FILM REVIEW: MILK

The film that could have defeated Prop “Hate.”

Written By: Ed Rampell

Gus Van Sant’s superb stand up and cheer biopic, Milk, opens tomorrow Nov. 26, to coincide with the 30^th anniversary of the Nov. 27, 1978 assassination of its title character, as well as of Mayor George Moscone (played by Victor Garber, who can also currently be seen on the intriguing ABC Series Eli Stone).

Hollywood progressive Sean Penn, whose father Leo Penn had been blacklisted, is brilliant as Harvey Milk, California’s first openly gay elected official. One of the film industry’s top talents and most socially committed activists Penn deserves yet another Oscar nomination for this thoroughly convincing and moving portrayal of the San Francisco City Supervisor who was a tireless champion of gay rights.

Josh Brolin also deserves an Oscar nomination as the troubled killer and probable closet case (as Milk notes) who successfully used the so-called “Twinkie defense” to beat a first degree murder rap. Brolin presumably prepared for his role as politician/assassin Dan White by portraying mass murderer George W. Bush in Oliver Stone’s W.

For some inexplicable reason (unless it had to be released near the anniversary), this stellar movie is being released three weeks after the election, too late to impact Proposition 8.

Ironically, in the film Milk and his forces mobilize to defeat a similar anti-gay California proposition. Had Milk been released prior to the Nov. 4 election, it would have contributed to a cultural climate that could have arguably rallied people to beat Prop “Hate” and similar anti-same sex marriage measures in a number of other states.

Another omission is the delight audiences would have taken in seeing Anita Bryant – the 1970s celebrity who was a sort of combination of The View’s Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Governor/schlockey mom Sarah Palin – getting that famous pie in the face during her crusade against gay rights. Bryant was a prototype of the religious right/culture wars crusaders, and reliving her getting her comeuppance in the form of a pie to the face in one of the news clips Milk uses of the actual Bryant would have added to the fun, with relish (and cream). Oh well, another missed opportunity.

Nevertheless, let’s not quibble: Milk is a stellar cinematic and political achievement. Van Sant’s direction here is far more direct than in his other efforts to comment on social issues, such as the Columbine-shooting 2003 feature, Elephant. This more to the point, less vague, directorial style enhances the compelling nature of the Milk drama, rendering it all the more powerful and milking it for all it’s worth. Kudos also goes to screenwriter Dustin Lance Black for a cogent, cohesive story that illumines its hero – and villain – and the issues at stake.

It’s worth pointing out that this is the third time since 2004’s The Assassination of Richard Nixon that Penn has starred in a film based on the assassination of real life political figures. In 2006, he also played a character suggested by Louisiana’s Depression era governor, Huey Long, in a remake of All the King’s Men.

During the Bush presidency there has been a plethora of features, documentaries, plays, novels, nonfiction books, etc., about the assassinations of public figures, from Julius Caesar to Abraham Lincoln to Jesse James to John Lennon and now, Milk and Moscone, the latter being the liberal mayor who tried to reform San Francisco politics. What was it about the Bush regime that so enraged audiences and artists that it produced this backlash in the collective unconscious and the pop culture that emanates out of it?

As president-elect Barack Obama prepares to take office -- ike President Bill Clinton with the gays in the military issue -- his incoming Democratic administration could be confronted by another gay rights issue, namely same sex marriage. Milk raises the question of the effectiveness of working within the system, as Milk did, versus the power of a social movement independent of politics-as-usual and a political machine. As Obama continues to betray his mandate for “change” by selecting one Clinton retread and de-regulator (arguably responsible for the fiscal fiasco we’re in now) after another, Milk’s militant masses protesting in the streets can serve as a rallying cry for the people in today’s audiences -- if Obama fails to deliver on his promise of “change we can believe in.”

Milk makes it clear that Prop. 8 and the same gender marriage issue is not solely about gay rights - it is actually more properly understand as being a matter of equal rights for all. The story of America is one of all people, from slaves to females to gays, et al, galvanizing to ensure that the promise of America is extended to all, not just to rich, white male landowners and men of property. This societal story is far more dramatic than the personal tales most movies tell, about private sex lives and the like (though the film does not back off on intimacy just because a non-gay man stars in the film). And Milk tells this social tale brilliantly and powerfully, making the personal political and visa versa.

THEATER REVIEW: CARMEN

Opera’s original “bad girl” is back onstage.

Written By: Ed Rampell

Los Angeles Opera’s do-not-miss Carmen is the best production that I’ve seen so far at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, and I learned a major lesson in art appreciation at this performance in the process.

Hungarian mezzo-soprano Viktoria Vizin brilliantly embodies the eponymous character, the sensuously smoky cigarette girl who works in a tobacco factory and burns with a lust for life in Georges Bizet’s Spain-set opera. Vizin’s Gypsy seductively caresses her body, spreads her legs, hikes her scarlet dresses up to reveal inner thighs and so on. Carmen is a prototypical “Latin lover,” the essence of the “hot blooded” “oversexed” Latina – although the Paris-born Bizet never set foot in Spain. Like the Biblical characters of Jezebel and Bathsheba, Carmen is also an archetypal “bad girl,” whose unabashed, open carnality leads to carnage. Film Noir is full of these femme fatales who ensnare males in a web of desire.

