Month: February 2019

Waiting for the Carnival (Estou me Guardando Para Quando o Carnaval Chegar)

Posted on by victorfraga

Toritama has 40,00o inhabitants and it’s located in the hinterlands of the Northeastern Brazil, the poorest region in the country. Historically, the town depended on agriculture and livestock. Forty years ago it was a very silent and quiet place. It has since become the Brazilian capital of jeans, in charge of 20% of Brazil’s produce. The serenity has been substituted by the hustle and bustle of thriving trade, seven days a week. The silence has been replaced by the noise of the manufacturing devices: sewing machines, gigantic dyeing sprayers, laser printers. A former chicken farm has been converted into a factory. Only one chicken is left. Her name is Sara Jane, and she’s the factory’s mascot, and a reminder of a not-so-distant past.

Waiting for the Carnival lends an entire new meaning to the expression “feeling the blues”, and not just because of the colour of the fabric being locally produced. The people at the coalface have turned a menial and repetitive job into a thoroughly enjoyable trade. They are not sad, they are not sullen. Their joie-de-vivre is palpable. Their humour is fascinating. Their ambition is refreshing. Everyone without exception is extremely hard-working and ambitious. And that’s for two reasons: they are autonomous workers and they get paid pro rata (according to the amount manufactured). They are genuinely persistent and motivated to work up to 14 hours a day seven days a week because that’s their personal choice. They can stop whenever they wish, and they can harvest the benefits for as long as they want.

The sensibility and the inventiveness of Brazilian director Marcelo Gomes are extraordinary. At one point, he wilfully removes the sound of the sewing machines abruptly and halfway through the sequence, replacing it with soothing music, and thereby also meditating on the “anguish of repetition”. The main character Leonardo is extremely funny, cheeky and yet tender, epitomising the spirit of the movie itself.

These hard-working people have one ambition in common: the escapism of carnival. They are prepared to work even harder and to sell anything valuable (such as a TV, a fridge or a motorbike) in exchange for a few days of hedonism. “I want to laugh, what’s life good for if I can’t have fun”, says a woman. Leonardo, however, does not manage to earn the money needed. The filmmaker then makes a very deft and generous proposition to the young man. The director offers to pay for Leonardo’s carnival expenses if Leonardo films the festivities for his documentary. Such ingeniousness is sublime. The director empowers his subject. For the next 10 minutes or so we watch the images captured by Leonardo. The quality of the equipment is clearly inferior, but not the emotions conveyed.

The film wraps up with the magnificent titular song Estou Me Guardando Para Quando o Carnaval Chegar, a Brazilian classic by composed by the iconic Chico Buarque. The tune is played in its entirety by a local music group.

Waiting for the Carnival showed in the 69th Berlin International Film Festival, when this piece was originally written. It sees its UK premiere at the Sheffield Doc Fest in June.

Stone Speakers (Kameni Govornici)

Posted on by victorfraga

QUICK SNAP: LIVE FROM BERLIN

Three decades ago, after the collapse of Yugoslavia and the end of the Bosnian war, Bosnia Herzegovina switched quickly to capitalism. Yet, country’s people and institutions did not adapt overnight. The changes have been slow and gradual. The various towns are grappling with the new economic system, and finding novel and very peculiar ways to make ends meet.

The town of Medjugorje capitalised from the sighting of the Virgin Mary, and turned itself into a large pilgrimage centre. Large crowds are to be seen throughout the year, while large loudspeakers deliver the gospel in various languages. The town of Andricgrad pays tribute to Nobel laureate Ivo Andric, with a helping hand from professor and filmmaker Emir Kusturica (who also happens to be a local). Andricgrad saw many buildings erected from stone taken from other parts of the Balkans, including Kosovo. In Visiko, a hill conceals ancient pyramids that attract cosmic energy enthusiasts. In Tuzla, the disused salt mines have been turned into lakes. The pyramid, the Virgin, the mines and the houses all have one thing in common: they are made of stone.

