“Never forget” is a slogan usually applied to Holocaust references, and if for much of the last 80 years it seems we could hardly forget, history is now repeating itself in a fashion fit to underline that anything can be forgotten, erased, or denied—particularly if that serves the purposes of new autocrats.
The Berlin & Beyond festival’s 29th incarnation (Thu/27-March 31) serves to prove that at least parts of German-speaking Europe isn’t inclined to bury that history, despite contending with their own xenophobic and white-power movements. Several films in this year’s event deal head-on with events of the Nazi era (do we have to say “original Nazi era” now?), while others champion values antithetical to it. The opening night selection is about a brilliant gay artist who might well have been killed in the camps, had he landed in Germany one generation earlier.
That person is John Cranko, the South African-born choreographer brilliantly played by English actor Sam Riley in Joachim A. Lang’s film. Cranko was a misfit dynamo already working in several art forms when he moved to London while still in his teens. He rather quickly made a name for himself, not just in the ballet world but in devising musical revues and other endeavors. Unfortunately, his high-flying career there crashed when a “morals charge” arrest became a public scandal right at the point when there was angry argument over the potential decriminalization of homosexual acts.
The film begins in its immediate aftermath in 1960, when Cranko was grateful to accept an offer to stage one of his dances at the relatively non-prestigious Stuttgart Ballet—then immediately asked to take on its directorship. He drastically raised the company’s profile within a few years, to international stature. But his own story ended prematurely at age 45 in 1973, due to an allergic reaction to a medication. He was a generous, inspired, but also eccentric and mercurial personality that Riley makes compelling here. The film’s great strength, however, is its unusually vivid portrayal of artistic process—Lang has normal conversational scenes interrupted by dancers trying and re-trying choreographic ideas as they occur to Cranko, so we actually feel privy to how the subject’s creative mind works. It’s easily one of the best dance biopics ever made.
Several other fact-based films in the festival rewind to a considerably less glorious Teutonic past, one that regrettably seems to loom ever nearer in our present political landscape. Andreas Dresen’s From Hilde, With Love is a quietly powerful dramatization of what happened to one pregnant young woman (Liv Lisa Fries) when she, her husband, and their small anti-Nazi underground resistance circle were arrested by the Gestapo in 1942 Berlin. Michael Krummenacher’s The Traitor tells a different real-life wartime tale, of an AWOL soldier turned drifter (Dimitri Krebs) who was all too easily manipulated into selling Swiss military intel to the Nazis, and suffered the consequences.
Andres Veiel’s Riefenstahl is perhaps the definitive documentary portrait of the undeniably gifted Leni R., whose ambition made her Hitler’s most valued screen propagandist (i.e. Triumph of the Will)—and who then spent the rest of her 101 years furiously, unconvincingly denying she was ever “really” a Nazi, “knew anything” (re: the Holocaust), and so forth. Drawing on some hitherto unavailable materials, this posthumous portrait lets her own words and deeds reveal the shameless absurdity of those denials. There are many jaw-dropping old interview sequences where she demonstrates that classic last resort of liars, simply trying to out-shout any well-evidenced truth they can’t refute.
Sarah Neumann’s Beyond the Blue Border and Natja Brunckhorst’s Two To One both fictionalize tumultuous changes in East Germany just before and after the 1989 fall of “the Wall.” On somewhat lighter notes, Sonke Wortmann’s Weddings and Wokes and Eileen Byrne’s The Mariana Trench offer seriocomic clashes between different generations and viewpoints. Offering a more international perspective is Soleen Yusef’s Winners, about a preteen Syrian refugee who finds soccer is one universal language in her new German home; and Mohammad Rasoulof’s German-produced, Tehran-set Oscar nominated drama The Seed of the Sacred Fig, which we reviewed during its recent Bay Area commercial release.
There’s still more in this year’s Berlin & Beyond, including three episodes of new TV series Black Fruit. The festival runs this Thurs/27-Sat/29 at SF’s Roxie Theater, then Sun/30-Mon/31 at Berkeley’s Elmwood, plus single programming dates at the Vogue in SF (Fri/28) and Napa’s Jarvis Conservatory (Sun/6). Full program, schedule, venue and ticket info is here.