But in our more enlightened times, Carmen might alternately be seen as a liberated woman who unapologetically owns her own sexuality, an apostle and practitioner of a form of “free love.” (Note: Nancy Fabiola Herrera, who hails from the Canary Islands and presumably sings like a canary, plays Carmen Dec. 6, 9 and 14.)

Tenor Marcus Haddock portrays Don Jose, the soldier who falls madly in love with Carmencita. It is the genius of Bizet, and his librettists Ludovic Halevy (lyrics) and Henri Meilhac (book), that despite his weaponry and warlike skills, the military man is less powerful than the alluring Carmen, whose power stems solely from her sexuality and the force of her personality. (Note: Spanish tenor German Villar takes on this role Dec. 6, 9 and 14.)

Don Jose is repeatedly forced to choose between “duty” and sex. It’s obvious which one wins out, or else there would have been no opera. That ‘60s slogan, “make love, not war,” could have been derived from this play. (The late comic George Carlin once said that had he invented that motto, he would have made his contribution to the human race and spent the rest of his life at the beach – lucky for us, he didn’t: apparently, Bizet did.)

Further complicating the drama is Micaela, a “wholesome” woman who offers Don Jose a chaste form of “pure” love as well as mom and apple pie. It’s the age-old “whore versus the angel” return. This genial character is depicted by Austrian soprano Genia Kumeier and on Dec. 6, 9 and 14 by Slovenian soprano Sabina Cvilak.

But wait, there’s more to throw into the explosive mix: the crowd-pleasing matador Escamillo (bass Raymond Aceto), who is also bewitched by Carmen, squaring the love triangle. Predictably, with all of these combustible emotional elements (which include a dash of cross-dressing), all hell breaks loose in this production adeptly directed by Javier Ulacia, who hails from Carmen’s homeland.

Gerardo Trotti’s sets co-star in this lavish production. His subtropical Spanish plaza with palms, rendition of Lillas Pastia’s (Worthie Meacham) inn and bullring all ring true, helping to bring the action and play fully alive. They quite literally set the scene.

Spaniard Nuria Castejon’s carefully staged choreography, which includes wild flamenco numbers, is ebulliently sensational. Ole!

Of course, the real superstar of this or any other production of what is widely considered to be the most popular opera is Bizet’s music, ably conducted here under the baton of French conductor Emmanuel Villaume. Vizin’s performance of Carmen’s “Habanera” aria, Aceto’s singing of the baritone aria, the “Toreador Song,” et al, are all exquisitely rendered by the singers and orchestra. Bravo!

L.A. Opera’s Carmen may be flawless, but there was, alas, a fly in the ointment, albeit one that had nothing whatsoever to do with the production itself. Herein lies the valuable lesson I learned in appreciating the arts, and also in being a reviewer.

Critics try to illumine artworks for the public and hopefully guide readers/listeners/viewers towards a greater enjoyment of the experience and aesthetics. Usually, we review the performing and creative aspect of the work under consideration; occasionally, the audience itself is covered. For instance, the crowd that rioted during the 1913 premier of Igor Stravinsky’s dissonant The Rite of Spring and the gunshot fired at an early screening of Bernardo Bertolucci’s sexually-charged 1972 Last Tango in Paris starring Marlon Brando, are well-known incidents in the history of theater-going.

What I’ve rarely seen commented upon by critics are the guests they bring to the shows they cover. At the end of L.A. Opera’s Carmen, the Gypsy woman who seemed to be a veritable life force does something that boggles the mind and seemed to me to be out of character. Stunned, after the curtain fell I asked my guest, “Why did Carmen do that?” The response was: “That’s it, blame the woman!” When I repeated in detail what I had seen from a center seat in the R aisle – close enough to clearly see the action – there was no refutation of this description or explanation of Carmen’s action (which I won’t reveal here), just repetition of the charge that I was somehow blaming the female of the species for Carmen’s inexplicable individual act. (L.A. Opera confirmed that my interpretation of events was a reasonable one.)

I realized then that I had squandered a valuable opera ticket on somebody who was argumentative and managed to conjure conflict out of the thin air where there had been none to have. My thanks for this much-sought-after favor was to be verbally abused by a crank hell-bent on inflicting pain, and I made my mind up then and there to never have anything to do with this messenger of misery again – let alone provide opera seats.

Although little noted, the point here is that attending events, arts, etc., with an appropriate companion is an important part of the overall enjoyment and appreciation of the work, and one must choose wisely, especially when experiencing something extremely special and divine. It is a testament to Bizet and L.A. Opera’s production of Carmen that even a fellow theatergoer who may very well be bonkers could not diminish my enjoyment of an immortal work of art, that I highly recommend everyone go see – with, but of course, the right companion. I won’t make the same mistake for Richard Wagner’s upcoming Das Rheingold.

Carmen is at LA Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave., 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 22, Dec. 3 and Dec. 6; Nov. 30 and Dec. 2 at 2:00 p.m.; and Dec. 9 and 14 at 1:00 p.m. For more info: (213)972-8001; www.laopera.com.