Religion is a central topic. The Virgin in Catholic, while Andricgrad is Orthodox. We also learn about Muslim warriors buried at the spot where they were killed, their ghosts still visible to dervishes and the most devout followers. Religion is not a divisive issue in Bosnia, at least not compared to its neighbours. The country is historically tolerant of multi-faith. The country is also anti-fascist. We learn that six out of seven anti-Hitler struggles in Yugoslavia started in Bosnia. A major uprising in 1941 commemorated its 75th anniversary in 2016, and we follow some of the celebrations. A local explains: “mixed marriage is between a man and a goat. Marriage between a man and a woman is not mixed. That’s my definition of anti-fascism”

Stone Speakers is a stern and yet ingenious documentary. The camera is entirely static, allowing viewers to reflect upon the topics at length. And the interview style is entirely unique. Interviewees stand still motionless outdoors location while their pre-recorded voice is played out. Yet the topics are a little esoteric, and you might struggle to follow the narrative if you are not very familiar with the Balkans.

Stone Speakers is showing in the 69th Berlin International Film Festival as part of the Forum section.

Marighella

Posted on by victorfraga

Wagner Moura is an old familiar face at the Berlinale. He’s the protagonist of Jose Padilha’s Elite Squad, which won the event’s top prize 11 years ago, the Golden Bear. A lot has changed since. Brazil has seen a coup d’etat and the rise of fascism with election of Jair Bolsonaro. Moura himself has fallen out with Padilha for political reasons. Padilha supported the coup, while Moura has been a very vocal critic of the reactionary developments. Now Moura gets behind the camera for the first time. It’s for a good cause. The topic of Marighella is incendiary: it documents the struggle of a communist revolutionary Carlos Marighella during the military dictatorship that ruled the country between 1964 and 1985. This wouldn’t have been a very sensitive topic three to five years ago, but with a president who openly advocates torture and murder, this is political dynamite. The film will more than likely experience censorship and all types of retaliation in Brazil.

We are promptly informed at the very beginning of the movie that the military regime conducted widespread murder, torture, that the press was gagged and civil rights eroded. Brazilians were promised elections within a year after the 1964 coup, but democracy only returned more than two decades later. The coup d’etat had the enthusiastic support of the United States. We are also told that Marighella was a writer, a poet, a politician, an activist, a fighter and a direct descendent of Sudanese slaves. He’s played by Brazilian actor and musician Seu Jorge. The films begins in 1964 in Salvador, Marighella’s birth place. He explains to his 11-year-old son that he will not be in touch for some time, and that he’s doing this in the name of his very own security. He promises to return in time for his 15th-birthday. We then move to 1968, the year when the military regime descended into sheer authoritarianism and violence. Marighella conducts an underground armed struggle with a circle of associates. The movement was called ANL (“National Liberation Action”, in free transation). In one of the film’s first sequences, they rob a train loaded with weapons.

A lot of the film dialogue centres on the contradictions of the armed struggle. Marighella is adamant that guns are necessary, while some of his associates prefer other strategies. He has a friend called Jorge in the press, a local newspaper called Tribuna do Sudeste. It’s thanks to Jorge printing Marighella’s picture on the newspaper cover that the revolutionary was freed from his first prison stint. As the military regime becomes increasingly oppressive, Marighella’s associates (or “comrades”) gradually agree to more extreme tactics. Their intercept a local radio and inform Brazilians about the widespread murder and torture being conduct in secrecy. The revolutionaries too become more violent. They murder an American diplomat. Suddenly, everyone is trigger-happy.

A lot of the topics described in the film have returned to haunt Brazil. In the film, Marighella – who was formerly a congressman – talks about going into exile. Brazilian congressman Jean Wyllys went into self-exile last month. Censorship is widespread. At present, criticism of Bolsonaro’s government is entirely absent from many of the country’s leading media.

But Marighella also has a a few contradictions. While criticising US imperialism and the Brazilian mainstream media from a political point-of-view, Marighella embraces both institutions wholeheartedly from an aesthetic and formal perspective. The film is structured like a conventional Hollywood thriller, or a Brazilian television series. The language is formulaic. And the film is too long at 150 minutes. A very large number of people left the cinema in the first hour. Marighella does not elicit profound reactions. No one laughed out loud, no one cried.

Another contradiction is that the film was co-produced by Globo Filmes. The Globo group was a staunch supporter of the military dictatorship. It described the 1964 coup as “divine intervention”, and it grew to become the largest media conglomerate in the country thanks to its unwavering support of the military regime. In 2016, it supported yet another coup d’etat. Marighella will eventually be split into five 30-minute segments and be made into a Globo television series.

Also very importantly, the film omits a crucial historical fact. Brazil’s former foreign minister Aloysio Nunes, who acceded to the role following the 2016 coup d’etat, is entirely absent from the movie. Nunes was one of Marighella’s closest associates, and many historians argue that he was the whistle-blower personally responsible for Marighella’s murder. Wagner Moura explained to DMovies: “The ALN had more than 100 members, I opted to show just 12 of them. My characters were not real people, but instead an amalgam of various individuals”.

