Review: Senna (+ Oscar Eligible?)

Senna

Dir. Asif Kapadia

Year: 2011

Aus Rating: M15+

Running Time: 106mins

It can be a funny business watching films as often as someone like myself. Films based on subjects that I find fascinating can routinely be rote and poorly made, whereas sometimes a film can come along that puts an illuminating light on a topic that I have zero interest in whatsoever. Asif Kapadia’s documentary Senna is one of those cases, as he allows his documentary gaze to fall upon the sport of motor-racing in this thrilling exploration into the life of a man who aimed to do as much for those less fortunate as he than he did for the sport.



Read the rest at Trespass Magazine

Along with How to Die in Oregon and Jiro Dreams of Sushi, MIFF 2011 threw up three documentaries that I think deserve Oscar consideration. Unfortunately for Kapadia's rather fascinating documentary, Senna will most surely be deemed ineligible ala Werner Herzog's Grizzly Man. I remember the furor that erupted amongst Oscar-watching circles when Grizzly was ruled out due to an Academy rule that makes films made up entirely of previously existing footage ineligible. Now, the Academy seem to change their eligibility rules every year so, for all I know, they nixed this silly rule plus Kapadia himself seems to have implied that the film is eligible as recently as late July, so I will follow with great interest. Just don't be surprised if it doesn't make the cut for the reasons above.





It would be a particular shame, too, since the film has had bonza box office in the UK and it's quite a high profile entry in the documentary field that too often fails to catch on with audiences. It'd be a definite shame if Senna was ousted and something as dull as - here's that name again - Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams makes it in instead.

Things to Learn from the MIFF Critics Poll

After all the films and fun of the 60th Melbourne International Film Festival - yes, we're still discussing it! I should hope that the 60+ films I saw shouldn't be immediately deemed "old news" less than a week later - was over, a bunch of us filmy criticy folks submitted grades for every film we watched into a critics poll being hosted by At the Cinema.net. It's a fascinating look at how people respond to certain films and fail to connect with others. Most of the films at the very top of the poll receive unanimous acclaim while, likewise, the bottom rungs of the chart are almost universally negative.



I've included the feature poll here, but click over to this link to see what we all thought of the documentaries and shorts that screened.





Click for documentaries

Click for short films

Of the films that had several grades attributed to them, I can deduce the following facts:

• I am the sole representative to give 5 stars to Lena Dunham's Tiny Furniture and the only one to give Markus Schleinzer's Michael 1 star out of 5.
• I appear to be in the minority on Jon Hewitt's X (4 stars from me; average of 2.33/5) and Markus Schleinzer's Michael (1 star from me; average of 3/5).
• Werner Herzog's highly anticipated 3D documentary Cave of the Forgotten Dreams must surely take the title of the festival's biggest disappointment, scoring an average of 2.40 out of five. It was certainly the film that, for me, had the greatest discrepancy between levels of anticipation and end results.
• The King of Comedy, Martin Scorsese's 1983 satire masterpiece, was the festival's best-received title. Who cares that it was a retrospective title when it's able to amass eight 5-star raves from the nine critics who saw it? After The King of Comedy it was a three-way tie between A Separation, Senna and Melancholia, which all received six 5-star raves from the critics polled.
• Of the critics polled, I was the only one to see Ruhr, the Melbourne shorts programs, French child fable On the Sly, African drama Sleeping Sickness and French animation Tales of the Night.
• Three films managed 1 star from three separate critics: Norwegian Wood, Post Mortem and my personal choice for worst of the fest, Innocent Saturday. Another diabolically bad film, Greek import Wasted Youth, ranked equal last with two critics polling it with 1 star. I note that I know of at least one of the other critics here who ditched their later screening of Wasted Young based on the reception greeted to it.
• The lowest ranked film from the most amount of votes was another Greek film, Attenberg. Averaging a score of 3.0/5 from 12 critics.

MIFF Blogathon: Day 2 (Forgotten Caves, Kill Lists and Submarines)

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

Cave of Forgotten Dreams
Dir. Werner Herzog
Running Time: 90mins

Has Werner Herzog become a quasi-hipster joke? A piss-take of himself that nobody can take seriously? It certainly feels that way after watching this 3D documentary, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, as he drearily walks around a cave spouting ridiculous dialogue like "is this cave the beginning of the modern soul?" in that recognisable accent of his. Perhaps Herzog thinks that by this stage of his career he can do whatever he likes and that if he just throws out some verbose narration and obvious references to Baywatch that people will love it?

