Photography, spying and the joy of Communism in Peter Stephan Jungk's documentary, TRACKING EDITH

A documentary in which the content and tale told are much more interesting that the actual execution of the material itself, TRACKING EDITH is the story of Edith Tudor-Hart (née Edith Suschitzky), born in Vienna in 1908, who emigrated to London, acted as a spy for Russia's KGB, and was simultaneously an even better -- first-rate, really -- photographer who beautifully captured many of the social issues of her time, from England's industrial decline and the plight of refugees of the Spanish Civil war to Britain's housing policy and the needs of its children.

Edith was also the great aunt of the filmmaker here, Peter Stephan Jungk (shown left), who is to be commended for bringing to our attention this very interesting woman and her work, even if the result, as a movie, is somewhat mediocre. If nothing else, Edith's photography that we see here should make many viewers ready to line up at any exhibition of her work that might find its way to their locale. It's that good.

Her spying was something else. As a Jew who had to leave Austria due to the Nazis rise to power, she -- as did so many others of the day -- embraced Communism as, at very least, an antidote to the fascism that was growing ever stronger during this time. While many eventually understood Russia's Stalin to be as crazy and murderous as was Adolf Hitler, Edith evidently clung to her belief that Communism would make the world a much better place.

The lovely Edith (shown in self-portrait on poster, top) is said to have recruited for the KGB a number of very important spies -- often from the cream of the Britain's crop. She was responsible for the recruitment of both Kim Philby and Anthony Blunt, two of the infamous (or famous, depending on your viewpoint) Cambridge Spy Ring, that, in Russia, was known as the Magnificent Five.

Filmmaker Jungk uses everything from archival photos and interviews with family members, historians, photo historian (above, right) even an ex-KGB member (below) to somehow give us a fuller portrait of our photographer/spy. Individually, the interviews make some sense, yet our Edith never really coalesces as she might, and the constant jumping from one subject and/or person to another becomes annoying over time.

Further, the use of animation (below) that tries to goose up the proceedings to would-be thriller status seems almost silly and certainly pointless. This may stand in for the often "acted-out" segments of certain documentaries, or perhaps take the place of archival footage that might have been difficult to obtain (though I rather doubt this: Britain's Blitz by the Nazi's was undocumented?), but as seen here,  the animation seems both unnecessary and rather clunky.

The family members interviewed, including brother Wolf Suschitzky (below, center) and nephew Peter Suschitzky (below, left, who became a noted cinematographer and credits Edith for steering him away from science and toward art), provide the most interesting dialog and may make you want to learn even more about this unusual woman who gave birth to a lovely son who, in his younger years, turned schizophrenic and never recovered.

Finally, it's Edith photography (above and below), seen heavily over the end credits, that seems most special. This woman clearly had a gift -- and used it. I hope I'll get to see an exhibition of her work before I depart this world.

From First Run Features and running 92 minutes, Tracking Edith arrives on DVD this coming Tuesday, February 26 -- for purchase and/or rental.

Michael Haneke's HAPPY END is just what you expect -- and every bit as much dark fun, too

Dissecting (and eviscerating) Europe's haute bourgeoisie, as ever, German filmmaker Michael Haneke is at it once again. In HAPPY END he's working with those splendid actors he also used in his Oscar-winning (but not really very good) Amour --Isabelle Huppert and Jean-Louis Trintignant -- and he's added a number of other, lesser-known (except for Mathieu Kassovitz) performers, each of whom does a terrific job. Especially fine is the young actress Fantine Harduin (shown two photos below and already seen in both the Spiral TV series and in Fanny's Journey), here playing the family's subversive and highly problematic grandchild. The spot-on scene between her and Trintignant toward the film's conclusion is a keeper that also deftly manages to bring all of the movie's concerns to the fore.

Herr Haneke, shown at left, is doing pretty much what he always does, and, as usual, he does it so well -- quietly, subtly, often indirectly -- that intelligent audience are likely to follow along, enrapt as ever.

