A unique knockout: Olivia Colman leads a stellar ensemble in the Rufus Norris/Adam Cork/Alecky Blythe "verbatim musical," LONDON ROAD

Wow. This is something else. LONDON ROAD, according to its press release, is a "verbatim musical" -- one in which its writer, Alecky Blythe, uses the transcript of her interviews with the of residents of that titular street in Ipswich, England, to create the lyrics for all the dialog we hear in this new musical film, which has then been set to a rhythmic, pulsating score by Adam Cork, said to be inspired by the dialects and intonations of the residents interviewed. The result is a knockout of a movie that compares to little else that TrustMovies has ever seen.

As directed by Rufus Norris (shown at right), from an award-winning British theater piece of the same name (which Norris also directed), the movie version has been "opened out" so perfectly that it never betrays its "theater" roots. The subject? Well, that's an interesting question.

Initially, it would seem to be the murder of five prostitutes in the Ipswich area who worked along London Road. Yet we never see the murders, nor do we find out anything about the dead women, other than their line of work. We also -- and this is key, I think -- never meet, see nor hear their killer, who, during the course of this film, we learn is caught and then convicted of the crime.

Instead, we meet the denizens of London Road -- the folk who live around the murder site -- and we are soon made privy to their thoughts and fears, as initial shock, then paranoia, followed by reassurance and even some hope spring to life. We also see and hear the TV reporters covering all this for the media (their reports, I should think, are also given us verbatim).

So what we have here, finally, is a look at how the British bourgeoisie reacts to something this horrible. And the reaction, while pretty predictable, is also pretty disgusting. In the eyes of these people, the victims don't count for much. Only the fear and shock and worry that the inhabitants feel for themselves seems to matter. (The character played by Olivia Colman, above, at one point even insinuates that the killer may have done the community am actual favor by "offing" the hookers.)

Now, the fact that all the dialog/song is verbatim is one thing. But the choice of what to include, and how often to repeat it, is an artistic one. And in this way, I think, the movie makes its main point: the pettiness of these reactions, compared to what has happened, grows almost staggering.  As I watched I began to wonder if and when the creators would allow us to hear from some of the local prostitutes who remain alive. They wait a good while, but at last, we do hear. And then, of course, class and economics and culture and a lot more rear their heads. To their credit, the moviemakers do not push this: They simply offer it up for us to make of it what what we will. (Shown at left is Nick Holder, playing one of the inhabitants of the titular road.)

In the end, our good citizens unite to make their London Road a better, tidier, more beautiful place -- there's a contest for the best local garden, doncha know, with the media covering all this. So, out of horror and pain can come renewal and life. Yeah, right. My spouse, who prefers to see the happy side of things, took this part away from the film. I, who tend to draw darker conclusions, saw something else. The movie allows us to both have our views enabled but leans, I think, toward my darker one.

It is as a piece of art that London Road shines brightest. The dialog/song, even with/because of all its repetition, grows ever more wonderful and strange, and the music does indeed capture the feel of the dialects and the character intonations here. The choreography by Javier de Frutos, in tandem with the direction by Mr. Norris, is often brilliant in its use of simple facial or neck movement to underscore points. Note the scene in which the townspeople await in the street the arrival of the killer in a police van. The movement here makes for brilliant, subtle cinema experienced as a kind of stationary dance. And the energy level? It's staggering. The film is alive and moving at every moment, (That's Anita Dobson, playing one of the elderly neighbors, shown above.)

The finale, too, in which one of the younger prostitutes (Kate Fleetwood, above) looks quietly at all these goings-on, allows us again to be made aware of the other side of the coin. I was not a particular fan of Norris' earlier film, Broken, but I shall remember and treasure this one for a long time. I can't imagine any caring, intelligent film/theater-goer not rushing headlong to the cinema to see the kind of surprising, encompassing art that can be made from the most unexpected of sources.

Also in the estimable cast, by the way, is one, Tom Hardy, shown above and below, who has but a small role as a taxi driver and fills it to perfection. So he can sing, too? Is there anything this actor cannot do?

