Fridrik Thór Fridriksson's MAMMA GÓGÓ, Iceland's Oscar entry, gets an L.A. airing

Am I imagining this, or are we critics and reviewers having more opportunity to view, not only the movies that finally make their way to nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, but even those that are initially submitted to represent various foreign countries in the yearly Oscar race? Seems so to me, at least. Relevant to this (and I am making an assumption here), I would guess that a country like Iceland, with its relatively small population, does not have nearly as many movies to choose from -- as does, say, Italy, France or Germany -- when selecting which film should represent it at Oscar time. Hence (another assumption), the pick by Iceland's powers-that-be of Fridrik Thór Fridriksson's MAMMA GÓGÓ as the country's official Oscar entry.

This not uninteresting film has some very moving moments along the way, as well as some funny ones (often black and bleak), dealing as it does with a down-on-his-luck movie director who has just made a film called Children of Nature (about Iceland's elderly) that is bombing at the Icelandic box-office, and for which the only hope would seem to be a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nomination. Meanwhile, the director's own mother is beginning to suffer from dementia of a particularly virulent and dangerous sort. Fridriksson, shown at left, is the man who also directed last year's fine documentary, A Mother's Courage: Talking Back to Autism, so the fellow is clearly knee-deep is the understanding of human beings facing difficult handicaps in both early- and late-life situations.

What is so odd about the filmmaker's new Mamma Gógó, however, is that the aforementioned Children of Nature, is an actual movie, made in 1991, that was indeed nominated for (but didn't win) said Oscar. In fact, in Mamma Gógó, we're at the premiere of Children of Nature in one of the film's first scenes. Following this, we're with the poor beleaguered director (played quite well by Hilmir Snær Guðnason, above, Iceland's go-to guy for roles that require a sexy young -- now actually approaching middle-age -- male, and who has scored big in films such as 101 Reykjavík and The Sea). Further, the movie appears to be taking place today (certainly within a year or two past), since events such as the Icelandic economic crisis, a possible new drug that might  help Alzheimer patients, and a very large, wide-screen TV all make appearances in the film. Yet Children of Nature is now 20 years old. What is happening with the time frame here? Is the writer/director simply goofing on us? Or not-so-subtly telling us that this is just "a movie," so anything goes?

Even more interesting is the use of popular Icelandic actress Kristbjörg Kjeld, above, in the title role. Ms Kjeld is terrific: smart and funny early on (watch her get out of a traffic violation!) and sad, dense and confused as the film (and her character's sickness) progresses. Fridriksson not only stars Kjeld as she appears today but also uses footage (below) from her debut film 79 af stöðinni (from 1962), in which she also played a character named Gógó, in what appears to be flashbacks within Mamma Gógó to indicate the young love affair with her now deceased husband. For Icelandic audiences this is probably gourmet catnip;  for foreign viewers, however, it works mostly as sentimental overlay.

Sentimentality, particularly at the finale, is what finally reduces the film to less than the sum of its often very good parts. The dialog is sometimes a little too pedestrian and the pacing standard stuff, but the 84-minute running time helps make the experience easier. There are some very moving scenes along the way (the son diapering his mother) and others that are nasty and powerful (mom's sudden outbursts against her daughters and, particularly, her daughter-in-law). But because, as this point in time, we've seen an awful lot of movies about elderly dementia, there is finally not a lot that's terribly new here. Other than the filmmaker's interestingly bizarre mash-up of time periods with older movies and performances.

Los Angeles film people will have the opportunity to see Mamma Gógó this Sunday afternoon, Jan. 9, at 12:30pm, at the Writers’ Guild Theater, 135 South Doheny Drive, Beverly Hills. I don't think, so far, that any U.S. distributor has stepped up to the plate. But that could change, depending on which films the Academy chooses for its Best Foreign Language Film shortlist, then nominees and -- finally -- winner.

Elia Suleiman's THE TIME THAT REMAINS is one of this year's -- and last's --best films

TrustMovies is sorry that Elia Suleiman's newest movie, THE TIME THAT REMAINS -- which made its debut at the 2009 Cannes and Toronto film fests -- is only now opening theatrically in the USA.  "Now" being but a week too late to qualify as one of last year's films -- as which, it would have appeared on a num-ber of "best lists," mine included. I say this, as someone who loathed Suleiman's earlier film Divine Intervention. (Click this link to connect with my Greencine post about that 2002 movie.) Now, however, I believe that, had I seen that earlier film after I'd watched his new one, I'd have been much more appreciative.