FILM REVIEW: EDEN

Tin Marriage

By John Esther

If you are one of the lucky ones, the tenth anniversary of marriage is the first of many milestone anniversaries you will cross. It is indicative of your commitment to another as you are, probably, still finding yourself while simultaneously being held up and through the eyes of someone you have spent a considerable amount of time with during your adult life. A foundation has been set, but flexibility is the key if you want to double down on that time -- and beyond.

After a decade of domestic devotion and diligent display to fellow denizens, Billy (Aidan Kelly) and Breda (Eileen Walsh) are having problems of the flesh.

Billy has encountered a bout of impotence. He cannot talk about it nor take responsibility. He is a man. It cannot be his fault. Go down to the pub, knock back several beers and leer at Imelda (Sarah Greene), a youthful synecdoche of Breda. One night with Imelda and its cheers to Aidan and his pink meat mate. And maybe Breda will benefit, too. She is aching to get laid herself.

Without knowing Aidan's intentions with Imelda, to her credit Breda does everything she can to make things right. They have pulled together for 10 years, have a wonderful family inside a secure home. Aidan has sufficiently provided for Breda and their two boys. Why toss that away on this temporary setback? We all know Aidan loves Eileen and Eileen sure loves Aidan; can he or she find another way?

Facing forward as hard as she can, without much help from Aidan, Breda gives more than she gets. But when Aidan disappears during the night of their anniversary, Breda will, in bourgeois matrimony terms, transgress their relationship farther than Aidan ever had -- although given the chance he probably would have done the same thing. There is a reason why they call it "The Walk of Shame."

Drawing on rich characters written by Eugene O'Brien, based on his play of the same name, director Declan Recks's 84-minute film succinctly illustrates a couple at a crossroads. Pizzazz and spontaneity have been replaced by familiarity and humiliating disclosure. It is a tough transition that only great loves may be able to cross.

Watch it with a date. Their response should inform as to what you what you are in store for if you are lucky to make it to the 10-year mark yourself.

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: MICHAEL RAPAPORT

Michael Rapaport finds Les is more in Special

Brand of Outsider
A Special interview with Michael Rapaport

By John Esther

Native New Yorker Michael Rapaport sits across from me on the balcony of a West Hollywood hotel. He looks tired yet enthusiastic to talk about his work.

A versatile and continually working actor since his first screen acting role on the television series, China Beach, in 1990, Rapaport has racked nearly 80 acting credits to his name. His more memorable parts were in the films Zebrahead, Higher Learning, Bamboozled, Cop Land, and Beautiful Girls, plus his television roles as Dave Gold in The War at Home and Donald Self in the silly currently-running series, Prison Break.

Often Rapaport is the best thing about his films or television shows, but his greatest performance in what may be his best film yet (actors can be auteurs if directors can), is that of Les Franken in co-director/writers Jeremy Passmore and Hal Baberman’s quirky yet highly intelligent film, Special.

Les works as a parking enforcement officer. A quiet, unassuming guy who reads comic books and eats microwave food alone in his crummy apartment, nobody notices Les unless he is handing out, or trying to hand out but does not, parking citations. Les could die tomorrow and the only people who would probably show up at his funeral are two comic book reading, stoner dudes (Josh Peck and Robert Baker).

Rather than overcome the inertia of a meaningless existence, Les does no more than take a new drug, Specioprin Hydrochloride (“Special”).

But the drug is more than Les bargained for in life. Now Les thinks he has superpowers and he is going to use them for the good of society. Or at least he imagines this is happening. Donning his super "Special" suit of armor, Les does not want to junk the junk to find out if he is wrong, despite advice from his friends and doctor (Jack Kehler).

A film with a lot of things going for it -- drugs as both self-realization and self-destruction; deconstruction of the comic book narrative; the fantasies of the working class person; paying and playing to advertise brand names as an act of hero worship and identification (albeit false); working class dupe as guinea pig and wild horse; as much as you push down the working class person, he will eventually rise (along with other genders); special as in stupid – although it has taken three years to see the big screen, this is one of the special films of the year.

In this exclusive interview, we spoke to Rapaport about being Special.
JEsther Entertainment: Why did you want to make this film?
Michael Rapaport: I responded to it. It was so well written I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t care the budget was so small and people attached to it were not that experienced.

JE: Is there something beyond a well written script that motivates you to pick a role?
MR: It’s always good to get paid well. My first inclination is always the creative process of the role. It excited me to play a part like this. When you do a movie with first time filmmakers with a small budget you’re rolling the dice and this just happened to work out.

JE: What do you think you have in common with Wes?
MR: I related to his insecurities and his feeling alone and feeling like an outsider.

JE: How can an actor be insecure?
MR: I don’t know one actor that’s not completely secure. There’s a lot of insecurity. Probably, actors are able to mask it better. Everybody has insecurities and people have different ways of covering them up and dealing with them.

