Ebertfest 2013: Day 2

As I lingered under the Virginia Theatre’s marquee avoiding the cold rain before the first film of the day, I was approached by a man with a DSLR camera and asked if I would provide some thoughts for a documentary about Roger Ebert's Film Festival.  I hesitated because I sort of feel like I’ve said all I have to say about the festival and its namesake.  (Only three days of coverage remaining to churn out!)  I blogged a little about Ebert after learning of his passing, and I’ve been covering the festival for more years than it seems possible.  What words do I have left to string together on the subjects?  Eventually I agreed to go on camera and answer a few questions.  Badly, probably.  Editors, work your magic to spin gold from those rambling soundbites.

I’ll admit that it’s easy to lack something to say on this particular day.   I started writing this early Friday as developments in Boston competed for my attention.  Wild reports were beginning to surface about what sounded like a city turned upside down as the hunt for the marathon bombers continued.  And yes, it sounded like something out of an action movie, although more and more that comparison seems increasingly lazy.

The thing is, the film festival environment is largely a haven from all this sort of news.  Sure, I attempt to keep up with Twitter between movies, but that amounts to rapid scrolling through my feed.  Otherwise the theater--and it’s just one location at Ebertfest--is a virtual bubble, as is the community of people around it.  It’s not as though one can’t keep up with what’s going on in the larger world but that it’s nice to be in a self-contained space for a little while.  Isn’t that part of the appeal of the movies, to inhabit a mental landscape where the outside world disappears for a couple hours, even if what is on the screen relates strongly to reality.?

Thursday’s four films--three features and a short--kept the real world close at hand. The festival director’s daughter co-directed the short TO MUSIC, which included Ebertfest regular Paul Cox in a small role.  The theme of becoming absorbed in art, not as a way of shutting out but enhancing life, seems ever so applicable with what surrounds the festival this year.

I’ve not shared Ebert’s enthusiasm for Cox’s films, and when it became apparent that VINCENT: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF VINCENT VAN GOGH would be John Hurt reading the artist’s letters to his brother over experimental imagery, recreated period scenes, and footage of Van Gogh’s drawings and paintings, part of me despaired prematurely.  99 minutes of this?!  While some of the nature b-roll wasn’t evocative of anything in particular, tracking the artist’s development and interior life in such a manner turned out to be instructive.  Off the top of my head, I don’t think I’ve seen anything quite like this mixture of biography and art history. Cox invites a new way of seeing Van Gogh’s work, whether through juxtaposition of the items and places that inspired what he put onto canvases or noting the gradual stylistic shifts.

Kevin B. Lee, In the Family's Patrick Wang and Trevor St. John, and Michael Barker

It’s impossible to watch Patrick Wang’s IN THE FAMILY and not be reminded of the consequences, sometimes unintended, that legislative and legal decisions have on common people, yet the film’s achievement is demonstrating in heartbreaking detail how the political is personal.  This could very easily have been a TV movie-of-the-week issues drama that backslaps viewers who share the “correct” point of view about gay rights as they pertain to marriage, visitation, and parenting.  Instead Wang is more interested in studying how good people behave when backed into corners they don’t expect to find themselves in.  Forget for a moment what the government or the law says is just.  What is the humane thing to do?

This was my second time seeing IN THE FAMILY, and I was struck again by how empathetic it is to all parties. In telling the story the way that he does Wang reveals a clear perspective on how such family struggles should be handled, but it never feels like he’s pushing an agenda.  The tension exists on an interpersonal level but lacks nastiness.  Blame is accepted on both sides.  It’s simply scared people reacting to protect what they feel needs preserving.

As writer, director, and star Wang gives the story and performances room to breathe. For the most part it’s a successful approach that deepens the connections even while a lot of the family history is inferred and implied.  Some scenes stretch out beyond their usefulness, but the length and deliberate unfolding of the plot are integral to the payoff in an extended deposition scene in the final act.

Bernie's Richard Linklater and Michael Barker with Jack Black by phone

Richard Linklater’s BERNIE capped the day with some much-needed laughs after the seriousness pervading all of the Ebertfest films to this point.   That’s an odd thing to say about a dark comedy about the real-life murder of an old woman but there it is.  Since I think I have tapped whatever words I had available for this write-up, I’ll point you to my review of BERNIE and try to refill for tomorrow.

Ebertfest 2012: Day 3

Chaz Ebert and Roger Ebert

Whether it’s the selected films or the genial vibe of the event , Roger Ebert’s presence can’t be missed at the festival bearing his name even if he is no longer introducing each movie and conducting every post-film Q&A.  He made his second appearance from the stage this year to lead into the showing of a documentary about a longtime filmmaker friend who experienced his own brush with death.

Ebert’s computer gave voice to some of his words.  His wife Chaz read the rest of a lovely tribute to director Paul Cox.  From introduction through the discussion, the session was an extended feel-good moment, so I’ll try my best not to seem like a crank in writing about the film, which I didn’t care for.

Chaz Ebert, Paul Cox, and festival director Nate Kohn

ON BORROWED TIME is part career overview, part documentation of Cox’s journey from cancer diagnosis to liver transplant.  I’ve not seen much of Cox’s work, but what I am familiar with hasn’t particularly won me over.  An abundance of shots and scenes from his oeuvre are regularly dropped into the documentary, but free of their contexts and with my rudimentary knowledge of his films, it looks like so much indistinguishable b-roll.  I’ll allow that, to some degree, this is my problem more than it is the film’s.

