SI PUO FARE (WE CAN DO IT/IT CAN BE DONE)

(Italy, 2008, d. Giulio Manfredonia)

Here is a comedy on risky, very risky, ground. The central characters are a group of mentally ill men and women who are part of a program, a co-operative, which tries to manage the lives of people who have been released from an institution but are still considered unable to live a 'normal' life. They are a strange bunch, as might be anticipated, and they provide a number of laughs. Which can raise alarm bells. Will we be asked to laugh with them or at them? Whatever the initial temptation to laugh at them, it is very soon superseded by our laughing with them.

While the setting is Milan, 1983-1985, the screenplay is based on a number of stories from this period and the 1990s. In fact, it is quite surprising to find at the end that there are many of these 'co-operatives' in operation in Italy today, offering opportunities for work and more personalised living (with a decrease in prescribing tranquilising medication).

We are introduced to Nello, a Leftist with a girlfriend, Sara, who works in the design and fashion business. He is got rid of from the Union and asked to go to one of the mentally handicapped organisations and manage their life and work (mainly stuffing envelopes and putting stamps on them). He applies union techniques, rules and egalitarian philosophy as well as making the members the partners in work. The supervising doctor is not impressed. His assistant is.

Nello is an idealist and, to the frequent chagrin of Sara, is obsessed with saving the world and his co-op members and forgetting her and ordinary people. However, the result of the meetings and discussions where every idea (or not having any idea) is welcomed, is that the group has a flair for laying parquetry.

The actors performing as the mentally impaired do a very convincing job, remaining steadfastly in character, through their limitations, their collaboration and work, their idiosyncracies. While there are a number of problems – some of which become serious towards the end – and the audience may feel that erring on the side of caution in having these men and women out in the workplace is better, the principle of affirmation, less reliance on drugs and more on enabling them to grow in being their better selves, in going with the manias as far as possible while finding humane ways of supervising and controlling, is the best and most effective policy.

Sad, often very funny, this is a very humane film, always challenging the audience to ask themselves how they would act and make decisions concerning these men and women, their self-image, their illnesses, their being forced to the margins, their relationships, sexuality, and management of their salaries and lives. Above all, the film suggests hope and encouragement rather than marginalisation and despair.

SNIJEG (SNOW)

(Bosnia Herzogovina, 2008, d. Aida Begic.)

Snijeg is a moving film about the aftermath of the Balkan wars. The setting is Bosnia Herzogovina in 1997-98.

The film is set in autumn-winter, a small village inhabited by refugees from other towns, all women except for the imam and a little boy who is mute because of the traumas of war. The group in the village try to earn a living by growing fruit, harvesting it and making preserves and jams which they sell by the roadside. The film is interesting in its presentation of this group of women, many of them very earthy. However, the central character, Alma, stands out. She is a devout Muslim, a widow who lives with her rather haughty mother-in-law who is the chief member of the village.

Possibilities open up: a group of entrepreneurs arrive from the city interested in buying up the land for development; on the other hand, after an accident on the highway where a truck crashes into the jam stall, the driver offers to transport all the jams and preserves and so develop a business. The postscript to the film indicates that the inhabitants did not sell their village but rather employed the young man and have built up a trade.

Throughout the film there is great regret at the death of the men, fathers and husbands, sons. One of the entrepreneurs is a Serb who comes, wanting to make some kind of recompense for the war, having saved one of the inhabitants of the village but unable to save another.

The film is very sad in showing the futility and ugliness and brutality of the clash between Serbs and Bosnians. The director is a young Bosnian woman, a writer-director

THE NECESSITIES OF LIFE (CE QU'IL FAUT POUR VIVRE)

(Canada, 2008, d. Benoit Pilon)

A serious, worthy and impressive film.

Set in the early 1950s, it takes us into Inuit territory on Baffin Island, the world of snow, ice and hunting. However, TB has become rampant and the warrior, Tivii (a moving and natural performance from actor/sculptor, Natar Ungulaaq, who played the hero of Atarnajuat: The Fast Runner, 2001) has to travel to hospital in Quebec, leaving wife and daughters. He is overwhelmed by the city, buildings, even so many trees that he is not used to on the vast ice plains. He does not speak French. He is not accustomed to the food, the manners, the attitudes of the whites. While he does settle after trying to run away, his healing takes a long time.

The hospital is a Catholic hospital managed by sisters who are both stern and kindly. The doctor is harrassed with so many patients. However, Carole, a sympathetic nurse befriends him and transfers a young Inuit boy to his ward. At last he can communicate with words.

