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Mill Valley Delivers Great Indies by Sky Tallone with Spider Santana
Tommy Lee Jones and Hillary Swank in Mill Valley's opener, 'The Homesman'. photo: courtesy MVFF
AS MAINSTREAM HOLLYWOOD FILMS
continue to get worse, the indie films coming out of local festivals keep getting better. There’s a pretty fantastic line-up for the Mill Valley Film Festival this year, which starts today, October 2nd, with “The Homesman”, directed by Tommy Lee Jones and starring Hilary Swank.
It’s followed by an all-star cast in the Jason Reitman dramedy, “Men, Women & Children”, with talent like Adam Sandler, Jennifer Garner, Emma Thompson, Judy Greer and Dean Norris, just to name a few. Reitman will be the special guest at opening night, and the gala at the Town Center in Corte Madera should be pretty epic.
Indeed, the festival has a few impressive dramas to look out for. “Like Sunday, Like Rain” is an incredible character piece, with exquisite pictorial cinematography and a captivating performance by an up-and-coming young actor.
Written and directed by Frank Whaley, it tells the stories of Eleanor (Leighton Meester), a jobless young woman in her twenties who just left her boyfriend (Billie Joe Armstrong, of Oakland's Green Day rock band, in his big screen debut) and doesn’t know where to go; and Reggie (Julian Shatkin), a twelve-year-old prodigy born into wealth; and his self-involved and neglectful mother, played by Debra Messing.
When Eleanor’s friend hooks her up with an interview at a temp agency, she’s immediately hired as a live-in nanny for Reggie while his mom is off on a trip with her new husband. The plot is similar to "Uptown Girls" but it’s an entirely different type of film with untraditional characters and a classical, timeless feel.
Most of the film takes place in Reggie’s late 19th century New York City mansion or outdoors. With no prominent technology like iPhones or computers or other time-specific elements, it could easily be transpiring in the '60s or right now. The character of Reggie steals the show, domineering and stubborn but surprisingly charming and intuitive with a refined sense of humor.
While the characters should have changed each other more by the end, perhaps, this one is well worth watching for the performances and cinematography alone. It also features an incredible soundtrack, including a classical-style piece composed by Reggie’s character.
Another flagship film for MVFF is '“Wild', about woman solo hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and starring Reese Witherspoon. photo: courtesy MVFF
You can catch this one for regular price on Wednesday the 8th at 4:15pm, or Thursday the 9th at 3:45. Or if you want to check out the special event on Monday the 6th at 7pm, director Whaley and leads Meester and Armstrong will be special guests.
“Diplomacy” on the other hand is a period piece from French, a World War II drama based on a stage play, which takes place almost entirely in one room. While that may sound "bo-oring" on the face of it, not when it concerns the orders to German General Dietrich von Choltitz (Niels Arestrup) to utterly obliterate Paris, for no reason other than Uncle Adolph's emotional need for revenge.
The day before the planned destruction of one of the planet's most beloved cities, and with it the deaths of a tens of thousands of people, the Swedish consul Raoul Nordling (Andre Dussollier) mysteriously arrives in General von Choltitz’s hotel room determined to convince him not to go ahead.
With fantastic performances by both actors, this is a dialogue-driven film which also pulled off the era incredibly well in addition to great camera work. This is definitely a different approach to the WWII drama, and if you’re a lover of theater, it’s a must-see. Directed by Volker Schlondorff. See it Saturday the 4th at 8pm, or Wednesday the 8th at 3:30.
In another hemisphere as well as time, “The Wolf at the Door” is an intense psychological thriller from Brazil, which begins with the disappearance of a little girl picked up by an unknown person after school. Most of the film is told in the form of flashbacks from the perspectives of the mother, the father and an accused woman.
At first, it might come off as a police procedural or a mystery but the interrogations are just the vehicle for dramatic tale of obsession, manipulation and betrayal. Can’t say much without giving away the store but if you’re into hardcore drama and can handle psychologically disturbing plot twists, all a la Brazil, the writing and directing by Fernando Coimbra as well as the performances are very impressive.
While period piece shot mostly in one room sounds boring, 'Diplomacy', directed by German master Volker Schlondorff and about Hitler's determination to destroy Paris is anything but. photo: courtesy MVFF
Low budget but well-shot and polished, and never a dull moment, you can see it Saturday the 4th at 11am, or Sunday the 5th at 4:30pm.
“I Can Quit Whenever I Want” was a fantastic ride. An Italian film with a cast of hilarious and well-written characters in a drug-dealing comedy, it feels like a cross between “Breaking Bad” and “The Italian Job.” When Professor Pietro (Edoardo Leo) is denied funding for his work on an algorithm, he can’t bear to tell his girlfriend the truth.
Now stuck trying to find an income without skills in anything besides formulating molecules and algorithms, he pulls together his most brilliant friends, all equally desperate and working at low-paying jobs, and they plot to create and sell a new drug that isn’t on Italy’s list of illegal substances yet. Every single character in Pietro’s gang is hilarious, unique and incredibly well-written. Packed with comedy, action, danger and conflict.
Unlike popular drug films like "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" or "Trainspotting", which focus on the drug experience itself, "I Can Quit" is more about the characters and how their new lifestyle affects their relationships. Check it out on Friday the 3rd at 9:15pm, Sunday the 5th at 7:45pm, or Saturday the 11th at 5:30pm.