Watching this clip show and hearing people friends and collaborators attest to his abilities yielded the similar effect of taking in a concert film featuring a band whose greatness is, at best, something I’m not convinced of, and, at worst, something I question.  No matter how accomplished the final product might be, if the basic content isn’t engaging, it doesn’t matter how eloquently it’s delivered.

I want to be clear about my ignorance of Cox’s overall body of work and biases formed based on what I have seen.  I don’t think ON BORROWED TIME is a particularly good entry point for someone in my position.  It goes without saying that those with affection for the director’s films will take more away from this than I did, but that cuts straight to my issue with the documentary.  It’s for those already in the club, not those who need to be persuaded or educated.

I suppose it points out the positive environment fostered at Ebertfest if I feel as though I must be apologetic for disliking a film.  Then again, Cox means a lot to Ebert and went through a serious health situation, so in this instance it seems like I’m being a bit rude.  So it goes, I guess.

David Poland, The Alloy Orchestra's Ken Winokur and Terry Donahue, and David Bordwell

I’ll have no such problem praising The Alloy Orchestra, which has performed at almost every Ebertfest.  The three-piece band’s accompaniment to a silent film is an annual highlight, and this year is no different.  Rather than playing with one feature, they presented their WILD AND WEIRD program of short films from 1906 to 1928. (Some of the dates I’m listing with these films conflict with the information on The Alloy Orchestra’s website.  I’ve cross-referenced with the Internet Movie Database and Wikipedia, but who knows which source is most accurate.)

The program consisted of:

-DREAM OF A RAREBIT FIEND (Wallace McCutcheon and Edwin S. Porter, 1906)
-THE RED SPECTRE (LA SPECTRE ROUGE) (Segundo de Chomón and Ferdinand Zecca, 1907)
-THE ACROBATIC FLY (F. Percy Smtih, 1910)
-THE THIEVING HAND (J. Stuart Blackton, 1908)
-PRINCESS NICOTINE; OR, THE SMOKE FAIRY (J. Stuart Blackton, 1909)
-ARTHÈME SWALLOWS HIS CLARINET (ARTHÈME AVALE SA CLARINETTE) (Ernest Servaès, 1912)
-THE CAMERAMAN’S REVENGE (MEST KINEMATOGRAFICHESKOGO OPERATORA) (Wladyslaw Starewicz, 1912)
-DREAM OF A RAREBIT FIEND: THE PET (Winsor McCay, 1921)
-FILMSTUDIE (Hans Richter, 1926) (with poetry by Hugo Ball)
-THE LIFE AND DEATH OF 9413, A HOLLYWOOD EXTRA (Robert Florey and Slavko Vorkapich, 1928)

Early cinema is a big blind spot for me, so it was a treat to see these highly imaginative and inventive shorts often experimenting with special effects and animation.  Among my favorites was the comedy ARTHÈME SWALLOWS HIS CLARINET is built upon an accident that results in an unfortunate musician having his instrument pushed through the back of his skull.  Think of star Ernest Servaès as a proto-Steve Martin with an arrow through his head.  The stop-motion animated THE CAMERAMAN’S REVENGE is a sophisticated parody of melodramas in which a restless beetle couple have extramarital affairs and run afoul of a camera-wielding grasshopper.  The short amazes with the personality given to the insects. THE LIFE AND DEATH OF 9413, A HOLLYWOOD EXTRA is a visually striking criticism of a system that chews up and spits out aspiring stars.  Surely Guy Maddin, a past Ebertfest guest, would go crazy for it if he hasn't seen it.  (Fun fact: Gregg Toland photographed it.)  As a whole, the WILD AND WEIRD program served as a fun introduction to this time in cinema history.

Nell Minnow, Omer Mozaffar, Paul Cox, and Michael Barker

Sony Pictures Classics co-president Michael Barker is a regular Ebertfest guest and is here with three films this year.  His introduction to A SEPARATION, in which he described it as a perfect film, set the bar high.  Having already seen and loved Asghar Farhadi’s film, I was inclined to agree.  (My review is here.)  Seeing it again, I’m convinced that Barker isn’t resorting to hyperbole.  It’s amazing how no moment, shot, or line of dialogue is wasted in A SEPARATION.  If a film can achieve the platonic ideal of perfection, this one has done it.

One line that stuck out to me this time was when Nader corrects his daughter Termeh during a language lesson.  She uses a word that her teacher told her was correct, but Nader argues that “wrong is wrong” and that it does not matter who says otherwise.  (I wish I’d written down the exact line.)  This point gets to the crux of the dispute between the couples and why it spins out of control.  The failure of everyone involved to own up to their mistakes inflames an already volatile matter.

Notes:

-This year’s festival has had a bit of bad luck in terms of invited guests being able to attend.  Patton Oswalt couldn’t make it Thursday.  A SEPARATION star Peyman Moadi was supposed to be in Champaign on Friday, but Barker explained that he’s currently shooting a movie in such a remote part of Iran that they were unable to get in touch with him.

-Each year it’s interesting to discover what improvements have been made to the Virginia Theatre.  This time it’s a renovated men’s restroom.  It is nicer, although I think there’s even less room to maneuver in it now.  Never fear, though.  The best view of Champaign (from the urinals) remains.

-On Opening Night I was pleased that an organist was back at the festival, but unless I’ve missed him, he’s not been present since.

On Borrowed Time (David Bradbury, 2011): C-/40
Wild and Weird program (Various): B+/74
A Separation (Jodaeiye Nader az Simin) (Asghar Farhadi, 2011): A+/100