I only managed to see one movie today.
The End of Love - Mark Webber writes, directs, and start as himself. His wife has died and he is left alone to raise his infant son. The first 20 minutes or so involve him and his son waking up and eating breakfast. That's about it. I almost fell asleep.
Eventually he goes to an audition. He takes his son in the room with him, which means he has to keep breaking character to talk to his son. Then he goes to the cemetary to see his wife's grave. He goes home again.
I don't know if the movie was improvised, but if there was a script, it was 2 pages long. Nothing much happens, and the only reason for this movie to be made was so Mark Webber could have a home movie of the two of them. There is a bit of a plot regarding a woman he likes, but it goes nowhere. I walked out after about 45 minutes.
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I spent a bit of time walking around Main Street today. I checked out the sponsors and giveaways and stuff. I also visited New Frontier. They always have come cool, intersting things there. There was a cool 3-D video collage of a bunch of scenes from Hollywood movies. It was called Evolution. I spent a while trying to identify all the different movies the images were taken from.
There was also something cool called Hunger in Los Angeles where you put on a virtual reality helmet and you can see and interact with people in line at a food bank in LA. I saw people try it but I was not able to try it myself. There was only one helmet and you can wait a very long time before you get a turn.
That evening I went to the Music Showcase: BMI Snowball produced by BMI. I saw several great musical performances including Donovan and Rodriguez. As much as I love bands, there is something special about one guy and an acoustic guitar. All the performances were just vocals and acoustic guitars. Very cool.
The last thing I did was go to the after hours lounge at The Yard. I met the 3 women who were there for Young & Wild. They are Marialy Rivas (writer, director), Alicia Rodriguez (actress) and the real girl who wrote the blog youngandwild (I forgot her name). Marialy told me about how at one screening, the audience didn't react at all. She thought they were not liking the movie. After during the Q&A, she asked them about it. They said it was just because they were so into it. She realized that as long as people aren't walking out or booing, it's a good sign.
I also met the team from Can, which is the first movie from Turkey to get into Sundance. I met Burak Akidil (producer) and Tamer Ciray (composer). They were very nice, and I promised to see their movie before the festival was over.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Sundance Tuesday, January 24
A couple of good movies today, and as usual at Sundance, they are as different as they can be.
Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare
This was a documentary about our health care. It coveres several different topics. It starts out showing how many general practicioners are not able to give proper health care because they are so limited in the time they spend with patients. One subject of the documentary is a doctor who is limited to 7 mintes per patient. It doesn't matter what they are there for or how much care they need. She has to go through a certain number of patients per day. This means people are not getting the attention from their doctor that they need.
The movie also brings up our habits. We eat a bad diet and don't get enough excercise, then expect the doctors to fix whatever happens to us. Also, some doctors don't push diet and excercise enough. The movie shows a woman who had a heart condition and kept getting splints put into her arteries. When they finally start working with her to develop a healthier lifestyle, she stops having heart problems. Our bodies can heal themselves if we treat them right.
Another topic is our dependancy on drugs. There is a lot of money in medication and not so much money for acupuncture. They show soldiers injured in the middle east being flown back to Germany or the states for treatment. Before loading them up on the plane, they start them on medications to manage pain. One soldier shows a bag full of pill bottles that he was on. This leads to soldiers addicted to pain killers. The movie shows an effort to get the military to use acupuncture to control pain instead of the pills.
The movie manages to resist the impulse to be political. It shows a little bit about the health care debate and health care reform, but it doesn't take a political side. This is one of those movies that everyone should see.
Compliance
Several years ago there was a story in the news about a young girl working at McDonalds. Her manager took her into the back room and told her that she had been accused of stealing. The manager strip searched the girl. This movie is a fictionalized version of that story.
A man calls the manager at a fast food restaurant. He tells her that he is a police officer and that Becky, the pretty blonde working the counter, stole money from a customer's purse. He says the woman is there at the station and the manager needs to question Becky for him. She brings Becky in the back room and the terror begins.
It starts innocent enough, but the man on the phone keeps raising the stakes. He tells Becky and the manager that if they cooperate and help in the investigation, Becky can avoid being arrested. Becky is forced to strip and then be searched by the manager. Then things get really creepy.
The manager's defense is that she believed the man was a cop. He had an answer for every one of her questions and concerns. Watching the movie, it is hard to believe that no one at the restaurant puts a stop to this. No one suggests getting the cop's name and badge number and calling him back.
