance, brief, encounter at a café. Screening as part of Heartbreak, a 75 minute program of short films that take a journey into the infinite — and intricate — depths of the human heart. Ben Cotton, Sarah Deakins, Lucia Frangione, Clint Bargen.

Oct 8 9:30pm | Empire Granville 2
Oct 9 4pm | Pacific Cinematheque

DIRECTOR: Jason Goode
EXEC PRODS Rosie Perera, Jeff Benna, Nick Brampton, Chris Hansen
PROD Dylan Jenkinson
SCR Sarah Deakins
CAM Chris Dalton
ED Greg Ng
Hope of Glory Pictures

books | the ethical vision of clint eastwood

This just in from IMAGE Update 

Though he may be controversial as a political personality, there is no doubt that Clint Eastwood is a film icon: a winner of five Academy Awards, five Golden Globes, and numerous other accolades for his work as an actor, director, producer, and composer. Yet few critics have ventured to consider Eastwood's philosophical, ethical, and artistic agenda the way film scholar Sara Anson Vaux has in The Ethical Vision of Clint Eastwood.

Bridging popular film and theology, Vaux traces Eastwood's career from Spaghetti Westerns and Dirty Harry-style shoot-em-ups to more recent films such as Million Dollar Baby, Gran Torino, and Invictus. "Seen along a forty-year continuum," Vaux writes, "Eastwood's movies reveal stages in an unfolding moral ontology—a sense of being in the world. They become more sophisticated and nuanced in tone and narrative exploration even if the basic motifs—justice, confession, war and peace, the gathering, and the search for a perfect world—remain the same throughout his career."

Vaux is also quick to refuse the temptation of Christian scholars (or any scholars of a particular camp) to dig through art for validation—for "endorsements of a particular religious system." The film analysis in her book is far from it. In four sections (Westerns, mysteries, war movies, and healing narratives), Vaux peels back the surface of Eastwood's films so the reader can see all the humming parts within: reccurring themes, camera techniques, Hollywood tricks and archetypes, critical reception, the whole shebang—and adds it all up to tell the story of the moral worldview that Eastwood has brought into the living rooms of millions of moviegoers.

This is a book for film critics and movie lovers, Clint Eastwood buffs and academics alike—a film-writing delight.

viff | beyond the hills

Could so easily be yet another "Catholic = bad" film. But the Film Comment comment suggests it's maybe more nuanced than that. Here's hoping.

Beyond the Hills
(După dealuri)
(Romania, France, Belgium, 2012, 152 mins, DCP)

Oct 09 10:30 am Granville 2
Oct 11 09:30 pm Granville 7

A nun is torn between her devotion to god and her loyalty to a lifelong companion in Cristian Mungiu’s riveting follow-up to 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days. "The increments with which the screws of tragedy turn are finely calibrated."--Sight & Sound. Winner, Best Actress (shared by leads Cosmina Stratan and Cristina Flutur), Best Screenplay, Cannes 2012.

After his race-against-the-calendar abortion thriller 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days, Cristian Mungiu employs a slow-burning brand of suspense in this riveting account of a nun torn between her devotion to god and her loyalty to a lifelong companion. Having found her calling at a remote Romanian monastery, Voichita (Cosmina Stratan) is taken aback by the arrival of Alina (Cristina Flutur), who insists that they flee to Germany together. When the devout nun demurs, Alina comes apart at the psychological seams, leaving the monastery’s authoritarian priest (Valeriu Andriuta) convinced that she’s possessed. As Aline’s rescue attempt cedes to the priest’s relentless efforts to save her soul, Mungiu’s technical brilliance transforms Beyond the Hills into an equally captivating and disconcerting experience. His masterful long takes not only draw us deeper into the women’s trials, they also leave us with no avenue of escape from the mounting tension of his latest provocative tragedy.

