Dustin Guy Defa's BAD FEVER opens; Kentucker Audley hits a loopy home run

BAD FEVER, first seen at last year's SxSW fest and opening today in the New York City area, is another in the ever-increasing mumble-core catalog and the brainchild of one Dustin Guy Defa, who here acts as writer/director/
producer/editor and even actor, though not in the film's leading role. That task falls to another interesting up-and-comer, Kentucker Audley, who has, as well, fooled around with film-making in all of the above areas, and for whom -- on the basis of what we see in Bad Fever -- acting may turn out to be his ace-in-the-hole. (This review, by the way, is an edited repeat of what TrustMovies posted at the time of the film's SxSW debut.)

It appears that I am more familiar with the work of Mr. Audley (shown at right) than I had previously thought. Not only did I view him in a subsidiary role in the film he directed, Open Five, I also saw him (without realizing that it was he) in one of the lead roles in a film -- Passenger Pigeons -- shown two years ago at BAMciné-matek during the yearly BAMcinemaFEST. In both films Audley was perfectly acceptable, though in no way memorable -- yet the latter is exactly what he is in Bad Fever. In fact, he is riveting. Why this should be so got me to ruminating yet again on the glories and doldrums of mumblecore. When I covered Open Five (that review is here), I suggested, regarding the m'core genre, that my readers try to imagine some of our late, great actresses -- Bette Davis, Susan Hayward, Joan Crawford (or even today, Meryl Streep and maybe Jessica Chastain) -- doing a mumblecore movie. What might be the result?  Not m'core, for sure. Why not? Because those actresses command the screen. It's true, film fans: charisma and mumblecore don't seem to mix.

Which bring us to back to Audley's performance. In Passenger Pigeons and Open Five, he's "truthful" enough, but he often recedes into the background scenery. The actor is "being," but he's not "doing." Being is the hallmark of most m'core performers (except, sometimes, Greta Gerwig -- hence, I believe, her move into mainstream) because being, of course, is truthful and real and honest and all that. But it's pretty passive. Eventually we need, we demand, action from our actors. And I am not talking about chasing villains by car, foot or spaceship. I mean the kind of "action" that comes from the realization -- ours and the character's -- that he or she wants something. Fortunately, eventually, filmmaker Defa -- shown above -- allows us this. And actor Audley starts pulling out the stops. But here's the weird part: He does this so haltingly, strangely, that initially, we get this from his voice more than from anything else. Also, Defa delights in the old Gus Van Sant ploy: let's photograph our hero from the back of his head because, isn't the back of the head just so full of expression?! Well, no, it's not.

For the first maybe 20 minutes, that's mostly what we see, until we keep asking what does this strange guy, with his weird vocal mannerisms, look like. Then Defa shows us some profile, and finally full-on frontal, and we see Audley in all of his character's goofy glory. And by hook or crook he has created a character (Eddie, shown above). This poor young man, who apparently has been given little in life by either of his parents (we only see his no-great-shakes mom: Annette Wright, below), is determined to prove himself via stand-up comedy -- an occupation for which he appears to have almost no credentials or gift.

Eddie meets an equally odd, though a lot nastier, young woman named Irene (played by Eléonore Hendricks, below), whom he wants to maybe "date" (as much a Eddie might understand this concept) but who has other plans for her "men."  The scene, further below, in which she tries to undress our "hero" is a kind of creepy classic.

Mr. Audley seems to key everything about Eddie's desire into the young man's stammering vocal pattern (don't worry, this is nothing like The King's Speech). He makes us listen intently, while, at the same time, we're trying not to (it's so painful). The result is some-thing I have seldom encountered in a performance. But it works.

Mr. Defa takes quite a chance here, making his lead character so bizarre that were it not for Audley's ability to somehow hold us, we'd probably be elsewhere -- and fast. I asked myself rather often throughout whether someone like this could actually exist in today's world without already being in an institution. Perhaps.  Eddie does seems to possess certain skills, which might help him get by. It's when he opens his mouth that it all falls apart. Nor am I sure that the film's final scene, featuring a faux-Asian masseuse named Yoko (a rather delightful Allison Baar, below) is wish-fulfillment fantasy or the embodiment of that old saying that Granny told us to allay our fears of forever being alone: There's a cover for every pot. Either way, the scene makes a predictably odd ending to this short 'n sour (77-minute) movie that is, in its strange way, quite memorable.

Bad Fever screens today -- February 3, and continues through the 9, with one more screening on February 15 -- at Brooklyn's reRun Gastropub Theater. Several personal appearances tied to the film will take place during the week: Click here for details.

