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mama feeding babies a pigeon:

proud poppa:

some of these people got much better pictures than I did, and not only because their friends didn’t borrow their cameras and LEAVE THEM SET ON SOLARIZE:

The new Jean-Pierre Jeunet film, more formally known as Micmacs à tire-larigot, was a last-minute closing night substitution at IFF Boston. To quote Brad Searles, “upgrade.”

From the outset, Micmacs is classic Jeunet, set in a world just a bit off-kilter from ours. Like Amélie, Micmacs stacks improbable coincidences as part of its plot. Like City of Lost Children (La cité des enfants perdus), Micmacs is crammed full of lush visuals — so much so that I’m actively looking forward to seeing it again when it opens locally next month just to catch some of what I missed.

Micmas includes several familiar Jeunet themese and motifs — there’s wonder, humor, romance, and some darkness — but it’s also more directly satirical, even political. Bazil (Dany Boon) runs afoul of two rival weapons manufacturers, and with the aid of the typically (for Jeunet, that is) unlikely and somewhat folkloric friends he makes, he endeavors to set the two companies at each other’s throats. The result is often very funny, but more than a little pointed. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Gil Reyes’ biography of doomed indie rocker Smith is very interesting in how it embraces constraints: there’s not much film footage of Smith, and much of what there is isn’t technically good — so Reyes embraces the slacker aesthetic, using techniques like deliberately awkward cuts and mildly obnoxious microphone pops to make his footage match the spirit of the scant Smith material available*. Smith’s family/estate wouldn’t cooperate (because Reyes’ film includes Smith’s girlfriend at the time of his death, Jennifer Chiba, alleged by some to be his murderer) so Reyes’ inclusion of Smith’s music is an intricate dance through fair use doctrine: songs are excerpted, never performed in full, and always accompanied by critical commentary from folks like audio engineer-extraordinaire Larry Crane.

Reyes brings a journalistic eye to his first feature, and he proves himself an adept interviewer. He gets some remarkable moments on camera with Chiba, Crane, and some of Smith’s fellow musicians in the Portland scene like Pete Krebs (Hazel, Pete Krebs & the Gossamer Wings) and, especially, Sean Croghan. (After seeing the film, I went on a mild Croghan binge, snapping up his solo album as well as releases from his former bands Jr. High and Crackerbash.)

Reyes wisely assumes his viewers are acquainted with the rough outline of Smith’s life and death (I assume my readers are too) and doesn’t structure his film to depend on a grim third-act twist. And neither Reyes nor his interviewers try either to turn Smith into a saint or demonize him; they treat him as a human being: terrifically talented, but as flawed as any of us.

Smith’s death six-and-a-half years ago hit me like the proverbial load of bricks. I’ve scarcely been able to listen to his music since. I didn’t want to miss a chance to see this film, but I was a little afraid I’d find it tough to handle. If you’re of a similar frame of mind, you might want to know that it left me feeling a little more healed, and not a lot more saddened.

*for my taste this stayed just on the right side of cheerfully lo-fi, as opposed to amateurish and/or annoying.

If you’re a fan of The Magnetic Fields, you’re going to love Strange Powers, directors Kerthy Fix and Gail O’Hara’s love-letter to the singular genius of Stephin Merritt (not to mention his longtime manager/collaborator Claudia Gonson). The film’s decade-long gestation means that viewers are treated to footage of Merritt and his merry crew working on both I and Distortion. A scene with Merritt and Gonson puzzling out the metrical details of I’s “In an Operetta” was a personal favorite — it quintessentially captures their spirited but affectionate bickering.

In many respects Strange Powers is like hanging out with a couple of really smart, acerbic, and funny friends for an evening. If you’re not a fan of The Magnetic Fields are you likely to become a convert? Maybe — because Strange Powers is also not unlike the vibe of The Magnetic Fields’ live performances, which — especially considering how mannered and arch Merritt can be on record — are similarly touching experiences, and are what transformed me from a very casual fan into slightly nutso fan. (I keep trying to write about how magical Magnetic Fields shows are and not getting it quite right.)

Fix explained in the Q & A session that one reason it took so long to complete the film was that it was waiting for a story arc to present itself: for the band to break up, for the band to break through to the mainstream, for Merritt’s theatrical scoring sideline to take off, etc.. Ultimately she opted to follow what she described as a “portrait of a genius” template. This approach suits Merritt very well; it puts his singular personality front-and-center; he has the (oddball) charisma to carry the picture. Strange Powers is I think a stronger film for not having a strong authorial hand constraining its elements to a specific narrative arc.