The very upper-middle class family this time around owns what appears to be a construction firm that may be having some economic difficulties, soon to be made even more difficult by an event -- shown by Haneke ever so quietly, suddenly and at the perfect distance so that it becomes what TrustMovies would call one of the year's best "special effects" -- that helps set things on their ever-spiraling and downward course.

If that very pretty granddaughter, above, has her difficulties, so, too, does Trintignant's other grandchild, played by an actor new to me but very worth seeing, Franz Rogowski (below).

These two young people have problems that are quite obvious. Less so are those of the family matriarch, Trintignant's daughter (played by Huppert, below, commanding and cold, as she so often is) and her sleazy, superficial younger brother (played by Kassovitz, two photos down).

Britisher Toby Jones (shown second from right in the photo at bottom) joins the group as Huppert's fiance, a moneyed fellow who just might pull the ailing company out of its doldrums. The family is cared for and waited upon by a group of French-via-Algeria-looking servants, who are treated not quite badly (but not quite well, either).

All this comes to a delightfully dark head at the engagement party for Huppert and Jones. From the film's beginning right through to its finale, Haneke sees to it that our modern technology plays a major part. How he does this is both clever and unsettling -- which is, one way or another, ultimately the case with all of his films.

From Sony Pictures Classics, Happy End (ah, the irony!) has already played a number of cities throughout the country during its large though limited theatrical run. Click here to see all current and upcoming playdates, cities and theaters.

Beauty in desolation: Nikolaus Geyrhalter's exquisite photographic study, HOMO SAPIENS

Our species appears nowhere in Nikolaus Geyrhalter's brilliant and breathtakingly beautiful, if ironically titled documentary, HOMO SAPIENS, yet our mark is all over the place. In this, the latest film from Herr Geyrhalter, who has already given us a couple of whoppingly good docs -- Our Daily Bread and Abenland -- the Austrian filmmaker who conceived, directed and shot this stunning piece of work (with the prodigious help of Simon Graf in scouting the amazing locations used here) has compiled a series of what could almost be -- were it not for the occasional wind, waves and birds -- still-life photography of empty, desolate but stunning exteriors, interiors and sometimes a combo of the two in which nature seems to be re-enforcing her domain on ours.

The filmmaker, pictured at right, lets his camera remain stationary as it gazes at scene after scene, location after location, for anywhere from 15 to 30-or-more seconds. This gives the viewer ample time to take it all in. And how very much there is to take. Geyrhalter is an artist. His compositions are wonderful: rich and detailed, forcing us to observe closely, think about what we're seeing, then make all kinds of connections.

We go from a gorgeous, decrepit amphitheatre to a deserted (for quite some length of time, it seems) railway station and shopping mall (in Japan, perhaps? The writing we see would indicate somewhere Asian) to an auditorium or two, hospitals, even a roller coaster seemingly positioned in the sea. The locations are bizarre and amazing, and the cinematography is, too. Yet it is not simply beautiful (that might very well be enough), it is also about as artful and thoughtful as photography can get.

There is no dialog here, no sound save the ambient ones: wind, gulls cawing, pigeons cooing, Music? You know, I cannot now remember. The movie was that hypnotic. But yet I never felt sleepy in the least. I would imagine that photography buffs will make a bee line for the documentary, which opens this week in New York City at Anthology Film Archives.

Although there is great beauty here (and Geyrhalter seems incapable of not zeroing in on it with simplicity, always capturing the right composition, angle and even color (or lack of it). He finds his beauty in desolation, and this is the way in which he gets us to considering what homo sapiens have to do with all this. How did the hospital room (above) come into such disrepair, for example? Was that empty shopping mall too near Fukushima? (One of these malls may be closer to the USA, as it bears the name Woodville.)

A house of religion is just as likely to have emptied out as has the mall. Or a prison. Or an office, below, full of aged computers. For me the most beautiful shots of all seems to have been taken in an empty planetarium. Even a greenhouse has gone to seed. The movie offers its own special pacing and an odd kind of momentum. There's dark humor, too: in the loudspeakers atop poles wrapped in vines (or in the winter, snow). Interestingly, the shots taken in the desert seem not as memorable as the others (the desert is already desolate, right?). Ditto the wintertime scenes, where snow can more easily mask the desolation.

