Streaming choice: Zach Clark's WHITE REINDEER -- an oddball, deadpan original

Though TrustMovies has seen the actress Anna Margaret Hollyman in a number of movies (generally not in the leading role: Somebody Up There Likes Me and Gayby are two of the most recent), nothing she has given us so far impresses me as much her work in WHITE REINDEER. In this strange and rather deadpan film by writer/director Zach Clark (shown below), Ms Hollyman not only has the leading role but it would be difficult to imagine anyone else quite as distinctive and right for this quirky, unclassifiable little bit of holiday non-cheer.

The movie would seem to have the outline of a melodrama (after all, it includes, robbery, murder, infidelity, pole dancing and more), yet in the playing/telling, it is resolutely unmelodra-matic. You will find yourself laughing off and on, yet White Reindeer is anything but comedy. It is not a drama, either, exactly, though there are also moments of odd tenderness and feeling that make themselves felt without the filmmaker, actress or the rest of the cast "pushing." Among its themes is one that probably stands out most: Even if you think you know who you are and what your life's about (a sometimes tricky proposition to begin with), all this can change in a moment. Oh, yes, and it's a Christmas movie, too, though I think we'd have to place it firmly in the category of "alternative" holiday fare.

Ms Hollyman, above, plays a happily married realtor named Suzanne, whose hubby is a successful businessman about to move the couple to Hawaii. Once fate (or whatever) intervenes, Suzanne finds herself involved with a group of strippers,

one of whom is  named Fantasia (a quite wonderful first performance from Laura Lemar-Goldsborough, above), who has a young child and lives with her mom.

There's a detective (Chris Doubek); a newly married couple played by Lydia Hyslop (above, center) and Joe Swanberg (yes, that Joe Swanberg, above, left, doing a nice acting turn here) who has bought a house via Suzanne; a couple of co-worker real estate ladies; Fantasia's group of strippers (shown below), and some other odd and various characters. But it is Ms Hollyman who holds it all together, as she tries to figure out, well, so many things. And we're right there along with her.

White Reindeer can be streamed now via Netflix, and elsewhere, but apparently it is not yet available on DVD.

Jay Arnold's WHAT HAPPENS NEXT details -- and well -- the later-in-life "coming out" experience

In its quiet, easy-going and quite charming manner, writer/director/ producer Jay Arnold's film from 2011, WHAT HAPPENS NEXT, shows us a successful businessman, single and suddenly forced into retirement (don't worry: he's been bought out and so can live quite well) who now finds enough time on his hands to finally consider who he might be, sexually speaking, and discover in earnest his attraction to men. Now, this is a rom-com, gay version, so don't expect enormous depth and exploration. What makes What Happens Next more unusual than you'll first imagine is the relationship between the two men at the core of the movie. In it, the younger fellow -- who's long "out" and happy with his life -- must slowly lead his older paramour through the shoals of this new "learning experience" without moving too fast and frightening him off. This is something that gay movies almost never give us, and it turns out to be useful, funny, moving and quite, quite dear.

Mr. Arnold has cast his film with more of an eye toward quality and believability than the usual gay hunk quotient. This goes a long way in making his movie as much fun and moment-to-moment real that we sometimes get in gay-themed cinema. Jon Lindstrom (above, left) as Paul, the early-retirement businessman, and Chris Murrah (above, right, and at bottom, right) as Andy, the relatively young kid he meets dog-walking in the park, are both very fine actors with the kind of attentiveness to each other's performance that makes for scene after scene that rings truthful, funny and touching. As the relationship develops and we get to our first "bedroom" scene, instead of some would-be hot sex, we get a kiss that is so fraught and tender and amazing that it's all we need to make us melt in the hands of the filmmaking team and the actors.

As Paul's ever-controlling sister, Elise, Wendie Malick does her usual, and does it very well, and there are some nice supporting performances, too. But it is the relationship between Paul and Andy that is the heart of the movie: how it develops, why it is important for both men, and how Andy must lead Paul into a better understanding of himself -- all this is captured with a genuineness that is rare for the genre.

What Happens Next -- running 100 minutes -- is available now on Netflix streaming and elsewhere. It's worth a watch.