The reason is this: To view Divine Intervention with no understanding of this filmmaker (he's pictured at left), his history or his work is to be set adrift on the sea with neither compass nor paddle. Consequently, DI becomes a WTF movie. With The Time That Remains, however, we absolutely know where we are: in a family history that also becomes a  history of Palestine. We meet characters whom we watch age and grow (or not) and whom we grow to love in all their sadness, humor and near- suspended-animation. For they are Palestinian: non-citizens in the eyes and minds of their Israeli keepers, who, at their best, are mildly threatening and disinterested, and at their worst, possibly fatal.

The Time That Remains is both a provocation and a concession to the Israeli occupation. Done with knowing humor and satire that often seems deadpan, it is actually much more than that. Among several extraordinary filmmaking techniques, Suleiman uses quiet and stillness in a manner that is exactly right and all his own. In the press material for the film, the director calls silence "...subversive. All governments hate it because it is a weapon of resistance."

Suleiman uses silence as much for humor (which becomes its own kind of resistance) and to point up strange juxtapositions as for anything else. There's a scene during curfew of an Israeli police vehicle outside a club, where, inside, the party-goers are dancing wildly. The combination here of light and dark, noise and quiet is spectacular, offering just one of many memorable moments in this unusual film.

We -- along with Suleiman, who is a kind of silent character/
narrator in his own movie -- follow the history, from 1948 until the present, of the filmmaker's family (a kind of everyfamily), as his father ages from young man to middle age to elderly, and Suleiman himself goes from boy to man. That fine young actor Saleh Bakri (Salt of the Sea, The Band's Visit), shown above, left, and below, right, plays dad in all three time periods, and the particular use that he makes of this quiet and silence is both provocative and wise (not to mention extremely sexy).

The film begins with a shadowy figure taking a cab to... nowhere? The abyss?  (There's a sudden, near-apocalyptic rainstorm.) We don't understand what is happening, but by the time we return to this passenger, we've come to understand the family, the country, who that passenger is and what is going on. In each of his scenes, Suleiman capture the details of the time period -- from clothes and hair styles to the furniture and objects (as in the kitchen above) -- wonderfully well.

The filmmaker is particularly adept at making visual connections, and as The Time That Remains is a kind of memory piece, these connections are vital. Suleiman gives them to us in his own piquant way. Toward the film's beginning, a man is tossed over a wall. Near the end, another man vaults symbolically over a more modern and recognizable wall. You'll make what you will of the meaning of the "surmounting" of these walls and the connection of the two men, but you can't fail to appreciate how the director has melded past to present, while giving us plenty to chew on in the process.

One of the most delicate and delectable movies I've seen in a long while, The Time That Remains is a keeper. It is certainly one of the richest film about the the Palestinian people that I've yet experienced, as well as an indispensable record of the creation of the state of Israel from the Palestinian perspective. (We've had a lot of movies--  from Exodus onwards -- that gave us that experience from the other side.) I want to see this film again, and soon, as well giving Divine Intervention another watch and viewing Suleiman's first film, Chronicle of a Disappearance -- the three of which have now become this filmmaker's trilogy.

The movie, from IFC Films, opens simultaneously in theaters and On-Demand this Friday, January 7. In New York City, it will play at the IFC Center.  Click here to learn how to get the movie via IFC On Demand.

Kenneth Bowser's PHIL OCHS: THERE BUT FOR FORTUNE is a fascinating time capsule

For some of us who came of age in the 1960s, PHIL OCHS: THERE BUT FOR FORTUNE, the new documentary by Kenneth Bowser may prove to be quite the little time trip back into what we imagine to have been our "heyday." They're all here: the folk singers (Dylan, Baez, Peter Yarrow and, of course, Mr. Ochs) and their songs, the protests, the hippies, drugs and alcohol aplenty, along with that sense of purpose -- loosely imagined as it might have been -- that appeared to bring us all together. Yet what emerges from the film more strongly than anything else (for this viewer, at least) is the sense of history as something that repeats and repeats and repeats. All of which makes this movie, as immensely enjoyable as it is on one level, depressing as hell on another. Given the state of the USA today.