David Frankel's THE BIG YEAR: that rare movie for birders arrives on DVD

Someone at Fox studios must be into bird-watching bigtime, no? Otherwise why greenlight a movie based around an activity (and that activity's "annual event") of which few in the mainstream audience will have heard or probably care. Still, Fox did it, and Trust Movies is glad -- for the result, while no ground-breaker or record-setter in any category, remains a very pleasant comedy with enough charm and laughs to entertain for its 100 painless minutes. Plus, it gives those of us who know little about bird-watching the opportunity to understand a bit of its quiet, though colorful, allure.

Directed  by David Frankel (shown at left, of Marley and Me and The Devil Wears Prada) and written by Mark Obmascik (from his book of  the same name) and Howard Franklin, the movie, which takes place over approximately one year, details the trials of three bird-lovers who hope to win the award for spotting the most rare birds within a single year. This means hopping from one part of our vast country to the other -- and even abroad -- to see and/or hear the song of the birds in question. Interestingly, this contest proceeds on the honor system, something that appears to have practically died out in the western world. (In the eastern? Forget it. Honor just means you can kill your sister for her infraction of being human.)

Because these "birders" are played by Owen Wilson (above, as the guy who already holds the crown for bird-spotting), Steve Martin (below, right) and Jack Black (below, left), it should be clear that we are in for some fun -- though all three of these fine performers, while exhibiting the stuff we have come to enjoy and expect from them, keep their worst habits in check, playing instead for some subtlety and humanity. Their characters (and their lives) are a bit more complicated than is necessary for mainstream. This makes the movie perhaps less "riotous" but a lot more bearable.

Almost a rom-com, the film does not finally provide the ladies on view with enough control or screen time to do more than stand by their man (for awhile, in one case; in the other, to first discover that he is her man). But the three -- JoBeth Williams, Rosamund Pike (below) and Rashida Jones -- do more thsn enough with what they are given.

No great shakes, the movie would not have called out for me to cover it were it not for its unusual theme -- which is treated decently, I think, right through to the end credits -- in which all 750-odd birds spotted that year are given a visual (albeit, a very brief one) on the left hand side of the screen, as those credits pass by on the right.  The Big Year is available now on DVD and Blu-ray (it looks smashing in the latter venue).

Ben Wheatley's KILL LIST hits theaters, while DOWN TERRACE streams on Netflix

Flavor of the bi-month (in the FSLC's current issue of Film Comment) and flavor of the quarter (as his film makes the cover of Cinema Scope), Ben Wheatley would seem the current darling of the British independent film scene. Well, we're all always looking for something new-and-different, and Wheatley, at first glance, does provide it. But after a moment-or-two's reflection, it seems to TrustMovies that new-and-different may not quite be synonymous with extra-special. Since KILL LIST, Mr. Wheatley's second feature as director and co-writer, opens theatrically this week, we'll tackle it first, though I might suggest that, before viewing Kill List, you stream his first feature (also-much-loved-by-Brit-crits), DOWN TERRACE (it's available now via Netflix), if only because Kill List will then seem a step upwards in some regards.

Mr. Wheatley, shown above, likes meshing (and messing with) various genres. Kill List, which begins but one step above current Brit miserabilism and family dram/com, goes on to enter the crime-and-hit-man areas, and finally comes out looking like an only-slightly-updated Hammer horror of, say, The Wicker Man sort -- but with some ersatz politics tossed into the mix. The big problem is that, despite relatively good work by all in the writing, acting and directing arenas, this genre-jumbling does not feel the least organic. Instead, it goes along clunk, clunk, clunk.

The first clunk comes with practically the opening frame, in which we see what looks like some kind of Blair Witch insignia. Aha! we think: Scary horror film. (I understand about foreshadowing and all that -- we learned it in school --  but this very early and not at all subtle hint is a bit much.) But then we're suddenly in family rom/dram/com territory, as hubby and wife argue about money and responsibility and what not. Along the way, we note that hubby and his buddy are involved in some kind of military or government-sponsored "business" that went a little haywire some time back.

And then we have a family dinner, in which buddy's date, during a visit to the loo, does something that sounds the second "clunk" of the evening, in an even less subtle manner. And then the killings start (Or maybe they've already begun -- it's been several months since I've seen the film, so its timeline is growing a bit foggy.) One by one, each grows more graphic than the one that preceded it. The second is so bloody/ghastly that my female guest said she came close to rising and talking back to the screen as she walked out of the auditorium, but she stayed silent in her seat, so as not to embarrass me.