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Strangling Family Ties in Zambia, Kentucky, Ireland
Three worthy new dramas prove some issues are translatable in every culture—like family obligations so oppressive they can ruin a life, or even end it.
Most nuanced and memorable of the lot is probably On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, the sophomore feature by Rungano Nyoni, whose I Am Not A Witch was one of the most intriguing and widely seen African films in recent years. Where that film was about superstitious fear as applied to an unknown little girl who shows up in a rural village, this film’s heroine (again named Shula, this time played by Susan Chardy) is a multilingual, middle-class professional. Driving home from a party one night, she spies something in the road—her Uncle Fred, who’s simply dropped dead. (We eventually learn he had plenty of unhealthy habits that might’ve led to such an end.) One gets the sense that the single, self-possessed Shula has carefully constructed a life in which she is largely immune to her extended family’s endless drama. But this event pulls her into that mess like a riptide.
She is strong-armed into participating in all funeral preparations; she is chided for insufficient displays of public grief. Never mind that Uncle Fred molested every girl-child within his reach—including Shula’s cousins Nsansa (Elizabeth Chisela) and Bupe (Esther Singini)—or that he leaves behind a wife and umpteen children somehow no one knew about. Propriety is the important thing… well, that and seizing whatever property he had from his hapless widow.
Though largely a black comedy with notes of absurdism, Guinea Fowl simmers like a pot about to boil over—only a lifetime of grinning-and-bearing-it suppression keeps Shula’s rage from exploding. While men are barely seen here, it’s obvious that this societal microcosm allows men to get away with anything, while all too frequently women take their resulting exasperation out on each other. The guinea fowl is noted for warning other savannah creatures when a predator is approaching—a pointed contrast the conspiracy of “family united” silence that allowed Uncle Fred to continue abusing underage relatives to his dying day. This elegantly crafted, excoriating tale rarely allows so much as an accusatory word to be spoken. But its cumulative impact is devastating nonetheless. On Becoming a Guinea Fowl opens at SF’s Roxie this Fri/28.
A simpler, touching exploration of familial damage is Tracie Laymon’s debut feature Bob Trevino Likes It, which was apparently inspired by the writer-director’s own experiences. Lily Trevino (Barbie Ferreira) is your classic “low self-esteem girl”—an endless, hapless would-be “people pleaser” who gets little appreciation and expects none. Abandoned by her mother as a tot, she barely scrapes by in adulthood as a live-in home assistant to a Louisville woman with muscular dystrophy (Lauren “Lolo” Spencer). Nonetheless, she is constantly hit up for money by her awful father Bob (French Stewart), a childish narcissist who exploits her in numerous ways yet somehow considers himself the victim in every situation.
When they have a temporary falling out (because he blames her for something that was his fault, of course), she ought to celebrate her liberation from a toxic parent. Instead, she masochistically tries to “re-friend” dad online—which is how she accidentally makes the acquaintance of a different Bob Trevino (John Leguizamo), who shares his name but is otherwise his opposite number. This Bob is a naturally warm, generous soul somewhat neglected by his preoccupied wife (Rachel Bay Jones), as well as a frustrated would-be parent (their only offspring was born with a terminal condition), and a hard building-industry worker stuck with a jerk of a business partner (Ted Welch). These two click, filling voids in each other’s lives despite the understandable skepticism those who question the platonic innocence of a friendship with a 40-year age gap.
Low-key and yes, likable, Bob Trevino Likes It springs few surprises as it heads towards tearjerker territory. The painfully needy main characters are almost too good to be true—their fine qualities ignored at large, so lonely they hang onto the slightest social-media bump for dear life. Still, their performances and restrained approach are duly moving. And Stewart, best known from the overbearing sitcom 3rd Rock From the Sun, switches gears entirely to create a negative “father figure” you will immediately want to slap senseless. The film opens Fri/28 in Bay Area theaters.
Still intriguing, albeit the least successful of these three features, is Christopher Andrews’ Bring Them Down, a sort of Hatfields-versus-McCoys interfamily blood feud set in rural west Ireland. Michael (Christopher Abbott) is a sheep farmer living with his cantankerous invalid father (Colm Meany). That already unpleasant existence gets worse when he realizes some of his flock is missing—rams soon found being sold by the hostile neighbor (Paul Ready as Gary) who married Michael’s ex-flame Caroline (Nora-Jane Noone).