The film has something of a serious, documentary tone, indicating the background of the director. We are immersed in the hospital along with Tivii and empathise with his experiences and the strangeness of what he finds – which raises all kinds of questions of inculturation and respect for different races and cultures.

Tivii wants to adopt the boy when he goes home and is helped by a sympathetic priest with questions from the rather formal bishop. This more even-handed presentation of the Church of the period is something of a relief after the (necessary) stories of abuse and mistreatment by church officials.

This theme is reminiscent of La Neuvaine (The Novena, 2005) where its agnostic director wanted to indicate that French Canada too quickly let go of its long French Catholic beliefs and traditions and is the poorer, culturally, for that. In fact, The Necessities of Life as written by Bernard Emond, the writer-director of La Neuvaine.

The Necessities of Life was Canada's official Oscar entry for 2008 and was listed amongst the final ten. SIGNIS Commendation, Washington DC, 2009.

HASSAN AND MORCOS

(Egypt, 2008, d. Rami Imam)

A film of great, good intentions. However, it relies on very broad characterisations, more than a touch of the stereotype, dashes of slapstick and performances which range from the hammy (the son) to the dignified (Omar Sharif and Adel Imam as the Muslim and the Coptic priest respectively).

There are plenty of films with mixed up identities and misunderstandings. And, in religious situations, we have had Sister Act and the Iranian, The Lizard, where a criminal is mistaken for a. Hassan and Marcos is a comic tale of two religious families caught up in hatred and intolerance who go into a kind of witness protection program – but each is disguised as the opposite religion, the Copts as Muslims and the Muslims as Christians.

Since the early part of the film shows groups who campaign for religious tolerance and fostert live and let live (despite grumblings by each side that the other has more privileges), the sight of the Coptic priest mistaken for an Imam and having to interpret the law and the Muslim bewildered by Christian rituals make for interfaith humour.

And, if you were concocting a popular entertainment to promote understanding and tolerance, what better and easier to do than add a Romeo and Juliet situation? Christian son in love with Muslim daughter each thinking secretly that the other is of their faith.

The Egyptian settings are quite colourful. The atmosphere of Christian and Muslim worship and tradition is maintained. And there is a symbolic ending as viciously hostile crowds indulge in religious hate violence and the now harmonious families walk arm in arm through the mayhem.

Interesting that Egypt should make the effort to produce a film on interfaith understanding and that Omar Sharif should return home to be in it.

DEPARTURES (OKURIBITO)

(Japan, 2008, d. Yojiro Takita)

A fine, often beautiful, film that can be recommended. It won the 2008 Best Foreign Film Oscar over Waltz with Bashir and The Class, strong competition.

However, you might be wondering during the first ten minutes. It begins slowly and solemnly with ceremonial and ritual for the dead. The, without warning, it becomes quite farcical and you wonder where you are. This is pre-credits. And immediately after the credits there is an orchestra playing Beethoven's Ode to Joy with a full choir. What is this film? What are the departures?

Actually, the central character of the film, the young Daigo, a cello player whose orchestra is shut down, wonders about this same question when he applies for a job on returning to his home town. He thinks he will work for a travel agent or be a tour guide. The Japanese title of the film is said to mean, 'the one who sees persons off...'. But, he is to be a 'coffinator', an embalmer of the dead who performs his duties with religious atmosphere, reverent ceremonial and a decorum that enables the grieving family and mourners to pay their respects to the dead and experience the solemnity of the final rite of passage. Death is seen, in Buddhist and eastern religion terms, not as the end but as the gateway to the next stage of existence.

We are fascinated with the repetition of this ceremony, the ritual meticulously the same, but the response of the mourners so different – and we realise that the manager and Daigo are contributing to a sense of human dignity and an acknowledgement of the life of the dead person as well as the survivors.

That all sounds very, very serious, and so it is. However, the film is interspersed with a great deal of humour, especially in Daigo's personal journey from being very sick at his first case to a final ritual which brings the whole drama, the embalming, his marriage, his family and the absence of his father, to a very satisfying conclusion.

Masahiro Matoko gives a finely nuanced performance, just the right seriousness and comedy, an acute sense of timing and facial expressions indicating the depths of the character. Tustomu Yamizaki brings a blend of the offhand and the dedicated to his role as the manager.

Beautiful to look at (which is sometimes rather challenging through our tears), it is a wonderful combination of the realistically mundane, the sadness of life and its uncertainties, yet the funny side of human foibles, the emotion of music and an opportunity (without being preached at) for the audience to really respond emotionally to and intellectually think about the deeper aspects of life and death.

SIGNIS award winner, Washington DC, 2009.

THE DRUMMER

(China, 2007, d. Kenneth Bi)

With visual suggestions of symbols, mystic movement and dance, as well as drumbeats, The Drummer suggests a film exercise in Zen meditation. Then, it suddenly shifts to dance in a night club, flirting and drinking, sex and a world of gangsters and revenge familiar from so many Hong Kong films. Just when we were wondering what happened to the symbolism and whether we were just in for betrayals and shootings, the core meaning and drama of the film reveal themselves. The symbols and the drums return.

The son of a gang chief (Jaycee Chan), who enjoys playing drums in the club, has to take refuge in the mountains because a rival chief whom he has caused to lose face wants to cut off his hands. But, he hears drumbeats, a great variety of rhythms and beats and goes exploring. It is a troupe of drummers (who are also skilled acrobats) rehearsing before a world tour. This is a conversion experience and he dedicates himself to becoming a Zen drummer.

There are more complications with gangsters, double-crosses and the young man having to ask himself where the true course of his life is taking him.

The drumming is quite mesmerising as are the performances (one of which is a fantasy where the young man duets with his father). Whether the two genres combine well is still a matter of conjecture and taste. But, the ideas are very interesting and the drumming absorbing.

THE EMPTY NEST

(Argentina, 2008, d. Daniel Burman)

The best advice a reviewer can offer about this film is to urge those going to see it to pay careful attention to what is happening. Even then, there is every possibility that the ending will come as quite a surprise and the audience will appreciate the clues as they mull over what they have seen and realise that the questions that may have come to mind have indicated what is really happening.

The screenplay is ingenious as well as witty and often humorous.

Daniel Burman has made a number of entertaining Argentinian films with a Jewish background. It is the same here. However, he has had young protagonists up till now. This time he has an older famous writer. We are introduced to him during a meal at a restaurant, the camera moving fluidly from one dinner guest to another as they chat and gossip. He lives in Buenos Aires with his wife and two children.

What follows is what happens to him and his family over the years: his career, difficulties in relationship with his wife, his daughter's marriage to a novelist and going to live in Israel, advice from a psychiatrist... All very interesting and entertaining. But, as has been said, we still need to pay attention to the development of the plot and its details.

DANSEN (DANCERS)

Denmark, 2008, 90minutes, Colour.
Trine Dyrholm, Anders W. Birthelsen.
Directed by Pernille Fischer Christensen.

Set in a dance school (with an opening of a variety of dances and students and closing with their end of year show), this is a small but very effective drama about the manager of the school. She works with her mother and lives at home. When a reticent electrician comes to fix the faulty wiring system, she is attracted to him only to discover that he is just out of prison and has served a sentence for rape.

The film, sensitively written and directed by a woman, shows the dilemma facing the teacher: her attraction to the man (and even the exciting danger in a relationship with him) and the repulsion at his crime. He is an enigmatic figure, gradually revealing what happened and the effect on him. He is attracted to the teacher but has to find ways of telling the truth to her. She tries to probe what happened, visiting the victim.

The audience appreciates the falling in love but also understands the behaviour (firing the electrician) and sound advice of the mother even when she speaks harshly and her daughter responds badly.

While the film focuses principally on the woman's point of view, the question arises concerning a man serving his sentence and asking what becomes of him then. With empathy for the victim, one asks whether he can be forgiven or, if not forgiven, redeemed.

1.A slice of life? Ordinary people? Difficult situations? Moral choices?

2.The Scandinavian background, the dance school, apartments, the woods? Realism?

3.The musical score, the range of songs, the dances, the choreography?

4.The framing: the lessons at the beginning, the finale of the show? The range of students, the range of dancing, the moods, the teachers, Annika and her mother, Lasse and his own dancing?

5.Annika’s story: her age, background, seeing her at work, likeable, positive, her response to the students? Her past, relationships? The school, her grandfather, her mother running the school, her being a partner? The issue of the electricity, Lasse coming to fix it, the attraction, giving him the extra job in her apartment, offering to pay, the beer? His leaving? The phone contact, Lasse and the jobs, the awkwardness between them? Saying he was in prison, fraud? To go to the movies, the confession about the rape? Annika’s reaction? Her stopping the relationship, resuming contact, wanting to start over again, their discussions, her believing him, defending him to her mother? The walks in the woods? Going to the carnival and the dodgem cars? The sexual encounters? His saying he had a black hole in his memory? Her asking questions, his police record? Andreas and the phone calls, saying she should be ashamed? The visit to the house, meeting Andreas, meeting Nina, hearing her story, confronting Lasse, hitting him, drawing the knife? Her mother and the warnings, firing Lasse? Her upset with her mother, telling her to shut up, her decision to go to find Lasse, seeing him in the street, the happy ending, the dance performance, her future? Her moral choice to continue the relationship, knowing who he was? Her own desire to break out, the daring and danger of the relationship with him?