JE: Les is this working class guy who wants to be a hero. We are seeing a few of those right now in American cinema -- high profile; heroic, but not superheroes -- such as Che, The Wrestler and Milk. Why are we seeing those right now?
MR: It’s a global appeal to see the everyman in these big struggles, but in reality they’re also getting over little things; these internal conflicts. It’s what makes Rocky still a great movie. It’s about getting over the little humps, not jumping off of buildings. The thing about Special that’s really good is that Les has sort of both those paths. He thinks he’s doing something really big, that’s helping the world; and he sort of comes to terms with that. I really love the dialogue in the voice over where he talks about there not being any bad guys to fight, any great wars to fight, and superheroes and villains. It’s just you waking up in the morning, getting coffee, do your laundry, you go to work. I like that he’s just coming to terms with that. I think the movies you mentioned are dealing with the same thing – internal fears instead of these big made-up ones.

JE: What is the film saying about drugs and self realization and promise?
MR: The reality is that you need to be careful with what you put in your body. Whether it’s pharmaceutical or whatever, you can’t fuck around with that stuff. People making their bodies into like science experiments and they’re not scientists. It’s a dangerous thing.

JE: What can we draw from the fact he injures himself yet does not realize it?
MR: That has to do with drugs. You can do a lot of damage to yourself if you’re not having your senses working the way they’re supposed to be. You can fuck yourself and, by the time you realize it, real damage can be done.

JE: I was trying to tie in the working class condition where people think they are empowered when actually they are being worked over.
MR: I agree.

JE: The first time I saw this movie I laughed a lot more than the second time.
MR: That’s good. I like that the movie starts off like, “Oh, this guy is crazy. Look at him.” Then it gets serious. That’s the way the script was constructed. I like the turn it took. When you realize this guy was really going crazy it becomes a little bit sadder. That’s what makes it sometimes an uncomfortable movie to watch.

JE: The film was shot in a sparse environment which makes it look like a comic book narrative.
MR: Right. It’s isolating and him being alone. We talked about those things when shooting.

JE: How does this role compare to Donald Self on Prison Break, who has a lot of control?
MR: They’re very, very different. Donald has a lot of control. He’s on top of his shit. He’s confident and assertive where Les is not assertive and, you know, can’t assert himself in any situation until the end when he realizes that it is possible to stand up for yourself. They’re very different characters with a very different approach and that’s the fun of being an actor.

JE: You have done a lot of roles over the years. Are you still hungry to work? Are there certain roles you’re looking out for to do?
MR: I’m extremely hungry to work, to do diverse parts and to try to push myself and push the perception of what I can or can’t do as an actor. It’s challenging and frustrating but also very fulfilling at the same time.

JE: Lastly, what do you think about interviews where you talk about you and your work? Do they serve the work? Should the film speak for itself?
MR: Nah, this is part of the business, man. I’m happy to have the opportunity to do this. I’m happy to do a movie where it’s worthy of discussing and I’m happy to do a movie I feel proud to talk about. We’ve been talking about this movie for three years. If I didn’t feel good about the movie I wouldn’t be here. All that “work speaks for itself” shit; this is part of the business. You get paid to do a job and this stuff here is all part of it. Hopefully you can stand behind what you’re promoting. In this case I am so proud of this movie I’m going to ride it out until it gets seen the way I feel it deserves.

EXCLUSIVE BEL AIR FILM FESTIVAL OPENING NIGHT

Opening night party palace. Photo by Lynnette Gryseels.


By John Esther

The inaugural Bel Air Film Festival commenced this evening with a little party inside Lionsgate Vice Chairman and Director Mark Amin's monstrously ostentatious mansion in the namesake city.

Titled "Film Fashion Night," non-filmmakers, leisure class denizens and others swallowed sparkling wine served in plastic cups while chowing down snacks of various merit. Honorees for the evening included Anya Sarre, celebrity stylist for such banal enterprises as Entertainment Tonight, The Insider and ET on MTV.

Hosted by Genlux Magazine, opening night held screenings of the short and enlightening documentary, Louise Dahl-Wolfe: Painting with Light, about the famed photographer’s life and works. While few from those present attended that documentary, only a few remained for the second and last short documentary of the night, James Gill Full Circle, which is an autobiographical look at the American pop artist James Gill.

For more information go to www.belairfilmfestival.com

Above: A photo from the documentary Design by Light, an image far removed from opening night.

THEATER REVIEW: THE JOY LUCK CLUB

East meets West meets East at the East West Players

By Ed Rampell

Susan Kim’s play currently at the venerable East West Players adapts Amy Tan’s groundbreaking bestselling 1989 novel, The Joy Luck Club.

A notable 1993 film directed by Wayne Wang and produced by Oliver Stone, this multi-generational, multi-culti saga about four Chinese immigrant mothers and their Chinese-American daughters is richly complex, with numerous storylines with divergent elements that are further complicated as Joy veers from the comic to the tragic, and jumps around in time and space. The plot further thickens when Cold War tensions between Communist “Red China” and capitalist America are factored into the equation, along with a dose of mysticism.

Onscreen the divergent plot points are largely held together by the universal theme of parent-child relations, and in a settler society where most are descendants of “foreigners” who came to the New World, the commonality of the émigré experience. Onscreen, and I suspect in Tan’s novel, the Mahjong game played by the four “aunties,” et al, is also a leitmotif and recurring theme that serves as a metaphor to unify the tale’s wide ranging strands. The title is derived from these games that serve as a meeting place, discussion group, feasting opportunity, etc., for the aunties, and then some.