I’m a little baffled at my reaction to Orgasm Inc. It’s specifically about the creation of the medical condition “Female Sexual Dysfunction,” a.k.a. FSD, and the pharmaceutical quest for the “female Viagra” to treat it. (This theoretical elixir — or snake oil, if you prefer — would enable women to climax without clitoral stimulation.) More generally it’s about the process of defining conditions which must be treated with drugs: who does the defining, and who stands to benefit from convincing us we’re all sick?

Both the general issue and this specific instance of it enrage me (there’s a particularly appalling Vagina Monologues kinda moment in this film when you learn that one of the victims of medical attempts to “cure” her non-orgasmic condition only has trouble achieving orgasm during penetrative sex).

So why did Orgasm Inc. leave me lukewarm? I think partly because it follows the “standard” documentary rules, and partly because despite its sensitive subject, it keeps the viewer at an odd emotional remove. There are a few informed pontificating heads, several interviews with “sufferers” of FSD, title cards at the end that tell us what happened to some of the participants presumably after principal shooting wrapped. Director Liz Canner brings a personal dimension to the film — she actually started out working for the bad guys, and came to gradual awareness that she was on the wrong team. But the audience doesn’t really get to know Canner, or any of the other experimental subjects. Another thing that rubbed me the wrong way about this film was the recurring use of computer animation of assorted FSD treatments in a footrace toward FDA approval. It looks expensive, but the only information it really conveys is the date when clinical trials of a given product forced it out of the potential marketplace.

I love this movie so much, it’s a struggle to write about it coherently. The many thoughts it provokes are stumbling over each other between my head and my keyboard. What’s the best way to convince you that you should see 9500 Liberty? (You can significant chunks of it on the 9500 Liberty YouTube channel, so it’s easy to access.)

9500 Liberty takes its title from a street address where a community resident posts signs about his reaction to a discriminatory community ordinance in Manassas, Virginia. (The contentious law is very much like the Arizona one you’ve been hearing about.) Filmmakers Eric Byler and Annabel Park — whose film had its genesis as a series of YouTube videos — documented their concern about the divisive issue’s effect on their community.

I wish every US citizen could and would see this movie. It has at least two important messages — the first is about the discriminatory law and its impact on the community, but the second is much broader — it’s about the need for re-introducing civility to public discourse. 9500 Liberty succeeds not only in informing its audience about the issue, but also is an artistic success. It’s very solidly constructed and paced, perhaps surprisingly so for a work that had it’s genesis in snippets posted in near real-time. Byler and Park are gifted filmmakers and interviewers. One of the many striking things about this film is that they don’t just seek out the voices that agree with their opinions; they have shockingly candid conversations with private citizens and elected officials on both sides of the issues.

The parts of Anne Perry: Interiors that I liked best concerned Perry’s career as a best-selling mystery novelist. They provide some insight into her creative process, and a lot of detail on the operational process of producing books. (A scene with Perry and her transcriber both puzzling over an unclear word was perhaps my favorite.)

But Perry, under another name, was involved in events in 1954 that were dramatized in a 1994 film. Perry and her associates acknowledge these events only reluctantly, and writer/director Dana Linkiewicz pushes them to confront and discuss them. If I faulted Lemmy for being too respectful of its subject, I felt Anne Perry: Interiors went too far the other way; watching some of the interview clips of Perry’s associates and friends, it was hard not to wonder if those friendships and associations might not be damaged when Perry saw the interviews; one of the sessions with Perry herself seemed almost abusive. I was reminded of David Frost going after Tricky Dick as depicted in Frost/Nixon, but whereas Nixon was a figure in public office who was never formally charged with crimes, let alone convicted of them, Perry was convicted, and served out her sentence. Badgering her to get a “money shot” fifty-five years later struck me as mean-spirited.

The film’s title comes, I think, from its use of a formal device: shots in Perry’s home represent the controlled, reserved life Perry has constructed; exterior shots of the surrounding countryside represent the underlying unresolved emotional tension. This worked for me when the exteriors were unruly lonely moors and claustrophobic winding lanes, but there were a few shots (skeletal branches waving across the full moon’s face; waves crashing against the shore) that seemed rather ham-fisted.

Confession: by the time I saw Drones, I was really tired. I had high expectations from the nerd dream-team cast and crew, including directors Amber Benson and Adam Busch (a.k.a. Tara and Warren from Buffy the Vampire Slayer), and actors Samm Levine (Freaks and Geeks) and James Urbaniak (The Venture Bros., American Splendor, and assorted Hal Hartley projects).

For the first twenty minutes or so I was really charmed by Drones wry crossbreeding of Office Space with Invasion of the Body Snatchers. But I thought it front-loaded its most creative ideas and character interactions, and got a bit repetitive as it went on.

I can’t really tell, though, how much the problem was with the movie running out of steam, and how much the problem was with me running out of steam. I suspect there was some of both, but I’m not sure what the balance was.