DAY 7: THE FINAL DAY

So it was sadly our Last Day at Sundance last week and I’m finally writing this Blog a few days after the event.  I’ve gone from snowy Park City to sunny Miami Beach for the weekend and finally on to a bitterly cold London: the excitement of the Festival now seems like a lifetime away.  It was totally unmissable and I’m still on a high from all that I got to see.  Well, from most of it.  I thought we had seen more than previous years but now that I tally my schedule up I see that I saw 15 narratives and 12 Documentaries and a few Shorts over my seven viewing days (Viv beat that score, but Kareem somehow managed less  …. hmmm).  BUT at least we all went out with a bang by catching two of the very best movies of the week in our last few hours.

'ROOM 237' is a wonderfully absurd film that is a must for every serious cineaste. According to this winsome documentary there are lots of people out there who see hidden messages in every single scene throughout Stanley Kubrick’s classic movie ‘The Shining’. For the past 30 years since it was released a whole sub-culture of fans have been ruminating their own theories which have been greatly fueled by You-tube and the Internet. Some are convinced that Kubrick made the movie about the Holocaust and The Final Solution, whilst others pointing out all the tribal-themed items in the Hotel in the movie say it is definitely alluding to the genocide of American Indians. And then there is even a small cult who see evidence that Kubrick was actually confessing that he helped NASA fake the Apollo Moon landings.

This truly delightful documentary doesn’t just repeat many of these wacky suppositions but it creatively tries to prove them by often using clips from other Kubrick movies with some very hilarious results.  Some of the reasoning that these theories propose actually resonates and you actually find yourself concurring with them, but others are far too silly for words and you realize that there are some people out there who have far too much time on the hands.

Kubrick was undoubtedly a genius and all his work attracts a wealth of criticism and endless volumes of in-depth analysis.  Whether its justifiable is not really that relevant here as even when it is downright daft it makes for compulsive viewing in Room 237.

American viewers often struggle understanding even the most straight forward English accents so I’m not sure how on earth they are going to cope with 'SHADOW DANCER' a narrative about the ‘troubles‘ in Northern Ireland where most of the characters speak with thick Ulster brogues. This new movie also seemed an odd choice for director James Marsh who picked up an Oscar in 2009 for 'Man On A Wire' (which he followed with the chimp movie 'Project Nim'.

Set in 1990s Belfast, Colette McVeigh an active member of the IRA becomes an informant for MI5 in order to protect her son's welfare.  Her whole family is very involved in terrorist activities and when the authorities ambush one of their operations they suspect a traitor in their midst and Colette senses she is in real danger.  But in this fast-paced well-written thriller there is a rather inspired twist in the plot which sets this above most movies in this genre.

Clive Owen stars as a British Secret Service Agent, and UK based American Gillian Anderson is his boss, and luckily for us they don’t have to attempt accents.  Andrea Riseborough rather stunningly plays Colette, so luckily for her there is life after starring in Madonna’s heavily panned 'W/E'.

We get lunch today ( yippee) as our next movie is not until 5.30 pm so we catch the bus and head out to Main Street.  The snow has started again and its very cold but we are getting really sad about having to leave the next day.  Me, I would do anything to stay and be in pictures …. even a Western!

'BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD' had been getting a lot of buzz here so thankfully they scheduled an extra P + I Screening so we joined a packed and excited line of die-hard film professionals to see if it lived up to the hype of the circuit.

Set against the backdrop of Hurricane Katrina this is a gritty story about a father and daughter. Hushpuppy, an intrepid six-year-old girl, lives with her father, Wink, in "the Bathtub," a southern Delta community at the edge of the world. Wink's tough love prepares her for the unraveling of the universe; for a time when he's no longer there to protect her. When Wink contracts a mysterious illness, nature flies out of whack-temperatures rise, and the ice caps melt, unleashing an army of prehistoric creatures called aurochs. With the waters rising, the aurochs coming, and Wink's health fading, Hushpuppy goes in search of her lost mother.

It is a magical realist tale and is stunning visually and also extremely tender and touching especially with the scenes between father and daughter ….(she is played by an amazing wide-eyed sensational 6yr old called Quvenzhabe Wallis).    It is also quite unlike anything I have ever seen before.

Manohla Dargis in 'The NY Times' went as far as declaring it not just the standout of this year’s Sundance, but one of the best movies to play there in the past two decades.  I’m not qualified to know if that is true, but I will say that it is unquestionably one of the best movies what we saw this week.  I will also confess that it never even surfaced on our radar until others started talking it up so enthusiastically, and I will also own up to the fact that that I’m not sure exactly what this allegory completely means and I really need another viewing to think it through further

Drained and deep in thought we make a dash to the Redstone Theater for a Public Screening of 'Marina Abramovic: The Artist Is Present' a feature length documentary on the celebrated Performance Artist as as she prepared for her major retrospective as Museum Of Modern Art in N.Y. in 2010.

It is a major event for any living artist to be given a retrospective such as this and for Abramovic its essentially a chance to finally answer the question that has prevailed her whole body of work over the past four decades ‘is this art?’

