And so another year’s Seattle International Film Festival comes to a close. You might be saying “Hey! You only watched like eight movies? What kind of publication is this?!” Tut tut, readers.  We here at Redefine watched a boat load of movies! We just couldn’t find the time/space/wherewithal to write about every single one.

But because we love you guys, and to prove to my editor that I really did watch all those movies I said I watched, here’s 29 mini-reviews of all the films I saw that I didn’t get a chance to write about.

Air Doll - Japan

Korean actress Bae Do Na (The Host) stars as a sex doll given a soul. “Nozomi” partakes of all the wonders of human life: some sunshine, a part time job, some casual sex, and murder. But does she deserve this gift? It’s like Pinocchio, if Geppetto gave him a rubber vagina.

Amer - Belgium

Giallo is more than just the color red and extreme close ups of sweaty women. There’s supposed to be a little bit of pulp in there too! All style no substance. Second portion is exceptionally long and drawn out.

Beyond Ipanema - Brazil

Brazillian music is cool. A bunch of Americans think that. Brazillians are surprised that Americans think that. A musical movement is born! Too bad it’s already over.

Cargo - Switzerland

What do you get when you cross Sunshine and The Matrix? An irredeemable, Hindenburg-esque atrocity of a movie. When it starts you ask “where is this going?” When it ends, you answer “absolutely nowhere.” Shitty European CG doesn’t help either.

Castaway on the Moon - Korea

Korea’s take on Castaway. Worthless man is trapped on an island in the middle of Seoul. Internet-living woman sees him out of her window.  Woman wants a human connection, man just want Black Bean Noodles. Duck boat suffers.

The Concert - Russia

Charming, slightly cloying movie about an over-the-hill orchestra. Also, Jews being Jews. Take your parents, they’ll think you’re the best. The woman from Inglorious Basterds is gorgeous.

Crossing Hennessy - Hong Kong

Hong Kong’s take on When Harry met Sally. Asians feel love too! Especially over dimsum. Director Ivy Ho has a way with dialogue, but when the dialogue disappears, the movie plods.

Dear Lemon Lima - USA

Charming, adorable, cute, funny and earnest. Like all the non-sci fi parts of Donnie Darko. Even half-eskimo, suburban girls just wanna have fun! Fun movie for all ages.

Disco and the Atomic War - Estonia

Low, low, low budget documentary on propaganda experiments during the Cold War. More interesting than it sounds! Estonia is used as a media lab rat by the USSR due to its proximity to Norwegian radio waves. Communists want to see what all the fuss about, Estonians ask, “Who Shot JR?”

Hipsters - Russia

It’s hard out here for a teenager in Communist Russia. Glee meets Glasnost as young good-fer-nothing Russians trade their bootstraps for wingtips, wear Technicolor clothes. I personally liked the uptight Katya more than either of the leads.

Holy Rollers - USA

It’s hard out here for a young Hasidic ecstasy dealer. Jesse Eisenberg is probably a better actor than Michael Cera. The dude from the Hangover plays the best orthodox douchebag. Based on a true story.

Howl - USA

Pros: James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg. Cons: Like watching a Wikipedia article about Howl. Useless and disappointing if you’ve read the work. Who’s bright idea was it to animate Howl? Animation looks like a Fantasia fan-project loaded with cocks.

I Killed My Mother - Canada

It’s hard out there for a French-Canadian gay teenager. Pretty good movie for a 21 year old. Moms are the worst! Aren’t they? Main protagonist still comes off as a bit entitled and bratty.

K-20: The Fiend with 20 Faces - Japan

Batman Begins with a lower budget and a mounted camera. Kids in movies are still annoying. When did Steam Punk = Nikolai Tesla fan-fiction? There’s probably going to be a sequel.

Kanikosen - Japan

What the hell is this movie about? Proletariat prisoners on a crab canning prison ship invent unions, have dreams about tossing a beach ball. Chinese caricature on a Russian crabbing ship imparts valuable wisdom. I can’t tell if it’s interesting or not.

