Senior trip: Sheila Hancock does a title-role star turn in Simon Hunter's sweet movie, EDIE

Thank goodness for Sheila Hancock and Kevin Guthrie, the two stars of the 2017 film EDIE (just now getting its U.S. theatrical release). Without them and their sterling work -- moment to moment, they play off each other just perfectly -- this sweet but-always-threatening-to-grow-saccharine -- movie might have become intolerable.

The writing and direction are not the culprits; instead, it's the use of the musical score -- credited to Gast Waltzing and featuring a lovely major melody -- which has been allowed to be beaten into the ground so heavily by the finale, which itself provides the heaviest moments, that you'll wish you had brought your own mute button to the theater.

Director Simon Hunter (pictured, right, who also provided the idea for the story; the screenplay is by first-timer Elizabeth O'Halloran) has worked most often in the horror genre, so this aged-senior-decides-to-do-her-own-thing tale must have proven a nice change of pace for the guy. No zombies or mutants to contend with here!

Mr. Hunter has managed a very nice build-up, along with excellent pacing, and the two fine performances he's coaxed from his leads. Actually, I doubt much coaxing was needed, as both Ms Hancock (shown above and below) and Mr. Guthrie (two photos down) have proven themselves more than capable  -- the former since the early 1960s and the latter since the beginning of this century.

Still beautiful at age 83 (when Edie was filmed), Hancock has a remarkable face, which she uses with both subtlety and force (when needed). Her Edie, thankfully, is a nicely rounded character: prickly, sweet and alternately closed and open to at least some degree of change.

In the role of Jonny, the fellow who initially knocks her off her feet (along with his ever-rushing girlfriend, played by Amy Manson, below), Guthrie, above, is Hancock's equal at winning us over without using anything but his skill, charm and good looks. That Edie and Jonny will bond is of course obvious from the get-go. But the smart, funny little pas-de-deux in which they consistently engage proves as engaging as it is believable.

The plot, such as it is, has to do with Edie's need/desire to climb a certain mountain in Scotland (seen below) -- no Everest, mind you, but a real jaunt -- and Edie, just like Hancock, is 83 years of age. Little wonder the locals do not expect this old woman to manage it.

Does she? Does it matter all that much? And why? Or is simply trying the main accomplishment here? You'll find out, as the film builds (so does that music, unfortunately) to its inspirational, feel-good finish. And thanks to these two wonderful actors, you'll happily note that -- as we've often been told -- it's the journey that matters much more than the destination.

From Music Box Films and running 102 minutes, Edie opened this past Friday, September 6, in New York City at the Angelika Film Center, and in Los Angeles at several Laemmle theaters. Here in South Florida, it opens this Friday, September 13, at the Bill Cosford Cinema, Miami, and the Living Room Theaters, Boca Raton. Click here and scroll down to click on Theatrical Engagements to view all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters.

Walking/discovering New York City in Jeremy Workman's THE WORLD BEFORE YOUR FEET

The very interesting documentary filmmaker, Jeremy Workman, who back in 2014 brought us that year's finest doc (of those TrustMovies managed to see, at least) -- Magical Universe -- has a new one that just opened in New York City and Los Angeles. It's titled THE WORLD BEFORE YOUR FEET and, so far as subject matter is concerned, proves highly reminiscent of Workman's contribution to another documentary, True New York, he produced two years ago. That would be the episode entitled One Track Mind, all about a fellow who has devoted his entire free time over the past 30 years to cataloging and archiving information on every last station in the New York City subway system.

Mr. Workman's new film tracks another, younger fellow, Matt Green (shown above, left, with the filmmaker), who has spent all of the past seven years walking the maybe 8,000 miles of roads and paths that make up New York City's five boroughs. Green gave up employment as a civil engineer (what most of us would call a very good job, particularly in these terrible times) to pursue his unusual dream. Why? Even he doesn't quite know. "People tell me I could be doing something more useful with my life," he explains "They ask me what is the point of it all. I'm kind of learning that as I go along."

And so do we. One of Workman's great gifts is to take us inside the folk he films, well enough and far enough so that we really do understand how they think and feel. We begin to experience life through their eyes. And Mr. Green's new lifestyle is a fascinating one: He tells us he is able to live on $15 per day. Homeless now, he depends on the kindness of former friends but mostly on that of the strangers he meets who often invite him in for a meal, a shower, even a place to sleep. He also cat-sits (and sometime dog-sits) as a means of providing himself shelter. The guy is a charmer, all right, pleasant looking, intelligent and affable. And his "trek" really does seem to interest many of the New Yorkers he meets.