London Road, via BBC Worldwide North America, opens this coming Friday, September 9, in New York City at the Village East Cinema and the following Friday, September 16, in Los Angeles at The Sundance Sunset Cinema and Laemmle's Playhouse 7 in Pasadena. Elsewhere?  Perhaps, if word-of-mouth takes off as it should. Otherwise, we'll have to wait for it on digital or DVD -- at which time, I hope, it will come complete with English subtitles. I could have used them while watching the screening link supplied. Still, what a pleasure it will be to see this film again, with those subtitles at the ready.

DVDebut worth noting: Salvador Litvak's unusual and beautiful SAVING LINCOLN

Hitting the street on DVD tomorrow, June 18, is one of the more interesting and provocative (regarding its film technique, at least) movies to have appeared this year: SAVING LINCOLN. The film, directed by Salvador Litvak, utilizes a new film-making technique – CineCollage, which makes use of actual Civil War photos (from the Library of Congress) for the green screen backdrops in every scene. Based on fact, the story follows U.S. Marshall Ward Hill Lamon as he shadows Abraham Lincoln as his bodyguard during the Civil War, and it offers everything from Lincoln's love of music and song to his wife's need for a good seance now and then.

Well-acted and -directed and relatively well-written, the movie's a salve for those of us who found the Spielberg feel-good version overlong, over-done and way overproduced. This is small potatoes, budget-wise but its use of the green screen and those wonderful photographs makes for a kind of pageant-like production that is often oddly moving and sometimes wonderfully strange.

My full review of the film when it opened this past winter can be found here.

Salvador Litvak's green-screened SAVING LINCOLN plumbs Abe's bond to Hill Lamon

"The better part of one's life consists of his friendships," is the quote by Abraham Lincoln that opens the new film, SAVING LINCOLN, a surprise of sorts from Salvador Litvak, last seen dishing up the crass but pretty funny Jewish family comedy When Do We Eat?  As he was not invited to see the current Spielberg/Kushner take on our 16th President (at this point in time, he'll wait for the Blu-ray to appear), TrustMovies has to say that he was surprised, charmed, moved and held fast by Litvak's and his co-writer Nina Davidovich's odd mixture of a movie. (The above quote is apropos because the film deals with the rela-tionship of Lincoln to Ward Hill Lamon (rhymes with Damon, of Damon & Pythias, as a song of the time makes clear), who was Abe's best friend and valued protector during his Presidency.)

What sets Saving Lincoln rather spectacularly apart, however, is the manner in which it has been filmed. Using all its actors working against a single green-screen stage, Mr. Litvak (shown at right) and his special-effects people have somehow "composited" the result into a kind of 3D environment of vintage black-and-white photographs from our Civil War era. The result is both artful and beautiful, with the actors appearing in a kind of tamped-down color, and always in quite the right proportion, against these photos. The movie is like watching a storybook unfolding, full of important facts and events and people and ideas, put forward as a kind of historical pageant. Yet it is never stolid or boring. Thanks to some excellent acting from all concerned, the events shown spring to life.

How much better in all ways (except, I would image, its upcoming box-office take), is this film to something like the also-green-screened 300 -- in which abs, attitude and uber-violence are front and center, while history is fucked over and appallingly boring backdrops are paraded incessantly before us. The backdrops here, these wonderful photographs, are used so well and imaginatively that the movie, I think, may find a permanent place in memory.

Something else I appreciated, though others may not, is the fact that Mr. Lincoln (a terrific performance from Tom Amandes, above, right) is not deified. He is shown to be very bright, caring and politically astute but also given to whims (attending a seance at the behest of his wife-- well-played by Penelope Ann Miller). And while there is a definite homo-erotic tension between him and his friend Hill, nothing faintly homosexual should disturb any highly-conservative Lincoln lovers.

As I say, the acting here is often splendid, never more so than in scenes like the one between Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly, his wife's maid (the fine and moving Saidah Arrika Ekulona) sparked by the death of the Lincolns' son and addressing the man's faith, or lack of it, in god. Another good, if brief performance comes from Bruce Davison, above, as William H. Seward. Also wrenching is an amputation performed in a military hospital (below) using only the tools on hand in a more medically primitive time.

