Joe Swanberg's HAPPY CHRISTMAS: holiday mumblecore & the screen's most adorable baby

After the enormous success (everything's relative, right?) of his Drinking Buddies, Joe Swanberg offers up another surprise with his latest effort, a charming little trinket titled HAPPY CHRISTMAS. Catering to ever starrier casts, the filmmaker toplines Melanie Lynskey, Mark Webber, Lena Dunham and Anna Kendrick (making her second appearance in a Swanberg film) -- plus a newcomer who steals the picture right out from under the rest of the cast. That would be Joe's own kid, little Jude Swanberg, a "natural," if I've ever seen one.

The "plot" has Jeff (Swanberg, at right) and wife Kelly (Lynskey) and baby Jude preparing for the holidays, as Jeff's sister Jenny (Kendrick, below) arrives to move in with them. Somewhat irresponsible, Jenny causes problems big and small as she reunites with old friend Carson (Dunham), romances with new friend Kevin (Webber, below), and helps Kelly write her romance novel. That's pretty much it. But the actors are so nicely attuned to each other that watching and listening to them is great fun. And any and every chance we get to observe adorable little Jude proves beyond pleasurable.

Mr. Swanberg has now moved mumblecore into the hipster mainstream; each new his film of his grows more fun. Here, he keeps his m'core bona fides bright and sharp, while adding mainstream sure-fires like children and dogs.

I am not certain that this is quite the way best-selling books are created, but as shown here -- with Lynskey, Kendrick and Dunham doing pro work -- it sure makes for a lot of fun. (Do stay all the way to the end of the end credits for an extra helping.)

Swanberg himself (shown above, right, with Lynskey) is growing into an actor of surprising charm and low-key sex appeal. He carries this movie as easily as do his better-known co-stars, while drawing completely natural performances from every one of them.

Happy Christmas is a little holiday bauble, bright and assured and silly as can be. And very enjoyable.  The film, from Magnolia Pictures and running just 78 minutes, opens this Friday, July 25, in Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles and Philadelphia, and here in New York City (and elsewhere) the following Friday, August 1 -- after playing VOD since the end of June. You can view all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters by clicking here.

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.

Lynn Shelton's early WE GO WAY BACK gets a late theatrical release in Brooklyn

Or is it a re-release? I'm not sure. Either way, this was TrustMovies' first time to see WE GO WAY BACK, the early (2006) film from Lynn Shelton, the woman who brought us Humpday in 2009 and My Effortless Brilliance in 2008. To TM's taste, this older film is twice the movie Humpday was: funnier, faster, finer in every way. Delicate with out being wispy, and with quite an original idea at its core, the film grabs you, places you into various moods from light to dark, and will not let go until the final frame -- at which point you are left to wonder what will happen to our heroine: a young woman who, up until that point, has shown herself to be quite the lovely and much-used doormat.

Seems to me that Ms Shelton, shown at left, is working with much more of a script here than she was in Humpday. At least We Go Way Back has little of that annoying, half-assed dialog that so many mumblecore movies wear like some verbal badge of honor. The dialog here, in all cases, seems not only real and just-discovered but also intelligent and on-the-mark, creating character, even as it rolls onwards -- to my mind the real badge of honor where filmed conversation is concer-ned. The filmmaker's lead character, Kate, is a 23-year-old actress with an experimental theater company in Seattle whom Shelton and the lovely young actress who plays Kate (Amber Hubert, below, right, and at bottom) bring to wonderful, alternately annoying/funny/sad life.

 
The filmmaker's "take" on the theater company, its actors and particularly its director results in some of the funniest, low-key satire of an "experimental" theater doing "the classics" that I have ever seen. Simply for what Shelton lets us see and hear of the company's re-creation of Ibsen's Hedda Gabbler, her film deserves its own "classic" status. This is prime stuff, hilarious and all too true. (It should make us New Yorkers even more thankful for our own Pearl Theater Company, which, for nearly thirty years, has given us those classics in their real, rightful form -- unadorned by idiotic experimenters. And it's not that I'm against experimental theater. But create it on your own for christ's sake -- don't bowdlerize your betters.