Like You Know It All - Korea

Talky movie about a young, shitty director and the shitty things he does. There isn’t a single likable person in this movie. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing! Also, film directors are all fucked up people.

Night Catches Us - USA

Philly in the 70’s never looked so cool. Good performances by all the leads, excellent costuming. Even better music. It’s hard out here for a young black man in a post-Panthers world (no joke).

The Oath - USA

Excellent documentary about reformed Jihadists. Abu Jandal might be the greatest motivational speaker of our time. He’s so good even I considered Jihad for a second.

The Penitent Man - USA

Fuck this movie. This is the movie the douchebag in your quantum physics class tries to make. Blah blah blah blah blah wormhole blah blah blah blah die. This is the worst movie Lance Henriksen has ever been in.

Plug and Pray - Germany

Could God build a robot so smart even God couldn’t beat it? Could man? SHOULD man? Also, the Japanese are still creepy.

Protektor - Czech Republic

Czech radio ain’t what it’s cracked up to be. Leading lady Jana Plodkova has gorgeous eyes, Protektor has gorgeous art direction. But ultimately, if you’ve seen one Nazis vs Films period piece you’ve seen them all.

Queen of the Sun - USA

Bees are really important. Bees are really in danger. Beekeepers are 95% crazy people. This documentary makes it’s point about half way through, and then goes off the deep end of bee admiration. Credits song is ridiculous, on par with the Monster Squad closing theme.

Rapt - France

French Asshole rich guy is kidnapped, no one cares. Criminals, frustrated that no one cares, release him sans a finger. Asshole levels up in assholery. Too Haneke or not too Haneke?

RoboGeisha - Japan

Unlike it’s nihilistic, unfeeling brethren (Tokyo Gore Police, Meatball Machine), RoboGeisha offers a little bit of heart and soul with its pop-culture detonation and gory slapstick. Exactly like aforementioned brethren, the movie lags a bit in the middle during the exposition. Bad guys: “It hurts when you cut me!”

The Sentimental Engine Slayer - USA

Mars Volta guy makes Mars Volta-esque movie about El Paso teen life. Masochistic to make, masochistic to watch. Joyless. It’s hard out here for a sociopathic, hooker choking, tranny fucking teen.

Skeletons - United Kingdom

Finally, a sci-fi movie that actually kind of works! Two dudes go around cleaning out people’s closets (read: secrets). Probably more enjoyable then that DiCaprio “I’m in ur dreams solving ur crimes” movie. Maybe it’s because everything sounds wittier with a British accent.

Some Days Are Better Than Others - USA

It’s hard out here for a twenty-something in Portland. James Mercer does a decent job, especially with the atrocious dialogue he’s given. Me and You and Everyone who watched this movie should demand their two hours back.

Vengeance - Hong Kong

Vengeance is not blind; it just has a memory problem. Old hitman seeking revenge for his daughter’s assault hires cool looking hitmen to kill cool looking hitmen. But sometimes even he can’t tell Asians apart! Lol! Nice to watch Johnnie To movie that isn’t about Triad politics.

William S Burroughs: A Man Within - USA

Burroughs is insane, we all know that. But did you know that he was like the King Midas of Insane? Everything he touches goes nutso. Even Peter Weller is batshit crazy now.

Whew! Glad that’s out of the way. See you next year, SIFF.

Director: Aaron Schneider
USA, 2009

Back when Saturday Night Live was still funny, Robert Duvall appeared in a sketch called “Who’s More Grizzled,” where contestants on a game show riff on subjects to show their grizzled-ness. Of course, Mr. Duvall won handily. No one does old and ornery better than Duvall. Get Low is his latest entry into the Grizzled Hall of Fame, with Duvall playing Felix Bush, a woodsy, ornery, secretive hermit in Depression-era California. Sensing that his passing is near, Felix uses a large, dirty ball of money to convince Bill Murray and Lucas Black (of Tokyo Drift fame!) to hold a big fancy funeral for him. While he’s still alive.