It’s confession time for me (again) as I had not come across Ms Abramovic before but I was totally bowled over with this very intimate look as she started to prepare for her MOMA installation.  As well as getting some young artists to re-enact her ‘historical pieces’, she had decided to create this new one where she sits motionless and silent on a chair for six days a week for three months.  Opposite her was another chair where MOMA visitors can sit down quietly in front of her individually and she focuses all her attention upon them.  She is intent on exploring the physical endurance and limitations of the human body.

The reactions of all the ‘sitters’ was simply astounding and in this beautifully filmed documentary you share their sense of discovery as the camera reveals the intensity of the moment.

Asides from  the MOMA show the documentary included an appreciation of some of Ms. Abramovic’s career to date and of the way that her highly emotional work is intrinsically involved in her life. She is not only one of the most important artists of our time, but also a very warm and wonderful person too.  I am so so smitten.

Time to drag Kareem away.....

And I get to put this hat away again....

DAY 6: THE PENULTIMATE DAY

Ethel Kennedy had so many children that even they couldn't remember how many siblings they had. In this new documentary on the Kennedy Matriarch, Robert F. Kennedy Jnr. challenges one of his sisters claim that they number 11, and he proceeds to name just 10. The 11th and youngest is Rory and she is the filmmaker and the one actually sitting in front of him!

The fact that this insightful profile on one of the most powerful women in the Kennedy Clan was made by her daughter, a respected and successful filmmaker,  and by having her mother's involvement it included  a treasure trove of previously unseen photos and videos.  Not that the family connection made it plain sailing as Ethel proves to be both modest and intensely private, but the very expressive face spoke volumes when the topic just got too personal for her comfort.

Ethel was born a Skakel, part of a self-made Massachusetts family who went on vacations with the blue-blooded Kennedy family, where she met and fell in love with Robert.  He actually dated her sister for 2 years, but her patience paid off and she soon had him up the aisle.  Ethel had very old fashioned ideas about married life and she very happily devoted her life to her husband and to her children too. When his eldest brother Jack ran for the Senate, Robert became his Campaign Manager and Ethel got her first taste of campaigning which, unlike her shy husband. she took a real shine too. Even more so when her brother in law later  ran for the Presidency and she threw herself enthusiastically into the campaign.

Meanwhile she was endlessly pregnant (as Rory pointed out, for 99 months of her life in total) but that never slowed her from always being at her husbands side, and and at the same time creating an almost magical country home life for the children. Each of them enthused on camera as to how much effort Ethel invested in making their childhood so much fun and including a whole menagerie of animals with a  herd of horses and countless dogs. ('I cannot remember a time when we had less than 16 dogs'). She actively encouraged the children to play as many sports as possible and tried to passed on to them her highly competitive nature ('There is no such thing as coming second, unless you were a Shriver').

Ethel was there propping up her husband who almost fell apart when President Kennedy was assassinated; she was his biggest supporter when he ran for the Senate always dragging the children along to every stop on the Campaign trail; and she was by his side as usual the day that an assassin took his life too. She found herself a widow at 40  years old and pregnant with her 11th child

After his death Ethel's strength which seemed propelled by her deep Catholic faith saw her somehow empowered as  single parent determined to aggressively take  on the roles of both father and mother to her brood whilst at the same time throwing herself into a carrying on her husbands commitment to social reform with such great zeal.  True she led a very privileged life with a host of staff to perform most daily functions, and she never had to ever worry about money, but what comes thorough  so strongly in the film is that even though she chose to be in her husband's shadows, she was a real tour de force in her own right.

Usually the Kennedy woman who is talked about endlessly is Jackie (and she is barely mentioned in this movie probably because the two women 'allegedly' really disliked  each other). It was therefore fascinating to have this  behind-the-scenes intimate portrait of the  woman who as the matriarch of the 'other branch' of  America's nearest thing to a Royal Family who resolutely used her moral principles for the common good despite  the heartache of she had to deal with along the way (two of her children died tragically too, a nephew was convicted of murder). In this poignant profile by her youngest child Ethel Kennedy is shown as a quick-witted woman with a sparkling sense of humor and a great deal of compassion, and one who would/should have been a great First Lady.

When the first movie we see in the morning  is as great as this, it bodes well for a good day at Sundance.  We would expect that usually to  compose of catching five movies; one  or two gems, one quite good one, one so-so, and always one so bad you just have to walk out way before the miserable end.  The latter one was next on my list that day, although we had no idea when we sat down in our usual excited anticipation.

'KID THING' was being shown in Sundance's 'NEXT' category which according to their blurb 'encompasses bold works shown by promising filmmakers distinguished by an innovative forward-thinking approach to storytelling.' Hmmm.  It was about 10 yr. old Annie living on a small farm in Texas with two men, one of whom I think was her father but he makes no attempt at parenting just leaving the little brat to run wild on her own and aimlessly getting up to pointless mischief.  No school, no friends etc. and nothing much happens at all  for what seems like an eternity (actually 40 minutes) and there is hardly any dialogue except when she is playing on her own in the woods and she starts hearing voices.  So do I by then.  Mine are saying get the hell out of there.  So I do.

