Not a Rock Doc (A Shark’s Tale)

T[/dropccap]he documentary opens on two old men watching footage of a band called Sharks. The band, it seems, were a band led by Free bassist Andy Fraser, and enjoyed a modicum of success in their native England. The camera returns to the two men, who introduce themselves as Sharks bandmates Steve Parsons and Chris Spedding. What follows is a film that demonstrates these veterans of 1970s rock familiarising themselves with the trappings of the 21st century. They make a joke that The Clash won’t be turning up in the feature, but what we get is a strangely insightful look into the workings of a London rock band. Better still, it’s a very funny doc.

“Did I have fun [on cocaine],” Spedding muses. “Yes. Do I regret it? No.” Spedding made a name for himself in the 1980s, working as a session player beside a collection of big names (he worked with Paul McCartney on ‘No Values’.) Parsons – incidentally, a co-director of the film – flitted between singing and acting in the intervening years, but there’s no denying the sparks behind his eyes at he arrives on stage. Spedding too speaks of the group with great fondness, telling an interviewer – conveniently wearing a ‘Who The Fuck Does She Think She Is..’ t-shirt – that he prefers playing guitar to singing. More humorously, Spedding and Parsons are learning as they go, coming up with zingers and catchphrases as the film envelops. “What’s my motivation?” Spedding asks. “Money,” comes the reply.

We see an excited teenager attending their concert, happily comparing them to the other albums in his personal collection. Parsons is captured speaking on radio, stating that Sharks were a “supergroup” of sorts who represented the sound of the era. Spedding, meanwhile, autographs for a queue of fans, many of them as old as he is. But Parsons is nevertheless determined to make Sharks a viable proposition for the new decade, utilising websites and applications to generate support.

Schematically, Not A Rock Doc (A Shark’s Tale) bears something of a resemblance to Let It Be (Michael Lindsay Hogg, 1970), although the tone is ultimately more positive than The Beatles work. This isn’t a film about breaking up, but about piecing something that was thought to be broken back together. It doesn’t hurt that Spedding and Parsons are joined by Tosh Ogawa on bass, bridging a gap between their generation and the younger audiences. Spedding sounds fiery during some of the instrumental sections, invoking raw blues in the process.

In a strangely moving segment, Toshio Nomura speaks of his unwavering support for the outfit. Spedding seems moved by the support for the band, particularly in this digital era. But the analogue instrumentation adds a dimension that is somewhat missing from the music in the modern circuit. Parsons quips that although it has been forty years since the band started, they can still rock out. No, the film doesn’t luxuriate from a high budget, but this gives it a strangely holistic vibe to it that makes for compelling viewing.

Sex Pistols fans will enjoy the appearance of drummer Paul Cook, but the focus is almost entirely on Spedding and Parsons, two old friends who have been on many rodeos together. They share war stories (Spedding is spotted in a Womble costume in a funny interlude), yet never take their eyes off the present. Where the band will go next with their music, it’s too early to say, but there’s no doubt that whatever the project is, it will be very interesting , and no doubt there will be a solo or two in it. Not A Rock Doc (A Shark’s Tale) is a very good work.

Not A Rock Doc (A Shark’s Tale) premiered at the Doc’n Roll Film Festival.

Napoleon

The film opens with the titular character (Joaquin Phoenix, bringing an uncertain birdlike quality to the performance), walking through the rubbles of French, his eyes peering at the revolution on the streets. Electing to defeat the “Royalists and the English”, he rises through the social rankings, when he meets Joséphine (Vanessa Kirby, in a role that is weirdly underdeveloped, despite the actresses sterling credentials), and falls head over heels in love. Her presence is a common distraction: No one has ever cast such a spell on him, and the strength is such that the thought of another man beside her repulses and infuriates him in equal measure. But as he rises to the rank of Emperor, pressure is put on him to sire an heir, and he grows dubious of Joséphine’s ability to produce a successor for him.