The majority of the movie is a bit of fluff, there isn’t much to be gained from Felix’s story or secret or his relationships with the other characters in the movie. It feels like more of a victory lap for Duvall, who gets all the best lines, as well as the last laugh. The supporting cast turns in excellent performances (Sissy Spacek and Lucas Black especially), but they all seem to be holding back and kowtowing to the venerable Duvall. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Basically, Get Low is 100 minutes of Robert Duvall doing his thing while Bill Murray cracks funny here and there. Duvall’s ornery crank is a classic character: old, embittered, wise, weathered, honest, wistful, human. It’s not really an impactful or meaningful film by any stretch, but I can think of a worse way to spend an evening.

Get Low was screened at the 2010 Seattle International Film Festival. It will be the festival’s closing night movie, screening on Sunday, June 13^th at the Cinerama at 6:30pm.

When 11-year-old Paloma (Garance Le Guillemic) decides that she wants to commit suicide on the date of her next birthday, she has 165 days left to go. By viewing her mother, who talks to house plants, and her father, who is well-intentioned but has nothing much more to offer, Paloma concludes that her life is bound to be horrible. Her promise to herself comes with one self-assigned stipulation, though; while other people might make climbing Mt. Everest their lives’ greatest goal, Paloma aims to make a film. She begins to do so with her father’s 8mm camera, filming everyone and anyone who will allow her to.

With The Hedgehog (Le Herisson), director Mona Achache brings Muriel Barbery’s novel to life with a clear and concise vision. Although the film’s subject matter seems bleak, it is far from; instead, it captures beauty in seemingly insignificant moments, making it clear that even the smallest details can hold worth when viewed from the outside. All throughout the film, Paloma’s dry, sardonic narration is charming and keeps viewers in line with the childish yet thought-provoking viewpoint.

Paloma inches closer and closer to reaching her suicidal deadline, but finds herself forming close bonds with unlikely individals, including the building’s lonely bookworm janitor, Renée Michel (Josiane Balasko) and a refined Japanese widower Kakuro (Togo Igawa). By finding refuge in the company of those two individuals, she begins to discover that beyond the walls of her home, life really can contain some mystery and wonder.

NOW SHOWING IN SEATTLE:
May 28, 2010 7:00 PM (Uptown Cinemas)
May 30, 2010 4:00 PM (Uptown Cinemas)

From its opening train hijacking sequence to its creative opening credits, The Good, The Bad, The Weird seemed like a film that would be right up my alley. The first few minutes were so enjoyable that I was quite sure that the goofy, highly stylized film would be one of my new favorites.

Well, that was shooting a little too high. While it was in fact very close to being a perfect over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek masterpiece, it fell slightly short — an unfortunate situation, considering the film is very obviously the collaboration of people who know what they’re doing.

First and foremost, the film succeeds in a fundamental way with fantastic character development. Familiar Korean actors fill in the roles impressively, with Song Kang-ho (Thirst, Memories Of Murder, JSA) playing “The Weird”, bad ass Lee Byung-hun as “The Bad” (Three Extremes, Hero, JSA), and lesser-known Jung Woo-sung (A Moment To Remember, The Warrior) as “The Good”. Ultimately, they are caricatures, but it works. Song plays the role of the familiar bumbling comedic relief, Lee owns the role of the egomaniac killer, and Jung is almost too perfect as the renegade long arm of the law. The three, as suggested by the title, are vastly different, and Lee and Jung in particular stand strong; the whole film seems to be a teaser leading up to their ultimate showdown.

The film is a visual treat in a cluttered, hypercolored way. With impressive neon lighting that’s notable in nearly every frame, The Good, The Bad, The Weird is home to brightly colored, ornate marketplaces, warriors donning unmatching, richly patterned textiles, and strange leftover war relics. At some points, it literally seems like the costume and set designers just scoured junk stores and pulled home everything with some kitschy collectable appeal, from motorcycles with sidecars to Manchurian-inspired furs and rusty wind instruments. This kind of worldly hodge-podge works with The Good, The Bad, The Weird, because if films could be copy-and-paste collages, this would be one. It is stylistically all over the map, but somehow it pulls together.