"A quintessentially praiseworthy festival film: weighty in intent, unfamiliar enough in setting, rigorously masterful in execution... But what is remarkable about Beyond the Hills and the unexpected interrogations it awakens is the lingering sense of doubt it leaves you with. Not merely as to the virtues of organized religion -- that would be too simple -- but just as much the facile condemnation of it... It is a work that forces you into the not entirely pleasant yet oddly rewarding territory of moral uncertainty."--Joumane Chahine, Film Comment

viff | virgin tales

The "just enough rope to hang themselves" inclines one to think this won't be exactly the "objective and measured examination" of the subject the blurb-writer advertises. But hey...

Virgin Tales
(France, Germany, Switzerland, 2012, 87 mins, HDcam)

Oct 04 06:00 pm Empire Granville 1
Oct 07 12:15 pm Empire Granville 5
Oct 12 03:15 pm Empire Granville 1

What little girl doesn’t grow up dreaming of attending a Purity Ball: a fairy-tale celebration that sees her don an immaculate gown, hang from her father’s arm and vow absolute celibacy until marriage? Created by Randy and Lisa Wilson in 1998, these elaborate (and unnerving) father-daughter formal events are now staged in 48 US states, with one-in-eight American girls taking a purity oath.

Visiting the Wilsons over the course of two years, documentarian Mirjam von Arx reveals them to be devotees of rituals: be it Randy’s verbose blessings, son Logan’s sword-and-scripture "manhood ceremony" or daughter Jordyn’s increasingly despondent video diaries. As her affirmations about "saying no for the greater yes" cede from righteous to rote, Jordyn emerges as a tragic figure. Ultimately, this objective and measured examination of the virtues of abstinence supplies Evangelical Christians with just enough rope with which to hang themselves...

"Von Arx manages to capture moments of pure gold--manufactured "heartfelt" confessions of familial love whose lack of spontaneity is called out by a particularly sassy daughter, or the revelation from the twenty-something daughter (who’s desperately still waiting for her husband to appear) that she didn’t go to college because it would be a "waste of money" since she just wants to be a wife and mother. If it wasn’t so infuriatingly real, the film would make for great comedy."--Basil Tsiokos, Indiewire

viff | apparition

Seems likely not to be Soul Food ("Sandoval is less interested in questions of faith than in the issue of good governance" - ooh, a civics lesson!), but one never knows...

Apparition
(Aparisyon)
(Philippines, 2012, 87 mins, Betacam SP)

Oct 09 05:00 pm Vancity Theatre
Oct 11 06:45 pm Pacific Cinematheque

A startling left-turn after Senorita (VIFF 11), Vincent Sandoval’s new film is about nuns in a cloister convent, like Powell and Pressburger’s Black Narcissus and Jacques Rivette’s La religieuse. It opens with a quote from Gramsci: “The old is dying and the new cannot be born. In this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appears.” We’re in 1971, and the largest morbid symptom around is Ferdinand Marcos’s play for greater political power, which occurs off-screen. But little of the outside world impinges on Adoration, a convent set in secluded woods outside Manila, which sees itself as a physical and spiritual sanctuary. We explore this closed world, riven by manias and secrets, through the eyes of Sister Lourdes, a newly arrived novice. She has hardly settled in before she learns that her activist brother is missing, presumed arrested... She finds ways to venture out to Manila, where a terrible fate awaits her.

Apparition obviously reflects the fact that the Philippines is a predominantly Catholic nation, thanks to its years as a Spanish colony, but Sandoval is less interested in questions of faith than in the issue of good governance. Adoration’s Mother Superior, Ruth, knows much more about what’s going on in the outside world than she lets on. Is she a kind of Marcos, imposing her own kind of martial law?

— Tony Rayns

viff | jesus hospital

Jesus Hospital
(South Korea, 2012, 91 mins, HDCAM)

Oct 03 09:30 pm Granville 1
Oct 05 03:30 pm Pacific Cinematheque

Remember Whang Jungmin, the doting girlfriend in Save the Green Planet? She’s equally great in this heartbreaker, co-directed by woman-and-man team Shin A-go and Lee Sangcheol, about a woman torn between her comatose mother, her alienated family and her secretive religious beliefs. Whang plays Hyunsoon, a milk-delivery woman who masks her own vulnerability behind bull-in-a-china-shop aggression. Her "issues" come to the surface when her brother and sister decide that they can no longer afford hospital bills--and authorize the doctors to withdraw life-support from their mother. Hyunsoon is outraged, and convinced that their mother can yet revive... The film tangles together familial, religious and moral questions in a satisfyingly complex knot. It’s engrossing, very well acted and as punchy as a heavyweight title bout. — Tony Rayns

viff | consuming spirits

It's not immediately apparent why this film is listed among the festival's Religion, Spirituality & Myth heading, but...  I'm intrigued.