“Living is Easy With Eyes Closed” is a heartwarming 1960s-era road trip comedy from Spain about Antonio (Javier Camara), an English teacher and die-hard Beatles fan who uses Beatles lyrics for teaching. When he hears about John Lennon coming to the area to shoot a film, he is determined to get on set to and present Lennon with a list of ideas and suggestions relating to English and translations of the lyrics.
On his journey there, he picks up two hitchhikers, a young woman who’s pregnant and lost in life, and a sixteen-year-old boy who ran away from home when his father tried to make him cut his hair. The three become close and also build relationships with the people of the small town near where the filming is taking place.
A quirky character study, which maintains the delicate balance between comedy and drama, "Living is Easy" has fantastic art direction and, of course, a couple Beatles songs—a must-see for all ages and tastes, especially for Beatles fans. It plays Thursday the 9th at 8pm, and Friday the 10th at 12:45pm.
A couple other comedies worth mentioning are “The Young Kieslowski,” which is sort of "Juno" but from the perspective of a guy, though the style is very different and it becomes much more dramatic after twenty minutes. When Brian (Ryan Malgarini) ends up getting the first girl (Haley Lu Richardson) he’s had sex with pregnant, possibly with twins, the two terrified teens try to deal with the situation, their parents, and each other. See it Saturday the 4th at 8:15pm, Sunday the 5th at 1:45, or Friday the 10th at 12pm.
An Italian film with hilarious characters, 'I Can Quit Whenever I Want” concerns a gang of under-employed scientists who turn to drug dealing. photo: courtesy MVFF
Then there's “Lucky Stiff,” an over-the-top theatrical musical with vivid imagery, a lively soundtrack and a kooky cast of characters. Appropriate for all ages—just be prepared for some serious silly—It’s about a poor shoe salesman who finds out his recently deceased uncle left him six million dollars, but only under the strange condition he take his corpse on a vacation to Monte Carlo. Wednesday the 8th at 8:15pm, and Friday the 10th at 11:30am.
“Cowboys” is a very funny character piece made in Croatia, about a group of non-actors and an amateur theater director attempting to put mount the first live show their little town has seen in years. While the director struggles with health issues, his actors all have problems of their own and begin to develop friendships with each other as they try to pull off the production, which they have decided will be a Western.
The film opens with a hilarious and telling audition scene, in which we meet our main cast and immediately realize what a challenge this will be—arguably the funniest of all the films we pre-screened, with “I Can Quit Whenever I Want” in a close second. Written and directed by Tomislav. “Cowboys” plays Saturday the 4th at 5pm and Tuesday the 7th at 5:30pm.
As for docs, the fest is full of them, ranging from local Bay Area stories of inspiration to environmental awareness films to bio-pics. A great local doc every San Francisco resident and stand-up comedy fan should check out is “Three Still Standing”. About the rise and fall of the San Francisco stand-up scene, it focuses on the three comics who are still making a living in comedy without going the LA route.
One doc theme that jumped out as unique to this year’s fest is dealing with death. “Dying to Know” is about spiritual and LSD gurus Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert and “Yalom’s Cure” covers the well-known scholar, psychotherapist and author Irvin D. Yalom, both about learning to accept death and be at peace with all of existence. Meanwhile “The Immortalists” concerns two very different individuals striving to reverse aging and prevent death altogether.
A genre unto itself, 'The Boy and the World' is an animated masterpiece with no dialogue. photo: courtesy MVFF
Then there is one film which is really a genre one its own: “The Boy and the World”. It is an animated masterpiece with no dialogue, which tells the story of a little boy leaving the country and journeying to the fast-paced city in search of his father. Every frame is like a painting, ranging from simplistic shots with a plain white backgrounds to incredibly intricate and dark scenes of pyramid-shaped cities, colossal machines and factories that fill the frame.
It’s about the ultimate battle between love and greed, nature and industry, quality-of-life and commercialism. Though this surreal piece sometimes feels more like a painting than a film, the characters the boy befriends are as well-defined as the boy himself AND without a word being spoken. Catch "Boy" Sunday the 5th at 11am and Sunday the 12th at 11:15am.
The fest is making a pretty big deal of “Low Down,” which stars Elle Fanning as a teen growing up in the 1970s in LA with her jazz-pianist father (John Hawkes), and also “Wild.” The latter is an adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s bestselling memoir about her thousand-mile hike along the Pacific Crest Trail, which she took to mourn the death of her mother. It stars Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern and is director by Jean-Marc Vallee of "Dallas Buyer’s Club" fame.
Festivals have changed a lot in the last few years. It wasn’t long ago that to find a decent film at a festival, it required patience, sitting through a dozen badly-shot, low-budget "director's babies" to find one or two that are well done, and even those didn’t look too polished. Now, almost every film that makes it into the festivals is pretty good.
Even those which aren’t that great at least look fantastic, with even the most low-budget project shooting on a RED or Alexa. This is an exciting time for the indie film world, and for audiences everywhere who have been craving something more polished than the indies of the 90s and early 2000s, but more personal expression and of higher significance than the 3D super hero epics playing in theaters.
Indeed, there are dozens of other exciting films and events to check out, so be sure to go through the festival schedule and do some prioritizing. The films this year are better than ever and it’s a great excuse to make a trip to the North Bay.
Sky Tallone is a writer, director, filmmaker and blogger, who collaborates with her partner Spider on the blog, Aberrant Films, and can be reached .Posted on Oct 02, 2014 - 05:30 PM