AMERICAN RADICAL: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein; Ridgen/Rossier's doc debuts

If, like TrustMovies, you couldn't get enough of the Norman Finkelstein seen in Defamation, the recent inquiry into anti-semitism by Yoav Shamir, you'll want to pop over to Anthology Film Archives to view a new documentary entitled AMERICAN RADICAL: THE TRIALS OF NORMAN FINKELSTEIN to learn more about this pained and painful, intelligent and feeling, tireless and tiring proselytizer of the uses of The Holocaust, Israel's abuse of the Palestinians, and what it means to be Jewish.

I love this guy, pictured above. I love how he argues, keeping to the point at hand and not letting an opponent (as we observe in the film) sneak in a reference to the late, lamented reporter Daniel Pearl in order to cloud up the argument with sentiment and anti-Semitism. I love how he's managed to handle his own intense history as the son of Holocaust survivors (a father who never talked and a mother who wouldn't shut up) for whom that event set in stone the rest of their lives. I love how he tries very hard to explain this and then waves us (and the filmmakers) away when he's suddenly overcome with emotion. I love how he has dedicated his life to what he perceives as the truth.  But I don't love that this has cost him one job after another, culminating in the loss of deserved tenure and consequently his job at De Paul University.

Award-winning filmmakers  -- David Ridgen (above, left) and Nicolas Rossier (above, right) -- have brought together the man, his words and his deeds, into one 84-minute film that captures his aggressiveness as well as his warmth, and should leave you with greater understanding and respect for this difficult (even one of his best friends worries that he's self-destructive) fellow.

Beginning with a prime joke that I had not heard (and that of course will be taken as anti-Semetic), the filmmakers see to it that we're off and running.  We get the history of the man (Norman's mom took the lesson's of The Holocaust in a "different direction," notes one interviewee); hear from Finkelstein's fans (Noam Chomsky) as well as his detractors (Alan Dershowitz, shown above, right); and then see the man during a lecture tour of Canada (below).

Especially prominent is a scene in which a young woman begins to cry because she feels Finkelstein demeans Jews and the Holocaust.  "Those are crocodile tears," he tells her without a trace of sympathy.  "I don't like playing the Holocaust card, but now I must. All my relatives on both sides of my family were killed and both my parents were in concentration camps and in the Warsaw Ghetto.  I will not have their suffering used to excuse Israel's attack on Palestinians.  If you had any heart, you would be shedding those tears for the Palestinians."

Notes Dershowitz: "The man's only Jewish on his parents' side."  Does Finkelstein (shown above during one of his early cam-
paigns) go beyond being merely criticial of Israel?  "OK," he says at one point, "let's assume that my being anti-Semitic is true?  How does this affect the truth of what I am saying?  If Albert Einstein had deep identity problems, does this mean his theories were not true?"  At the Univiersity of Western Ontario, he is warned about possible violence from an unruly crowd but speaks to them anyway.  And they listen. "Why don't you bring up Palestinian terrorists?" he is asked by one audience member.  "Why you don't bring up Israel's President?" he responds, "He is the biggest terrorist of them all."

Against his own book The Holocaust Industry, another is published called The Finkelstein Industry, in which he is accused of profiting from the Holocaust.  "Losing my job is profiting?" he asks. On a tangent for a moment, he speaks of the song "I Will Survive," and what it meant to his mother (that's the point at which he waves us and the camera away).  Then comes the De Paul scandal, and finally a trip to the mideast (above) that he is warned against making. Suddenly banned from visiting Israel for several years, he instead goes to surrounding areas where he meets, greets and speaks.  To hear, at the close of the film, young Palestinians talking about their experience with the man and what they've gained, is somewhat heartening.  "I learned that we don't have to use terrorism, but we can use diplomacy," one fellow says.  (Let's hope that the latter will eventually work.)  Then he adds, "And I learned that not all Jews are the same."  Hey, it's a start.

American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein plays at AFA from Thursday, February 11, through Wednesday, February 17, daily at 7 and 9pm, with an additional 5pm screenings Saturday and Sunday. (Click here for more information.)  If you live outside New York, click here for information on additional screenings around the country.

BAREFOOT TO TIMBUKTU, Martina Egi's documentary about Ernst Aebi opens

The lives some people lead! How is it that certain indi-
viduals accomplish so much in so many different fields, while others of us simply sit back and watch? (Or write about it.) Viewing the engaging documentary by Martina Egi (shown below) about the artist/builder/sailor/adventurer Ernst Aebi brings just such thoughts to mind.

BAREFOOT TO TIMBUKTU: Ernst Aebi -- Come Hell or High Water (I think we might shorten that title) introduces us to the man, and while it does not begin to answer TrustMovies' question in the previous paragraph, it gives enough information -- colorful facts, history, tidbits and opinions -- to engross us and prime us for more. 

More, in this case, would be all about Herr Aebi and his various careers: first as an artist, then a family man and world traveler who, during his time in Africa, comes upon the tiny village of Araouane (which, if you click on the link, will give you information and other links about the nomadic Tuareg Rebellions that have plagued the region for decades).  It is in Araouane, in the late 1980s, that Ernst becomes involved with the villagers, helping them to bring back to the little town some of its former glory.

Teaching the Araouaners to plant a vegetable garden (they seem to be able to handle everything but garlic -- which proves too intense a flavor for them), he goes on to help them build a hotel for tourists,  and in general to become somewhat self-supporting.   Late in the film, listen to him angrily explain to the villagers why they must learn to keep their resources local and within their own community.  The introduction of Aebi's new wife into the mix also helps the the entry of the Araouane women into the work force.

When yet another rebellion of the Tuareg created havoc in Mali during the early 1990s, the Aebis had to flee.  Ernst's return to Araouane nearly two decades later  -- and what he finds there -- provides the emotional kick of the movie, and it's a good one: thoughtful and melancholy.

This is all Ernst the traveler.  But what about Aebi the family man?   We get tantalizing glimpses of the guy via his four children (three girls and one boy) who seem to love and respect their dad, warts and all. However good or bad a dad he might have been, he did wrest his kids away from their mom, whom he declares an unfit mother.  (The children, grown now, don't seem to disagree.)   Back in Switzerland we meet his two brothers (center and right, above), next to whom Ernst seems noticeably Americanized.

Regarding the artist, we see some of his early pen-and-ink work: "One drawing could take me weeks to complete!" he explains, "so now I just paint horses.  It's much quicker."  Aebi became successful early in life and used the art money to start a loft renovation business in New York's Soho, which also proved an enormous success. The man does seem to have the Midas touch.

And yet.  There is something that remains unsatisfied about Mr. Aebi. He'll always be going and doing, it seems -- remaining just out of reach of everyone else in his life -- including, perhaps, himself.

BAREFOOT IN TIMBUKTU -- from Mesch-Ugge filmproduktionen, Zurich -- opens next Friday, February 12, in New York City at the Quad Cinemas.

Tabakman/Doster's surprising (and very hot) EYES WIDE OPEN gets a theatrical run

It was only three weeks ago that EYES WIDE OPEN (Eynaim Pekukhot) made its New York debut as part of the 19th New York Jewish Film Festival, and now here it is opening in a commercial run.  This is the first full-length, narrative film from director Haim Tabakman (shown below), in which, as writers, he, along with producer Rafael Katz, French connection David Barrot and the film's original screenwriter Merav Doster were all involved.

An ugly film to watch (the settings -- workplace, apartment and "shul" -- could hardly be more drab and unappealing), Eyes Wide Open takes place in Israel's ultra-orthodox Jewish community, in and around a butcher shop in which one of its leading characters, Aaron, labors and which, due to the recent death of his father, he now owns.  Into Aaron's life one day comes the transient Ezri, a young man whom Aaron hires to help in the shop. (The only other major character in the film is Rivka, Aaron's wife.)  Ezri is gay (we learn this fact fairly quickly), and Aaron soon finds himself attracted to the young man.


Though this attraction grows throughout the course of the film and is returned in kind by Ezri, the orthodox community, which permits no deviation -- certainly not one this deviant -- rises to what it perceives as a challenge to its very being, as does Rivka, fighting as best she can for her man and her life (the couple has four children).  But passion, clearly new to Aaron though not to Ezri, cannot be easily halted. Though, god knows, Aaron tries.  This is one of  the great strengths of the film: How hard Aaron attempts to deflect, prevent what is happening.  "We can refrain!" he pleads with Ezri, for this is what  his religion teaches.  "We can restrain ourselves!"  This restraint builds and builds; when the explosion comes, it is overwhelming -- for both the characters and the viewers -- resulting in one of the hottest sex scenes in cinema history.  And one, I might add, in which the participants remain fully clothed.