Despite its shortcomings, I still hope that large numbers of people will watch Marighella. Its message of resistance is both urgent and timely. I emphatically commend Moura’s audacity in the topic choice.

Marighella showed at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival in 2019, when this piece was originally written. It will premiere at the UK on December 5th and 13th at the BFI, as part of the African Odysseys selection. The screenings will be introduced by Victor Fraga, the author of this piece, founder and director of DMovies. Click here in order to buy your ticket now.

Synonyms (Synonymes)

Posted on by victorfraga

QUICK SNAP: LIVE FROM BERLIN

Young Israeli Yoav (Tom Mercier) has defected his homeland, a country that he has learned to despise. He arrives in Paris, but he’s not off to a good start, either. His clothes are stolen while he’s taking a bath and almost freezes to death (literally) in the bathtub. Luckily for him, two young locals Emile (Quentin Domaire) and Caroline (Louise Chevillotte) come to his rescue. They offer him the opportunity of a new start in this great and promising European country.

Yoav wholeheartedly embraces his newly founded “Frenchness”. He refuses Israel in every conceivable way. He describes he country as “disgusting, foul, vile, fetid, horrific, odious, bad-hearted, creepy, nasty” and more. He has a habit of reading out synonyms (hence the film title) in an attempt to improve his French and prove his allegiance to the European country. He refuses to speak Hebrew. He explains that his grandfather refused to speak Yiddish upon arriving in Israel because the language reminded him of the Holocaust. He now feels the same way towards his mother tongue. The analogy is crystal-clear: Israel is the Holocaust.

French nationalism, however, isn’t rosy at all. Yoav has to take citizenship lessons where students are asked to sing the national anthem La Marseillaise. The lyrics are riddled with xenophobia and calls to violence: “To arms citizens, form your battalions. March, march. Let impure blood water our furrows”. Plus he earns money by posing naked for a photographer in very awkward and sexual positions. He’s unfazed. He seems determined to become French, whatever it takes. He marries Caroline and wishes to practice the French values of “freedom”. Will he eventually realise that such freedom can also become a handicap?

Ultimately, the “synonyms” in the film title refer to nationalism. Israeli nationalism and French nationalism, they are synonymous.

Synonyms is a two-hour long absurdist film. A little like Yorgos Lanthimos’s Dogtooth (2009), except that the prison here are the confines of nationalism (instead of a villa somewhere in Greece). The dialogues and the actions are wilfully contrived and artificial-sounding. And there’s a lot of language play (sadly, much gets lost in translation, and will only make sense to French speakers). The problem is that this absurdist streak is so extreme that it alienates viewers. The director probably intended so, but it also comes across as a little pretentious at times. Plus there’s too much intertext. To boot, there’s little examination of what makes Israel so “evil”. One sequence shows Yoav’s cringeworthy memories of the Israeli army, but that’s about it.

Synonyms is showing in competition at the 69th Berlin Film Festival taking place right now. It’s unlikely to win anything.

Greta

Posted on by victorfraga

This is a candid, fascinating and at times disturbing look into the life of a lonely, older and marginalised gay man. Greta tells the story of 70-year-old male nurse Pedro (Marco Nanini), who works in an overcrowded public hospital in the Northeastern city of Fortaleza. His transsexual friend Daniela (played by cis actress Denise Weinberg) suffers from kidney failure and cannot find a hospital bed. So Pedro secretly takes a wounded young man (Demick Lopes) into his own home in order to vacate a hospital space for his ailing friend.

The young man turns out to be a criminal who viciously murdered another man with 41 stabs. Despite the horrific revelation, the age gap, and the fact that both men are now in trouble with the police, they develop a tender and sexual relationship. The man refuses to budge from Pedro’s modest dwellings. And soon Pedro – who prefers being called Greta in his intimacy – is attached to the mysterious stranger, too. Meanwhile, Daniela refuses hospital treatment, despite knowing that her condition is very grave and she could be facing her very final days.

