Andy Warhol Screen Tests with Dean & Britta

What makes the Los Angeles film festival such a unique festival has always been its knack for bringing us events that mix cool music and films. I still remember their punk-rock karaoke years ago when the festival was taking place at the Sunset plaza while other highlights included the Sex Pistol's Steve Jone's Indie 103.1 radio show live from the Ford Amphitheatre.

This year they brought us once again another exciting moment, this time blending art, music and cinema, with the screening of Andy Warhol's screen tests, supported by a live accompaniment by electro-folk duo Dean & Britta. The music of the band, with its Velvet Underground tones, provided a great experience while the screen tests featuring the likes of Lou Reed, Denis Hopper, Nico, Eddie Sedgwick among others were being shown onscreen. 13 Most Beautiful... Songs for Andy Warhol Screen Tests review

The Stoning of Soraya M

The Stoning of Soraya M (read The Stoning of Soraya M review) proved to be one of the most powerful and revolting film I have seen in a long time (and no, I'm not saying that to sound like that advertising whore for film posters that Rolling Stone's Peter Travers is).

Set in a remote Iranian village, the film tells the true story of a woman who was stoned to death after being wrongfully accused of cheating by her husband who wanted to get rid of her. Based on the eponymous bestseller, this film avoids the traps of melodrama and makes sure to not be interpreted as a critique of Islam. The Stoning of Soraya M takes on hypocrites using religion as a pretext and denounces a world where women are treated as second-rate citizens. Fueled by a documentary-like realism, this is a rought and uncompromising work, which ending is almost unbearable to watch - be warned that most of the audience had to close its eyes or was crying during the final sequence.

The film was followed by a Q&A featuring the director and the lead actress (the beautiful Shohreh Aghdashloo) and the LA film festival can also be credited for bringing a scholar who, among other things, explained that stoning wasn't part of the Koran.

Jimmy Page, Jack White & Coffin Joe

Our coverage of the LA film festival 2009 started with a bang as Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page and the White Stripes's Jack White were attending the screening of It Might Get Loud (read the It Might Get Loud review), a documentary focusing on the art of guitar playing of emblematic figures such as Page, White and U2's The Edge (who was busy rehearsing in Spain for the opening of U2's tour). If you're a fan of the 3 guys, which I am, you certainly will enjoy having the opportunity to spend time with these 3 icons and see them jam together. However, watching It Might Get Loud as a critic is a different kind of experience, as this film proved to be highly disapointing. To capture the essence of these musians and the creative process in general, the filmmaker posed himself as a watcher, rather than as a true director, letting his camera roll freely to follow whatever the artists are doing. As a result, It Might Get Loud is devoid of any narrative threat, wandering aimlessly and failing to bring anything of substance to the table. Listening to what Mr White had to say, there would have been several interesting points to explore, if the filmmaker would have dared to challenge the musicians; but by containing himself in the role of a witness, he unfortunatly fails in his endeavor, delivering the work of a fan rather than a real documentary.

The third entry in the Brazilian horror Coffin Joe series, Embodiment of Evil (Embodiment of evil review) brought back the thrills of exploitation cinema, with its crazy mix of sadism and nudity. While I enjoyed it, I must admit some scenes were hard to watch -- horror geeks seemed to find them amusing -- and I wouldn't recommend that film, unless you have a strong stomach or a sadistic propensity.

Cannes Film Festival 2009

Just a quick announcement to let you know that from May 13th to May 24th, Plume Noire will be covering the Cannes film festival 2009 to bring you exclusive reviews of the films presented.

COLCOA 2009 Awards

Top Prize: Eden is West
Special Prize: The First Day of the rest of your life
Audience Award: Welcome
Audience Special Mention: Mesrine
Short film Award: Make Yourself At Home
Short film Special Prize: Skhizein

A Day at the Museum and A French Gigolo

Designed to be a critique of the art world, the ensemble piece A Day At the Museum, turned out to be one of the most excruciating films I've seen in a while. Not only wasn't it funny, but this spoof of a pretentious world suffered from being pretty pompous itself. The film, which is an adaptation of a popular play also suffered from looking like a filmed play, the director here being a stage director, which resulted in creating a constant feeling of stagnation while cinema, contrary to plays is about movement. While some of the scenes only lasted a few brief moments, several scenes aiming at vehiculing a message were stretched, creating a sense of boredom onscreen. Despite an ensemble cast including some of the most popular figures of French cinema, A Day At the Museum not only fails to entertain but ends up being a major failure, like a bad piece of art.

