DVD Releases: 'As If I Am Not There'

As If I Am Not There (2010), the second feature from Irish writer-director Juanita Wilson and starring Stellan Skarsgård, Miraj Grbic and Natasa Petrovic, opens on a young woman tearfully looking at her unwanted newborn baby, before taking a shower as blood trickles into the drain. Of all the films based around the conflict in Bosnia, few have focused solely on the plight of ethnically cleansed civilians, and none are likely to be as relentlessly sombre in tone. Yet as uncomfortable as it is to watch, it's also extremely powerful and engaging.

We follow the plight of Samira (Petrovic), a young, middle-class teacher from Sarajevo who begins teaching classes in a remote hillside village just as the Bosnian war is beginning. Serbian troops arrive soon afterwards and their barbarism is swift and ruthless. After executing all the men, they bus the women and children away to a military camp, to live in diabolical conditions, where they are either forced into hard labour or mercilessly raped and abused. Word to the wise: this is not a date movie.

Depictions of such unforgiving recent histories will inevitably put some viewers off, and the brutal rape scenes will certainly echo long in your memory. But Wilson consistently makes her biggest mark in quieter moments. For an adaptation from a novel, dialogue is sparse, and impact is felt when we don’t see things. When the men of the village are led outside by the soldiers, the camera remains indoors, lingering on the women as machine gun fire is heard, and their expressions pack a desperately emotional punch. Wilson demonstrates impressive patience and thoughtful pace.

This also provides room for a breathtaking central performance from the Macedonian newcomer. In her first lead role, Petrovic carries As If I Am Not There with a gravity that belies her age; her face conveys emotions that dialogue could not articulate.

Samira is a more complex lead than the usual helpless victim we're used to, and eventually starts using the soldier's sexual appetite to her advantage, a grim compromise that wins her no friends with her fellow detainees. But as one of the soldiers tells her, "You're only doing what you have to do to survive - just like me".

Indeed, it is a resolutely human drama - save for the end title, the war on which events are based is not mentioned, nor are the motivations behind the Serbian's ethnic cleansing; and you sense that the reality was even worse. Political or historical grounding is deliberately bare, and no comforting conclusions are offered. Such endless hopelessness is only offset by almost inconsequential lifelines: when Samira is raped, she concentrates her attention on a tiny fly, giving meaning to the title. But these are small mercies.

Bleak and hard-bitten though it is, As If I Am Not There is also immensely compelling, a film to be admired if not necessarily to be enjoyed. Thoughts and emotions are stirred and provoked, and despite the lack of historical context, that it is 'based on real events' cannot fail to rouse strong feelings. As If I Am Not There has been announced as Ireland's official submission to next year’s foreign language Oscar, and richly deserves a nomination, at the very least.
Article source - http://www.cine-vue.com/2011/09/dvd-releases-as-if-i-am-not-there.html

DVD Releases: 'Cat O' Nine Tails'

In only his second film as director after the sublime Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970), Dario Agento was determined to demonstrate new facets of his talent, enthusing that Cat O' Nine Tails (1971) - starring James Franciscus, Karl Malden and Catherine Spaak - would be a different beast to its giallo siblings. An over-simplistic diagnosis perhaps, but the only discernible difference between the film and his masterful debut seems to be that only one of them is any good.

Opening abruptly with the blind (and impossibly saintly) Franco Arno (Malden) and his niece overhearing a particularly delicate conversation between two shadowy men in a parked car, the film quickly falls into a familiar trajectory of death and paranoia. The men's words gather more relevance as the pair investigate following a string of murders related to a pharmaceutical company's research into criminal gene theory, another underexploited and potentially interesting angle on an otherwise generic piece.