The final third of the movie consists of a jaunt into Fortaleza’s LGBT world. There is a very explicit oral sex scene in a sauna/ sex joint. Daniela delivers a classic Brazilian song on stage in a cabaret club. Pedro sits in a bar while a gogo dancer performs in the background. This is bleak and yet moving representation of an impoverished and marginalised segment of Brazilian society. Solitude is also a central topic. Pedro cries out line: “I want to be alone”, in reference to Greta Garbo’s famous phrase. Despite enjoying his time with the murderous stranger, the lonely man struggles to adapt to a life of companionship.

This is a very audacious film in its representation of queerness at old age. Marco Nanini is an iconic television actor at the age of 70. The nudity and some of the sex are very graphic. Nanini does not perform penetration and fellatio, but does appear with an erection and very much “hands on”. The portrayal of the marginalised LGBT community of Fortaleza is equally graphic and honest.

Yet this is not a perfect movie. There are a few teething problems, not entirely unusual for a first-time director. Firstly, there are a few loose ends (for example, it’s never entirely clear how the murderer repeatedly leaves and returns to Pedro’s apartment). Demick is not very convincing a manipulative murderer. And he chemistry between Nanini and Demick isn’t very good. As a result, some of the sex sequences don’t seem very authentic, and some of the dialogues a little contrived. And the ending of the movie is a bit clumsy. Nanini, on the other hand, is nothing short of spectacular.

The Brazilian LGBT community has been consistently berated by Brazil’s fascist president Jair Bolsonaro. He removed LGBT rights from the Human Rights statute in his second day in office his year, and he has consistently and unequivocally insulted the LGBT community. He shouted profanities at the only member LGBT member of parliament Jean Wyllys, and he clarified that he would prefer a dead child to a gay son. Jean Wyllys left the country a few weeks ago in self-exile following repeated death threats. Bolsonaro openly celebrated his departure on Twitter, calling the occasion “a great day for Brazil”. The importance of progressive and liberating films like Greta therefore cannot be overstated.

Greta showed in the 69th Berlin International Film Festival in February 2019, when this piece was originally written. It premieres in the UK as part of BFI Flare (March 21st to the 31st).

Varda by Agnes (Varda par Agnès)

Posted on by victor@dmovies.org

In Agnès Varda’s new documentary essay, which premieres today at Berlinale, the director returns again to a theme that has run throughout her work: herself. Varda by Agnès is a feature-length keynote with the French New Wave pioneer, who takes the audience on a journey through her films, stylistic choices, and changing themes.

It’s also a person reflecting on their 60-year career, from beginnings as a photographer, through successes and failures, her marriage to Jacques Demy who she loved very much, and her willingness to explore alternative mediums. It’s a mighty rejoinder to the Nolan/Tarantino shoot-on-film-only freaks that one of cinema’s great formal innovators is so open to adapting to new technologies, to see how they can bring her closer to the world.

It’s a primer for those who have discovered her work since Faces Places (which, along with her iconic image has made her an online darling). Varda has always been a master of controlling her own image, of exploring how people see and are seen. She muses on her production of the Jane Birkin film Kung-Fu Master (1988) alongside Jane B. par Agnès V. (1988) about what it meant to create portraits of another person which were also portraits of herself.

Part of why she’s such a source of fascination is that she’s never depicted herself as a tortured artist or intense genius, as so many writer/directors do. She’s self aware and good humoured about her work, but its this view of the self as only separated by the camera lens, so her films always feel like a trip directly into her interior monologue.

Part of me wondered if this film is a response to the increasingly memed version of her – a cardboard cut out likeness that toured along with Faces Places (2017) and became a must-selfie-with item, for example. She reclaims her own image and recycles it, which is effectively what Varda by Agnès is. Varda says as much herself in the section on one of her greatest films The Gleaners & I (2000). In that film, she realised that through following gleaners that she was herself one, recycling the stuff of life for film. Varda by Agnès is doing just the same with her own cinema, punctuating her life story with choice movie moments.

It’s expertly done, and it is a joy to revisit one of the greatest and most consistent filmographies in the history of European cinema, but if you are already familiar with Varda’s work this doesn’t tell you much that you don’t already know. As another capper to cement an already certain legacy though, we should be thankful for Varda Par Agnès as we are for the woman herself.

Varda by Agnès premiered at Berlinale, when this piece was originally written. On BFI Player, Mubi and Amazon Prime in May 2023.

Elisa and Marcela (Elisa y Marcela)

Posted on by victorfraga

This is a film about two women in love, and directed by a female. And this is cinema at its most universal. It will move you regardless of whether you are a male or a female, Spanish or British, progressive or conservative, or anything else. This is the real-life tale of two humans being who fell in love and took draconian measures in order in order to remain together, against all odds.

