Aaron Krasnov: One emergent festival theme I've started thinking about since we started this correspondence is the disturbed female: through Miss Bala, Melancholia, A Dangerous Method, Shame (though not the focus), and Martha Marcy May Marlene. Elizabeth Olsen and Martha Marcy May Marlene epitomized this for me (note: I have not seen A Dangerous Method yet), a fragmented narrative aiming to disorient and frighten, evoking empathy through reconstruction. Melancholia, though gorgeous and well acted feels insular compared to Martha May, which reaches into the numbed confusion and examines what it means to exist in this world, with family, with society, sexually, behaviorally and ideologically. Blurring dreams, reality, past and present, the confusion is allowed to evolve. Where as the symptoms in the festival's other films tended to remain more one-note.
Peter Gutierrez: That's great to bring up -- because now I can be yang to your yin, or vice versa, I'm not sure. I was sick and couldn't attend Martha Marcy May Marlene, so now you've made me look forward to it more than ever. On the other hand, I saw and loved A Dangerous Method and a lot of what you say applies to it as well. That is, much of its greatness lies in its anti-one-noteness, if you will. (I also think you've hit on the hinge issue with The Loneliest Planet -- audiences will tend to like it if they appreciate the setting-in aspect you describe.)
What about you, though? Anything you saw that really exceeded your expectations--or did the opposite?
AK: McQueen also mentioned during the press conference of Shame that shooting Hunger had exhausted him so much he didn't want to make another film. Eventually he fell back into the process, and Shame feels like the easier, younger cousin of Hunger. Not reaching for too much, deftly visualizing the elements at hand, shot in a place McQueen wanted to capture. I don't see this as a bad thing, and thankfully I had heard a lot of backlash before hand and went in without expectations. It is, as you put it, just another addiction film, and one that certainly doesn't do anything new, but captured through McQueen's lens it has a glossy, aggressively operatic quality to it that is deserving of more.
I keep hearing about the importance of A Separation,
which I did not have a chance to see. You did though, and are echoing
the masterpiece talk. What makes that film such a standout?
A Separation as a drama, or family drama, in a naturalistic mode makes it sound far more boring than it actually is.
But describing it in generic terms as a "legal thriller" or "courtroom drama" also sells it short: you're fairly far along in the narrative before the main characters appear before the investigating magistrate, a kind of one-man-grand-jury, and things have already been riveting from the get-go. You can easily identify with the plight of several of these characters, and the ingeniously crafted script slowly draws all the believable, everyday details and events of their lives together in a way that catches both them and the audience in its net. I guess the best thing I can say about A Separation is that one can't easily pinpoint why it's so successful -- the acting talent on display, its wonderfully twisty and yet utterly convincingly plot, or Farhadi's direction in service of both. As in any truly great movie, they all go hand in hand.
AK: It's time to touch on the charming, buoyantly old-Hollywood The Artist.
As somewhat of a silent film novice I missed many of the references in
the film, though was taken with the exuberance with which the film
captures Hollywood's transition from silent cinema to the talkies;
Singing in the Rain's silent, less musical brother if you will.
Captivating and reverent, expressively detailed and utterly
transportive, this is the type of film that makes me love the art-form.
One of my favorites of the fest and a film I will be seeing again with
friends upon release.
AK: You were not happy with The Descendants when we exited, and I can understand the same-old formula in a lush environment producing that sort of sentiment. But, I am on the complete opposite side of the proverbial fence here. The Descendants certainly doesn't do anything new: the better living through family, brought together by a disaster and better for it model, is well worn ground, though not a fault in my book. As someone who spends his life telling and listening to stories, I've learned it's not always the content of the story, it's how the story is told. The Descendants is one of those stories that gains strength as it moves along, presenting a familiar situation which slowly, disarmingly proves affective through strong acting and the great writing we have come to expect from Alexander Payne.
AK: It's a film that is overwhelmingly blunt in its thematics: parenthood, natural preservation, infidelity. That works within these universal confines, teaching us that if you are true to yourself everything will be OK, as long as you're not a prick. It's a film where not everyone wins, where life deals you a shitty hand and you need to figure out how to deal with it, then maybe things will start getting better. It's a film about the power of communication, growing up and moving on. It's a film with all of those fluffy morals that is unconcerned with anything loftier, just finding a way to improve things through family and a little bit of humor.
Across the board, from the smaller roles of
Beau Bridges, Matthew Lillard and Robert Forster to the front and center
work of relatively unknown Shailene Woodley the acting is the
star. Archetypal or not, these are characters I'll remember, and feel a
kinship with; and thinking back this is true of most of Payne's
characters. There is a life within them, a want for something better,
that moment of catharsis where you feel good about yourself as a person,
that striving I see in all of Payne's central rolls. You harp on the
quirk a bit, but without that humor, that lightness of conversation, in
which anyone can say something dumb if it will teach them a lesson or
lighten the mood, we wouldn't have as much character progression. People learning from their mistakes while providing the film a
bit of spontaneity not allowing it to be weighed down by the death that gravitates the
film. There are certainly a few times where the histrionics burn
through, but in-general the film skips the heavy-handedness and lets the
actors do their thing, something I warmly welcome.
PG: Well, all in all, an amazing festival -- and that's without my catching so many of the "Nikkatsu" pictures or classics such as The Exterminating Angel, another personal favorite. Instead of simply feeling like the green room for would-be Oscar contenders, or just a collection of Cannes or Toronto leftovers, NYFF really seemed like an incredible, and incredibly generous, "festival" in the true sense: a tremendous amount of fun, and an experience it's hard not to feel inspired by if you love the art form in all its myriad shapes and sizes.
PG: Well, all in all, an amazing festival -- and that's without my catching so many of the "Nikkatsu" pictures or classics such as The Exterminating Angel, another personal favorite. Instead of simply feeling like the green room for would-be Oscar contenders, or just a collection of Cannes or Toronto leftovers, NYFF really seemed like an incredible, and incredibly generous, "festival" in the true sense: a tremendous amount of fun, and an experience it's hard not to feel inspired by if you love the art form in all its myriad shapes and sizes.