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51st
SAN SEBASTIAN FILM FESTIVAL
Nazioarteko
Zinemaldia DONOSTIA-SAN SEBASTIAN Festival Internacional de Cine
report
by Neil Young
official
website : San
Sebastian Film Festival
Section
one : Day 1, Day 2, Day 3
Section two : Day 4, Day 5
Section three
: Day 6, Day 7
Section four : Day 8, Day 9, Day 10, Awards comment
format
of reviews:
Title
/ rating / original title(s) : country(s) of origin : year : director(s)
: length : section of festival
synopsis
in italics taken directly from official festival brochure
SECTION
FOUR
Day
8 (25th Sept) : Red Dusk, The Dreamers, In the City, The
Bottom of the Sea
Day
9 (26th Sept) : Gun-Shy, Unfaithfully Yours, The Sin of
Harold Diddlebock, Offside
Day
10 (27th Sept) : Open Range, Awards comment
Day
8 : Thursday 25th September
RED
DUSK
4/10
Dans
le rouge du couchant aka Crepusculo rojo : France (Fr/Spn)
2003 : Edgardo COZARINSKY : 90 mins : Official Section (in competition)
Marisa
Paredes, Feodor Atkine and Bruno Putzulu are the three stars of this tale
set in Paris but with its roots in Buenos Aires. The cinema of Argentinean
Edgardo Cozarinsky, a resident of France for several years, maintains
a strange, attractive balance between both sides of the Atlantic. On this
occasion embodied in the faces of three actors who bring vibrant life
to the people who run into each other one red dusk.
Style
overwhelms content with ultimately tiresome results in Red Dusk:
audiences expecting a sequel to Red Dawn will rapidly head for
the exits when they realise what an art-house self-indulgence they’ve
stumbled into. DV-shot in Buenos Aires, Paris and Budapest: artworld intrigues
of low-level, slow-burning sort. Presence of Putzulu (the well-dressed
director from Godard’s Eloge d’Amour)
and Paredes (who played Huma Rojo - ‘Red Smoke’ - in All
About My Mother) promises much, but both deserve far better material.
Paredes doesn’t appear until half-hour in. Early stretches concentrate
on Putzulu (returns to France from Argentina with valuable painting he
intends to get rid of on black market). Focus then switches to Paredes
(former member of some kind of political underground organisation back
in B.A.), then to Atkine (art-dealer, also perhaps a former member of
Paredes’ group). Overcomplex plot, but director much more interested in
stylistic exercises – over-the-top music on soundtrack alternates between
Herrmann-for-Hitchcock ominousness / smoky French horns / easy-listening
muzak. Ill-advised fantasy sequence(s) in which dead appear and talk to
living. Slow, pretentious stuff. Non-thriller, doesn’t deliver on any
front – plot too jumpy to carry us along over the bumps. Frustrating experience.
Tedium sets in before the hour point. Amusingly daft, however, that they
use one of the best-known Caspar David Friedrich paintings ‘Woman at the
Window’ as key part of the artworld intrigues. Finale involves heavily
symbolic placing of clown’s red nose on dying man, plus a couple of child
performers who can’t act: classic litmus indicator of director who isn’t
up to scratch.
THE
DREAMERS
6/10
UK
(UK/Ita/Fr) 2003 : Bernardo BERTOLUCCI : 103 mins : Zabaltegi
Although
The Dreamers is not actually based on the events of May ’68, clearly
remembered by Bertolucci, the story can only be understood when considered
from that context. Cinema and life merge in this movie, an homage to a
kind of young idealism and hymn to the search for new experiences as valid
35 years ago as they are today.
Bertolucci
now in his 60s – never exactly very cutting-edge in terms of his visuals
(no matter how often content of his movies pushed the envelope). Seems
an odd choice to adapt Gilbert Adair’s novel of movie love, and passions
of the more carnal variety – set in Paris 1968, characters infected with
very nouvelle vague temperament (one even claims her first words
to have been ‘New York Herald Tribune!’ a la Jean Seberg in Breathless).
