Synopsis: Arms dealer Yolaf Peterson aims to make a sale to guerilla Mongo, but the money is locked in a bank safe, the combination known only to Professor Xantos, a prisoner of the Americans. Yolaf agrees to free Xantos, accompanied by reluctant guerilla Basco, but a former business partner of Yolaf’s- John ‘The Wooden Hand’, has other ideas.
One of Hondo’s enduring masterpieces, West Indies is a stunning widescreen musical that takes place entirely on a single set – a giant slave ship that symbolizes the triangular relationship between Africa, Europe and the Caribbean – as it explores the parallels between the forced migration of the Atlantic slave trade and the contemporary migration of Afro-Caribbean subjects to former colonial metropoles. In a breathtaking display of virtuosity, Hondo deftly uses an array of filmic techniques (a vertically oriented mise en scène, dexterous tracking shots, beautifully orchestrated long takes) to explore four centuries of history within his single location, signalling temporal shifts through fluid camera movements and sumptuous staging; meanwhile, the remarkable range of musical styles, witty, poignant, and rousing lyrics, and brilliant choreography dazzle the senses and invite the spectator to join in the struggle to transform the world. –Aboubakar Sanogo
Said Hondo: “I wanted to free the very concept of musical comedy from its American trade mark. I wanted to show that each people on earth has its own musical comedy, its own musical tragedy and its own thought shaped through its own history”.
ArtsEmerson writes: Hemingway’s crestfallen tale of American expatriates in Europe is faithfully refashioned for the screen in Henry King’s 1957 drama. The Lost Generation’s carousing lifestyles and misguided behavior are depicted much like in the original text, with performances rich in contradiction and nostalgic sentimentality. Leo Tover’s Cinemascope cinematography, elegantly reserved and yet aptly illustrative, imbues a lively atmosphere into the film’s famous Pamplona bullfighting scene, and the screenplay retains much of the distinct syntax and rhythm of Hemingway’s printed dialogue.
Depicting the effects of a mid-1980s strike by the employees of a Hormel meat-packing plant in Austin, Minnesota, Barbara Kopple’s Academy Award-winning documentary American Dream observes both the daily struggles of the striking workers and the behind-the-scenes conflicts amongst the union leaders. Upset at a proposed pay cut, the local union chapter begins the strike against the advice of their parent organization, hiring an outside consultant who encourages the workers. This consultant’s aggressive, no-compromise approach turns the conflict into national news but also alienates management. Soon, despite the efforts of a seasoned negotiator sent by the parent union, the company has locked out the workers and hired scabs, leading to a series of violent conflicts amongst members of the community. The workers’ resolve progressively fades as the battle extends into months and years, and the financial hardships they and their families suffer leads some to doubt the value of their efforts. Kopple, who had previously covered an extended miner’s strike in the acclaimed 1977 documentary Harlan County, USA, focuses on the personalities and emotions behind the strike, creating a highly charged portrait of labor that is sympathetic to the workers’ distress without ignoring the strike’s greater ambiguities.
A man, a child, two wars, a river, a tree. A man and a child meet under a tree on a river bank, sharing the same memory and a secret. They find in each other the serenity, the silence and the time they lost in the flowing water of the river. Quote: One of those rare films so accomplished and yet so open to interpretation that each viewer will find their own references. Vladan Petkovic, Cineuropa
Quote: This stirring, anarchic behind-the-scenes look at Paul Gross’ Hyena Road uses everything from psychedelia to instructional videos to question both the validity of war movies and Canada’s mission in Afghanistan.
