Cloisters, by their very nature, are cut off from the rest of the world. People of faith live there in order to dedicate themselves in service to God without being encumbered by the problems of the modern world. Yet, as governments and countries change, even the most secluded of us find themselves caught up in the events of history.
Isabel Sandoval’s film Apparition takes place in the Philippines, 1971, just before President Ferdinand Marcos devastates the country by putting it under Martial Law. We start as Sister Lourdes (Jodi Sta. Maria) makes her way to the convent, finding herself lost in a dense thicket of trees. Then, like in so many convent-based dramas, we are introduced to the many practices of this space, which functions as a universe unto itself, with its own codes and laws. They seem untouchable, solely dedicated to the Lord.
But Ferdinand Marcos has other ideas. The leader turned dictator of the Philippines is never seen but often heard, speaking on the radio in English as he calmly asserts power over the country, setting into course a series of events that will change the fabric of the nation forever, and even encroach upon this self-contained world.
It’s an interesting choice for Locarno’s Open Doors selection — finding the best cinema South East Asia and Mongolia has to offer— which has barely any new feature films this year, as it resembles, in both tone and content, the Argentinian drama of Maternal. Yet where the much stronger Maternal had an strongly-established aesthetic, using a lot of natural light to match, a lot of Apparition looks cheaply shot, with a strange blue filter used to dampen the striking look of the women’s habits.
Characters are often held at a remove, playing rigid roles (the stern Mother Superior, the Rebellious Friend) instead of being complex people in their own right. The central thesis point is finely drawn, especially by the way this feminine world is violently violated, but it cannot seem to amount to more than just academic criticism, further stressed by the Antonio Gramsci quote (“The old is dying and the new cannot be born. In this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear’) that opens the film. Additionally, the pivotal event of the movie is repeated from different angles, showing us how all the nuns are complicit in letting it happen. While sometimes this technique can work, little is revealed here that we didn’t already know, making it a somewhat superfluous filmmaking gesture.
With the Marcos Family still holding considerable sway in the Philippines, as shown in The Kingmaker, the message of Apparition — to speak up when power, both patriarchal and political, is being abused — rings as true as ever. But for a real understanding of how things can go wrong, that documentary, also available online, is a far more intriguing and urgent document.
Apparitionplays as part of the Locarno Film Festival’s Open Doors segment, running online between August 5-15. Just click here in order to watch it.
Alice (Madeline Brewer) is in charge of her destiny, or so it seems. From a secret and self-contained, fluffy pink studio set up in her apartment, she promotes herself as her online persona Lola who hosts her own live online erotic shows where enthusiastic fans can encourage her to do specific things by sending her virtual currency. Her goal is to become number one on the site which hosts her and many thousands of other hopefuls, but she seems to have got stuck somewhere around the rank of 60th. What’s a camgirl to do in order to boost her ratings?
Clearly, spicing the sex up with a little violence is a winner, so when one of her admirers encourages her to use a knife, while others egg her on and other still try to talk her out of it, Lola cuts her throat online. Then, after what seems like an eternity, she raises her neck to show that it was a special effect, a trick which wasn’t real at all, a fake reality. But it did the job and boosted her rating several points. Once she’s offline, it soon becomes clear that the fan who egged her on was in fact a mate and that the whole thing was a setup by Alice.
Competition for the top spot is fierce, however, and in a subsequent session Alice sees her ratings suddenly plummet when a rival offers to strip if people will abandon Lola for her. Worse is to come when she finds herself locked out of her own site where someone is performing new shows as if they were her broadcasting live as Lola. Her account has been hacked and the site’s hapless tech support prove unable or unwilling to fix the problem.
Conceived and written by real life erotic cam performer Isa Mazzei, Cam possesses a striking understanding of both online sex work and the technical machinations of the internet. The portrait of the self-employed, small town girl using sex work as a career which she can control herself (at least until everything goes unexpectedly off the rails) is convincing as is a further subplot wherein she’s forces to deal with one of her fans in real life Tinker (Patch Darragh) when she runs into him in the local supermarket. And the plot line about being hacked and having to deal with a less than helpful tech support line will ring true to many internet users.
The conceit about a performer replacing the protagonist’s online persona with a clone she can’t control doesn’t quite make sense, with the only explanation a trashy and ill-thought out, generic horror plot device. Yet curiously, in terms of the insecurities of an artistic performer, the idea is spot-on and provided you can get past its narrative implausibility pays off in spades.
The film deftly juggles multiple elements: screens of activity within screens of activity, with internet chat pertinent to the plot going on at the same time elsewhere on the screen, all very impressive on a narrative and technical level. You might struggle with watching it on a small, low resolution screen but on a decent screen in a small cinema, it plays just fine.
Ultimately, this provides a glimpse into both a scarcely discussed commercial/erotic netherworld and the mind of one of its occupants/performers, with lots of smart observations about online communication to boot. A clever little movie, well worth 90-odd minutes of anyone’s time.