The movie is very disturbing, but it is an interesting story. It's a good cautionary story for anyone in a position of management.
Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare
This was a documentary about our health care. It coveres several different topics. It starts out showing how many general practicioners are not able to give proper health care because they are so limited in the time they spend with patients. One subject of the documentary is a doctor who is limited to 7 mintes per patient. It doesn't matter what they are there for or how much care they need. She has to go through a certain number of patients per day. This means people are not getting the attention from their doctor that they need.
The movie also brings up our habits. We eat a bad diet and don't get enough excercise, then expect the doctors to fix whatever happens to us. Also, some doctors don't push diet and excercise enough. The movie shows a woman who had a heart condition and kept getting splints put into her arteries. When they finally start working with her to develop a healthier lifestyle, she stops having heart problems. Our bodies can heal themselves if we treat them right.
Another topic is our dependancy on drugs. There is a lot of money in medication and not so much money for acupuncture. They show soldiers injured in the middle east being flown back to Germany or the states for treatment. Before loading them up on the plane, they start them on medications to manage pain. One soldier shows a bag full of pill bottles that he was on. This leads to soldiers addicted to pain killers. The movie shows an effort to get the military to use acupuncture to control pain instead of the pills.
The movie manages to resist the impulse to be political. It shows a little bit about the health care debate and health care reform, but it doesn't take a political side. This is one of those movies that everyone should see.
Compliance
Several years ago there was a story in the news about a young girl working at McDonalds. Her manager took her into the back room and told her that she had been accused of stealing. The manager strip searched the girl. This movie is a fictionalized version of that story.
A man calls the manager at a fast food restaurant. He tells her that he is a police officer and that Becky, the pretty blonde working the counter, stole money from a customer's purse. He says the woman is there at the station and the manager needs to question Becky for him. She brings Becky in the back room and the terror begins.
It starts innocent enough, but the man on the phone keeps raising the stakes. He tells Becky and the manager that if they cooperate and help in the investigation, Becky can avoid being arrested. Becky is forced to strip and then be searched by the manager. Then things get really creepy.
The manager's defense is that she believed the man was a cop. He had an answer for every one of her questions and concerns. Watching the movie, it is hard to believe that no one at the restaurant puts a stop to this. No one suggests getting the cop's name and badge number and calling him back.
The movie is very disturbing, but it is an interesting story. It's a good cautionary story for anyone in a position of management.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Man On a Ledge - 2 1/2 stars
Sam Worthington plays an escaped convict. He checks in to a hotel and climbs out on the ledge. Everyone thinks he is a jumper. A crowd forms and the police come to talk him down.
What they don't know is that he is not planning on jumping. He is there to prove his innocence. He was accused of stealing a diamond from Ed Harris. While he is serving as a distraction, his brother and his brother's girlfriend are going to break in to Ed Harris's safe (in the building across the street) and get the diamond. Then he will be able to prove that he never stole it. Harris said the diamond was stolen so he could commit insurance fraud.
The script is very by the numbers. Every move and plot twist can be seen a mile away. Plus the dialogue is pretty bad.
There are a few bright spots. The couple breaking in are a lot of fun. They are lovers but they are fighting about stuff the whole time. The finale of the movie is pretty good. It is ridiculous, but entertaining. And there are a couple of refreshing things that happen during the finale that I did not expect from such a by the numbers screenplay.
What they don't know is that he is not planning on jumping. He is there to prove his innocence. He was accused of stealing a diamond from Ed Harris. While he is serving as a distraction, his brother and his brother's girlfriend are going to break in to Ed Harris's safe (in the building across the street) and get the diamond. Then he will be able to prove that he never stole it. Harris said the diamond was stolen so he could commit insurance fraud.
The script is very by the numbers. Every move and plot twist can be seen a mile away. Plus the dialogue is pretty bad.
There are a few bright spots. The couple breaking in are a lot of fun. They are lovers but they are fighting about stuff the whole time. The finale of the movie is pretty good. It is ridiculous, but entertaining. And there are a couple of refreshing things that happen during the finale that I did not expect from such a by the numbers screenplay.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Sundance Monday, January 23
Best day yet. I saw 4 movies today.
Slavery by Another Name - When did slavery end in America? If you think it ended with the Emancipation Proclomation, you are wrong. The 13th ammendment included words about how slavery is outlawed except in cases where someone has committed a crime. This put a lot of wiggle room in, and the south exploited it for over 70 years.