Spirit of Godardian revolution – plot kicks off during protests at Henri
Langlois’ sacking from the Cinematheque Francaise: Jean-Pierre Leaud seen
in archive footage rabble-rousing, intercut with present-day Leaud apparently
playing himself in dramatisations. It’s here that raw American lad Michael
Pitt (much closer to decadent camp of Hedwig
than Sandra Bullock vehicle Murder
By Numbers) meets Parisian brother-and-sister duo Philippe Garrel
and Eva Green. They set about educating him in film – and politics, culture,
and sex. All are living in their own movie, but it certainly wouldn’t
look like this picture (apart from the many clips that punctuate
the action, best of which is Garbo in Queen Christina.) However,
on reflection perhaps Bertolucci isn’t such an unlikely choice: the trio’s
talk of revolution is just that: talk. Especially with Pitt, who narrates
in vaguely Damon-as-Ripley style. All are much more bothered about
sex - until violent revolution forcibly breaks their bourgeois, hermetic
world: brick through the window. When bro and sis do commit to action,
film instantly ends. Circular: finishes as it began, with Hendrix’s terrific
‘Third Rock from the Sun’. In between Hendrix blasts, we get odd but beguiling
mixture of social satire, sex film and freewheeling comedy. Very funny
moments – even Eva’s “suicide” attempt has very witty punchline. Doesn’t
outstay welcome, though essentially light stuff that doesn’t add up to
a great deal.
IN
THE CITY
5/10
En
la ciudad : Spain 2003 : Cesc GAY : 110 mins : Official Section
(in competition)
Following
the success of Krampack (Nico and Dani) the Catalan director has
chosen to make a completely different film. An urban, choral and wintry
tale portraying from a particularly unconventional and harsh point of
view a group of thirty-something year old friends, En la ciudad (In
the City) is more of a contained melodrama than a custom comedy.
Short
Cuts has a lot to answer for – the ‘urban intersections’ sub-genre,
while potent in the right hands (Magnolia,
City of Hope), has too often been an easy option for ambitious
film-makers eager to try their hands at a wide-canvas vision of modern
life. In the City is a typical example: as blandly generic as its
title, ensemble tale of middle-class Barcelona couples and their friends
is undemandingly watchable without ever managing to assert own identity
or flavour. Even ends with balcony al-fresco lunch, perhaps ill-advised
tribute to Altman’s template. Much closer to tame chick-flick material
like What’s Cooking? Broader
comic touches and subplots work best, but otherwise this is largely uninvolving,
lukewarm-tempo peek into a disappointingly narrow, well-heeled stratum
of today’s Catalan thirtysomethings. Who’s who, in relation to who? What’s
happening. Never catches fire. Before we know it, various plots have started
unfolding. Struggle to catch up with them all. At one point two characters
go to see 8 Women.
Woman enthusiastic afterwards, bloke non-commital. “You laughed!” she
points out, but we get his point. In the City similarly hard to
get worked up about – passes through viewer like glass of water. Done
so much better elsewhere, so why bother. Also very cheeky to put Leonor
Watling on the poster. She’s barely in it. Clever girl.
THE
BOTTOM OF THE SEA
7/10
El
Fondo del Mar : Argentina 2003 : Damian SZIFRON : 91 mins :
Horizontes Latinos
A
comedy-cum-unexpected peculiar thriller. Discovering that his girlfriend
Ana is cheating on him, Toledo decides to find out with whom and why,
setting off on the heels of her lover. An absurd persecution in which
those involved are too close to see one another. And the bottom of the
sea? The bottom of the sea is the only refuge left for Toledo on realizing
that life will never be the same again for him.
Unassuming
but very likeable little comedy with dramatic touches - loses way with
ill-advised pretentious coda. Up to this point a fine, unpretentious chronicle
of infidelity-paranoia. Boyfriend (bemused, scruffy, engaging Daniel Hendler)
tails his girlfriend’s obnoxious, penny-pinching, sleazy ‘lover’ (Gustavo
Garzon, excellent in the showcase role). Inevitably, all isn’t my any
means as it seems – but writer-director makes a very old set-up seem fresh,
funny and surprising. Quirky background details – suspicious lover is
an architect designing underwater hotel for divers, and he’s a diver himself
as well. Builds to very satisfying finale, then (unwisely) keeps going:
quirky background stuff emerges into foreground in bizarre, uneventful
last five minutes. Insecurity of first-time director? He shouldn’t worry:
control of tone sufficiently expert in first hour to bode well for future
career. Like Toledo, Szifron just gets a little out of his depth.
