Lake Tahoe [IMDB][MFF], directed by Fernando Eimbcke, starring Diego Catano, Hector Herrara and Daniela Valentine…a story of Juan, a teenager who crashes his car on the outskirts of a sleepy Mexican town and tries to find a mechanic. During his quest he doesn’t seem to find what he is looking for, but meets an old paranoid dog owner who wants him to walk his dog, a young punk mother who is looking for a babysitter and a Kung Fu fanatic who’d like to watch a Bruce Lee movie with him. Their relationship to each other is quiet, perhaps as sleepy as the town, but during his mission to get the car running again he slowly finds some friendships and people he hesitatingly begins to care about.

Lake Tahoe was a genius mix of deadpan humor and drama that kept me interested from beginning to end. I loved the overall mood and atmosphere, the characters and how they interacted with each other. It was slow and quiet, but in a very good way. Very nicely paced, beautifully photographed, it managed to say a lot without using many words or music. Watching this movie reminded me of spending a relaxing vacation in another country…and I could have stayed a bit longer.

Our second screening was Stringray Sam, directed by Cory McAbee, starring himself, Crugie, Joshua Taylor, Willa Vy McAbee, Bobby Lurie, Frank Swart, Caleb Scott, Jessica Jelliffe, Ron Crawford, Michael DeNola, Michael Wiener and David Hyde Pierce [IMDB][MFF]. It actually was a story split in six Youtube-friendly parts…a sci-fi-western-musical. Another musical?! Yes! When I looked at the film-descriptions all it took to make me want to see it were Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and “homage to the cinema, rock & roll, comic books, and everything else cool from our childhoods.”

I didn’t expect it to become our second musical this year…and what a cool and fun musical! I absolutely enjoyed the songs, I loved director Cory McAbee in his role as Stingray Sam and guitarist Crugie as Quasar Kid, the Monty Python’esque collage-art…and how it managed to speak to the kid inside of me. During the Q and A Cory McAbee told his story when he was interviewed in Europe about one of his previous features The American Astronaut. The interviewer explained to him that many people in Europe were very angry with the American government and what they were doing at that time…that they feel like they don’t like Americans. His movie, however, included many things Europeans always loved and enjoyed about America and American culture. With this conversation in mind he wrote Stingray Sam including the Wild West, Cowboy, Sci-Fi, Musical, Space-Travellers that Europeans (or Germans in my case) always loved about American culture, but also highlighted the dark side with Tobacco and pharma companies, the privatised prison system, etc. Being European myself I can confirm that in Stringray Sam you can find the “cool” things we love about America, without ignoring the not so cool things.

It felt a bit strange to see six separate episodes in a row and not one full-length feature, but these episodes had cult-potential, were a lot of fun and I absolutely enjoyed them. I haven’t seen American Astronaut yet, but will have to check it out sometime.

After a short break we saw a documentary about Stanley “Stanless Steel” Pleskun in Strongman [IMDB][MFF] by Zachary Levy. A man strong enough to leg-press massive trucks and bend pennies with his fingers reaches his middle age and struggles with difficult personal relationships and a number of career disappointments. This documentary was filmed over the course of several years and presents a close portrait of Stan who wants to prove that he’s still got it, and that he is more than a kids’ party-attraction. Life, however, presents him with another reality…other strong men who bend bolts with much less of an effort or pull nails with their teeth…problems to stop smoking, breathing issues…family and relationship problems…and an alcoholic brother who developed a crack habit.

This film moved me on several occasions. It seemed obvious that Stan invested a many years and a lot of discipline to train and build up his strength, to become “the strongest man on earth”. I had the impression he might have found his motivation in an attempt to find a better life for himself than what his background was like growing up. His brother was presenting him an example of what not to become. I felt reminded of my own background… I, too, put a lot of work, time and discipline into my education to break out of my working class background and find a better living for myself. I don’t think I’m the strongest man, but there was a time I felt like I was the best software developer on earth. After a few disappointments I had to realize that was a big mistake. There were a few other moments in Strongman that reminded me of my own history in one way or another, turning this documentary into more of a personal experience than I ever anticipated. I really enjoyed this film.

Your Humble Narrator

In a slightly different matter: The film description in the festival booklet calls Strongman a cinéma vérité portrait. I think the director mentioned this documentary style during the Q and A as well. Not familiar with this expression I looked it up and found that it combines “[...] naturalistic techniques with stylized cinematic devices of editing and camera work, staged set-ups, and the use of the camera to provoke subjects.” I might be wrong but I didn’t feel this applied to Strongman. Direct cinema on the other hand seemed to be a better fit. I read that both cinéma vérité and direct cinema have in common that they don’t use voice-overs, they both try to let the subjects speak for themselves, avoiding to make them dependent on the filmmaker’s interpretation, and they both try to avoid assigning social problems to a larger political or cultural context. Instead, they both try to capture truths and the everyday reality.