Cam played in the 62nd BFI London Film Festival, where this piece was originally written. A trailer was subsequently released on Friday, November 9th, one week ahead of its release on Netflix on Friday, November 16th. Watch that trailer below:
This December you have an extra reason to stay at home. Even better: you have 10 reasons to stay at home. As if you needed yet more encouragement to trade the freezing temperatures outside for the comfort of your sofa and the company of dirty European film. The online platform for independent films Festival Scope has teamed up with the European culture channel ARTE and come up with ArteKino, a unique online film festival featuring 10 carefully selected films not available anywhere else for a limited period only. And it’s entirely free: there are to hidden catches and credit card numbers to be given out!
Each film can be viewed by 5,000 people between December 1st and December 17th on a first-come-first-saved basis, and they are available everywhere in Europe unless stated otherwise (see exceptions below). All films area available in the UK and Ireland, except for Chevalier.
These gems were carefully handpicked by Olivier Père, Director of Film at ARTE France and Artistic Director at ArteKino Festival. He explains “ArteKino is designed to be a 100% free digital event, the festival was born out of ARTE’s desire to strengthen its support for modern European arthouse films in an original manner by giving yet them greater visibility and wider distribution.”
He went on to explain how the event is curated: ” we have selected 10 films that represent the eclectic and daring trend sweeping across modern European film productions. Alongside the latest work from renowned filmmakers, we have decided to showcase new talent, with some directors’ first ambitious feature-length films that demonstrate the outstanding creative ability of the new generation from countries such as Romania, Greece and Poland.”
The amazing selection includes a Bulgarian story of lovelessness, corruption and addiction, with a twist, a Portuguese tale of sorrow and nostalgia, the life of controversial Polish surrealist painter ZdzisławBeksiński, before he rose to fame, and also a very dysfunctional macho game in Greece (pictured above), plus much much more. Check the full list just below, and visit ArteKino’s portal in order to view them RIGHT NOW!
Berlin-based engineer Michael must travel to Norway for his father‘s funeral. His sister is unwilling to go, and Michael is left alone with his 14-year-old son Luis, with whom he has always had minimal contact. Michael tries to bond with Luis while exploring the remote region of northern Norway for a few days. But their first trip together is much more difficult than expected. Daily interaction is unfamiliar territory to both, and Luis obviously holds a grudge because of his father‘s negligence. But during these longest days of summer, Michael is determined to break a bittersweet father-son pattern.
The film showed at the following festivals (and it took home the prize between brackets): Berlin (Silver Bear for Best Actor), Hong Kong, Buenos Aires and Taipei Golden Horse. It is not available for viewing in the following countries:Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia, Austria and Norway.
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2. Scarred Hearts (Radu Jude, Romania/ Germany):
During the summer of 1937, Emanuel, a young man in his early 20s, is committed to a sanatorium on the Black Sea coast for treatment of his bone tuberculosis. The treatment consists of painful spine punctures that confine him to a plaster on a stretcher-bed. Little by little, as Emanuel gets accustomed to the sadness of his new life, he discovers that inside the sanatorium there is still a life to be lived to the fullest. He makes friends and engages in conversations, he reads, he writes, he smokes and drinks, interacts with doctors, nurses and stretcher-bearers. Meanwhile, outside Romania doesn‘t have much to offer him, as it turn into an extreme right-wing society.
It showed at the following festivals (having snatched the accolades between brackets): Locarno Festival (Special Jury Prize), BFI London, Hamburg (Hamburg Producers Award), Haifa (Special Mention), Busan, Gothenburg and 11 more. Not available in: Romania, France, Germany, Austria and Luxembourg.
The image at the top of the article was taken from Scarred Hearts.
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3. Chevalier (Athina Rachel Tsangari, Greece):
In the middle of the Aegean Sea, on a luxury yacht, six men on a fishing trip decide to play a game. During this game, things will be compared. Things will be measured. Songs will be butchered, and blood will be tested. Friends will become rivals and rivals will become hungry. But at the end of the voyage, when the game is over, the man who wins will be the best man. And he will wear upon his little finger the victorious signet ring: the “Chevalier.”
The movie showed at nearly 50 festivals (having won the following prizes), including: Locarno Festival, Toronto, IFF Rotterdam, SXSW, BFI London (Best Film), Sarajevo (Best Film), Gothenburg, Cartagena (Best Film), Thessaloniki (Audience Award), Goteborg, New York, Hamburg, San Francisco and 30 more. Not available for viewing in: Greece, United Kingdom, Ireland, Malta, Portugal, Poland, Cyprus, Germany, Austria, Ireland, Estonia and Lithuania.