Article source - http://www.cine-vue.com/2011/09/dvd-releases-cat-o-nine-tails.html

"Technique is nothing more than failed style" offers John Water's Cecil B. DeMented (2000), but the inverse is equally applicable in Argento's early career, with films such as Bird with the Crystal Plumage and Deep Red (1975) exuding an inventiveness, even playfulness, born out of the filmmaker's desire to push the technical and visual boundaries of the medium. You can practically see the director's eyes lighting up as the ideas sparked: 'What would happen if we put the camera on a bungee rope? Or if we attached the knife to the camera?'.

Cat O' Nine Tails opts for a more classical approach, unfolding predominantly in wide and medium compositions, panning slightly to accommodate movement. In the hands of a more versatile filmmaker, this would hypnotise - in Argento's hands, it looks like bad television, a verdict confirmed by the hammy delivery of a script which, though ludicrous and exposition-heavy, could have actually been a lot of fun.

Later Argento films are similarly flat but always boast astonishingly designed set pieces that elevate even the most routine or ridiculous to a higher plain - what Cat O' Nine Tails lacks in its moments of suspense or, in one particular instance, body horror, is consistency. There are flashes of brilliance and what the filmmaker would later coin 'violence as art', including one particularly memorable shot of a falling man's hands smoking as they clasp an elevator cable. Sadly these moments are sandwiched between such obvious and mundanely executed elements, making it hard to determine whether these flourishes are truly as inspired as the appear, or simply more favourable by comparison.

To bring myself explicitly into the proceedings for a moment, I must say that I found myself scouring the film for silver linings or fresh takes, attempting to impose the filmmaker's talents and preoccupations onto areas of the film where neither are present. For those who have read my previous pieces on Argento's cinema, my own stance on the director's work is clear, making it all the harder for me to denounce Cat O' Nine Tails as a failure of only passing interest to lovers of Argento's work.

DVD releases: September 23, 2011

'Bride Flight'

 Music Box Films

(★★★): It's been a while since one of those sweeping historical dramas wrapped around a tale of star-crossed lovers has come along. The new Dutch film "Bride Flight" is satisfying in that way, weaving together the fates of four young Dutch strangers caught up in the post-WWII migration to New Zealand. Fiances await the three girls; adventure the guy; all in a land they believe holds infinite promise. Director Ben Sombogaart begins the story in the present day with a wonderfully weathered Frank (veteran actor Rutger Hauer playing a rugged youth in his later years) surveying his vineyards, stopping in to taste the latest vintage. Soon, three women — scattered around the world and defined by different lives — are opening letters with news of Frank that will bring them together again. The answers to the mystery raised by those first few scenes will come in time as the filmmaker takes us back to the start of the engrossing story. 130 minutes; R for a strong sex scene and some graphic nudity.


Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/sep/22/DVD_releases_main_0923/#ixzz1Ym4iWcYe
- vcstar.com

DVD releases: September 23, 2011

'Bridesmaids'
(★★★ ½ out of four): This takes the typically clichéd wedding movie genre and completely upends it and reinvents it into something surprisingly daring and alive. But it also takes the Judd Apatow-style buddy comedy, with its mixture of raunchiness, neurosis and sentimentality, and tailors it to female experiences and sensibilities. That the film achieves both of these ambitious goals simultaneously while remaining (mostly) hilarious is a testament to the power of Kristen Wiig as co-writer and star, and to the awesomely eclectic ensemble cast of strong comedians who surround her. Wiig plays Annie, a Milwaukee woman who's recently lost her bakery and her boyfriend. The one bright spot in her life is her best friend Lillian (Maya Rudolph), who's just announced that she's getting married and wants Annie to be her maid of honor. But Annie ends up competing with Lillian's new BFF, the perfect and passive-aggressive Helen (Rose Byrne). Meanwhile, Melissa McCarthy steals the whole film as Lillian's wildly inappropriate future sister-in-law. The film was released in May and became an immediate sensation, taking in $281 million worldwide. Not too shabby for a film that cost $33 million to make. 125 minutes; R for some strong sexuality and language throughout.


Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/sep/22/DVD_releases_main_0923/#ixzz1Ym4VD3NY
- vcstar.com