I actually check my schedule and see that Herr Obersturmfuhrer Kareem has me only down for seeing a mere four movies today, so we actually get time for lunch today.  I wouldn't call it a rare treat  .... rare it is, but the food in the Strip Mall where these particular  theaters are, is as almost as palatable as the movie we have just left.

One burger and some onion rings later from our fine dining experience and we at back inside watching a cute Latino coming-of-age story MOSQUITA Y MARI.  Set in L.A.'s predominately immigrant Huntington Park area it tells of two Mexican teenage girls who become neighbors.  One of them Yolanda, who's nickname is Mosquita, is a good girl who lives in a nice home with hard-working pushy parents who are proud of their daughter who gets straight A's at school and who  is on track for college.  Mari, the other girl is a toughie living with a younger sister who she looks out for, and her mum, and as the family are undocumented aliens work is hard to come by and they are so broke that they always on the edge of being evicted. On Mari's first day at High School she is assigned to be Yolanda's study mate, and at first they do not hit it off at all as they appear to be complete opposites. But then a  friendship blossoms and later to the confusion of both girls it is on the cusp of developing into something much  deeper than that.

After seeing the very disappointing 'FILLY BROWN' the other day, it's refreshing  to see this very sensitive treatment of these young girls dealing with their burgeoning sexuality without having to resort to all the usual cliches and stereotypes that litter movies based in Latino communities .   

For the last movie of the day I get to slip away from Kareem  & Viv to see a comedy.  And a really good one at that.   'YOUR SISTER'S SISTER' the 4th feature directed by Lynn Shelton ('HUMPDAY') tells the story of  Jack who hasn't recovered from the unexpected death of his brother, and one year on is still drifting aimlessly through life broke and without a job.  Hie best friend Iris, who also happens to have once been his brother's girlfriend, stages an Intervention and  insists he literally gets on his bike ad catches a Ferry to a remote island where her father has a hideaway.  When he arrives at the house in the middle of the night he discovers its already occupied by Hannah, Iris's sister, who has the same of idea of escaping the world as she has just broken up with her girlfriend of seven years.  So both trapped in the house and feeling sorry for themselves they get absolutely smashed and end up in bed for some very unfulfilling sex.

Meanwhile next morning Iris, finding  herself at a loose end in the city, turns up at the house unexpectedly and is totally surprised to find her sister there and that's when the fun starts as these three lonely souls all have their own hidden agendas.


This wee entrancing and delightful movie was evidently shot in just 10 days and binds together so well with spot on performances by the three actors.  Iris is played by Emily Blunt, Rosemarie Dewitt plays Hannah her sister, and Mark Duplass is the quick-witted Jack.  Mr Duplass (one half of the filmmaking Duplass Brothers who wrote, directed, produced and sometimes acted in,  three excellent movies : 'The Puffy Chair', 'Cyrus' and 'Baghead') actually conceived the plot which he took to Lynn Shelton (he had starred in Humpday) and most of the script was improvised. Maybe that's why it felt so fresh and engaging 


Mr. Duplass and Ms Shelton are very busy people it would seem.  They both act in another movie at Sundance 'SAFETY NOT GUARANTEED' and if that is not enough for the prodigious Mr Duplass he also wrote the screenplay for his actress wife Kate Aselton who's directing edbut 'BLACK ROCK' is premiering here too. Mr and Mrs Duplass also both star together in the TV series 'The League'  !  

Emily Blunt

They were also some of the many stars that made an appearance at Sundance and some how manage to avoid slumming it with me. The town (but not me!) also sees other celebs that you would never expect i.e. country singer Taylor Swift was at the Premiere of Ethel.

Bradley Cooper

Meanwhile some visitors who obviously dont even hang around in movie theaters at all undeservedly get all the breaks.  We met an excited Italian women at the Sundance Lounge who had managed to snatch photos of herself with two actors that she had never heard of.  They were Bradley Cooper and Denis Quaid!  

I'm just going to contend myself with the one (half) sighting we had on the bus today of  a young star of tomorrow, an Egptian/British lad called Fady Elsayed. Evidently he was in 'MY BROTHER THE DEVIL' which we will not be able see as we are now on countdown for our last day here.  However he said he was very good, and who am I not to believe him?

Main Street starting to look quiet again :it's almost time for the Fat Lady to sing........

  

DAY 5: ABOUT FACE & SO MUCH MORE

Bethann Hardison is an African American who was a very successful NY showroom model for years in the 1960's but it wasn't until she appeared in her first TV commercial that her mother actually saw her work, and she was totally shocked. In those early days the word 'model' was often a pseudonym for hooker, and she had just assumed that her daughter was being coy!  This is just one of the deliciously funny stories that are told by an amazing coterie of the first ever super-models as they look back on the days when they graced the front covers of Vogue way-back-when in photographer Timothy Greenfield-Saunders delightful new documentary  'ABOUT FACE'.