Furthermore I read that the difference between cinéma vérité and direct cinema is that direct cinema tries to put the camera and film maker as far into the background as possible. The camera is as a “fly on the wall” supposed to be as unnoticed as possible. Camera and crew should try not influence the situation at all to capture the “privileged moments” in which the person forgets about the camera’s existence and reveals truths you otherwise wouldn’t get to see.

Cinéma vérité, so I read, follows a different strategy…instead of being a “fly on the wall”, the film maker becomes a “fly in the soup”, actively participating in the situation and trying to provoke those “privileged moments”. Some examples would include reality-television or interview movies. Even fictional movies like the Blairwitch Project used this technique. I wonder if I understood it right… how would you as educated film people define the difference between cinéma vérité and direct cinema? It has nothing to do with Strongman, but I was curious because I wasn’t familiar with this word before.

Off to the next and last movie of the day, presented by director Bobcat Goldthwait himself: World’s Greatest Dad [IMDB][MFF] with Robin Williams, Daryl Sabara, Alexie Gilmore, Geoffrey Pierson, Henry Simmons, Mitzi McCall and Tony V. It’s the story about a middle aged author and poetry teacher Lance who fails to find somebody to publish his writing. He also seems to fail as single father of an abusive son Kyle. After an abrupt turn of events, Lance faces new challenges, fame and respect approaching from all directions.

Bobcat Goldthwait and Jed Dietz

Bobcat Goldthwait originally planned somebody else for Robin William’s role, and his character as poetry teacher was not at all related to the old Dead Poet’s Society at all, he explained during the Q and A. I enjoyed this film. It was very entertaining, funny, and sometimes also very dark which I always appreciate in a comedy. Similar to Sleeping Dogs Lie (a screening we saw a year or two ago), he managed to play with a darker, unspoken side of an individual’s psychology or social/cultural standards as a whole, while giving it all a very entertaining, lightweight appearance.

The following list is in order from my top pick down for both Friday and Saturday:

1. Modern Love is Automatic
2. Love Songs
3. Invisible Girlfriend
4. Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
5. Strongman
6. Stingray Sam
7. Lake Tahoe
8. World’s Greatest Dad
9. Seventh Moon

Our day started with Modern Love is Automatic [IMDB][MFF], directed by Zach Clark, starring Melodie Sisk (as Lorraine) and Maggie Ross (as Adrian).

Modern Love is Automatic was a dark and dry comedy-drama about nurse Lorraine who, bored with with her environment and the people in her life, detached herself emotionally and socially from everything. Controlling every detail in her life it doesn’t seem surprising when she finds interest in a dominatrix magazine. When she finds her boyfriend cheating she decides to look for a new roommate and becomes a dominatrix at night. She finds aspiring fashion model Adrian, whose emotionality and bubbliness very much is Lorraine’s total opposite. But just as opposites attract, they very slowly develop a friendship in the background of their individual lives and Adrian’s boyfriend Mitch who is uncontrollably obsessed with Lorraine.

Zach Clark, Maggie Ross, Melodie Sisk, Daryl Pittman

This movie was easily one of my favorites this year. I not only loved the great performances, cool sets, colors and costumes, but also the pace and quiet as well as Melodie Sisk’s facial expressions that said more than could ever be said with words. Modern Love feels like a nice companion to my other favorites from the last two festival years when I saw Ronald Bronstein’s Frownland and Mary Bronstein’s Yeast. In these movies I was able to identify with the characters and their paralyzed social lives and relationships to an unusual extent. What can I say, I loved everything about Modern Love is Automatic. Even the bursts of doom metal worked really well in there. Definitely a movie I would like to see again sometime, and one I can highly recommend.

David Redmon

Our second screening this Friday was Invisible Girlfriend [IMDB][MFF], directed by David Redmon and Ashley Sabin, with and about Charles Fihoil, a bipolar paranoid schizophrenic who lives in Monroe, Louisiana with his parents and children. He is in love with his invisible girlfriend, the spirit of Joan of Arc, and decides that DeeDee, his pen pal and New Orleans bartender, might be Joan of Arc in the flesh. The filmmaker follows him on a 400-mile bicycle journey to find DeeDee.

This was a wonderful documentary about a man who may be a bit crazy, but also very intelligent, insightful and caring. During his journey through rural Louisiana, which lasted about 12 days, he met several generous, kind and very down-to-earth people who gave him a ride or shared food and stories with him. I found it interesting how this journey was accompanied by a number of moments of death and decay that foreshadowed what he would find at his destination. Beautiful, sometimes funny, but also very sad, this film managed to create a non-judgmental portrait of Charles Fihoil and the people he met on his way. I really liked this film. I was also very impressed by some of the music choices.

Another documentary we saw this Friday was Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo, directed by Jessica Oreck. This film portrayed a part of Japanese culture I was completely unfamiliar with before: Japan’s love and fascination with insects that is inherent in the whole society and all generations from young to old age. Insects are collected like trading cards or comic books, are part of quite a significantly sized industry of collectors and breeders. Insects appear in shape of dolls, toys, video games, candy, but also inspire art and literature, dating back to the beginning of Japan’s history.

