Five things you probably didn’t know about Cannes

On Wednesday 16th May, the 65th Cannes Film Festival kicks off in the South of France.  For 12 movie-packed days and glamorous evenings, le Festival de Cannes (as it’s known by the cognoscenti) sees filmmakers, casts and crews from around the world descend upon a small seaside town to watch one another’s work.  

There are films “in competition”, vying for awards such as the Palme d’Or (given to the director of the voted Best Film) and Le Prix Un Certain Regard (for best newcomer).  The names Loach, Haneke, Cronenberg may be familiar; Mungiu, Nichols and Garrone less so (though Take Shelter and Gomorrah were lapped up by Kiwi audiences, which bodes well for their latest offerings).  There is a programme of short films which showcases young talent (including New Zealand filmmaker Zia Mandviwalla’s Night Shift), special screenings of classics and Master Classes given by legendary director Philip Kaufman and film composer Alexandre Desplat.  The Festival is a veritable cornucopia of cinematic treats.  

But aside from pictures of Brad in black tie on the red carpet, and news stories about Danish directors being banned for unsavoury comments made at press conferences, there are a few things behind the scenes at this world famous bun-fight that may surprise.  

Queues
Cannes is an invitation-only festival for filmmakers and foreign press, and it is undisputedly a privilege to attend.  But just because your name’s on the pass, doesn’t necessarily mean you’re getting in.  Members of the press are accredited under different categories, where regulars from Sight & Sound and the New York Times will get precedence over a first-timer from the SST.  With a busy timetable of movies to preview, journalists must queue, often for an hour or more, from early in the morning (we’re talking 8.30am-early for some films) before fighting their way to a seat.  No room for lateness here; no traipsing in during the trailers and staring into the gloom as you slurp your jumbo size Coke and try to find a centre-middle-seat for two.  It doesn’t pay to come with mates or a plus-one. At Cannes, it’s every writer for herself.  

No such thing as a free chat
Despite the fact that you could say the press are there to help – to spread the word, start the buzz, fuel the fire of excitement that a film sometimes requires in order to be a worldwide hit – let’s face it honey – it’s called the Film Business for a reason.  Securing interviews with filmmakers and cast requires nomination by a distributor and often payment, usually at the distributor’s expense (in whose interests it is, obviously, that the film gets seen when it’s brought back home), sometimes to the tune of 2000 euros to join a table with other foreign journalists, all vying for their sound-bite.  One-on-one interview opportunities are like hen’s teeth.  Less-funded press will have to resort to collaring their prey at the local patisserie, dictaphone at the ready.  If they can get past the entourage.

To frock or not to frock
Again, because of the red carpet photos, one might assume Cannes is just one big catwalk.  By comparison, the press previews that a jobbing reviewer attends in New Zealand are an entirely casual affair – hoodies and jandals mingle with cargo pants and parkas.  So Cannes is a shock to the system for someone who seldom has high heels in her wardrobe, let alone her suitcase.  Because, don’t forget – we’re also in France, land of the chic and home of the vogue, so even during the day one has to hit the “smart casual” button like a European.  And just in case one has the good fortune to be invited to the Dutch Ambassador’s party to launch a new cine-environmental initiative, or to be shown the nightlife by pals from the British Film Pavillion, one has to be prepared. So it’s frocks and heels at the ready, because, really, as much as people say “if you need something, you can just buy it!” we are still playing with Euros.  

Buy buy, sell sell
For the filmmakers, Cannes is where they first show off the latest from their oeuvre and gain the critical acclaim of their peers and the world.  Directors are often working right up until the eleventh hour in post-production to get the film ready for submission, and a category win can launch a new director’s career into the stratosphere. Following in Scorsese’s footsteps with Taxi Driver, Tarantino scored with Pulp Fiction; Campion won for The Piano.  With far more critical kudos than an Oscar, the Palme d’Or has seen some brave and exciting work rewarded over the last six decades.   But Cannes is also the market for distributors to buy and sell, hawking their wares to foreign programmers hoping to acquire the latest Prophet and White Ribbon to take home to their own festival audiences, who wait eagerly as if for a mail-order bride.  Le Marche du Film (literally the Film Market) was set up in 1959 to run in conjunction with the Festival as a forum for producers, sales agents and festival programmers to get the movies out into worldwide audiences.  Only the lucky press get into the Marche screenings; the rest of us will have to wait like the rest of the world.    