Quote: Wherein Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, and Galen Johnson give Paul Gross’ wannabe populist war epic Hyena Road a right and proper cuadecuc-ing. Who would have thought Pere Portabella’s legendary experiment shot on the set of Jess Franco’s Count Dracula (1970) would inspire not one, but two films at this year’s TIFF—well, three, if you include Ben Rivers’ short A Distant Episode alongside his feature The Sky Trembles and the Earth Is Afraid and the Two Eyes Are Not Brothers (which, likewise, is also inspired in part by Sam Peckinpah: a worm’s tail indeed!). Along with being fucking hilarious, Bring Me the Head of Tim Horton (a.k.a. Gross and Grosser) is a bona fide exploration into the depiction of violence in the cinema (video or emulsion, doesn’t matter), doing for the war film what Portabella did for the vampire movie. Does this make Stephen Harper a present-day Francisco Franco? You make the call.
Shot on the margins of the Jordanian shoot of Gross’ big-budget production, this mash-up is pitched as a kind of literal director’s monochromatic fever dream behind the scenes, as Canadians in uniform go about playing real soldiers, stalking their prey video-game-like. Why Maddin is wearing all black in the middle of the desert, lying on the ground supposedly playing a Taliban extra, is one of the many questions the film/installation only partially answers. Other pertinent queries include: Who or what is speaking the pseudo-intellectual gibberish that includes such memorable phrases as “the abandoned chesterfield of ontology?” Why did Paul Gross agree to this in the first place, and how the hell did Maddin and the Johnsons get away with it? Will this ever be shown again in public?
Synopsis: In Zagreb, the stripper Anna de Istria works in a sleazy cabaret. She is seduced by the blonde Cynthia Robins that invites her to move to her house. Ana is disturbed by nightmares, where she kills a man with a spear, and Cynthia calls Dr. Paul Lucas to treat Ana. Meanwhile, a couple that lives in the house next door spies the movement in Cynthia’s house.
Quote: In West Africa during the late 17th century, King Adanggaman leads a war against his neighboring tribes, ordering his soldiers to torch enemy villages, kill the elderly and capture the healthy tribesmen to sell to the European slave traders. When his village falls prey to one of Adanggaman’s attacks, Ossei manages to escape, but his family is murdered except for his captured mother. Chasing after the soldiers in an effort to free her, Ossei is befriended by a fierce warrior named Naka.
Extra: 11min: Historical Viewpoint by Fritz Umbach, Professor of World History, John Jay College, City University of New York.
Kawase’s contribution to the 2009 Jeonju Digital Project.
A Japanese-Korean man (Kitamura Kizuki) travels to a village in Nara to fulfill his late grandfather’s final wish. A local woman (Nakamura Yuko) shows him around town, but the relationship grows into something beyond visitor-and-guide.
Quote: In 1972, Miyuki tells her ex-lover Kazuo that she’s going to Okinawa with their son. Kazuo decides to film her. He narrates his visits to her there: first while her flatmate is Sugako, a woman Miyuki is attracted to; then, while she works at a bar and is with Paul, an African-American soldier. Once, Kazuo brings his girlfriend, Sachiko. We see Miyuki with her son, with other bar girls, and with Sachiko. Miyuki, pregnant, returns to Tokyo and delivers a mixed-race child on her own with Kazuo and Sachiko filming. She joins a women’s commune, talks about possibilities, enjoys motherhood, and is uninterested in a traditional family. Does the filmmaker have a point of view?
Against Tradition, Against the System, Against Society
After Golden Blade Sentimental Swordsman, Tsui joined the film industry. His debut work was The Butterfly Murders (1979). Set in Shen’s castle, the plot focuses on an investigation of the ‘butterfly killers’, who have committed a string of murders. Valiant men from various places have also been killing each other. A writer-reporter, Fang Hongye, is writing about all of these incidents to anthologize them in a book entitled Diary of Hongye. In the process, Fang discovers that all of the killings have been initiated by the master of the castle, as part of his plan to become the king of wulin (the martial arts world). Other people, one by one, are murdered and the sole survivor is Fang. This movie marked the beginning of the director’s trial use of sci-fi special effects as a substitute for the special effects seen in traditional martial arts movies. The intention behind this work was to blend the dichotomies of tradition and modernity, myth and science, and the Orient and the Occident (including Japan).
