A four film day and a mixed bag. I really liked The Maid (Chilean drama from 2009) and also enjoyed Graceful Girls (Australian callisthenics documentary) and the Documentary Shorts. I hated Tales of the Grim Sleeper (sloppy US documentary about a serial killer), awarding it half a star.
Each cinema at MIFF is different and it helps to know the best places to sit and where the toilets are. Continue reading
Thank you Jenny. I sat next to Jenny on my first day and we chatted. She is a regular MIFF-goer and one year stepped in to manage the festival, so she knows her films. We compared our schedules and she saw that I was seeing Magic Magic by Chilean director Sebastián Silva, who is having a retrospective at MIFF this year. Although she quite liked that film, she recommended two others of his – The Maid and Old Cats. So I booked The Maid and loved it. Continue reading
It’s hard not to be won over by the girls and women of the callisthenics community. Callisthenics, it turns out, is uniquely Australian and developed with migrant populations as a way to promote physical fitness and gracefulness for young girls. Callisthenics is like a cross between gymnastics, ballet and synchronised swimming and (almost exclusively) girls and young women train and compete in solo and group events. The pinnacle, is the annual competition at Royal South Street in Ballarat, in particular the Most Graceful Girl prize. Continue reading
Should you blog angry? Probably not. I hated this film. When I read the synopsis, I saw that it was directed by the same guy who made Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer in 1992. In fact that screened at MIFF in 1992 and that’s probably where I saw it. I remember being fascinated with Aileen Wuornos and having arguments in the uni cafe about her with fellow students. What I had unfortunately forgotten was that I really disliked the filmmaker and his approach to documentary and his subject. It was only as the lights dimmed in the Comedy Theatre and he appeared on screen that I thought, “Shut the front door, it’s Nick Broomfield, I can’t stand Nick Broomfield.” Continue reading
I added a shorts package to my repertoire to broaden my horizons. Shorts packages are a bit of a lucky dip. I didn’t read up on what they were, preferring to be surprised. It was an 11am session on a Sunday and today’s a four film day so I knew it was going to be a full day. And I didn’t get time to grab a coffee beforehand. Can you see where I’m going with this? Continue reading
Two films today and they complemented each other – The Ground We Won, a beautiful New Zealand documentary about a rural rugby team and Sworn Virgin, an exploration of a bizarre custom in rural Albania for women who want to do more than be wives. Two explorations of gender roles in rural communities where to be a part of the social fabric, you must conform to limitations set by long tradition. Continue reading
Sworn Virgin is another of those multinational coproductions but I’m going to call it an Albanian film. The thread of the story is about gender roles in rural Albania, and although it is set equally in Italy, it is Albanian life and culture that we experience. The story is set in two time periods, we see Mark traveling from Albania to Italy and reuniting with his sister and her family after 14 years. We can tell that Mark is actually a woman and we know that Lila, his sister, knows but everyone else is oblivious. We then flash back to Lila and Mark’s teenage years in Albania and we discover the story. Continue reading
I admit that I booked this film because it was filmed in black and white and from New Zealand. I knew it was about rugby in a rural town but that was about all. When it began I thought, “Oh Lordy, what have I done. I’m watching a film about sport.” I’m so glad I booked it. Continue reading
Okay, I’ll admit it right now, today I saw a film at a cinema and it wasn’t a MIFF film. It was an unashamedly mainstream comedy, I was with a friend, we bought glasses of wine and chips and we sailed past the queues of earnest MIFF goers at the Kino into our film. It was great. You can read my reviews of the said film, Trainwreck, and the much more worthy (though no more enjoyable) Vietnamese film Flapping in the Middle of Nowhere. Continue reading
This quiet Vietnamese film tells the story of Huyen, a young girl, maybe 17 years old, who is pregnant and living alone in a small apartment in Hanoi. She can’t tell her parents, her boyfriend is a bit of an idiot, and she doesn’t have the money for an abortion. She’s afraid – of the pain of labour, of dying whilst pregnant, of the pain of an abortion, of telling her parents. She drifts from day to day, knowing she must make a decision but seemingly paralyzed in her doubt and immaturity. Her boyfriend’s idea of helping her is to fight his rooster in cock fights run by thugs and so win the money they need. This doesn’t go so well and he runs out on her. Continue reading
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