Consuming Spirits
(USA, 2012, 130 mins, HDCAM)

Oct 05 08:30 pm Granville 5
Oct 07 05:00 pm Granville 6
Oct 10 09:15 pm Pacific Cinematheque

In this spiralling animated tale, the seemingly unrelated misadventures of three down-at-heel Rust Belt grotesques gradually entangle in a single affecting narrative. Twisting its way to a transcendent closing chapter, Consuming Spirits immerses viewers in an extraordinary viewing experience. Fifteen years in the making, Chris Sullivan’s bittersweet, handcrafted labour of love is truly something to behold.

During his ubiquitous Garrison Keillor-like radio broadcasts in the rundown community of Magguson, Earl Gray’s folksy musings routinely segue into bizarre digressions, capably setting the film’s unhinged tone. However, heed Gray when he advises, "Though I ramble… All that I say is vital." As we’re introduced to lonely Gentian Violet and emotionally damaged Victor Blue--this drama’s other key players--shards of narrative and slivers of flashbacks are assembled into a cracked-mirror reflection of small-town America. And while these three may be bound by tragedy, they also possess the capacity to grant one another absolution and release.

"The stand-out aspect of Chris Sullivan’s [film] is its insanely meticulous construction... The film seamlessly combines cutout animation, pencil drawing, collage, and stop-motion animation to create the haunting atmosphere of a self-contained world... What starts off as a collage of broken characters in perfect detail evolves into a carefully woven narrative, as delicately assembled as the pinned puppet characters. "--Priscilla Frank, Huffington Post

red hook summer

"Spike Lee’s new Brooklyn-set film, “Red Hook Summer,” which is about a boy from Atlanta who spends the hot months with his grandfather, is a clear failure, yet Lee is getting at things that mystify him. He celebrates the intense joy that religion brings to the community—and seems to be asking at the same time whether repeated, emotionally overwhelming professions of faith don’t reconcile people to stasis and failure. It’s a bitter question, but not many people working in movies would have the courage even to pose it."  new yorker

sep 19 | william kurelek | the maze | cinematheque

William Kurelek was a Canadian painter whose Christian faith survived severe childhood trauma and resulting mental illness. His Northern Nativity is a favourite of mine: the images can be seen in this YouTube video (though the music seems ill-suited to the spare images: I'd recommend turning off the volume).

William Kurelek’s The Maze
USA 1969/2011
Directors: Robert M Young, David Grubin [Re-imagined by Nick Young, Zack Young]
Colour, Blu-ray Disc. 60 mins.

Pacific Cinematheque
Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - 7:30pm

Canadian painter William Kurelek (1927-1977) may be best known for his beautiful illustrations of bucolic children’s classics (Who Has Seen the Wind?, A Prairie Boy’s Winter) and his landscapes of Ukrainian-Canadian prairie life, but it is his disturbing early work and difficult upbringing that is the subject of this intriguing documentary.

Born on a hardscrabble Alberta farm, the oldest of seven children of stern immigrant parents, the sensitive, artistic Kurelek was an outsider from an early age. Bullied at school and at home, especially by his fearsome father Dmytro, William left the farm as soon as he could. Settling in London in 1952, he sought help at the Maudsley Psychiatric Hospital, an institution at the forefront of the art therapy movement. Kurelek was provided not only with treatment but space in which to paint. He created terrifying works with nightmarish and surreal imagery reminiscent of Bosch and Bruegel — including, in 1953, “The Maze,” a depiction of his tortured youth.

In 1969, the award-winning American filmmaker Robert M. Young co-directed a short documentary on Kurelek and “psychotic art.” Using original interviews, a new score, and modern digital animation techniques to give Kurelek’s paintings dimension and movement, filmmakers Nick and Zack Young have remastered and expanded their father’s original film into a comprehensive and insightful portrait of the artist as a young man.

PS Van Halen used the painting for the album cover on Fair Warning (1981). There's a good article on that cover here. From that article...

"The vividly brutal imagery contained in “The Maze” is remarkably different from the paintings sequel, entitled “Out Of The Maze”, painted after the artist’s recovery. This second painting reflects a pastoral countryside, as well as an artist no longer as deeply disturbed, with his wife and children enjoying a happy family picnic. However, all is not as idyllic as a first glance might suggest. An empty, open skull in the bottom left hand corner is a reminder of the psychological prison from which the artist has escaped and the impending storm on the far right horizon hints at Kurelek’s premonition that the world was heading for a nuclear holocaust."

viff 2012 | beyond the hills

from Cannes...

BEYOND THE HILLS
(După dealuri)

Romania/France/Belgium | Dir: Cristian Mungiu

A nun is torn between her devotion to god and her loyalty to a lifelong companion in Cristian Mungiu’s riveting follow-up to 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days. "The increments with which the screws of tragedy turn are finely calibrated."—Sight & Sound.

Winner, Best Actress (shared by leads Cosmina Stratan & Cristina Flutur), Best Screenplay, Cannes 2012.


PS

Sept. 1 - Sneak Preview Guides Hit The Street
Sept. 10 - VIFF Advance Box Office Opens
Sept. 19 - VIFF Official Program Catalogue On Sale
Sept. 26 - VIFF Film + TV Forum Starts
Sept. 27 - VIFF Opens

living pictures passion play

Lancashire workers enjoy the ‘wakes week’ holiday in this early film from travelling filmmakers Mitchell & Kenyon.

This short film was screened up to 20 times a day in August 1901 to entertain the poorer children of Salford. The wakes week was an industrial holiday introduced in the 19th century, involving the annual closure of the workplace to allow for maintenance and leisure time for the workers. This unpaid seven–day holiday for the workers of Lancashire’s textile factories (the women workers are easily recognisable by their shawls) became a social custom. Leisure industries developed due to this increase in recreational time. Travelling fairs would visit during the wakes week to entertain the holidaymakers.

Sight & Sound

aug 17 + 18 | the mill & the cross | vancity

extraordinary soul food. previous post from viff 2011.

THE MILL AND THE CROSS

vancity  aug 17 8:45 | aug 18 6:45

Poland, 2011, 35mm, 92 min.
Directed by: Lech Majewski
Cast: Rutger Hauer, Charlotte Rampling, Michael York

With creative verve, historical knowledge and aesthetic and political insight Polish artist Lech Majewski brings Pieter Bruegel’s 1564 frieze, The Way to Calvary to life. Bruegel’s canvas transports Christ’s passion to rustic Flanders. It teems with the drama of everyday life. Using computer-generated blue-screen compositing, a massive backdrop painted by Majewski himself, and marshalling dozens of actors, animals and extras, the filmmaker explores this fixed moment inside and out. Among other things, the film is a dazzling tribute to the art of painting and a deft demonstration of the camera’s capacity for time-travel.

“Transfixing… an inspiring, alluring meditation about imagery and storytelling, the common coin of history, religion and art.” —Daniel M Gold, The New York Times

“Here is a film before which words fall silent… If you see no more than the opening shots you will never forget them… A film of great beauty and attention, and watching it is a form of meditation.” **** —Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

“A feat of artistry worthy of its source. Majewski takes us deep inside the Flemish’s master’s beautiful nightmare… A dazzling master class in visual composition… Coalesces into a surprisingly moving finale. After toil and terror, there can still be joy.” **** —Erik Hynes, Time Out New York

sight & sound | 2012 poll results

The top fifty, selected by 846 critics, academics, programmers and distributors. All the details on the once-a-decade poll can be found at the Sight & Sound website.