One method of slavery was for states to lease prisoners to corporations or individuals. These prisoners were worked almost to death. During slavery, owners had some incentive to keep their slaves healthy, as they were valuable property to them. But once they were prisoners to be leased out for work, there was no incentive to keep them healthy. They were only temporary workers. The states made tons of money leasing these people out to companies including U.S. Steel.
And the charges people were arrested on were ludicrous. Someone could be arrested for vagrancy, which could be nothing more than standing around doing nothing. Thousands of innocent people were arrested for nothing more than being there when the state needed more prisoners.
Another way people were kept in slavery was peonism. A wealthy white man said a black man owed him money. The black man was arrested and given to the white man to work off the debt. There was no proof of debt, and the man could be held as long as the white man wanted.
There was an effort to stop this in 1903, but the federal government turned a blind eye and allowed it to continue. Between the 1860s and the 1900s, there was a real danger of the country overturning the Emancipation Proclomation. There was an attitude that maybe it was a mistake to grant black people their freedom. This was not just in the south - the north was slowly starting to adopt the attitudes of the south.
Slavery didn't really end until 1941 when the US entered World War II. FDR was responsible for making sure all these cases ended and the perpetrators were brought to justice. But think about that. As late as the 1930s, there were black people in the south being held as slaves. They weren't called slaves, but it was the same.
This is a very important documentary. Like many people, I thought slavery ended after the civil war. Most of what I know about civil rights are from the 1950s on. This movie should be included in every American's history education.
Nobody Walks - Martine (Olivia Thirlby) is a 23 year old artist from New York. She moves to LA to stay with Peter (John Krasinski) and his family. Peter is a sound mixer, and Martine wants him to help her with the sound editing.
There isn't much story here. I was kind of bored. Things get a little interesting when Martine and Peter sleep together. Will this destroy Peter's marriage? Will his wife find out? As the movie went on, I really didn't care. Skip this one.
Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry - This is a documentary about Ai Weiwei, an artist living in China. He isn't afraid to speak out against the government. The movie is as much about his art as it is about China's social injustice. This sounds like a great subject for a documentary, but it kind of left me cold. I guess I felt like I learned everything this movie had to tell me in the first 10 minutes.
Yound and Wild - Daniela is a 17 year old girl living in Santiago, Chile. She writes a blog called Young and Wild where she talks about two things - sex and religion. She is very horny all the time, attracted to men and women, but she is also an evangelical christian.
The movie wasn't written very well. It is basically a bunch of different scenes thrown together. There is no narrative through line. You could walk out and miss 20 minutes of the movie and you wouldn't even notice it. It also isn't edited very well. There are a lot of cuts that just seem awkward.
The movie is based on a true story, and the real life blogger was there at the screening. When she was asked about her relationship with her mother today, she said that her mother just found out about the movie and was not happy about it.
Slavery by Another Name - When did slavery end in America? If you think it ended with the Emancipation Proclomation, you are wrong. The 13th ammendment included words about how slavery is outlawed except in cases where someone has committed a crime. This put a lot of wiggle room in, and the south exploited it for over 70 years.
One method of slavery was for states to lease prisoners to corporations or individuals. These prisoners were worked almost to death. During slavery, owners had some incentive to keep their slaves healthy, as they were valuable property to them. But once they were prisoners to be leased out for work, there was no incentive to keep them healthy. They were only temporary workers. The states made tons of money leasing these people out to companies including U.S. Steel.
And the charges people were arrested on were ludicrous. Someone could be arrested for vagrancy, which could be nothing more than standing around doing nothing. Thousands of innocent people were arrested for nothing more than being there when the state needed more prisoners.
Another way people were kept in slavery was peonism. A wealthy white man said a black man owed him money. The black man was arrested and given to the white man to work off the debt. There was no proof of debt, and the man could be held as long as the white man wanted.
There was an effort to stop this in 1903, but the federal government turned a blind eye and allowed it to continue. Between the 1860s and the 1900s, there was a real danger of the country overturning the Emancipation Proclomation. There was an attitude that maybe it was a mistake to grant black people their freedom. This was not just in the south - the north was slowly starting to adopt the attitudes of the south.