These oppositions, however, are mixed not in an organic but in a connotative manner, ultimately subverting myths through science. The narrative eschews magic devices of the traditional martial arts world, such as flashes of light, flying swords, thunder coming from the palm of a hand, flying through the air and digging through the ground. It makes use of certain substitutes, for instance, a slingshot arrow and string-and-hook instead of qinggong [the ability to move lightly and swiftly], gunpowder instead of secret weapons, tin and lead amour instead of a golden bell cover/iron-cloth garment. Unfortunately, this approach of trying to find scientific explanations greatly neglects the unlimited potential of the human imagination. This neglect is a big fault, particularly in the cinematic world where imagination is a source of creativity and is a criterion. In addition, the metaphysical arts and extraordinary powers of the Orient contain their own spectacular attributes, which are well suited to the exercising of the imagination
The martial arts genre with special effects has an illustrious history. It is the successor of a Shanghai feature, Torching the Red Lotus Temple,7 which already incorporated the technology to show light and force emanating from swords, palm thunder, people flying through the air and so forth. This movie was so well received that a total of eighteen episodes were produced. At the peak of its popularity in 1931, the drama was suddenly banned by the Film Inspection Committee of the National Government.8 This prohibition also put to an end the making of martial arts films in mainland China. However, the Japanese occupation and the civil war led a number of pioneers of the martial arts movies, such as Wang Yuanlong, Hong Zhonghao, Ren Pengnian, Wu Lizhu (actress), Lu Jiping (set designer), to migrate to Hong Kong, thus allowing the genre to live on.
The 1950s and 1960s were the golden decades of Hong Kong martial arts movies. Films such as Marvelous Gallants of the Jianghu and Temple of the Red Lotus I and II were made in 1956 and Torching the Red Lotus Temple I and II were made in 1963. In the 1960s, over thirty such films were made,9 of which The Secret Book (1960), Buddha’s Palm (1964) and Holy Flame of the Martial World* were the most memorable. In that period, the technology that was adopted in the martial arts movies of that decade bears reference to certain foreign pictures such as Godzilla, King Kong and others. More complex animation, optical effects and archetypes came into use. Added to this the locally created yinbogong (sound-wave martial arts) and other technologies, these films were so spectacular that the audience was amazed. The final episode of The Secret Book even earned 280,000 Hong Kong dollars in box office revenues, which broke the record for local and foreign films in the past ten years.10 The 1970s were basically dominated by the kung fu genre, in which practical fights and moves were emphasized. However, King Hu’s Dragon Gate Inn, A Touch of Zen and some other movies made use of optical effects and animation.11 Tsui took these traditional special effects and updated them into modern, sci-fi type effects. Besides being a pioneer, Tsui has also taken on the role of advocate, which has bolstered his reputation as one of the most prominent auteur of ‘special effects’ movies.
Without doubt, Tsui’s The Butterfly Murders is a breathtaking work that contains extraordinary characters, spectacular images and peculiar moods. However, he was overambitious and tried to raise too many questions in this film. The content was confusing and appeared to beyond the director’s control. Moreover, this film incorporates too many pastiches from other movies, namely Yatsuhaka Mura from Japan, The Birds by Hitchcock and robot figures from Star Wars. In the process of appropriation, the director did not sufficiently digest the elements and make them part of his own. The result was a film with a disorganized structure and confusing logic. Little wonder that the editor of the French periodical Cahier de Cinema wrote, ‘The plot is so disorganized that, soon after the beginning, I was already unable to follow the movie.’12 If even a film professional was bewildered, it is not surprising if the general audience was as well. However, this work certainly tried to challenge traditional myths and attempted to be ‘different’. While the movie may perhaps be overly exaggerated or perhaps ‘be stuck at the stage of handicraft techniques,’13 the film-maker did indeed take a significant step in the direction of reforming martial arts movies.