The big news: Citizen Kane drops from the Number One position for the first time since the inaugural 1952 poll, where the Orson Welles film wasn't among the top ten. Not a good day for Welles, with Touch Of Evil (formerly #15), The Magnificent Ambersons and The Third Man (formerly tied at #35) dropping right off the charts.

The last ten years have also been cruel to Ingmar Bergman. While Persona joins the party at #17, Wild Strawberries (#27 in 2002), and Fanny and Alexander and The Seventh Seal (previously tied at #35) have been frozen out completely. ("Fanny and Alexander and The Seventh Seal" - sounds like an adventure story for kids).

And these are the films that disappeared.

For the time being, only the top ten films of the Directors' poll are available. Again, Kane falls. The Godfather holds on better than in the Critics' poll. In general, the American auteurs of the seventies do well with this crowd: though Raging Bull dropped from the top ten, Taxi Driver and Apocalypse Now were added.

More to come;

Aug 3/4: August issue of Sight & Sound released in UK: complete list of 100 films

Aug 7: August issue available as digital download (Apple Newsstand)

Aug 15: complete critics’ poll of 846 entries in interactive form on S&S website

Aug 22: complete interactive directors’ poll online (358 entries) added

sight & sound | 2002 poll results

In about 15 minutes, Sight & Sound magazine will begin announcing the results of their once-a-decade poll of critics and directors - certainly the most significant of the cinephile lists (as opposed to more populist tallies such as IMDb).

 Advance word is that Citizen Kane has been dislodged from the top slot on one of the two lists - first time since the inaugural poll in 1952, where Kane didn't make the Top Ten.

Also worth keeping an eye on are the Godfather films: while "The Godfather and The Godfather II" placed high on both critics' and directors' polls, landing at the number three spot overall, it's hard to know how those votes were tallied. Some critics voted for the two films as a unit, others voted separately for the two films, and some voted for "The Godfather Trilogy." In 2012, the rules have been clarified: separate voting for each. Another factor is that the field of "voters" was expanded significantly this year, with 1000 critics invited to submit their lists, including many online critics not previously polled. Which bodes well for The Godfather. (And Star Wars...)

 Here's a rundown of how the films fared in the last poll (2002). I've combined the votes from critics and directors to see how the list would look without that distinction: the red and blue columns provide the placements on the two separate polls.

higher ground | carolyn s. briggs

Higher Ground is a 2011 film that examines a woman's experiences in a slightly-post-Jesus-People church community through the seventies and into the eighties. Extremely accurately, and I feel sympathetically, observed - enough so that if you've fled that world, it will push a lot of buttons, and if you're still in that world, it will push a lot of buttons, and if you've never gone near that world, these folks will just look like loonies. I don't think any of those responses is really intended: like the book it comes from, it's a memoir, and simply aims to portray a series of experiences. Maybe I was the perfect audience member:  I only ever visited that world, and have never really stopped visiting, so it didn't rile me up - I mostly marvelled at how much they got right, and how little they condescended.  The Carolyn S. Briggs memoir was originally titled "This Dark World," which was changed to tie in with the release of the film - which is currently showing on Canadian Netflix. 

Do you have any regrets in writing This Dark World?

Sure. I wish I would have allowed for more time to pass, so that my perspective cleared a bit. I regret the book was edited in such a way that I appear to have wholly rejected my faith—which I have not ever been able to do. In writing memoir, one tells one’s story, obviously, but one also tells other people’s stories who may not want their stories told—especially from someone else’s perspective. I have wrestled with this reality and continue to as the film is released.

Where are you with your faith right now?

I could not live in a world without God. And this God is big enough to contain my doubts. Tobias Wolff says doubt is part of faith. Doubt and faith can co-exist; each informs the other. My faith infuses my doubt and my doubt infuses my faith. What else can I do but keep seeking God? Tolstoy advised a life of seeking God because that assures a life with God.

Do you consider yourself a Christian?