With so much going for it, then, The Good, The Bad, The Ugly only falls significantly short in one way. Apparently, the director and editors decided after shooting that they really, really love explosions — from every angle and in every speed. And while the explosions are initially entertaining, they become boring towards the end of the film. There is what seems to be a ridiculous ten-minute clip that switches between shots of running horses and shots of explosions. The over-saturation is completely underwhelming.

Asides from this misstep, though, the film concludes in a satisfying way. As mentioned, The Good… seems to be teasing the viewer throughout its duration, hinting at the ultimate showdown between the film’s three main characters. And despite this built-up anticipation, the conclusion satisfies.

SCREENINGS AT THE 2010 PORTLAND INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL:
February 13 - 9:00pm at Regal Broadway Cinemas (B1)
February 15 - 4:00pm at Whitsell Auditorium (Portland Art Museum)
February 17 - 9:15pm at Regal Broadway Cinemas (B2)

Terribly Happy opens with an outrageous narrative the film claims is based off of true events. In a small town, farmers discover that their cows are sinking into the grass fields, because the fields are really part bog. One cow gets stuck in the boggy field and is eventually dug out. Once it is, though, it gives birth to a calf that is half-human and half-bovine, and all of the women in the town become greatly distressed. The cow has to once again be sunk into the bog for the mental sanity of the people in town. Ridiculous!

Through the years, I’ve taken quite a liking to the black comedies exported by Scandinavian countries. Not quite in line with typical American humor, Scandinavian black comedies are funny in a dry, cynical, and wholly fantastical way; they often revolve around scenarios that are so absurd they become surreal. Terribly Happy begins in just such a fashion, with just such an influence. It perfectly sets the tone for a film that will sink deeper and deeper into crazy comedic scenarios, only… that’s not what happens.

Terribly Happy soon starts to hum to a vastly different tune. Comedy goes out the window, and it becomes a mixed and mashed amalgam of psychological thriller, action, noir, and western. In fact, asides from the beginning and end of the film — which are steeply entrenched in “black comedy” territory — Terribly Happy is quite serious, with slight moments of amusement in the, “this-is-funny-but-not-in-a-laugh-out-loud” variety.

The film follows around city detective Robert Hansen (Jakob Cedergren), who is transplanted temporarily into a small town. He is quite obviously out of place, and one learns early on that he has no one but a wife and kid who do not wish to speak to him. He is, for all intents and purposes, alone. And while we do know his on-screen character to a degree,we soon learn that we don’t really know anything about him other than the fact that he is a man who yearns to do his job as police chief.

As the bizarre inconsistencies of a small town replete with strange rituals emerges, one begins to question who is correctly pointing the fingers and who is behind the mysterious murders and disappearances that take place in the town. Is it the entire town? Is it the film’s ultimate wife-beating villain, Jørgen? Is it Robert? It’s hard to decide, because Terribly Happy is terribly hard to predict. Somehow, the film manages to bend genres and expectations without becoming overly complicated or feeling cluttered in any way.

About a year ago, I was working for a start-up in an old building in Seattle’s SoDo District. It was complete with rickity floorboards and unusual decorations crafted from salvaged parts. The overwhelming scent could’ve been described as “dusty.” The upstairs housed uniquely-decorated office spaces, and the downstairs had a large, spacious room with no functional use. It was being fitted to house a club and a bar (and has since been successfully deemed Club Motor).

Imagine our curiosity and surprise, then, when it was announced to us that a film crew would be shooting a feature-length movie in our building. We had no idea what to expect, but peering into a set revealed a strange-looking set with a lot of toilet seats and a pyramid of toilets stacked almost entirely to the ceiling. What kind of film could this possibly be?!! The film crew soon revealed that the film would be something like a surreal comedy, and that it was titled, “The Immaculate Conception Of Little Dizzle.” I wrote down the name of the film, but had completely forgotten about it until this year, when I attended a press screening of it, completely randomly. The connection didn’t dawn on me until more than halfway through the film, when the toilet pyramid appeared and I was able to put two and two together. It was a miraculous moment.