First to see the new day
Films cannot have been shown at any other festival prior to their debut at Cannes, which means that once acquired by a programmer, the race is then on for international festivals to show off the latest winners.  New Zealand’s annual international film festival tours the country in July/August, which puts us in the agreeable position of sometimes being able to show a Cannes movie before London, Berlin and Toronto. Our festival programmers work tirelessly at the key markets around the world to secure morsels for our viewing pleasure.

It certainly saves us the airfare and the cost of outfits.

If it’s Saturday, this must be Paris

Just time, as I sit in the departure lounge at LAX, for a quick round-up of the non-cinema aspects of my week in LA.

(As a brief aside, I don’t know who flies Swiss Air, but no one I know ever has. The impirical evidence surrounding me would suggest only the Swiss do. I guess that’s not so surprising in itself; Kiwis love to fly AirNZ (though haven’t we won international awards or something?). In any event, this next 11 hours through Zurich to Paris will be interesting. Will the announcements be in French, German and Italian? The Swiss have a reputation for fairness (unless impartiality isn’t quite the same thing). Alas, no upgrade this time (I knew I would forever be spoiled after my Skycouch experience!) but I have an aisle seat and my blow-up pilow, so will just have to get on with it.)

Anyway. A wise man once said:
The thing with LA is, everything is terrible, except the things that are good, which are great. (Myles Webster, native New Zealander and resident Los Angelino)

LA week was as much about eating as film trivia, and I am pleased to have sampled Japanese, Ethiopian, Mexican, Thai, Chinese and Turkish, along with the obligatory hamburger, hotdog, pizza pretzel and *cough* Nutella crepe. It goes without saying the next 4 weeks in France and Italy show great promise on the gastronomical front.

A few observations about the locals. People in the service industry are super friendly, and make a good show of appearing completely genuine. (It is in my nature to assume people are being authentic, but let’s not forget that most Los Angelinos are probably fostering an acting career.) For every “thankyou” uttered, there is a heartfelt “you’re welcome”. One young chap in retail told me enthusiastically of his desire to move to NZ and become a shepherd. Another shoe salesman wheedled his way into my good-books by declaring I reminded him of a cross between Jodie Foster and Kirsten Dunst. Alas, he didn’t have the sneakers I wanted in my size. I have received compliments on items of clothing and jewelery from complete strangers; a bus passenger told my NZ friend and me she loved our accents. I love this place – so great for your self esteem!

Hipsters are everywhere, the young men sporting their black-rimmed glasses and leather loafers with rapidly fading irony or individuality. All the businessmen downtown wear cuffed trousers (is this a “thing” elsewhere??). The jandal is a surprisingly popular item of footwear.

And the sun shines, every day I’ve been here, warm and bright but without the tendency to burn you to a crisp. This really has been most agreeable.

Paris will be a whole other bucket of moules (I know from experience to manage my expectations of the friendliness) but I anticipate an entirely different kind of cultural experience. A bientot!

On Universal Studios

I last visited LA a whole 24 years ago, and I hardly need tell you that west coast America in the mid-80s made quite an impression. Notwithstanding our family was met at LAX by a white stretch limo (our aunt was at the time working in Hollywood so threw on quite a show for Wide-Eyed of Mairangi Bay), my memory of that holiday was of early starts and drive-thru McDonalds’ breakfasts en route to the theme parks. We still have the photos of us kids lifting the A-Team van up onto two wheels, and riding through the night sky with ET in our bicycle basket. Those were the days. Hair was boofy, t-shirts were fluoro, and there was good, clean fun to be had at Universal Studios.

More than two decades on, I was looking forward to getting another pic with ET and nursing the smug foreknowledge that on the studio tour, when the bus suddenly dips precariously off its tracks, the Jaws shark lunges out of the water and frightens you to death. Not this time, Universal.