Greenfield-Saunders interviews some 20 of these women as he gets them all together for a new group photograph. They represent the creme of the crop of modeling and include Cheryl Tiegs, Isabella Rossellini, Christie Brinkley, Christy Turlington, Jerry Hall, Marisa Berenson, Pat Cleveland, Beverley Johnson and Carmen Dell ’Orefice. These women are not only still stunningly beautiful but without exception are intelligent, articulate, very fascinating people with a great sense of humor.  But the most surprising part was the fact they were all disarmingly honest and genuinely shocked that they could have achieved the success that they had which so empowered their lives.

One of my favorites was the ultra glamorous Carmen Dell 'Orefice, who has such a wonderful infectious energy that is still keeping her working regularly at 81 years old.  The interviewer was tactfully trying to inquire if she had ever had any 'work done' i.e. cosmetic surgery.  Ms. Dell 'Orefice laughing simply retorted that 'if there was a crack in the ceiling you would get it fixed without even thinking about it!' So we took that for a yes, even though there simply is no hint of it on her beautiful face.  She has the  last line too when she swans off so elegantly dressed declaring she doesn't care when her time is up, a long as she dies with high heels on.

And less you think Ms. Hardison's mother was the only one naive in their household, Ms. H had us in stitches when she told us that back then her mother ran with a very fashionable crowd.  One day Ma came home with three very handsome well-dressed men and they all disappeared into her bedroom together.  Some time later her mother left with three very spectacularly dressed women in all their finery.  Young Barbara couldn't work that one out for ages.

I love the diversity of our movie schedule, and today I go from seeing people being fashion models and being loved, to a look at someone being a model Christian and being hated. ‘LOVE FREE OR DIE’ is a wonderfully moving documentary that follows the progress of Gene Robinson who in 2004 was elected as the 1st openly Gay priest Episcopalian Bishop.  In 2008 he also became the first Bishop to be banned from attending the powerful Lambeth Conference (the highest forum of the Anglican Church) in London but he traveled there anyway in the hope of making some change. What exasperated the situation is that he was not even allowed to meet or even attend any fringe events with any of the other Bishops, because as Gene Robinson preached in the only London church to defy the ban & invite him, they are afraid. Of him and of all homosexuals.

Bishop Robinson on the other hand allowed the filmmakers unrestricted access and what really moved me in this very touching movie was no matter how bravely he stood facing the intense homophobia of the Church's Establishment and of some evangelical zealots, along with several death threats, in unguarded moments it was obvious that all this hate really upset him.

From London back to his Diocese in New Hampshire where he had a Civil Union with Marc his partner of 20+ years, and then finally to the Episcopalian General Convention in California in 2009 when both the Bishops and the Laity voted overwhelmingly to allow gay man and women to become Bishops, and at the same time they also voted to allow Same Sex Marriages in their churches. Two major forward steps for which  Bishop Robinson can take his fair share of the credit

I should also mention that along the way another career highlight was President Obama inviting Bishop Robinson to lead the Invocation at the Lincoln Memorial at the kick-off event for his Inaugural Weekend.

As an atheist I am never surprised about how so much hate and violence erupts from devout Christians, and equally worse is their  immoral hypocrisy of it all.  As one leading female Bishop said, if the Church really thinks that Robinson is the only Bishop who is gay, then they are living in a fool's paradise. Whilst of course the other Holy Men are living in the closet from where they can continue to be self-loathing gay men.

That’s actually a fairly good link to my next movie 'THE IMPOSTOR’, except in this case the person hiding his true identity was a young dark French man passing himself off as blond American teenager.  I actually remember reading this story in The New Yorker a while back and was flabbergasted then, but now seeing the whole scenario skillfully re-enacted on the big screen, I still have trouble believing it is true.

Essentially a 23-year man gets picked up by the Police in the South of France pretending to be a teenager so that they will have to put him a nice comfortable children’s home.  He acts dumb refusing to talk but eventually knows he must say something before they suss out that he is actually wanted by Interpol. He tells the Social Worker that he is an American and that he had run away from home and then was abducted and bought to France against his will.  He persuades them to allow him to phone his parents himself and because of the time difference they let him stay in the Office one night to make the call.  What he does in fact is phone several Police Depts. in the US pretending to be a French police officer who is from the Precinct where they are holding a young boy who they want to identify. This clever ruse results in getting details on a 14 year old who has been missing from his home in rural Texas for 4 years.  When the US Missing Persons Office fax over the details of Nicholas Barclay, it’s very obvious that he looks nothing like the kid at all, but he goes ahead planning to steal his identity anyway.

The absolutely ridiculous thing is that he actually gets away with it.  To cut a very long story short he fools the boy’s sister and mother and (almost) his entire family back in Texas and gets accepted in the community as Nicholas who everyone is led to believe was tortured and abused and never allowed to speak English ….. hence his foreign accent now.