A note, too, should be made regarding the excellent choice of music in the film -- from the banjo and singing that early unite Lincoln and Hill Lamon to the rendition of Dixie that the President insists on having sung after the Civil War has been won by the North, no doubt as a kind of move toward proper reconstruction.

Despite its sense of pageantry, the movie does not slight (in fact, it pushes this front and center) the huge and ghastly number of lives of young Americans lost to the Civil War against the need to win -- and soon -- at all costs. The film also suggests, without making too much of it, that Lincoln may well have been aware than his time was at hand, now that he had accomplished what was necessary for the country.

The movie's weakest link -- oddly enough, given the quotation that begins it -- is the relationship between Lincoln and Lamon. Despite a good performance from Lea Coco (above, right, from Dorian Blues) in the latter's role, we never get much more than that aforementioned music as the bond, together with Lamon forever warning the Prez not to go out unaccompanied. I realize that what we do get -- the war, the necessary politics, the loss of a child -- is important, but a little more of what truly bonded these two men, even if imaginatively created out of whole cloth, would have been appropriate and appreciated.

Saving Lincoln, a sad and humane pageant via Pictures from the Fringe and running 101 minutes, plays one night on Lincoln's Birthday, this Tuesday, February 12, in Washington DC, and then hits New York City (at the Quad Cinema) and Los Angeles (at Laemmle's Music Hall) this Friday, February 15, with further openings in cities around the rest of the country to follow. Click here to see all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters.

A small movie miracle opens: Ari Taub's LAST LETTERS FROM MONTE ROSA -- plus a short Q&A with the filmmaker

Could there be, at this late date, anything left to say about World War II, specifically about the Germans, Italians and Americans who fought in the mountains of northern Italy as the war came to a close? On the basis of two new films -- The Man Who Will Come, which recently won Italy's Best Picture award and premiered during the recent FSLC's Open Roads, and now a small, independent American movie, LAST LETTERS FROM MONTE ROSA directed by Ari Taub (shown just below) and co-written by Nick Day and Caio Ribeiro (who doubled as cinematographer) -- there's plenty left to say.  And, boy, it this worth hearing (and seeing). Regarding Mr. Taub's new film, I believe that Sam Fuller would approve mightily.

Last Letters from Monte Rosa begins with the explanation that a long-buried mailbag of letters written by Italians and Germans toward the end of WWII was discovered.  (More about this satchel in the Q&A that follows.) Instead of the documentary we might expect from this beginning, we're thrust into narrative mode, in the north of Italy, jostling amongst a German platoon of soldiers that awaits the arrival of its Italian counterpart. In the surrounding forest are the Italian partisans, as well as a few Americans, one of whom visits a heavy-set Italian sleazebag who appears to be a some sort of crime boss, complete with his own set of goons, to finalize the sale of some cases of expensive black-market French wine.

It's an incendiary situation, what with the American military further encroaching on Italian turf, and the German and Italian soldiers at each other's throats.  Their respective commanders fare a bit better, however. Class will out, I guess.  The first thing you may notice is the terrifically real "look" of the film: From the costumes to the various equipment that the soldiers must use, from the men's faces to their anything-but-buff bodies, everything seems remarkably "as it was."  

The stories that Taub and his writer show us are small but telling, with moment after moment written and acted with quiet beauty and strength.  Best of all, I think, is that, by the end of this film, you'll have trouble finding any villains. Collectively, of course, you can pin the tail on the German donkey, or on the Il Duce's military.  But individually, even with plenty of bad behavior across the boards, the humanity of each of these men shines through -- and in no sappy manner. Taub, his writers and his actors, make you mourn the death of the individual Germans, even as you detest their cause.  As for the Italians, the difference between the partisans and those who "fought for their country" has seldom seemed less important, even as you know that it was, of course, all-important.

Last Letters is full of wonderful incident: that black-market wine deal (shown below); a conversation (above) between the Italian commander and his right-hand man in which the former wonders if Hitler is right: Are the Germans a superior people?   Then there's a deer that manages to first divide the soldiers -- German from Italian -- before bringing them together, and another scene of a German instructing the Italians on how to plant a land mine.  Best of all, perhaps, is an extremely suspenseful few moments between the Italian partisans and the Italian military.