Mr. Bowser, shown at right (the photo credit's at bottom) has done a bang-up job of telling Ochs' story -- and a good one (if a sad one) it is. We get his youthful enthusiasm and talent, along with hints of what is to come; some interesting critique of performers and their songs (Dylan's were accessible, Ochs' direct but more difficult); and some family history (Phil's dad had what seems like undiagnosed post-traumatic stress syndrome after his experiences during WWII). We hear some of the witty numbers Ochs was so good at (Love Me, I'm a Liberal, in which he gives liberal Democrats "what for"), as well as some of his more rousing songs (I Ain't Marchin' Anymore, Draft Dodger Rag, and The War Is Over).

For me, Ochs most memorable song has always been The Pleasures of the Harbor (from the album of the same name). Not a protest number, it is instead simply gorgeous and moving in its sad beauty -- and different from anything the musician had done before or did after. The album flopped, though it had its staunch defenders at the time. At this point Ochs' decline, already in motion, speeded up.

The musician was manic-depressive, as we learn from his brother, and also somewhat paranoid. Fueled by too much alcohol, these handicaps finally burst their too-lightweight bonds. As we see event after event pass before us all over again -- the 1968 Democratic Convention at which Chicago police attacked peaceful demonstrators, helping to lose the that year's election to Richard Nixon; the rise of the Weathermen, together with the bombings and the despair; Kent State; and finally the fall of Allende in Chile, for which Ochs and others clearly blamed the US/CIA connection -- it becomes clear that outside events, coupled to the musician's inner demons, joined forces to sink the man. (The movie seems particularly smart about the unusual combination in Ochs' character that made him both a patriot and a protester.)

We're treated to a final concert at which both Ochs and Dylan (who, though initially close, soon became rivals and enemies) join up to sing and play (not very well, from the sound of it) at a final (for Ochs) sold-out concert. This strange, sometimes funny but more often sad and depressing, trip down memory lane is one I would not have missed. Reliving those times is salutary, and Bowser and his crew have put together an exemplary documentary about a man who deserves remembrance from his contemporaries and knowledge of from the younger set. For far too many of the latter, the idea of "protest" (except maybe at mom and dad for curtailing the credit card) has yet to enter their vocabulary or their life.

Phil Ochs: There but for Fortune, from First Run Features, opens today, January 5, in New York City at the IFC Center, and will play in seven other US cities (and one Canadian) in the months to come. You can check playdates here, with cities and theaters listed.

All photos are from the film itself, except for that of Mr Bowser, which 

comes courtesy of Zev Greenfield/Milk & Honey Productions. 

Florin Serban's weird WHISTLE/WHISTLE: What a guy's gotta do to get a date

Shocking as this might seem to some of us who've been praising the living daylights out of almost anything we view from a certain small, Eastern European country, we can rest easy at last: Not every new Romanian movie turns out to be a classic. Case in point: Florin Serbin's marquee-filling film, IF I WANT TO WHISTLE, I WHISTLE (Eu cand vreau sa fluier, fluier). Here we have an interesting story, featuring an unusual central character played by a charismatic young actor, and a short running time only half the length of, say,  Aurora or The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu.

The second full-length work from director/co-writer (with Catalin Mitulescu and Andreea Valean) Florin Serban (shown at right), the film takes us inside what initially looks like a relatively decent Romanian prison for young men, where we meet our lead character, Silviu, played by a newcomer with a big future -- George Pistereanu (below) -- and a few of his prison-mates.

This rangy and very keep-to-himself kid is about to be released back into society when his little brother makes a surprise visit to the prison and informs Silviu that their mom (Clara Voda, below) has returned and wants to take the younger bro with her back to Italy. This sends a jolt through out "hero" -- the reason for which we learn only haltingly -- and from this point on the young man's life begins to spin wildly out of control.

Fortunately, the movie does not, although by the finale, it has deteriorated somewhat in the believability department -- allowing all the irony, cynicism and pointlessness we now expect from many Romanian movies to come home to roost. In the better films, these seem unavoidable. Here they appear more than a bit manipulated.

As in so many of the television sit-coms we grew up with, the withholding of important information is all that allows the plot to continue. Whistle offers a hero who withholds just about everything. He won't communicate with anyone. Not the warden, who is clearly on his side (until suddenly he ain't: Whoops -- some of that manipulation is showing), nor the female prison "intern" to whom he is attracted. While we may accept this ultra-closed attitude as a kind of Romanian version of "macho" who would never be a snitch, what's harder to manage are all the events that conspire to do our boy in, starting with the sudden fixation of another of the prisoners (Papan Chillibar, above) with making our hero his bitch.