This detailed reconstruction has lengthy interviews with ‘Nicholas’ and his family, which even suspend disbelief, and even when the impersonation is eventually discovered, it is still hard to imagine that he could have fooled so many people.  There are suggestions that turn into unproven accusations that the reason the family accepted the man so readily as one of their own is that they had actually killed the real Nicholas, and having the substitute around let them off the hook.  We will never know.  But is a preposterous story made that much more fascinating now it has been filmed.

We had spotted William H Macy in town the other day and now we are going to see the reason he was here i.e. to promote his new movie ‘THE SURROGATE’.  Yet again another story so bizarre that it had to be true, but this dramatized movie tells of a very witty and courageous young man who just wanted to have sex once before he died.  Mark O’Brien had polio as a kid and although he wasn’t paralyzed his muscles were so extensively damaged that he was unable too move anything but his head.  He spent his nights in an iron lung and his days strapped to a gurney, and with the help of his aides managed to pursue his goals of being a poet and journalist.

Mark had been wanting to have sex for some time, and when he was commissioned to write an article about sex among the disabled he uses this as an excuse to finally lose his virginity.  He finds himself a sex surrogate who helps him with his tendency to panic and over-think, and as he was a devout Catholic he took to taking advice with his new very droll Parish Priest (William H Macy) on his feelings of guilty pleasure.

The relationship that Mark develops with his Surrogate is tender and touching and despite her extreme detached professional attitude she is in real danger of allowing her feelings to interfere with her work.

It is a glorious warm and compassionate story that was enriched by Mark’s incredible quick-witted dry humor and his passion for his poetry. In the movie he is played John Hawkes who manages such an astounding portrayal without moving a muscle.

There is a significant amount of nudity ….most of it by the Surrogate beautifully played by a very much in shape Helen Hunt … and despite the subject it is not the least bit pornographic.

When you just read the program notes, it doesn’t seem the most obvious of choices to make into a comic drama, but translated as well as this to the screen, it made for one of the most enjoyable feature films we have seen this week.

I do deliberately fluctuate between I and We because some times all three of us see the movie together, but sometimes we split up and go our separate ways if we want to see something else.  I mean I’ve done Latino Hip Hop, Chinese Boxers, Video Game Nerds etc. etc. but I do stop at Horror.  Life is scary enough with out it.

P.S. Too much time spent inside the movie theater leaves me such little time to 'star search', and my efforts were not appreciated anyway as they put this sign out to put me off.  It won't of course.

DAY 4 ; CHINESE NEW YEAR ET AL

What better way to celebrate Chinese New Year at Sundance than selecting 'CHINA HEAVYWEIGHT' as my first movie of the day.  Evidently that old curmudgeon Chairman Mao banned boxing in China as he said it was the sport of capitalism and thus very bad.  It wasn't until after Mohammed Ali visited China in 1979 as a goodwill ambassador that the sport was allowed, and then encouraged again.

This documentary film by Yung Chang, the award winning director of 'UP THE YANGTZE' follows some elementary school kids as they are selected to train at a local boxing school, also students who are about to take part in regional championships, and one of their coaches a retired boxer who feels he has one last big fight in him.  All their journeys are fascinating especially when they and their families with their traditional small country village lives consider the impact that boxing could have in giving the young fighters a lifestyle their parents could never have ever imagined.  As their all work towards their new goals, we find at the end that it is not always about winning.

It's an early lunch today so back to the Sundance Channel Lounge to have a lesson in How To Pitch A Movie.

First afternoon movie is 'NOBODY WALKS'  (as in nobody walks in LA)  and is a disappointing drama about Martine a 23 year old NY artist  who flies into LA to meet with Peter a sound engineer who is going to help her finish her art movie on bugs for an upcoming  Gallery Show. The essence of the whole movie is established in the very first scene when Martine is walking with her luggage in a car park at LAX when the attractive man she is with has her up pushed against the car and is undoing his trousers. She stops him there as evidently they have only just met on the plane.  As the movie unfolds and seemingly every man wants to have sex with her, she suddenly stops being quite so reticent.

Martine is actually staying with Peter and his family in the pool house attached to their home as his mixing studio is on site too.  But its not just her movie that ends up being mixed there, as despite  Peter's seemingly  happy marriage with Julie his attractive successful Therapist wife, he cannot wait to get into Martine's pants. So too does David his handsome young Assistant and when he gets lucky Peter gets really pissed.  Meanwhile Julie's seemingly only patient who is good looking highly strung screenwriter wants to put the moves on her. As Viv (my 'Boss) summed it up so accurately, it just seemed that everyone walked around with continual hard-on's.

The movie made our viewing schedule as it was co-written by Lena Dunham who's filmmaking debut was the delightful 'Tiny Furniture' so it was a tad disappointing seeing her follow up be this tale of these self-obsessed irritating characters. When it comes to it at the end it was a case of nobody walks but everybody runs. 