 Eyes Wide Open, a broadside against fundamentalist thinking (and behaving), does not end with the coupling of the two men.  This action only begins the suffering to come and answers the question -- Can the true array of human sexuality coexist within orthodox religion? -- in the negative.  So effortlessly real are the performan-
ces of Zohar Strauss as Aaron and Ran Danker as Ezri, and so relentless yet believable is the screenplay in its setting-up and working-out of this face-off between immovable objects that we viewers are held captive and pummeled into submission by the enormous constraints imposed by the fundamentalist community.


I wonder: Does a movie exist that shows this community in any joyous light? If so, let me know.  If not, maybe it's time to make one.  If that is even possible without every character towing the highly constrained line that "god" has decreed.

Eyes Wide Open, from New American Vision, makes its New York theatrical debut tomorrow, Friday, February 5, at NYC's Cinema Village. A DVD release will come eventually via First Run Features.

DISTRICT 13: ULTIMATUM soars, thrills & delights via Luc Besson/Patrick Alessandrin

Why doesn't America have something like the Luc Besson stable of directors, writers and perfor-
mers that France possesses? The closest we come -- under-appreciated and under-seen as it is -- would be the Neveldine-Taylor duo (the Crank films and the more recent Gamer). What the Besson group (some of whom are shown below) offers are action movies that really move, loaded with intelligence (and only a modicum of bloodshed) and executed with genuine skill in terms of concept, direction, peformance, screenplay, stunts and all the rest.

For a fine example of the Besson touch, look no farther than the movie opening tomorrow -- DISTRICT 13: ULTIMATUM -- a kind of sequel to the popular District 13 from 2004, in which we met Captain Damien Tomasso of the French police and his soon-to-be pal, the street punk Leïto. Though these two would seem to be on opposite sides of the law, their commitment to truth, justice and the Français way soon makes them fast friends. D-13 Ultimatum quite literally begins with the ending of the original film, and before we can say sleazy, manipulative, lying, murdering right-wing bastards,  the powers-that-be are once again trying to rid France of its notorious B (for Banlieue) 13, where the French have-nots of all races and persuasions gather.

The sequel, directed by Patrick Alessandrin, pretty much does the same thing as its predecessor: It offers some phenomenally clever and entertaining action sequences spliced into a good-enough story about bad guys in the police and the government and their nefarious plot against the now famous "District."  The first of these sequences (there are maybe half a dozen within the 90-minute movie)  involves a Chinese night club (above) with a very unusual bar girl and offers non-stop action and fun with little blood and guts.  Instead the viewer is treated to a display of expert martial arts and parkour combined with wit and film savvy.

My adult daughter accompanied me to the screening and assured me afterward that the martial arts on display were about as good as the movies have given us, combining various types into one stunning demonstration.  She also had high praise for the actions skills of the two leads: Cyril Raffaelli (below foreground, bald -- who plays policeman Tomasso) and David Belle (below center, tatooed -- who essays Leïto). Along for the wild ride can be seen two staples of French film: Philippe Torreton (César-winner and Comédie-Française star, who plays the decent but be-deviled French President, and Daniel Duval as the chief sleaze. Both are fine, with Torreton providing the kind of nuance that films of this genre rarely receive.

Once again, in addition to the great fun the film gives, what distin-
guishes this D-13 movie is the understanding Besson (he wrote the screenplay and produced) brings of the politics, sociology and econ-
omics of France (and by extension the west) -- not just its obvious divisions (and how the right wing manipulates these against each other) but what it might take to bring them together. If there's nothing quite as tasty here as the original's great line comparing liberty, equality and fraternity with gas, water and electricity, the script is still packed with smart dialog and fast, funny quips.

The finale, by the way -- which in any American version would have explosions and probably carnage aplenty -- is here handled by mere sound effects, muted and at a distance.  We know what is about to happen, but only a movie-maker who understand the uses of subtlety and who trusts his audience as he does himself would take this kind of chance. Does it pay off? You'll find out.

District-13: Ultimatum, from the Magnet Releasing arm of Magnolia Pictures , opens Friday, February 5, across the country in nine cities, including New York's Village East Cinemas.  In the month to come, it will open on screens in nine more.  Click here for playdates, cities and theaters.

