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This
week's featured review & film archive
Sarah Jaffe reviews independent and foreign
films,
in addition to reporting the latest buzz behind
Colorado's film festivals.
Sarah
reviews three movies this week -
so she gives us the scoop on how they place
WIN
- dirty pretty things
--2002, Stephen
Frears
Audrey Tautou of Amelie fame doesn't speak much
English, so she had to learn most of her lines
for this movie phonetically. That doesn't stop
her from turning in a heartbreaking performance
as Senay, a Turkish woman seeking asylum in London.
This movie, about the struggles of two immigrants
trying to gain legal status, is a drama/thriller
that is all the more scary for its gritty realism.
Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Okwe, a Nigerian doctor
forced to drive a cab and work the front desk
at a hotel. He discovers something shocking in
the toilet of one of the hotel's rooms, but is
unable to call the police because of his illegal
status. He sleeps on Senay's couch during his
few hours off, but puts her status in jeopardy
when he is discovered there. Both of them have
to make difficult choices in order to keep from
being deported (watching the virgin Senay being
taken advantage of by several different men is
only the least of the nasty situations), while
sorting out complicated feelings for one another.
To say any more will give away far too much of
this excellent movie. It twists and turns, introducing
several characters from the seedy underbelly of
London, but making all of them believable and
human (though at times you don't want to believe
them). Stephen Frears gets wonderful performances
out of his actors, and never romanticizes their
situation. Go see this movie.
-Sarah Jaffe, August 21,
2003
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PLACE
- camp
--2003, Todd Graff
Camp is light, funny, and at times touches
a chord within. I was a theater kid when I was
younger, so I can definitely relate to the group
of outsiders who have a place to call home at
Camp Ovation, a summer theater camp.
Michael (Robin de Jesus) is a teenage drag queen
who gets beaten up for going to his prom in a
dress. Ellen (Joanna Chilcoat) has wanted to act
for as long as she can remember, and spends all
her time palling around with the gay boys. And
Vlad (Daniel Letterle) is the lone straight boy
over a certain age at Camp Ovation, who is the
object of Michael, Ellen, and, well, most of the
camp's affections. There's a stereotypical cute-boy-falls-for-not-so-cute-girl
story in here, as well as the more complicated
(and compelling) interaction between Michael and
Vlad, and the story of Bert Hanley (Don Dixon),
a washed-up alcoholic songwriter who ends up working
at the camp, much to his distaste.
There was a bit too much emphasis on everyone's
obsession with the cute straight boy for my taste,
and a few issues are simply glossed over at the
end, but there are genuine laughs in here, and
some genuine humanity, mostly coming from Michael.
If you've ever known or been a theater kid, you
should watch this movie. You'll recognize these
kids, and you can't help but like them.
-Sarah Jaffe, August 21, 2003
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SHOW-
le divorce
--2003, Merchant/Ivory
Everyone knows about Ismael Merchant and James
Ivory, but almost no one knows that Ruth Prawer
Jhabvala does almost all of their screenwriting.
Her name may be left off the signature by choice,
but it seems significant to me that it is not
there, especially when you look at this film.
I am sick and tired of watching women pine over
men on film and hearing it called drama. It's
not drama. It's an unfortunate fact that many
women spend far too much time chasing after older
creeps, or trying to win back the husband who's
cheated on them. And this film's tagline, "Everything
sounds sexier in French," just reminds me
of a comment I read in a women's magazine that
shall remain nameless, that since only part of
this film is subtitled, you can feel like you're
watching a sophisticated French film without all
the effort. In short, just because it's in French
doesn't make it smarter.
Kate Hudson and Naomi Watts both deserve better
than this. They try hard to bring life to these
characters, but what the film boils down to is,
"This is what Americans do, this is what
the French do." Isabel (Kate Hudson), very
obviously named after Henry James's Isabel Archer,
goes to France to visit her pregnant sister Roxy
(Naomi Watts), whose husband has just left her,
and gets involved with a much-older senator. There
is a subplot involving a painting that belongs
to Roxy that her husband's family would love to
get their hands on, that is very hard to care
about, and an even more preposterous subplot involving
the husband of the woman Roxy's husband cheats
on her with.
Most of the movie is trivial fluff, then it attempts
to get serious, which makes it worse. Fluff I
can handle, but not fluff that wants you to think
it's something deeper. I'd rather go see Angelina
Jolie or Michelle Rodriguez kick some butt in
a Hollywood movie that knows exactly what it is,
and doesn't try to be more serious.
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