Transsiberian

The biggest question to a film critic is why a distributor will or will not choose to screen a film in advance. Transsiberian, a film I really like, mainly for Emily Mortimer's dark turn as a wife with a secret past, was not screened. Nor was Bangkok Dangerous a film that opened this weekend. By contrast Lakeview Terrace, a film that opens in a couple of weeks was screened last month for film reporters. There are over a half dozen companies that distribute films, probably a baker's dozen if you count smaller distribs like Music Box (OSS 117 or Tell No One). When it's 20th Century, Lionsgate or Disney, or the myriad of boutique companies that distribute films it obviously has nothing to do with the budget, nor, judging Transsiberian, the actual quality of said film.
Brad Anderson made a mark in the 90s with a couple of indie navel gazing flicks like Next Stop Wonderland and Happy Accidents, a very cool and minimal time travel story. That was then and this is now, and for Transsiberian Anderson seems interested in dissecting relations between spouses while they are enjoying what is supposed to be an idyllic vacation. On a impossibly long train trip between mainland China and Moscow such a couple (Mortimer and Woody Harrelson) bond with another younger international pair (Eduardo Noriega and Kate Mara). They latter couple (actually just the dude) are smuggling drugs and they surreptitiously get Mortimer to act as a mule.
The whole operation unravels pretty quickly once a corrupt Russian cop (Sir Ben) gets wind of Mortimer. As you might guess at this point this is Mortimer's movie and she owns you the viewer. I could go into her secret past but that takes away from what you perceive while watching the film.
Transibberian rolls past quickly and in the final analysis its best selling points are its speed and the ability with which it maneuvers its plot tracks.

Pupi Avati retrospective at MFA

Over the last few years the Museum of Fine Arts has run retrospectives of major Italian directors. While the names and films of Antonioni and Fellini are familiar the output of Pupi Avati has rarely, if at all, been distributed in the United States (much less Houston).
Avati's films cover a range of genres and promise a stash of cinematic surprises as the series unfolds.

September 5 through September 21, 2008:
5 Fri. 7 p.m. House of Laughing Windows
6 Sat. 7 p.m. Knights of the Quest
7 Sun. 5:30 p.m. A School Outing
and 7:15 p.m. Christmas Present
12 Fri. 7 p.m. The Three of Us
and 9 p.m. Revenge of the Dead
13 Sat. 7 p.m. Graduation Party
and 9 p.m. Stars in the Ditch
14 Sun. 7 p.m. A Midsummer Night’s Dance
19 Fri. 7:30 p.m. The Heart is Elsewhere
20 Sat. 7 p.m. The Story of Boys and Girls
21 Sun. 7 p.m. Bix


Director Pupi Avati along with his producer/brother, Antonio, will attend the final weekend of the tribute. The video below shows a sequence from Una gita scolastica (A School Outing).

In-Between (Al Mabien): Iraqi Artists in Exile | September 10th

In-Between documents the experience of contemporary Iraqi artists who are living in exile, most as refugees, awaiting welcome from host countries. Iraqi artists and intellectuals have suffered tremendously through decades of dictatorship, sanctions, occupation and fundamentalism. Shot in Syria and Jordan in November of 2007, In-Between shares artists' stories, describes their creative work, why they left Iraq, intentional destruction of culture, love for their country and hopes for the future. This short, produced by Artist Rescue Mission, is part of an on-going project documenting the Iraqi contemporary art community in exile.

Wednesday, September 10th - 7:30 pm - Rice Cinema

Special in person discussion with director Tish Stringer and Iraqi Artists Nazar Yaha and Mohammed Al-Shammery who appear in the film.

Directed by: Tish Stringer
2008, 30 minutes
Arabic and English with English Subtitles

Babylon A.D.

You have to wonder how any director gets a film made after listening to Mathieu Kassovitz moan about his issues with 20th Century Fox and their version of Babylon A.D. The film looks cool, it aspires to Blade Runner levels of futuristic dsytopia. The film is chock full of recognizable thesps. The ending is totally incoherent.
In the opening moments of Babylon A.D. Vin Diesel tells the audiences he dies at the end. But with a plot that involves the virgin birth of twins, death doesn't exactly mean demise. Toorop (Diesel) sports Necronomicon tattoos and lives in a grungy apartment where he cooks an animal he just chopped up. It's little surprise his services are in demand from master criminal Gérard Depardieu (actually wearing a bigger fake nose than his own huge proboscis). Next thing we know Toorop is leading a chosen one and her guide (Mélanie Thierry and Michelle Yeoh) across Kazakhstan, then through the Bering Strait and eventually to a New York City of the future (tons of skyscrapers and people). After the first hour of running around the globe, Toorop drives his companions to upstate New York with all sorts of baddies in pursuit.
The High Priestess of the World (Charlotte Rampling) conspires to snuff all the good guys. By this point the film has become incomprehensible in spite of its sleek look and adventurous plot. Babylon A.D. resembles the Tower of Babel with attention deficit disorder. This is one film so convoluted it demands the viewer seek out the original source material (a French sci-fi novel by Maurice G. Dantec).

The Black List

In front of a gallery containing 25 larger than life size color photos composed and shot by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders a monitor plays a clip from the documentary The Black List.
This particular moment has Chris Rock talking about breaking into showbiz. His friends told him he was funnier than some guy they’d seen at Madison Square Gardens. For Rock, working at UPS was, he thought, a pinnacle of success. “Where I live now there’re four black residents. Hall of Famer, Hall of Famer, world’s greatest singer (Mary Blige), and me. Next door to me is a white dentist,” relates Rock with a sly smile.
This HBO documentary (broadcast on cable August 25 and showing at the MFA throughout September) combined with the Greenfield-Sanders portraits forms The Black List Project.
A five-gallery expanse titled Houston Collects: African American Art that “traces social and artistic themes of the last 130 years,” accompanies The Black Project to cover the entire upper front wing of the Law Building.
From the museum’s press kit: “The Black List borrows its title from the infamous 1950s-era dossier of suspected American communists, playing on the connotations given to the word black. Toni Morrison talks about her absorption with literature as a teenager, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar recalls an encounter with Miles Davis.”
Greenfield-Sanders, who previously directed Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart, has his photos in prominent permanent collections around the world. He made The Black List in collaboration with film critic and NPR commentator Elvis Mitchell. “In terms of arts and culture this is the way the world thinks,” Mitchell remarks about the Afrocentricity that permeates modern culture. Other portraits on display include: Colin Powell, Dawn Staley, Slash, William Rice, Al Sharpton, Mahlon Duckett, Susan Rice, Richard Parsons, Russell Simmons, Vernon Jordan, Faye Wattleton, Serena Williams, and Zane.
In addition to participating in the film the interviewees were asked to pose for the striking portrait shots. Speaking at a media preview the day before the exhibit opened to the public Mitchell and Greenfield-Sanders noted the behavior of their celebrity talent regarding the documentary. “Russell Simmons gave us 45 seconds, he actually put down the phone,” Mitchell recalled. By contrast “Colin Powell gave us several minutes, but he had to leave to get to his office to watch The Price is Right.”
The Black List plays at the MFA’s Brown Auditorium on Thursdays through Sundays during the month of September.