Reviews
The Witnesses, Blame it On Fidel, IN Memory of Myself, Heima and Air Guitar Ntion
With films like Z, The Confession and The Siege to his credit, Constantin Costa-Gavras was the titan of 1970s political cinema and his daughter Julie has clearly drawn on her recollections of the times, as well as Domitilla Calamai's novel, for her directorial debut, Blame It on Fidel.
Nine-year-old Nina Kervel conveys a wonderful sense of juvenile indignation and bemusement, as she struggles to understand why her bourgeois Parisian parents, Julie Depardieu and Stefano Accorsi, have hauled her out of her beloved catechism class at a chic convent school, sold their comfortable home and become infatuated with Chilean democracy. Indeed, whether confiding her doubts to her conservative grandmother or playing shop with the bearded revolutionaries crashing at the family's new apartment, Kervel retains an amusing gravitas that never detracts from the seriousness of such issues as class warfare and illegal abortion. Perfectly capturing the era's flawed idealism, this is a little gem, whose insouciant charm contrasts with the more patent period posturing of André Téchiné's The Witnesses.
There's something soap operatic about this study of an unconventional 1980s marriage that's unsettled by the spectre of Aids. The opening chapter delights in freedoms and flirtations, as bisexual cop Sami Bouajila cheats on children's author Emmanuelle Béart with Johan Libereau, the young protégé of gay doctor, Michel Blanc. However, trepidation and rancour intrude after Libereau is diagnosed with a terrifying new disease and, even though the survivors pick up the pieces of their lives, an air of resignation defiles the climactic optimism.
Téchiné establishes the changing attitudes of the times with an assurance that also informs the tonal shifts and Julien Hirsch's lustrous cinematography (that recalls the precious style of both Sirk and Fassbinder). But, while the male trio is persuasively drawn and vigorously played, Béart's reluctant mother often feels as peripheral as Libereau's opera-singing sister, Julie Depardieu.
A gay subtext informed the 1960 Furio Monicelli novel that inspired In Memory of Myself, Saverio Costanzo's transfixing insight into life in a Venetian island seminary. However, the director was right to make the homoeroticism less conspicuous in his measured adaptation, as it would have been an unnecessary distraction from the study of the psychological pressures imposed by enclosure that Costanzo had explored to such excellent effect in the shocking Palestinian drama, Private.
The austerity of the institution (which is evocatively photographed by Mario Amura) recalls Philip Gröning's Into Great Silence. But the routine of contemplation, prayer and self-realisation is more intense and, consequently, loner Christo Jivkov is tempted to seek solace from the perceived hostility of superiors Andre Hennicke and Marco Baliani in speculating about the crises facing fellow noviciates Fausto Russo Alesi and Filippo Timi. Brilliantly conveying the enormity of surrendering the self, this is a religious film with universal relevance and a closing shot to make the soul soar.
Several of the sequences in Dean DeBlois's documentary Heima have the same effect, as the benumbing beauty of the Icelandic landscape blends with the ethereal music of the extraordinary and utterly unique band, Sigur Ros.
Having spent 13 months touring the world, singer-guitarist Jon Thor 'Jonsi' Birgisson, bassist Georg 'Goggi' Holm, keyboard player Kjartan 'Kjarri' Sveinsson and percussionist Orri Pall Dyrason teamed with the all-girl string quartet, Amiina, to give a series of free concerts around their homeland. Consequently, they showed up in deserted fishing ports, arts venues, taverns, parks, halls and even protest camps to perform songs whose ambition and ingenuity defy description, even by their creators. The stage pyrotechnics are often dazzling. But nothing surpasses the rugged, unspoilt surroundings or the warmth that exists between the combo and audiences of all ages, whose pride in music rooted in ancient tradition is touchingly heartfelt.
Staying around the Arctic Circle, the rapport between the crowd and the artistes is equally warm in Alexandra Lipsitz's Air Guitar Nation, a pleasingly mock-serious account of David Jung and Dan Crane's bids to win the US heats that will enable their alter egos, C-Diddy and Bjorn Turoque, to compete at the World Air Guitar Championships in Finland. However, the good time that the spectators are evidently having in New York, LA and in the rain-sodden outpost of Oulu simply doesn't come across in the fussily edited footage that completely misses the surreal artistry that goes into an air axeman's costume, conceptualising and performance. This is great fun, but it's more concerned with showcasing eccentricity than analysing an anti-artform that requires front rather than talent.
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