Well, it turns out the park has moved with the times, and I clearly have not. Today’s movie rides are all about Shrek, The Mummy and Terminator 2. A recent addition is the brand new Transformers ride, not even open to the public until 25th May, but it was running technical rehearsals so I made a beeline to the park’s lower lot right away. Had I been with my engineer father on this trip, he may have questioned the wisdom of riding something that is still being checked, but I went anyway. No queues to speak of (how glad I was not to have upgraded to the front-of-line pass for a “meagre” $129 USD) and I have to say it was pretty good. Of course nowadays it’s all about 3D glasses and jolting seats that give you the full physical sensation that you are inside a parallel world. I forgot that rollercoasters render me completely speechless, though at one point someone sounding like me uttered a weak “Oh sh*t” as we plummetted over the edge of a skyscraper down to the streets below. I won’t spoil whether we survived or not.

By comparison, the abovementioned rides and shows felt a little lacklustre, though I admire the efforts gone to to create a 4D experience – lots of water sprayed out of the darkness to evoke a dragon’s spit and dry ice enveloping the audience in the aftermath of an on-screen explosion.

The studio tour is still the highlight. Again, things have moved on in a quarter of a century – now we cruise Wisteria Lane and see stunt cars in action for the latest Fast and Furious flick. Jaws is there, as is the Psycho house, but not like last time. The truly impressive moment (and how proud I was) is when Peter Jackson appears on our in-cart TV and introduces his new ride, King Kong 3D in 360. It is brief but fantastic, and a worthy collaboration by one of our greatest exports and the studio he seems to be contracted to for the rest of his life.

To be fair, Universal Studios is really for the kids, and though it’s the parents who will pay for the undercooked, overpriced hotdogs and sweet popcorn and slushy lemonade, adults don’t even get the pleasure of a laugh at the mature in-jokes that are routinely written into kids’ movies nowadays. Universal is strictly G admission. If your child wants a photo with Spongebob, and won’t be petrified by the plastic dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, it is as great a day out as it was in the 80s. Only the hairdos have changed.

In Tinseltown, all that glisters certainly ain’t gold

The Sound of Music is one of my favourite films.  Years ago I went on the movie tour in Salzburg, which was enlightening enough, but destroyed so many of the illusions that I was literally depressed for a day. I’d already read a book that said Christopher Plummer hated the kid actors in real life, but to see they shot the lakeside exterior of the family home miles away from the house they used for the scenes out front was crushing.

Forewarned is forearmed, as they say, so I felt better prepared as I turned up at Paramount Pictures on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood to take the studio tour. A bunch of foreigners from Russia, Chile and NZ, we were ferried about in an open-air, battery-powered cart by our guide, Chris (an aspiring TV writer, not actor) and learned a variety of insights about the likes of ex-Studio head (and one of only three women to run the studio in its 100 year history) Lucille Ball, and how if we encountered anyone from the cast of Glee, they don’t like to be asked for an autograph (sorry, Gleek friends back home!).

Perhaps because I am older and more jaded now, it was less disappointing and more impressive to see a shopfront on Paramount’s purpose-built “New York Street” and then be shown a clip from the latest (awful) Indiana Jones movie which shot a scene on that corner, and to realise Shia Leboeuf actually is a good actor after all. We saw where Woody Harrelson left drunken handprints in wet concrete, and the sound stages where the studio’s Oscar-winning Godfathers were shot. The biggest plummet of disbelief came from seeing a metre-deep carpark, painted light blue, which is periodically emptied of cars, filled with water, and used in films as disparate as The Ten Commandments (Charlton Heston parted the Red Sea right there) and the Jack Black vehicle Orange County.

Plenty of studio history, the odd anecdote, a look at a couple of sets for TV shows we haven’t seen. I even helped the guide with his commentary by giving a bit of background to the old Hollywood studio-contract system (I bet tour guides just love people like me).

As I write, I am sitting with a 920-calorie chocolate milkshake (hey, I’m in America!) in Downtown Los Angeles, where the bank robbery scenes from Heat were shot in 1995. Two separate, very patient, bank employees were complicit in my finding the right building. Unfortunately a lot has changed since filming, and it turns out I am 4 years too late to see the bank exterior as it was shot, before they renovated the outside and added benches, flowers and a fountain. Not to worry. There is a familiarity in the slope of the streets and the natural lighting that satisfies my pilgrimage.

