#31: Strange Culture (2007)

On the eve of his new exhibit, artist and professor Steve Kurtz was shocked by the news that his wife had died of heart failure. The medics on the scene became suspicious of Kurtz's artistic media, which includes genetically modified foods, and the FBI accused him of bioterrorism. This disquieting true story is brought to life by actors Tilda Swinton, Josh Kornbluth and Peter Coyote in Lynn Herschman Leeson's chilling dramatic documentary.

Chilling and terrifying and almost too much to watch and take in. The technique of reenacting some scenes in the documentary is interesting -- and works, completely. Interviews with the actors, film running while they talk about the real people they're playing, all contribute to the large mosaic they're building about the artist and this case.

As the opening line reads:

"Steve Kurtz is unable to comment on events that occurred immediately prior to his arrest. Actors have interpreted his story."

Hence the reenactions. Because he has a story, and has told it at various points (and others have pieces of the story to tell, as well), but while he can give interviews on events occurring after the arrest, he can't tell the substantive part of the story on camera.

This easily surpasses "Jesus Camp" as the most terrifying movie I've seen in the last year.

#25: Sherrybaby

Golden Globe-nominated Maggie Gyllenhaal stars in director Laurie Collyer's feature film debut about a young woman's struggle for normalcy. After being released from prison, Sherry Swanson (Gyllenhaal) returns to the realities of life, visiting with her parole officer, finding a job and being a mother to her 5-year-old daughter. But complications arise when Swanson learns that in her absence her brother and his wife have become surrogate parents.

With the always-excellent Maggie Gyllenhaal, it's hard to go wrong -- but the writing is also fantastic and detailed, but not sentimental.


25/18 -- yes, time is catching up to me.

#24: Conversations With Other Women

Conversations with Other Women

Sparks fly at a wedding reception when a man (Aaron Eckhart) and a woman (Helena Bonham Carter) with a mysterious past are reunited in this bittersweet tale inventively shot in split screen. The complex layers of their past relationship are slowly revealed as the pair rekindles their flirtation. One thing leads to another and the old flames leave the party for a private hotel room, but passion gives way to regret when the champagne wears off.

Another split screen film, though I really didn't mind it. It's largely used as a device to allow flashbacks, but it's also a welcome relief from the intensity of shooting in one room (mostly), with only two people (mostly), just doing a lot of talking. More unusual, I thought, was the casting of Aaron Eckhart as a lawyer with a terminal case of nostalgia. I'm used to seeing him as the King of Asses (and a mighty king he is).

Though it's structurally similar, this is a much more engaging piece (imho) than Yes, and definitely more grown-up than Before Sunrise/Sunset (the non-Fiddler kind).

84 minutes, and not too long at all.

#23: Jesus Camp

This riveting Oscar-nominated documentary offers an unfiltered look at a revivalist subculture where devout Christian youngsters are being primed to deliver the fundamentalist community's religious and political messages. Building an evangelical army of tomorrow, the Kids on Fire summer camp in Devil's Lake, N.D., is dedicated to deepening the preteens' spirituality and sowing the seeds of political activism as they're exhorted to "take back America for Christ."

Astounding, and terrifying.

Just a couple thoughts at the moment:

I suppose the filmmakers found it necessary to situate this in a particular time, but given the fall of Haggard and a variety of other events leading up to the recent election, the appointment of Justice Alito hardly seems like a pivotal moment in recent history. Still, it's a reminder to viewers that this is a pre-Obama film, if that makes a difference.

I'd love to believe that most of these kids will grow up and have children and live and work in the town where they grew up and won't bleed their hate out onto the world around them any more their parents did. But who knows -- the leader of the camp sees this as the tip of the iceberg. God help us all.

#20: The Forest For the Trees

Naive educator Melanie Pröschle (Eva Lobau) leaves her small town behind to teach at an upscale metropolitan high school in this engrossing character study. Determined to make a good impression, the socially inept Melanie instead commits one faux pas after another -- unwittingly alienating nearly everyone she meets. As she struggles against a tide of loneliness, aloof colleagues and disorderly students, she slowly begins to melt down.

This film had good reviews by Netflix members, and I've rarely disliked a Film Movement title. But it was hard to get through -- partly just because of the way it was shot (on DV, in harsh lighting).

20/10

#17: 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (2007)

In the last days of communism in Romania, Gabita (Laura Vasiliu), a young college student, wants to end her unplanned pregnancy. With the help of her best friend, fellow student Otilia (Anamaria Marinca), she seeks an abortion, illegal under the oppressive Ceaucescu regime. Director Cristian Mungiu's searing portrait of life under dictatorship received a slew of film festival awards as well as a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film from the Golden Globes. 113 minutes.

Intense. This'll take a few days to comment on.