At last! Marco Bellocchio's thoughtful end-of-life movie DORMANT BEAUTY hits American theaters

I first saw and covered this moving and surprising film two years ago, expecting it would open soon in a limited release. No such luck. Now, finally, adult movie-lovers will have the chance to see and ponder the film that is one of its director's -- Marco Bellocchio's -- best. I've re-posted my original coverage below, with a few updates. Watching DORMANT BEAUTY a second time makes me realize anew how very fine a film it is.

Euthanasia may not seem the hot-button issue in America that abortion always is, but float it into a conversation -- anywhere, anytime -- not simply as a subject for discussion but with real specifics attached and you'll discover disagreement and shock followed by flaring tempers before you know what has hit you. Imagine the same topic in Italy, home of the Vatican and its I'd-better-abdicate-before-the-shit-hits-the-fan former Pope, not to mention the oh-my-god-he's-a-Communist (who maybe helped the Argentine military "disappear" leftists) current Pope, and you'll no doubt end up with that disagreement, shock and flaring tempers squared.

All of which makes Marco Bellocchio's newest film DORMANT BEAUTY (Sleeping Beauty is a closer translation, but I guess that one's been used a few too many times) such a strong and satisfying film. A surprising one, too -- and not in terms of what Signore Bellocchio (shown above) is capable of and usually gives us. Rather, the surprise comes from the fact that this writer/director does not take a side but instead shows us several sides. (Yes, in life, there exists more than merely "pro" and "con.") This forces us to confront human beings in specific situations, rather than mere ideas.

The film takes place in 2009, during the fraught period just prior to an Italian father's pulling the plug on his daughter, Eulana Englaro, who had been in a coma for some 17 years. (For an American version of this, think back to 2005 and the case of Terri Schiavo.) While Italians demonstrate on both sides, Bellocchio zeroes in on a handful of disparate people.

Among these are a Senator (Toni Servillo, above left) whose personal feelings and conscience go against those of his party, and, in fact, of his own daughter (Alba Rohrwacher, below, right) who is adamantly pro-life. His conversations with his peers, as well as with a "therapist to the politicians," are among the film's most trenchant and sometime darkly amusing.  When she becomes suddenly involved in an incident provoked by the other side, her life takes a drastic change, as she finds herself drawn to the brother of one of the protesters on the opposite side (Michele Riondino, below, left). This situation -- fodder, it might seem, for a smart rom-com -- is here used in a way that allows these characters, along with us, to try for some growth and change.

The dormant beauty of the title, in addition to the real Eulana, is found in the home of a famous French/Italian actress, played by Isabelle Huppert, below. Her daughter, too, is comatose, and while the father and brother might like to see that plug pulled, the actress, who has renounced theater, has submerged herself in the Catholic faith. That this section, though believable enough, is the least persuasive should not be surprising, for all-or-nothing religious faith must, I think, be experienced to be truly understood.

Elsewhere, a drug-addicted woman (Maya Sansa, below, left) is taken notice of by a doctor (the filmmaker's younger brother, Pier Giorgio Bellocchio, below, right) and a dance of death/life ensues, and again, thanks to first-rate writing, directing and performing, we're able to understand things from both sides of the war. Will the movie change any viewer's viewpoint from one side to the other? Probably not. But it probably will make the "other" a little more understandable.

From Emerging Pictures and Cinema Made in Italy and running 115 minutes, Dormant Beauty opens tomorrow in New York City exclusively at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema. In the Los Angeles area, the film will open in Friday, June 13, at Laemmle's Music Hall 3, Town Center 5 and Playhouse 7. Elsewhere? Yes, and you can find the cities and theaters by clicking here, and then clicking on Show all dates worldwide for this title.

MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE, Marc Bauder's classy doc about a German sleaze, opens at AFA

What a guy! There will be times during the course of MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE -- the Austrian/German documentary in which ex-banker Rainer Voss tells a-lot-if-not-all about the current economic crisis as experienced from the European side -- when you'll feel like sticking your fingers into the eye sockets of Mr. Voss and simply pushing as hard as you can. Unless, of course, you yourself are a banker or European-equivalent Wall-Street sleaze. Then, depending on your particular level in the hierarchy, you'll do everything from snicker in fond reminiscence (if you were anywhere near Voss' level) or simply wave all this away as "old news" and utterly unimportant now (if you're closer to the top of your respective organization, à la  Lloyd Blankfein, CVS -- Chief Vampire Squid -- of Goldman-Sachs).