Napoleon is an ambitious film, spoiled by the lack of an emotional centre. Phoenix, all furrowed brows and frenzied laughs, is a curious choice for the French leader, and his brio sits at odds with the bedroom scenes, where Napoleon repeatedly fails to satisfy Joséphine’s secret desires. She shacks up with a younger, more handsome man while her husband is away at war.
Phoenix is better during the battle scenes, although he is underserved by the camera work, which flits from one angle to another, confusing the narrative in the process.

The battle in Russia – all white specks and dark hues – comes across worst of all, and Scott makes little effort to distinguish one army from the next. A film of this magnitude is bound to take liberties with the historical sources, and – while the depiction of Waterloo might ruffle a few feathers – it does present some flavour of the tactics of the era. Less happily, the battle scenes are done with nary a flourish nor a feature. If the audience hears a footstep, then a soldier is about to be killed. There are no surprises, no red herrings; nada.

Napoleon also disappoints in its depiction of women. Joséphine anchors her husband’s desire, but she spends much of the film offscreen, and her presence is only mentioned via flashbacks and letters. In essence, Kirby is there to be plucked by a ravenous husband, who twists and turns until he exhausts himself. The only other female character of note is Marie-Louise, a 15-year-old who weds Napoleon after the annulment of his marriage to Joséphine, who speaks of her attraction to the French Emperor, before following him to his bedroom. Glaringly, she is never seen or heard from again. This wouldn’t be such an issue if it wasn’t for the fact that the film opens up with Marie Antoinette’s execution, which Scott films with giddy, semi-schoolboy like glee.

Ridley Scott’s latest historical drama is disappointing. Considering the talent – an Oscar winning lead matching with a director of Scott’s calibre – this could be one of 2023’s most memorable works. Instead, what we get is something that is bland, banal and driven by old fashioned, sexist ideals. More happily, the film highlights Napoleon’s unquestioning desire to win no matter the cost. The film closes out with a memorial of sorts to the many men who laid down their lives for his Empire, cautioning viewers to the promises of idealistic young leaders in the process.

Napoleon is in cinemas on Friday, November 22nd.

Skunk

Liam (Thibauld Dooms) is a troubled soul. His domestic life is a mess, as is his current dwelling, a youth facility for neglected and abused teens. Struggling to find a place of his own, Liam flits from fury to reflection in the hope of gaining some sense of clarity at this turbulent time. What follows is a journey of sorts, where Liam re-plays some of the more tramautic moments in his life in the hope of becoming a more rounded and developed person.

The journey, he quickly realises, is perilous. His memory, it is quickly established, is rife with violence; much of it sexual. Director Koen Mortier directs these flashbacks with nary a flourish nor a close-up, and merely lets the tension play out in front of the camera. Scarred by the experience, Liam ends up screaming at his guidance counsellor, reminding her that he cannot go home, and cannot stay in this place. The camera allows Liam to walk away, giving him the space to scream out his thoughts without intrusion. Dooms is an excellent lead, commanding the screen with a series of furrowed brows and miminalistic gestures. He’s talented, although he’s helped by the authenticity of the script, which frequently places him in the middle of a corrosive setpiece.

Mortier films it naturalistically, which adds to the reality of the pain. Although some of the violence is toned down from Geert Taghon’s book, there is enough to make an impact. In one almost tantric moment of pain, Liam recalls a whole horde of people fighting in his house, which ends with a person throwing him up the stairs. It’s clear that Liam has never experienced kindness in the one place he should be safest and most loved of all: his home. Like Dooms’ acting, it’s the smaller actions that hold the most impact, and the most affecting moment in the film comes when Liam realises the kindness that is being offered to him.

Cinemagoers could be forgiven for suffering from an aversion to uber-violence, which explains why much of the actions are implied rather than exhibited in full force. There is heartache; there is teeange fuelled angst; but Mortier coolly keeps everything loping along at an unhurried pace. This is a world where family drama is other people’s business. Put simply, this isn’t a Europe that discusses the ramifications of crime, but turns a blind eye to it.Most of the set-up is fairly holistic. There are no montages, no miraculous feats of technical ingenuity. What is on display is raw, and bolstered by nothing but nerves. As the film progresses, Liam grows stronger, aided no doubt by the memories that have put him on this solitary road to his Damascus.