But back to the film: That original and core idea that Shelton has come up with is to have her heroine discover and re-read letters that she, as a teen-ager ten years earlier, wrote to her older, not-yet-even-there self. These are sad, charming and dear -- and though I've never heard of any teen actually doing this, why not? It would take a rather mature girl to even think of it, but that's part of the point here: The writings of this younger, hopeful girl becomes the very thing that sets her older counterpart to wondering about her current life. And perhaps assisting her in doing something about it. It's a lovely conceit, and Shelton makes good use of it without turning it into some heavy-handed lecture (which I may be doing here). Think of it as a kind of non-scary ghost story, with your own youth as the specter.

The younger self is played by a terrific little look-alike in youthful form, Maggie Brown (above and further above), and the various men in Kate's life are given small but telling moments.  Her theater director is played by Robert Hamilton Wright, and he is low-key, pretentious perfection. Without giving away too much, I hope, I will say that because the director sees the character of Hedda's hubby as a man-child, he decides to replace the adult actor with his own teen-age nephew (below, left). If we were to see the finished production of this Hedda, it might just prove the funniest theater piece of all time. (On the other hand, it might bore us to sleep before our laughter could take wing.)

Some film-goers may carp about being left in limbo at film's end. (Or not returning again to the theater to experience some deserved come-uppances.) Not I. We've seen quite enough to understand what could happen from here on in, and that, coupled with some lovely closing visuals, should be enough to quietly please us.
We Go Way Back opens today for a week's run in Brooklyn at the re-Run Gastropub theater. I saw the film on a wonderfully bright, crisp Blu-ray screener, which put the first-rate cinematography (by Benjamin Kasulke) up front. I hope that the film will be eventually be available to the public -- on DVD, and if possible on Blu-ray.

DIY: Mumblecore-meets-documentary in Porterfield's overpraised PUTTY HILL

Another attempt, and not a particularly successful one, at joining documentary with narrative (why is this marriage neces-sary or worthwhile?), PUTTY HILL by writer/director Matt Porterfield, who earlier gave us Hamilton, has received a surprising amount of main-stream press for a film destined to reach few mainstream audiences, with those seeing it likely to emerge from the experience scratching their heads. As some of my compatriots stood around, post press-screening, scratching ours, one of us -- Michael Lee of Film-Forward.com -- noted that the movie is made up of a number of interesting scenes, any of which works pretty well on its own. Yet together, they don't add up to much.

The main invention here, so far as mumblecore is concerned (the genre of which I would categorize Putty Hill as part of) is the addition of a narrator/
interviewer who, by default, becomes a kind of character in the film.  We never see him, though we hear him asking questions of various characters we meet along the way. Like so much of the movie, however, this charac-ter disappears at some point, never to return, as though he were not all that important in the first place. Mr. Porterfield, pictured at left, makes him an interesting touch that, like the movie itself, doesn't finally go anywhere or provide much edification.

The content of the movie, set on the outskirts of Baltimore, has to do with a funeral being organized for a dead drug addict, an evidently well-liked (by some) young man with lots of friends and relatives, some of whom we meet here. Unfortunately there is little connecting tissue to hold the scenes together. A character from one might appear in another, and the dead boy, of course, provides a kind of ballast; even so, the film begins to seem ever more arbitrary. The interviewer, too -- who initially appears to be something/someone new to the genre, eventually grows annoying because he, along with whom he chooses to interview and why the filmmaker even bothered with him to begin with -- seems arbitrary.