One of the more interesting scenes in this new film, released in Europe in the fall of last year, and now opening for a week's run here in New York City at Anthology Film Archives, is that involving Jérôme Kerviel and Société Générale, the French multinational banking and financial services company for whom Kerviel worked and was eventually convicted of fraudulent trading, even though he claimed his practices were widespread within the company, and that making a profit resulted in the hierarchy's turning a blind eye. Under a little pressure from the film's director and co-producer Marc Bauder (shown above), Voss explains why traders get punished while the higher-ups never do.

Voss (shown above and below) also explains that in the old days, not that many years ago, when a share in a particular company was purchased, it was held on to for an average of four years. In our current times, that average is 22 seconds. What's the point -- other than to make a quick buck -- and where does this leave the company and whatever work it is supposed to be accomplishing? The film takes place in an empty building, not that long ago abandoned, in which one of those huge international bank/financial services companies used to be housed. The cinematography (by Börres Weiffenbach) is aces down the line. This movie at times looks better even than Cosmopolis. And the accompanying music (by Bernhard Fleischmann) works very well, too. But the center, the dead heart of the film, is Herr Voss' narration.

This guy tells us all about how to gyp your client, then excuses himself, contradicts himself, makes more excuses, and finally goes silent. This happens periodically. "You're always trying to get more out of me!" he exclaims at one moment to someone we assume is the filmmaker. Well, yes: That's the point, dear. Herr Voss began his career at around the time computers first came upon the scene, and so he smartly acquainted himself with this new machine, which helped his rise in the industry. The film's first half takes us up to the crash, the second half covers post-crash.

We learn a lot of interesting stuff along the way about our new "banking and investment services" industry. Lesson one would be this: Just because a transaction is highly complicated doesn't mean that it makes any sense. Regarding whether or not we're remotely "out of the woods" just yet: "It's going to blow up in our face; there's no way this is going to have a happy end."  We see our own American Congressional hearing, as congressmen try to pin Goldman-Sachs employees to the wall, and later we watch one of those "We want to help YOU!" commercials for a new German bank.

"The bigger the shit, the thicker the Corporate Responsibility Brochure," remarks Voss. In that case, this guy's CRB should be thickest of all, for he comes across as one cynical, self-satisfied son-of-a-bitch. But a smart one, it must be said, and one who has helped further lift the cloak of secrecy from the worthless (except to itself, of course) industry that has wrecked -- and continues to keep wrecking -- the world economy.

Master of the Universe -- in some English but mostly in German with English subtitles and running 88 minutes -- opens this Friday, June 6 (D-Day!) in New York City at Anthology Film Archives. You can check for performances times, tickets and directions by clicking the appropriate link.

The FSLC's OPEN ROADS 2014 opens w/ Daniele Luchetti's fond, clear-eyed THOSE HAPPY YEARS

After viewing and reviewing nearly every film in the annual OPEN ROADS series of new Italian films showing at the Film Society of Lincoln Center over the past decade or more, 2014 marks the first time that I will not be able to properly cover this fine festival. The intrusions of life have meant that suddenly I had to bow out of seeing more than the first press screening of the opening night film, THOSE HAPPY YEARS (Anni felici) from the popular and accomplished writer /director Daniele Luchetti (shown below, of Ginger and Cinnamon and My Brother Is an Only Child).

Intelligence, humor, nostalgia, and family love and pain have whirled within all the Luchetti movies I've seen and his latest is no different: Only the setting -- the art world of 1970s Italy, in a time of noticeably changing mores throughout western civilization -- is different. The filmmaker's skill and compassion is upfront and on fine display, as usual.

I don't know that the story told here is a personal one, but it certainly could be, as the film is narrated by the older son of the

family, Dario (a wise, funny, sad, first-film performance by Samuel Garofalo, at right), a character whose age range during the course of the film would easily fit that of Signore Luchetti's back a few decades, and who is himself a budding filmmaker. In fact, Dario receives the gift of his first video camera during the film.

As good as is young Garofalo, the main characters here are his loving but confused parents, played by two of Italy's most beautiful stars. Dad (Open Roads regular Kim Rossi Stuart, above), a semi-successful "modern" artist with more ambition than apparent talent, is also a heavy-duty narcissist who cheats repeatedly on his wife but can't conceive of her being able to do the same thing to him.