But the malign absurdity of his personal life is reflected in his actions, which make him difficult to be around. His domestic life is undercut by a hope to reunite with his parents one day in the future; when they can be a family once more.Economically, the film has the good sense to wrap the story up in little more than an hour and a half.

There’s an urgency to the film that adds to the closing sense of nausea, and by the time the film closes, it ends on just the right note. What’s more, the film draws into the fractured male psyche, which is rare to see these days. There are shocks, but nothing anybody above the age of sixteen can’t handle. Mortier is particularly good on the sense of place: the wooden houses, grey-buildings, the rusted gates. Each of these tiny details makes for a compelling and deeply watchable whole.

Skunk just premiered at the International Youth Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

All, Or Nothing at All

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Jiajun ‘Oscar’ Zhang’s debut feature unites a collection of individual tracks of mind, winds them into something resembling a story. Most of the film is set in a mall, where teenagers leer at the devices, faders and paraphernalia on display. They walk together like sheep, searching for a leader, almost hypnotised by the material on display. They are young – clearly representative of the Generation Z market – introducing an oddly fractured vision of their generation.

All, Or Nothing At All opens on a hologram of a tower, the floors and windows pixelated.The film cuts to a young bespectacled girl, putting on different types of shades. She veers over the counter to witness a dance class, which is heavily influenced by genres heard in the West. Suffused with colour, the feature is rife with contradiction and contrast, especially in the camera angles, positing the smaller humans beneath gargantuan models- looming like Gods over their obedient subjects. Zhang shows the message rather than lazily transmit it through exposition, but he is guilty of repeating ideas during the process. It’s a paper-thin plot that overstays its welcome (the film is just shy of 130 minutes in length), but director Jiajun ‘Oscar’ Zhang luxuriates viewers in a series of beautifully lit set-pieces in order to deliver the emotional undertones.

As commentaries go, All, Or Nothing At All is a deeply prescient one: young people flock to the shopping centre searching for the newest, shiniest object to go with their collection. The word “robot” stems from a Slavic word meaning “forced labour”, ie slave. While Zhang never explicitly refers to the consumers as “robots” or “slaves”, it’s clear that the consumers involuntarily surrender themselves to the merchandise in question.And with a centre as grand as this one, the feeling is that the more sparkly and splashy the thing in question is, the more it attracts buyers by the bucketload. In one illuminating shot, the film exposes a line of people looking at an object, like a herd of lionesses mounting a prey.

Composer C-Low offers a strangely haunting score, lit by a post-modernistic template that reflects the materialistic counterpoints within the tale. The soundtrack is soaked by keyboards, emulating the disparate adventures reflected by the consumers ambitions and lack of desire. Zhang paints a very desolate depiction of society, whole communes walking silently through the coppers and electronic stairs that guide them from place to place. Again, the film is occasionally guilty of indulgence, repeating plot lines – boy meets girl who prefers a device – throughout the picture. The film’s unconventional plot structure, if there is one, doesn’t make for easy viewing.

But there’s no denying the grandeur, the design, the ambition and the creativity of thought that enters into every stylised shot. Where there’s a sparsity of plot, there’s a rich diversity of shots. The bar scene is lit like a Michael Mann film from the 1980s, blue shadows rippling off the wall, whereas the café scen shows a greyness that’s almost as lonely as the couple that sit beneath it (the boyfriend barely looks up to smile at the woman sitting across from him.) Such is the raw power of the film, it highlights the importance of digital detoxification among viewers, both old and young.

Fittingly, the movie ends with a young woman returning her phone. Clearly, she’s dissatisfied with the results. Amused by her candour, the shopteller asks if she’s drawn “snowflakes?” A dig at this generation’s inability to take a joke? Either way, All, Or Nothing At All is a fable about mass consumerism.

If society continues in this manner, it will be hard to distinguish humans from their devices.

All, Or Nothing At All just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Stairway to Heaven (Taevatrepp)

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It is indeed possible to travel through time. Not through a portal, but through memory instead. Something as trivial as a bicycle can take us back to a happy and carefree time of the past. Such it is for Uu (Mait Malmsten), who is reminded of happier times in his life when he visits an ailing Georg, a childhood mentor of his , who tells him to try cycling again.