And finally, a quick brag about the film we saw last night. USC’s film school puts on free weekly screenings of unreleased or seriously indie movies, and last night’s was a revelation. Bobcat Goldthwait (that’s right – the chap from Police Academy with the Grover voice) has written and directed an undoubtedly personal tirade against all that is wrong with America. God Bless America (all in lower case in the film’s titles) has Mad Men‘s Joel Murray playing a beleagured, loserville kinda guy who despairs at the reality TV, the materialism, consumerism and Kardashianism of contemporary America. Pushed to the limits by work, family and health, he embarks on a spree of cathartic madness with Tara Lynne Barr’s teenage “Heather”. The film delivers all its shocks in the opening scenes (the audience was in fits) then takes you on a heckuva ride. It has done Toronto and some other festivals, and is released locally in LA this Friday, but it’ll be interesting to see whether it makes it to NZ.  Here’s hoping – I think audiences there will love it.

Skyped in my film review to Radio Wammo from a room of Hollywood movie posters at the LA Public Library (God bless free wi-fi).  Universal Studios got deferred to tomorrow, so I will write about that after!

Lina goes (back) to Hollywood

So, several months ago I decided on a whim to attend this year’s Cannes Film Festival. And as fantastical as that may sound to most of us, there are ways and means (the foremost being the requirement to be a jobbing film critic somewhere in the world) and now, finally, after months of planning and countless sleeps of anticipation, I am en route.

Notwithstanding I felt like a change from stopping in S. E. Asia on my cross-the-world trip, it seemed appropriate to take in some of the movie-related sights in Hollywoodland itself.  So I am currently spending a terrific five days in Koreatown (west of Downtown, or WeDo, as only I am amused to be calling it) with some Kiwi friends.

First, though, was the flight up from Auckland. Thanks to the generosity and possible patriotism of AirNZ, I was upgraded to Premium Economy for the first time in a relatively long life of international travel. The Skycouch and excellent food and drink were all the more appreciated given I am not being funded by a media organisation, but am travelling as a civilian. That said, once AirNZ were told of my ultimate destination, they happily set me off with a glass of French champers and the fine choice in inflight entertainment. At last, time to catch up with Mark Wahlberg in Contraband (I know Mark nearly always plays himself, but he does it so well!) and then a shamefully belated introduction to Mike and Rosemary Riddell’s beautiful and touching The Insatiable Moon. It has taken me far too long to catch this locally-made and Ponsonby-based adaptation of Mike’s book, and while not all of the themes sat comfortably with me, I was frequently moved to tears. In daylight! In the aeroplane! The stewardesses feigned not to notice.

Day 1 in sunny LA was a bonus day, since I’d left NZ that night already, and proved fruitful in gastronomic as well as cinephiliac terms. A jaunt up to the Griffith Observatory provided smoggy views across LA, where obligatory photos of the distant Hollywood sign didn’t really come out. There is a bust of James Dean up there, too, something to do with Rebel Without A Cause having been one of the first movies shot around there that represented the Observatory in a good way. A tenuous link, to my mind, but apparently Dean himself commissioned the bust, so who am I to question. But imagine my great geeky excitement as we stood at a crosswalk (see me talk the language!) and I recognised the army surplus store across the road as being from Joel Schumacher’s last decent (well, pretty much) movie – Falling Down! It’s on Sunset Boulevard, and even though that iconic road goes for miles and miles, you imagine you’re getting a whiff of decades of film history just by going there.

Today we visited the diner from the opening scene of Reservoir Dogs but were spared the inevitably lousy diner coffee by dint of its closing two minutes before we got there. Tomorrow is Universal Studios, where I will sadly be unable to tweet my extreme excitement from the new Transformers ride, so will just have to get on with being In The Moment.

LA, I love you.

The Lucky One

This review first appeared in the Sunday Star Times, 22nd April 2012

If you’ve watched the trailer, you might feel you have seen the whole story before you even sit down. A young American marine finds a photo of a beautiful girl in the horrors of the Iraq war, and on his return home he goes on a mission to find her. Hmm, how do you think this will go? Zac Efron (Hairspray, Me and Orson Welles) is as talented as he is handsome, but could he redeem the inevitable, mawkish cliche of a Nicholas Sparks novel? Having baulked at The Last Song and The Notebook and avoided Dear John altogether, I felt surely not.

Certainly, the story is straightforward, the relationships pretty uncomplicated – but Efron and co-star Taylor Schilling (surprisingly lovely and natural in her first major role) somehow manage to scythe through the lack of narrative innovation and give us something with real heart.