Mom is that amazing and energetic actress Micaela Rammazotti (above, right), who made such an award-winning stir internationally a few years back in Paolo Virzi's family chronicle, The First Beautiful Thing. She learns and grows during the course of the film -- just as does Dad, and even the kids (especially Dario) -- coming to grips with an attraction to her hubby's agent (a very smart and interesting performance from Germany's Martina Gedeck, of The Wall, shown below, center right).

We learn something of Italy's art world back in the 70s and watch a funny, surprising display of performance art, while we also observe, yet again, that special something that seems to distinguish Italian cinema and how it deals with family. Luchetti's addition to the oeuvre is a keeper, so I hope this film will get a theatrical release in the USA. In any case, you can see it first at Open Roads, this Thursday, June 5, at 1pm and 6:30pm -- along with a whole bunch of other films that look, from their description and credits, extremely promising.

Check out the entire Open Roads program here, and see as many of these movies as time and money permit. After all, it's hard to go too far wrong where Italy and cinema are concerned.

Brian Horiuchi's unsettling end-of-the-world tale, PARTS PER BILLION, goes straight to Blu-ray

There are pretty much two kinds of end-of-the-world movies. One type is faux, since the world contin-ues, as in the worthwhile Deep Impact or the piss-poor Armageddon. The other version is not afraid to give us the real thing, though this kind of film doesn't come along all that often -- and is never of the blockbuster variety (the hoi polloi demands feel-good). The best of the actual end-of-the-world lot would be Don Mc Kellar's Last Night from 1998, but 2012 brought us another fine example in David Mackenzie's Perfect Sense. Now there's a new one to add to this brief list: PARTS PER BILLION by Brian Horiuchi (below), his first film as writer/director.

While not nearly up to the level of the other two films on my short list, Parts Per Billion is good enough to qualify as a quality product. It's well written, directed and especially acted by the eight excellent performers who play the three couples, the sister and the best friend who comprise the fine ensemble. Mr. Horiuchi, shown at right, takes our current and ever widening revolutions, wars and general anarchy in the mid-east and leaps off from the chemical warfare supposedly used of late by Syria, and from this sort of behavior extrapolates a new kind of pathogen released into the air via chemical warfare. Airborne, it is soon wiping out entire populations. Once it crosses the Atlantic, goodbye USA.

Parts Per Billion concentrates on just three couples, one very young (Teresa Palmer and Penn Badgley, above, right); one approaching middle age (Rosario Dawson and Josh Hartnett, above, center), and one old (Gena Rowlands and Frank Langella, above, left); the Badgley's character's sister (Alexis Bledel, below, who doubles as nurse to Langella and Rowlands); and the Hartnett's character's best friend (the excellent Hill Harper).

Horiuchi tends to bury his exposition well enough so that it tends to pop out only when his characters might actually be talking about that particular subject. He also uses flashbacks judiciously to fill us in on how these people come to be in the position they now find themselves.

The three couples are deeply in love, though not, it seems without having had some bumps along the way. The true beauty of this film is how we come to share their love and believe in it. "What are the important things?" one character asks during the course of the film. Parts Per Billion forces this question upon us time and again in scenes that include Hartnett, a young boy and the boy's father in the park; Badgley and Palmer in a truly lovely proposal scene; and Langella facing down his past behavior and terrible decisions with grit and grace.

Horiuchi's writing is better than this genre usually offers: smart but unshowy and always about things. "This is how wars start," notes one character, " because of the different ways people keep stuff in their cupboards!" When you actually see this moment, that line seems both amusing and sensible.

The filmmaker does not back away from the darkest side of things, either. He spares us the blood and gore but takes us to the brink, allowing us to view (or hear) as some of the characters meet their demise. There's also humour along the way, as well as music, lovemaking and food. As we see our civilization closing down via these eight characters, it becomes clear that Mr Horiuchi has given us an end-of-the-world movie that can actually bear the weight of its subject.

Parts Per Billion -- from Millennium Entertainment and running 102 minutes -- hits the street on DVD and Blu-ray tomorrow, Tuesday June 3 -- for sale or rental. Apparently Netflix hasn't even ordered the film yet (you can "save" it to your queue), but Amazon has it on disc and streaming, the latter via its Instant Video.