Reality soon descends into melodrama, and the finale is so drawn out and obvious (oy -- that date!) that we just kind of shrug and go along with it out of respect for the early part of the film. Serban has a flair for immediacy -- close-ups and characterization and moment-to-moment involvement. And in Pistereanu, he has a commanding presence who can carry a movie. These are reason enough to give the film a shot. Just don't expect the profundity of The Death of Mr Lazarescu or Police, Adjective.

From Film Movement, Whistle/Whistle open this Wednesday, January 5, in New YorkCity at Film Forum for a two-week run. Further playdates, with cities and theaters, one hopes,
will follow soon.

Note: Filmmaker Florin Serban will appear in person 

at Film Forum for the opening day, Jan. 5, 8pm show.

In THE KING'S SPEECH Hooper & Seidler offer quiet, classy history to move & amuse

This year's class act (at least, the one that will immediately read as such), appearing not by accident at Oscar- qualification time, is of course THE KING'S SPEECH, the new film from writer David Seidler and director Tom Hooper. It is everything you've probably heard -- from your friends; critics were a bit more mixed -- intelligent, relatively subtle for one of those movies-that-tackle-history, and played to near-perfection by its stalwart cast of classy Brits (and one Aussie) we know and love -- with a story based on true happenings that is guaranteed to amuse and move in nearly equal proportions. What's not to like?

Practically nothing, actually. The movie delivers on its many promises and does so without undue manipulation or moments that come too close to cloying. If it does not offer the excitement of surprise, novelty or a truckload of stylistic flourishes, neither does it bore -- even though you will pretty much know where it is going and how it will get there within a scene or two (or three). Director Hooper, shown at right (and known for Longford, The Damned United and last year's John Adams cable mini-series) has cast his film very well, and each actor, whether the role be large or small, delivers the goods. The filmmaker has his pacing down pat, too: There's a circuitous path from stammer to command that starts, stops and starts again, and as we travel it, we come to know these people, particularly the royal family, better than we might have expected.

Taking place in the 1930s, the movie offers the UK's current Queen Elizabeth II's dad (Colin Firth, above left), who, back then, had a terrible stammer. Because radio was growing in popularity and the royal family had to address its people, and because dad, affectionately known as "Bertie," is in line (not next, but in the wings) for England's throne, he simply must conquer that handicap. HRH, his wife (Helena Bonham Carter, above, right), does some sleuthing and comes up with a said-to-be-exceptional speech therapist (Geoffrey Rush, below). The rest, as they say, is (but this time it really is) history.  NOTE: I have recently been told that, although everything that happens here indeed did happen, the time frame in which it actually happened is not at all as the movie would have it. This may upset some who demand veracity from their films, though it does add suspense and necessity to the situation.

As fine as is the acting on display -- and some of the credit here must be given to Hooper and his editor, Tariq Anwar, who handle each scene with surety, whether it be an argument between teacher and pupil or a surprise introduction to the royal couple (one of the best scenes in the film is the initial meeting of the therapist's wife, the lovely Jennifer Ehle, above, with King and Queen) --  I believe it is the writing that seals the deal. 

The screenplay by Mr. Seidler (above) is expert in juggling its themes -- the life of royals against that of commoners, the psychological underpinnings of handicaps, the casual (and sometime not so) insults of England toward its colonies -- with ease, care and the occasional short, smart exchange. "What are friends for?" asks the therapist, during one telling conversation. After a very short pause, The King's "I wouldn't know" speaks volumes about the troubled, regal life of this poor, wealthy fellow. Up till now, Seidler's work has included a co-writing credit on one of Coppola's lesser accomplishments, Tucker, and a lot of television, including -- of all things -- that noted and campy TV movie Malice in Wonderland, in which Elizabeth Taylor and Jane Alexander limned, respectively, Parsons and Hopper.  

The movie begins to rely a bit too much on the wonderful faces of its actors, as full of humanity and barely-repressed emotion as they are. At the finale, one might want something more than a close-up of Rush following a close-up of Firth to get across the meaning, the fullness, of what we've just seen witnessed. A symbol perhaps, something not quite so literal that makes us think and connect. Am I quibbling? The King's Speech is certainly a fine and enjoyable film -- but it does finally come a tad too close to the movie equivalent of painting-by-numbers.  

Click on the film's site link, then click on one of the ticket hawkers under BUY TICKETS to learn where the film is playing closest to you.