Julian Jarrold, James Marsh, Anand Tucker tackle the RED RIDING TRILOGY

Something new in cinema (though per-
haps not so much in TV), the RED RIDING TRILOGY consists of three separate films, adapted by a single scribe (Tony Grisoni) from a series of linked hunt-for-a-serial-killer novels by Yorkshire writer (David Peace) and directed by three different filmmakers: Julian Jarrold (below, left) James Marsh (below, center) and Anand Tucker (right).

Originally made for British television, each film contains a number of the same characters, played by the same actors, though with a different man-in-charge calling the shots in each case. Each filmmaker may have his own "style" (though none of the three, good as he may be, has made much of a stylistic mark so far), yet they appear to have played down their differences in order to come somewhat close to each other in final execution.

Aside from the novelty aspect, the trilogy offers some plum perfor-
mances, among them an outstanding job by Rebecca Hall (below), who went unrecognized by me (perhaps because here she's a blond), the versatile Andrew Garfield (of Boy A, shown two photos below), Paddy Considine (the second film's lead) and Mark Addy (co-lead in number three).  There were actually four books in this series by Peace, but for various reasons we shall have to wait for the fourth, which Sir Ridley Scott, I believe, is on tap to produce.

The tales told in the trilogy, though each has its own "hero," are really offshoots of a single thread:  tracking down the decade-long doings of a killer known as The Yorkshire Ripper.  That so little progress is being made (and when there is any, it is quickly scotched) can be attributed to a combination of a corrupt police, prison and legal system, compromised journalists and an overall group of characters about as consistently sleazy as any you'll find in filmdom (or maybe film-dumb).  Red Riding is one of those long sloughs through venality and corruption in which the bad guys are so thoroughly in control that they can put the kibosh on anyone, anytime, for any reason -- and never pay a price.  This tends to sap energy, not to mention suspense, from the proceedings, as well as making the viewer wonder why, in a few cases, the villains waited so long to wreak their vengeance.  Well, to ramp up excitement for the finale, of course!

That this corruption is unveiled in pieces over time should (and I suppose could) offer surprise and suspense.  But if you have witnessed by now as many of these dark, noirish thrillers, particularly those that come from British television -- Prime Suspect,  State of Play, Touching Evil and so on -- as have I, Red Riding may look an awfully lot like second-hand goods, its spruced-up, tri-director template notwithstanding. Further, after sitting through nearly six hours of dank, dark and supremely ugly doings, with the few good guys on view totally trounced, to be made to endure a feel-good finale awash with slow-mo, soaring music and flying pigeons (to the best of my know-
ledge, John Woo was not involved), is beyond the pale.  It is hard to believe that the director of this episode, Anand Tucker (who has given us the good Hilary and Jackie and the even better Shopgirl) was not subjected to some of the very torture we see on view before he agreed to demean himself and us with an ending this angelic/trashy.  (And the sentimental handling of the BJ character, who would hardly be allowed to live, is further fuel for the fire.)

To give credit where credit is due.  Julian Jarrold directed the first episode Red Riding: 1974 (each piece goes by its year), which is filled with overdone visuals (to reflect those drug-ridden years, perhaps?) and is the worst of the lot: obvious, repetitive, and unbelievable -- not in the extent of the evil of display but that the evil would drag its feet so ridiculously long before putting right to wrong and silencing any naysayers. (That's Sean Bean in the photo below.)

Red Riding 1980 is the best of the three -- and the shortest. Director James Marsh takes a grittier, no-nonsense approach that works somewhat better, though all the back-and-forth agonizing by the character played by Considine (shown below, left) over the old wife-vs-mistress conundrum becomes tiring.  We don't know enough to care much about these people, so why waste our time? Well, because giving the cop/hero his backstory is now so de rigueur that we viewers can practically write it as we watch.

Mr. Tucker's final episode, Red Riding: 1983, in addition to offering some fine work by Mr Addy, features David Morrissey (below) as the co-lead.  Morrissey is always good, so no surprise that he comes through again. Whether he's romancing a "spiritualist" (the fine Saskia Reeves) or worrying that he may be on the "wrong" side (hello, dummy: you are), he takes us with him.  Which is more than this trilogy manages, unless you have an unending appetite for very dark retreads.

The Red Riding Trilogy comes to us via IFC Films, where it opens Friday, February 5, in a special "New York Roadshow Presentation" for one week only, exclusively at the IFC Center, in Los Angeles at the NuArt on February 12, and in selected theaters nationwide beginning February 19.