Well, if surrealism, toilet pyramids, and a playful title aren’t enough to spark your interest, “Little Dizzle” may not be your ideal kind of film. Nonetheless, let me expound.

“Little Dizzle” is a comedic tale about the adventures of four after-hours office building janitors who unknowingly become the test subjects for a self-heating cookie, that warms itself when being consumed. The characters are easily lovable, and include an individual blindingly confused about his religious faith, an artist temporarily working as a janitor, an extremely impulsive couple, and a cross-dressing employer. Much to their dismay, the trial cookies have unanticipated and otherworldly side-effects that slowly emerge. While the film starts off fairly normal, as a straight-forward comedy with clever dialogue, it soon plunges into a surreal adventure. And here, the forte of director David Russo truly shines, in his ability to set a playful mood from the very beginning that makes the sudden shift into the implausible to be surprising, but not at all disconnected.

“Little Dizzle” is a clever film which culminates into a comedy unlike any I have ever seen, which is a remarkable in this day and age. Despite the aforementioned prevalence of toilets, this film’s brand of toilet humor is intelligent, and it allows the film to stand out as a gem in the budding local film industry.

www.littledizzlefilm.com

Cool graphic design doesn’t even make this film interesting.

An extremely minimalist take on the lives of four deeply unhappy people. Well-shot if you are fine with a drab color palette. Largely pointless. I mean, one can stretch potential meaning if one really wants to, but this film certainly didn’t make me want to. I’m only giving it minor consideration now that I am sitting here writing this review. Continental, despite its entertaining and clever title, is nothing more than somber entertainment that fails to make any memorable or long-lasting impressions.

Director:
Stéphane Lafleur

Producer:
Luc Déry, Kim McCraw

Editor:
Sophie Leblond

Screenwriter:
Stéphane Lafleur

Cinematographer:
Sara Mishara

Music:
Stéphane Lafleur, Hugo Lavoie

Principal Cast:
Marie-Ginette Guay, Gilbert Sicotte, Fanny Mallette, Réal Bossé

Language:
French

A cute, happy, dysfunctional cast!
I’ve come to take quite a liking to black comedies that come out of the Nordic countries. They often focus on untraditional subject matters and have underlying social commentaries; in the case of The Art of Negative Thinking, the focus is on disabled people — a demographic that is usually never made light of in American culture, which regards disabled individuals as practically helpless.

Those who have personal experience with disabled people or are particularly sensitive to the subject might find this movie to be callous and cruel. But that would be a simplified view on the subject. The movie does not set out to make fun of the disabled. The characters in the movie are unique individuals, each with their own mental and physical dysfunctions. Despite whatever quirks they have, they react to crisis in ways that any human being off the street might. The scenes that are hilarious are not hilarious because they contain disabled people; they are hilarious because they are studies on human emotion that take unexpected turns.

It seems at times like the characters are acting irrationally or intensely, making it easy to generalize that the movie is making a mockery of the disabled. But what’s important to note is that the three non-disabled characters in the movie act just as irrationally as the disabled ones do. If anything, the movie almost sets out to prove that the playing field is level, and that everyone has a little bit of crazy in them.

Director:
Bård Breien

Producer:
Dag Alveberg

Editor:
Zaklinka Stojevska

Screenwriter:
Bård Breien

Cinematographer:
Gaute Gunnari

Music:
Stein Berge Svendsen

Principal Cast:
Fridtjov Såheim, Kirsti Eline Torhaug, Henrik Mestad, Marian Saastad Ottesen, Kari Simonsen, Per Schaaning, Kjersti Holmen

Language:
Norweigan

The soldier from the second clip contemplates suicide!

Collections like Fantastic Parasuicides, which combine three shorts by different directors under one title, always manage to peak my interest. In this case, all of the three shorts explore the idea of “suicide,” and due to my preference for black comedies, I thought this collection would be right up my alley. What I discovered was that only one of the pieces really held my attention; the other two were interesting, but hardly memorable or really even worth watching.

