SIFF Review: Yellow

There are plenty of films about people with crippling mental illness, but there are far fewer that tell the story through the over-medicated perspective of the afflicted. “Yellow” is the closest that schlock master Nick Cassavetes (“The Notebook”, “My Sister’s Keeper”) has gotten to emulating the experimental style associated with his father’s legacy. I’m still not 100% sure I liked “Yellow,” but it sure did give me a lot to think about, and to me, that makes it time well spent.

The script is co-written by Cassavetes and the film’s lead actress, Heather Wahlquist. Love it or hate it, you should make time for pie and coffee afterward, because you will need to discuss what you just witnessed. It begins, as do many dramas, in a therapist’s office. Protagonist Mary Holmes confesses that she is numb to the world. Worse yet, she has absolutely no desire to repair her affliction…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

SIFF Review: Kink

Every October in Seattle, our free weekly newspaper, The Stranger, puts on an amateur porn film festival called Hump! (their exclamation point). It’s not nearly as gross as it sounds. Well, it was at first. But over the years, the prizes you could win got bigger and better and the production value on the entries shot way up. Nowadays, many of the Hump! entries are legitimately beautiful, funny and/or visually impressive films. But since there’s a “Best Kink” category, there are also always a couple of major wince-inducers. The Stranger mercifully limits entries to 10 minutes, which can sometimes feel extremely generous to the filmmakers.

James Franco presents a feature length version of a Hump! contestant, very appropriately called, “Kink.” And if you think 10 minutes of unimaginable sexual torture sounds intense, try 80 minutes. I like to think of myself as pretty open-minded, but much of this film is difficult to stomach. I feel compelled to warn you that if you aren’t all that familiar with what BDSM (that stands for bondage, discipline, dominance and submission) entails, you might want to choose a different movie. Unless, of course, you’re into that. And clearly, many people are…

<b Read the rest at Film Threat.

SFIFF Review: Big Blue Lake

It’s difficult to pinpoint precisely where Jessey Tsang Tsui-Shan went wrong with “Big Blue Lake,” her semi-autobiographical second feature film. There’s a good story in there somewhere. Instead she presents us with something that, when it’s not being trite, is an utter snoozefest…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

SFIFF: Dom – A Russian Family

Most of us have issues with our family, but Viktor Shamanov could give us all a run for our money. Writer/director Oleg Pogodin’s “Dom: A Russian Family” is a glorious epic about a Russian mobster who returns home after a twenty-five year absence to bid farewell to his family prior to retirement. The dense narrative builds slowly, covering more characters than a “Game of Thrones” episode, but Pogodin clearly knows what he’s doing. “Dom: A Russian Family” is as brutal as it is beautiful and it belongs in the same breath as films like “The Deer Hunter” and “The Godfather.”…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

SFIFF Review: Pearblossom HWY

2013 SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL SELECTION!

There are a hundred songs about the compelling desire to “get out of this town.” There’s no shortage of films on the subject either, which is why I was surprised to find a unique, albeit incredibly bleak perspective in Mike Ott’s “Pearblossom Hwy.” “Mumblecore” is a term used to describe a certain level of realism in character-driven independent dramas. But I’m starting to believe that Mumblecore is simply the best way to tell a story. The characters are so authentic that you tend to root for them almost immediately. But this also means you have no idea how it will turn out. Life isn’t a movie but that doesn’t mean a movie can’t be like life.

“Pearblossom Hwy” is a shining example of this exceptional genre. Ott and co-writer/star Atsuko Okatsuka have crafted a small town tale that breaks all the rules that Hollywood has set for dramatic storytelling. Cory (Cory Zachariah) is a sensitive blockhead with dreams of stardom. He films his video selfies as part of an audition for a reality TV show, but we know he’s not going to make the cut. His problems are way too grave to make for good television. His punk band is lucky to get tiny gigs at the local watering hole, and he doesn’t even really have a day-job to not quit. Cory is a small-town kid with big dreams, but it’s only a matter of time before these dreams are dashed. You would not see Channing Tatum playing a character that unnervingly tragic. Cory comes off as one of those naive gay kids from Middle America who winds up on the end of a rope. His potential misfortune looms so ominously that you’re not sure you want to be around when it happens…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

SFIFF Review: Sofia’s Last Ambulance

2013 SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL SELECTION!
The title is a bit of an exaggeration. The team we follow in “Sofia’s Last Ambulance” is one of 13 ambulances in the financially-crippled health service of Sofia, Bulgaria, a city that’s home to about 2 million people. You wouldn’t take odds like that in Vegas, so it’s even more dispiriting when you consider that lives are literally at stake. Ilian Metev’s debut documentary is a grimly gripping condensed version of the professional lives of three paramedics who spend every shift attempting to save as many lives as possible and not always succeeding…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

SFIFF Review: After Lucia

2013 SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL SELECTION! Michel Franco’s “After Lucia” is about the quiet dissolution of a family following the death of its matriarch. Having just picked up the nearly totaled car that took his wife’s life, Roberto (Hernán Mendoza) decides to abandon his old life by the side of the road and move himself and his daughter Ale (Tessa Ia) to a new city. This clean break is the last good decision that either of them makes. Unlike their car, they are irreparable. They are so convinced that pretending everything is fine around one another is the right thing to do, that they stay the course as things increasingly disintegrate…

Read the rest at Film Threat.

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