We sat through to the bitter end (or rather till I was bitter at the end) but we were rewarded by getting to next watch a stunning uplifting movie about the genius who is Ai Wei Wei the celebrated Chinese artist and political activist. Filmmaker Alison Klayman's debut feature documentary chronicled his life for 3 years starting with his role as a Consultant to Herzog the architects as they constructed the 'Birds Nest' Olympic Stadium, and then he immediately infuriated the Government when he became the first notable person to publicly denounce their policy of clearing swathes of the old city to make Beijing look pristine for the outside world for the duration of the Games.

He came to even greater prominence as an activist when he took upon himself to highlight the real depth of the tragedy caused by the Sichuan Earthquake in 2008 when shoddy school buildings collapsed killing all the students trapped inside. When the Government's propaganda machine clamped down on any information being circulated, Wei Wei 'twittered' and got a whole gang of volunteers' to come forward and they stealthily managed to gather all the names and details of every single school kid who lost their lives and he published the long list as a work of art on the first anniversary of the disaster. 

This transposed into one of Wei Wei's most famous art installations when he plastered the whole front of the  Haus der Kunst in Munich with 9000 school backpacks that spelt out in Chinese characters the message 'She lived happily in this world for seven years' a quote from one of the grieving parents.  The name of that Exhibition was 'So Sorry' from which they took the title of this film.

The film also covered the installation of 'Sunflower Seeds' which used 100 million hand-painted porcelain seeds to ever  the entire vast floor of the Tate Modern Turbine Hall in October 2010. 

As a man, Ai Wei Wei comes across as a gentle giant : generous, articulate, funny, with endless compassion for the rights of his fellow countrymen.  Despite his denials he is extraordinary brave and totally fearless even though he has almost died from an injury caused by an unprovoked beating from the Police.  On the  April 3rd 2011 the inevitable happened and he 'disappeared' and the Authorities denied knowing of his whereabouts or even if he was still alive.  Both the political and art international communities protested loud and clear with influential voices as important as the US Secretary of State lobbying China, and then suddenly, without notice Wei Wei was released on Bail in June.

There is so much to admire about this man who's art and life enriches so many, and yet we all must fear that maybe next time he 'disappears' that he may never ever return.  An unmissable movie.

And so the last movie to finish up the Chinese New Year is Danish  .... but a lot of the action does take place in Thailand, and that's close. No?  'TEDDY BEAR' is the story of Dennis a middle-aged pumped up bodybuilder who still lives at home with his diminutive mother who bullies him like mad.  After Dennis's old Uncle marries his new young Thai bride it sets him off thinking that he too may actually get a lady friend of his own.  After lying to his mother he sneaks off to Thailand but this powerfully shy big man can not overcome his fears and insecurities when he tries his hand at being a sex tourist.

He is totally miserable in Pattaya City until he discovers a gym, and the widow owner, and suddenly things are looking up.   Only snag is how the hell is he going to tell his fierce controlling mother?

Usually Danish movies are always so bleak .... maybe it's something to do with all that cold weather.... but despite the icy glares of Dennis's mother, this one was really  quite sweet and touching.  And a nice way to finish a day.

P.S. Whenever I mention to people that I come to Sundance I'm always asked if we ever spot Robert Redford here.  The answer is NO.  But thinking more about it I've never ever seen him on TV the same time as Sir Elton and methinks that perhaps they are the one and same person.  I mean check out these hairpieces, they are identical!

DAY 3: WRONG IS ALL RIGHT

Asides from the endless slew of instant celebrities that Reality TV tries to force upon us, there is now an onslaught from the Internet when videos go viral.  The first documentary we are seeing today is about one such star, and trust me I use the word 'star' very reluctantly.  Chris Crocker was an outrageously gay teenager living in the backwoods of Tennessee where his flamboyant behavior meant that he had to skip going to High School to avoid  an inevitable outpouring of violence against him. Abandoned by his mother (who gave birth to him at 14) he was raised by his paternal grandmother who, whilst never understanding her highly strung grandson's many odd penchants like wearing  girls clothes, indulged him nevertheless particularly in his fixation with Brittany Spears.

It was this obsession that made Chris infamous.  He had been making videos of himself either dancing in his bedroom or simply screaming at the camera on any lightweight topic that was on his somewhat twisted mind ever since he got his first computer.  Initially his postings on YouTube got very few hits, but over time he built up a small coterie of fans who loved to either worship him. or mock him with their imitations. At the same time he attracted a great deal of vicious hate mail too. And then it all changed when Brittany was evidently pilloried in the media for an excruciatingly piss-poor performance on TV when it seemed obvious that they had released her from Rehab way too early.  Chris's high pitched rant 'Leave Brittany Alone!' soon had several million hits and as a result the media turned their attention on Chris himself.

This Doc. follows how he got close to getting his own TV show in LA when his unfettered big mouth went just too far and he ended back in Tennessee living with his Saint of a Grandmother, whilst his mother back on meths was living rough on the streets.

I must confess that I went into the movie knowing none of the backstory or even having heard of Chris Crocker, and normally I would have run a mile from anything remotely like tabloid trash. However I must admit though although he did annoy me (more than once) I found the movie totally fascinating.  The fact that we are living in a culture where someone can make so much out of essentially very little real talent intrigues me.  And knowing for a fact that in the end they will just fizzle out and need something else to do when their five minutes under the spotlight is over appeals to my inquisitive nature (nosey even).  In this particular case it would appear that Mr Crocker is now trying for a career in porn for which judging from the photos you can see on the internet (but God Forbid NOT in this Blog) is something he is well qualified for. 