To successfully pull this complicated comedy drama off onstage requires a focus with laser-like precision. For some reason, in Kim’s adaptation the pivotal mahjong games more or less vanish after the first act. Following eight major and numerous minor characters presents difficulties, especially, perhaps, for theater-goers who do not belong to the ethnic group being depicted. Those who have not read the novel or seen the movie version may also have a harder time keeping track of the action that jumps from China to California, the 1930s to a more recent era, and so on.

John Binkley’s set design, however, creatively seeks to solve this problem. Much of the set is cleverly fashioned like an unfolding scroll; the names of the dramatis personae whose tale is being related at that moment is projected on it, along with a sort of headline encapsulating her storyline at that point.

Despite all of these challenges, Tan’s tale shines forth. The generational clashes between mother and daughter, intensified in a cross-cultural cauldron, remain touching.

During the production long buried memories of my Ukraine-born grandmother bubbled their way up from my unconscious to the surface of my mind. The yearning of the American-born to reconnect with their ancestral roots and heritage is a powerful theme. The conflicted daughters, who are strangers in a strange land, must cope with their quest for identity, as they seek to find out: Are they Chinese, American or some sort of amalgam of the two? Of course, this has implications for their private lives, as three daughters marry Caucasian men.

Some sharp, insightful and witty lines of dialogue ring true. A discussion of fate leads to the observation that “faith is just the illusion that you’re in control.” Along these same lines, when one of the aunties works in a fortune cookie bakery, an employee quips that they are determining the fortunes of others.

A live musical ensemble enhances the theatrical experience by playing mood-setting Western and Chinese music onstage. However, the sense that viewers are watching through the proverbial “fourth wall” is undercut: When one character cuts her arm with a knife, no blood is drawn; invisible food is served at a dinner: and so on, undermining the realism audiences used to cinematic special effects and naturalism on the stage and screen have come to take for granted.

The stereotypical notion that East Asians are highly competitive, overemphasize accomplishment and are a “race” of overachievers is dealt with, too. However, the play also shows that the aunties were atypical of 1937 China (the year Imperial Japan invaded China -- when the play sort of begins) in their class origins. One auntie describes herself as “the most rich in the village.”

Ultimately, the play returns to the Joy Luck Club itself, if not to a mahjong match per se. The three surviving aunties pool their mahjong winnings to enable Jing-Mei Woo (Elaine Kao), the daughter of the sole deceased mother, to travel to China and meet, for the first time, her twin sisters. She becomes a daughter for the return home and is lucky to discover the joy of her Chinese-ness.

In this production skillfully directed by Jon Lawrence Rivera, Karen Huie depicts Lindo Jong and Celeste Den depicts her daughter Waverly Jong; Deborah Ping is Ying-Ying St. Clair, Katherine Lee is her daughter Lena St. Clair; Emily Kuroda portrays An-Mei Hsu, while Jennifer Chang plays her daughter Rose Hsu; and Cici Lau plays Suyuan Woo, with Kao as her daughter Jing-Mei. The entire cast performs multiple roles; however the star, but of course, remains Ms. Amy Tan. Bravo!

The Joy Luck Club plays at the East West Players, David Henry Hwang Theater, 120 Judge John Aiso St. in Downtown L.A.’s Little Tokyo, on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. and Sundays at 2:00 p.m. through Dec. 7. For more info: 213/625-7000; info@eastwestplayers.org.

FILM REVIEW: ANTARCTICA

Lost in Lust

By John Esther

Far busier than Eytan Fox's The Bubble, yet without that film's political cognizance, Yari Hochner's (Good Boys) latest film follows several non-gay characters as they etch out their days in the seemingly, increasingly a la Israeli cinema, all-gay world of Tel Aviv.

Using quick opening montage and split screens, Antarctica immediately announces its sexually charged stance. Like many cosmopolitans in their 20s Omer (Tomer Ilan), searches for identities in the forms of books and one night stands, although the film concentrates almost solely on the latter with one sexual scene after another.

During one of these numerous encounters, Omer is caught off guard when he meets a younger man, Danny (Yiftach Mizrahi). There is an attraction between the two but fears and loathing of commitment and Danny's immaturity threaten any lasting relationship. Omer is also attracted to a journalist, Romen (Guy Zo-Artez). The two pique each other's mind slightly more than sexual curiosity. Coincidentally, similar to Omer and Danny's situation, Romen dates the younger, vapid Miki (Yuval Raz). Why is monogamy good?

Then there is Omer's sister, Shirley (Lucy Dubinchik), who pursues a relationship with her boss, Michal (Liat Akta), who works at a coffee shop where Romen interviews Matlda Rose (Rivka Neuman), an author with kooky ideas about alien kidnappers ("Bite off your tongue, swallow it whole/ Before it wags, betrays us all"). Michal's best friend, Eitan (Oshri Sahar), sporadically encounters the "sitting champ" Omer in bed. Meanwhile, Shoshana (Noam Huberman) meddles in the lives of her children Omer and Shirley.

As more characters come into the picture, and storyline increasingly intertwine past the point of credulity, the frank gay sex (lesbian sex is kept to a bare minimum) oozes across the screen. Gorgeous guys swap fluids and pose before the camera for open minded audiences like Russ Meyer's (Beyond the Valley of the Dolls) movies used to do for people who thought they were hip as they praised that reactionary filmmaker.