By now, I'm sure most anyone reading this has heard about the lack of added sound on this film (Palme d'Or winner at the 2007 Cannes festival) -- no music, no effects, just dialogue and any additional sound the mics picked up. It makes for an intense experience, and one without the usual breaks to remind you that you're just a viewer, watching a film. It's bleak and hard and completely unsentimental. The hard work just of living, let alone the work to obtain an abortion (punishable as murder, if the pregnancy has progressed to 4 months) isn't a romantic sort of struggle, it's just a struggle.

#14: Marilyn Hotchkiss' Ballroom Dancing (2005)

Buzz: "Writer-director Randall Miller's heart-achingly sweet drama finds at its soft center Frank Keane (Robert Carlyle), a baker deeply despondent over the death of his wife. Frank finds redemption and hope in tragedy after he helps a stranger (John Goodman) who's sidelined by a fatal accident. It appears the man was on his way to a fateful reunion, so Frank, sparked only by good intentions, decides to show up for the rendezvous in his place."

I don't know where this came from -- I'd never heard of it before, I don't remember putting it in my Netflix queue, and I don't know how it got to the top of the queue without my noticing. The cast list is leggy: Mary Steenburgen, Sonia Braga, Sean Astin, Marisa Tomei, Adam Arkin, David Paymer, and Donnie Wahlberg are all packed in there, and it's not really an ensemble piece. But that's not an upside -- they're mostly wasted.

The story is implausible, and even more implausibly told, but it's all just an excuse to get Carlyle's character into these social situations, and give us a chance to get to know him. I could forgive it that, if the story was more compelling, but it's just not. I can't say whether it failed more in plan or execution -- there are lots of movies that have fantastical plots, but work nevertheless because of something deeper. Not that I tend to like those movies, mind you. I still can't get anyone to explain to me why Forrest Gump was such an Academy favorite. Or Cast Away, for that matter.

Anyway, this isn't a winner. Steenburgen seems out of place, even if she is lovely to watch, but it's almost like she's in a different movie. Robert Carlyle is intriguing, but nothing else really supports him well enough, including the script. Yuk, overall.

104 minutes.

#12: The Tracey Fragments

Buzz: "On a quest to locate her missing brother -- who believes he's a dog after she hypnotized him -- Tracey Berkowitz (Ellen Page) traverses a city full of hazards. Meanwhile, her neglectful parents make plans to send her to an equally dysfunctional therapist. Unhappy and insecure, Tracey consoles herself with rock 'n' roll fantasies about the new boy at school, Billy Zero, in this quirky indie drama."

Quirky doesn't even begin to describe it... but it was interesting. Crazy split-screen stuff makes it a little hard to get into, but eventually I settled in.

12/4

#6: The Way I Spent the End of the World

"In 1989 Romania, plucky 17-year-old Eva Matei comes of age as she schemes to escape the country's tyranny with help from her recalcitrant neighbor. Meanwhile, as her parents endure the brutal dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu, Eva's 7-year-old brother plots to kill the despot."

Films like this always make me feel very inadequate in my knowledge of political history, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Cute kid, taciturn teen, and lots of heart all around.

6/2

#5: The Bothersome Man (2006)

The Buzz: "Mysteriously deposited in a perfectly serene but colorless city where every need is met, Andreas soon realizes that not even a new lover can change the sterile banality drowning him. Is this placid life a dream come true or an inescapable hell? Is the lovely music coming from a crack in the basement his ticket out?"

My take: Though the plot conjures up films like Being John Malkovich, Dark City, and The Forgotten, this one holds its own as a very, very dark comedy. The cinematography is gorgeous (though intentionally monochromatic through most of the film), and our guy is compelling -- though not entirely sympathetic, really. 91 minutes. Also from the Film Movement (screened via Netflix watch-instantly).

5/2

#3: Arranged (2007)

The Buzz: "When Rochel (Zoe Lister Jones) and Nasira (Francis Benhamou) -- an Orthodox Jew and a Muslim, respectively -- meet as new teachers at a Brooklyn school, co-workers and students expect friction. But the women discover they have a shared expectation of entering into arranged marriages. As they experience tension between their traditional cultures and life in contemporary America, Rochel and Nasira form a special bond."

My Reaction: It's really not as annoying as the description makes it out to be, but it's hard to recap without putting the labels out there. The film addresses the problem of labels and difference in several scenes, though, from a patronizing principal who actually tries to give the women money to get a makeover, to a "unity circle" activity one of the women leads in the classroom. There's one scene where the two women meet in the park, each with a couple of kids in tow. One young boy asks each person in turn, "Are you Jewish?", full of skepticism and certainty about this similarity/difference thing he's learned about, and the expectation of exclusion. It's partly a treatment of space for tradition in the modern world, and partly about individual people overcoming difference, and that's about it -- it's nice, heartwarming, and not too preachy. From Film Movement.

3/1