Efron plays the shell-shocked marine, bulked-up and battle-scarred, locking down his natural charisma to play a deeply affected war vet. The fact he still manages to be compelling may, in this instance, have more to do with his manly physique than his usual boyish grin, but thanks to his chemistry with Schilling’s Beth (herself wounded by loss), Efron’s Logan presents as a good catch. He loves dogs, respects his elders, and practically has Protect and Serve tattooed on to his torso. Meanwhile, Beth is raising her son, battling a controlling ex-husband, and looks fabulous in floral dresses and cut-off shorts.

The fact that this isn’t awful must surely be down to director Scott Hicks. Hicks made Geoffrey Rush a star in Shine all those years ago. He has a good eye and sharp instincts.

Set in balmy North Carolina amongst golden hues and trickling streams, Logan may just find his peace and his place in life. It’s not new, it’s not clever, but it ticks the boxes.

The Five Year Engagement

This review first appeared in the Sunday Star Times, 6th May 2012

British every(where) woman Emily Blunt and Team Apatow regular Jason Segel are Tom and Violet – a couple who fall quickly in love and then, as the title suggests, spend the next five years of their relationship travelling the ups and downs of the road to marriage.

Director Nicholas Stoller played slightly dirtier in Get Him To The Greek and Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but even without Russell Brand’s antics he manages to concoct a sweet lovers’ tryst out of Segel’s goofy chef and Blunt’s thoughtful psychologist. The script is a mixed bag – sometimes conveniently dull, unrealistic and even a bit lame, then suddenly spouting something clever, a new angle on relationship woes, and providing humour in its truisms.

Almost inevitably nowadays, there is a “funny bridesmaid” in the form of Violet’s emotional sister, Suzie, and adulterous intrigue provided by Welshman Rhys Ifans, who mostly veers away from professorial caricature but certainly cuts it close.

There’s never really any doubt that Tom and Violet, who are far nicer to one another than any long-time couple you’re likely to know in real life, will make it through – but their journey is nonetheless amusing, peppered with laugh-out-loud moments and some surprising cameos.

The Documentary Edge Festival

This review first appeared in the Sunday Star Times, 22nd April 2012

The first rule of the annual documentary film festival is you have to get to a cinema. Most of these films won’t be back, and many won’t even make it to DVD.  The Doc Edge team have scoured the four corners of our globe for the very best non-fiction stories.  I warn you: blink and you’ll miss them.

The second rule is: try anything. I have yet to preview a documentary in any of the last three years’ festivals that hasn’t been fascinating.  Some are confronting and disturbing; others are purely delightful.  Here is a taste of some must-sees.

Shakespeare High will ease you in gently.  The 90^th annual Shakespeare Festival presents an opportunity for talented kids from several Californian high schools to get into the Bard.  Distilling a 3 hour play into an 8 minute scene, the teams must capture the judges’ attention and admiration.  But this isn’t just white, middle class kids – in a tale of hope and inspiration, many come from difficult backgrounds.  Chris would get “popped” by his homies if they knew he was acting, but his aim is to get to college.  Following in the footsteps of featured alumni Kevin Spacey, Val Kilmer and Mare Winningham, it’s a heart-warming and exciting ride.

There is an excellent line-up of crime-related stories, and China’s Dead Man Talking is compelling viewing.  An audience of 40 million watches the weekly TV show where convicted killers, sentenced to death, are interviewed about their crimes by the Barbara Walters of Chinese TV.  Journalist Ding Yu cares enough to want to know “Why?” and insists on speaking to the condemned as human beings, not criminals.  As the families wail “Go peacefully!”, it’s hard not to be touched by the fate of these very ordinary people.  In a similar vein, The Interrupters tackles street crime in Chicago society, with its extraordinary tale of a brave and committed group of “Violence Interrupters” – idealists from the gangs who have turned their lives around, and now work to guide others away from retribution.  Ameena exhibits more chutzpah than any scripted character from The Wire, with bursts of real-life “dialogue” that are impassioned and surprisingly effective, no doubt due to her own history.  In Crime after Crime we look at the justice system from inside, as Debbie Peagler fights for freedom during 26 years in prison, jailed for her role in the murder of her abusive boyfriend.  It’s a tale of battered women overcoming prejudice and two devoted strangers who see the injustice in her case, and take up the mantle.