Along the way, Workman lets us meet and hear from other New York "walkers": a sociology professor, a real estate agent and a writer, the latter of whom also happens to be black and explains to Green and to us some of the differences in dress, attitude and actions that he must employ, due to, yes, the race card. The filmmaker also allows us to meet two of Green's former girlfriends, one of whom he very nearly married. His obsessions (I would call them that) and lack of interest in more "normal" patterns of behavior and relaxation (he has zero interest in ever going out to a movie) seem to have rendered any long-term love relationship impossible.
For now at least.

We visit Green's home town of Ashland,Virginia (blink and you'll miss what's playing at the local movie house: a screening of Workman's Magical Universe) and meet his parents who, as you might imagine, kind of wish that their son had some real employment again (he has never asked them for money, they tell us). We see snippets of his earlier across-the-USA walk, during which he stopped at the home of his brother in Chicago, and we learn of past trauma that happened to both siblings that might help account for Matt's more-or-less uber-carpe diem philosophy.

Lasting only 95 minutes, the documentary is still surprisingly rich in the ways it brings us into Matt's world and viewpoint: the objects he sees, the people he meets, the history he discovers and especially all he notices and begins putting together and writing about via his blog -- the many "churchagogues" (ex-synagogues that have become other-denominational), all the hair-cutting establishments that have replaced the letter's "c" and "s" with those of "k" and "z" (note especially his honorable mention that caps all those kutzes), the "puddle that never goes away" (in Staten Island, I think), the ingenious vegetable gardens of Queens, real redwood trees in New York City, 9/11 memorials, cemeteries, and the oldest tree in all of NYC (along with a notebook left in its hollow by a class of kids who visited it once upon a time), and a young woman who, thanks to Matt, here tastes her first fig! This is New York City like you have never experienced it.

There is also some lovely and stirring music, thanks mostly to Carly Comando and Tom Rosenthal (among other contributors). Mostly though, this is Green's and Workman's baby (the latter produced, directed, filmed and edited it). And it is very much worth seeing. From Greenwich Entertainment, The World Before Your Feet opened in New York City at the Quad Cinema this past Wednesday, and will hit Los Angeles at the Landmark NuArt today, Friday, November 23. It will also play Washington DC at the Avalon Cinema on Thursday December 13. Elsewhere? Sure hope so. I'll add playdates, cities and theaters here, as I learn of them.

Blu-ray/DVDebut: Thomas Bidegain's brilliant and bedeviling quest film, LES COWBOYS

I would not be surprised to learn that LES COWBOYS, the gripping and consistently absorbing movie by French writer and now director (this is his first attempt), Thomas Bidegain, has become the best least-seen movie of 2016. It's that good. If you missed, as I did, its brief theatrical run, the film makes its Blu-ray/ DVDebut this coming week. It's a must-see.

The movie is brilliantly conceived and written, and M. Bidegain's direction, even in his first outing, is assured enough to bring the movie home. Its themes range from the generation gap, parental power and its use and misuse to patriarchy, love, coming-of-age, racism and immigration. That's a lot to bite off, but Bidegain, shown at right, chews it all up with relish & elan.

Best of all, he has locked these weighty themes into a story that can easily support them. His movie is never preachy or heavy-handed. It simply flows.

That story concerns a family, above -- dad (François Damiens), mom (Agathe Dronne), older daughter (Iliana Zabeth), younger son (Maxim Driesen as the child version, Finnegan Oldfield as the mature son) -- that falls slowly apart when the daughter suddenly disappears. How/why this happened makes itself plain fairly quickly, and dad begins his long search for the girl.

M. Damiens, above, who began as a comedian, continues to excel as a dramatic actor. He is moment-to-moment truthful and full. When the time comes for him to leave the film, you feel the loss acutely, with an odd mix of relief and sorrow. The rest of the cast is equally well-chosen and assured in their performances.

Comparison has been made of this film to The Searchers, and indeed there is much to compare, and though the time frames and locations are very different. the themes are similar. And so, I think, is the quality and success of each.

Over its just-about-perfect length of 104 minutes, the movie becomes hugely moving, as much for its refusal to provide either the sentimental or something approaching full closure. Instead, it maintains proper distance as well as respect for its characters and their situations that is rare in today's cinema.

I don't want to say more for fear of spoilers of any kind. But do seek this film out. From Cohen Media Group, it arrives on Blu-ray and DVD this coming Tuesday, October 11 -- and eventually, I would hope, on digital streaming.