Elisa (Natalia de Molina) first meets Marcela (Greta Fernandez) on the first day of school in 1898. They are immediately fascinated with each other. Their tender affection gradually develops into a full-on homosexual relation. Marcela’s parents intervene and send Marcela away to a boarding school in Madrid for three years. The two women, however, resume their romance as soon as Marcela returns. The residents of the parish of Couso too realise that their share more than a friendship. Elisa is branded a “marimacho”, and the couple become increasingly despised and isolated.

The two women come up with a very audacious escape plan. Elisa disappears, with Marcela claiming that she migrated to Cuba with some distant relatives. Then suddenly Elisa’s cousin “Mario” surfaces and marries Marcela. Mario is in reality a cross-dressed version of Elisa, with a hand-drawn moustache et al. Marcela becomes pregnant and tells locals that Mario is the father (we never learn who made Marcela pregnant). She justifies striking resemblance between Elisa and “Mario” on the fact that they are first-degree relatives. In reality, the two women intend to migrate to Argentina and restart their lives in a place where they will not get harassed. But locals suspect that Mario is Elisa. A local mob of vigilantes attack their house. Their plan goes terribly awry.

I can’t tell you too much more about the actual story without spoiling it for you. I should just tell you that they find kind and generous people on their way, and that they get a helping hand from another non-conventional couple. A reminder that solidarity and empathy can change the world. What these people do for them will put a smile on your face.

The countryside of Galicia in Northeastern Spain is depicted in abundant and accurate detail. The stone houses and bridges, the octopuses, the accordion, the Celtic dresses are all present. Plus the film deals with the subject of emigration (Elisa and Marcela want to emigrate to Argentina). Galicia is the region of Spain most closely associated with emigration. Half a million Galicians currently live abroad (a quarter of the population of the region). My father is one of such emigrants. The only thing that’s strangely and entirely absent from the film is the local language Galician. Elisa and Marcela is entirely spoken in Castilian. Neither my father nor my late grandparents spoke such language.

Isabel Coixet’s latest drama excels in technical wizardry. The sharp black and white photography gently morphs into grainy images and real photographs taken at the beginning of the century. The wedding picture of the real Marcela and Mario/Elisa appears briefly. Such visual ingeniousness might ring bells with those who saw the Portuguese film Tabu (Miguel Gomes, 2012), another masterpiece of black and white Iberian cinema, which also deals with emigration and a seemingly impossible love. Tabu won the Alfred Bauer Prize for “new perspectives on cinematic art” when it premiered at the Berlinale 7 years ago, and Elisa and Marcela could achieve a the similar feat.

The dramatic elements are also outstanding. The chemistry between the two leads is effervescent. Or explosive even. And who doesn’t love some 19th century Lesbian action with octopuses (no pun intended) and even some very peculiar bonding? Despite its sexual audacity, Elisa and Marcela never slips into the vulgar and absurd. It’s purely carnal and sensual (says a gay man).

The film wraps up with a reminder that gay marriage became legal in Spain in 2005 (more than 100 years after Marcela and Elisa departed), and also that homosexual love is still punishable by death in many countries around the world.

Elisa and Marcela showed at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival, when this piece was originally written. It was our editor’s favourite to win the Golden Bear, in a year with a very strong selection. This did not come to fruition. Had this happened, a lot of eyebrows would have been raised. That’s because the film was produced by Netflix, and this means that it will never see a theatrical release. This is indeed regrettable. Elisa and Marcela deserves to be seen at the cinema., Perhaps not surprisingly, the Netflix logo triggered some members of the audience to boo. The film made available on Netflix in June.

A Private War

Posted on by Jeremy Clarke

This is the story of the last decade or so of Sunday Times war correspondent Marie Colvin from just before she lost an eye to enemy fire in Sri Lanka in 2001 to her death in an explosive blast in Homs in 2012. Recent events since the film’s completion suggest that she was deliberately targeted and murdered by the Syrian forces.

Director Heineman is a documentary film maker of some considerable repute having made City Of Ghosts (2017) , Cartel Land (2015) and Our Time (2012) and he graduates to feature films here. You can see the attraction of the biographical subject for someone with that background. Judging by the excellent documentary about her Under The Wire (Chris Martin, 2018), Marie was not only something of a force of nature but also an extremely difficult woman to work with and at the same time someone who absolutely refused to play by the accepted rules of the game. She got herself in to inaccessible places and got information out to the world about what was happening in them.