I understand that Christian hipsters are using the hyphenated word Christ-follower these days. I’m too old and not cool enough to be a hipster, but I love that idea. I am striving, pressing on, working out my salvation in fear and trembling. I can’t think of anyone or anything better to follow than Jesus Christ.

I titled the screenplay Higher Ground because I wanted to show Corrine as a character reaching for God, reaching for higher ground throughout her life. As Vera says in interviews, Corrine is not leaving her faith. She is leaving an impoverished faith.

from Carolyn S. Briggs' website. 

watching for... into the abyss

July 2012: currently showing on Canadian Netflix

 

Nine years after the murder of three people in Montgomery, Texas, in 2001, Werner Herzog patiently but persistently interviewed the convicted killers, as well as the victims' relatives, the chaplain who presides at the prison's executions, and a former executioner who has lost his taste for the work. As in Truman Capote's "In Cold Blood," the crime itself is unimaginably stupid (two nineteen-year-old boys set out to steal a car and wound up committing the murders), and Herzog's attention moves to the pathology that produced them and the devastation left in the wake of the crime. It is yet another of Herzog's leaps into moral chaos, but there are elements of love and self-knowledge in the families of both victims and perpetrators that are extremely moving. You come out shaken by the fathomless destructiveness of idiocy and the healing powers of belief and remediation. The New Yorker, David Denby

notes on margaret

The DVD is out, including two cuts. The one that was in theatres, of which the director approved, and a second cut by the director himself. Since the editing of the film was a big brouhaha, it adds interest to see what Lonergan himself would have done - or, in fact, has done - with the film.

It's well known that there's been endless offscreen drama with this one, leading up to production and particularly afterward. There's validity on both sides of the controversy: the studios may well have looked at a film that doesn't have a story-driven structure and wanted an edit that would pull the narrative to the fore - and who can blame them, they stood to lose millions - while the director stuck to his vision, of a different sort of film altogether. More like a novel (that's not written by Stephen King or John Grisham), with a story that meanders, takes time to simply investigate a life, spends time on scenes and events that don't add to the flow or build momentum, but are simply experiences the character has.

Ursula LeGuin proposed what she called the "carrier bag" approach to fiction, as opposed to more linear, story-driven narrative. More observational, less cause-and-effect. It's very common, as I mentioned, in literary novels. And that's how Margaret feels to me.

Lonergan is perfectly capable of the well-structured story. You Can Count On Me is terrific that way, while also being non-Hollywood, non-King/Gresham. It's just that Margaret is different.

*

Lots of fun actors: Mark Ruffalo (whose break was You Can Count On Me), Stephen Adly Giurgis (who wrote Jesus Hopped The A Train and The Last Days Of Judas Iscariot), Jean Reno, Matt Damon, Matthew Broderick (Ferris Bueller, no longer skipping class - as in Election), and of course Anna Paquin.

The Lear scene reminded me so much of Frederick Buechner's great high school English class scene in Open Heart (97-101). An important scene for Buechner: he includes the whole section in Telling The Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale (26-30). Far and away, two of Buechner's finest books.

I wonder how many films have names for titles - which aren't the name of a character in the film. Particularly effective here, and another of the touches that makes the film at least hover around the edges of Christian faith. As does You Can Count On Me.

the amazing spider-man | anthony lane

The first “Spider-Man” came out in 2002, followed by its obligatory sequels in 2004 and 2007. If you are a twenty-year-old male of unvarnished social aptitude, those movies will seem like much-loved classics that have eaten up half your lifetime. They beg to be interpreted anew, just as Shakespeare’s history plays should be freshly staged by every generation. For those of us who are lavishly cobwebbed with time, however, the notion of yet another Spider-Man saga, this soon, does seem hasty, and I wish that the good people – or, at any rate, the patent lawyers – at Marvel Comics could at least have taken the opportunity to elide the intensely annoying hypen in the title.

Peter Parker is played by Andrew Garfield, who was excellent as the hapless Eduardo Saverin in The Social Network, and he still bears the mournful traces of a smart kid who had to agree to an out-of-court settlement. If anything, he is rather too mournful. I know that years of sappy cinema have left me lachrymose-intolerant, but I really couldn’t understand why Garfield’s Bambi eyes kept glingint with a mist of tears. His closest friend is a skateboard, which I guess is a step up from Mark Zuckerberg.