Like the unknown woman imagined by the poet – which is never quite the same nor entirely different- this new Glimpse 13 resembles it’s twelve prestigious precedents while having its own distinct identity. Roy Stuart has put extra effort into the design and implementation of the twenty odd sequences that make up this diverse album. All the imagination, energy, expertise, as if making a feature film. Probably because he had been working on a feature film project earlier this year. This is especially true of the brilliant main sequence, which tells the story and contrast of two girlfriends-an inexperienced childlike beauty that recites romantic poetry in the street and a more mature girl who likes to show off in front of her webcam.-The younger girl opposes her friends twisted plan to use her as bait to pick up and rip off a guy -but who will come out on top? …
And of course, this is the DNA of Roy Stuart, a bevy of pretty girls – brunette, blonde or redhead, all generously unshaven, get naked, play ,evolve, caress, love, with intensity and authenticity and who sometimes spring golden sources. The work is multi-faceted- even the darkest expression projects a surrealistic life-force along with the lighter work which is sheer fun,… a playful shared wink straight from the artist himself…
Two and a quarter hours of pure pleasure once again, Roy’s magic! – Christian Noirot
In the sixties the painter and sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle started her career with shooting paintings, reliefs that were fired at with paint bags. She became famous and popular for her Nanas, colorful sculptures of big and cheerful women, and for the cooperation with Jean Tinguely. The frame of this film is a tour through her tarot garden in Tuscany.
Quote: A confident young cop is shown the ropes by a veteran partner in the dangerous gang-controlled barrios of L.A. about to explode in violence in this look at the gang culture enforced by the colors that members wear.
Loosely adapted from William Faulkner’s controversial novel Sanctuary, this notorious pre-Code melodrama stars Miriam Hopkins as Temple Drake, the coquettish granddaughter of a respected small-town judge. When a boozehound date strands her at a bootleggers’ hideout, Temple is subjected to an act of nightmarish sexual violence and plunged into a criminal underworld that threatens to swallow her up completely. Steeped in southern-gothic shadows by influential cinematographer Karl Struss and shot through with moral ambiguity, The Story of Temple Drake is a harrowing vision of sin and salvation that boasts an astonishing lead performance from the fiery Hopkins, whose passage through the stations of terror, trauma, and redemption is a true tour de force of screen acting.
Quote: After a film production wraps in Peru, an American wrangler decides to stay behind, witnessing how filmmaking affects the locals.
Quote: THE LAST MOVIE 1971 was his follow-up to the hugely successful EASY RIDER, but it’s core was much more elusive and abstract, dealing with the nature of film reality and reality it’s self. The editing was loose, the story half told. Hopper shot tons of footage in Peru and brought it back to his home in Taos, New Mexico. He seemed lost in this editing process and the studio was getting upset. For a while Alexandro Jodorowsky, who’s EL TOPO 1971 Hopper greatly admired, assisted in the editing. During this time the documentary THE AMERICAN DREAMER 1971 was made showing Dennis toting a machine gun, frolicking with numerous groupies, and acting supremely wasted. (The Weird World of 70s Cinema)
Music icon David Byrne was inspired by tabloid headlines to make his sole foray into feature-film directing, an ode to the extraordinariness of ordinary American life and a distillation of what was in his own idiosyncratic mind. The Talking Heads front man plays a visitor to Virgil, Texas, who introduces us to the citizens of the town during preparations for its Celebration of Specialness. As shot by cinematographer Ed Lachman, Texas becomes a hyperrealistic late-capitalist landscape of endless vistas, shopping malls, and prefab metal buildings. In True Stories, Byrne uses his songs to stitch together pop iconography, voodoo rituals, and a singular variety show—all in the service of uncovering the rich mysteries that lurk under the surface of everyday experience.
A married couple grieving the recent death of their young daughter are in Venice when they encounter two elderly sisters, one of whom is psychic and brings a warning from beyond.