And then we've come full circle, back to that original amphitheater. What a journey! Perhaps I missed them, but I tried to check the credits for a listing of locations where the movie was filmed. I am pretty sure Japan, Germany (or Austria) and the USA are among them -- and maybe other countries, too. Whatever, Herr Geyrhalter has graced us with one wonderful documentary that photo buffs will eventually want to own on disc. Unless some enterprising publisher thinks to put out the coffee-table book version.

From KimStim and running 94 minutes (TrustMovies could have watched another hour of it, at least), Homo Sapiens opens this Friday, July 29, at Anthology Film Archives in New York City for a week's run. Elsewhere? There's is nothing as yet on the KimStim site to indicate further showings. But I would hope an eventual DVD or Blu-ray is in the offing.

Fun with the fanged undead in David Rühm's chuckle-worthy THERAPY FOR A VAMPIRE

Genuine scares and originality are in such short supply these days regarding zombie and vampire movies that we mostly must rely on humorous riffs on these genres to bring us decent entertainment. Zombies don't lend themselves much to humor (though you might want to try the very funny, clever and low-budget Stalled), but vampires, being a lot more versatile than zombies, do occasionally provide some fun (witness last year's New Zealand mockdoc miracle, What We Do in the Shadows).

Now comes the latest bit of very funny nonsense regarding these particular undead, and it's a little ditty from Austria/Switzerland -- in German with English subtitles -- called THERAPY FOR A VAMPIRE. This particular Count (not Dracula, but one, Geza von Közsnöm) has been married now for some 500 years and is growing bored with this lengthy state of matrimony. Writer/director David Rühm, shown at right, has cobbled together a short, swift, full-of-laughs riff on many of the vampire themes and lore that we vamp-lovers have come to appreciate. His "take" on it all proves charming and refreshingly light on its feet.

The very idea of a vampire needing therapy due to marital problems is clever enough, and while Herr Rühm makes some fun out of Sigmund Freud's encounter with our Count (Karl Fisher -- above, left -- does a fine job as our famous "first shrink"), the most sustained laughter in the film comes from the way in which the filmmaker deals with vampire habits like flying, climbing walls, and not being able to reflect in mirrors.

The last of these characteristics is responsible for the appearance of our vampire Count's wife (Jeanette Hain, above, right) at the door of a talented young artist (Dominic Oley, above, left), whom she needs to paint her portrait (since she can't see herself in any of her mansion's many mirrors).

The Count, meanwhile (a lovely and humorous faux-Drac rendition by Tobias Moretti, above), has become smitten with the artist's girlfriend, Lucy (Cornelia Ivancan, below, left), who quite resembles his old girlfriend who, thousands of years ago, turned him into the bloodsucker he remains.

The rondelay in which these four indulge keeps the plot ticking, but it is how certain characters react to their newly acquired -- and then, oh, no! loss of -- vampire skills that makes the movie so much fun. These moments are as oddly "real" as they are enchanting and hilarious, and they'll keep that grin across your face for most of the movie's 87-minute running time.

The requisite blood and gore? Oh, it's there, all right, but it's done with short, sharp and relatively subtle bravura, so that we get the point while also getting the humour/satire implicit. Meanwhile, themes of identity, feminism and vampirism all get their due, too, and we finish the film with that satisfied smile still on our faces.

Therapy for a Vampire, from Music Box Films, opens this Friday, June 10, in Los Angeles at the Landmark NuArt and in New York City at the Landmark Sunshine Cinema, and then, in the weeks following, hits another 15 cities around the country. To see all currently scheduled playdates, click here and then click on THEATERS on the task bar midway down the screen.

DREAMS REWIRED: Luksch, Reinhart & Tode's poetic & amusing look at communication and technology down the decades

The talk seems all about "now," and yet the visuals of DREAMS REWIRED offer up the past in all its bizarre splendor. The movie in question is a new documentary that wittily combines mankind's need for communication and entertainment with poetry, technology, philosophy, history and marketing. Add to this a splendid narration from none other than Tilda Swinton, who reads the cleverly allusive script with her usual panache, and you have a recipe for very smart art-house entertainment.