Streaming tip (to miss): Iain Softley's adaptation of Sébastien Japrisot's TRAP FOR CINDERELLA

Iain Softley (shown below) directed one of my favorite scare movies, among the quieter and most genuinely evil and shocking in this genre, The Skeleton Key, and also did a pretty good Henry James adaptation with Wings of the Dove, and so it pains me to have to report that his latest directorial effort, TRAP FOR CINDERELLA, is generally tired and obvious from about the one-third point onwards. I attribute this more to the late writer from whose novel Softley adapted his screenplay: Sébastien Japrisot, a scribe whose work has "gifted" us with some of the sillier would-be mystery thrillers.

Remember Rider on the Rain, The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun and One Deadly Summer? On the other hand, Japrisot did the marvelous screenplay for Children of the Marshland and the novel on which A Very Long Engagement was based. Perhaps when he worked in other genres, he did a better job. With mysteries, his silly "twists and turns," seldom backed up with much psycholo-gical reality, get tired awfully fast.

So it is with this new film that deals with identity, amnesia and a murder plot. If you haven't figured out what is going on much sooner than the movie dumps it on you, then by all means keep watching.

Once you do figure it out, you simply wait for the film to catch up. And that can be pretty boring. What you'll have to divert you will be the performances and the casting -- which bring to the fore some good actors like Kerry Fox (above, left) and Frances de la Tour, plus that new hottie Aneurin Barnard (here quite under-used), and a couple of attractive and, for all we can tell, maybe talented ladies: Tuppence Middleton (below, right) and Alexandra Roach (below, left).

By the end of this 100-minute-but-still-too-long endeavor, you may simply shrug and ask, so what?  You will find no answer to that question. But perhaps you can content yourself with those silly and unbelievable twists and turns provided by M. Japrisot.

Trap for Cinderella, from IFC Films, is available now via Netflix streaming and maybe elsewhere, too.

Streaming tip: Fans of Peter Facinelli and/or oddball rom-coms will want to watch LOOSIES

The hunky and talented actor Peter Facinelli, a Queens boy, has had quite a nice career: more than 50 film and TV appearances in less than 20 years. Yet the stardom, which many of us expected would be his, seems to have so far eluded him. Still, he manages to appear in lots of interesting films, the least interesting but most successful of which would have to the Twlight saga, in which he portrays Daddy Vampire. He also made some waves in movies like the delightful Can't Hardly Wait, the ill-fated (but still fun) Supernova, and the recent rom-com-cum-chase-movie, LOOSIES, which he wrote, co-produced and in which he plays the leading role.

As directed by Michael Corrente (shown at left: American Buffalo, Outside Providence), the movie plays fast and relatively well, while the screenplay -- though not always super-believable (are cops really this stupid?) -- works decently enough to engage us in both the love story and the action /chase aspects of the film.

Facinelli (on poster, above, and below) plays Bobby, a pickpocklet and petty thief who manages to sustain himself and his mom via his clever fingers and fast thinking/action. Under normal circumstances, we might find it difficult to root for a guy like this, so the movie provides Bobby with a backstory "out," which we learn a bit of, and then more of, as the film progesses.

Romance is provided by the lovely Jaime Alexander (below) as Lucy, a girl with whom our "hero" had a little fling, which now comes back to haunt and entice him all over again.

The bad guys (except they're not, really) are cops played by Michael Madsen, whose police badge Bobby has stolen and uses from time to time, and his boss William Forsythe, below, both of whom have some fun with their roles.

The real bad guy is the crook to whom Bobby is "indebted," played with his ususal relish by Vincent Gallo (below, right). There's a subplot about Bobby's mom (a nice job by Marianne Leone) and her new romance with a fellow played by the always amusing Joe Pantoliano, and this is worked nicely into the film's focus and climax.

That's about it. Loosies turns out to be a feel-good fluff piece that will easily pass an hour-and-a-half of your time -- particularly if you're already a Facinelli fan. If not, the movie might turn you into one.

You can stream Loosies now via Netflix and elsewhere. It's also available on DVD and Blu-ray (the latter under the title, Love Is Not a Crime).