Poor Miss Spears.  Evidently no-one, especially the paparazzi,  ever left her alone ( I really must read the National Enquirer to keep abreast of such weighty matters).  I did at least respect her privacy when I snapped this photo of her from the bus this afternoon.

From bizarre to absurd as my next movie of the day was that and more. If you read my regular movie blog then you will know what I really love are movies that are really out there, and that my creed is actually the weirder the  better. And this delightful ridiculous surreal comedy called 'WRONG' was a perfect example.   Written, directed, photographed and edited by Quentin Dupieux (who also did the music too!) the story essentially was about a loner called Dolph who wakes up one morning and discovers that Paul his dog has disappeared. Starting with his very odd next door neighbor who's in denial that he's a jogger(!),  everybody Dolph encounters in his search for the dog has a twisted story of their own.  Not only has Dolph lost his only friend but the palm tree in the yard has mysterious turned into a pine tree and so he tries to distract himself from his distress by phoning a new pizza company who have just mailed him a flyer to have an in-depth discussion of  whether their logo of a rabbit on a motorbike makes any sense.   He seeks solace by going into his office to work, even though he had been fired three months earlier.  The office incidentally has a constant indoor rain shower that does not deter his co-workers getting on with their soggy work.


The dog's disappearance is not an accident at all but he has been kidnapped by a guru named Master Chang as part of his master plan to spread the gospel about his theories of the powers of psychic energy between dogs and their owners. Still with me? There is  very stiff competition as to who is the most bonkers of them all .... Master Chang is up there, but so too is the Pizza Company Receptionist who leaves her husband to move in with Dolph after sleeping with him just one night (although actually the man in her bed was Viktor the gardener who looked nothing like Dolph).  Confused?  Don't be.  It does all make sense (albeit a very weird one) in the end.


I unhesitating loved it all 100%.  It was also the first time this week that the hard-bitten Industry audience broke out into applause as  the end credits rolled.  I've read since then that there is the possibility of a subtext to the whole thing i.e. reverse the word dog, and maybe Dolph's search is something more spiritual.  I'm not sure at all if I buy that theory, but regardless of that this wonderful wacky real treat of a movie will definitely be one of my top favorites from this Festival.

From such a high its inevitable there will be a low to follow.  And there was in the shape of 'FOR ELLEN' a movie with a small story that was dragged out far too long.  A rock musician was returning to his small home town to agree the final Divorce terms with his wife.  They included giving him half the value of the house, money he much needed to fund his next album, but also entailing him giving up his custody rights to Ellen their small child.  He could take the money and run, or fight the case in court and lose it all.  He so lost all my sympathy when he put the onus on the kid herself in a scene no doubt intended to have us reaching for our kleenex, but I would have made better use of a sick bowl.

We are here mainly to watch independently produced movies but occasionally, time allowing, will break out a see a big budget star-studded film.  This time I chose to see the new one from Academy Award Nominee Stephen Frears ('The Queen' & 'The Grifters') who like Spike Lee, was back showing in Sundance after many years absence.  There are usually two reasons why big-named directors return with new work, a) to garner more press coverage or b) excuse despite the star wattage of their product they still haven't managed to sell the movie.  'LAY THE FAVOURITE' was evidently based on a true story of Beth an ex-stripper who moved to Las Vegas with the lofty ambition of being a Cocktail Waitress but instead fell in with Dink a professional gambler who gave her a job running numbers instead. The gambler had a hard-bitten wife called Tulip who had Beth fired when she could see Beth trying to steal Dink (inexplicable when you see the movie), but later when Beth is working for a NY Bookie and gets in trouble , its Tulip that pushes Dink to come to her rescue.

Like the last two Frears movies ('Tamara Drew'  & 'Cheri') this was really lame and very flat.  Rebecca Hall played bubbly Beth to the hilt but after a time what I initially thought was a wonderful portrayal, really started to irritate me.  Bruce Willis was an uninspiring Dink and had zero chemistry with with either Ms Hall or my beta noir (a really skinny) Catherine Zeta Jones playing Tulip.  Without a doubt, Mr Frears was there to get a Distribution Deal on this one which now I have sat through it I know will be no easy task, and its not surprising to me that this has not shown up in the slew of daily announcements of movies that have been 'picked up' here.

That's one my and only foray to anything that's a product of Hollywood this week, but it hasn't stopped me keeping my eyes peeled when we are dashing in between venues to see any of it's peeps instead. Sometimes stars can be really unfriendly like Bob Hoskins who turned his back on me just because I stuck my camera right in his face.

I didnt do much better when I shouted out 'Oy Marcia' to Ms Gay Harden who just blanked me.