Kurdistan comes to NYC's Quad Cinema, as two Jano Rosebiani movies open: CHAPLIN OF THE MOUNTAINS and ONE CANDLE TWO CANDLES

According to Wikipedia, contemporary use of the word "Kurdistan" (of which there is no official "country," though the term can mean a particular region of Iraq) refers to large parts of eastern Turkey (Turkish Kurdistan), northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan), northwestern Iran (Iranian Kurdistan) and northeastern Syria (Western Kurdistan) all of which are inhabited mainly by Kurds. These days, some 25 years after the awful al-Anfal genocide waged by Saddam Hussein, it's easy for younger people (and older ones happy to forget history) to imagine that Kuridstan somehow is its own special country -- which it might, one can hope, someday become.

Even here in New York City, considered one of the cosmopolitan capitals of the world, we see few Kurdish films. So this double debut of movies by Kurdish filmmaker Jano Rosebiani is a welcome treat. Rosebiani is from Iraq Kurdistan, and though he seems to have spent a good deal of his life here in the USA, his movies hark back to his home country. CHAPLIN OF THE MOUNTAINS, an odd kind of sweet/sour road-trip about American documentary filmmakers showing Charlie Chaplin films in the mountain towns, as two lovely ladies tag along, even deals with the results of the al-Anfal genocide, while ONE CANDLE TWO CANDLES proves a comedy, if a somewhat dark one, about marriage and equality in present-day Kurdish culture.

The first thing you may notice about both films is how beautiful each is, scenery-wise. This mountainous area of Iraq Kurdistan, being industry-free, has no pollution and so, film-wise, the colors register strong, bright and true. On the basis of these two films, the work of Mr. Rosebiani, shown at left, seem to possess a nice combination of Hollywood storytelling ability and indigenous, low-key reality and charm.

In One Candle Two Candles he offers a kind of present-day "take" on a folk tale that includes an entire little town beginning with a goat-herd who dearly would love to own a pair of shoes and a pretty young girl (above, left) whose father is forcing her into marriage to a rich old man.

There's also a kid whose dad owns a local restaurant where very fresh fish are tastily prepared; a woman famous for castrating her husband who now seems always on the lookout for new meat; a hunky young artist just come to town (above); a sweet but feeble-minded man who longs to marry, and a dwarf who loves to expose himself and dance; and that aforementioned shoeless shepherd (below, after the "miracle").
Yes, this is quite crew.

Rosebiani sets the comic tone pretty well and keeps it going nicely throughout, though for us westerners, drawing laughs from the situation of a rich and entitled old man who'd rather burn his would-be bride to death rather than lose her to a more appropriate younger man simply underscores the horrors of Muslim culture, tradition and religion as evidently practiced here. "Would anybody blame me if I killed you?" hubby asks his bride.

Clearly, the answer, on one level, is meant to be a resounding no. Fundamentalist religion per se is mostly kept on the outskirts of both these films, yet its hammerlock on the culture is felt all the same.

On the other hand, that culture, as shown in the "Candles" movie, does seem to have some tolerance for "the Other," at least as viewed in the handling of the castrator, the feeble-minded and the exhibitionist dwarf (above). Who is kept in prison -- and for how long -- is one of the movie's funnier running jokes. Nary a homosexual shows his or her face, however; some "others" are clearly better than other "others." For the skinny on Muslim/Islamic hypocrisy on this matter, turn to George Gittoes' excellent Miscreants of Taliwood.

Chaplin of the Mountains has more of a documentary feel (Rosebiani has been involved in a few films in this genre, too) as his two young film-makers travel the mountain roads, stopping in various villages to screen Chaplin movies for the assembled crowds. There always seems to be an interruption, however: a herd of goats, or the screening at a wedding in which one of the mothers insists on more dancing rather than a movie.

Along the way, bits of several different Chaplin films are shown, the background and character of the young Parisian woman (above, second from left) who tags along is unveiled, as well as the needs and confusion of another beautiful young woman, a journalist (above, second from right), who also accompanies the two male filmmakers.

We get a philosophical discussion of love versus marriage; feminism ("In this country, you say hello, and they think you want to have their baby"); and finally we realize that, as well as road movie, we're also on a "quest" that offers some suspense and excitement. When we finally reach our title character, it turns out that the actor chosen (shown bottom, left) is way too young to be playing a great-grandpa.

As Rosebiani wrote, directed and edited both films, he's the man to praise or blame for the results. Mostly, I am happy to say, it's the former. The movies are lovely to look at, enjoyable to steep yourself in, and you'll come out the other side most likely with a better (or at least some) understanding of Kurdish culture.

From Evini Films, Chaplin of the Mountains (running 91 minutes) and One Candle Two Candles (running 105 minutes) open tomorrow, Friday, February 21, at the Quad Cinema in New York City. The filmmaker will be present for a Q&A on Friday and Saturday following the 7:10 show of "Candle"; Jano with also appear with his star Estelle Bajou (above, right) on Saturday after the 9:30 showing and on Sunday after the 5:00 showing of Chaplin of the Mountains.