New Release Review: The Conspirator (Robert Redford, 2010)

The American Judicial System, while still plagued by problems today, came under scrutiny all the way back in post-Civil War Washington. One case in particular established legal precedents that still stand today, that of Mary Surratt. Robert Redford, in his recent film The Conspirator, tackles the trial of the woman accused of aiding and abetting the conspirators behind the infamous assassination of American President Abraham Lincoln. The case in question, which took place while the country was still divided by war and crisis, did not abide by the system set in place by the United States Constitution, with the woman (a civilian) tried not before a jury of her peers, but that of a military tribunal. With a bitter government seeking not only swift justice for the crimes, but also revenge, Mary Surratt stood no chance.

In addition to Lincoln, attempts were made on the lives of Vice President Andrew Johnson and the Secretary of State. Seven men and one woman are arrested and charged with conspiring to kill the political figures. The lone woman charged, Surratt (Robin Wright) owned a boarding house where John Wilkes Booth (Toby Kebbell) and others met and planned the simultaneous attacks. Booth and is co-conspirators had been invited by Mary’s son John (Johnny Simmons), who fled before the night and still remains missing at the time of trial. Defense Attorney Reverdy Johnson (Tom Wilkinson), believing Mrs. Surratt to be entitled to a defense, assigns inexperienced attorney, Frederick Aiken (James McAvoy), a 28-year-old Union war-hero, to the case. The military tribunal is also assigned on the orders of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton (Kevin Kline), who wishes to silent an enraged public with a swift trial.

Classic Throwback: Trois Couleurs: Blanc (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1994)

Blanc is the second film in Krzysztof Kieslowski’s acclaimed Trois Couleurs Trilogy, adopting the trait of ‘equality’, represented by the white of the French flag. Often considered to be the weakest of the Trilogy, Blanc is still a great film in its own right. While there are subtle crossovers shared by the three films, each one contains its own unique messages, symbols and use of the title colour and adequately stand alone. As Blanc is the lone film in the trilogy to centre its story on a male character, a little misleading considering Julie Delpy’s presence on the DVD cover, the tone of this film is very different from Bleu, functioning more as a dark comedy than a drama. While none of Kielsowski’s films would be considered romances, they all touch on the protagonist losing someone they love and then renewing that love in a different way. Blanc again features Kieslowski’s brilliance at capturing humanistic qualities through fleeting, random situations, his skill at drawing impeccable performances from his cast and his technical wizardry.

The film opens cross cutting between the arrival of a nervous-looking Polish man at a Paris divorce court with seemingly irrelevant shots of a large brown suitcase on an airport carousel. If you know a Kieslowski film, he rarely presents something on screen has no importance. The man, Karol Karol (Zbigniew Zamachowski), awkwardly asks the court guard for directions, stating he has been ‘summoned’. Summoned to an embarrassing humiliation. Struggling to speak French, Karol is informed that his beautiful wife Dominique (Julie Delpy) no longer loves him and has taken her proposed divorce to court on the grounds that he was unable to consummate the marriage.

World Premieres Announced for 68th Venice Film Festival

The 68th Venice Film Festival runs from August 31 - September 10. American film director Darren Aronofsky has been announced Head of the Jury. Just announced, here are the films with World Premieres scheduled at the Festival:

Alps (Yorgos Lanthimos)

A Burning Hot Summer (Philippe Garrel)

Carnage (Roman Polanski)

Chicken With Plums (Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud)

Contagion (Steven Soderbergh)

A Dangerous Method (David Cronenberg)

Dark Horse (Todd Solondz)

The Exchange (Eran Kolirin)

Faust (Alexander Sokurov)

La Folie Almayer (Chantel Akerman)

Himizu (Sion Sono)

The Ides of March (George Clooney)

I'm Carolyn Parker: The Good, the Mad and the Beautiful (Jonathan Demme)

Killer Joe (William Friedkin)

Last Day on Earth (Abel Ferrera)

The Moth Diaries (Mary Harron)

Quando la Notte (Cristina Comencini)

Sal (James Franco)

Seediq Bale (Wei Te-sheng)

Shame (Steve McQueen)

Terraferma (Emanuele Crialese)

Texas Killing Fields (Ami Canaan Mann)

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (Tomas Alfredson)

L'ultimo Terrestre (Gipi)

W.E. (Madonna)

Wuthering Heights (Andrea Arnold)

Releases 28/07

There are four new releases opening in Australian cinemas tomorrow. What makes this week different from last is the fact that I want to see all of them. I have a very busy week ahead. The films are Captain America: The First Avenger, Hanna, The Conspirator and the 2010 Academy Award nominee for Best Animated Film, L'illusionniste [The Illusionist]. Expect reviews for all but L'illusionniste by the end of the weekend.


Captain America: The First Avenger - Don't look now but there is another Superhero film hitting theatres in 2011, and The Green Lantern hasn't even been released yet. From the trailer, I thought this one looked to be the best of the bunch, but as expected, reviews have been a little mixed (RT = 74%). Captain America focuses on the early days of the Marvel Universe when Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) volunteers to participate in an experimental program that turns him into the Super Soldier known as Captain America. Rogers joins forces with Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) and Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell) to wage war on the evil HYDRA organisation, led by the villainous Red Skull (Hugo Weaving). Directed by Joe Johnson, the film also stars Tommy Lee Jones and Stanley Tucci.

