siff is my mother, siff is my father
Jun. 13th, 2009 09:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ironymaidenGarbage Dreams
Afghan Star
Krabat
The Girl from Monaco
The Fortress
Kimjongilia
talhotblond
i liked Garbage Dreams - it follows several young men whose family business is garbage collecting and recycling near Cairo. they live in a population 60,000 suburb devoted to garbage. the filmmaker had great access, and the struggle of the community adapting to a modern world that keeps moving the bar for success is an absorbing one.
Afghan Star had me on the edge of my seat. it's the now-standard singing contest reality show, with contestants from all over Afghanistan. who will win? will the female contestants be hurt or killed? will the show even finish with the Taliban threatening to destroy cel phone towers? great for the storytelling, but even more great for chronicling life in a country that is allowed to have music and television for the first time in a decade. it doesn't just follow the contestants, but the fans - engineering homemade antennas and wiring car batteries to televisions and cramming dozens of people around tiny screens. delightful. this is partly a BBC thing, so i expect to see it broadcast or on DVD. worth seeing.
Krabat is very good - it's dark, what with the Thirty Years' War and the plague and the cost of using black magic. it's an adaptation of a novel, and i felt like there were nuances lost in the compression required for the film adapation, but even so it's a satisfying experience. i hope i can find a translation of the novel. it's a Fox film, but i have a hard time believing that a subtitled movie (German) where our hero has an inverted pentagram on his forehead is going to be distributed outside of "selected cities". fortunately, Seattle is usually a selected city - highly recommended for fantasy fans and very worth seeing on the big screen.
went to the Space Needle to see the Penguins on the March opening, and followed up with lunch and a monorail ride with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
scarlettina. visited the new Sounders FC/Seahawks pro shop on the way to the theater; i continue to be shocked at how many people have purchased jerseys at $70 - $90 a pop. also, it looks like they don't make my sweatshirt anymore. glad i picked it up, i'm sure that's the idea.
people who have seen The Girl from Monaco are divided about it. i rather liked it, but i liked it because i was not expecting a romantic comedy. i think this film and Humpday are a kind of pair - where the relationship between the men is more important than any other aspect of the film. if you think this movie is a romance about an older lawyer and a freespirited young weathergirl, you won't enjoy it. if you think it's about the lawyer and the bodyguard, then it is consistent, and it works.
next up, The Fortress. hopefully i can make the run from here to Pac Place for the next film. if not, perhaps i can arrange for dinner with C...hm.
i made fine time because i left early. (i would have held out, but my bladder told me i might as well go.) the style of the film is no narration, no interviews. i often like that sort of observation in a documentary, but in this case, there was not a strong narrative. it's about the holding area where asylum applicants wait to get into Switzerland. we didn't follow anyone through the whole process. it was just a bunch of vignettes. interesting material, but not a movie.
Kimjongilia uses dance and clips of N Korean films and performances to bracket interviews with people who have escaped N Korea between 1995 and 2006. i thought most of the clips were padding (and the film was still a slim 78 minutes) but the interviews and the supporting material for them were very powerful. what particularly horrified me was that getting through the DMZ is impossible, therefore many N Koreans run to China, where they are put in prison camps or turned back to N Korea. one can't help but be affected by severed fingertips, walking skeletons (starving adults and children that look just like concentration camp survivors), and people who were imprisoned because they were the family member of a transgressor (one strike and the family onto the third generation is locked up). i missed out on the post-film discussion due to an emergency call.
then i got delicious tacos, and a margarita, and had enough time to go downstairs for hot chocolate and a candy bar. i would like to point out that a Godiva bar from Starbucks is cheaper than *any* candy containing chocolate at the AMC.
next up is talhotblond. this is a story i followed as it was happening, and was thoroughly fascinated. the word on the film is good, so i'm hoping there's content that's new to me.
(there *is* new-to-me content.) the story is a love triangle, where the players only know each other online. talhotblond gets involved via chat with marinesniper, has a falling out, and then starts playing marinesniper and his RL friend beefcake off of each other. it leads to murder. two of the three are incredible liars. only one of them gets in trouble. the story is salaciously delicious, and the interviews with the players and their families made the film worth seeing. this was the premiere and the first official audience showing; there were no credits yet and the director was seeking feedback as she continues work on the film. it's good to go to the festival :)
showing the shape of my bubble - this story was familiar to me and i had read about it more than once. the director said "no one" had covered it outside local news and an article in Wired. apparently it never hit the mainstream media, and i had no idea that it wasn't common knowledge. i recommend the film or at least a read of the article.
