By Kim Voynar Voynar@moviecitynews.com
SIFF 2010 Review Roundup: Farewell, Letters to Father Jacob, Soul Kitchen, Skateland, Winter’s Bone and The Dry Land
Saturday night’s Seattle International Film Festival Centerpiece Gala Screening event was Christian Carion’s Farewell, based on a true story about an idealistic KGB colonel (Emir Kusturica) who, seeking to make the world a better place for his son, passes crucial information about KGB operations to a French engineer working in Moscow (Guillaume Canet). The engineer, in turn, gets the information to French president Francois Mitterand, allowing (then-president Ronald Reagan might have said “forcing”) France and the United States to work together to put the information to use in dismantling the threat of the KGB intelligence net.
Thus, the colonel, nicknamed “Farewell” by the French, changed the world through espionage based on ideals and not greed, helped to bring about the fall of the Berlin Wall and to end the Cold War. Farewell(which last year played at both Telluride and Toronto) is a well-done, superbly acted, tautly directed political thriller, but it’s equally a smart character study of the colonel, his motivations, and especially, his love for his teenage son, for whom he seeks a brighter future. I’m not sure when Farewell opens in the US, but it’s on the “hold review” list, so hopefully you’ll be able to catch it soon.
The Centerpiece party was held at the other end of Capitol Hill from the screening at the Daughters of the American Revolution Hall, a popular Seattle party venue. As we entered the party we were directed to “food on the right, drinks on the left, more drinks and dancing upstairs.” There were both food and drinks in abundance to satiate the hungry post-screening crowd. There’s generally been more of a celebratory air at the fest parties I’ve attended thus far, with Seattleites digging deep in their closets to locate their less-casual wear for fest events. It was a bit crowded when we were there, but everyone seemed to be taking the crowding in stride and waiting patiently in the food line (it helps if you hit the bar first and then sip your drink while you’re waiting for the yummy eats, I’m told).
Speaking of hold review films, there’s a couple I need to catch you up on. First up is Letters to Father Jacob, which, along with Father of My Children andWinter’s Bone , is in close running for my favorite film of the fest. This spiritual, stately film by Finnish director-writer Klaus Härö isn’t going to rush things along just because the world moves at internet speed these days; it’s a quiet, deliberate story about the relationship between Leila, who was serving a life sentence before she was pardoned on the condition that she take a job reading to the blind, gentle Father Jacob the mail he recieves from supplicants asking him to pray for their various trials and travails.
The cinematography is of painterly beauty; the acting — by the wonderfully expressive Kaarina Hazard, who conveys mountains of emotion with a twitch of an eyebrow, as Leila, and the exquisitely empatheticHeikki Nousiainen as kind, humble Father Jacob — is superb; the story simple yet heart-rending.
Hitting a completely different emotional tone is the very entertaining German filmSoul Kitchen, directed by Fatih Akin (Head-On, Edge of Heaven). Soul Kitchen brings together a cast of motley, intriguing characters at a dingy warehouse restaurant in Hamburg owned by Zinos (Adam Bousdoukos), who has more perseverance than talent at hand with regard to the culinary arts. Soul Kitchen serves up greasy-spoon diner fare — until Zinos brings on board the talented — but possibly psychopathic — Chef Shayn (Birol Ünel). The restaurant is the least of Zinos’ problems, though: his girlfriend is about to leave for a job in Shanghai; he’s thrown his back out; his paroled, charming, criminal brother Ilias (Moritz Bleibtreu) wants him to lie and say he’s working for Soul Kitchen; and an uptight tax collector keeps showing up and confiscating his property to pay back taxes he can’t afford. Akin weaves all this together into a delicously funny soup of humanity without resorting to the cheap tricks many American comedies resort to in order to get laughs.
While we’re on the subject of unfunny comedies, I wasn’t crazy about Anthony Burns’ Skateland, yet another retro-’80s comedy that relies more on the audience’s nostalgia for skating rinks and “jams” (that’s “parties” or “keggers” to you young folks) than on developing compelling characters we can get behind and care about. Ritchie (Shiloh Fernandez) is a handsome-but-lazy 19-year-old Texas kid with a talent for writing but little motivation to do anything that requires more effort than hanging out with his pals tossing back brewskies. His parents’ marriage is on the rocks, his perky younger sister is trying desperately to cling to the belief that her family and Ritchie will be okay.
Most of the characters are one-dimensional stereotypes: the nerds, the bullies, the pretty girl everyone wants to have sex with, the smart girl-best friend (Ashley Greene, taking a break from Twilighting) who wants to be with Ritchie, but he, being the selfish, aimless bonehead that he is, doesn’t appreciate her. None of it rings particularly true, and I didn’t care about most of these characters enough to be emotionally affected even when the tragedy telegraphed from early on in the film finally strikes. It’s just not enough to have skating rinks and retro music in your film, you need a story and characters we can actually root for, and no one here fits that bill — except for the would-be girlfriend and the sister, who are relegated to side dish parts rather than being the focus of the story. It might have been better told from their point of view.
Bringing it back around to a positive note, Debra Granik’s Winter’s Bone, which preemed to strong critical response at Sundance (where it also took the Grand Jury Prize), is a gem of a film. Ree (Jennifer Lawrence, in a stunning breakthrough performance), a 17-year-old girl from a poor-but-proud Ozark family, has to track down her father, who’s jumped bond, before the law comes and takes away the family homestead. But finding her dad means traversing a veritable family tree of dysfunction and violence, where loyalty means more than law, and disrespect or betrayal of the clan’s ways is a sure-fire way to wake up dead, even if you’re a blood relation and a teenage girl. Winter’s Bone reminded me of Frozen River thematically, with its sense of lawless desperation and a strong female lead, and it also stirred up memories of Asiel Norton’s Redland (though it lacks that films stunning use of light and shadow as a part of the storytelling).
Lastly, The Dry Land, Ryan Piers Williams’ excellent feature directorial debut, explores the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder in soldiers through the tale of James (Ryan O’Nan), a young soldier who returns home from war unable to remember the violent incident that resulted in the deaths of two fellow soldiers and his own discharge. Williams shows us the impact of war on James largely through the eyes of his devoted wife Sarah (America Ferrera, excellent here), best friend Michael and mother (Jason Ritter and Melissa Leo, respectively, in strong supporting performances). Wilmer Valderrama turns up in a solid side role as James’ army buddy Raymond, who goes with him on a quest to find the truth about what happened.
James’ battle with himself as he spirals out of control, not knowing how to get back to who he was before, and Sarah’s struggle to help the man she loves without losing herself, is heartbreaking fictionalized; knowing that the story was inspired by countless real stories of good, idealistic young men and women who return from the battlefied shattered by the reality of war makes it that much more tragic. There are no fancy flashback scenes here, no kick-ass explosions or battle sequences glorifying death and dying — just a well-crafted, compelling story with characters we can get behind and care about. Williams handles his disturbing subject matter with a deft touch that belies his own youth. Well done.
-by Kim Voynar