The first piece, by Park SoYeong, explores a girl’s suicide after failing an exam. It’s wacky, off-the-wall, and complete with poorly shot action sequences and sound effects along the lines of what you’d find in Pac Man. All definitely on purpose, and all intolerable if you do not find juvenile, nonsensical humor funny. In my case, I found it slightly amusing, but it definitely kind of turned me off to watching the other two, even though the other two are nothing like this one.The second piece, by Jo ChangHo, is almost dialogue-free and explores one soldier’s hesitations about committing suicide. He rents a hotel room in which to do the deed, but things take a turn for the unexpected. I’m not quite sure what the point to this story is, asides from the fact that there is obviously some kind of parallel between the life of a chicken and the life of the soldier. Definitely slow-moving, and, in retrospect, my least favorite of the three.

The third piece, by Kim SeongHo, is the least amateur offering by a long shot. A 70 year old man has suicidal plans for his birthday when he realizes that no one has remembered his birthday; from there, he stumbles upon a suicidal youngster and saves him. The film ends with not one, but TWO unexpected twists. Beautifully shot and effective in telling a story that the viewer will care about for longer than the duration of the story itself — something that the other two shorts failed to do miserably.

Directors:
Chang-ho Jo, Seong-ho Kim, Soo-yeong Park

Producer:
Stanley Kwak

Screenwriter:
Seong-ho Kim, Soo-yeong Park, Chang-ho Jo

Cinematographer:
Hee-seok Na, Young-min Kim

Music:
Jae-hwan Jeong, Hyeon-suk Choi, Myeong-jong Kim

Principal Cast:
Yeo-reum Han, Tablo, Ga-yeon Kim, Hwi-soon Park, Jae-jin Jeong

Language:
Korean

Norway, 2006, 90 minutes, DigiBeta
Norweigan (with English subtitles)

The reason the synopsis for The Bothersome Man sounds ambiguous is because the film is. A Norweigan surrealist flick directed by Jens Lien and written by Per Schreiner, The Bothersome Man has won 8 awards at film festivals around the world, as well as been nominated for two others. I can legitimately say I think it deserves it, as it was one of the best films I saw at the Seattle International Film Festival this year.

The movie starts off with the main character, Andreas, in a desolate area in the middle of nowhere. He is picked up by a car and transported to a city, where he is immediately and abruptly given a job and an apartment without much explanation. He does not seem to question it.

On his first day of work, Andreas sees a suicide victim who is impaled on a metal spiked fence outside of his office building. The next day, he meets the same individual, healthy and unscathed. Similarly, Andreas slices off his finger in the copy machine and finds that no one is alarmed, despite his cries. His finger regenerates the next day.

Many things can be said about this movie, but the more I say, the less the movie’s impact will have on you, the viewer. Thus, I will stray away from other concrete examples.

The film is one of mental horror, when an individual with free thought is placed into a world which lacks it. Andreas struggles with this throughout the movie, and seeks to find a way to end his unhappiness. Numerous suicide attempts do not help, so he resorts to more drastic measures. Lien does a great job of using drab colored and prolonged shots to convey the feeling of monotony.

The Bothersome Man is not for those who do not like movies that are relatively slow-paced and minimalistic. It is also not for people who like movies that necessarily linearly connect the dots realistically, because it doesn’t.

For individuals who enjoy human interactions, The Bothersome Man is a good fit; the film does not pay much attention to the larger picture. The focus here is on the exacting life of Andreas and his associations with others. The film shifts between the highly plausible and the highly implausible at the drop of a hat.

One of the film’s greatest strengths is that individuals can wholeheartedly disagree about the film’s meaning, yet respect each other’s opinions on it because the possible conclusion is so open to interpretation. It is possible that The Bothersome Man strikes amazing parallels with our current life on Earth. It is also possible that the film symbolizes the afterlife. Beneath the black comedy exterior, the film speaks to a deeper message that may be amazing to some, but absolutely lost on others.

Director:
Jans Lien

Producer:
Jorgen Storm Rosenberg

Music:
Ginge Anvik
Edvard Grieg

Cast:
Trond Fausa Aurvag
Petronella Barker
Per Shaaning
Birgette Larsen
Johannes Joner

Film Website:
www.brysom.no