The new batch of ten-year-olds, receiving their first hit of arachnomania – what will they have learned from this instructive film? One thing: if you want to grab a girl, as Peter does, you eject a strand of sticky stuff onto her from behind, then pull. Not true, kids. Don’t try it at home.

by Anthony Lane
excerpted from The New Yorker, July 9 & 16, 2012

jason goode + dylan jenkinson | cannes

DANNY AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA was the first full-length play Jason Goode had directed. So how's this - he received word of his Jessie Richardson Award nomination as outstanding director for that show while he was at the Cannes Festival in support of his latest short film! Not many days in a person's life are going to beat that.


Jason and his creative partner Dylan Jenkinson were profiled in Light Magazine: here are excerpts, with the full article at the web site.

Still from the film shoot of LATE

with Sarah Deakins and Ben Cotton

Christian Filmmakers showcase their talent
by Christina Crook

Dylan Jenkinson and Jason Goode’s short film Late was their ticket to the world’s most illustrious film festival – the Cannes International Film Festival. The two Christians from Vancouver made good on their supporters’ dollars and pounded the pavement, drumming up interest for their short film.

Each year the festival previews new films of all genres from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is the world’s most prestigious and publicized film festival and is an invitation-only event. So, when Telefilm Canada called to tell Jenkinson and Goode that their film was chosen for Telefilm’s ‘Canada’s Not Short on Talent’ showcase at Cannes, they leapt at the opportunity.

Late, written by Sarah Deakins, tells the story of two strangers who struggle for a completely honest connection in a brief, chance encounter at a café. Goode’s directing paired with Jenkinsons’ producing, created a stunning black and white film that showed to a sold-out crowd in France....

Jenkinson and Goode’s collaboration began three and a half years ago. “I remember talking to Jason about creating work that means something and I didn’t feel like I could do that by myself; I didn’t want to do it on my own,” confesses Jenkinson. The two traveled to a friend’s cottage on Galiano Island where they spent a day and night hearing each other’s stories. Goode had tried collaborations in the past but they didn’t seem to work, but in the case of Jenkinson, foremost a visually-driven producer, while Goode is more performance focused, they complemented one another well....

Jenkinson’s career in motion pictures began in 1998 with eight eclectic years in the physical production arena before transitioning into story development at Keystone Entertainment where he was the Development Executive for two very successful Disney DVD titles. In 2008 he attended the Producers’ Lab at the prestigious Canadian Film Centre.

Goode, whose directorial work includes the short films The Hitchhiker and the Leo-nominated The Planting, also recently directed John Patrick Shanley’s Danny and the Deep Blue Sea at Pacific Theatre in Vancouver. He holds a Masters degree from Regent College and is a dedicated stay-at-home father by day....

In the case of their feature film Numb, Goode came upon the script by award-winning screenwriter Andre Harden, a former artist-in-residence at L’Abri Canada, and resonated at once with it.

Numb tells the story of a debt-ridden couple who discover a map promising to lead them to a fortune of stolen gold. They partner with a pair of mysterious hitchhikers to enter the remote winter wilderness and recover the coins. What they soon discover is that the only thing more blinding than snow is greed.

“I love the quote from East of Eden that says: “There’s more beauty in the truth even if it is dreadful beauty. The storytellers at the city gate twist life so it looks sweet to the lazy and the stupid and the weak, and this only strengthens their infirmities and teaches nothing, cures nothing, nor does it let the heart soar,” says Goode.

precious

photo credit: Last Exit To Nowhere

transcendent darkness | scott derrickson | glen workshop jul 29 - aug 5

I've heard Scott talk about film - Taxi Driver, in fact - and that makes me think this would be terrific. Insightful, enthusiastic. He really loves movies - and he actually makes movies. 
Too, everybody I know who's gone to the Glen Workshops say it's a tremendous experience. (I'm talking myself into it!) What's great is that even for those of us who can't go, Mr D has provided a swell movie list, of films that may be included in the week. That REALLY is a good list...

