Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
SepTue 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: David Michod
Starring: James Frecheville, Ben Mendelsohn, Joel Edgerton, Luke Fork, Jackie Weaver, Sullivan Stapleton and Guy Pearce
Now playing: Landmark Sunshine Cinema - 143 East Houston Street, New York, NY
When his mother dies from an overdose, seventeen-year-old Josh Cody (Frecheville) has no one to turn to except for his estranged grandmother, Janine (Weaver.) Nicknamed “Smurf” because of her tiny size and affection for the color blue, she heads a household of armed robbers, lead by Baz Brown (Edgerton) and her eldest son, Pope (Mendelsohn), who is currently hiding from the law in a motel. Rounding out the crew are her two younger sons, Craig (Stapleton) and Darren (Ford). As Josh notes in the beginning narration, a life of crime is rife with tension, and things slowly start to unravel for the crew. Happily married with a young baby, Baz is looking towards the future and life less dangerous. Craig deals drugs on the side and has fallen into addiction. Pope is prone to fits of violence and things go from bad to worse when he comes out of hiding to join his family. Josh becomes embroiled in a world of violence, paranoia and fear that threatens his own existence.
This movie is awesome. As a matter of fact, I think it might be the best movie I’ve seen all year. Weaver is wonderful as the spunky, overly affectionate and slightly evil matriarch. Animal Kingdom is the first film for Frecheville, who gives an amazing performance. I have to admit, at first I was a little put off by his stoic-because-I-have-to-be performance. After all, I have reviewed a number of films where the protagonist is a teenager forced into a bad situation and is emotionally shut off (Fish Tank, Winter’s Bone). I was afraid that Frecheville’s performance would seem tired. But when Josh finally becomes overwhelmed by the world he’s in and breaks down, it’s incredibly moving. Director Michod has created a beautifully tragic world that is as impossible to look away from and it is repulsive. It’s true, Animal Kingdom is not the feel-good movie of the year, but it is unbelievably great.
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Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AugTue 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Todd Solondz
Starring: Allison Janney, Shirley Hnderson, Ally Sheedy, Cirian Hinds and Paul Reubens
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY
Clearview's 1st & 62nd Street - 400 East 62nd Street, New York, NY
In 1998 Todd Solondz made a movie called Happiness, which centered on the lives of three very different sisters living in New Jersey. There was Helen, the self-absorbed, pretentious poet, whose literary success alienates her from the family; Joy, the pathetic guitar-strumming hippie whose latest boyfriend commits suicide after their breakup; and Trish, the oldest sister who “has it all:” a nice house, three kids and Bill, her loving husband who, despite being a great father, also happens to be a pedophile. In Happiness Solondz pushed the limits of comedy, presenting an in-your-face look at suburban life behind closed doors that made just about everyone who watched it extremely uncomfortable, to say the least. I remember walking out of the theater after seeing Happiness feeling conflicted. While I thought it was a great movie, it was also one of the most disturbing movies I had ever seen, and I wondered about Solondz’s motivation in presenting such a provocative work. There was no doubt about the social commentary, but I wondered whether he was just being shocking for the sake of being shocking.
Life During Wartime revisits the sisters twelve years later. Trish (Janney) has relocated to Miami and begun dating again and is thrilled to find that her new beau is mind-numbingly normal. The only threat to her happiness is the lie that she has told her children. While they believe their pedophilic father is dead, the reality is that Bill (Hinds) has just been released from prison and is on a quest to find them. Joy (Henderson) believes herself to be happily married to a man who, despite a history of drug abuse and making lewd prank phone calls to women, appears to want to make a change for the better. When she discovers that there is still one vice he can’t let go of, she flees to the unsteady comfort of her family in Miami. Joy is then haunted by the ghost of her suicidal former lover (Reubens) and finds herself wondering if breaking up with him (and indirectly causing his suicide) wasn’t a terrible mistake. She soon realizes that Miami is not the place for starting over and visits her estranged sister, Helen. Helen has cut all ties from her family and moved to LA, where she continues to wallow in her own ego. Extravagantly rich and dating a man named Keanu, Helen has nothing to offer Joy in the way of comfort or advice. As Joy is struggling to find meaning in her shattered life, Bill travels across the country in search of his oldest son. The question looming for both of them seems to be: Are there some things in life that are simply unforgivable?
In Life During Wartime, I feel like Solondz has matured. While there are still the shockingly inappropriate jokes and severely uncomfortable moments we can expect from him, there is also a poignancy in this film that Happiness lacked. Go see it!