Suddenly, he is transported back to his youth, a time when he gawped at the naked models Georg painted (which for a teenager is better than a chocolate bar), and enjoyed the merits of football. He dances to the rock music of the era (the soundtrack is almost a character unto itself), and enjoys the friendships that he wishes could last an eternity. But the older Uu is undergoing personal duress: his work and romantic relationships are causing him harm, in a way his youthful endeavours never could. But by staying true to his younger ideals, he hopes to emerge a stronger and more fulfilled person, even though it’s hard to make it through time. There is, he is told, too much of it.

Surprisingly, the film recalls the wistfulness of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather Part II (1974), but the dialogue this time isn’t between a father and his son, but an older man and his younger self. In that sense, it’s less tantalising than Coppola’s treatise, but it’s arguably the more universal work. Stairway To Heaven is soaked in regret; ghosts can be found everywhere. Uu sees much in himself in the ailing Georg, knowing only too well that he too will have to face the Almighty. But until that happens, he can enjoy the merits of Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke On The Water’ and Electric Light Orchestra’s ‘Livin’ Thing’, both for the joys they brought him in his past, and the happiness it gives him in the present.

In one of the film’s more humorous moments, the younger Uu (played with rapier sharp wit by Timotheus Sammul) is told that The Beatles must have reunited; the voices on ELO sound very “Lennon”. By the time he has hit adulthood, this level of innocence has been replaced by a work ethic that slowly eats away at his soul. He’s a much lonelier figure in his older age, but that doesn’t stop him from working on himself. Indeed, the film makes a very good point that we never stop growing as individuals, even if we do feel like we’ve hit a fork. Work impacts Uu’s home life, work life and social life, but he always has that rock music to bring him back to a younger, more virile place in time. If time is an illusion, then memory is the key to safety, switching gears from one point of place to another point entirely. But as it stands, time keeps us marching on and on.

Stairway to Heaven is not without imperfeactions. Some of the supporting cast – particularly Harriet Toompere – feel like they’ve been drafted based on their looks and not their skills. And then there’s the matter of the slow motion shots, which do little to enhance the story, and actually do a lot to distract from it. he story is solid, the locations are stellar, and the songcraft (which also features Slade) is rocking.

Stairway to Heaven just premiered in the Baltic Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Giant’s Kettle (Hiidenkirnu)

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Markku Hakala & Mari Käki’s gripping nightmare focuses on two people in a committed relationship slowly drowning in sadness together. Credited only as “man” and “woman”, Giant’s Kettle follows these two people in their daily lives, from the rigours of work to the tedium of family life. Missing the bus at a factory stop, the man waits for a sign to guide him to his next step. Falling headfirst into a secret lecture, the woman is examined by a group of curious men. And then there’s the child, who is constantly searching for motion in a film that features little to no dialogue. Suddenly, a giant enters their lives, impacting the environment around them, creating a shift that is larger than any they’ve encountered so far in the film. There is rare excitement watching these two come face to face with a seven-foot giant, their eyes wide and ready for action. And like so much of the film, it appears only when it wants to.

An outrageous homage of sorts to black-and-white cinema, Giant’s Kettle is dotted with visual flair, objects peering from the side of a screen with momentary, meditative pace. As opening shots go, Giant’s Kettle is certainly a memorable one: A paw print lights up to resemble the shape of a hand, before the man’s body enters focus, and he stares at the viewer, as if willing them to walk away from the screening. The man, it seems, is a stern, taciturn writer, who is prone to moments of intense rage. Between maintaining the rotational machinery that keeps the city afloat, and glowering and resentful stares at his child, he screams to the high heavens when he drops his briefcase containing his newly-written work.

The woman is involved in a deeply disturbing montage that sees her wrapped in plastic, wheeled around in a circle of faceless people. Her sorrow is lessened by the presence of a giant, who may be providing her with the spark that’s sorely missing from her life. From the very first moment she appears on screen, our female protagonist’s life is a calamitous cascade of ennui and nonsense, which might explain why she barely lifts a finger in order to help her infant son who is trailing on a carpet beside her. Shot entirely in black and white, the film makes use of sound: factory explosions punctuating the pregnant pauses between scenes, while a cascade of smoke is moulded by the crashing fade-outs that centre the work.