Day
9 : Friday 26th September
GUN-SHY
6?/10
Schussangst
: Germany 2003 : Dito TSINTZADZE : 102 mins : Official Section
(in competition)
The
director of Lost Killers brings us a film hard to classify, full
of a dark, surreal humour set in a realistic context. The tale of a man
obliged to do something he never thought he’d do. A quiet, peaceable youngster
doing social work to escape from doing his military service is inexorably
drawn into taking vengeance. A movie shot through with extravagant characters,
absurd and funny moments despite its darkness.
Like
a Peter Handke novel filmed by Ioseliani
(compatriot of Georgian writer-director Tsintzadze.) Very slow-burning
comedy-drama described in some quarters as “German Taxi Driver”.
Kind of – much less action. Takes own sweet time to get to what is, admittedly,
a very jarring, abrupt and effective conclusion that puts everything that’s
gone before into a very different, rather darker light. Hapless Lukas
(Fabian Hinrichs) – tall, thin, good-looking bumbler in a rut. Meals-on-wheels
as substitute for National Service (see Bungalow
for a deserter’s tale). Amateur rower – though noticeable that his arms
are rather spindlier than such activity would produce. Delicate wisps
of “plot” slowly coalesce around Lukas’s relationship with irritating
Isabella (Lavinia Wilson) and her suavely menacing ‘stepfather’ Romberg
(Johan Leysen) – motivational speaker whose speciality is in advising
people to conquer their fears. Lukas and the girl ‘meet cute’ when she
drops a note onto his lap while he’s sitting in a bus – note reads ‘Help
me’ (classic scriptwriter’s conceit). Lukas an easygoing blank, led astray
by sinister/comic/flu-ridden cop Johanssen (Christoph Waltz) he meets
while spying on girl and stepfather. Cop plants various ideas in Lukas’s
head, and the lad’s character starts to change: buys rifle, but too jittery
to shoot (‘shot-shy’ might be better translation of title, if only to
avoid confusion with dire Hollywood
movie of almost-identical name). Careful accumulation of detail, including
some quirky comic stuff – girlfriend does kendo; while rowing Lukas keeps
meeting a nocturnal swimmer (Axel Prahl) whose preferred stroke is the
‘toter mann’ or dead man’s float (a reference to Christian Petzold’s Toter
Mann?); Lukas’s next-door neighbour (Thorsten Merten) is admirer
of North Korea and Kim Jong-Il; there’s talk of “a dog in Varanasi” who
survives with part of its head missing. Lukas clearly not all their either:
slides into… psychosis? Something bottled up. Effective vignettes, and
probably will repay a second viewing. But overall impression is of a curio
hovering between ambition and affectation.
UNFAITHFULLY
YOURS
8/10
USA
1948 : Preston STURGES : 105 mins : Preston Sturges Retrospective
Taken
in by [20th Century] Fox, Sturges shot this irresistible
chamber piece (less crowded than his films usually are) starring Rex Harrison
in the role of a scornful orchestral conductor overcome with jealousy
who plans how to get rid of his wife (the stupendous Linda Darnell) and
in the process discovers the gulf between desire (homicide) and reality
(see the final climactic scene).
Hard
to think of many comedies – many films full stop, in fact – with structure
so brilliant and original as Unfaithfully Yours, arguably Sturges’
most accomplished film. Very easy to forgive some glaring faults: slow
music-heavy stretches early on; thin story; slightly limp finale. None
of this really matters once the film suddenly clicks into place: as conductor
leads orchestra through three very different classical pieces, he imagines
how to deal with his supposedly unfaithful wife and her ‘boyfriend’. Bloody
murder? Martyred resignation? Desperate suicide? All three outcomes are
visualised. Then we see our hero attempt to put each into practice in
turn, with farcical results. Harrison perhaps not obvious choice for collaboration
with Sturges but this is very untypical Sturges – his usual surging cast
of ‘characters’ kept firmly penned on the sidelines for one. Harrison
triumphs: equally good at George Sanders-style acerbic putdowns and
at slapstick. Sidesplitting highlight is his tangle with a recording
machine (part of his fiendish homicide plot) which proves less than straightforward
to operate: and that’s even before he checks the diagram on page six…
THE
SIN OF HAROLD DIDDLEBOCK
4/10
(later
re-edited and released in 1948 as Mad Wednesday)
USA
1947 : Preston STURGES : 90 mins : Preston Sturges Retrospective
Sturges
left Paramount and teamed up with the eccentric millionaire and producer
Howard Hughes, who then treated him even worse, by re-editing this film.
