MIFF DAY 6: This was a day of the highs and lows of going to film festivals. The movie-watching day began with seeing ALIVE INSIDE. My wife and I were joined by my sister. Our family, like millions of others, has experienced having a parent suffering with dementia. This is why the message of this film is quite personal to me. That message is that what one has enjoyed for music (the soundtrack of ones life to which I alluded in writing about A HARD DAYS NIGHT) retains amazing power to maintain the connection and help reconnect individuals with dementia with who they were and with the world around them. There are some remarkable scenes of men and women appearing to be vegetables who appear to wake up after hearing music from their earlier life. The larger story is that while we have increasingly longer lives we do not appear to have an efficient and humane system for addressing the needs of an aging population. This is a result in societal changes in modern living and in how families function. While the impact of music is a major and very uplifting part of this films story, it has broader concerns that are very thought-provoking and affect us all. ALIVE INSIDE is scheduled to have its second screening tonight at 9:15 pm in Railroad Squares Cinema 2. We followed that up with Michael Winterbottoms THE TRIP TO ITALY with Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon. Like their first on-the-road-restaurant-reviewing collaboration THE TRIP, the two actors play loosely fictionalized versions of themselves traveling by road and sea in Italy sampling food in posh restaurants. Cinematographer James Clarke spectacularly captures the beautiful scenery and the food en route from kitchen prep to table. These visuals are accompanied by a delightful array of music. Oh, yes, Coogan and Brydon continue to outdo each other in doing impressions of Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Hugh Grant, and a host of others. I dont know if the targets for imitation feel embarrassed about this or feel it affirms their status as icons in the public imagination across the globe. For the most part, their jibes and bickering are very funny. The result is that THE TRIP TO ITALY is a pretty fun ride that doesnt demand much other than just coming along. Wednesdays screening was the last scheduled for MIFF, but the film is already booked for a return engagement at Railroad Square Cinema so there is no need to despair. When a film seems pointless, it is pretty clear that one has totally missed the point. Unfortunately, that is where I am with FRANK. Supposedly, the filmmakers were making a film that playfully examines the nature of art and artists. Moreover, there do seem to be those who have seen the film who got that and thoroughly enjoyed it. Based on behavior during the movie and what people said in the post-viewing discussion in the lobby, Im not sure how many others who saw the film with me count themselves in that group. There was sporadic laughter, but for the most part the audience watched in silence. Several of the testimonials on the Internet Movie Database website that praised the film were from the United Kingdom and Ireland. It may have been significant that the Frank character for them was not simply a fictionalized creation, but the persona of a character called Frank Sidebottom created by Chris Sievey (1955-2010) who was in rock bands and also appeared as a comic during the 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Frank Sidebottoms emblematic feature was wearing the oversized head. I suspect that the border between perceiving something as absurdly funny and pathetic may be rather narrow. It is possible that another time, a different audience, a chemically altered state of consciousness that perception might be markedly different. FRANK shows again on Friday night at 9:30 pm in Railroad Squares Cinema 1.
Posted on: Thu, 17 Jul 2014 12:36:18 +0000
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