Is that the whole truth? The film offers no easy answers. The static scenes might indicate that this is a nightmare of sorts, a bridge between the sleeping world, and the one that is wide awake. Naturally, it could also be that the filmmakers are laughing at their audience, as the strains of the early segments are bolstered by the presence of an unnatural behemoth of Finnish culture in the latter ones. It ebbs and flows like an orchestral piece, although the lack of coda might be a little jarring for some audience members.

The absence of dialogue ratchets up the despair ruthlessly, and of the two lead actors, Henri Malkki is the more vulnerable looking. He spends most of the film seeking some sort of reaction that might offer context or contradiction to his daily routine. But wherever he turns – whether it’s on the bus, or within the factory he frequents – there is nothing but vacancy and absence of interaction.

This is a dark and heavy film; it tests the weight an audience member can withstand without colour or dialogue. That the directors managed to complete the film without a crew is even more admirable. Giant’s Kettle suffers from a lack of budget, some of the props are visibly fake, and there’s an audible look of boredom from the grandmother who appears in certain static sequences, but by and large, this is a superlative achievement of modern-day silent cinema.

Giant’s Kettle just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Tentigo

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Llango Ram’s family drama is actually one of the most original comedies in some time. It involves a Sri Lankan family who find the patriarch’s hard-on is still throbbing in his pants, despite otherwise being clearly…dead. Fearing for their image, the family do what they can to blanket the man, and to buy themselves some time in the hope of diffusing the erection. What follows is a series of sketches. The characters grow more exasperated the more they realise that it is almost impossible to get rid of the unexpected physical reaction. And with their neighbour Kamala nosing around, the family need to do something before a family tragedy becomes family gossip.

One of the strengths of the film is its wackiness. It dances to an unpredictable rhythm, yet thanks to Llango Ram’s economic direction, not a single visual gag is wasted.It also gives the finished work a gloriously singular quality to it. Tentigo is not a dumb film either.

One of the sons laments the years he squandered squabbling with his father, when they should have been playing in the park. He stands beside a very different father, one a doctor is reluctant to sign off as “dead” because of the large penis in the pants. Electing to slap the organ down with a bat, the doctor is unable to squash it down, leaving the family to cart the body off in a rickshaw and hope for the best. The chief monk, a humourless stick-in-the-mud, offers them no answers either. And then there’s the option of chanting, which the family consider doing in the hope of deflating the throb.

Impeccable comic timing ensures the jokes hit their marks, and despite what some of the undertones might suggest, the film is tastefully made. None of the characters makes a sex joke. A sole “man-jumps-out-of-the-coffin” joke is unnecessarily crass, but by and large, this is an uproarious hoot. The sight of the throb (possibly a cucumber, or another vegetable hidden beneath the trousers) is never short of a quick chortle. Armed with a never-say-die attitude, the family the corpse from spot to spot searching for an answer. Once the erection has been severed, they can move on to the funeral.

There’s a great scene in which the family huddles together in their kitchen, frowning fervently at the woman traipsing through their garden, and unbeknownst to them, their body language demonstrates the great love they have kept hidden from both the public and themselves for some time. Like a true community, they stand beside each other, despite the ludicrousness of the scenario, and watch a woman free from turmoil stride around the property they have paid for.

The camera angles are sparky, without being too particularly ambitious, but there’s often someone running in a wayward direction in the back of a shot. Ram is clever enough to realise that the heft of the film – a funny, fluorescent, styled exercise that puts the deceased father front and centre – belongs on the shoulders of the actors, each of them poised to work on the ensemble. All of these elements are assembled by Ram, who puts his creative energy into a story that doesn’t feel like comic set pieces uneasily glued together.

The one liners always relate to the purpose of the film, and the female characters are very well established, serving as more than just window dressing for the male actors to oggle at. There is a little bit too much going on, for too long, but when the characters finally reach their point of destination, it feels well earned. The ending is crucial and hair-tinglingly charged, and the laughs are carefully delivered. But the film never forgets the heart of the story. It’s not about death, but about love.

