10 Auteurs Fêtiches

If I had to list my favourite filmmakers every month the list would be different every month, but I love this crop of ten filmmakers from all around the globe more than most. I love them so much I’ve spent the evening making mosaics of pretty images from their films for you to enjoy. Back in film school the course I hated the most (and which consequently stayed with me and affected me more deeply than the ones that I enjoyed) was film theory. I remember making a presentation on an essay by Roland Barthes in which he posited that stills from films are actually more cinematic than moving images. I should really dig it up and reread it, but off the top of my head his premise still stinks of bullshit to me. Anyway, the cinematic quality of the stills I’ve collected here is certainly undeniable.

1. TERRENCE MALICK (USA)

2. ANDREI TARKOVSKY (Russia)

3. FEDERICO FELLINI (Italy)

4. HAYAO MIYAZAKI (Japan)

5. ALFONSO CUARON (Mexico)

6. PETER WEIR (Australia)

7. AGNÈS VARDA (France)

8. NURI BILGE CEYLAN (Turkey)

9. APICHATPONG WEERASETHAKUL (Thailand)

10. INGMAR BERGMAN (Sweden)

VIFF 2010

The Vancouver International Film Festival will be a largely subtitled affair for me this year: only two of my eleven picks are in english. VIFF has a strong reputation as a showcase for rare Asian cinema, so I’ve decided to focus on that, selecting six titles from the Dragons and Tigers program. The highlight going in is the ample buffet of films by Thai filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul.

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Thailand, UK, Germany, France, Spain, 2010, 113 mins, 35mm)

The VIFF guide calls Boonmee “doubtless the most unexpected and rapturously received Cannes Palme d’Or winner ever,” a statement that I at least partially dispute, having predicted his imminent victory the day the Cannes lineup was announced earlier this year. Though largely unknown to a mass audience, Weerasethakul didn’t exactly emerge out of nowhere with Boonmee.  His celebrated auteur standing has been ascendant for the past decade, starting with Blissfully Yours taking the Un Certain Regard prize at Cannes in 2002, followed by a Jury Prize from Quentin Tarantino’s jury at the 2004 festival for Tropical Malady. My personal favourite, Syndromes and Century, placed 11th in IndieWire’s best of the decade poll. So “Joe” was well positioned (and even a favourite groomed by the festival itself) to take the top prize. It certainly wasn’t surprising that Tim Burton’s jury favoured the only “fantastical” film in the lineup. I love the disarming, gentle charm that balances out the aesthetic rigour of Joe’s work. In his hands cinema feels like a new language. Uncle Boonmee will be released by Strand Releasing in 2011.

Apichatpong and Hirabayashi (Dragons and Tigers short film package)

This cluster of six shorts features three of Joe’s shorts. Included is A Letter to Uncle Boonmee, which you can also stream online for $1 at MUBI, but I’ll wait to catch it on the big screen. I’m not familiar with the other two filmmakers in this program (Hirabayashi Isamu and Kang Sangwoo) but I look forward to discovering them.

Incendies (Dir. Denis Villeneuve. Canada, 2010, 130 mins, 35mm)

This Québécois title was picked up by Sony Pictures Classics after acclaimed screenings at TIFF and Venice. It’s based on a play, but apparently Villeneuve has given the material an extremely cinematic adaptation. UPDATE: Incendies won best Canadian Feature at TIFF today. Count me doubly excited to see this now!

Les Amours Imaginaires (Heartbeats) (Dir. Xavier Dolan. France, Canada, 2010, 97 mins)

Yes, the only Canadian films on my list this year are both from Québec. That’s where all heat and inspiration seems to be concentrated these days. A quasi-rivalry between Villeneuve and Dolan was instigated by the Genies this past year, when Polytéchnique swept up while J’ai tué ma mère was all but shut out. I haven’t caught up with either of those titles yet, so I’m bringing myself up to speed with their latest offerings. Sight unseen, these guys both inspire me already.

The Illusionist (Dir. Sylvain Chomet. France, 2010, 80 mins, 35mm)

This one is among the hottest tickets at VIFF this year. They’re even charging three dollars extra for seats! As a huge fan of Triplets of Belleville, I’ve been salivating to see this since it bowed at the Berlinale in February.