And I would have given my personal congratulations to Jonah Hill if I had known he was going to be on the Oscar Nomination List this morning for his performance in 'Moneyball'

And then I ran into one of my Blog's new readers and he asked me to print a retraction of my insinuation that his wonderful movie THE AMBASSADOR was actually a mocumentary, and this I am happy to do for my NBF filmmaker Mads Brugger.

Tomorrow is another day!

DAY 2: KEEPING THE LIGHTS ON

The first movie on our schedule is not until the afternoon, so we decide to use our downtime and go out to have a real sit down meal for a change.  However the snow has finally arrived big time so we need to re-think our clothing and dress sensibly before we can set out. This is the look that  Kareem opts for as he hates to draw attention to himself, but I really don't think that sensible is the first adjective that times to my mind.

Park City has a really fab free bus system that has different routes that seemingly run continuously between all the Festival Venues & the Ski Resorts. That comes as quite a relief as my bike wasn't very usable this morning  

We hop on a bus to Main Street which is the cute town centre which looks like an old movie set itself. The snow has settled and is quite deep but that didnt stop one glamourous under-dressed starlet type trying to negotiate the rather treacherous sidewalk in very high heels.  Damn, where is my camera when I need it? But we did get it out in time to capture me trying to deal with this very un-Miami weather.

We popped into the Sundance Channel Lounge to hang out a while and see if coffee would give us back any sensations in our fingers and toes, and also try and do a wee bit of Star spotting too.  Now the town is overrun with people who think they are celebs and are so convincing that I start to think they are too.  I swear  this man that I am pointing at is someone really big in pictures, but who the hell is he?

Fun over and back on schedule and our first movie is a very tender and realistic story that plots a loving relationship between two very likable guys in Manhattan through all it's highs  and challenges over a decade. There were sadly more of the latter but this well made movie's particular take was both honest and refreshing, and with excellent acting from a relatively unknown cast it deserves to get picked up by a Distributor  so that it can find the audience it deserves. Titled 'Keep The Lights  On' which referred to the preference of the more unstable partner's needs , it did also make me smile and think back to 'The Queen of Versailles yesterday when the obnoxious billionaire and seemingly reluctant father would shout out at his kids 'if  you love me then turn off the lights'. 


We didn't fare so well with our next flick, but that's Sundance for you. It doesn't matter how much one studies all the Program Notes to whittle it down to a manageable viewing schedule, you always make some wrong calls. But then again, if you don't go outside your comfort zone  here sometimes you may miss an unexpected sheer gem.  And 'Filly Brown' a movie about a female Latino hip hop singer with a drug pushing mother in jail easily qualifies as something you wouldn't normally find me in the audience for. Ever.  I was however just following orders. The movie was a pick of Vivian's who had heard good things about it.  Viv is Co-director of O Cinema for whom I am ostensibly acting as Program Consultant (even though they don't need one) and in light of the fact that money doesn't change hands I have taken to introducing her and Kareem as my bosses and that I  am their VERY unpaid  Intern. A somewhat mature one. I am also gravitating to the idea of upgrading my (hon) Consultant title that is on my Badge to that of Film Curator which I think adds more gravitas  to a man of such worldly experience. Lol.

Anyway back to the plot, or rather the movie.  It was a great vehicle for a remarkable young talent Gina Rodriguez who really could 'spit out her rhymes so dope',  but aside from her standout performance the whole thing reeked shamefully of stereotypes.  It was embarrassingly  corny and quite clumsy, and  although the director was aiming at our tear ducts via our hearts he kind of numbed our brains instead. I left the theater somewhat worried that I had found the movie so disappointing simply because I am such a lily white gringo. But in all honesty I couldn't stop thinking that the film was less like a World Premiere and more like a Latino Lifetime TV Special. My (Latino) 'Bosses' actually thought the same, with Viv concluding it was as if the whole movie had been shot 10 years ago when we didn't know better.

If I was too much of a Brit for that movie, then I was possibly not young enough for the last movie of the day 'Indie Games'. It's a new documentary about computer geeks who independently create video games which are very much a staple of daily life for young(er) people these days. (And judging by the film, some not so young too!) A pair of newbie filmmakers followed 4  developers for some months as they tortuously created three new games at the expense of having anything approaching a normal life for years. They were on the whole a bunch or irritating whining nerds who's obsessions were beyond annoying, but however the whole process from germinating an idea and pursuing it through all the slow painful process was totally fascinating. The fact that they all elected to do this on their  own outside of the major games maker was admirable and the potential financial rewards, if they succeed, are enormous. If only they were not such a miserable and unattractive bunch!  


Time for bed, but first another run through Freshmarket for supplies.  And also to commiserate with Levi who's  probably out of sorts as his fellow Mormon Mitt was rejected by the good people of South Carolina today.  That would never happen to Levi in any State. In fact I'm sure he could even swap shelf stacking for a role in the movies any day. I wanted to show him the new membership card that I was sent from Miami International Film Festival that shows the level of my donation and the fact that I made it on my own.  It says Film Producer (Single).  The first part I know may mislead Levi about me, but the second part is very clear.