Tentigo just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Cat Call (Cicaverzum)

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Fáni (Franciska Töröcsik) is a 30-year old, who has not had the easiest time with love. Every time she finds a man, she foretells his death, which amuses her mother no end. And when she bumps into Mihály, a hunky co-worker who lives in the same apartment block as her, the visions come back to haunt her. Then she notices his cat, who possesses the ability to speak to her. He seems to peer past the facade, the dresses and the pretence to see the “real” Fáni. What’s more, he doesn’t spur her on to imagine his demise.

She seems to have found the perfect gentleman, and by his influence, she’s developed a taste for milk, nibbles and long walks in the dark. Her friends aren’t convinced by this match, although Fáni assures them that the cat means well. He is, Fáni points out, a talented rapper, which horrifies her mother no end. “It’s one thing he’s a cat,” her mother cries; “but a musician?!” Her mother fears the cat will treat Fáni as badly as her father did, a man who would drop his infant daughter off in the cloak room to play rock music. Which leaves Fáni in a pickle: Is this a cycle she must break, or can she prove her mother wrong?

It’s a novel premise, and a very clever one, yet the execution is riddled with romcom clichés. We have the overbearing, clawing mother; the fickle best friend who is obsessed with materialistic goods; not forgetting the heartthrob who works closely with Fáni at her place of work, encouraging her to live out her dreams, no matter how audacious they are. Csaba Polgár looks bored as Mihály, resigning himself to everyone of Fáni’s whims, even if it means forking over €4,000 which the cat intends to use on a music video. Róbert Alföldi is similarly wasted as the boss who recognises the genius in Fáni, even though her cat/boyfriend devours his prized fish for breakfast. More annoyingly, the film’s funniest sequence feels like it was lifted almost entirely from The Return of the Pink Panther (Blake Edwards, 1975), in which Fáni tiptoes into her place of work, for fear of being spotted by a fellow colleague on a day she is reportedly sick for.

In short, what could have been an engrossing and original comedy is squandered by veering too closely to the quirky, mainstream American model (weirdly, Fáni’s friend bears an uncanny resemblance to Isla Fisher, an actress who has appeared in a number of insipid comedies). Mercifully for audiences, the filmmakers opt not to go down the bestial route, and the cat clearly tells her that he chose not to sleep with her while he had the chance to. More glaringly, there are too many “pussy” jokes, and a segment in which the cat “nibbles” at a woman’s breast, causing Fáni to lose her cool, feels misjudged in what is by and large a family film.

Which is a pity, because Franciska Töröcsik possesses tremendous comedy chops. Simply watch how Fáni salivates over footage of lions tearing into large tracts of meat; simply pause to the perfect rhythm of the milk gargling down her throat. Make no mistake, Töröcsik is a physical comedian extraordinaire. Unfortunately, she’s less convincing as the hapless maiden who falls head over heels in love with a cat, though to be fair, it’s hard to imagine any actor playing up that aspect with any sense of authenticity.

The film is impressively shot, luxuriating in the locations. Director Rozália Szeleczki flits from industrial greys to kaleidoscopic yellows in a matter of seconds, positing the mindset of the characters as he does so. The film is also tightly edited, and no gag lasts longer than it needs to deliver the point. What’s troubling is that the gags fall flat more often than they soar, and the director, cast and crew lean too heavily on the tried and tested narrative beats to merit Cat Call as disengaging and, worse, unremarkable. And in a film where a woman falls for a cat, it really shouldn’t be unmemorable!

Cat Call just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Endless Summer Syndrome (Le Syndrome de l’Eté Sans Fin)

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Prosperous French lawyer Delphine (Sophie Colon) seemingly has it all. She’s married to Antoine (Matheo Capelli), an altruistic husband who adores their adopted children as much as she does. Proud of her “multinational” family, she spends her days sunbathing, swimming and enjoying cocktails with her children. While watching her husband and children laugh at a private joke, she receives a disturbing phone call, one that intimates that her husband is enjoying a romantic rendez-vous with one of her kids.