The basic idea is irresisible: taking one of the geniuses of comic silent
films (Harold Lloyd), and getting him to spread his dynamic personality,
a bit worse for wear with age, all over Wall Street … accompanied by a
lion.
After
watching Unfaithfully Yours (see above), jarring in the extreme
to come across Diddlebock: from a superb, wonderfully clever script
of innovative structure, now Sturges barely seems to be using any kind
of script at all. Manic invention, extremely hit-and-miss. Cobbled together?
Harold Lloyd collaboration misfires badly: loose, surrealistic developments,
with comedy relying on repetitions and exaggerations. Cartoonishness rapidly
loses appeal: bizarre bellowing noise made by drunken characters initially
mildly amusing, finally grates. “Lion on Wall St” sequence: very few laughs,
and animal in obvious distress on more than one occasion. All best comedy
in first five minutes, which happens to be a single extended extract from
another film: Lloyd’s silent 1920s classic The Freshman.
Flashes of inspiration afterwards are few and far between: Lloyd and Sturges
try far too hard.
OFFSIDE
5/10
Fuera
de juego (aka Offsides) : Ecuador 2003 : Victor ARREGUI
: 82 mins : Zabaltegi
This
first feature by the Ecuadorian Victor Arregui was one of the most remarkable
of those presented [at San Sebastian] last year in Films in Progress.
Fuera de Juego tells the story of Juan. Young, innocent and sensitive,
the desperation of the boy’s social surroundings leads to his involvement
in murder. Arregui’s movie portrays life, a collectivity, the moral and
financial decomposition eating into South America.
Startling
mismatch between opening titles and rest of movie. Titles reminiscent
of – and the best since - Panic
Room as names appear among lights in copter-shot Michael Mann-ish
nightscape of Quito. Then the movie itself turns out to be aggressively
rough-edged, cheap-looking. Conspicuously low-resolution DV. All better
to tell gritty tale of ordinary teens. He’s just a face in the crowd when
trouble kicks off. Street chaos as indigent peoples organise themselves,
march on the city. Feels shot on-hoof, with strong musical cuts of Ecuadorian
rap and rock on the soundtrack. Film traces his specific problems (big-smiling
innocent sort, he’s led astray into drugs and crime by classic ‘bad influence’
pal) and juxtaposes them with those of his nation – a pais de mierda
(“land of shit”) as someone puts it. Government in crisis. Lazy brother
couch-potato glued to the news, watches streets in foment. Economic way
of widening out the story. Avoid melodrama in kid’s tale: instead, it
all gets shunted over to his teenage female pal – she has fancy dreams
but they’re all (predictably) shattered by the end. His story more
ambiguous and open-ended: optimism clearly thin on the ground, and only
real hope is to escape – but even this, as we see (experience of Ecuadorians
in Spain) isn’t a passport to happiness/riches. Misleading football title
– there’s some kind of footy game at the end, but this isn’t enough to
justify namin film after a soccer reference. Well-intentioned and performances
are solid enough, but it’s a little draggy, even at 83 minutes.
Day
10 : Saturday 27th September
OPEN
RANGE
5/10
USA 2003 : Kevin COSTNER : 140 mins : Official Section (not in competition)
Kevin
Costner has gone back to the great prairies in a western that reflects
the legacy of the classics of the genre. It focuses on the clash between
two completely different ways of life: between the cowboys, free men who
live out in the open, and the new settlers from the cities who bring corruption
and their thirst for power. Robert Duvall, Diego Luna and Annette Bening
complete the cast of Open Range alongside Costner.