As written and directed by the trio of Manu Luksch (shown at right), Martin Reinhart (below, left) and Thomas Tode (further below, right) -- with some help in the writing department from Mukul Patel -- the documentary is immediately charming and challenging, as it plies you with information -- along with funny, unusual visuals -- so fast that you dare not blink. A collaboration of Austria, Germany and the UK, the doc's visuals -- even though they have most to do with movies, television, telephones, wireless and the like -- come

not from the usual Hollywood-laden archives of most American documentaries. No, these arrive in large part via Europe and the UK and so offer us Americans a distinctly different look at a subject we thought we knew all too well. All of this is also quite different in ways too varied and bizarre to describe in detail (which would ruin their surprise, in any case), and they impart not only a smart visual sense to the film, but a lot of humor and even occasional grace, as well. They also make quite a good match for the sometimes odd but always on-target narration, as voiced by Ms Swinton, whose

lustrous yet highly intelligent voice lends itself well to the often telling, wide-ranging implications of this tale of communication, entertainment, marketing and societal behavior. Dreams Rewired, you see, is not content to simply offer up a little history and a lot of fun, along with reams of archival photos coupled to a smart narrative that manages to be both thoughtful and poetic. It also wants to challenge us rather fiercely to put all this together and run with it to a genuine conclusion.  Unfortunately, it does not always make this so easy to manage.

For whatever reason (perhaps because some or even much of the archival material was itself undated?) , the filmmaker have seen fit to leave out any dates entirely. Consequently, my spouse and I found ourselves too often wondering (aloud or to ourselves), "What year was this?" Also, the film seems to go back and forth in time, covering the same technology but in perhaps different eras. (Television seems to rear its head as a "new" attraction multiple times.)

And yet, so unusual and imaginative are the visuals (and the use of these) and the ideas that constantly bubble up throughout the 85-minute movie, that I suspect you'll be happy to give it a pass regarding its odd time-line.

If only for the chance to see that early "cell" phone whose wires evidently had to be wrapped around a fire hydrant (something metal, at least), or the chic woman's garters that concealed an early form of radio, or a scene from an early (probably Russian) sci-fi movie (above), the wealth of fun to be found here -- and then somehow dealt with -- is extraordinary. (Snippets of over 200 films are said to have been used throughout the documentary!)

Dreams Rewired, released by Icarus Films, opens for its world theatrical premiere in New York City at Film Forum on Wednesday, December 16, for a one-week run; in Houston at 14 Pews on December 17, and in Chicago (at Facets Cinémathèque), Los Angeles, (at Laemmle's NoHo 7) and Santa Fe (at The Screen) on Friday, December 18. Click here, then scroll down to the correct movie to see all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters.

Daniel Hoesl's SOLDATE JEANNETTE wryly targets today's naughty consumer culture

SOLDATE JEANNETTE translates roughly to Soldier Jane, but don't worry: This movie is no European rendition of G.I. Jane (and it's leading lady is certainly not reminiscent of Demi Moore). No. The more-or-less sub-title of the movie -- a European Film Conspiracy -- might give you a better sense of what is actually going on here. Made on a shoestring (probably a thrift-shop shoestring at that), the movie -- via a very odd screenplay that tells only the minimal but fills in the blanks via the performances -- makes us question the society in which we live and wonder about other ways we might better manage it.

As written and directed by Daniel Hoesl, shown at left, Soldate Jeannette is pretty much an ironic and rather sleek indie film European-style, that wants to indict crass materialism but has a very odd way of doing this. Live the good life it exhorts us; just do it via theft and undermining the bourgeoisie by lying, conning and then skipping town.

Fortunately Herr Hoesl has found a most interesting actress (Johanna Orsini-Rosenberg, shown below) to essay his leading role, that of an approaching-middle-age woman who is not only down on her luck but seem to actually court this. The various activities she gets up to are too much fun to give away here, but they cover a multitude of sins.

Ms Orsini-Rosenberg proves a large, horsey but not unattractive actress with the ability to hold our eye and mind as she brings her ever-under-the-radar schemes to fruition.