Initially, she seems nonplussed – she is, after all, a high profile lawyer who has received a number of scam calls. But then she starts to notice condoms piling in her daughter’s room, and her thoughts turn to the worse. Electing to keep a cool face – her son Aslan is moving to New York, after all – she carries on living in liberal suburbia before the truth comes out, and her life spirals out of control.

Like Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman, 1975) before it, Endless Summer Syndrome details a woman’s nervous breakdown over the course of a weekend. By the time she gets to Sunday, Delphine has abandoned all pretence of happiness, and elects to confront her husband directly. It’s not like her to be passive aggressive: Not only does she tolerate her son’s marijuana habit, she also partakes in it from time to time. Antoine, by contrast, seems happier to spend his evenings reading Jack Kerouac, or playing scrabble. How could a man of his quiet nature do something so garish and destructive?

What’s most compelling about the film is its desire to break with social convention. The word “incest” is never uttered during the feature – director Kaveh Daneshmand opts to focus on the trauma that comes with infidelity. Delpine, unnaturally sylphlike and glamorous looking, is left wondering what emptiness lies in her husband’s life. When she hears the answer, it’s as aimless as the question she asked. But there’s no denying the pain Delphine suffers, which is evident from a solitary tear that falls down her face as she readies herself to re-enter the world at large.

With the exception of one more harrowing sex scene, imagined by Delphine in a moment of self-analysis, Endless Summer Syndrome is surprisingly tender in its depiction of nudity. Delphine herself happily takes her clothes off in the house she has bought with her own money, while the children (who seem closer than siblings normally are at this point of late adolescence) walk around the garden in various modes of undress. In one fiery scene, Delphine drags her daughter to the shower, peering for love bites, marks or clues that might insinuate her guilt.

Colon lets composer Matteo Hager takes on much of the heavy lifting (he uses dissonance whenever he performs keyboards), leaving her to stare vacantly into the void. You sense that a little bit of her soul is being chipped away by the depth of this family secret. Thus might explain why Delphine jumps into the pool with a violent sense of urgency. It’s here that the film’s central irony takes place: Keen to save herself from drowning, Delphine plunges headfirst into the only place she knows she’ll feel at peace; underwater.

Stylistically, Endless Summer Syndrome keeps it fairly simple, documenting the story in a solid, albeit admittedly static, manner. But what a story it is, exhibiting an alternative voice in these seemingly enlightened times. Colon commands the screen, but Capelli enjoys some meaty moments, especially in his depiction of a husband struck down by the severity of his actions. Make no mistake: Antoine loves his wife. But like so much in this life, love just isn’t enough.

Endless Summer Syndrome just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

The Fisherman’s Daughter (La Estrategia del Mero)

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Miguel is a young fisherman who regularly goes to an island in the middle of the Caribbean for nets. Directed by one of the older men to grab material from “Samuel’s house”, Miguel jumps through the window and rifles through the brandy cupboard for some refreshment. Thinking the house is empty, he wanders around the place, and is startled by the presence of a person he doesn’t recognise. “Are you a man or a woman?” he gingerly asks. “That’s very direct,” Priscila giggles in response.

As it happens, Priscila is Samuel’s daughter, although the parent refers to her as “Samuelito.” Priscila has returned to the island for reasons she refuses to disclose, and is subjected to direct and indirect abuse from Samuel. Upset by the identity Priscila has chosen, Samuel has given her an ultimatum: Stay hidden from the superstitious fishermen, or find another home. Samuel’s brother is more understanding – surely a few weeks at sea will cure this “faggot” business once and for all? But the more time Priscila spends with her father, the more she realises the anger stems from the years he spent isolated on this island, while Priscila enjoyed a more colourful life elsewhere with her mother.

Frustratingly for Priscila, the majority of characters in the film are unable to distinguish between sexuality and gender identity. And so they see Priscila as a . The only person who sees Priscilla as a woman is Priscila herself, and at no point does any other character refer to her by her chosen pronouns. What’s worse, Priscila rarely corrects her father or uncle on their language, and seems more upset by their aversion to her taste in men, as opposed to her gender truth. Which is more the pity, because there’s an undeniable tenderness between Samuel and Priscila, which grows stronger the longer the film goes on for. In an almost tantric moment of truth, Priscila shows her father the scars she has received defending herself from policemen, who are too afraid to touch her in case they get infected with HIV. Mercifully, Priscila doesn’t have the illness.