Violent reprisals pile up, but the director’s script doesn’t provide enough depth or backstory to explain why these people don’t simply call the police over theft or vandalism. Credibility is further strained by casting as Gary’s simple-minded son an actor (Barry Keoghan, who’s played this sort of role a few too many times now) visibly just a few years younger than his “mother.” And I’m not sure why Andrews chose to tell this blood-and-thunder tale in non-chronological order, from different points of view. That’s a tactic I normally enjoy, yet here it’s so clumsily done, it only renders the story more confusing and convoluted.
Well-shot and acted, Bring Them Down holds interest. But the kind of modern-day Jacobean tragedy it aims for is ultimately beyond the grasp of a scenario lacking that grandeur, which instead boils down to a series of sensational incidents ill-supported by tangible psychological motivation. The feature is accessible on arthouse streaming platform MUBI as of Fri/28.
Documentary roundup: Andy Kaufman, Fly Fishing, Christian Nationalism, Led Zep
There’s a diverse spread of nonfiction films hitting screens this week, with something to satisfy nearly every taste. Alex Braverman’s Thank You Very Much is a persuasive appreciation of Andy Kaufman, a comedian considerably ahead of his brief time—a slim decade (starting with an appearance on Saturday Night Live’s very first episode in 1975) that ended with his early cancer death at age 35 in 1984.
Though he achieved mainstream popularity with an ongoing role on the sitcom Taxi, otherwise he invited controversy with pranks and personas designed to cause discomfort to himself, as well as viewers. These encompassed everything from a stone-faced readings of The Great Gatsby to posing as a diehard misogynist challenging women to wrestling matches in order prove male “superiority.” Such high-concept, “alienating” comedy was often carried so far, even colleagues began to wonder if he was sabotaging his own career. But as excerpted here, at least, it all remains bold and provocative. Thank You launches in select theaters and On Demand platforms Fri/28, with a Roxie Theater playdate on April 11.
A contrastingly ultra-laid-back Me Decade flashback is Christian Odasso and Guy de la Valene’s Tarpon, a short dive into early 1970s Key West culture and its attraction for the cream of that moment’s literary bohemian crop: Jim Harrison (Legends of the Fall), Thomas McGuane (92 in the Shade), and the Bay Area’s own Richard Brautigan (Trout Fishing in America).
Not that any of them actually talk about writing here. Instead, they lay about in hammocks, listen to local musicians, hang out with fishermen in pursuit of the titular species, and otherwise loaf. This genially hazy souvenir went unreleased at the time, but gradually accrued a cult following—no doubt in part because it sports an instrumental soundtrack by Jimmy Buffett. Film Movement Classics is releasing it in a 4K restoration to On Demand and Digital outlets this Fri/28. It’s just a 54-minute wisp of a movie…but one that may induce a desire to climb into the nearest time machine and never come back.
Seen by far too few since its release a year ago, Christopher J. Jones and Stephen Ujlaki’s Bad Faith: Christian Nationalism’s Unholy War on Democracy remains a crucial watch for those wishing deeper insight into WTF is happening in the United States today. Narrated by Peter Coyote, it charts the methodical rise of an evangelical underground determined to turn our nation into a theocracy—a plan that so far has been alarmingly successful, despite all outrageously non-Christian behavior displayed by many of its champions. It begins streaming on specialty platform OVID this Fri/28.
Last but not least, there’s Becoming Led Zeppelin, which wasn’t available in advance to cover when it opened theatrically last month, but now returns to IMAX screens for one day, on April 2. That proto-metal quartet’s surviving members seem such nice, polite fellows as interviewed here, you might forget they blazed the trail for all hotel-trashing, groupie-shagging rock excess since. Maybe that dirt will be in a sequel—Becoming only charts their career up to 1970 and the release of album III. (IV, with “Stairway to Heaven,” would arrive the next year.) I’ll admit they were never a personal favorite, but Bernard MacMahon’s film makes a pretty great case for them, drawing on a wealth of archival performance footage. Even among numerous fine rock docs in recent years, this ranks near the top.