Whatever the case my be, the subject matter - previously undiscovered, ancient rock drawings from France - feels like an important topic in a historic sense, but nothing Herzog does here, other than the occasionally spectacular 3D, can enliven the rather drowsy material. I admit to falling into several microsleeps during this film, which feels like a short documentary expanded into feature length to the detriment of the material. An abrasive musical score by Ernst Reijseger certainly doesn't help matters, either. A disappointing effort. C

Living on Love Alone
Dir. Isabelle Czajka
Running Time: 89mins

A lovingly lit French drama about a young woman, Anaïs Demoustier as Julie, whose inability to cope with the realities of inner city life sends her crashing towards a doomed romance with an out of work actor, Pio Marmaï as Ben. Living on Love Alone [D'amour et d'eau fraîche] is the debut feature for Isabelle Czajka and while it certainly looks impressive, thanks to sun-kissed cinematography by Crystel Fournier and the attractive leads, it suffers from the dreaded no-third-act syndrome. This is a phenomenon that plagues many Australian films, too, and it's disappointing that this brief film wasn't expanded somewhat and given a proper ending.

Demoustier is a stylish presence on screen, but it's Marmaï who really stands out as the film's strongest aspect. His charming presence makes Julie's decisions more believable than they otherwise would be. The screenplay, also by Czajka, has some interesting things to say about the laziness of youth and Julie's inability to comprehend what is required of her in the adult world. I appreciated Czajka's realistic take on young people and their attitudes towards sex, while a family dinner sequence is spot on, too, in the way family members interact. The closing scenes are involving, but end too abruptly. B-

I just want to show you what Pio Marmaï looks like, okay?


I think I'm in love lust.

Submarine
Dir. Richard Ayoade
Running Time: 97mins

"Ben Stiller Presents" says the poster. I presume because British humour does not travel well over the Atlantic Ocean (the Australian poster is Ben Still free) they felt the need to place Stiller's marketable name on there, but I can't imagine anybody going to see Richard Ayoade's debut feature Submarine based on his name and being anything but disappointed. That's not a mark against the film, but it was something that lingered on my mind after the credits. There is such a distinct voice to Submarine that dumbing it down to Ben Stiller's level feels silly.

At first coming off as Britain's answer to a Wes Anderson film, Submarine eventually morphs into something far darker and less pleasurable. Aided by a winning lead performance by Craig Roberts, the opening half of Richard Ayoade's debut feature is funny and charming, with brisk editing Chris Dickens and Nick Fenton and a wonderfully worked sense of time and place. However, the way Ayoade handled the shift in tone is troublesome. There's no nuance there and the abrupt change is distracting. Still, there are many pleasures to be found withing Submarine and I suspect it was garner a lot of fans with its refreshing take on American quirky indies. B

Kill List
Dir. Ben Wheatley
Running Time: 90mins

A film of three very different acts - domestic drama; action movie; horror - Ben Wheatley's Kill List is a rather confounding experience. The less you know about it the more intrigued you will be by it. I was curious as to where it was going, especially in those opening scenes where domestic non-bliss, although once it got there I found my interest waning. A third act about face, however, produces some truly visceral, terrifying cinema. Kill List is a curious film and probably demands more thought than I am able to give it right now. B-

The Innkeepers
Dir. Ti West
Running Time: 102mins

Ti West has, after two films, become one of the most interesting names in horror. Not content to make the same film like many others, West has followed up his terrifying 1980s homage The House of the Devil with this far more quaint and quieter scarer. Made with a very obvious wink at the audience, The Innkeepers succeeds due to the adorable charm of lead Sara Paxton and a gripping set of frights that work time and time again.

It still saddens me to know that The House of the Devil never got a release in country. I was able to see it a local horror film festival, but no subsequent DVD release has ever eventuated. Such a shame that people haven't been able to see it without illegal downloading because it's a doozy of a horror flick. West appears to have learnt a thing or two as well since there are no pacing issues and the third act is a considerable step in the right direction. I can only hope that local audiences get the chance to see The Innkeepers at some point as it works far better than many horror films that get a release. It's got a kindred spirit in Insidious, and I think if you mixed the two films together they would actually make a perfect horror movie. As it stands? B+

MIFF TALES:
I somehow made it through five films yesterday despite battling the flu. I have popped so many pills and drank so many blackcurrent lemsips and yet it still hangs around. If you notice my writing in these entries tends to drift off or sound disconnected, it's probably because I don't feel like myself right now. This is getting very tiresome.