Her character resists the pleas of both family and friends to live according to the current notions of consumer society. She is her own gal at all times -- from her passe clothing choices to the karate class she joins, from her notions of investment advice (and its payoff)  to the interest she takes in a young co-worker (Christina Reichsthaler, above, right) with whom she bonds, once our heroine goes "on the run."
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Soldate Jeannette is more a smart, cute provocation than any kind of realistic, believable or serious movie. It's not even really a genre film. But it is fun, and I suspect that it -- and the performance of its leading lady -- will keep you alert and semi-surprised throughout.

Its DVD --  in a good transfer from IndiePix Films and running just 79 minutes, with some movie-making extras included, as well -- is available now for purchase or rental.

AMOUR FOU: Jessica Hausner's smart look at 19th-Century romantic, political, economic and family life (and love) in an evolving Germany

What a fine film is AMOUR FOU, the new work by Jessica Hausner, who also gave us Lourdes. As good as was that earlier movie, her new one is even better: richer, more specific and dealing with so many themes and ideas simultaneously in ways that makes them glitter and refract until you can see them from some very surprising angles. Ladies and gentlemen, this is movie art of a very high order. It is also, in its quiet way, as grandly entertaining as you could wish.

By carefully observing all her characters -- including the silent servants and family dogs -- Ms Hausner, pictured at left, manages to tweak amazing meaning and content from the confined and stilted behavior of the bourgeoisie of that time. Considering that the characters here are taken from a real-life situation -- involving the famous German poet, playwright and novelist, Heinrich von Kleist, and the suicide pact he hoped to make with a smitten young woman -- the movie is hugely (but again, quietly) funny as it decon-structs, via careful observa-tion, so many of the notions we still hold dear--including romantic love, family life, and medical diagnoses.

Ms Hausner has also cast her film extremely well, with the young actor -- Christian Friedel, above, right, of The White Ribbon and Chicken with Plums -- who plays von Kleist looking surprisingly like the portraits we have of the poet himself. In this role, Herr Friedel manages to be utterly real, ridiculously romantic, and an absolutely major twat. He is memorable in the most bizarre manner.

His sort-of inamorata, Henriette, is played by a relative newcomer, Birte Schnoeink (in foreground, above), and it is Henriette, together with those who surround her -- husband, mother, daughter, servant and dog -- who form the family unit that tries to protect the young woman from von Kleist, as well as from herself and from the medicine professionals of the day. All conspire to rob Henriette of her very life, and part of the irony, even of the bleak, black humor of the tale, comes from the way in which the supporting characters, especially the husband (a finely detailed performance by Stephan Grossman, below, left), try their best yet fail to make the necessary difference.

Romanticism and romantic love, at least as perceived by the Germans of this era, come in for a licking here, and yet I don't think that Ms Hauser wants necessarily to destroy them. She is simply showing us what adherence to such a lame-brained idea can produce. Henriette's husband's ability to think logically and honestly is also not enough; were he more emotional -- jealous, even -- he might have better achieved his ends. (His input as to Germany's quest to become a more just and democratic nation is also worth hearing. The film is quite properly concerned with more than mere romance.)

While Hauser's screenplay is alive with ideas, her visuals are equally strong. I can't remember having seen a more exquisitely shot and lighted "period" film in a long time. Everything from the walls and carpets to the colors and costumes seem near-perfect regarding their time and place. There's one scene at a dance, in which the camera remains stationery and faces and bodies move in and out of its range, that is simply splendid.

The movie also acts as a kind of trap into which our heroine falls. We watch in shock and then horror but we're also strangely amused by it all. Every era, I suppose, has its own special Waterloo, and the Age of Romanticism, which reaches some kind of nadir in this tale, now has its sad, comic memorial, too.

Amour Fou, another fine film from Film Movement (and one of the best this distributor has released in a long while) has its U.S. theatrical premiere this Wednesday, March 18, via a one-week run at Film Forum in New York City. In Los Angeles, look for it at Laemmle's Royal come Friday, March 20; then it's off to Miami, Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Seattle and Winston-Salem. Click here (then scroll down) to see all currently scheduled playdates, with cities and theaters listed.