It is hardly a politically correct movie, with scenes of abuse, rape, prostitution, drug abuse, torture, religious corruption, porn addiction, etc,etc,etc....This film VIVA RIVA! shown several weeks ago at SIFF is NOT DULL, and these days that is something to recommend it. It's a lively, sometimes funny, sometimes brutal story of a friendly gangster who steels a truckload of gasoline from a more brutal gangster, and spends the movie running from other gangsters and the police, plus the corrupt military which in this case is headed by a nasty lesbian. You get the picture, but you will not be bored. GRADE----------B
Another SIFF entry opening today is THE TRIP, a two character talk-a-thon that features actor and comedians and impressionists Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon playing themselves as they drive through northern England visiting lots of fancy restaurants and trying to play one-upsmanship with each other. It's like a comic version of MY DINNER WITH ANDRE, and contains beautiful scenery, luscious looking food and an a capello version of Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights sung by the two leads. What's not to like? GRADE-----------------B
Appropriately named, THE ART OF GETTING BY is a tired young man coming of age movie, with Freddie Highmore playing a high school senior who over thinks his life so much so that he can hardly function as a student, son, and boyfriend. When the girl Emma Roberts makes a pass at him he nearly becomes catatonic. Can he pull himself together in time to save his mother's marriage, get the girl, and graduate from High School? Does anyone really care? Do teens really talk like sullen philosophers? Why does the director insist on using the hand held herky jerky camera so damn much? These uncompelling questions are answered in THE ART OF GETTING BY. Barely.
GRADE-------------C
_________________
See my BEST OF SIFF 2011 report in the previous blog (June 14)---
In the meantime, SIFF has brought back some films for the BEST OF SIFF playing this weekend only at SIFF CINEMA at the SEATTLE CENTER/MCCAW HALL. Some I have not seen. Some shown are decent, if unexciting, like BEING ELMO: A PUPPETEER'S JOURNEY, which is the type of documentary that seems likely to play continuously on PBS, since it is mostly about a key player on/behind SESAME STREET. I thought ON THE ICE was very interesting, with Barrow Alaska becoming an eerie, white, sinister character in the sad murder mystery that threatens to rip apart the small Eskimo community. Also well done is the Norwegian film KING OF DEVIL'S ISLAND, about (the miserable and cold) life in an island prison for wayward boys. An audience favorite is the sentimental but effective PAPER BIRDS--bring Kleenex. And the documentary TO BE HEARD is a clear-headed, hopeful story of three high school students who dream of using their talents as hip-hop poets as their ticket out of the ghetto--but a lot stands in their way.
But if you have only two hours to spend, GO SEE HOW TO DIE IN OREGON--the best that is being shown this weekend. It's a heartbreaking, devastating documentary about the Right to Die initiative in Oregon a few years back, which later came to Washington state. The shocking opening scene follows an elderly sick man as he ends his own life of pain, and then it follows several key patients and proponents as it explores their beliefs, hopes, philosophies of life and death, and decisions. The film is actually very empowering and hopeful, and in spite of some grim facts, you will leave the theatre rather exhilarated.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment