MILL VALLEY FILM FESTIVAL 2002

The great question for any film festival is more simple than you might expect… “Why?”

This is the same central question that I often start with when looking at movies.  Why did this writer and this director want to make the film… why did the studio finance it… why did the actors who weren’t just looking for a job get involved… why?  Film festivals have an odd place in our societies.  There are a handful that have true commercial influence and thrive, whether they like it or not, for that reason.  And there are festivals that are so specific in nature or so small that they answer “why” as simply as “because we wanted to.”

And then there are the other festivals.  Festivals like Seattle and Boston and Chicago and other major market festivals that are really big local festivals, but aspire to more.  But despite its proximity to San Francisco, Mill Valley is not a major market festival.  Mill Valley is a beautiful little town near one of America’s great cities… a city that is home to one of America’s biggest film festivals.  Yet, one look at the Mill Valley schedule tells you that this festival is aspiring to more than its place at the children’s table.

This festival manages to deliver more than 75 feature films and dozens of shorts in just 10 quick days.  On top of that, they offer over a dozen high-quality seminars and events, including a lot of specialty programming for children.  And then, there are the parties.  Yet after spending four full days in Mill Valley, I’m still not sure what the “why” is.

There is a personal element in my experience with this festival.  Many of the choices developed in Mill Valley over its twenty-five year history are very much in line with my choices in the one-year history of my Miami Film Festival.  But the “why” was clearer for me in Miami… I had a Top 15 market that is also a tourism center that could, with time, draw major crowds.  Mill Valley doesn’t have a lot of room to grow.  If 5000 visitors suddenly decided to visit the festival, there wouldn’t be a good place to put them or enough theater seats to accommodate them.

If you took the Mill Valley Film Festival and stuck it in Los Angeles – or in San Francisco, really – you would have a major film festival with national position.  I mean, there are some serious tech issues and some of the programming is a little iffy for a higher profile festival but, for the most part, Mill Valley has the pieces of the puzzle in place.

Maybe if I go back next year, I’ll find the “why.”  Maybe the Festival Director will actually make an effort to say hello to one of the handful of journalists in attendance.  Maybe not.  He has a good thing going.  The Rafael Film Center in San Rafael is one of the most wonderful facilities for repertory cinema that I’ve ever seen and, from what I gather, the film festival had a lot to do with re-modeling it into its current glory.  The Sequoia Theater in Mill Valley itself was clearly a great single house in its day and now stands as a mediocre split into two theaters… but still, there is a lovely intimacy to the town and the shared experience of the “downtown” Mill Valley neighborhood.

The only thing I would really do to improve the experience is to simplify it.  The festival is so expansive and so spread out that there is no feeling that the festival director is taking you on a journey.  And for a festival that is this intimate, and is guaranteed by location to remain this intimate, that is unfortunate.  I guess it is impressive to get Miramax and Warner Bros. to split opening night, with Frida showing in San Rafael and White Oleander showing in Mill Valley, but who is being served by that overload?

In any case, there were a few really nice surprising discoveries in Mill Valley.  The first was Ping Pong, a Japanese movie, currently in release in Japan and apparently making its North American debut at Mill Valley.  It’s a very promising first film from Fumihiko Sori, albeit a very commercial one.  It was reminiscent of last year’s Waterboys, which still hasn’t gotten a domestic distributor.

Larry Meistrich & Cassian Elwes’ new arthouse DVD distribution company, Film Movement, should really work on expansion once it gets more established.  Their film “curators” are not really the guys on the edge of the indie movement any more.  Frankly, if the LA Film Festival NY Film Festival or AFI Festivals were doing their jobs better, there wouldn’t be as much of a need for Film Movement.  (Or for that matter, for the Tribeca Film Festival or a worthwhile film festival in Los Angeles.)  Nonetheless, an expanded base could be a great answer for indie film in America as well as for the future of Film Movement.  Los Angeles’ American Cinematheque should be curating a Japanese pop series.  Roger Ebert’s Overlooked Film Festival should become a Film Movement series.  Unifrance should be delivering a French series of films that aren’t going to sell in the U.S.

But I digress…

Ping Pong was good unremakeable-in-English fun.  The website is here.  It feels like part of an international fun-with-sports movement, which included Waterboys, Fox Searchlight’s 2003 release Bend It Like Beckham, the underseen Nick Hornby soccer comedy Fever Pitch (which is now being remade as an American baseball movie) and Miramax’s 2003 release, Shaolin Soccer.

Another real discovery was John Sanborn’s MMI.  The bay area is more familiar with Sanborn than most of America, but Sanborn’s video performance art film (I can’t think of a better way to describe it) was one of the few pieces reflecting on 9/11 that I have seen that was really worth the viewing.  Perhaps the reason for this is that Sanborn’s film is not really about 9/11, so much as an entire year of change, pain and reflection.  Sanborn’s journey includes a cross-country move, a major career change, the death of a parent, the loss of what was supposed to be a life-changing job and the 9/11 experience in New York City.  Like so much video art, you shift around in your seat for the first ten minutes or so, waiting for your brain to accommodate a new language.  But MMI is well worth the effort.  A powerful film that deserves more exposure than it will ever receive.

Another documentary that has a small radius and makes a big wallop is Taran Davies’ Afghan Stories.  This journey also starts at Ground Zero, but Davies is looking to get outside of his own world and into Afghanistan, just as America is starting its bombing campaign.  He does get to Afghanistan and Tajikistan, but he never gets quite as far as intended… physically.  Emotionally, he goes farther than I think he expected.  He connects with humanity.   A terrific film.

A non-documentary that travels a similar road is The Deserted Station, a film by Alireza Raisan, based on a story by Abbas Kiarostami.  This is the tale of a modern couple, looking at an older culture before becoming stuck, thanks to an engine failure, in this world, experiencing instead of examining.  The film asks a lot of questions and leaves the answers to your experience, as it slowly brings you closer and close until you are experiencing instead of examining.

A film that I was not so enamored of was a 30 minute short that played with Afghan Stories, called The Children of Ibdaa: To Create Something Out Of Nothing.  It’s a film about a group of Palestinian children who are part of a dance troupe.  And while it was interesting, my problem is that I like my propaganda to be labeled as propaganda… or at least for the people making the film to recognize that they are making propaganda.

The irony is that the filmmaker S. Smith Patrick is obviously very talented, very smart and very sincere.  My guess is that the conversation about her film would be fascinating and would not end in an angry way.  I have no trouble feeling real sympathy for Palestinians.  But I don’t believe that the situation between Israel and these displaced people is a black and white one.  There is a lot of righteous anger and there are a lot of horrible failures of humanity… on both sides.  For me, the simplification of the situation, by either side, is more dangerous than any other form of explosive.

My challenge to Patrick, and all of the other documentarians who have made films about the children, would be to make some films about adult Palestinians and adult Israelis.  The pain of children is singularly unacceptable.  And therefore, as political discourse, it is unanswerable.  Whatever side of this issue you come down on – or if you are on the fence – you know that children are suffering.  But the answer, if there is an answer, will come from adults… unless we are willing to write off another couple of decades right now.  Absolutes fade to gray when embodied by adults.

Speaking of gray, Lynn Ramsey’s new film, Morvern Callar (that would be the lead character’s name), is a colorful exercise in grays.  The always amazing Samantha Morton is Morvern, a woman trapped in a tiny life who is set free by a loss that seems likely to destroy her, the suicide of her boyfriend.  Her initial inability to even acknowledge his wrist-cut body in the kitchen door leads to a true lust for life… but not in the easy or obvious ways that most films would ask us to applaud.  Morvern’s self-empowerment is tough and chilly.  Not many actresses (or filmmaker’s) could keep us so close to this woman’s heart and so willing to cheer for her fight for life.  At first, I wasn’t wowed by this movie, but it has stuck with me in unexpected ways.

One of the films I was really looking forward to was Made Up: A Vanity Production, Tony Shalhoub’s debut behind the camera.  Shalhoub is one of my favorite actors of his generation, along with other non-household names like Vincent D’Onofrio, Timothy Spall, Tim Roth, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Don Cheadle and others whose names I just can’t cough up at the moment.  He’s one of those guys I was onto early… for some reason, I even seem to remember already knowing his work when I saw him in Quick Change, his first movie.  Anyway, he is always great, whether in an indie like Big Night or a machine movie like Men in Black II.  In fact, he is so good that I have gotten absurdly tongue-tied both times I’ve met him in the last month or so.  I can talk a lot of crap, but with some people, small talk feels oh so small.

In any case, I was really curious about the directing skills of a guy who is so precise in his acting work.  Made Up is a digital feature based on Lynn Adams’ stage play, which Shalhoub produced, his wife Brooke Adams directed and in which Brooke’s sister Lynn Adams starred.  For the feature, Shalhoub went behind the camera, Brooke Adams took Lynn Adams’ stage role, Lynn Adams the writer wrote a new role for Lynn Adams the actress and the sisters co-produced along with Mark Donadio.  This is a family affair.  But Shalhoub found, as he tends to when acting, more than is on the surface.

The harsh reality of the film business is that Made Up will not find domestic distribution.  Whatever shot it had was ended by the box office failure of Tadpole, a film that hit theaters with a Sundance-powered engine… still, not enough.  Made Up has many of Tadpole’s best qualities and far fewer problems.  Shalhoub doesn’t direct like a first timer, obsessed with close-ups and coverage.  The film, which has been transferred to film, is formatted around the idea that the whole thing is being shot as a documentary, and still it looks better on the big screen than Tadpole.

But the concept does lead to one significant flaw in this film… it is reaching for too much.  As you dissect the film, it is clear that there the filmmakers have been very precise about how each shot was actually put on tape/film.  But that effort shows.  A film within a film is really, really difficult to do.  And while many of the shots that seem impossible prove to have a logic, many are reaches… and the story and performances are so engaging that the effect is sometimes that of great mu-shu put in a slightly stale pancake.

The real power of the film is in its performances.   This is a film that reminds audiences of what was so interesting about Brooke Adams in the first place… above and beyond her looks.  This couldn’t be more appropriate, as the film is about an aging woman, a retired actress, feeling the pressure of her increasing years.  Like Katherine Ross in Donnie Darko, Adams does look like most of her 53 years – not all of them – in close-up.  But, again as with Ross, it is a pleasure to watch an uninhibited performance by an adult woman who allows herself to look like an adult woman.  This film, even undistributed, could well re-start Adams’ acting career.  I can only assume that her voice over career is still happening… that voice!  Her sister Lynn’s performance in this film could also move her into more acting roles.  She comes off as a less extreme version of the ever-working Caroline Aaron… the perfect movie best friend/advisor/pushy broad.  And the real find of this film is Eva Amurri, who is also in The Banger Sisters as Susan Sarandon’s daughter (her real-life role as well).  I haven’t seen The Banger Sisters, but in front of Shalhoub’s cameras, Amurri shows real skill as a comedienne, a remarkably relaxed presence and a sexy side that can only be compared to her mother’s… a compliment of mammoth proportions.  My only advice for Ms. Amurri is that she grows her hair out.  Like her mother, her eyes are a bit overpowering and the pixie thing kind of smacks the audience in the face.  Amurri wears a wig in one part of the film and the difference is palpable.

Like I said, I don’t expect to see Made Up at the local multiplex.  And it was not my favorite film at Mill Valley.  But I spent a lot of column inches because I want to encourage Tony Shalhoub to get behind the lens again soon.  It sounds like damning with faint praise, but to say that his first directorial effort was imperfect, but showed no serious flaws is high praise.  I don’t feel his voice as a director in this film.  But my guess is that it is there.  And when he feels less like he has to “keep it together” and more comfortable with the process, my guess is that he can become one of our best actor/directors.