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AugMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Vikram Jayanti
Starring: Michael Cera and Portia Doubleday
Now playing: Out now on DVD
Nick Twisp (Cera) is your typical pale, nerdy, painfully virginal teenage boy. Despite his taste for Frank Sinatra and foreign film, or perhaps because of it, he has no hope of ever getting a girlfriend. This becomes even more painfully obvious when his mom and her boyfriend relocate the family to a trailer park in Southern California. There he meets Sheeni Saunders (Doubleday), the French-film-loving daughter of religious fundamentalists. Nick quickly falls for Sheeni but realizes that unless he can shed his goody-two-shoes image, he has no hope of winning her heart. So he does what any normal, hot-blooded American boy would do. He develops an alter ego, the chain-smoking, tight-white-pants-wearing Francois Dillinger (also Cera). Through Francois, Nick becomes the bad boy of Sheeni’s dreams, stealing cars, defacing public property and breaking into Sheeni’s fancy French boarding school.
As far as romantic comedies go, Youth in Revolt is not a terrible movie. Michael Cera puts in a solid yet expected performance as the under-confident kid who finally finds some guts and gets the girl. The story is funny and clever and I enjoyed the many nods to French cinema that run throughout. My problem with Youth in Revolt is this: I could not for the life of me understand what was so compelling and fantastic about Sheeni Saunders that could inspire such mayhem. While she is physically beautiful, her personality is pretty vacant, manipulative and just plain unlikable. While it’s definitely entertaining, the premise of Youth in Revolt is too far flung, even for this die-hard romantic. If you’re looking for a fun, satisfying romantic comedy to sit in the A/C and watch, check out Adventureland.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
JunMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Debra Granik
Starring: Jamey Jennifer Lawrence and John Hawkes
Now playing: Angelika Film Center New York - 18 West Houston Street, New York, NY
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas - 1886 Broadway, New York, NY
Seventeen-year-old Ree Dolly has a lot on her plate. Her mother has mentally checked out, leaving her to care for her two younger siblings. Adding to her bad luck, she finds out that her drug-dealing father has jumped bail after posting the family home and property as collateral. Ree has a week to find him to ensure he makes his court date and doesn’t leave the family homeless. But finding her elusive father in the meth-ravaged world of the Ozarks proves to be difficult and dangerous. She finds herself coming up against a tight-lipped network of Good Old Boys (and Girls) who try hard to convince her that her father is best left unfound.
As Ree, Lawrence gives a great performance. She is brave and strong in a quiet way that suggests she knows she’s been dealt a bum hand but will do whatever is takes to keep her family together without resentment. There are some definite pitfalls in Winter’s Bone. I found the dialogue at times to be a little too full of southern wisdom, and each character wears one of those animal print shirts you can get at rest stops everywhere at least once. But these are small things, and overall this movie was suspenseful and moving. Check it out.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks - Part 2
MayMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: John Waters
Starring: Tracey Ullman, Johnny Knoxville, Selma Blair and Chris Isaak
Now playing: Out on DVD
Sylvia Stickles (Ullman) is a typical suburban middle-aged woman. Sexually repressed, bored and uptight all around, she fends off advances from her husband (Isaak) and keeps her ridiculously bodacious daughter (Blair) locked in a room. Things change for Sylvia when she receives a concussion from a passing car and is helped by the charismatic Ray Ray Perkins (Knoxville). The head injury, it seems, knocks something loose inside of her, causing her to not only want, but also actually enjoy sex. A lot. Ray Ray assures Sylvia that her newfound sexual freedom is the right path, complete with a support group of fellow sexual freedom seekers. Unfortunately, in middle class Harford Road, there is another movement brewing, led by Sylvia’s own mother, Big Ethel. Horrified by the changes they see in their once bland community (“Used to be Harford Road was for families. Now it’s a lesbian aorta!&rdquo
The Neuters are out to squash any and all expressions of sexuality. Will Sylvia and Ray Ray show The Neuters the light? Or will The Neuters succeed in spaying the entire town?What I love about A Dirty Shame is that no one is spared. John Waters shines a light and pokes fun at everyone: straights, gays, liberals, conservatives, not to mention every fetish known under the sun (adult babies, anyone?). And he does so with a finely honed, brave wit. This film is pretty raunchy, it’s true. We are talking about John Waters here. But it is also funny and relevant. Worth a trip to the video store or putting on your Netflix queue. If you’re into that kind of thing.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MayMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Bette Gordon
Starring: Jamey Sheridan, Steve Buscemi, Aidan Quinn, John Savage and Campbell Scott
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY
Harry Sweeney (Sheridan) lives an isolated life in a small town. He works as an electrician and sings in an a cappella group, but he is a man who doesn’t let anyone get too close. When fellow ex-Marine Tom Kelly (Buscemi) calls from his deathbed and asks Harry to visit him, Harry hesitantly agrees. Kelly, knowing that death is near, seeks forgiveness for a crime he, Harry and the three other men in their troop committed against David Kagan (Scott), a gay Marine. Although he does not want to revisit his past or the incident in question, Harry agrees to track down the other men involved in the crime and David Kagan. As Harry revisits his old Marine buddies, he sees the effects that night have had on each of their lives. He also is forced to confront his own part in the crime and what impact it’s had on his own life.
Handsome Harry reminds me of a movie from another era. Although it’s set in the present day, everything from the dialogue to the characters’ interactions with each other reads like a movie set in the 1940s. It has a definite film noir feel to it, which is almost lost and feels a little weird when applied to the modern day. Saying that, Sheridan is wonderful as a man whose secret life has left him empty. Not the greatest movie, but worth renting when it comes out on DVD.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AprMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Banksy
Starring: Banksy, Shepard Fairey and Thierry Guetta
Narrated by: Rhys Ifans
Now playing: Landmark Sunshine Cinema- 143 East Houston St., NYC
Exit Through the Gift Shop is the true story of French shopkeeper turned amateur filmmaker, Thierry Guetta. While documenting his family’s vacation to France, Guetta discovers his cousin is actually a street artist operating under the pseudonym, "Invader." Guetta quickly becomes obsessed with the world of street art, following Invader around France and documenting his work. Through Invader Guetta meets Shepard Fairey, another street artist best known for the iconization of pro-wrestler, Andre the Giant (remember those “OBEY” posters plastered all over town?) and most recently for his graphic portrait of Barack Obama. Guetta travels the world filming various artists at work, but there is one in particular he longs to meet: the elusive Banksy. From the Tate museum, where he’s hung his own work alongside classic masterpieces, to the streets of London, where his stencils of rats peek out from every corner, Banksy is a cult hero, and Guetta becomes obsessed with meeting him. After many attempts he finally realizes his dream and is allowed into Banksy’s inner circle. Guetta’s goal is to create a documentary about street art. He has thousands of hours of video documenting some of the best artists in the world. But when he finally produces a 90-minute film, it’s a total disaster. Banksy decides to take the camera into his own hands and make a documentary about Guetta and “the world’s first street art disaster movie.”
I loved every minute of this movie. The first half is an exhilarating ride through the world of street art, and it was so inspiring to see the lengths to which these artists will go to get their work in the public eye. When the tables turn and Guetta becomes the central character, his transition from the quirky Frenchman behind the camera to Andy Warhol on steroids is unbelievably funny. Exit Through the Gift Shop is also the tale of the commercialization of street art and how through a few key events what was mostly considered vandalism quickly becomes a hot commodity. Please see this movie.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AprTue 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Daryl Wein
Starring: Zoe Lister-Jones and Daryl Wein
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Sixth Ave., NYC
After four years of living together finds them in a rut, New York couple Zoe and Daryl devise a plan to slowly break up. Scheduling days "on" and "off" from each other, the two attempt to break their co-dependent cycle. What ensues is confusion, anger and heartbreak as the two attempt to navigate the world separately. The two soon learn that even the best laid plans can't account for emotions.
Breaking Upwards is based on an experiment real-life couple Lister-Jones and Wein conducted on themselves. What is notable about this film is that from script to editing to the soundtrack, Breaking Upwards is 100% independent. Not only did Wein write and direct the film, he also edited it in his living room. Lister-Jones sings on a good deal of the soundtrack. While I found the story a bit predictable, I do admire the truly the independent spirit with which Breaking Upwards was made. Definitely worth checking out.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AprMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Catherine Breillat
Starring: Dominique Thomas, Lola Créton, Daphné Baiwir, Marilou Lopes-Benites and Lola Giovannetti
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Sixth Ave., NYC
Bluebeard is Breillat's adaptation of the classic fairy tale by Charles Perrault. Bluebeard is a wealthy nobleman with a penchant for murdering his wives. Left destitute by their father's death, sisters Anne and Marie-Catherine are given a way out of a life of poverty when Bluebeard extends a dinner invitation their way. Despite his fearsome reputation, the young Marie-Catherine is taken with the ogre-like man and marries him shortly thereafter. The two have a somewhat loving relationship until business takes Bluebeard away, and Marie-Catherine discovers the horrible rumors about her husband are true.