The most impressive scenes are shot underwater. Where the island is drab and dirty, the water is rife with colour, character and contradiction, as fish swim side by side like the metropolis Priscila hopes to live in one day. Fastidious in its nature, The Fisherman’s Daughter gets to the point of the story quickly, refreshing in an era of luxuriance, but Samuel’s transition from disgusted, old-fashioned fisherman to caring parent is clumsily handled. Seemingly all it takes is a fish supper – there is no meat on the island – to turn the man from grump to goodie.

Priscila is eventually spotted by the other fishermen, and one reveals himself as a closeted homosexual to her. Once again, there is no mention of her gender identity (the fisherman refers to Priscila as a “transvestite”), but the filmmakers have the good sense to cut away before showing the sex scene in its entirety. It would be remiss not to mention Nathalia Rincón’s central performance, who commands the screen as Priscila with subtle gestures, and frightened, furrowed eyebrows. Roamir Pineda is also noteworthy as the estranged father: Limited by the scope of story, Pineda nonetheless excels as a solitary man experiencing love again for the first time in many years.

The film closes with a quietly beautiful silloutte beneath the sea. Director Edgar de Luque Jácome uses lush lighting to demonstrate the otherworldliness of the ocean, presenting two swimmers floating as effortlessly as the creatures do beneath them. It’s a glorious montage that wraps the story up on a sombre note, free from the trappings and claustrophobia of the island.

The Fisherman’s Daughter just premiered at the First Feature Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

King Khat

QUICK AND DIRTY: LIVE FROM TALLINN

Hey, Breaking Bad baddie Walter White, eat your heart out. What we see in King Khat is a real life scientist who came up with one of the most popular drugs of the 21st century. The scientist – credited as Gabi Shalev, although I’m guessing it’s a false name given to protect the real individual – found himself in the middle of the Haifa underworld when he introduced them to this drug. Setting himself up as an entrepeurneur as such, he rose up in the social circles, although the more his fame grew, the more he attracted unwanted attention. But there was a market for psychoactives, so he felt duty bound to provide it.

What could have been a very boring documentary is given a new lease of life through an aimation programme that pushes viewers headfirst into the kaleidoscopic world of a drug taker. It’s a very colourful film, and might inspire viewers to try some substances in the process. (Writer’s note: Neither I nor anyone in Dirty Movies is encouraging that type of behaviour.) Aesthetically, the animation bears a resemblance to Terry Gilliam’s cartoon work on Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979), but this is no homage, building a universe full of flying objects, anthromorphic animals and ladybugs darting at the screen with dizzying speed. I was worried that the animation would become gimmicky, but it adds a dimension to the bizarre story that it would not have it stuck to the tried and tested formula of talking heads.

Watching the film, I admired the chutzpah of the character, who proudly boasts, “I was sure we’d make millions.” Now, whether that’s bravery or stupidity is neither here nor there, but somehow Shalev managed to build an empire from the ground up based on a drug he concocted in his early 20s. Impressively, the film finishes with great economy, and the finished result is little over an hour long in total. Personally, I think that’s the correct call to make because the animations cling heavily to the screen which might make it particularly taxing on the viewer if it were longer. The film makes clever use of Debussy’s ‘Clair de Lune’, which is littered throughout the more introspective moments in the film.

The film uses live action actors against animated backdrops, constructing a cabalistic painting of Israel in the process. In one the film’s wittier throwbacks, they construct a dinner scene in the style of Da Vinci’s The Last Supper. But the creative team never get lost in the world building, and no matter what visual gag appears on the screen, the focus is kept squarely on the story. Shalev, as played by Oshri Cohen, surprises himself with the rewards sent his way, although by the time the film closes, he seems content to pursue a quieter, more stable life.

King Khat just premiered in the Rebels With a Cause Competition of the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival. One to be watched on the silver screen!