However, Hochner is no radical. Thin on ideas and thick on sex, Antarctica will more likely have its audiences rushing toward the bedroom or local cruising bastion rather than heading toward a salon, library or bookstore.

AFI FEST 2008: KASSIM THE DREAM

Fighting His-story

By John Esther

From the terrains of Uganda to the rings of Philadelphia, PA, Kassim "The Dream" Ouma has been fighting for various reasons throughout his entire life.

As chronicled in Kief Davidson's worthwhile documentary, Kassim the Dream, Ouma was kidnapped by the Lord's Resistance Army of Uganda at the age of 6 and forced to kill.

(What the LRA was fighting for is not explained in the film. To put it simply, it was a military power grab in the name of God).

While kids in America were practicing shooting human beings and monsters in their imaginations, video games and play, Ouma and many other kids like him were torturing their fellow men, women, and children. Unlike American kids who may be grounded for not playing fair, failing to prey by the LRA resulted in torture and death. For a child whose only concept of resistance is tyranny a la the LRA, Ouma could not envision anything but cooperation -- something he has not entirely outgrown.

As Ouma grew older his conscious developed along with his boxing skills. At the symbolic age of 18 when Americans officially become adults, Ouma did took on a grave amount of responsibility for himself and defected to the United States. This transgression against those now in power back in Uganda resulted in the torture and murder of Ouma's father.

Homeless and unable to speak English, Ouma persevered in America. As he picked up English Ouma also rose up in the boxing ranks, eventually becoming the Junior Middleweight Champion of the World.

Yet the horrors of his childhood continued to bother Ouma. Although he managed to bring his mother and first son to America (he already had one son here), the 29-year-old Ouma wished to return to the homeland. But if he wants to do that he has many questionable obstacles to overcome, some the viewer may wish to cheer for more than others. As Ouma trains for a world title fight against Jermain Taylor in Little Rock, Arkansas, he also needs to appease the notorious government of Uganda that was responsible for his abduction and father's murder if he wants to get home.

A contradicting mixture of joviality and melancholy, courage and cowardice, insight and stupidity, Ouma is a complex character I found worth cheering for at times and sneering at during others. Ouma can crack jokes and wain reflexive on the differences between his grand life in North America and the tragic one back on the African continent. Ouma may have the heart to train heavily before the big fight, but he does not have the discipline to refrain from smoking pot and consuming alcohol (although he does manage to keep his "grease"). Ouma faces his inner demons only to turn around, and buckle to, and let himself be used by, the demonic Ugandan government.

Ouma understands the utter poverty of his homeland but embraces, without seemingly any pause, the materialism of his new one without ever noticing the two are indeed connected. That his trainer, "Uncle" Tom Morgan, a strident anti-Bush artist and politically minded American, fails to instill this in the young man warrants some inquiry .

A moving portrait of a complex character who gradually matures as the film goes by, it would be interesting to see what Ouma has done for himself, his past, and his two countries in the future.

(Kassim the Dream screens Nov. 8, 7 p.m.; Nov. 9, 12:30 p.m.)


For more information log onto http://www.afi.com/

AFI FEST 2008: PLAYING COLUMBINE

No endgame in site

By John Esther

Banned from Slamdance Film Festival for no explicable reason, director Danny Ledonne's documentary, Playing Columbine, made its World Premiere debut at AFI Film Festival 2008 last night to a surprisingly and disappointingly small attendance.

Inspired by the awful events that took place at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, on April 20, 1999, in which two demented teenage students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, waged a murderous assault on their school, Ledonne made a video game called Supergame Columbine Massacre RPG!.

Naturally the immediate kneejerk reaction to the game was to view it as "exploitative," "obscene" and hopes that Ledonne would meet the same fatal fate as Columbine students Rachel Scott, Daniel Rohrbough, Kyle Velasquez, Cassie Bernall, Isiah Shoels, Michael Kechter, Lauren Townsend, John Tomlin, Kelly Fleming, Daniel Mause, Corey DePooter and Steve Curnow, plus teacher and coach Dave Sanders, met that day.


If critics had bothered to actually watch the game -- where it seems there is no way out but hell for the killers, victims linger onscreen longer than usual video game storyline, and an emphasis on the amount of sorrow brought on by such actions is displayed -- these conservative critics may have come to understand that this low grade, amateurish video game was breaking boundaries by using the video game medium as a form of social engagement.

Using his journey from creator to "monster" to spokesperson as the narrative arc, Ledonne chronicles his own plight against the larger social context of video games as the emerging 21st medium. Gathering interviews from critics, fans, lawyers, politicians, video game makers and players alike, the best documentary I have seen at this year's festival weighs in on the values and responsibilities that come from having and maintaining the First Amendment, video games as art, targeting new audiences that may not typically engage themselves in social issues, and historical context via previous forms of art, namely cinema. To its credit, Playing Columbine slowly and surely bares out that form and content are never inseparable.