2011 Toronto International Film Festival Unveils Galas and Special Presentations

The 2011 Toronto International Film Festival, running between September 8-18, has unveiled a stunning selection of films in the Galas (10) and Special Presentations (43) programs. The titles I am about to mention are simply mind-blowing. The thought of seeing half of these films within the duration of a little more than a week sure is a crazy one. Hopefully the lineup in 2012 will be just as strong, as I hope to be in attendance.

Anyway, here are a taste of some of the films, a more in-depth look at the complete announced lineup can be found (here)

Opening Night Film

From the Sky Down (Davis Guggenheim)

Galas

Albert Nobbs (Rodrigo Garcia)

Butter (Jim Field Smith)

A Dangerous Method (David Cronenberg)

A Happy Event (Remi Bezancon)

The Ides of March (George Clooney)

The Lady (Luc Besson)

Moneyball (Bennett Miller)

Peace, Love and Misunderstanding (Bruce Beresford)

Take this Waltz (Sarah Polley)

W.E (Madonna)

Special Presentations

50/50 (Jonathan Levine)

360 (Fernando Meirelles)

The Artist (Michael Hazanavicius)

Coriolanus (Ralph Fiennes)

Dark Horse (Todd Solondz)

The Deep Blue Sea (Terrence Davies)

The Descendants (Alexander Payne)

Drive (Nicholas Winding Refn)

Killer Joe (William Friedkin)

Martha Marcy May Marlene (Sean Durkin)

Melancholia (Lars Von Trier)

Pearl Jam Twenty (Cameron Crowe)

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (Lasse Halstrom)

Shame (Steve McQueen)

The Skin I Live In (Pedro Almodovar)

Take Shelter (Jeff Nichols)

Trishna (Michael Winterbottom)

Twist (Francis Ford Coppola)

Tyrannosaur (Paddy Considine)

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay)

New Release Review: Meek's Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt, 2011)

Meek's Cutoff, a frontier western directed by Kelly Reichhardt (Wendy and Lucy), first played in competition at the 67th Venice International Film Festival and has hit cinemas in 2011. I missed a screening at the Sydney Film Festival, but managed to catch one today, at the very end of its limited Sydney release at Dendy Cinemas. It is based on a historical incident on the Oregon Trail in 1845, in which frontier guide Stephen Meek led a wagon train on an ill-fated journey through the Oregon desert, charting the route known as the Meek Cutoff.

Set in the wilderness of the Cascade Mountains and the Oregon High Desert in 1845, a small band of settlers with three wagons have split from the main train to take a shortcut under the leadership of Meek (Bruce Greenwood). We are thrust straight into their journey, with several wonderful early shots of the wagon train laboriously journeying over the perilous terrain. We are caught up on events through a whispered conversation between Emily and Solomon Tetherow (Michelle Williams and Will Patton), who suspect that Meek may not in fact know where he is going. With no end in sight, what was initially proposed to be a two-week journey has now stretched into five.

The families start to wonder if they are lost and question the motivations of their ignorant and arrogant guide. Tensions start to run high as water becomes increasingly scarce and their supplies run low, with the women, unable to participate in the decision-making, forced to look on as Meek and their husbands disagree on the next course of action. Emily begins to overthrow Meek's power by opposing his decision to kill a captured lone Indian (Rod Rondenaux), believing the man can lead them to water. She tends to him, providing him water and mending his shoe, in the hope that he will help them.

Classic Throwback: Trois Couleurs: Bleu (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1993)

Bleu is a 1993 French film written, produced and directed by Polish auteur Kzysztof Kieslowski (The Double Life of Veronique) and the first in his wonderful Trois Couleurs Trilogy, which are themed on the French revolutionary ideals. The subject of Bleu, according to Kieslowski, is ‘emotional liberty’, which replicates what the use of the colour in the French flag represents. Blue is also representative of a cold mood, one of sadness and despair, which is exactly the world that Julie (Juliet Binoche) is plummeted into following the tragedy that opens the film.

Following the beautiful opening shot; a piece of blue cellophane held aloft by a child’s hand and catching the wind, there is an automobile accident. Julie survives, and is forced to cope with the death of her husband and daughter in the accident. In hospital she watches the filmed funeral for her family, where we learn that her husband was Patrice de Courcy, a famous composer and that her daughter Anna was just five years old. After being released from the hospital, Julie empties the house her family lived in and moves to an apartment in Paris with the desire to live anonymously, alone and withdrawn from the world. She doesn’t keep any clothing or objects from her old life, except for a chandelier of blue beads that was hanging in her daughter’s room and presumably belonged to her.

'That don't make no sense...'

It made me chuckle, and consider, for longer than I am willing to admit, if meaning existed. 

Points for guessing what film the title quote comes from. 

I am feeling very sleepy tonight and not up to writing, hence the silly post. I have decided to settle down to a home-made curry and an hour of new Curb Your Enthusiasm.