The 51st San Francisco International Film Festival is coming up soon, and this year I've taken the unusually restrictive step of watching only films screened at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley. Last year -- and I write this without embarrassment -- I lived inside the Kabuki in San Francisco for almost a whole day, beginning with Bunuel's Belle du Jour at noon and finishing up with an Icelandic horror film that let out at 1:30 in the morning, popcorn and nachos for lunch and dinner and a side trip to Playground for a carafe or two of soju, and three rotating groups of friends with myself as the common denominator. But my move to the East Bay has made it easier for me to watch films on different evenings (and, conversely, more difficult for me to watch movies in SF).
This means I miss out on the lone Filipino film in the festival this year -- Sanchez's The Woven Stories of the Other -- which I probably won't be seeing. I was hoping for the latest films by Auraeus Solito, John Santos, Khavn de la Cruz, or Lav Diaz, but no such luck. (I'm rather happy with the Brillante Mendoza films from the recently-concluded Asian American film fest though.)
I'm also missing out on other potentially interesting movies like Du's Umbrella (documentary on Chinese umbrella factories, which sounds fantastic), Ferrara's Go Go Tales (this happens to be the third Asia Argento film in the entire fest, along with flicks by Breillat and Asia's dad), Rohmer's The Romance of Astrea and Celadon (I'm thinking this is probably minor Rohmer, but who am I to say), and Akbari's 10+4 (a sequel of sorts to Kiarostami's Ten, probably a painful film to watch).
I'd love to write a preview like the one on Evening Class, but all I can really do is provide links. Anyhow, here are the films I'm watching, in alphabetical order:
1. Andersson, You, the Living
- Review in the Observer.
I actually don't know much about this film except for a lengthy interview with the director in Cinema Scope.
2. Assarat, Wonderful Town
The critical buzz seems quite high on this one (including a Tiger award at Rotterdam), except for an abysmal review in Slant. I'm on a big Thai film kick right now, so I really want to watch this.
3. Chang, Up the Yangtze
- Interview with Chang on indieWIRE.
See Jia below.
4. Gianvito, Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind
- Interview in Cinema Scope.
Some of you Pinoys might recognize John Gianvito's name from an email circulating a couple of years ago looking for contacts / resource persons for his next film on the U.S. military bases and environmental toxic waste in the Philippines. (The synopsis of Profit Motive reminds me of a talk given by Benedict Anderson back in 1991 or so called "My Own Private Ilocos" (I think), accompanied by a slideshow of neglected statues and grave sites, Rizal in his overcoat in countless elementary schools. I'm thinking infinite reproducibility, nationally-generated amnesia...)
5. Jenkins, Medicine for Melancholy
- Interview in Premiere.
I don't know anything about this movie except that it looks interesting and that it's about sex in the city I used to live in.
6. Jia, Still Life
- David Denby's review in The New Yorker.
Any movie made by the director of Platform will be well worth seeing. This should be a good companion to Chang's Up the Yangtze above.
7. Maddin, My Winnipeg
- Interview in Cinema Scope.
Maddin's first documentary, though I suspect it'll be a "documentary" in the same way that, say, Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Mysterious Object at Noon was a documentary.
8. Sokurov, Alexandra
- J. Hoberman's review in the Village Voice.
Promises to be dreary and slow, which is right up my alley. See also Tarr below.
9. Solanas, Latent Argentina
I've never seen anything by him (this is Fernando, not Valerie -- though the latter would be very cool). Here's my chance.
10. Tajima-Pena, Calavera Highway
That's two decades of groundbreaking documentaries under her belt -- including the classroom favorite Who Killed Vincent Chin? and the very good My America... or Honk If You Love Buddha -- and this one promises to be excellent as well.
11. Tarr, The Man from London
- Review in Reverse Shot.
Promises to be dreary and slow, which is right up my alley. See also Sokurov above. Plus Tilda Swinton is in it!
Posted by the wily filipino at April 9, 2008 11:49 PM