Not Coming to a Theater Near You
What do you think she meant when she said “a huge black monster with giant claws”?
What do you think she meant when she said “a huge black monster with giant claws”?
Sundance is a festival that needs little introduction. Its ascendancy during the 1990s has been exhaustively chronicled in recent books such as Down and Dirty Pictures: Miramax, Sundance, and the Rise of Independent Film, Rebels on the Backlot, and The Sundance Kids: How the Mavericks Took Back Hollywood, and the list of films and directors “discovered” there seems to grow every year. Its role in shaping the independent film landscape continues to be a contentious subject (as more than one astute critic pointed out, last year’s breakout hit Little Miss Sunshine is the sort of broad comedy the major studios might have released during the 1980s; how it came to be a dark horse contender for an Oscar nomination for Best Picture is anyone’s guess), but it nevertheless remains the festival where up-and-coming filmmakers dream of debuting their work.
Midway through the 2000s, it shows little sign of slowing down. Last spring, the Sundance Institute formed an alliance with the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) to bring films, panels, and events associated with the Festival to the East Coast, and those unable to make it to either Park City in January or Brooklyn in May can watch daily re-caps of Festival highlights on the Sundance Channel beginning on January 19. Yielding to the trend of “platform agnosticism” (as delineated by David Denby in a recent New Yorker piece), the Festival will make its short films accessible for free viewing on their website and available for download and purchase on iTunes. Free podcasts will feature panel discussions recorded at the Festival, and the Sundance Channel will also be running a series entitled 10 Days of Sundance Favorites, featuring films and shorts from previous years’ festivals.
Despite this flurry of activity, the spotlight will remain fixed on the movies and the celebrities who trek out in their parkas and snow boots to promote them. Festival Director Geoffrey Gilmore heralds this year’s crop of films as bucking the pattern of insularity that plagued so many American indies of the 1990s, a claim backed up by a cursory glimpse at the program. The Festival’s Opening Night Film is Chicago 10, a documentary that uses inventive techniques to render the trial of the protestors charged with conspiracy in connection with the violence at the Democratic National Convention in 1968, and other films include Grace is Gone, in which John Cusack plays a father grieving over the death of his wife in Iraq; Ghosts of Abu Ghraib, a documentary in which both perpetrators and victims are interviewed; Everything’s Cool, a global warming documentary that no doubt hopes to capitalize on the success of last year’s An Inconvenient Truth; and Never Forever, a feature in which an American housewife begins an affair with an illegal immigrant from Korea.
Although Sundance is an easy target for criticism (even founder Robert Redford joined in the chorus last year, citing the omnipresence of parties – and Paris Hilton – as evidence that the Festival is “getting out of control”), it remains a vital showcase for films that are, if not entirely independent, then at least willing to engage with subject matter that Hollywood generally shies away from. (It should also be noted that a large proportion of the films showcased at Sundance have been directed by women.) So as the great beast formerly known as the US Film Festival ambles into its 26th year, I look forward to elbowing my way past the celebrities and settling into a packed theater to watch what are destined to become some of the year’s most talked-about, praised, derided, and debated films.
The 2007 Sundance Film Festival will run from Thursday January 18th to Sunday the 28th. Refer to this page over the next few weeks for reviews of select Festival films.
“This is not a history lesson about 1968,” stated director Brett Morgen before a screening of Chicago 10, the opening night film of the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. This disclaimer fell on some deaf ears (namely Variety’s Todd McCarthy, who felt Morgen was remiss in excluding figures such as Bobby Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy from the film), but those who took the director’s words at face value were rewarded in full by the bristling energy of this inventive, captivating documentary.
The bodies that race across the field are occasionally filmed in slow-motion, to the extent that the movements of the players take on the grace of dancers. Zidane lives up to his reputation as a soccer legend with a triumphant pass to Ronaldo that results in a goal during the first half, but his mercurial nature is also hinted at later on when he receives a red card for a foul. The latter scene is accompanied by deafening music that underlines the crowd’s reaction as well as Zidane’s undoubtedly conflicted emotions. This intersection of sound and feeling are the hallmark Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait, and as such, make it a vital portrait of a modern athlete.
David Gordon Green’s first three films largely deemphasized narrative in favor capturing the emotions of the characters onscreen, a lyrical approach that earned him comparisons to Terrence Malick. Snow Angels is by far the most plot-driven of his films, but unlike in Undertow, where his confidence as a filmmaker seemed to erode somewhat when forced to shift into more conventional narrative gears, here he handles the multifaceted story with aplomb.
As the horror genre is littered with images of nubile young women being raped, tortured, and mutilated, Dawn’s empowerment proves a refreshing change of pace. In Teeth, almost all the men are predators, but here the woman refuses to accept her status as prey. That said, the premise is often played for laughs, and in the role of Dawn, actress Jess Weixler proves a formidable comic talent, flawlessly channeling the ups and downs of the sunny teenager’s awakening. Still, beneath the movie’s bright-surface lurks a dark feminist fable about the consequences of objectifying women.
Those familiar with The Filth and the Fury should have no trouble getting into the rhythm of Julien Temple’s latest film, Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten. Using the same rapid-fire editing techniques – not to mention decibel level – as the earlier film, Temple once again strives not only to evoke a music legend, but also the social climate in which he rose to fame. In this case, however, the critique of British life in the mid-to-late 20th century ultimately takes a backseat to an affectionate, all-encompassing portrait of a middle-class boy once known as John Mellor.
The story of Stanley, a man who takes his two young daughters on an impromptu road trip upon hearing of his wife’s death during a combat mission in Iraq, the film is undeniably timely, even if its plot structure is somewhat contrived. Cusack and writer-director James Strouse have repeatedly said they didn’t intend for the movie to be used as a piece of political agitprop, but rather intended it as a universal portrait of the suffering caused by war. To drive this point home, they bend over backwards to evoke The Average American, but this careful rendering often feels too studied.
Those familiar with Sienna Miller’s off-screen exploits might be forgiven for viewing her appearance as a tabloid-friendly starlet as an example of spot-on typecasting. The role of Katja, however, turns out to be an opportunity for the actress to embrace and reject this image simultaneously. Adopting a pitch-perfect American accent, she flawlessly navigates her character’s frequent mood swings, allowing the steely calculation behind the pretty face to reveal itself gradually. Like Katja, it is Miller that emerges with the upper hand.