Slavery didn't really end until 1941 when the US entered World War II. FDR was responsible for making sure all these cases ended and the perpetrators were brought to justice. But think about that. As late as the 1930s, there were black people in the south being held as slaves. They weren't called slaves, but it was the same.
This is a very important documentary. Like many people, I thought slavery ended after the civil war. Most of what I know about civil rights are from the 1950s on. This movie should be included in every American's history education.
Nobody Walks - Martine (Olivia Thirlby) is a 23 year old artist from New York. She moves to LA to stay with Peter (John Krasinski) and his family. Peter is a sound mixer, and Martine wants him to help her with the sound editing.
There isn't much story here. I was kind of bored. Things get a little interesting when Martine and Peter sleep together. Will this destroy Peter's marriage? Will his wife find out? As the movie went on, I really didn't care. Skip this one.
Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry - This is a documentary about Ai Weiwei, an artist living in China. He isn't afraid to speak out against the government. The movie is as much about his art as it is about China's social injustice. This sounds like a great subject for a documentary, but it kind of left me cold. I guess I felt like I learned everything this movie had to tell me in the first 10 minutes.
Yound and Wild - Daniela is a 17 year old girl living in Santiago, Chile. She writes a blog called Young and Wild where she talks about two things - sex and religion. She is very horny all the time, attracted to men and women, but she is also an evangelical christian.
The movie wasn't written very well. It is basically a bunch of different scenes thrown together. There is no narrative through line. You could walk out and miss 20 minutes of the movie and you wouldn't even notice it. It also isn't edited very well. There are a lot of cuts that just seem awkward.
The movie is based on a true story, and the real life blogger was there at the screening. When she was asked about her relationship with her mother today, she said that her mother just found out about the movie and was not happy about it.
Sundance Sunday, January 22
A couple of good movies today.
Elena - set in Russia, Elena is married to Vladimir. They are both older and have children from previous relationships. Their marriage isn't very passionate, and she is more caretaker than wife. Her son's family is in need of financial help, and Vladimir is getting tired of giving them money. He says her son should be responsible for his own family, and why is it his (Vladimir's) responsibility to take care of them? They are strangers to him.
The movie moves very slowly. The first 5 minutes consists of a shot of a bird outside their home. The movie could have easily lost 20 minutes. There isn't that much story to it, but as it progresses I started to feel for Elena. She gets to a point where she makes a hasty decision that will solve all of her problems. I expected there to be consequences to her choice, but there were none. I guess I was a little disappointed that it had no real ending. I expected something.
And I didn't really understand what happened at the end with her grandson. He goes off with his friends and gets in a very vicious fight with some other boys. They are trying to kill each other, and I didn't understand who started the fight or what it was about. A little more explanation there would have been nice.
Excision - Pauline is a very disturbed teenager. She is very anti social and she fantasizes about performing surgery on strangers. She has lots of very twisted fantasies which are shown to us in all of their shocking details. There is quite a bit of blood in this, and it isn't for the squeamish. I saw quite a few walkouts in this movie.
Her mom is played by Traci Lords, and her pastor is played by John Waters. Nice bits of casting there. Waters is stunt casting, but Lords does a very good job playing Pauline's mother. She starts out as a very overbearing mother, but as Pauline's behavior gets worse, we start to sympathize with her mom. This girl should be committed.
I enjoyed the movie because it had an interesting story. It was disturbing, but I like movies that take chances and provoke a real reaction. I won't give away where the story goes, but the ending packs a real punch.
Elena - set in Russia, Elena is married to Vladimir. They are both older and have children from previous relationships. Their marriage isn't very passionate, and she is more caretaker than wife. Her son's family is in need of financial help, and Vladimir is getting tired of giving them money. He says her son should be responsible for his own family, and why is it his (Vladimir's) responsibility to take care of them? They are strangers to him.
The movie moves very slowly. The first 5 minutes consists of a shot of a bird outside their home. The movie could have easily lost 20 minutes. There isn't that much story to it, but as it progresses I started to feel for Elena. She gets to a point where she makes a hasty decision that will solve all of her problems. I expected there to be consequences to her choice, but there were none. I guess I was a little disappointed that it had no real ending. I expected something.
And I didn't really understand what happened at the end with her grandson. He goes off with his friends and gets in a very vicious fight with some other boys. They are trying to kill each other, and I didn't understand who started the fight or what it was about. A little more explanation there would have been nice.