Jessica Oreck and Sean Williams

Beetle Queen was partially in English, partially Japanese with English subtitles and filled with a great amount of insight, history and poetry about an ancient and still mysterious culture that may mostly be known to the Western world for their car and electronic brands, fashion and pop culture, their tv-shows or cuisine. I can highly recommended it to anyone who is interested in learning more about Japan from a slightly different angle. The cinematography comes from Sean Williams who also shot Frownland and Yeast I mentioned above. I would love to see it again and follow the history and poetry in more depth than I was able to comprehend upon my first viewing.

I have to admit: A few days ago, if someone had told me to watch a romantic musical, I probably would have would have smiled and dismissed it without giving it a chance. The musical genre was not one I was particularly interested in before. The few musicals I have ever seen were entertaining to a degree, but they didn’t manage to grab me. Why? I’m not sure… perhaps it’s something I wasn’t properly introduced to growing up in Germany. About every movie made in Germany of the 50s and 60s was incredibly silly and featured a lot of bad German Schlager music. Television was practically non-existent, and eventually the popularity died off and no musical films were produced anymore for a very long time. I can’t really think of any musical film produced in Germany since the days of the economic boom.

In the mid to late 80s (stage) musicals became very popular with Cats. Many others including Starlight Express, Phantom of the Opera followed later, and they are still popular in Germany, but as far as I know, there haven’t been any movies to speak of. Every time I saw a movie with dancing and singing people they appeared very foreign to me. Something I couldn’t connect to.

Perhaps the setting and background were too artificial…perhaps the music was too methodical or constructed…perhaps I was thrown out of the story every time one of the actors starts to sing instead of keeping his character. How believable is the evil villain, mad professor or action hero who suddenly begins to dance and sing?

John Waters and Jed Dietz

Being a romantic musical I never would have volunteered to pick Love Songs [IMDB][MFF] if it hadn’t been the John Waters pick this year. The annual “John Waters Pick” has been one of our traditions since we started attending the film festival. His movie selections did never disappoint in the past few years. Most of his selections, including Story of Women, Dog Days or Head-On offered an extraordinarily realistic view on love, people and the complexity of their emotional, social, sexual, human interactions…reflecting what life is really like, challenging what most movies try to suggest as reality.

Love Songs was directed by Christophe Honoré and stars Chiara Mastroianni, Louis Garrel, Ludivine Sagnier and Clotilde Hesme. It’s a romantic musical, yes…but one I actually enjoyed very much! It felt very current and natural, the songs and music were beautiful and were very elegantly woven into the story. So fluent, it almost felt as if these moments could have happened in real life… although I have never seen someone walking down the street singing, have I?

Everybody looked great, very natural and likable, the story was beautiful, so was the atmosphere and mood. I still find myself surprised how much I enjoyed this movie. Another contemporary musical film I saw a while ago (Sweeney Todd) left me with the same impression I had of other musicals before, not so Love Songs. Perhaps it worked so well because it was in French and playing in Paris? I don’t know, but I really enjoyed its pace and rhythm. I think I might have to correct some of my views I used to have about musicals. Perhaps there is more out there I would enjoy if I gave it a try.

After Love Songs we had our first break of the day and we used the opportunity to celebrate our 5th filmfest membership anniversary with a pitcher of sangria. I should have eaten something first, because the wine quickly made me feel a little fuzzy-headed.

Of course this didn’t help when we entered our fifth and last screening of the day: Seventh Moon [IMDB][MFF] directed by Eduardo Sánchez, starring Amy Smart, Dennis Chan and Tim Chiou. The story takes place in China where Melissa and Yul enjoy their honeymoon. Their visit coincides with the sacred Seventh Moon festival, celebrating the full moon of the seventh lunar month, which, according to a Chinese myth, is a time when the dead are free to walk the earth. The couple, drunk after celebrating, start a late night cab-drive to Yul’s grandmother’s house in the countryside. This trip will of course end somewhere lost in the middle of nowhere where the horror is about to take place.

Directed by Eduardo Sánchez who with Daniel Myrick also wrote and directed the Blair Witch Project, Seventh Moon felt a lot like Blair Witch Project including its shaky camera work. Even without sangria I got motion sick when I watched the Blair Witch on the big screen. The same happened Friday night during the Seventh Moon. I survived about three quarter of the movie, but I had to close my eyes because I felt increasingly dizzy. A few minutes before the movie was over I had to leave the theater to breathe some fresh air and get stable ground under my feet which made me feel better. Unfortunately I missed the ending of the movie and the Q and A afterward, but my stomach wasn’t ready for it. Next time I should probably take some pills for motion sickness before I watch another shaky movie.

The following list is in order from my top pick down for Friday, May 8:

1. Modern Love is Automatic
2. Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
3. Invisible Girlfriend
4. Love Songs
5. Seventh Moon

PS: Sorry about the bad quality of these photos. My camera didn’t take the low-light too well. I hope I got all the names right. Please correct me if I made a mistake.