Written and directed by French comedy star Josianne Balasko, A French Gigolo kicked off with a lot of Gallic charm but somewhat lost ground as soon as it started to oscillate between comedy and pathos without really finding itself. By turning abruptedly from comedy to drama, the film lost its welcome light tone, looking for morality and redemption through plot lines that strechted its running time.

A Night with Spies - OSS 117 and Spy(ies)

Friday night was arguably the best night at COLCOA this year with its mix of gangsters and spies.
Mesrine (read the Mesrine review) was screened in its entirety (part 1 and 2 were shown successively) while 2 different kinds of spies movies were featured, each of them being successful in its own genre.

The spy spoof OSS 117 Lost in Rio, which is the follow up of the highly successful OSS 117 proved to be as hilarious as its predecessor, its charming kitsch being this time transposed in the exotic surroundings of the Brazilian city. The writer director, present for a Q&A afterwards, brought a welcome note of sarcasm answering unintinteresting questions from the audience and from that annoying pompous critic from a well known publication.

A couple days after the highly disappointing and messy Secrets of State, Spy(ies) proved that French cinema can deliver smart and sharp movies about spies, without losing its soul to provide some entertainment. Focusing on highly flawed characters, the film was an effective psychological thriller supported by a strong cast.

Secrets of State

Somewhat aiming at being a spy movie with a French touch, Secrets of State leaves you with the feeling that you just watched a - post-Syriana - Hollywood movie set in France, rather than a French movie, which is mostly due to the fact that co-writer/director Phillippe Haim seems to be working hard at channeling Tony Scott and, to some extent, his brother Ridley.

By editing and shooting his film like an edgy and flashy piece of filmmaking, the writer greatly undermines his screenwriting's attempt at constructing a serious tale about the war between intelligence services and terrorists. While his film is captivating at times, whether it's during a couple action sequences or when it comes to describing in details how this world works, the central message he's delivering here is so heavy handed that it looses its impact once it becomes redundant: did we really need 3 references to understand that secret agents are prostitutes working for their country? Probably not, especially after watching Paul Verhoeven's Black Book.

COLCOA Opening Night Gala

COLCOA kicked off with a gala filled with the usual fine food, drinks and guests, from filmmaker Costa-Gavras to actresses/directors Josianne Balasko & Zabou Breitman.

The film opening the festival, Someone I loved, which was directed by Ms. Breitman and starred Daniel Auteuil was more problematic. Not only is this a minor - though entertaining - film that does not have the caliber to open a film festival - Mesrine (Mesrine review) or even OSS 117 would have been better choices - but its abrupt changes in tones, from pathos to a cliched romance, made it look like a work that is constantly questionning its own identity and purpose.

Mesrine review

The Mesrine review has just been added to our COLCOA page - make sure to check it out as it's one of our festival picks!
The two Mesrine films (Death Instinct & Public Enemy #1) will be playing on Friday.

COL COA 2009

The COL COA French film festival is coming, from April 20th to April 26th. As usual we will bring you some exclusive reviews of the films presented. In the meantime, here are our first recommendations for COL COA 2009

2009 Razzies - Nominations

This is this time of the year again and the Razzie Awards are coming soon. To check out the nominations visit 2009 Razzies ...

AFI Fest 2008 Awards

The AFI Fest 2008 Awards have been announced. Check our AFI Fest 2008 page for award results ...

Plastic City & The Brothers Bloom

I must admit it was hard to find agreement about the two films we saw on Saturday at AFI Fest. While I highly enjoyed Plastic City (see video comments here), a gorgeous-looking and pretentious Hong Kong gangster film set in Sao Paulo, my fellow writer Anji hated it. However she did enjoy the con men comedy The Brothers Bloom (see video comments here - read the Brothers Bloom review) more than I did, as I found it wasn't more than a TV movie.

The Wrestler

Darren Aronofski's The Wrestler (see video comments here - read the Wrestler review) is a small film about a washed-up wrestler who comes to question the purpose of his life, following a heart attack. The film has a realistic feel while being drenched in irony. While it's not a masterpiece, this is a highly enjoyable film, which will mostly be remembered by the raw performances from its two lead actors, Mickey Rourke & Marisa Tomei.

The Gomorrah Class

Sunday was pretty satisfying, movie-wise. The day started with The Class (read the Class review), the film that won the Golden Palm at the Cannes film festival this year. I must admit, I was expecting some over-hyped heavy-handed patchouli message-driven picture but was left astonished by the multiple layers offered here, including a subtle commentary, which questions the - somewhat outdated - foundations of the French education system (check out my video comments here).