By the time we get to the finale Hammer horror section, which really does seem like it is taking place in another movie (we and our two heroes have to traverse underground tunnels to get to this section, and what could be more organic than that), we're primed for just about anything. Which is pretty much what we get. The finale, however, would seem more of a transgressive shocker if A Serbian Film hadn't beaten it to the punch a year or two previous.

Kill List remains impressive on some fronts, chiefly the idea of melding these specific genres rather than its execution. And the cast is quite good, too. I found it a step up from Wheatley's first film in its ambitions, while the psychology of the characters -- at least those in its first two sections -- are quite a bit more on-the-mark.

***********

Down Terrace is certainly more of-a-piece than its predecessor. It does not switch genres but is from the outset what you'd call a dark family/crime comedy. Unfortunately it seems to be rooted in the kind of movie-making that says, "Wouldn't it be funny if such-and-such happened?!" and then sets out to make such-and-such happen -- despite everything we know about psychology, human beings, family bonding, and even drug trafficking (and other popular movie endeavors).

The film begins with father and son leaving the local police station where they appear to have "beaten the rap," though we don't know now (hell, by the end of the movie, we still don't quite know, though we can hazard a good guess) of what that rap consists.

We meet Ma (very well played by Julia Deakin, above) and then several of her's and Pa's friends and neighbors, as well as son's new girlfriend -- all of whom are involved in the family's unsavory whatever. Someone mentions a possible police informant -- and suddenly the shit hits the fan. What had initially seemed a family of weird people soon degenerates into a group for whom Charlie Manson would blush.

When the killing starts in this film, it never stops, growing crazier and less believable with each new "hit." And the film is only occasionally funny, though, as with Kill List, very well-acted. These characters are so very unbelievable as human beings that all credibility soon flies out the window. How could people this nutty have even begun to successfully man (and woman) an illegal business without screwing things up almost at once? The plotting here is by-the-book but pretty weak, and the psychology is nearly non-existent.

Why would the son, for instance (he's the first character in the film to be seen as clearly off-his-rocker) not take to heart word that his pregnant girlfriend (above, left) might just be preggers by another guy? Instead, it's like he never ever heard it, and what happens then, well, you'll see....

It's all just dark, darker, darkest -- with more than a trace of, gosh, aren't we smart/cute! Which is why I give the nod to Kill List as the better of the two films. It opens (at 95 minutes, via IFC Films) this Friday, February 3, in New York City at the IFC Center (and perhaps elsewhere around the country), after playing VOD for the past month or so.  Down Terrace (89 minutes, from Magnet Releasing), as stated earlier, is available for streaming via Netflix and perhaps other VOD-type venues.

Sci-fi/romance/meditation: The brilliant PERFECT SENSE is a best-yet for Mackenzie

The most thrilling thing about this job (other than it pays no money) involves sitting down one evening in front of your widescreen monitor and placing a screener of a new film, which you know almost nothing about, into your Blu-ray player, pressing "play" and... omigod, finding yourself fucking blown away. Excuse the French, fans, but that was my experience this past Sunday evening as we watched PERFECT SENSE, the latest from Brit filmmaker David Mackenzie (Young Adam, Asylum, Mister Foe and, yes, Spread). Written by Kim Fupz Aakeson -- the Danish screenwriter whose best-known films over here are probably last year's A Somewhat Gentle Man and Soap (from 2006) -- the movie works brilliantly as science fiction, love story, and meditation/
philosophy on how resilient we human beings can be in the face of one devastating loss after another.

This movie surprised me, scared me, moved me, entertained me and made me think, feel and (very occasionally) smile. How much better does it get? (There is not a lot of humor here; look elsewhere if you must have that.) I don't want to say too much about the film's plot, as part of the joy of this experience is discovery. Ewan McGregor (above, right) plays a chef who can fuck -- quite well, it would seem -- any number of ladies but must always sleep solo, while Eva Green (above, left) is an epidemiologist with problems of her own. When an outbreak of heavy-duty sorrow, followed by the loss of the ability to smell, infects people around the globe, these two meet and slowly bond, as the world (as they've known it) begins to change rather hugely.

We see this change mirrored in the lives of our twosome, as well as in clips from various spots around the globe, and perhaps the smartest move of the filmmakers was to shoot short segments on various continents -- Asia, Africa and the like -- and then to place these carefully, cleverly into their film. Using old (or even new) newsreel footage would not have worked nearly as well, because that non-specific footage of course would not include what is happening to the world under this particular scenario -- which is nothing like anything that has happened before.