Our review of Under The Wire suggested Colvin as a perfect subject for a feature adaptation and that “more psychological rigour would’ve deepened the story”, something A Private War has gone for in no uncertain terms and which does indeed lend it some extra gravitas in certain parts. That review further suggested that there could have been greater emphasis on why journalists go to such lengths in order to tell their stories, in which regard alas the current film doesn’t do quite so well.

As the narrative approaches Marie’s death, the list of places from which she reports plays out like a countdown: Marzak, Afghanistan 2009, Misrata, Libya, 2011, Homs, Syria 2012. Yet, in the end, the script doesn’t quite get under why Colvin pursued the career that she did. Addiction to constantly putting herself in danger is mentioned, but never really explored at length. Maybe Heineman should have looked at the wonderfully dirty Salvador (Oliver Stone, 1986) with its secondary cameraman character (Jon Savage) who’ll do anything to capture that perfect, photographic news shot. We don’t quite get that sense or anything like it here.

Nevertheless, Rosamund Pike is fantastic as the hard-bitten, globetrotting, one-eyed newshound who won’t take any nonsense from anyone. And there are some amazing transition scenes such as entering her London home, finding the interior covered with a mixture of flaking plaster and camouflage netting as her mind descends into the stuff nightmares derived from in the field traumas. More of this sort of material would have served the piece well.

Instead the script tries for historicity but trips up via an over-reliance on stereotypes. Its supporting character thumbnail of cameraman Paul Conroy (Jamie Dornan) works well enough as the recording eyes to Colvin’s own descriptive prose, but her London editor Sean Ryan (Tom Hollander) feels like a cliché as he tells her that everyone’s behind her, there’ll always be a place for her at the paper and so on.

A new girl called Kate (Faye Marsay) control alt delete’s Marie’s crashed computer back into working again in the office, turns up a couple of times abroad then mysteriously fades away from the narrative. A seasoned fellow reporter called Norm seems to exist for no other reason than for his later death under fire to shock us.

And then there’s the drama’s opening/closing shot, a spectacular and highly detailed crane up from the ground to reveal a panorama of Syria’s war-ravaged city of Homs in ill-advisedly minute, computer generated detail which both dominates and sits uneasily alongside everything else in a film which never approaches this clearly very expensive shot’s sense of devastated landscape.

The subject matter is still pretty strong stuff and moments like Colvin’s interviewing Yasser Arafat and seeing his dead body not long afterwards certainly deliver. When she broadcasts live to the world from a building in the middle of besieged Homs the scene can’t really fail to inspire because it was such a brave and amazing thing to do in real life and its representation here does it justice.

Elsewhere, though, you wish the film would go hell for leather into the mind of this extraordinary woman but it never quite does: the whole should somehow have added up to a much greater sum of its parts. Little bits of voice over and brief footage of the real life Marie Colvin herself talking at the end suggest what might have been. A Private War pales beside such dirtylicious films about war correspondents as The Killing Fields (Roland Joffé, 1984) or the aforementioned Salvador. It’s good, but it ought somehow to have been better.

A Private War is out in the UK on Friday, February 15th. On VoD on Monday, June 10th.

The Souvenir

Posted on by victor@dmovies.org

Supposedly a filmic memoir, Joanna Hogg’s latest, the excruciating, heartbreaking romance The Souvenir turns an overplayed drug addiction story into magic by peeling away at our sympathies for the characters and her arresting images. The palatial surroundings prove to be a diseased cage.

Newcomer Honor Swinton Byrne pulls off a difficult performance as Julie, the smart, rich girl becoming aware of her own naivety. Despite being a budding filmmaker who just wants to realise her script about working class people in Sunderland (she visited once for a friend’s art show), she is unable to see outside of her own experience, and blind to the problems closest to her. She largely stays inside her Knightsbridge flat, but what starts as a room of one’s own is soon infiltrated by a poison.

Julie has been utterly coddled by her parents and so she throws her dependency onto the Oxbridge graduate Anthony. He’s vague about his foreign office job; Julie finds pictures of him in disguise in Afghanistan. Their relationship is immediately intense, although Hogg does not show them touch for the entirety of their developing relationship. And as soon as we do see them make that physical connection, we, and Julie, finally see the track marks on his arm.

