Friday, November 17, 2017

H2N Review: 195 LEWIS

"Though 195 springs from a very specific culture it isn’t exclusionary, it portrays just another spectrum in the prism of life. The realness- the palpable honesty- of the work makes you sink into your own skin a little bit deeper." - full review @Hammer to Nail






































Saturday, November 4, 2017

Ragtag Cinema: Homebrewed/Most Beautiful Island

One of my favorite films of the year opens this weekend: Most Beautiful Island. I programmed this film in June as part of the Homebrewed series at Ragtag Cinema, the series finale & an incredible directorial debut!

Part psychological horror, part social issue thriller, part clawing NY portraiture the film's narrative is hard to write about because there is a slow growing tension that builds throughout; each scene and detail is a deliberate, thoughtful step towards the climax. In short, Luciana is a recent immigrant to NY, taking on shady Craigslist gigs in order to scrape by. Her shrouded past is hinted at, guilt and shame seem to haunt her very being. Slowly moments of eerie-ness start to creep in blurring the lines of reality and supernatural in a way similar to (unfortunately) Polanski's film Repulsion (an influence confirmed by Director, Writer Star Ana Asensio during our post-film Skype Q&A). One fateful job sends Luciana into a dark Manhattan basement where a high stakes game of fear and fate leaves the audience on the edge of their seat.



The Q&A with Asensio following the screening was everything I ever wanted in a Q&A! Asensio arrived on screen late- thanks to a sick child- apologizing profusely but quickly able to pivot into film talk. One audience question was about the children in the film- babysitter one of the jobs taken on by Luciana and also one of the few professions often offered to undocumented workers. The audience member wanted to know how Asensio was able to get such a pure performance out of the kids, a question the Director seemed so excited to be asked knowing full well the difficulty that child actors can bring. She said she added an arm cast to one of the children, giving him a prop to diffuse the awkwardness of a film set: misdirection directing, so smart!


Being Asensio's directorial debut, one that she wrote and starred in as well, I asked a lot about her approach to filmmaking; how does one direct while in front of the camera? Coming from a career in stage acting, Asensio said she treated the experience much like a theater set, knowing her relation to the things and people around her while keeping in mind a general sense of the camera's frame. We also talked briefly about the film being shot on 16mm film, a ri$ky undertaking that gave the film a dreamy Cassavetes veneer and a feeling of an old New York, slightly displacing the film in time and aesthetically adding to the hazy unease. Asensio admitted that some reshoots were done digitally but processed to match the film stock, a smooth, imperceptible transition that made me wonder why more people don't try this hack? Or maybe they secretly are...?


At one point in Asensio's life she found herself between visas in New York City, a precarious position that caused her to have to live partly underground, job to job. One particular job sent her into a party at a house that just didn't feel right; she wanted to leave, she felt unsafe. This is the core of Most Beautiful Island, this feeling of being suffocated in the name of possibility. Embarking on a new life isn't just a haphazard choice it is a decision that quite often brings with it risk and fear: in some cases there isn't even a choice. Seeing this film and hearing the truth behind it makes it even more harrowing and vital. Most Beautiful Island isn't just a masterful horror film it is also a window into a human life behind a political issue whose rhetoric has moved so far beyond reality that one could say it is encroaching on real life acts of horror...

Thursday, November 2, 2017

Ragtag Cinema: Homebrewed/Princess Cyd

Back in June one Wednesday evening via Skype, Director Stephen Cone asserted that he isn't afraid of casting directors or professional actors, an obvious declaration when watching his work- especially his most recent character driven Princess Cyd. In his films, Cone's precise writing is made into flesh through a sublime collaboration with his actors to the point that sometimes one forgets the entire film is a fantasy and not just a dreamy drop into someone's reality.


The seed of the main character, Miranda, was the near 70 year old spiritual novelist Marilynne Robinson. Cone wondered about her, her sex life, her life in general and wondered what types of conflict would arise if she were forced to face her own opposite. In the film, this opposite takes the form of Miranda's sexually precocious niece, teenaged Cyd, left motherless after a tragic family incident. The story then flourishes outward from this conceit; a coming of age film- as a teen and also into middle age- exploring conflicts and holding space for possibility, understanding and love.

Cone's film explores, as one audience member put it, "the female psyche" as it deeply searches for self in the world one is forced to (or is it one chooses to?) navigate. Princess Cyd oddly reminded me of a Victorian novel as it used densely layered, pointed dialogue to unearth the origins of antiquated ideals, unravel societal/social expectations all while searching for a way towards a sense of self or towards "alternative" ways of being in the world, especially as women.


This classical feeling in the script translated visually too as slow motion, extremely measured zooms, gardens and silent zephyrs elevated the contemporary moments of life into near oil paintings of lush composition. Cyd's slow moving figure amongst roses as a harp whispered in the background allowed for the scene to become isolated in time, giving a pause that beckons calm contemplation but also to somehow show that these moments are found in everyday life if we choose. The world is chaotic but these scenes of pure beauty, breathe and contentment- almost transcendence- do exist if we let them.


At its heart, Princess Cyd is another film in Cone's career that extends the drama of character driven theater to the screen, but this time making a giant leap into a signature lexicon that explores the limits & possibilities of film anew. Cone uses the medium in all of its aspects- music, time, writing, acting etc.- to slow down life, to look deeply into the fleeting moments, relationships and decisions that occur throughout using film to crafts sentences- or even words- in the biography of his characters. One begins to wonder whether larger forces are at play in the universe or if each movement is a calculated choice; the film isn't a narrative, it is an unfolding of humanity.

Princess Cyd opens in NYC on November 3rd and in LA on December 1st, with more cities TBA. The Museum of the Moving Image will be hosting mid-career retrospective of Cone's films November 3-12th, more info can be found here!