SBIFF ’24

Lest I forget, I should thumbnail the seven films I saw at SBIFF (not counting the extra-festival free showing of Zone of Interest), from best to worst:

Wicked Little Letters – our best festival experience, augmented by having our names as sponsors highlighted before both showings. Jessie Buckley should get a BAFTA nomination for her performance as the louche Irish neighbor, and Olivia Colman was wonderful as usual. Everyone else was a kick, too, and the story provided laughs galore.

The Cowboy and the Queen – a documentary from our backyard with an enlightening, inspiring story about a better way to “break” horses. And a good supporting role for QEII.

Suze – We enjoyed the lighthearted very Canadian story of the overdoting mother who takes care of her daughter’s ex-boyfriend.

Before It Ends – Well made story of moral dilemma in Denmark weeks before the German occupation ended.

Snow Leopard – not a good movie by Western standards, but an insight into Tibetan culture and humor, not unlike ours.

Dance First – a fantasy about Samuel Beckett that shed little light and left me cold.

Let Me Go – Sorry, but an unattractive lead and unsexy sex made me wish I were elsewhere.

 

Here – 3

This Belgian film spelled its title with a backward “r,” but it could just as well have been called “Where,” or even “Why?” The film festival programmer previewed it as “a film about soup, moss and love.” If he had added rain, a car in a repair shop and a Chinese diner he would have covered everything. Oh, and a vacation that never happened. The camera seemed stuck, the story was implausible–especially the bit about the soup, but the love affair was not far behind. There was a nice punch line at the end, but it didn’t make up for the preceding 80 minutes I’d waited in vain for something to happen. A rave reviewer called it “miraculously weightless.” I agree.

The Night of the 12th – 6

It takes away suspense when the film announces at the outset that it’s about a murder that won’t get solved. The rest of the movie shows why other movies eschew that route. What, then, was this about? The relationships? Ho-hum. The characters? Not very interesting. Societal issues? Not very deep. Mildly interesting as a French police procedural, but nothing in comparison to Spiral.

The Innocent – 8

A cleverly plotted, very funny crime caper peopled with delightfully idiosyncratic characters. Every moment is fun an the relationships are touching. Only in French cinema would the robbery target be a shipment of caviar.

SBIFF – 7.5

Because few of these, if any, will make it to my local theater, I will quickly summarize my reactions to nine movies I saw at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. (I accord The Quiet Girl and To Leslie their own reviews because of their respective Oscar nominations.)

Dr. Anthony Fauci – 6. A charming guy, but a disjointed documentary that shoehorned in the AIDS crisis and covered the years after the main story–Fauci’s time with Trump–was over.

Dirty Divide – 7.5. Very professional and sensitive portrait of the homeless in L.A.’s Skid Row. No fingers pointed and no solutions in sight. Heartbreaking but watchable.

The House Band – 4. Very unprofessional portrait of the homeless on Venice Beach. The story got away halfway through, and the director never found it again.

It Ain’t Over – 7. The movie’s subject, Yogi Berra, made this fun to watch. The saying, “It ain’t over till it’s over,” lost its charm, however, with its 57th repetition.

Miranda’s Victim – 2. Terrible acting, trite dialogue, confused story; not a believable character or scene. Where (or who) was the director?

Soul of the Ocean – 7. Wonderful underwater photography with annoyingly vapid narration that was neither here nor there.

Starring Jerry as Himself – 7.5. A rare comedy and a poignant tale. Made for the small screen but charming and original.

T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets – 7. A one-man (Ralph Fiennes) recital, dramatic and powerfully paced. I understood nothing but couldn’t move.

Werner Herzog: Radical Dreamer – 5. A pleasant but incomplete look at the career of a favorite movie director. Nothing new or terribly insightful.

 

 

House of Darkness – 6.5

Not for everyone, but if you came to it expecting Neil Labute’s typically cruel depiction of a male-female relationship you wouldn’t have been disappointed by Justin Long’s bumbling attempt at seduction or Kate Bosworth’s innocent iciness, not to mention the bloody denouement. With only one set and three actors (plus a cameo), this was evidently a Covid project. Even in the fine arts, not every picture is pretty.

Apples and Oranges – 1

A history of volunteers at Israeli kibbutzes, told through archival footage and ex post facto interviews, making no point, having no point of view, presenting no reason for its existence as a documentary film.

Stranger’s Arms – 7.5

Hate to call a movie “cute,” but this was adorable. No bad guys, no one got hurt, nothing really “happened,” just three 19-year-olds figuring things out in suburban Long Island, with a lot of beer, a little weed and some locals. This played like the low-budget first feature of recent film school grads, which it was, which made the performances of the non-actor leads and the pitch-perfect dialogue, quite funny, all the more remarkable. I hope director Emma Westenberg goes on to a nice career, without losing her authenticity.

The Last Tourist – 3

You could make a movie about the problems caused by the cruise industry, or the evil of raising and training wild animals for human amusement, or the lack of qualifications required to volunteer teach in the developing world, or the self-absorption promoted by social media, or the difficulty of experiencing art masterpieces, or overpopulation in general, but to address them all superficially, lay the blame on “tourism” and call your film The Last Tourist is not insightful, instructive or helpful. You might as well make a movie called Money and list all the bad things people do to get rich. Moreover,  the film reeked of moral superiority over the masses depicted who, because of lack of funds or education, weren’t taking the kinds of culturally rich vacations that you and I sign up for. I am told that the film got better toward the end, but I could only take an hour.

The Bastard King – 8.5

This is sort of a Don’t Look Up for lions: why are we fighting over something trivial like different eye color when our entire species faces extinction? The story could not have been told more intimately if the director had used animation. Extraordinary documentary footage of two lion prides in southern Tanzania shows the lions making love, raising cubs, hunting giraffes and zebras, squaring off, killing each other and suffering the effects of climate change and habitat destruction. A sepia-tinted palette and percussive music raised the art quotient above a simple documentary. The anthropomorphism was a bit heavy, but not if you see the blue- and yellow-eyed lions as stand-ins for the humans in the audience.