Screening today at 3:15 at Arclight Hollywood, Ledonne's impressive debut is a worthy companion to two other films which have addressed the Columbine massacre, Michael Moore's famous documentary, Bowling for Columbine and Gus Van Sant's eloquent yet problematic film, Elephant.

For more information log onto http://www.afi.com/afifest

AFI FEST 2008: LIVERPOOL

I-ce

By John Esther

A film with Michelangelo Antonioni pictured all over it, if the late great filmmaker -- who was part of AFI's Milestones last year (featuring a horrible projection of Antonioni's The Passenger) -- would have ever dealt with such a working class protagonist, Lisandro Alonso's film is one of AFI's best pictures this year.

Slow, meticulous and without much dialogue, the film follows Farrel (Juan Fernandez), a lonely sailor coming back to his family for a temporary visit. Along the way the film encounters few and very lonely people, existing to work and live and not much else.

Most people would tend to view these characters as rather sad, lonely and perhaps even degenerate, but Alonso chooses to frame his characters in ways that give their lives beauty and meaning in a cold and indifferent landscape.

Unfortunately there are no more screenings of Liverpool at AFI Fest 2008.

For more information log onto http://www.afi.com/

AFI FEST 2008: A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE

Cy Carter (Dax) and Mary Elizabeth Ellis (Olive) as the young married couple enduring A Quiet Little Marriage

Loud and fearful

By Don Simpson

Winner of an audience award at Austin Film Festival and my pick for the best film of the narrative feature competition (Note: I was not able to view the winner – Nobuyuki Miyake’s Lost & Found), writer-director Mo Perkins’ A Quiet Little Marriage is an improvised (a la John Cassavetes) tale of a young, fault-filled marriage. The story is brutally realistic; the dialogue and the performances are skillfully subdued and the cinematography is perfectly natural. The ending twist is a bit trite, but otherwise the only “fault” of A Quiet Little Marriage is that the writing plays second fiddle to the acting.

(A Quiet Little Marriage screens Nov. 7, 7 p.m.; Nov. 8, 3:45 p.m.)

For more AFI Film Fest 2008 info, log onto http://www.afi.com/

DVD RELEASE: EARTHLINGS

Changing dines

By John Esther

Earlier this year when vegan Dennis Kucinich, Democrat Ohio House Rep, was running for President, the issue of vegetarianism and animal rights registered a blip on the national political map. After Kucinich kicked the campaign bucket -- and we saw photos of the leading presidential candidates chewing down on cooked carcass on the campaign trail -- the issue seemed as dead as the estimated 20,160,000 chickens killed each day in North America alone

Fortunately Californians overwhelmingly passed Prop. 2, which prohibits farms from caging chickens, calves, and pregnant pigs in ways that prevent them from lying down, stretching their appendages. It is a small step and we need to do a lot more considering the realities of eating meat and animal abuse which have been documented in writer-director Shaun Monson's documentary, Earthlings.

One of the top ten films of 2006, Monson’s exploration into the relations between humans and their fellow sentient creatures will change life on earth for the better every time someone watches it. Narrated by the recently-retired actor Joaquin Phoenix, this documentary is the most comprehensive of its kind as it details how animals are misused for pets (breeding), food, clothing, sport, entertainment and one’s own self-loathing.

Now available the special extended DVD edition includes 25 minutes of deleted sequences, additional narration, director commentary and subtitles in 10 different languages.

If you watch “Earthlings” you are bound to change.

For more informatiion log onto http://www.earthlings.com/earthlings/earthlings-2.php

AFI FEST 2008: ELECTION DAY

By John Esther

The sixth day of AFI Film Festival 2008 happens to be Election Day.

After you have voted, feel free to come over to the Cinema Lounge at the Roosevelt Hotel and watch the returns roll in. If it is all too much to watch, you can distract yourself with a movie or two.

As an incentive to vote (as if one needed it) if you bring your “I Voted” sticker to the Box Office, you will get two tickets for the price of one.

AFI FEST 2008: CHE, TOKYO SONATA, ETC

Sex, lies and revolution: Oh Che can you see?

Written By: Ed Rampell

The American Film Institute is a major force on the cinematic scene, and its film festival is one of Los Angeles’ annual cultural highlights. And as our financial system crumbles and the terms “working class” and “socialism” are revived in the American lexicon, a biopic about one of the most famous communist of all time arrives just in the nick of time – sort of like Comandante Guevara’s rebels at Santa Clara. Steven Soderbergh’s masterpiece Che, starring Benicio Del Toro (who also shares producer’s credit), was unleashed at Hollywood Blvd’s historic Grauman’s Chinese Theatre on Nov. 1 as AFI’s centerpiece gala – all 4.5ish hours of it, intermission and all.