Taub, who has built his way up to this film via earlier ones -- shorts and full-length -- shows surprising skill as a moviemaker.  He draws excellent performances from his cast members, recruited from Ger-
many & Italy who came to America to film (upstate New York, Mas-
sachusetts and Pennsylvania all stand in for Northern Italy).  Even the director's use of slow-motion is judicious; he manages to make that old cliché death seem somehow new -- and horribly unfair.

Taub's work is such a small movie, but it's one that deserves some real acclaim.  The director never bites off more than he can chew, yet he challenges us just the same.  Last Letters from Monte Rosa opens this Friday for a week's run at New York's newest home for independent cinema in Brooklyn: IndieScreen. You can find dates and screening time here.

**********

Once TrustMovies had seen the film, he turned to the press kit for further information. What a gold mine it proved, making him even more impressed with Mr. Taub, his writers and his cast of wonderful actors, who have given up so much to be able to make this fine film.

First of all, the movie was shot almost entirely here in the U.S., with the actors imported from Europe.  The verisimilitude is certainly achieved.  Performances are terrific, right down the line.  Indoor photography was shot on sets created in studios in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, hence the entirely appropriate venue in which the film is opening.  Most bizarre, I guess, is the fact that here is a piece of American independent cinema that is actually a low-budget WWII combat drama.

We catch director Ari Taub for a 30-minute phone call during which he fills us in with answers to a few on extra questions that the press kit did not address. In the following TrustMovies' question are in boldface, white Taub's answers are in standard type.

Were there actually that batch of letters mentioned at the beginning of the film? Can you give us some background on that?

Yes. everybody always wants to know about those letters! The satchel of letters does exist. Letters were recovered in Northern Italy maybe 10-14 years ago. A lot of them were rotted and only bits and pieces could be read. We only read a fragment from one letter --

Was that the letter from the German commander to his wife that we hear at the end?

Yes: the one that was read at the end. To prepare for this film, we read that fragment and also Last Letters from Stalingrad, a wonderful book written by soldiers who perished during the Battle of Stalingrad in Russia.  And so, from a single fragment, rather like one bone from a dinosaur, we created the whole piece.

According to the IMDB, you've made other films: shorts and full-length, and a number of these were war films.

Yes, I have made a number war films. Some of my war films, in fact, are earlier versions of this movie. The Fallen tells the story from the American viewpoint. This one is my favorite, though, because it seems unique. I really worked hard to get inside the hearts and minds of how men would act during this time.

After this initial week's run at IndieScreen, where might your film go?

We hope elsewhere around the country, of course, but we don’t have a big war chest for getting the movie out there.

What was the total cost of making  this film, start to finish?

The cost all told was $350,000, includsive of everything.  Our production budget was $210,000 and then of course there was post production.

And how long, total, did it take to film?

It took seven years to complete this movies.

Wow.

It's unbelievable, the amount of time and life that went into this work. Mostly because we did not have the money. There was a time that we couldn't even continue shooting for two years because we had no money.

Your cast really is wonderful.  So real.  Did they all come from abroad?

No: the guy who played the local gangster (Rossini, shown below), sort of the small town bully, he is a friend of mine (Carmine Raspaolo) who lives right here in Brooklyn. He had wanted to play one of the soldiers, but I had to tell him he just weighed too much. But we could -- and did -- cast him as that gangster.

How old are you now, Ari?

I’m 44 years old.

Is there anything else you'd like to say, since I have you for this quick interview?

Maybe I should say why I originally wanted to even make this movie.

Yes, good idea.

I wanted to tell a story that involved the cooperation between German and Italian men during WWII because I found these people to be so different from each other. I could not imagine how they could get along. And when I researched, I found copious amounts of material that corroborated the fact that they did not get along.

And yet, you make it so they do try to get along.

Yes. Some of my best friends are both German and Italian. So I don’t want people to think that I don't like either group!

Nobody's gonna think that.  Your movie is too full of understanding and appreciation for humanity -- of whatever country or group.