Film Festival Reports

CPH:DOX

CPH:DOX 2017: SWAGGER BY OLIVIER BABINET

By Morella Moret

Screened in the Kids & Youth section of the CPH:DOX Film Festival, happening this week, Swagger by Olivier Babinet tells us the story of a post-terror, fragmented France, as experienced by a diverse group of students. Babinet proposes a collective therapy session where the goal is avoiding judgment, either from the one who gazes or the one who is gazed at. The teenagers tell us their childhood dreams and adulthood nightmares. The director tries to show this through a sincere and wistful eye that is refreshing but sometimes overwhelming.

2017.03.17

CPH:DOX

CPH:DOX 2017: THE THIRD OPTION BY THOMAS FÜRHAPTER

By Ivonne Sheen

The Third Option put us in the middle of several ethical questions about the way contemporary societies have figured life, health, and progress. Along the film, there are different voices that guide us through a minimalistic visual essay (echoing Harun Farocki), which take us from personal testimony, to philosophical and scientific thoughts.

2017.03.16

CPH:DOX

CPH:DOX 2017: STRANGER IN PARADISE BY GUIDO HENDRIKX

By Mónica Delgado

Only in rare occasions does a film stir up the politic roots of migration such as Stranger in Paradise does, and it does that by staging a bureaucratic process with an actor simulating to be a teacher or employee of the state in three different moments, while real refugees deal with a process to get a Dutch residency.

2017.03.16

Berlinale

BERLINALE 2017: WOCHE DER KRITIK

By Tara Judah

During the Berlinale the two exist together, alongside but outside of the official festival. Conceived of in 2014, by the German Film Critics Association, Woche der Kritik was born from a frustration with the industry. Calling on critics to take up activism in academic pursuit, they wrote and circulated a manifesto before launching the now established programme of annual screenings and discussions.

2017.03.13

Berlinale

BERLINALE 2017: ULYSSES IN THE SUBWAY DE MARC DOWNIE, PAUL KAISER, FLO JACOBS, KEN JACOBS

By Tara Judah

For me, the affect of 3D holds a specific fascination, as it constructs real life dimensionality (between the viewer and the surface of the screen) from the images (the (re)presentation of something that exists) to create cognitive and theoretical interpretation. So, while immersion may be one way to talk about the affect of 3D, so too might the relationship between the aesthetic pursuance of the ontology of what it (re)presents: an historical, indexical real.

2017.03.13

Berlinale

BERLINALE 2017: IMPACT, OR CINEMA-GOING

By Tara Judah

Amidst the festival buzz of the Berlinale, a new cinema has opened in Berlin: w o l f Kino. With two small screens (between 40-60 seats each), a stylish bar and a multi-purpose studio space that accommodates a screen and temporary projection set up, w o l f announced itself while the majority of its industry players were ferreting about Potsdamer Platz.

2017.03.13

Film Festival Reports

ROTTERDAM 2017. PARALLAX VIEWS: BIGGER THAN SHINING BY MARK COUSINS

By Tara Judah

Building on last year’s audio-visual essay provocation – Whose Cinema: the video-essay on the big screen of the International Film Festival Rotterdam – critic and filmmaker Mark Cousins returned to screen his 2016 contribution Bigger than The Shining one last time before destroying it (the DCP) with an axe.

2017.02.14

Film Festival Reports

ROTTERDAM 2017: SUPER DARK TIMES BY KEVIN PHILLIPS

By Tara Judah

First time feature filmmaker, Kevin Phillips, captures the sweet mundanity of suburbia well; the meaninglessness of the boys’ conversations as they discuss wanking, set against beautiful sunsets, are the kinds of motifs that form the backbone for nostalgia and evoke the notion of ‘formative’ experiences. But, and let’s be clear that the male characters are all unrepentant and abhorrent, Phillips’ film is no Stand By Me (Rob Reiner, 1986); the boys have no future. Instead, this dramatic horror is characterised by absent fathers, failed morals, self-interest and extreme violence.

2017.02.01

Film Festival Reports

ROTTERDAM 2017. THE MOLE SONG: HONG KONG CAPRICCIO BY TAKASHI MIIKE

By Tara Judah

The prolific Miike Takashi directed five other films in the two years (2014 and 2015) since the first instalment of his live action adaptation, The Mole Song: Undercover Agent Reiji (2013). Returning now to the titular bat-shit cray undercover cop character, created as a manga series by Noboru Takahashi, Takashi has created something exhilarating and messy.

2017.02.01

Film Festival Reports

ROTTERDAM 2017: MANIFESTO BY JULIAN ROSEFELDT

By Tara Judah

In each segment, Cate Blanchett is re-invented as a human incarnation of each movement’s manifesto. The hair, make-up, wardrobe and mise-en-scene that mark each transition are supreme. But beyond that, and beyond even the careful composition of each striking establishing shot, or the brilliantly rhythmic score, is a belly full of passionate anger.

2017.02.01

desistfilm

CPH:DOX 2017: SWAGGER BY OLIVIER BABINET

CPH:DOX 2017: THE THIRD OPTION BY THOMAS FÜRHAPTER

CPH:DOX 2017: STRANGER IN PARADISE BY GUIDO HENDRIKX

BERLINALE 2017: WOCHE DER KRITIK

BERLINALE 2017: ULYSSES IN THE SUBWAY DE MARC DOWNIE, PAUL KAISER, FLO JACOBS, KEN JACOBS

BERLINALE 2017: IMPACT, OR CINEMA-GOING

ROTTERDAM 2017. PARALLAX VIEWS: BIGGER THAN SHINING BY MARK COUSINS

ROTTERDAM 2017: SUPER DARK TIMES BY KEVIN PHILLIPS

ROTTERDAM 2017. THE MOLE SONG: HONG KONG CAPRICCIO BY TAKASHI MIIKE

ROTTERDAM 2017: MANIFESTO BY JULIAN ROSEFELDT

desistfilm