The life of Ernesto “Che” Guevara actually merits the big screen epic treatment; indeed, the co-screenwriter of the 1962 classic Lawrence of Arabia was the blacklisted Communist Michael Wilson, who also co-wrote 1969’s Che! with Omar Sharif in the title role. As Leonard Maltin notes, “you haven’t lived until you see [Jack] Palance play Fidel Castro” in what became a youth exploitation pic; one half expects Palance to break into one-armed pushups during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

However, one also suspects that Soderbergh’s guerrilla warfare saga is far closer to what Wilson originally had in mind before his script was, like its subject, butchered. Soderbergh’s Che is the most socially conscious of the films by the producer and/or director of 2000’s Erin Brockovich, 2005’s Good Night, and Good Luck and Syriana, 2007’s Michael Clayton, and, lest we forget, the Ocean’s series. Che begins shortly after that other recent Guevara biopic -- 2004’s The Motorcycle Diaries, starring Gael Garcia Bernal as a Christ-like Ernesto who literally ministers to South America’s lepers (a metaphor for the oppressed) -- ends: with the youthful, beardless Argentine (by the way, AFI is presenting an Argentina Showcase this year) meeting Fidel at Mexico City, and joining the revolutionary movement against Cuba’s U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. The film artfully follows Che as he evolves into a guerrilla warrior and emerges as a leader of the Cuban Revolution. The epic is skillfully intercut with Che’s interlude at New York, where he rather famously and boldly addressed the U.N. and faced down assassination threats and attempts. (Look for Julia Ormond as a journalist.)

The first part of Soderbergh’s instant classic is as joyous and triumphant as part two is downbeat, a sort of leftwing version of Mel Gibson’s 2004 The Passion of the Christ. The film does not make clear what Guevara’s intention was when he surreptitiously decamped for Bolivia: to export Cuba’s revolution from a strategically located nation that bordered on numerous other South American countries. Che failed because the author of a classic book on guerrilla warfare forgot the first commandment of people’s warfare: that the guerrilla, as Mao put it, is the fish, while the people are the sea. In Bolivia, the foreign-imported revolt was cut off from the sea, and the Cuban and Bolivian insurgents became fish out of water, as the Comandante descended into a Dantesque inferno.

Nevertheless, the asthmatic Che, who is brilliantly depicted by Del Toro, comes across as utterly fearless and worthy of his status as the ultimate revolutionary icon, his image found on more T-shirts, banners, etc., at demos around the world than anyone else’s. Soderbergh could have ended on this more uplifting note, and revealed that today, Bolivia has a socialist leader, Evo Morales, and indeed, with leftist and liberal leaders such as Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega currently in power south of the proverbial border, Latin America is closer to Che’s dream, and Cuba is less regionally isolated, than at any time since the days of the great liberator Guevara emulated, Simon Bolivar.

Che is scheduled to be released in L.A. and N.Y. for Academy consideration on Dec. 12 as a single film. The epic will then go wide in January as two separate pictures. Che merits nominations for Best Director and Best Picture, and deserves the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, while Benicio should receive the Best Actor Oscar (perhaps he can immortalize Che’s rifle in the cement in front of Grauman’s near John Wayne’s boot-clad footprints?). Among the cast of thousands look for Matt Damon and Lou Diamond Philipps in cameos, Run, Lola, Run’s Franka Potente as Che’s Bolivian companera Tania, Catalina Sandino Moreno as Aleida (who artfully portrays Che’s wife-to-be falling in love with her hombre during the Cuban Revolution) and Demian Bichir as Fidel. Venceremos!

This year, most AFI screenings are not being held at the Hollywood Blvd. movie palace but at the ArcLight Cinemas on Sunset Blvd. One of this year’s best offerings is director/co-writer Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s (no relation to Akira Kurosawa) Tokyo Sonata, an offbeat, droll look at the Sasakis, a dysfunctional Japanese family. Sonata’s rollicking plot takes many unexpected twists and turns, some quite hilarious. The film wickedly observes the plight of Japanese salary men who need to save face, even as they are hit by downsizing; not-so-blissful domestic bliss; women’s liberation; unruly children; and the need of artists to express themselves. This quirky, well-directed drama starring Inowaki Kai, Teruyaki Tagawa, Kyoka Koizumi and Yu Koaynagi as, respectively, Kenji, Ryuhei, Megumi and Taka Sasaki also manages to comment on the Iraq War. If not for a well-informed filmgoer’s suggestion, I would have missed this late entry that is not in AFI’s program guides, but is scheduled to be released in L.A. in March.

With its eye on foreign, indie and other specialty cinema, AFI is screening a retrospective of French cineaste Arnaud Desplechin’s oeuvre. Like Tokyo Sonata, 1991’s La Vie des Morts is about a dysfunctional family – this time in France, so expect lots of angst among puffs of Gaulois cigarettes and quotes from literary sources, as a family assembles after one of its members attempts suicide. Family remains a Desplechin obsession, and in the 2007 documentary L’Aimee the filmmaker chronicles the history and legacy of his own clan. This is a worthy idea; ideally, each family deserves its own movie, just as each has photo albums. However, the problem with L’Aimee is that the famille Desplechin, et al, are not particularly interesting. The director, on the other hand, proved to be as quirky as his films during the intro to and Q&A after a screening of the far superior A Christmas Tale, another offbeat family drama starring Catherine Deneuve, which screens at LACMA 7:30 p.m., Nov. 7, is well worth seeing and elsewhere reviewed below. It’s interesting to see not only Desplechin’s recurring themes but his returning thespians, such as Emmanuelle Devos, who appears and, appropriately, ages in La Vie des Morts, A Christmas Tale, and other films by this auteur.

For more AFI Fest 2008 information please log onto http://www.afi.com/