Afghan Star
Krabat
The Girl from Monaco
The Fortress
Kimjongilia
talhotblond
i liked Garbage Dreams - it follows several young men whose family business is garbage collecting and recycling near Cairo. they live in a population 60,000 suburb devoted to garbage. the filmmaker had great access, and the struggle of the community adapting to a modern world that keeps moving the bar for success is an absorbing one.
Afghan Star had me on the edge of my seat. it's the now-standard singing contest reality show, with contestants from all over Afghanistan. who will win? will the female contestants be hurt or killed? will the show even finish with the Taliban threatening to destroy cel phone towers? great for the storytelling, but even more great for chronicling life in a country that is allowed to have music and television for the first time in a decade. it doesn't just follow the contestants, but the fans - engineering homemade antennas and wiring car batteries to televisions and cramming dozens of people around tiny screens. delightful. this is partly a BBC thing, so i expect to see it broadcast or on DVD. worth seeing.
Krabat is very good - it's dark, what with the Thirty Years' War and the plague and the cost of using black magic. it's an adaptation of a novel, and i felt like there were nuances lost in the compression required for the film adapation, but even so it's a satisfying experience. i hope i can find a translation of the novel. it's a Fox film, but i have a hard time believing that a subtitled movie (German) where our hero has an inverted pentagram on his forehead is going to be distributed outside of "selected cities". fortunately, Seattle is usually a selected city - highly recommended for fantasy fans and very worth seeing on the big screen.
went to the Space Needle to see the Penguins on the March opening, and followed up with lunch and a monorail ride with
scarlettina. visited the new Sounders FC/Seahawks pro shop on the way to the theater; i continue to be shocked at how many people have purchased jerseys at $70 - $90 a pop. also, it looks like they don't make my sweatshirt anymore. glad i picked it up, i'm sure that's the idea.people who have seen The Girl from Monaco are divided about it. i rather liked it, but i liked it because i was not expecting a romantic comedy. i think this film and Humpday are a kind of pair - where the relationship between the men is more important than any other aspect of the film. if you think this movie is a romance about an older lawyer and a freespirited young weathergirl, you won't enjoy it. if you think it's about the lawyer and the bodyguard, then it is consistent, and it works.
next up, The Fortress. hopefully i can make the run from here to Pac Place for the next film. if not, perhaps i can arrange for dinner with C...hm.
i made fine time because i left early. (i would have held out, but my bladder told me i might as well go.) the style of the film is no narration, no interviews. i often like that sort of observation in a documentary, but in this case, there was not a strong narrative. it's about the holding area where asylum applicants wait to get into Switzerland. we didn't follow anyone through the whole process. it was just a bunch of vignettes. interesting material, but not a movie.
Kimjongilia uses dance and clips of N Korean films and performances to bracket interviews with people who have escaped N Korea between 1995 and 2006. i thought most of the clips were padding (and the film was still a slim 78 minutes) but the interviews and the supporting material for them were very powerful. what particularly horrified me was that getting through the DMZ is impossible, therefore many N Koreans run to China, where they are put in prison camps or turned back to N Korea. one can't help but be affected by severed fingertips, walking skeletons (starving adults and children that look just like concentration camp survivors), and people who were imprisoned because they were the family member of a transgressor (one strike and the family onto the third generation is locked up). i missed out on the post-film discussion due to an emergency call.
then i got delicious tacos, and a margarita, and had enough time to go downstairs for hot chocolate and a candy bar. i would like to point out that a Godiva bar from Starbucks is cheaper than *any* candy containing chocolate at the AMC.
next up is talhotblond. this is a story i followed as it was happening, and was thoroughly fascinated. the word on the film is good, so i'm hoping there's content that's new to me.
(there *is* new-to-me content.) the story is a love triangle, where the players only know each other online. talhotblond gets involved via chat with marinesniper, has a falling out, and then starts playing marinesniper and his RL friend beefcake off of each other. it leads to murder. two of the three are incredible liars. only one of them gets in trouble. the story is salaciously delicious, and the interviews with the players and their families made the film worth seeing. this was the premiere and the first official audience showing; there were no credits yet and the director was seeking feedback as she continues work on the film. it's good to go to the festival :)
showing the shape of my bubble - this story was familiar to me and i had read about it more than once. the director said "no one" had covered it outside local news and an article in Wired. apparently it never hit the mainstream media, and i had no idea that it wasn't common knowledge. i recommend the film or at least a read of the article.