Western
genre famously and fundamentally conservative: which means that we’re
always at the end of an era, with the good days firmly in the past. Myth
of Golden Age. This applies to the cowboy way of life shown, the cowboys
themselves (there’s usually at least one in the twilight of his years),
and also even to the idea of the cowboy movie itself. Westerns
are made all the time, but Hollywood always keen to present this ancient
genre as limping on its last legs. Everything ends up so damn elegaic
and bittersweet – can’t imagine the cowboys themselves would have had
much time for elegy. Genre doesn’t favour innovation or originality, either
– as with Bollywood, adherence to established form, images, and content
is a badge of pride, not dishonor. Genre can be used for radical
ends in certain hands (McCabe
and Mrs Miller) but Costner a long way from radical intent. His
disavowal of political angles, however, seem ingenuous at best: with George
W Bush in the White House, any endorsement of ‘the cowboy way’ can hardly
be neutral in 2002/3. Perhaps director prefers not to think of such things
: more bothered about showing respect to previous classics; clouds and
horses in wide-screen; casting Duvall in iconic central role as sage old
hand, though he’s by no means incapable of startling brutality when the
situation arises. Little else to remark upon here, or to detain the non-initiate:
Jean Brodie’s dictum applies. Costner and Duvall dominate – little else
for others (Luna, impeccably made-up Bening, Gambon’s two-dimensional
villain; Michael Jeter’s helpful pixie) to do. Slow and predictable stuff,
stretched out to 2hrs 20mins (main character is called ‘Waite’ after all).
Chatty blokes, these cowboys – hardly very realistic view of life on the
c19 range. Sentimental streak – Costner (character and director)
more bothered about death of dog than dog-owner, though latter had been
a prominent figure up to that point. Fundamental paradox: film is about
heroic ‘little men’ in their stand against the controlling hand of big
business. This is a $20m production – small beer by current Hollywood
measure – but by no means an ‘indie’: Buena Vista / Touchstone: Disney
corporation. Cowboy way would have been to do it for $20,000.
51st
SAN SEBASTIAN FILM FESTIVAL : AWARDS
(no
film was allowed to receive more than two awards)
Concha
d’Oro for Best Picture : Schussangst
Noisy
boos from the press when the announcement was made. Not hard to see why
– at times, hard to see why Tsintzadze’s film was even in competition
at all. When word got round that it was one of main candidates to win,
many jaws hit the floor. On reflection, a second viewing is probably desirable.
But even so, hard to feel that Achero Manas was short-changed for his
marvellous November: only trophy won was the ‘Premio Juventud’,
the prize awarded by a ‘youth jury’ of 250 members.
Jury
Prize (runner-up) : The Station Agent
Second
best movie in competition? Perhaps Girl With A Pearl Earring or
possibly Memories of Murder. Nothing wrong with Station Agent,
however…
Best
Director : Memories of Murder
A
very popular win for a much-liked film from a very promising young director.
The ending baffled everybody, and the running-time could perhaps be trimmed
a little, of course. (And Manas should have won).
Best
Screenplay : Inheritance
More
boos from the press, but this time they were well off the mark. Though
not to everyone’s taste, this was a surprisingly gripping and powerful
re-tread of supposedly familiar and predictable material. (November
had the better script, though).
Best
Cinematography : Girl With a Pearl Earring
The
biggest round of applause at both the press conference and the awards
ceremony, and the one category where everyone was in total, blissful accord.
Best
Actor : Luis Tosar, You Have My Eyes
This
would have been honour enough for a below-standard film, but hard to begrudge
Tosar – a very competent and consistent performer who did as well as could
be expected with such a badly-written character. Easily the best performance
in competition, however, was Oscar Jaegada as the messianic/egomaniac
leader of November.
Best
Actress : Laia Marull, You Have My Eyes
No
boos, but this was the travesty of the whole show – Scarlett Johansson
from Pearl Earring was well and truly robbed, though compensation
surely awaits when the Oscar nominations are announced. Hard to think
of any female performance in the competition (even the annoying
Lavinia Wilson from Schussangst) worse than Marull’s horribly mannered,
cliché-ridden performance as the battered wife. Award presumably a sop
to local sentiment – Spanish jury member Silvia Munt quoted in next day’s
paper as saying You Have My Eyes was the “moral winner” of the
competition. Cojones!
films
seen at cinemas Principe, Principal, Astorias and Kursaal, San Sebastian/Donostia
by Neil
Young
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