Not as tiresome, however, as the technical issues a near sold out crowd experienced at Cave of Forgotten Dreams. Not just one, but several! At first the film began to play with distorted sound. As @FeNi64 humourously put it on Twitter: "It sounded like Stephen Hawking on flat batteries." That this is an apt description is all very o_O you know? Still, the pandemonium that erupted through the Hoyts cinema was like nothing I had ever witness before. Patrons, a lot of them, were stomping their feet, booing, chanting... anything to get the attention of the festival staff so they would do something. I heard later in the evening from someone who was standing next to festival director Michelle Carey when she got the phone call and she was none too pleased.


Once they finally got the film going from the start again the crowd couldn't have expected what would come next: During the "postscript" sequence (the bit about albino crocodiles) the film just stopped. Another wave of moans and groans swept across the cinema as one employee valiantly tried to keep us all in check. Several people got up to leave. I didn't. However, once the film started up again and then froze AGAIN? I grabbed my stuff and left. Such is the burden of a person seeing 60 films at a festival.

Review: The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans

The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call Orleans
Dir. Werner Herzog
Year: 2009
Aus Rating: MA15+
Running Time: 122mins

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is a movie isn’t close to being as fun, funny or insane as it thinks it is. Considering the original Bad Lieutenant by Abel Ferrara was released 18 years ago, it’s hard to see how Werner Herzog’s version is as shocking as it thinks it is either. Harvey Keitel’s lieutenant was doing drugs, masturbating in front of young women and abusing suspects around the same time Nicolas Cage was giving his patented crazy style of acting in much better movies such as David Lynch’s Wild at Heart. So what then, dear reader, was the point of this movie?

It’s hard to say. None of the actors are able to emerge out of the shadow that Herzog creates for Cage. Eva Mendes has nothing to do but stand around and look sultry, which is a hard thing to do given Peter Zeitlinger’s cinematography is so dank and confining – while the likes of Val Kilmer and Faizura Balk just stand around with nothing to do. Jennifer Coolidge is perhaps the only actor who’s able to shine since she has the innate ability to be even more deranged than Cage and Herzog put together. The brief moments where Herzog really goes off his medication, mostly moments involving alligators and iguanas, are amusing in a broad sort of way, but feel more like token oddities rather than anything truly organic.


The actual plot of The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans revolves around the trailer park shooting of a family of Senegalese refugees in the months after Hurricane Katrina. Herzog can be commended for his representation of New Orleans, he doesn’t sugarcoat this town’s misfortunes and there isn’t a pretty sight in the entire movie. As a murder mystery, however, it doesn’t even rise above the level of intrigue supplied by season 15 of Law & Order. Nor does it excite from a filmmaking point of view. None of the twists or developments feel exciting from a storytelling point of view, nor are they shown in any compelling form. Things happen and that’s about it.

Which brings me back to the lead character of Lieutenant Terence McDonagh as played by Cage. His foul behaviour is supposed to be the hook of this film, but it instead feels forced and even juvenile. I’m sure it was shocking to see Harvey Keitel strut around naked while snorting bags of cocaine whilst solving the crime of a nun being raped in the 1992 original, but in 2010 watching Nicolas Cage dive off the deep end is about as revolutionary as, well, Harvey Keitel nuding up.

And what of Nicolas Cage? A man whose tics and twitches have seemingly taken over his career and his mumbly vocals inserted itself into every performance. There isn’t anything about this performance here that we haven’t seen. Am I meant to find it better simply because he’s being directed by a man just as bonkers as he? Cage’s style perfectly fit the aforementioned Wild at Heart 20 years ago and at least that picture was stylistically on the same wavelength. And then there’s the issue of Cage’s accent, which strangely changes midway through the movie into some weird combination of Jimmy Stewart and Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man.


Ferrara’s original wasn’t even that good in the first place and even though there is no connection other than the bare strings of plot that they share, Herzog’s movie feels dated and warn out. As a movie made solely to frame Herzog and Cage’s duel wackiness around a story of ever-increasing moments of “shocking” depravity it lacks anything that can truly be described as shocking in this day and age as it plods along at a snail’s pace. Both of these men have done incredible work before, similar to that on display here, but The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is a perfect example of two people being so perfect for one another that they end up cancelling each other out. Two pretty people equalling an ugly baby if you’d like a metaphor. It could be humourous if it wasn’t so ugly and putrid, both to look at and from an entertainment level. All that’s left in the end that’s truly new is a scene involving iguanas and that just isn’t enough. D