13 Assassins (Dir. Takashi Miike. Japan, 2010, 125 mins, DCP)

Word is mixed on this title, but the director is one of my blind spots, and it should provide a welcome change of pace in the midst of VIFF’s typically genre-averse lineup.

Certified Copy (Dir. Abbas Kiarostami. France, Italy, Belgium, 2010, 106 mins, 35mm)

Count me on the fence about Kiarostami. I love Taste of Cherry, but a retrospective of his video installations at MOMA in 2007 left me cold… and bored. La Binoche is the deal maker for me on this one. (More evidence that Cannes grooms it favourites: Binoche was featured on their poster this year AND won best actress, much to Gérard Depardieu’s apparent chagrin.)

Himalaya, A Path to the Sky (Dir. Marianne Chaud. (France, 2010, 65 mins, DigiBeta)

Don’t know anything about this title, but I’m on a big Himalaya research kick for a screenplay I’m writing, so this one appeals to my imagination.

The Fourth Portrait (Dir. Chung Mong-Hong. Taiwan, 2010, 103 mins, 35mm)

A total shot in the dark. What’s a film festival without random adventures?

Poetry (Dir. Lee Changdong. South Korea, 2010, 139 mins, 35mm)

Another Cannes favourite. A friend of mine saw this at TIFF and recommended it. The production still is so elegant, and the actress elicits instant interest. Who is she?  I just have to find out.

L.A. Zombie (Dir. Bruce LaBruce. Germany, U.S.A., 2010, 63 mins, HDCAM)

Oh Bruce, you’re so trashy. Transgression and provocation are also crucial ingredients for a well-rounded festival experience. Three cheers for zombie porn.

All told, I’m excited about this spread of films, though still nursing disappointment that I’ll have to wait for the theatrical rollouts of many hot US titles on the festival circuit this year: Meek’s Cutoff, The Way Back, Tabloid, and Black Swan to name a few. There will be time. 2010 looks to be redeeming itself as a good year for movies after all.

Tarkovsky: Mystic Polaroids

Andrei Tarkovsky made seven astonishing feature films including my all-time fave, Stalker (1979). The son of a celebrated Russian poet, Tarkovsky became known as a poet of the cinema for his mystic mise-en-scene, which he developed into both a technique and eventually a posthumous book on film and art theory called Sculpting in Time.

He rejected Eisenstein, his predecessor in the Soviet tradition of theorist-filmmakers; rather than constructing meaning through montage, he located the unique quality of film as a medium in the rhythm of time flowing through each shot. He manipulated this “time pressure” in long (sometimes long, long) takes that produced some of the most hallucinatory, dreamlike sequence shots ever created. Few filmmakers are credited with creating a new film language, a feat which Tarkovksy certainly accomplished. Twenty-five years after his death that language echoes in the work of many of the greatest living auteurs: Alfonso Cuaron, Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Carlos Reygadas to name a few.

A selection of polaroids from his private collection has been published and digitized. While these slivers of time cannot express his central preoccupation with temporal fluidity, they nevertheless bear his unmistakable fingerprints. That unique touch is evident in the composition, choice of subject matter, and most of all in the lighting.

Through Tarkovsky’s lens the world is bathed in an eternal mist. The light hangs in the air, always palpable, a physical manifestation of the spiritual foundation of his perception. Indeed, looking through the collection of polaroids, one might picture Tarkovsky as a man surrounded by ethereal vapour wherever he went. Or maybe he deliberately filmed in the early morning to create the intended effect.  Or maybe Russia is simply always shrouded in fog, just as Tarkovsky would have us believe that its architecture is perpetually crumbling and overgrown, always haunted by the echo of water dripping into a bucket.

“For me the most interesting characters are outwardly static, but inwardly charged by an overriding passion.” - Sculpting in Time

“Never try to convey your idea to the audience – it is a thankless and senseless task. Show them life, and they’ll find within themselves the means to assess and appreciate it.” – Sculpting in Time

You can check out more of the polaroids here.