Excision - Pauline is a very disturbed teenager. She is very anti social and she fantasizes about performing surgery on strangers. She has lots of very twisted fantasies which are shown to us in all of their shocking details. There is quite a bit of blood in this, and it isn't for the squeamish. I saw quite a few walkouts in this movie.
Her mom is played by Traci Lords, and her pastor is played by John Waters. Nice bits of casting there. Waters is stunt casting, but Lords does a very good job playing Pauline's mother. She starts out as a very overbearing mother, but as Pauline's behavior gets worse, we start to sympathize with her mom. This girl should be committed.
I enjoyed the movie because it had an interesting story. It was disturbing, but I like movies that take chances and provoke a real reaction. I won't give away where the story goes, but the ending packs a real punch.
Sundance Saturday, January 21
I was not able to attend Sundance today. Coverage will resume tomorrow.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Sundance - Friday, January 20
My first Sundance movie this year was THE AMBASSADOR. This is a documentary about a man who buys diplomatic credentials so he can get diamonds in and out of the Central African Republic. His cover story is that he is a businessman and his purpose there is to open a factory making matches.
The filmmaker is the subject of this documentary, so his real purpose is not really to get diamonds illegally, but to expose corruption. We see how easy it is for anyone to purchase diplomatic credentials, and we see that every diplomat in the CAR is involved in illegal activities.
This could have been a really interesting documentary, but he somehow manages to avoid the most interesting things. At the end, I really didn't see the point of the movie. We learn about the corruption early on, and from there nothing really happens. This movie was a waste of time.
The next movie I saw was MADRID, 1987. Set in Madrid, it's about an older man who writes a daily newspaper column. A hot young college student wants to interview him, and all he wants to do is sleep with her. They meet in a restaurant and he gets her to come with him to a friend's apartment. Eventually they end up locked in the bathroom together with no hope of rescue.
The bulk of the movie is these two people locked in a room together. But the dialogue is so good that it never drags. The man is one of those guys who thinks he has life figured out. He is constantly telling her about how things were in his day, how things should be, and how smart he is.
The writing is great, and the performances are incredible. I'm glad I saw this one.
UPDATE
I also saw 4 shorts:
A Morning Stroll - Animated about a guy taking a stroll and running into a chicken. It replays the event 3 times, but each time is different with a different animated style. The last one includes zombies and is a lot of fun. It ends with a bang.
Las Palmas - This was strange. It's a baby surrounded by puppets. I didn't make it 5 minutes into this one.
Una Hora Por Favora - A single, neurotic woman hires a day laborer to be her boyfriend, which basically consists of watching reality shows together. Interesting, not bad.
Tooty's Wedding - An unhappily married British couple go to a wedding, and each one tries to have an affair. A couple of funny moments but not memorable.
The filmmaker is the subject of this documentary, so his real purpose is not really to get diamonds illegally, but to expose corruption. We see how easy it is for anyone to purchase diplomatic credentials, and we see that every diplomat in the CAR is involved in illegal activities.
This could have been a really interesting documentary, but he somehow manages to avoid the most interesting things. At the end, I really didn't see the point of the movie. We learn about the corruption early on, and from there nothing really happens. This movie was a waste of time.
The next movie I saw was MADRID, 1987. Set in Madrid, it's about an older man who writes a daily newspaper column. A hot young college student wants to interview him, and all he wants to do is sleep with her. They meet in a restaurant and he gets her to come with him to a friend's apartment. Eventually they end up locked in the bathroom together with no hope of rescue.
The bulk of the movie is these two people locked in a room together. But the dialogue is so good that it never drags. The man is one of those guys who thinks he has life figured out. He is constantly telling her about how things were in his day, how things should be, and how smart he is.
The writing is great, and the performances are incredible. I'm glad I saw this one.
UPDATE
I also saw 4 shorts:
A Morning Stroll - Animated about a guy taking a stroll and running into a chicken. It replays the event 3 times, but each time is different with a different animated style. The last one includes zombies and is a lot of fun. It ends with a bang.
Las Palmas - This was strange. It's a baby surrounded by puppets. I didn't make it 5 minutes into this one.
Una Hora Por Favora - A single, neurotic woman hires a day laborer to be her boyfriend, which basically consists of watching reality shows together. Interesting, not bad.
Tooty's Wedding - An unhappily married British couple go to a wedding, and each one tries to have an affair. A couple of funny moments but not memorable.
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