In the press material for the film, Porterfield notes that his is an "approach to realism in opposition to the anthropological, lyrical and romantic currents present in most of the genre." Hence, I suppose, the "documentary" feel of the work. Yet I would suggest that the filmmaker incorporates all three currents, but in his own more paltry manner -- anthropology (the interviewer), lyricism (the "nature" scenes) and romance (all that's told us is of "failed" romance, but that, I submit, still counts). He certainly cannot be accused of sentimentality. Nor of much else, either. He claims to be no fan of exposition, yet we get plenty of it via the interviewer and the talking heads he meets and greets. In fact, on one level the whole movie is exposition, which may accounts for some of the boredom that eventually sets in.

Performances by the mostly non-pro cast seem exactly that. This works well enough in delivering that kind of "documentary"-type acting that often passes for truthfulness on film. The "lead" role (though to my mind there is no real lead in this film) is given to Sky Ferreira, above, who acquits herself well but does not approach what I'd call memorable. Still, the PR materials refer to her as "the 18-year-old sultry electro-pop newcomer who will release her debut album in the U.S. in 2011," so at least we have synchronicity here.

TrustMovies is reacting more negatively to Putty Hill than the film deserves, and I admit that this is in part due to the rather amazing press it has garnered in advance of release. As my compatriot Mr. Lee (mentioned in the opening paragraph) states, a number of the scenes in this movie do work and quite well. The paint-ball match that marks the beginning of the film is very well done; likewise the dialog between grandmother and (I think) granddaughter (shown above). The at-home tattoo-parlor (below) should garner a lot of interest, too. As annoyed as the movie made me, I acknowledge Mr. Porterfield's skills and would like to see them increase. (I'll also try to view his earlier Hamilton, which I've just discovered one can stream via Netflix.)

I do take exception to the filmmaker's penultimate scene, however -- and in a big way.  Filmed in an old, dark house in which the electricity has been turned off -- at night, 'natch -- two girls engage in snooping and chatting while we viewers can't see a god-damned thing.  This, I suggest, is deliberately obfuscatory, sloppy film-making that goes on, it seems, for-fucking-ever. And it's totally unnecessary. If Porterfield wanted to access the "truth" of a no-lights-in-the-house scene, why not have an unlighted candle-in-candelholder on hand, which the characters can find in the attic, and to which the proper response becomes, "Gotta match?"

Putty Hill opens Friday, February 18 in New York City at the Cinema Village and will also play in Baltimore (that's only fair), Columbus, Los Angeles, and Omaha. Click the city to learn the venue, and/or click here then scroll down to see any further upcoming playdates....

Social Notes of interest:
Filmmaker Matt Porterfield will be in attendance for all Q&A's at Cinema Village (22 East 12 Street, NYC).
Friday 2/18
6:30pm, Yance Strickler (Kickstarter) for a fundraiser discussion
8:30pm, Jonathan Caouette (Tarnation) with Putty Hill crew and Sky Ferrira
10:30pm, Yance Ford (POV) and Esther Robinson (ArtHome, Danny Williams: A Walk Into the Sea), the Heterodox team
Afterparty: Café Select for industry and friends with large Putty photos and behind the scenes footage, great DJ line-up!
Music by Justine D, Chris Keating (Yeasayer), Matt Papich (Ecstatics, Meters Delight) and Kari Altmann (blackmoth.org)
RSVP only: puttyhillmovie@gmail.com

Saturday 2/19
*Surprise daytime Q&A with Gordon Porterfield (writer-father of the filmmaker)
6:30pm, Jeronimo Rodriguez (NY1 News)
8:30pm, Richard Brody (The New Yorker)
10:30pm, Amos Poe (filmmaker)
Afterparty: The Beauty Bar (231 E 14th St off 3rd Ave)

Sunday 2/20
6:30pm, Amy Dotson (IFP)
8:30pm, Chris Keating (Yeasayer)
10:30pm, Jem Cohen (filmmaker) with Putty Hill crew
Afterparty: Lit Lounge (93 2nd Ave off 6th St) with Dope Body, Dustin Wong (Ponytail) & Co La (Matt Papich).