TRUE GRIT, indeed. We're in good hands with the Coen Bros and their expert cast

Are there any U.S. filmmakers, main-stream variety, working at a higher level than the Coen Brothers?  I don't think so. Some time ago, to have called them mainstream would have seemed crazy (Barton Fink, anyone?), yet with each new film -- even the very serious/
hilarious A Serious Man -- their work grows clearer, more understandable, and their view of life richer and truer. TRUE GRIT is, for now, their pinnacle, maybe even their apotheosis. Their movie is so simple, direct, that you could almost miss it. Yet, as it brings together under one "roof" the brothers' many skills, it also takes the western genre to new heights, while placing movie "violence" firmly in the realm of the real and neces-sary: to be avoided if possible; if not to be handled swiftly, com-pletely. There's not a violent moment here you could call gratuitous.

When TrustMovies first heard that the brothers (that's Joel at left and Ethan, below, right) were doing a remake of True Grit, his first response was "Why?"  The original, oft-seen on TV, was a middling movie in most ways, bestowing on John Wayne an unearned Oscar. (Stack his work up against that of Dustin Hoffman or even Jon Voight, two other nominees from the competing movie Midnight Cowboy). Its source material was the over-rated, barely fleshed-out Charles Portis novel of the same name, the big draw of which was its character Mattie Ross, an older/
smarter-than-her-years

girl who is out to avenge her father's death. A secondary draw was the over-the-hill, sometimes drunken U.S. Marshall Rooster Cogburn, whom Maittie hires to help her in this task. The earlier film relied on our understanding and appreciation of cliche to makes its points (helllo, Mr. Wayne!). Even Kim Darby's smart rendition of Mattie fell into this game.  The cliche's are still there in the Coen's version but they don't register as such. You barely notice them, in fact, so unremittingly real seem every word uttered and action taken. Everything here is hardscrapple -- from the lives led (and lost) to the sleeping accommodations and eating (even shitting) condi-tions. The filmmakers do not un-derscore anything. They needn't because they are content to show it all simply and easily. This new True Grit lasts 110 minutes, yet it seems a good deal shorter. No time is wasted watching the vast vistas of the west. The fine cinematography (by Roger Deakins) is even a little washed-out, as befits the parched land we see, sometimes snow-covered.

Performances are all we've come to expect from those in a Coen film, with Jeff Bridges (above left), Matt Damon (below) and newcomer Hailee Steinfeld (above, right) -- who gives an even more career-making performance than did Ms Darby -- offering exactly what is needed to capture character, reality and -- yes -- the kind of movie-star charisma that keeps us hooked, but here without any of the ego-building bloat that so often accompanies this charisma.

Bridges is, of course a much better, more believable, versatile and honest actor than was Wayne (who could be fun from time to time in giving us, as ever, the expected).  But this fine actor surprises us again, disap-pearing into the character until it almost seems you can smell him (not that you'd want to get a whiff of this Rooster). Damon uses his occasional penchant for the near-prissy to initially put us off, but then spends the rest of the film drawing us to him. He's got a gift for taking any dialog and making it his own; here, that dialog is some of the best he's had in a long while. Damon, too, keeps surprising us. At this rate, he may yet become one of the more versatile actors at work in all of Hollywood.

Ms Steinfeld is the revelation here. So incredibly honest is her each moment and word that she takes what could easily slip into caricature and gives it rock-solid believability. It's an unfussy perfor-mance, too, as befits the Coens. Not a facial expression is over-drawn nor wasted. This is not Steinfeld's first role: She's done TV work and made a few short films. Her IMDB photo makes her look like any number of attractive young starlets, but leave it to the Coens to find what's special, then make the most of it -- a la Michael Stuhlbarg in A Serious Man.

Josh Brolin (above) -- on a roll these days, after playing chief vilain in the Wall Street sequel, a comic cad in the latest Woody Allen, and hero in the under-seen but surprisingly enjoyable (for a based-on-a-comic-book movie, anyway) Jonah Hex -- proves once again memorable. His screen time is short but he makes the necessary impression. How the Coens handle the violence that surrounds this character is particularly telling, I think.

I don't remember how the original film ended, but I certainly will this one. The Coens use that fine actress Elizabeth Marvel, narrating and striding through the finale with such strength, barely-buried feeling and finesse that she suddenly, briefly, owns the film. Her encounter with two very well-known gentlemen is ripe indeed -- smart, quiet and filled with sad, troubling information that deepens what is already a fine little story.

You get up from True Grit feeling enormously satisfied. As the days pass, you'll begin to realize just what a piece of art it actually is.