Transcendent Darkness
Taxi Driver (1976, USA, Martin Scorsese)
Apocalypse Now (1979, USA, Francis Ford Coppola)
Blade Runner (1982, USA, Ridley Scott)
The Exorcist (1973, USA, William Friedkin)
The Shining (1980, UK/USA, Stanley Kubrick)
Breaking the Waves (1996, Denmark, Lars von Trier)
Seven (1995, USA, David Fincher)
Out of The Past (1947, USA, Jacques Tourneur)
Night of the Hunter (1955, USA, Charles Laughton)
Rashomon (1950, Japan, Akira Kurosawa)
Cries and Whispers (1972, Sweden, Ingmar Bergman)
Repulsion (1965, USA, Roman Polanski)
Films that have provided the most transcendent experiences
for Scott Derrickson as a Christian and as a filmmaker

Scott Derrickson, the director of The Exorcism of Emily Rose and the upcoming Sinister, is a connoisseur of the darker traditions of cinema and uniquely situated to speak to the significance of Christian relevance within them. His own spiritual journey—from fundamentalism through evangelicalism and beyond—has been accompanied by an artistic journey that he will share with the class. This seminar and its accompanying discussion will be unafraid to confront the grotesque in the context of grace, in the grand tradition of Flannery O’Connor. In the end, Derrickson believes, confronting the darkness in us is often not only a prelude to understanding grace, hope, and redemption, but can itself be an experience of the divine. The selection of films, from horror to film noir and more, will be a guided tour through the films that have provided the most transcendent experiences for Derrickson as a Christian and as a filmmaker.

Derrickson graduated from Biola University with a B.A. in Humanities with an emphasis in literature and philosophy, a B.A. in Communications with an emphasis in film, and a minor in theological studies. He earned his M.A. in film production from USC School of Cinematic Arts. Derrickson co-wrote and directed the film The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which was loosely based on a true story about Anneliese Michel, and won a Saturn Award for Best Horror Film and a place on the Chicago Film Critics Association list of the Top 100 Scariest Films Ever Made. Derrickson also directed The Day the Earth Stood Still starring Keanu Reeves and Jennifer Connelly, written by David Scarpa. Derrickson is currently attached to write and/or direct several films, including an adaptation of Dan Simmons' Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, a remake of the Danish thriller The Substitute (produced by Sam Raimi), a supernatural suspense thriller called The Living, and an action movie about the biblical Goliath. Derrickson recently agreed to team with producer Jason Blum (Paranormal Activity, Insidious) to direct Sinister, a mystery-horror crime film starring Ethan Hawke. He is also currently working on Two Eyes Staring, a horror film starring Charlize Theron, and writing the TV pilot Thunderstruck for AMC, which is based on the Hugo and Nebula award winning short story Hell is the Absence of God.

Taxi Driver art print by Joe Taylor

New Yorker | career

"And they said my career was over after 'The Godfather.'"

Brad Stratton, Franklin, Wis.

The New Yorker, June 4 & 11, 2011

moonrise kingdom

Nothing particularly Soul Foodish about this one. But I'm in love.
After the screening, I asked Carole if she liked it. "Yes. But not as much as you did. Nobody in the theatre liked it as much as you did." My favourite Wes Anderson yet. The second of my true favourite films in 2013.

sight & sound & tree of life

Note from my movie pal Peter

Not sure whether you're that into the deca-annual Sight & Sound poll. (I certainly get excited about it, especially the 2002 version with its online database.)

For what it's worth on the soul food front, though, I've read two voters for this year's poll (results forthcoming in August, I believe) who have divulged their lists: Roger Ebert and Peter Howell. They both voted forTree of Life.

It's exceedingly unusual for a newish movie to crack the heights of the consensus, (it's a regular beef people have with the survey that nothing new seems to score high these days), let alone a movie released the year before. And it's very unlikely that Tree of Life is going to do so. But, based on the two lists I've seen, it's already two-for-two! Interesting.