Film rating: 4/5
Walkouts: 0/5
Pretentious clapping at credits: 0/5
BPM sighting: No
Irascible and lazy, Rupert ‘Ratz’ Kramer is a 35-year-old slacker who plays out his patricidal fantasies through the development of a violent computer game. A chance call from an old flame sends him to New York, where he hopes to sell his creation to a games company, but instead becomes embroiled in events that begin to pose increasingly uncomfortable moral questions.
Part thriller, part psychological family drama, part exploration of German–Austrian war guilt, this film from Michael Glawogger defies categorisation.
Adapted from the novel Das Vaterspiel by Josef Haslinger.
Interesting and believable characters, along with a mysterious script with lots of room for guessing, ensure that you can’t take your eyes of this film. But it turns out to be a slow-burner, with everything building up to a stunning under-egged scene featuring a Nazi war criminal talking about his guilt, fear and lack of remorse. Kill Daddy Goodnight certainly defies categorisation and leaves you thinking for hours afterwards.
Film rating: 5/5
Walkouts: 0/5
Pretentious clapping at credits: 2/5
BPM sighting: Yes
Actor–director Baltasar Kormákur calls his modernised version of Anton Chekhov’s play Ivanov a ‘dramedy’, inspired by the likes of Pedro Almodóvar and Woody Allen.
A middle-aged professor braces himself for his second marriage, to an ex-student half his age, but as his guests flock to the wedding’s remote island locale, he starts to get cold feet. After a long ‘white night’ of drinking and thinking, will he make it to the church on time?
Kormákur’s expertly juggled tone – slapstick tinged with darker and more perverse elements of Chekhov – has seen White Night Wedding become one of Iceland’s highest-grossing domestic hits.
“Dramedy” indeed. A heart-wrenching tale of relationships and life told with a just-right application of humour and understated slapstick. As the protagonist lurches towards his wedding day, with flashbacks to the disintegration of his first marriage, viewers are invited to ponder the fragility of human interaction and the way that middle age brings with it the realisation that life is a series of wasted opportunities. White Night Wedding keeps you guessing right up to the penultimate scene, which seems to provide a Hollywood ending, only to have that illusion shattered as the credits roll.
The best part, but? I was riding home from the cinema and came to a stop at a red light. A couple of seconds later another bike pulled up next to me so I looked over and it was … Bicycle Pump Man! However, I wimped out and didn’t get a photo.
Film rating: 4/5 (Scott); 3.5/5 (John Surname)
Walkouts: 0/5
Pretentious clapping at credits: 4/5
BPM sighting: Yes
The directorial debut of Duncan Jones (son of David Bowie), this claustrophobic sci-fi feature stars Sam Rockwell and the voice of Kevin Spacey.
Heralding a fresh renaissance in indie sci-fi flicks, Moon eschews big budget CGI effects for slow-burn combustible tension, telling the story of a man on a solo mission on the moon who begins to suffer hallucinations, as he succumbs to the isolation and monotony of his assignment.
An intimate character portrayal in a starkly impersonal outer space setting, Moon is a claustrophobic drama that harkens back to classic sci-fi of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Scott says: Moon is an atmospheric study of life, death, isolation and human desire. Set to a cracking soundtrack that perfectly creates a mood to match the action, and featuring an excellent performance by solo actor Sam Rockwell, Moon lets us imagine the nature of space exploration in the near-ish future and prompts us to question what the implications are for humans’ needs.
The director mostly lets viewers discover plot twists on their own, although a few are rammed home a little too obviously. Once the major twist is revealed the film plays out a touch too predictably at times, but enough mystery is retained to command your attention until the conclusion which is mercifully free of an overblown and trite Hollywood ending.
Moon is a film that will make you look inside and question your own emotions, needs and desires.
** SPOILER ALERT — READ NO FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW PLOT **
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Film rating: 2.5/5
Walkouts: 0/5
Pretentious clapping at credits: 2/5
BPM sighting: No
From within the straightjacket of a highly controlled film industry, Iranian visionary Asghar Farhadi (The Beautiful City, Fireworks Wednesday) miraculously emerges with an uncompromising chronicle of middle-class Iranian malaise.
A group of friends holidaying on the Caspian Sea play matchmaker between a divorcé and schoolteacher Elly. When she disappears, a sticky mess of seemingly innocuous deceits – some being the product of tarouf, a type of Persian cultural politeness – prove dire in their consequences.
One of the best Iranian films in years – and accordingly well-awarded at this year’s Tribeca film festival – it’s also the final one to feature Golshifteh Farahani, who inflamed controversy by appearing in Ridley Scott’s Body of Evidence, in turn causing About Elly to be banned in Iran.
A well-constructed character study that revolves around the social norms at play in middle-class Iran. At first the characters’ action were difficult to understand as a Westerner, but as the film progressed it became easier to accept why seemingly stupid decisions (from an audience perspective) were the only option available to the protagonists. However, the film lost a bit of momentum towards the end and offered no new insight or surprise; the ending was predictable once the invisible rules binding the characters were revealed. A solid, but not sensational film.
It’s on! The Melbourne International Film Festival launched last night and my personal MIFF ‘09 experience begins tomorrow night. After spending an agonising couple of hours over a couple of pints of Guinness with the festival program, I’ve whittled my shortlist of 30 films down to the 13 allowed by my festival pass and I’m gearing up for two weeks of darkened cinemas, sleep deprivation and awesome international cinema. Just like in ‘05, ‘06, ‘07 and ‘08 I’ll be assaulting you with my film reviews whether or not you want them.
This year’s big questions:
