Tag Archives: female directors

All We Had

Katie Holmes directs herself in All We Had, and proves she isn’t afraid to paint herself in an unfavourable light. Rita Carmichael is good at loving men but terrible at picking them. When another loser reaches his expiration date, it’s her daughter Ruthie (Stefania Owen) that knows it’s time to cut ties and get the hell out of dodge. The problem is that Rita and Ruthie are chronically broke. Rita self-medicates for her crappy childhood with null cheap booze. Between men they live out of their piece of shit car. They have almost nothing going for them but Rita makes keeping Ruthie out of child services her top priority, and so far, she’s always succeeded.

This time, though, it’s going to be extra difficult. Their car breaks down literally in front of the greasy spoon where they just dined-and-dashed and it looks like they’re stuck in whatever crummy small town this is.

All We Had is not a great movie, but it’s not bad. It’s just that Katie Holmes is so hellbent on making this an inspirational story of redemption, she leans heavily on tired formula schtick. Addictions, childhood trauma, financial crisis: this movie has it all, everything except focus. All We Had is the kind of movie you’ll make excuses for – “it means well” you’ll say, and mean it. But that’s not quite enough. There’s not enough skill here to pull meaning from the good intentions. But if you’re willing to watch Katie Holmes try, All We Had is good for 1 hour and 45 minutes of trial and error and smudged eyeliner.

Nina

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Nina Simone, born Eunice Kathleen Waymon, was a tour de force. She was a classically trained pianist who studied at Julliard. She applied at the prestigious Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia but was rejected despite an excellent audition because of the colour of her skin. Never intending to sing, she was forced to in order to make a living being a musician of the non-classical variety, the only option open to a woman of colour. She played a blend of jazz and blues, folk and gospel, and probably more besides. She changed her name to avoid embarrassing her family now that she played “the devil’s music.” And she became an activist, an outspoken proponent of the Civil Rights movement. Her music had always spoken to her roots, but soon she incorporated political themes there as well. A beautifully angry song “Mississippi Goddam” written in response to the bombing of the Baptist Church in Birmingham Alabama (that killed 4 little girls) particularly comes to mind, because how could it not? It’s spectacular and heart breaking. There was a great documentary made about her life not too long ago, but Nina is not a documentary, which means someone had to step into her shoes.

MV5BODk1NDY2MjcyN15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNzkzNzM2ODE@._V1_SY1000_CR0,0,1502,1000_AL_ Mary J Blige was originally cast but had to drop out. Nina herself had hoped that it would be Whoopi who’d portray her on screen. Instead director Cynthia Mort went with Zoe Saldana, and thus created a furor. With Dominican and Cuban ancestry, Saldana identifies as a black woman, but critics felt she was not black enough. Not black enough? The notion makes me queasy. But when Saldana said she was honoured to play Simone, the Nina Simone Foundation nastily replied “Dear Zoe, please keep Nina’s name out of your mouth for the rest of your life.”

Saldana’s talent is bigger than the criticism. She has a great voice, which you may have heard in The Book of Life, but no, she doesn’t sound like Simone. No one does. But she brings a lot of strength and dignity to the role, a mean feat considering the film focuses on the latter years of Simone’s life, which were turbulent to say the least. Mentally and financially unstable, Simone was committed to a psych ward, where she met a nurse she would later make her assistant, and then her manager. David Oyelowo plays the nurse. Biopics generally benefit from a narrow focus, but this one is perhaps unfair to her memory since Simone was so much more than just her struggles. See the documentary for a clearer picture of her life, but to see Saldana shine, this is one good role among many.

Two days before she died, the Curtis Institute of Music bestowed granted Simone an honorary degree.

Hobbyhorse Revolution

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I was excited to review this film for Hot Docs because I’d heard of and was mystified by ‘hobbyhorsing’ and needed to know more about it.

Hobbyhorsing is a lot like the horse competitions you’re used to seeing on TV, or in Olympic events. Dressage, an equestrian sport, is the highest expression of horse training. In the events, you’ll watch horse and rider perform a sequence of events from memory, including piaffe (a special kind of trot), and pirouette (a 360 degree turn). In the obstacle event, the horses will jump over poles. Horse and rider are judged on how smoothly they go through the movements, and how willingly and with minimal cues the horse performs.

In hobbyhorsing, the competitions are similar, except – NO SHIT – performed with a fake horse. A hobbyhorse: those toys for small children which consist of a horse head on a broomstick.

Hobbyhorse Revolution is a documentary that sheds light on this burgeoning community, and on the people who compete (they’re older than you’d think).

Competitors “train” extensively, but don’t forget it’s their own two feet doing all the work. The ‘horses’ get off pretty lightly but are still given starring roles. Their ‘riders’ talk about them as though they are real: this one is ‘energetic’, this one ‘well-schooled.’ They are ridden with whips and put away with stable blankets. You know, in case they get fake cold.

The teen-aged girls interviewed for the film are almost all troubled in one way or another and I can’t believe that’s a coincidence. Playing make-believe with toy horses is a blatant extension of childhood. In this light, hobbyhorsing is perhaps not simply a curiosity but a disturbing trend – 10 000 “hobbyhorseists” in Finland and growing. Unfortunately, the film maker fails to answer that most obvious of questions: why? What is happening to these girls that they’ve left their peers and retreated to the safe but immature world of racing fake horses? Interesting but superficial, Hobbyhorse Revolution is a hollow look at a surprising new safety blanket.

[Between you and I, I can’t really watch a 17 year old young woman prancing around with a stick between her legs and not wonder if it’s somewhat sexual. Or entirely sexual. Either way, something here is messed up.]

Hot Docs: Tokyo Idols

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What saved a 43 year old man from depression? What is he so devoted to he refers to it as a religion? What is so intoxicating he’s blown through his life’s savings? Sad-sack middle-aged men in Japan are flocking to ‘pop’ concerts performed by underage girls. They’re called Idols in Japan, they perform in ‘girl groups,’ and to date there about 10 000 of them.

They’re providing a coveted if creepy role in modern Japanese society: comfort to men MV5BOTk0OTQ1NjYzNV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwODA4NzE5MDI@._V1_SX1777_CR0,0,1777,999_AL_ who have very little else going on. In a tanking economy, middle aged men find themselves with poor jobs, little money, and even less confidence. It’s no wonder they’ve stopped dating real women and have shifted their fantasies toward little girls, who run no risk of rejection. The Idols host “meet and greets” where their fans will of course pay a lot of money to have a minute’s worth of childish conversation and a handshake – in a culture where the handshake still has a sexual component to it, having been completely taboo between the sexes until only a few decades ago.

Yes, watching these stunted middle aged men fawn over children is uncomfortable. They worship virginity, prefer girls who are “still developing,” and believe that 17 is past prime. Their worst fear is that these girls will grow up to be strong women. Sapped of self worth, many men in Japan have quit dating ‘real’ women altogether. The birth rate is falling. Idol culture is proliferating. The men who adore them beyond all reason are called ‘Otaku’. These super fans would put even the most fervent Justin Bieber fan to shame. Not long ago, Otaku were considered failures, some song lyrics even called them filthy pigs, but they are becoming more and more mainstream.

The Idols, meanwhile, are on constant parade, never far from a judging eye. Every year there are Idol elections, where the men pick their favourite girls to perform for the next calendar year. For the girls it becomes about winning male adoration, and they become conditioned to want it from an alarmingly young age. The men can spend thousands (monthly!) attending concerts, accumulating merchandise, and buying time with the girls. If this sounds like prostitution to you, you’re not wrong. It’s even creepier than prostitution, isn’t it? There’s no intercourse taking place, but money changes hands for its substitution.

Director Kyoko Miyake does an excellent job absorbing her audience into this obsession. I almost felt like a voyeur, that’s how intimate her access is. And as morbidly fascinating, as this phenomenon is, Miyake expertly nestles it within a social context that deepens our understanding of it. While I was discomforted watching these transactions take place, it’s clear that the lines are blurrier in Tokyo. Miyake carefully shows both sides, the good with the bad, finding what sympathy she can in the humanity of it. Tokyo Idols is a really interesting watch and my only complaint is that I wanted even more. I’m positive there are even darker themes here to explore (what happens to the past-prime girls, for example?) and I can only hope that we’ll see more from this director in the future.

Casting JonBenet

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The case of murdered 6 year old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey still fascinates today. Originally reported as a kidnapping, her strangled body was eventually found in the family home. Her parents were publicly if not legally tried but the case remains unsolved. In ‘Casting JonBenet’, streaming now on Netflix, director Kitty Green uses members of the Ramseys’ Colorado hometown to recreate JonBenet’s last hours. But more than that, the film documents the actors’ reflections on the crime, their theories, their impressions, and their own personal connections and recollections.

Green explores the mythology surrounding the 20-year-old crime, and palpates the collective memory, to which even we, the viewer contribute. It makes for a very different, almost hybrid documentary, that doesn’t so much shed light on the JonBenet case but reminds us of how we’ve all coloured our own recollections over time. The movie’s casting call includes the following characters:

MV5BMTY3NDU3ODUwNl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNjE3NTE5MDI@._V1_SY1000_CR0,0,1738,1000_AL_ The Mother, Patsy Ramsey, seen by many as suspect #1 since the kidnapping note was determined to have been written on her stationary with her pen from inside the home. Was she jealous of her beauty queen daughter? Frustrated by another bed wetting episode? Did she accidentally kill her, then try to cover it up? Interviews with the press were defensive and unsympathetic. Do you identify with her grief or crucify her for her mistakes?

The Father, John Ramsey, destroyed vital evidence when he moved his daughter’s body, despite being cautioned not to. There were no signs of an intruder. His intuition in finding the body struck police officers as suspicious – did he know too much? And then rumours of sexual abuse circulated. Plus, the family let the ransom note’s 10am deadline slip by without a word, and John was booking tickets for the family to fly to Atlanta that same day.

The Brother, Burke Ramsey, was shielded by his parents from the press as a child but recently came off as creepy if not culpable in an interview. A flashlight in the family home fits perfectly with a gash on her head, and could explain a skull fracture. A piece of undigested pineapple found in JonBenet’s stomach seems to have come from Burke’s nighttime snack – did he strike out in anger? And marks on her back are consistent with toy train tracks in his room. Did her brother kill her and his parents cover it up?

A convicted pedophile living in the area was found with a picture of her in his possession. He also had a stun gun – could this explain those marks on her back? He’d also placed a call to a friend not long after, confession to having “hurt a little girl”. And the knots in the garrote used on JonBenet were consistent with knots used when he tried to choke his own mother with a telephone cord.

Santa, actually a friend of John’s dressed as Santa, visited the home just days prior to the Boxing Day murder, for a party at which the children each sat on his lap. He seemed to pay particular (too much) attention to JonBenet, and even arranged a “secret” meeting with her later.

The only new information in this documentary is the dirty laundry being aired by the actors, about themselves. But it’s a compelling look back and a bracing reminder that JonBenet’s killer was never brought to justice.

Ithaca

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Should you tip the boy who brings you the telegram that says your son is dead?

That dilemma and others covered in Ithaca, loosely based on William Saroyan’s The Human Comedy, which is not remotely funny. But it did give Meg Ryan some comfort when she was going through her divorce from Dennis Quaid, so what better material to use in her directorial debut?

ithaca9f-2-web She plays the mother of sons, a hard thing to be in 1942; Marcus, who is off to war (played by Jack Quaid, Ryan’s actual son), Homer (Alex Neustaedter) who struggles with being the 14 year old man of the house now that his father (Tom Hanks) is gone, and little Ulysses (Spencer Howell) who doesn’t remember anything different.

This is really Homer’s story and the growing up he had to do. He’s such an exuberant kid at the start of the film, determined to be the best and fastest bike messenger in town. But 1942 means WW2, and WW2 means lots of devastating telegrams. How does it transform a 14 year old kid to deliver grief in an envelope? To witness the moment a woman is made a widow? To see a mother torn apart by pain? That’s pretty heavy stuff to be grappling with when you’re also mooning over your first crush and taking your little brother down to the local fishing hole. It makes for a heightened existance, but it’s also just life for Homer, who has his own little odyssey to live.

The film is a little under-achieving, a retread of themes we’ve seen elsewhere, and often. Sam Shepard has a pretty compelling role, which makes up for the very rare glimpses we get of Hanks. If it doesn’t quite live up to its potential, it’s still bittersweet in its nostalgia, and tucked sufficiently at my heart strings. Meg Ryan hasn’t hit it out of the ballpark on her first swing as director, but don’t count her out.

Shiners

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Shoe shiners: at the airport, a busy subway station, a kiosk in your local mall, even on the street corner. There they are, every day, providing a service to the people walking by. Yet this humble profession is often overlooked. Who goes into shoe shining, and why? Director Stacey Tenenbaum gives us a documentary that gives us the answers by putting us in the shoes of shiners around the world.

Filming in cities as diverse as New York, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Sarajevo, La Paz, and more, shoeshining-640x480 Shiners gives a good sense of the universality of pride in one’s work. However, it is also clear that the profession is not viewed the same from one country to the next. In America it is being reclaimed by hipsters who deride the neglect of older crafts. In Japan we see a lot of honour in the skill, in making something old new again. But in other places, it’s seen as degrading work, and the shiners work on the street, earning little money and even less respect.

In that way, Tenebaum quietly addresses poverty and social justice without quite mentioning it directly. Shiners is a character-driven documentary, the shiners speaking for themselves. A mother of young children barely earns enough to feed her family; she refuses to be shamed for her position but insists that her children will be ‘professionals.’

Don, a.k.a. the shoe dude, working a street corner in Manhattan, has a vibrant personality. A former accountant and pastry chef, he’s chosen shoe shining for the sense of freedom it gives him. He talks candidly about the racist connotations of shoe shining, and the satisfaction he’s derived from telling “uppity people” their shoes are dirty.

Shiners excels at providing an insider’s view. It cracks the humanity wide open, and guarantees that you’ll never walk by these people without seeing them again.

This review first appeared at Cinema Axis.

Jeremiah Tower: The Last Magnificent

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Jeremiah Tower, if not the father of American cuisine, is at the very least its very fun uncle. But a case for fatherhood can be made. He burned bright and then disappeared. This documentary finds him.

One of Tower’s earliest memories: sitting on the beach, maybe 6 years old, watching an old man prepare barracuda for dinner. Holding his hands as they held the knives, watching him rub some spice from the jungle on them, the aroma as the fish cooked. The old man said that next they would eat snake, or perhaps iguana, and those exotic dishes got confused as the old man also referred to the “little lizard” in young Tower’s pants. That child’s confusion, food and sex already mixed up in his head, is perhaps why he went on to be a renowned chef. But it’s not the only reason.

CNN Films: Jeremiah Tower documentary He had an unconventional childhood and perhaps not a happy one, travelling extensively with his parents who exposed him to culture and glamour while largely forgetting he existed. Food became his friend and companion, and he’d gluttonously study the menus of all the great restaurants he visited, making friends with the kitchen staff in all the best dining establishments in the very best of hotels.

He never intended to become a chef, but circumstance had made him a cook, and when opportunity knocked, Jeremiah Tower answered. Not only did he answer, he opened the door to a transformation of food and ingredients, and how we thought of them. He was perhaps the first celebrity chef but abandoned it all at the top of his game. Wolfgang Puck, Mario Batali, Anthony Bourdain, and Martha Stewart all speak of him reverently, but it’s clear his legend is still shrouded in mystery.

A couple of years ago, Jeremiah Tower resurfaced, and the foodie community went bananas foster (that’s me making a foodie joke, fyi). He was to be the new Executive Chef at Tavern on the Green, a large restaurant in New York known more for its touristy location than the quality of its food. It seemed a strange move for such a king of the kitchen, but then again, what do we really know of this culinary superstar who walked away from his own fame and success?

This documentary is fun and interesting from start to finish, but a lot of Tower’s mystery remains intact. Lydia Tenaglia shoots him like the lone wolf he is, perhaps a little scattered and deliberately artsy at times, but the truth is, Tower is a force that pulls you in, his charisma alone enough to compel. The Last Magnificent made me hungry – sure, for some of his California cooking, but mostly just for more of him, of this fascinating, elusive man.

Jeremiah Tower: The Last Magnificent opens Friday May 5th in select cities: Toronto,
Vancouver, Calgary, Halifax, and right here in Ottawa, luckily enough.

The Whole Truth

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It’s possible that if Keanu doesn’t play a lawyer at least once per decade he’ll die. That’s the only reason I can think of to explain his casting as a lawyer ever, because he’s barely credible as the sandwich guy who delivers lunch to law firms.

hero_TheWholeTruth-2016-1 In The Whole Truth, Keanu does indeed play a lawyer who is defending the son of a former colleague and longtime friend. The son is accused of killing his father, that very same former colleague and longtime friend. I’m sure Keanu would like to believe that his client is innocent, but his client isn’t talking. And his client’s mother (Renee Zellweger) is mostly weeping, and begging Keanu to save her son’s life.

Gugu Mbatha-Raw, who is above this material, plays a lawyer assigned to help Keanu, and be less of a dick in the courtroom than he is, which is a role that could have been fulfilled by Andy Dick or Jeremy Piven or goddamned Jim Belushi, who was actually busy playing the murder victim, but you catch my drift. It wasn’t a high bar.

Anyway. It’s derivative. It’s one of those “unravel the plot” movies probably based on a mystery novel only sold in drug stores. When “the whole truth” is finally revealed, you probably won’t be around to hear it, having already changed the channel, and you certainly won’t give a shit. The ending isn’t earned, it doesn’t pack a punch, it’s just a fart in the wind (is that a saying?).

I’m dubious, Keanu.

SXSW: M.F.A.

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Shortly after we are introduced to Master of Fine Arts candidate Noelle (Francesca Eastwood), she is raped by a classmate. When she confronts him the next day, he denies doing anything wrong and winds up dead in a mostly-accidental way. Somewhere during the events that caused Noelle to be a victim of sexual assault and a murder suspect, she snaps. Formerly introverted and a loner, Noelle starts going to frat parties in order to seduce and murder other rapists who, due to a faulty system, got away with their crimes.

It will not be surprising to anyone who has seen the excellent documentary The Hunting Ground (or really, anyone who has attended a post-secondary institution) that despite her school having reported no sexual assaults at all, it is all to easy for Noelle to find rapists to kill on her college’s campus as she goes full vigilante. In carrying out a series of increasingly violent kills, Noelle has no real fear of being caught even though she knows the police are closing in.

Eastwood is INTENSE in M.F.A. Like, maybe more intense than her father has ever been, and that’s saying something because that guy’s face is frozen in a permanent, angry, “Ima kill you” sneer. She is the best part of this movie and while she can’t make Noelle relatable, she keeps the audience on her side throughout the film, and that is no small feat in the face of her bloody killing spree.

M.F.A. offers an interesting twist on the typical slasher flick, and Noelle’s numerous kills are well-executed and, as is traditional in the genre, get more gory as she goes. If nothing else, M.F.A. calls attention to the conversation we all should be having, namely why so many women are being sexually assaulted on college campuses and why the colleges are in many cases turning a blind eye to the rapes, or even discouraging victims from reporting these assaults!

The scary part about M.F.A. is not Noelle, it’s that the rapists and the evil administrator who blames the victim and covers up assaults are all too real, and are on your campus, or your friend’s, or your daughter’s. We need to find an alternative solution, other than murder, so that a campus rape stops being a standard part of a Saturday night frat party, and so that when a college claims to have had zero rapes it’s not because the administration successfully intimidated and discouraged all potential complainants. No more sexual assaults should be swept under the rug. M.F.A. helps to shine a light on the problem.