The story unfolds through the eyes of two sets of sisters: Anne and Marie-Catherine, who live the tale, and the younger Marie-Anne and Catherine, two little girls from the modern era who stumble upon a copy of the fairy tale while exploring a forbidden attic. Like a lot of Breillat's work, themes of sibling rivalry, pedophilia, and burgeoning sexuality abound as both sets of girls experience the tale of Bluebeard. It works as both a cautionary tale and a story of feminist power.
I really like Catherine Breillat. Her films are raw, honest and unflinching in their depiction of female sexuality. While Bluebeard is more restrained than her other work, it's definitely worth checking out.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
AprMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Noah Baumbach
Starring: Ben Stiller and Greta Gerwig
Now playing: Angelika Film Center - 18 West Houston Street, New York, NY
BAM Rose Cinemas - 30 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, NY
After a nervous breakdown, Roger Greenberg (Ben Stiller), nearly forty, returns to LA to recuperate while house-sitting for his brother’s family. In between obsessively writing letters of complaint to various city officials, car service companies and airlines, he reconnects with his old friends. He also forges an awkward relationship with his brother’s personal assistant, Florence, a lost soul in her mid-twenties. He struggles with coming to terms with a life that is less than expected and old resentments from both his friends and family. Frustrated and angry, he tells his friend and former band mate, Ivan, “Life is wasted on people.”
I was kind of skeptical going into this movie. Movies about people freaking out about wasted youth and getting older are a dime a dozen. Greenberg is definitely a life-crisis movie. However, it is also one of the funniest films I’ve seen in a while. I laughed out loud a bunch of times during this movie. In the sometimes bleak landscape of independent films, that is a great thing. Stiller in particular is stellar as the main character. It would have been easy for him to insert some of his trademark goofiness into this role. Instead he used great restraint, and the result is a realistic portrayal of a socially awkward man trying to make sense of his world. In Roger Greenberg he’s created one of cinema’s most memorable curmudgeons. His angry rants are poignant as well as funny and contain some of the best lines ever said on screen. As I rode the subway back to Brooklyn, I found myself laughing as I remembered different parts of Greenberg. Definitely worth checking out.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MarMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Floria Sigismondi
Starring: Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning
Now playing: Landmark Sunshine Cinema - 143 East Houston St,. Lower East Side
As most of my friends know, I love music. I’ll listen to pretty much anything, but there is a huge place in my heart for rock and roll and punk rock from the 1970s. So when I heard that a movie about The Runaways was being made, I was psyched. The Runaways were the seminal all-girl rock band, formed by Joan Jett in 1975. "Cherry Bomb" is, to me, the ultimate bad-girl song. I remember feeling pretty badass listening to it on my Walkman on my way to Catholic school. They opened for Cheap Trick and The Ramones. I really could not wait for this movie to come out.
The Runaways focuses mainly on the band’s beginning and the life of its troubled lead singer, Cherie Currie (Dakota Fanning.) A teenager from a neglectful, alchololic home, she jumps at the chance to grab the spotlight when approached by guitarist Joan Jett (Kristen Stewart) and producer Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon). She wrestles with the guilt of leaving her twin sister at home to deal with their sick father while living every teenager’s dream: a life with no parents and no rules. Success and a world tour come quickly, as do drugs and in-fighting, and Currie ends up leaving the band after only two years.
I’m not going to lie. This is not a good movie. The pace is tedious, the story is scattered and a lot of the scenes are outright laughable. And I’m no prude, but I have to ask: Just how many scenes with girls playing guitar in their underwear does one movie need? Michael Shannon’s performance as the outlandish Fowley in particular is just absurd. On the plus side, the movie is shot beautifully, and the costumes are so good I wanted to cover everything I own with sequins. Dakota Fanning and Kristen Stewart put in good performances as well. I feel like The Runaways really lacked focus, which is a shame because there is a great story there. This movie really didn’t do it justice.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MarMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Directed by: Bong Joon-Ho
Starring: Hye-ja Kim and Bin Won
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Avenue of the Americas, West Village
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas - 1886 Broadway, Midtown
When a schoolgirl turns up murdered, mentally challenged Do-Joon seems the most likely suspect. He was the last person to see her alive and has a history of violent outbursts. The only person who believes in his innocence is his mother. While her son sits in jail, trying to piece together his memory of the night of the murder, his mother goes around town finding out all she can about the victim. As the events of that night slowly unfold, she learns that nothing is what it seems.