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4. Frost (SharunasBartas, Lithuania/Ukraine):
Rokas and Inga, a couple of young Lithuanians, volunteer to drive a cargo van of humanitarian aid to Ukraine. When plans change and they find themselves left to their own devices, they cross the vast snowy lands of the Donbass region in search of allies and shelter, drifting into the lives of those affected by the war. They approach the frontline in spite of the danger, all the while growing closer to each other as they begin to understand life during wartime.
Festivals where the movie showed include (having won the following prize between brackets): Cannes (Director’s Fortnight), Locarno Festival, Transylvania, Odessa, New Horizons, Haifa, Busan. Not available for viewing in: France, Portugal, Poland, Ukraine and Lithuania.
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5. Colo (Teresa Villaverde, Portugal):
Struggling against the crisis in Portugal a mother doubles up jobs to pay the bills since her husband is unemployed. Their teenage daughter tries to keep living her everyday life even if the money’s running short and makes everything uneasy. Escaping from their common reality, they slowly become strangers to one another, as the tension grows in silence and in guilt.
This Portuguese film showed at the following festivals (having won the following prize between brackets): Berlin, Uruguay, Hong Kong, Indie Lisbon, Melbourne, Scanorama Vilnius and the BildrauschFilmfest Basel (Best Film). It is not available for viewing in the following countries: Finland, Denmark, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Poland, Portugal and France.
In a remote Bulgarian town, Gana looks after the elderly with dementia, while trafficking their ID cards on the black market of identity theft. At home, she provides for her jobless mother, with whom she hardly speaks. Her relationship with her car-mechanic boyfriend is no shelter for love either – with sexual attraction vanished, intimacy is reduced to an addiction to morphine. Things start to shake up, when Gana hears the music of Yoan, a new patient, whose ID card she has trafficked. A growing empathy for the old man unlocks Gana’s conscience. But when Yoan is arrested for fraud, she learns that doing ‘the right thing’ comes at a high price.
It showed at the following festivals (having snatched the accolades between brackets): Locarno (Best Film, Best Actress), Sarajevo IFF (Special Jury Prize), CPH PIX (Best Film), Reykjavik (Best Film), Toronto, Turin, Black Nights, Hamburg FF and 14 more. Not available for viewing in the following countries: Bulgaria, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Sweden and Norway.
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7. Living and Other Fictions (Jo Sol, Spain):
The desire to have a full sex life becomes a vital, political option when Antonio, a tetraplegic writer, decides to set up a space offering sexual assistance in his own home. He who wants to live ends up having problems with life.
The Spanish drama Living and Other Fictions showed at the following film festivals (and won the following prizes): San Sebastian, Gothenburg, Munich, D’A Film Festival, Queer Lisbon (Jury Prize) and also Toulouse Cinespaña (Violette d’Or).
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8. The Last Family (Jan P. Matuszyński, Poland):
ZdzisławBeksiński, a Polish surrealist painter, is a cult artist who has portrayed decaying bodies and fantasised of hard core sadomasochistic sexual experiences. Known for his keen sense of humour, he is also scared of spiders and tending to his sick mother. His neurotic, suicidal son, Tomasz, is a cult radio DJ and translator, responsible for the Polish versions of Monty Python films. His wife, ZofiaBeksińska, a devout Catholic, endures these two eccentrics and glues the family together. As the parents try to prevent their son from hurting himself, their lives are defined by painting, a series of near-death experiences, funerals and changing trends in dance music.
The Last Family showed at the following festivals (having snatched the following prizes, between brackets): Cameraimage (Best Film), Locarno Festival (Best Actor), Molodist IFF (Best Fim), Sofia (Special try Award), CPH PIX, Reykjavik IFF (Best Film), Black Nights, Hamburg and 10 more. It’s not available for viewing in Poland, France and Monaco.
9. Soleil Battant (Clara and Laura Laperrousaz, France/ Portugal):
For the holidays, Gabriel and Iris return to a family house in Portugal with their daughters Emma and Zoe, irresistible six-year-old twins. In the heart of a solar landscape, between bathing in the river and their kids’ laughter, the couple’s past resurfaces.
The festivals where Soleil Battant showed include: Black Nights, Bordeaux, Arras FF, GardanneAutumn and the Auch Festival. The film is available for viewing everywhere except France and Portugal.
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10. The Giant (Johannes Nyholm, Sweden/ Denmark):
Rikard is an autistic and severely deformed man who tries to find his way back to his long lost mother through the game of pétanque (a form of boules) and using the help of a 200 foot giant. His fragile physique and a harsh judging environment makes everyday life tough for him. Convinced that his mum will take him back if only he wins the Nordic championship of petanque, Rikard tries to do the impossible.
The Swedish-Danish production showed at the following fests (and won the following prizes): San Sebastian (Special Jury Prize), Reykjavik (Special Mention), Warsaw (Free Spirit Award), Rotterdam, BFI London, CPH PIX and GardenCity. The movie is nort available for viewing in the following countries: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland.