Tom Burke’s performance must be one of the highlights of Berlinale. Delivering lines so slow, his bulking presence in the frame dominates and his arrogant demeanour cuts through scenes with this bitter assumed birthright. A harrowing withdrawal scene far removed from the romanticised movie view it gets in movies like Trainspotting (Danny Boyle, 1996), turns the living room into a kind of tomb, with Anthony a terrifying Bela Lugosi.

Inspired by Ozu, Hogg cramps the characters into these full, tight frames. Even when the camera takes a distance, the architecture of the flat, the lines of furniture, silhouettes of the city skyline, separate the characters. Often these stark shots are replicated later on with certain elements changed, drawing our attention to the passage of time without the need for exposition. A jaunt to Venice becomes a horrifying death march, in a scene that really pulls together the film’s critique of high-class degradation. Unsatisfying sex and opulence correspond in a scene that puts the audience into a drugged stupor.

The literal souvenirs of a relationship, however, are the most haunting element of the movie. Not just material things, like the ornate bed frame and extravagant clothes she acquires, or her taste for music which moves away from punk until she’s enjoying classical. It’s this entire worldview, how all of our relationships will change us in ways that might never become clear to us.

All of the characters carry a baggage, and Hogg doesn’t push any of this onto the audience, allowing the fragments of this story to take place in glimpses. Parts of it are almost cringe comedy, as Anthony condescends with such ease, telling Julie to abandon sincerity or documentary in her work, to be more like Powell and Pressburger. But it’s not quite satire. Repeated references to The Troubles tell us what’s taking place in the background, and what Julie doesn’t have to concern herself with. This other world, a real world. It’s on the other side of the wall, outside the window, through the lens.

Swinton Byrne’s real-life mother Tilda Swinton lends her presence to a small but effective role, giving it a little star power. It’s great that her discerning choices can bring more eyes to directors who can do with the attention. She’s back in old lady mode, only a step removed from her Grand Hotel Budapest (Wes Anderson, 2014) role. It’s an exquisite, detailed turn.

The beats of a toxic relationship are so familiar, and that’s what makes it difficult to watch. We want to tell at the screen, tell Julie off, beat Anthony up. This will be too much to handle for some, such unadorned privilege, a protagonist making such obvious mistakes and going largely unchecked. It might be difficult to sympathise, why doesn’t she just leave him? But in the sustained depiction of high-class consumption, Hogg shows toxicity as a drug, a society as sick as Anthony. With the end title card promising The Souvenir Part 2 is coming soon, I can’t wait to find out how Hogg will expand this already epic chronicle.

The Souvenir premiered at the Berlinale, when this piece was originally written. It’s out in cinemas across the UK on Friday, August 30th. On VoD Monday, September 16th. Available for free on Mubi for a month from October 25th.

Farewell to the Night (L’Adieu a la Nuit)

Posted on by victorfraga

QUICK SNAP: LIVE FROM BERLIN

Muriel breeds horses somewhere in the Occitanie region of France, not far from the Spanish border. She is played by a 75-year-old Catherine Deneuve, who has subverted the rules of ageing by looking younger every year. One day she receives the visit of her 18-year-old son Alex (Kacey Mottet Klein), who has become increasingly attached to his childhood friend Lila (Oulaya Amamra). While abroad, Alex remained in touch almost daily with the pretty young lady. One sunny day (quite literally, as the film takes place during the first days of Spring, mostly in the bright outdoors), Muriel catches his son (low and behold…) praying in Arabic (shock!!!).

The quiet and introverted Alex has converted to Islam. He is confident that he will enjoy a very happy and fulfilling “second life” after he says goodbye to his current dark existence (hence the film title Farewell to the Night). Lila has become his closest associate, and she shares his convictions and ambitions. Gradually, the horrific truth emerges. Alex and Lila intend to leave everything behind in order to become jihadis in Syria. They are convinced that this is the way forward, and no one can dissuade them from their holy purpose. So Muriel takes matters into her own hands, resorting to very desperate measures in order to prevent her beloved son from embarking on a journey presumably of no return. An ankle-monitor-wearing jihadi defector lends Muriel a helping hand. But their quest isn’t straighforward and simple.

Farewell to the Night is an auspicious movie because Techine is an accomplished storyteller with more than five decades of experience making films. The story is both riveting and plausible, with strong performances by the three leads. There is an important message about the failure of capitalism driving young people to religious fundamentalism. Alex and the other young people recruited by radical Islam have never been in trouble, and there is nothing wrong with them. They are simply bored of an increasingly consumerist and futile society. They are seeking a noble purpose and also a “Summer adventure”, we are told.