The following feature, Gomorrah (read the Gomorra review), proved to be as intense, giving us a realistic look at the mafia. While much has been said about how it de-glamorizes the mafia myth, which was already done with humor in the Sopranos, more important was its focus on the use of kids for all the dirty jobs, which makes it close from films such as City of God.

Waltz with Two Lovers

I guess I hadn't done my homework ... When I arrived proudly on the rooftop of the Arclight this morning, I had the surprise to realize that the AFI Fest village was nowhere to be found, the festival's headquarters having been moved to the gorgeous Roosevelt hotel, right across that tourist trap named the Chinese theater. Upon arriving, I was even more disappointed running into a few witches and ghouls remaining from Marylin Manson's Halloween party the day before - I should have been there instead of that lame-ass party I went to.

But let's go back to the subject ... I started the festival with the screening of Nirvana (read the Nirvana review or watch my video comments about Nirvana here and if you need subtitles, email me!!), a post-punk Russian film that even a Sigue Sigue Sputnik fan like me found pretty tedious. The film was followed with some absurd Q&A with the director, who managed to never answer to the questions he was asked.

The following Waltz with Bachir was even more disappointing as it was preceded by some good buzz from Cannes (see video comments here - read Waltz with Bachir review), proving that having a good political/humanitarian message isn't enough to make a good film.

Finally, the documentary about Gogol Bordello (see video comments here) proved to be entertaining but messy, while James Gray's Two Lovers (Two Lovers review) was a good surprise despite the bad buzz from Cannes -- I know why the French hated it ... they didn't like the ending ... which isn't surprising, knowing their propensity to enjoy "drama".

AFI Fest 2008

Starting next week, Plume Noire will be covering AFI Fest 2008 live from Hollywood. You will find blog posts in this blog, a video journal on Youtube as well as exclusive reviews of the films.. In the meantime, check out our first reviews of Che, Tokyo, Two Lovers and Waltz with Bashir here

LA Film Festival 2008

I must admit, though it was crowded and rather uncomfortable at times, I still pine for the punkish LA Film Festival days at the Sunset 5 Plaza. Westwood Village is great and all, but we Eastsiders aren't all that fond of the 10 & the 405. Oh well…..

What are our picks this summer at the Los Angeles Film Festival?

The festival certainly has its eye on sure hits in the action genre for opening and closing nights, though they're from directors far removed from the Michael Bay school of Kaplowie! high jinks. Opening night features Wanted (Wanted review), directed by Timur Bekmambetov (director of the hyperkinetic Night Watch - Nightwatch review) and starring James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman and Angelina Jolie, while the festival closes with writer/director Guillermo del Toro's Hellboy II: The Golden Army. Del Toro will also be on hand for a conversation at the Hammer.

Must sees include Elite Squad, which looks like Brazil's answer to Training Day, Nordic music videos in Declare Independence: Spotlight on Scandinavia, HottirBoombaLottie, The Wackness, Momma's Man, South Africa's The Choir and Infinite Border.

Outdoor screenings at the Ford Amphitheatre remind us its summertime in the city. Swear-a-Long Scarface, surf movie Highwater (Highwater review) and high school documentary American Teen (American Teen review) will screen at twilight.

Poolside chats at the W Los Angeles in Westwood tackle topics like pot "The New Stoner Age", funny women "Funny Girls", and "Hollywood, D.C.".

Documentary topics include art:Dirty Hands: The Art & Crimes of David Choe, family strife Must Read After My Death, transsexuals Trinidad chef school Pressure Cooker, and the yucky Fleiss Heidi Fleiss: The Would-Be Madam of Crystal.

To its credit, the LA Film Festival has always screened a few films that deal with the complexities of angeleno life. This year two films explore South Central. The ever important free screenings include The Garden (The Garden review), which examines the dirty underbelly of LA politics that allowed the destruction of a 14 acre farm in the middle of South Central and Made in America, which takes a look at root causes of gang warfare. Quintessential LA architecture is explored in Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman.

Is it too early too visit the 80's? LAFF doesn't think so. From The Lost Boys to Night Flight: Born Again, campy fun abounds.

The LA edginess has been watered down, but that means events like Antonio Banderas being saluted. And who doesn't mind saluting Antonio?

LA Film Festival 2008

The Cannes Film Festival might be just over but we're already preparing for the LA Film Festival. Get ready for our coverage of the LA Film Festival 2008, which will take place from June 19th to June 28th.