Utterly fascinating is the remarkable Hitler’s Children.  A slight misnomer, the film actually talks to descendants of those Nazis who did have families, and who battle with either their name or their guilt about the sins of their fathers.  It is subtly played and shocking, as we hear about children who grew up next door to Auschwitz under a veil of ignorance, playing on toys built by prisoners, and with the memory that the ash on the strawberries had to be washed off.  For some, catharsis and acceptance; for others, lifelong pain.

For some light relief, head to Big in Bollywood.  So unbelievable you couldn’t make it up, this documentary was shot with remarkable foresight by the friends of Indian American actor Omi Vaidya, native ofPalm Springs and struggling inHollywood to get a break.  Cue a random casting in a Bollywood movie, and his mates decide to film him attending the premiere in Mumbai.  What follows is an extraordinary Star is Born story, which will have you grinning throughout.

And to round off: Vanity Fair writer and columnist/public speaker Fran Leibowitz makes a living out of being a smart-arse, and isn’t she fabulous?  In Public Speaking, Martin Scorsese films the writer’s witty take on life, interspersed with clips from the 70s and 80s.  Leibowitz’s tongue-in-cheek opinion of her invaluable contributions is entirely justified, as you can’t help but smile and nod along with her.

 

Blackthorn

This review first appeared in the Sunday Star Times, 8th April 2012

This unassuming yet enthralling film reimagines a conclusion to one of the most famous westerns of all time. Suppose Butch Cassidy didn’t die in 1908, but in fact spent the next 20 years living peaceably in Bolivia among the locals, an old and fading gringo of some means but no obvious ambition. Deciding to make one last visit to his erstwhile home, Butch (living in happy anonymity as James Blackthorn) is suddenly thrown into a partnership with a new “Kid”, robber Eduardo Apodaca (Eduardo Noriega), who imposes on the reluctant old-timer.

Sam Shepard (most recently seen in Safe House but in fact the hero of a film career spanning four decades) has virtually all the screen time, and legitimately so. With the exception of a few flashbacks dotted throughout to show Butch and Sundance in their younger gun-slinging days, this is Blackthorn’s story, and Shepard’s understated, soft-spoken charm is magnetic.

As in any good western, it’s as much about tone as action – sensational photography, aided by the beautiful Bolivian landscape, laps up rainforest, desert, authentic costuming and local faces, producing a wonderful evocation of 1920s South America.

Battleship

This review first appeared in the Sunday Star Times, 15th April 2012

Since the producers of Battleship presumably knocked up the concept for the movie on the back of a Nicotinell packet, let’s take a similar tack.

Story: having run out of childhood fairy tales to mangle and clearly not wanting to stray into “indie” territory by having an original thought, the premise for the film is taken (with liberties) from the strategy game that originated, albeit on paper, in the 1930s. In the movie, the US and Japanese navies are about to engage in some good-natured war games exercise on the high seas around Hawaii, for old times’ sake, when suddenly an alien spacecraft plummets to earth and threatens the lives of every mortal.

Cast: John Carter hadn’t yet been released and received its critical panning, so the cast is helmed by JC hero Taylor Kitsch. It will take Tarantino to resurrect his career after this. For luck, Kitsch’s naval commander brother is the usually wonderful Alexander Skarsgard (True Blood and Melancholia)

Yet, as it turns out, the best things about this film are two supporting actors: New Zealander John Tui, making a terrific foray into Hollywood from a career in television here, and pop singer Rihanna as the feisty, token female naval officer, Raikes.

Their lines may be stock-standard, their characters necessarily one-dimensional, but both do a fantastic job and provide the most watchable moments.

Direction: Peter Berg, who had a respectable acting career in the likes of Chicago Hope for many years before he turned to directing The Kingdom (good) and Hancock (not so much), produced and directed this film, which was a terribly disappointing revelation as the credits rolled.

Even the bombast of McG and Michael Bay would have provided more innovative entertainment. However, instead Berg seems to have eschewed any notion of making this gritty and exciting, and phoned in his direction from the office.

Battleship makes a great navy recruitment video but a lousy two hours in the cinema.