MacKenzie -- pictured above, looking out the window of what, I believe, is the apart-ment of our hero in the film -- has managed some truly adroit genre-jumping in this movie. He, together with Mr. Aakeson, makes the mystery of what is happening both exciting and suspenseful -- better yet, believable, in a way that many bigger-budget films do not manage -- building ever more quickly and sadly toward the inevitable. Yet because he has cast the film so well, using some of his regulars like McGregor and Ewen Bremner (at right, in the photo above), the characters easily pull us into their lives, so that the romance of the movie demands as much caring and attention from us as does the sci-fi plot. This is a balancing act your rarely see accomplished this well.

Casting McGregor and Ms Green was particularly fortuitous because these two are such beautiful people, with gorgeous bodies and warm, open faces, as comfortable unclothed as clothed (McGregor's package is on display again, though not nearly as fully as in Young Adam or The Pillow Book). As the troubled lovers who center the film, these two are also good enough in the acting department to make us care about their relationship -- which finally stands for whatever love is left alive in this dying world.

I'm not going to say more about the film -- except see it, and deal with it. It may remind you, on one hand, of a movie such as the delicate and lovely The Five Senses or maybe that still-the-best-end-of-the-world work, Last Night (both via Canada) and on the other something like Blindness but raised to the nth power. I hesitate to compare it to Never Let Me Go, since so many people I know loathed that movie for its darkness and despair (I loved it for its overpowering humanity). Perfect Sense is not as political as Never Let Me Go, in which the "haves" demand everything, including the final sacrifice, from the "have-nots." But because Perfect Sense exists to make us think about and care for civilization, it is also a most humane and wonderful film.

From IFC Films, Perfect Sense opens this Friday, February 3, in New York City at IFC Center, and elsewhere I hope. It can also currently be seen on IFC's In Theaters & On-Demand program. Click here to learn how to view the movie via VOD.

Green Sleaze: Laura Israel's WINDFALL tracks wind energy in upstate New York

How disappointing is the experience of viewing WINDFALL, the award-winning documentary by longtime editor and now filmmaker Laura Israel about the coming of wind energy to a small farming town in upstate New York? Hugely. And I don't mean the movie itself -- which seems the very model of a smart, thoughtful documentary about a timely and important subject. No, I am speaking of the reaction that many of us who thought we were "green" -- welcoming all forms of safe and effective alternative energy -- are likely to have after experiencing this 83-minute movie. It will turn many of our preconceptions upside down.

Ms Israel, shown at right, starts slowly, introducing us to the townfolk of Meredith, New York, one by one or two by two. They all seem like such nice people, and indeed they were until a certain company dedicated to installing windmills in upstate New York came calling. The manner of this calling is on the individual person or family, and when any interest is shown, the company requires a confidentiality agreement to be signed. Why? We soon discover that the reason is damned sleazy. When word gets out, as of course word does in a small town, neighbor is soon pitted against neighbor, as some of the less trusting townspeople want to know many more facts and explanations than are being provided.

The one young man who represents the company (and has since parted ways with it), does seems like a decent sort (perhaps this is why ways were parted), and as we learn more of the facts about the windmills to be installed (they are 400 feet high and are to be built awfully close to the surrounding buildings), we also learn about some other communities in New York State and abroad in which windmills have become the bane of residents' existence: health problems, noise pollution, sleep deprivation and so on. ("Imagine, one fellow tells us, "your vacuum cleaner running right beside your bed all night!")

How can all this be? Wind energy is green, after all! Yes, and so is the money that (oh god, here they are again) corporations and shadow banks are making (as well as enjoying heavy-duty and repeated tax breaks) from the construction and operation of the windmills. And yet it seems that the town of Meredith is deeply divided over allowing wind energy into its midst. We hear from various people on this subject, and get to be flies on the wall at town council and planning board meetings. Finally it becomes a question of, if possible, kicking the bums out and voting in a entirely new slate of town leaders in order to stop this incursion. And yet, not all of the pro-wind townsfolk are bums. Many have been good, solid citizens for years, though Ms Israel manages to let us see the conflicts-of-interest that appear to have attached themselves to some elected members of the council who are also -- surprise! -- among the most prosperous of the town's population.

In a sense, little Meredith is a microcosm of big America, where money walks, talks and rules. We're there for all of it, thanks to Ms Israel and her crew, and we come away from the ordeal, I think, a lot wiser than we went in. We can be for "green energy" (god knows, the Meredith residents still are) but done on a scale that matches the community. I was sorry that Ms Israel did not stop the soundtrack's music or commentary long enough to let us simply listen to what one of these windmills sounds like from inside a nearby home. Otherwise, however, she's given us plenty to chew on and mull over. Perhaps it's time for a new rendition of the ever popular British folk song Greensleeves. This time out, it's Green Sleaze, with lyrics to match: Alas, my love, ye do me wrong, to build yer windmill so close to town...