MVFF EVENTS:  One of the strengths of this festival is its events.  They offered four tributes; Ed Asner, Milos Forman, Diane Wiest and Robin Wright Penn.  All four are worthy tributes, although Forman is the only true film icon of the group at this point.  But Wiest is one of the great character comediennes of all time, Wright Penn is one of our best working actresses and Asner is more than an actor… he is one of California’s most important actor/activists ever.  One of the real highlights of the weekend was a panel with Wiest, Asner, Adams and Shalhoub discussing a life in acting… particularly the pitfalls of getting older.

I only attended the Forman tribute, which was hosted by David Thomson, who continues to rise up the list of critics of world significance.  The event was well put together and Thomson’s relaxed charm was more than matched by Forman’s gracious style as a storyteller.  The only problem was that there was not nearly enough time.  And again, in a mature film festival, this is one of its only weaknesses.  Besides having a long career as a cutting edge Czech filmmaker, Forman has made seven films in America, every one of which deserves at least 20 minutes of discussion.  Perhaps there was some editorial judgment involved, but I wasn’t happy to find Valmont completely missing from the program.  And there was a whole lot more Ragtime to chew on than we ever got a chance to start towards.  Still, a wonderful opportunity to hear from a wonderful filmmaker.

I also attended two of the events that were put out there as kids events.  And indeed, the behind the scenes look at Kermit’s Swamp Years was really for the kids.  But “How Did They Do That: The Secrets of Star Wars” was really for adults.  I don’t know too many eight-year-olds who have the patience to sit through a discussion about effects development at LucasFilm.  I only wish that the event, which was a tremendous seminar for any festival to offer, was sold to adults and offered at a more accessible hour.  But even with the mention of these two events… pretty impressive stuff for a small film festival… or even for a larger film festival.

Even in my few days there, there were other highlights, like Welcome to the Club: The Women of Rockabilly and The Crime of Father Amaro.  But my fingers are tired.

There is a lot to get enthusiastic about in Mill Valley.  I’m still waiting for my “why.”  But my best advice for improvement is that less can be more.  MVFF feels like a little festival whose ambitions have built it up like a bodybuilder on steroids.  As it heads into its 26th year, a little body sculpting is in order.  It is great success story to be able to deliver so much of what they want to deliver.  But it is a sign of real maturity to stop eating when you are no longer hungry but not yet full.  More importantly, it leaves room for desert.

READER OF THE DAY:  TAIWAN STEVE is back!:  “Swept Away is not a horror film, The Ring is.

Back to 1999, when the Japanese film The Ring (or you can all it "Ringu") released in Asia, wow, that's big phenomenon.

We already seen the original The Ring, its extra sequel (which the plot has nothing to do with the first one), its real sequel and the prequel. Besides, there's TV series based on the extra sequel (the curse video turn into a curse CD-Rom), and comic books series based on the film and the series of short novels. Before Dreamwork purchase the remake right, Korea already remake "The Ring" in their own version.

All these happened in two years. Amazing.

When it released in Taiwan, the first two weeks box-office were flop. Everyone thought it's a loser. Somehow, it turned out to be No.1 in the next 7 weeks. That's right. The Ring got such strong buzz from everyone who saw it, so strong that it was purchased and released at HK in a very short time.

Because the real scary is not in the theater, it's after the theater. It haunted you, followed you to your home. While you sleep, dream, awake, you always think about The Ring and the curse. Some people were too scared to sleep or watch TV, they must go to temple to ask monks to pray for them.

The Blair Witch Project is scary? No, You must check out The Ring. Then You will realize why "The Ring" can scare you out of shit.

Now, people in Asia already knew what The Ring would happen, but you guys in America have no idea. We knew how to survive the curse video, protected ourselves again The Ring.

We knew how to survive longer then 7 days once we saw the curse video!

And you guys don't know.

Until you see The Ring, having nightmare or troubles about getting to sleep. I will tell you how to break the curse.

Or, you can beg me now. Then I will tell you."

E ME:  Anyone want to beg Steve?