Hye-ja Kim is pitch-perfect as the overprotective title character. Whether she is feeding her son medicine while he urinates at a bus stop, or tenaciously trekking out to the middle of nowhere to interrogate a possible eyewitness, she completely captures the essence of an overbearing mother who will do anything to defend her son. Her performance is nothing short of amazing. Watching her transform with each plot twist was for me the best part of this tense psychological thriller.
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Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MarMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
(lat den ratte komma in)
Directed by: Tomas Alfredson
Now playing: On Video
Starring: Kare Hedebrant and Lina Leandersson
People have been telling me to see this movie since it was released in the U.S. last year. It’s been on my list for quite some time, but like a lot of things that are on lists that exist only in my head, I kept forgetting to check out Let the Right One In. As luck would have it this week’s been a slow one for the independent film scene. Everything’s either been in theaters for weeks now or only in theaters for one week. So I trotted off to my local video store (yes, Virginia, they do still exist) and picked up this Norwegian vampire movie...
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Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MarMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Written and Directed by: Don Argot
Now playing: IFC Center - 323 Avenue of Americas, West Village
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas - 1886 Broadway, Midtown
Movie on Demand - Also playing on Channel 1000 for $5.99!
In 1923 Dr. Albert C. Barnes lent his art collection to a show at the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. The show of mostly Post-Impressionist and early Modern art was panned by the Philadelphia press for being “ugly,” “base,” “nasty,” and lacking in artistic merit. Outraged by public reaction, Barnes packed it all up and moved it to a house in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania. Did I mention that this collection includes paintings by Renoir, Cézanne, Matisse and Picasso, and that today its estimated worth is at the very least, oh, around $25 billion? Out of an altruistic ideal of promoting art awareness without the confines of the museum aesthetic and the social elitism that often accompanies it, and perhaps a bit out of spite, Barnes set up the Barnes Foundation. Operating as an educational facility, he closed off his impressive collection to anyone not enrolled in the school, much to the chagrin of the rest of the art world. As one person put it, “If you were an art critic from The New York Times, you couldn’t see it. But if you were a plumber from New York, you could.” Barnes hired a lawyer to draw up an ironclad will. One of the main provisions of the will was that the collection never be sold, lent or moved from the Foundation. He further thumbed his nose at the art establishment by entrusting his collection to Lincoln University, which at the time of Barnes’ death in 1954 was a liberal arts college for young black men...
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Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
MarMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Written and Directed by: Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher
Starring: Dottie Mosher, Don Mosher, Denise, Donna, Daneal, Desi, Ruby, Chris
October Country is a documentary which follows a year in the life of Mosher's family from one Halloween to the next. Like all families the Moshers have their fair share of problems. Patriarch Don is a veteran of both the Vietnam and Gulf Wars. His experience in Vietnam left him deeply disturbed. Rather than talk about it he shuts himself off from his family. His wife, Dottie, tries to compensate for Don's emotional distance, but it's clear the damage has been done. Their daughter, Donna, got pregnant as a teenager and stayed too long in the abusive relationship. Donna's daughter, Danael, followed in her mother's footsteps and is in the midst of a custody battle with her abusive ex-boyfriend. The lone hope in the family lies in Donna's youngest daughter, teenaged Desiree, who seems determined not to follow the pattern set by her mom and sister. However, she spends most of her time playing video games and has no desire to get more than a high school education. Rounding out the cast of characters are Chris, Don and Dottie's foster son, who steals money, computers and whatever else he can get his hands on from them and Denise, Don's socially maladjusted sister, who claims to be a witch and frequents the cemetery with a tape recorder, insisting the dead speak to her.
Documentaries hold a special place in my heart. I feel that more often than not, real people are more compelling than any character a writer can make up. Documentaries can also give us insight into a side of life we know nothing about. In the case of October Country, the message, though subtly stated, is of the long-term damage of war, not only to the veteran himself, but to those closest to him as well. As the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continue, it's a timely message as well.
I'm going to be totally honest here. While I think this is a great movie and totally worth seeing, it's kind of bleak. Next week I promise my review will be a laugh riot.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks - Terribly Happy
FebMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Written and Directed by: Henrik Ruben Genz
Starring: Jacob Cedergren, Lene Maria Christensen & Kim Bodnia
Following a nervous breakdown, Copenhagen police officer Robert Hansen is sent to work as town marshal in South Jutland, a small town in the middle of nowhere. Surrounded by a huge bog known for swallowing up everything from cars to cows to, oh say, a person or two (what ever did happen to the former town marshal?), it’s the kind of place where people take matters into their own hands rather than involve the police. The town doctor, shopkeeper and priest rule South Jutland and Robert learns quickly that if he wants to fit in, he’d be wise to follow their leads. Things get complicated when Robert meets the beautiful Ingerlise Buhl, who is married to the local brute, Jorgen. While Jorgen brutalizes Ingerlise, their daughter walks the town, pushing a squeaky baby carriage full of stuffed animals. Things go from bad to worse when Robert tries to get involved. He learns the hard way that when it comes to justice in South Jutland, logic and reason don’t apply and that sometimes, it’s best to just play the hand you’ve been dealt.
Terribly Happy combines two of my favorite elements: it manages to be very creepy, yet funny at the same time and it made me uncomfortable in that cool, understated way that only a foreign film can. While it is stated in the beginning that the story was based on actual events, the film reads almost like a fairy tale or fable. I was left feeling like I would like to spend a week in South Jutland. Well, maybe not a whole week. But maybe just a night passing through on my way to someplace else.
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks - A Serious Man
FebTue 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Written and Directed by: The Coen Brothers
Starring: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Fred Melamed & Sari Lennick
Playing at: Quad Cinema 34 West 13th Street, New York, NY 10011 (212) 255-2243
A note from me: As much as I would like to be able to get out and see a new movie once a week, the truth is, sometimes life has a way of interfering. So, on those rare occasions when getting out to the movies just ain’t gonna happen, I’ll review either a movie recently released on DVD, or a classic indie film that I think is worthwhile.
Set in 1967 in the Midwest, I couldn’t help but draw a parallel between Larry’s crumbling life and the huge changes that were sweeping the nation at that time. While the Summer of Love may not have made it to Larry’s neck of the woods yet, it was clear that change was coming and it was going to be big. Told with the offbeat humor you expect from the Coen brothers, A Serious Man tackles the big question of what do you do when everything you ever believed to be true turns out to be a lie?
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
FebMon 2010 Filed in: Tara's Indie Pick Flicks
Written and Directed by: Andrea Arnold
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Rebecca Griffiths & Katie Jarvis
Playing at: IFC Center 323 Sixth Ave. New York, NY 10014 (212) 924-7771
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas 30 Lincoln Plaza, New York, NY 10023
Things change for Mia when her mother brings home Connor (Michael Fassebender). Scruffily handsome, he takes a keen interest in Mia in a way that is both paternal and predatory. On a family outing to a park, Mia cuts her foot. While her mother turns away and her sister makes fun of her, Connor tends to the wound. It is the first time in the film that anyone has shown Mia any kindness. It is also most likely the first time she’s ever experienced anything close to parental care. It is with Connor that we can see past Mia’s tough, street-chick veneer and get a glimpse of the affection-starved kid she is. Connor exposes to her to new music. When Mia learns about an upcoming dance audition, Connor lends her a camera to shoot a demo. Of course, their relationship is not all innocent. Their mutual attraction comes to a head one night after Joanne passes out drunk, leaving the two alone. The next morning Connor quickly splits the scene. When Mia tracks him down to confront him, she erupts into a dangerous rage that had me terrified.
It may seem that Fish Tank is yet another tale of young-girl rebellion (Thirteen) and rising above in the face of abuse (Precious), but there’s more going on here. Whereas Thirteen reads as a cautionary tale, and Precious seems to take place in an urban nightmare-scape, Mia’s story, told through the lens of handheld cameras, has an immediacy that makes you feel like you are right there in her world. What also leads to this sense of realism is the way the story unfolds. Mia’s world is revealed through short, telling scenes that paint a whole picture. Things happen slowly, especially the build up in the relationship between Mia and Connor. We’re able to see the conflict within her: she’s attracted to him as both a would-be father substitute and as a man. When their relationship dissolves, we feel the pain of being left alone again in a loveless life. And when the opportunity to escape the life she seems destined for arrives, I was left breathless, hoping for Mia to make the right choice.
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I'm a New Yorker! I Knew That (8)
In the Doghouse with Sasha (11)
Jessica's Street Performers (37)
Jose's Random New Yorker (25)
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random pic of the week (3)
Reflecting With David (33)
Tara's Indie Pick Flicks (21)
This or That Poll (6)
Through Lindsey's Eyes (6)
True New Yorker Interview
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