Windfall, with theatrical distribution via First Run Features, opens this Friday, February 3, in New York City at the Quad Cinema and in eight more cities over the next couple of months. Click here for all currently scheduled playdates.

Getting a jones for Preston Miller's JONES, an earlier film from the God's Land director; it's on FANDOR now -- for free!

Since God's Land was (and still is) my favorite film from last year -- this doesn't necessarily make it the "best" film, by the way, just my personal favorite because it went places and did things for me that no other movie accom-plished (my earlier review is here) -- I wanted to take a look at something else from its filmmaker, Preston Miller. Mr. Miller was kind enough to send me a DVD of his earlier movie JONES, which I finally got around to watching the morning. It's different enough in some ways, similar in others, to make Miller seem an even more interesting director and one worth keeping an eye on.

What the two films have most in common, I think, is Miller's interest in filming in real time (the filmmaker is shown at left). He edits a good deal less than do many other filmmakers, and while this made God's Land pretty lengthy (nearly three hours), Jones is surprisingly short -- just 76 minutes. The title refers to the title character (played oddly but indelibly by a Brooklynite from Texas named Trey Albright), and also -- perhaps not by intention but by the way art is created sub-consciously -- to both the Jones Mr. Jones has for many things Asian, and the Jones some of us viewers may get from watching Albright (below) in the altogether, full-frontal and (in one scene, at least, semi-erect.

The actor has a good body: muscular (but not "toned"), pale and freckled, and he uses it naturally and easily, whether clothed in a business suit (below: Jones is up in New York City on business, shooting a video for a legal deposition) or in nothing at all. Most odd is his non-business attire, as he strolls around Manhattan in what is clearly chilly weather, clad only in a jeans and a t-shirt, while everyone around him wears sweaters and/or jackets.

This creates an odd tension, setting Jones apart in yet one more manner, as he wanders the Big Apple,

drifting into a bar and engaging in conversation with a fellow (Bob Cabrini, above, right) who just might be a "made" man,

taking a subway to the end of its line,

and hiring a call girl (Amy Chiang, above, but below Jones).

The single really odd thing in the film is how we finally cannot hear all of Jones' dialog. We hear what the other person is saying, but sometimes (unless this was a glitch in the DVD*) we can't hear what actor Albright is saying, particularly in that bar scene. Whether this means that what he is saying is relatively unimportant, or maybe boring (the dialog is not what you would call slick) I don't know. I think this cutting-it-out, however, is somewhat misjudged, but as a stylistic "tic," it's no deal-breaker.

The sex scenes are quite realistic, so if this sort of thing disturbs you, be warned. They are not, however, unpleasant. They're just there, and every bit as natural as is Jones himself. Since the character, we have already learned, is happily married to a woman expecting his child, the question of why he is doing what he is doing does crop up.

Mid-sex, he suddenly seems to either lose his erection or have his attention wander. We learn why, in interesting fashion, at a later point in the film. But for now, as we know he craves Asian culture, I would say he is simply acting like men often act when on a business trip -- getting what they cannot get at home, adultery and Moses' commandment be damned. (Jones also engages with a young woman in the street -- photo at bottom -- who's having a problem with her new infant, and we see him react a bit haltingly to the prospect of being a father.)

Needing more of this special Asian hospitality, Jones craves a second night of pleasure but maybe wants to save money by going to the establishment itself (it's $200 a pop for the girl to come to him, but only $150 if he goes to her). This leads to the film's quiet climax, in which our hero gets a bit more (and less) than he bargained for.

Jones seems to me a nice precursor to Miller's later film: thoughtful, never less than interesting and very well-acted and directed. Made in 2005, it shows a filmmaker exploring and taking chances, both of which pay off here -- but even more beautifully and spectacularly in God's Land. You can savor Jones on Fandor now. In fact, the film site is offering a free 7-day pass, and if you log in with Facebook, you can watch the whole movie free. Might be a good way to get acquainted with Jones and with Fandor.
Or, you can purchase a Jones DVD here.

* It apparently was a DVD glitch. Preston Miller has informed me that the Jones character is indeed meant to be heard throughout the bar scenes, and that the DVD I obtained had somehow mis-fired. For those of you watching the film via Fandor, don't worry: Miller quickly went on Fandor to make sure that its copy was OK. It is.