But there is also a very significant political issue with Farewell to the Night. It fails to distinguish between radical and moderate Islam, which is very dangerous in an increasingly racist and Islamophobic France and Europe. All Muslims in the film – bar the defector – are brainwashed fundamentalists. The message is: “Islam is evil and it’s corrupting our children”. Hardly a positive statement when we face the very real threat of the far-right. France has infamously banned veils in public, in a sheer gesture of Islamophobia disguised as a “freedom” statement. There is also a subtle and cringe-worthy apologia to the anti-terrorism laws, conveniently forgetting to mention that such legislation represent the erosion of our personal freedoms. Marine Le Pen will probably love Farewell to the Night.

Farewell to the Night is showing as part of the 69th Berlin International Film Festival, which is taking place right now. Andre Techine’s last two films Being 17 (2016) and Golden Years (2017) were far superior and yet never saw theatrical distribution in the UK. Farewell to the Night may well make it to UK cinemas, simply due to the presence of über-actress and USP Catherine Deneuve.

Piranhas (La Paranza dei Bambini)

Posted on by victorfraga

Adapted from the eponymous novel by Neapolitan writer and Camorra expert Roberto Saviani (who also wrote the screenplay), Piranhas follows 10 adolescents in Naples who set up a gang in order to make money and enjoy an unbounded and hedonistic example. The original title in Italian La Paranza dei Bambini literally means “the group of boys”, in an attempt to emphasise their young age. The translation into English Piranhas has a far darker connotation, suggesting that the teens are sanguinary predators. While a little awkward, this translation isn’t entirely inaccurate.

Fifteen-year-old Nicola (Francesco di Napoli) is the gang leader. He convey a very disturbing type of masculinity at a very young age. He takes “protection” money from locals in order to buy drugs, attend expensive clubs, buy branded clothes and posh furniture. Thousands of euros flow like water. He smokes marijuana and snorts cocaine, and circulates locally with the confidence of an adult. He loves to show off his newly found power and wealth. He has a beautiful girlfriend called Letizia, and he also hire prostitutes. He terrorises the narrow alleyways on his scooter.

It rise to power begins when he robs his first gun from a policeman, and then convinces a hesitant local drug lord under house arrest to supply him with further weapons. Nicola and his young associates (Briato, Lollipop, etc) use an online video in order to learn how to operate the pistols and machine guns. They are prepared to rob. They are prepared to shoot. They are prepared to kill. All in the name of power and the small capitalist pleasures.

There is a turf war taking place, and Nicola’s gang has to protect their Quartieri (neighbourhood) from rival gangs. It’s boy versus boy in the gang wars. A little bit like like a toned down version of City of God (Fernando Meirelles, 2002), where the criminals are even younger and yet far more sadistic.

The most concerning aspect of this grotesque masculinity is that it remains unchallenged. Such behaviour is never frowned upon. Nicola’s mother is unfazed by her son’s activities. And he’s role model to his younger brother, who insists that he too should learn how to use a weapon. Paradoxically, the drug lord under house arrest is the only person – at least at first – discourages Nicola from engaging in criminals activities. He says: “why don’t you play football, they too make a lot of money!”. Otherwise, the film seems to endorse and romanticise such demeanour.

Nicola does have respect for at least two pillars of his life: his mother Vittoria and a local saint called Santa Concetta. This is represents duality of the “marianismo versus machismo” conspicuous in several Latin cultures. The male is strong and empowered. The female is pure, holy, maternal, and must be respected and protected. And the female does not stand on the way of the male. The male has carte blanche to act as he pleases.

The photography of the rundown and impoverished districts of Naples will ring bells with those familiar with Roberto Rosselini and Vittorio de Sica’s filmography. The Neapolitan offers the perfect balance between glam and gloom. Most of the dwellings are modest and in desperate need of painting and restoration. The alleyways are dark and oppressive, yet strangely charming. There is a very large underground cave where children play football and the titular precocious adults practice shooting. The local dialect sounds very peculiar, more like Catalan than Italian (I speak neither language, and my comment is purely anecdotal).

In a nutshell, Piranhas offers you the opportunity to deep-dive into a vibrant and foreign world where boys behave like men. It’s equally jarring and fascinating.

Piranhas showed at the Berlin Film Festival, when this piece was originally written. It will see its UK premiere in October, as part of the BFI London Film Festival.