Genz's TERRIBLY HAPPY, Danish entry in the Foreign Language Film derby, opens

Oh, those Danes! They think the "Oscar" voters want dark? Black comedy? Well, there's dark and there's midnight. There's black and there's pitch. So it's little wonder that TERRIBLY HAPPY, the Danish submis-
sion to compete for Best Foreign Lan-
guage Film, did not make the shortlist. Dark works best for Academy voters when it ends up giv-
ing them the chance to feel good. Or sad. (Or when the film in question receives critical hosannas and does well enough at the box-office to make some waves: No Country for Old Men.)  When a "dark" movie ends up making you feel nothing at all, that tends to be an Academy deal-breaker.

In this movie, directed and co-written (with Dunja Gry Jensen and Erling Jepsen) by Henrick Ruben Genz (shown at left), a Copenhagen policeman (Jakob Cedergren, below, left, a looker who also appears in Sally Potter's Rage) who's had a pot of trouble at home is transferred to a new post in a tiny little town in the Danish sticks that operates, well, a bit differently from your run-of-the-mill hamlet. (Or perhaps, being so small, everything percolates a bit faster.) That's all you need to know without having something spoiled for you, so if you're prone to the kind of entertainment that goes from gray to somber, all the while posing as a "comedy" -- yet sans laughs -- then this is a film for you.

TrustMovies is not certain what, if any, American landscape might fill in for the one shown here.  Appalachia?  Probably not, but it's as good a choice as any.  In our little town we have a man-in-charge who's drunk on power, some spousal abuse, a doctor (below) a tad too free with his drugs, a store owner who encourages kleptoma-
nia, and many more offbeat characters.  Genz likes to film at odd angles for arty, "meaningful" moments, in which all sorts of things -- including Shirley Jackson's The Lottery -- come fleetingly to mind.

In the end we have a non-hero hoisted by his own petard, which seems appropriate enough in this case.  Along the way, we learn a typical (I am guessing) Danish phrase: "Mojn," which mean (I am guessing again) Mornin'.  If I sound less than enchanted with this movie, it's because I am less than enchanted.  Dark but not much fun and telling us plenty of stuff about human nature of which we're already aware, Terribly Happy (ironic title, dontcha know) is a cynical little romp for art-house pseudo-sophisticates.

The film, distribted via Oscilloscope Laboratories, opens this Friday, February 5, at Manhattan's Angelika Film Center.

Agustin's FALLING AWAKE offers life, death and music in the Bronx via IFC On-Demand

Get past the somewhat-too-
cutesy title of FALLING AWAKE and you'll encoun-
ter a number of positive things: lead actors Andrew Cisneros & Jenna Dewan, whose talent may nearly approach  the level of their knockout gor-
geous looks; a cast of smart supporting players including Nestor Serrano, Julie Carmen and Nicholas Gonzalez; and some pleasant music. The downside? Plotting that is hackneyed as hell, relying far too much on coincidence, convenience and whatever works.

The story involves a young and handsome street musician from the Bronx who meets and falls for a Manhattan girl who's above him in class, finances, and maybe smarts.  None of this really matters, of course, because love conquers all, including storyline and intelligence. What saves the movie -- barely -- is Cisneros' performance.  The young actor (this marks his first full-length film) also composed some of the music and sings it quite well: His session at an open-mic performance at a local club is terrific. For once, you can believe that the audience is bowled over. 

Unfortunately we need to believe a lot more, but here the movie lets us down.  Directed and co-written (with with Doug Klozzner and Michael Baez) by a fellow named Agustin (shown at left),  it gives our hero a half-assed family life that manages to be both under-conceived and repetitive, a damning combination which even the good cast cannot rise above. Too much happenstance sinks the film.  One sudden downpour that helps protect our hero from the bad guys is OK; a second one is too much. ("Boy, it rains a lot in the Bronx," one of my compatriots cracked, as the press crowd existed the screening.)

The film's beginning possesses a nice, off-the-cuff quality and some charm, but as it moves along, cliches begin to pile up, with a little too much angst, fevered emotions and wall-punching unleashed to diminishing effect.  There is also no need to ramp up the ending of the film to the point at which it seems simply fake.  Keep it real, someone might have helpfully suggested, midway along.

We'll certainly be hearing from newcomer Cisneros (above, right) again soon, as well as from Ms Dewan (above, left), who has already racked up a solid resume of film and TV appearances.   

Falling Awake will open this Friday, February 5, in Manhattan at the IFC Center, but meanwhile, you can catch it via IFC On-Demand from most local cable suppliers.