6.The mother, Annika living with her, running the school, her mother’s expectations? Sharing, her mother’s warnings, firing Lasse? The risks in the relationship, the mother being correct in her advice, the final clash?

7.Lasse, arriving, working, reticent, the job in the apartment, the beer, no pay, offering to go to the movies, telling her he was in prison, the bond between them? Tentative, the apartment, the dance lesson, the vigorous dancing? The sex, rough? The effect on her? The truth about the situation, his police record, the rape, the assault, breaking Nina’s fingers? The phone calls? The on and off relationship and its effect on him, saying he had a black hole in his memory, lying to Annika? Finally telling the truth or not? A psychologically wounded man? Deserving of forgiveness, love? Hope and the end?

8.The issue of men, aggression, sex and rape, victims, further crimes or not, forgiveness and redemption?

9.Nina, her story, the relationship with Lasse, the party, drinking, the drive home, the house, the attack, her going to hospital? With Andreas and the boy?

10.The range of students, their performance, Annika being severe on them, their complaints to their parents?

11.An effective drama, small scale, love, ethical issues?

MUTANT CHRONICLES

US, 2008, 111 minutes, Colour.
Thomas Jane, Ron Perlman, Devon Aoki, Sean Pertwee, Benno Furmann, John Malkovich, Anna Walton.
Directed by Simon Hunter.

Something of a glum experience. We are back in the future and a grim future it is. The map of the world shows, not countries, but divisions based on corporate organisations. They are at war with each other – and the film uses the model of trench warfare in World War I for fifteen minutes to show the horrors and the bloodshed. But, an explosion opens up a hole in the earth's crust letting out a race of mutants whose be-all and end-all seems to be to capture as many humans as possible and take them down into the interior of the earth to a machine that will transform them all into mutants. A dismal prospect for the human race so many are escaping to Mars.

A monastic order (with plenty of vocations it seems) holds the secret book and stone which can lead to the destruction of the mutant-making machine, so Brother Samuel (Ron Perlman) sees himself as the leader of the mission to fulfil the prophecy of a coming saviour. He enlists the help of several soldiers led by Hunter (a less than charismatic Thomas Jane). Down they go into the earth just like the board game that the film is based on, down and down with many levels at each of which as many mutants must be graphically disposed of as possible. The team must use all kinds of ingenuity and force of arms to proceed to the next level.

So far, what you might expect and a story not all that interestingly told.

The set design for the caverns and tunnels is impressive it its way. However, the film-makers have opted for a colour design that is basically grey-green which means that the proceedings look particularly drab. There are splashes of bright red for blood which do punctuate the monotony.

Not a futuristic adventure with great appeal.

1.The appeal of this kind of futuristic film? Science fiction? Retro presentation of World War One-style battles? Future technology? Religious dimension?

2.The origins of the story in a board game? The goal of the game, the fights, the different levels? Reproduced in the film?

3.The colour design, the grey-green, the splashes of red and scarlet for blood? The grim dark look of the film? The heavy score?

4.The title, information about the future, the humans and the world collapsing, the migrations to Mars, the battles between the four corporations, seeing the corporations covering the map of the world?

5.The war sequences, the trenches, the images of World War One? Nathan Rooker, his command, Mitch Hunter and their friendship? The war and its imagery? The shell opening the hole? The mutants arising? Dragging the humans to transform them in the machine?

6.The monastery, the large community, the silent woman, Samuel, his role as leader, the rituals, the talk of faith and prayer, prophecy and Samuel seeing himself as the fulfilment as the saviour? The book, the machine, destroying the machine and (**? in?) the mission?

7.Assembling the group, Hunter and his type, his collecting the tags of the dead? His past friendship with Rooker? Encountering him in the depths, trying to save him, discussions about saving his children, his merciful shooting him? Hunter as tough, not having any faith, capacities for leadership? His achievement, almost becoming a mutant? Fulfilling the prophecy? The final battle with Samuel?

8.The group, Steiner and his Germanic stances? The black Englishman? The Asian? The white members of the group? Valerie Duval and her agility? Severian and her silence? Her finally speaking? The bonds with the group, their working together?

9.The journey, going through the Earth, the different levels, the shafts, ledges, falling, the ropes, bridges, fire?

10.The visualising of the mutants, their attacks, dragging Rooker away, the attack on Mitchell? The shooting of the mutants? The fights, Samuel transformed?

11.The remnant, getting to the machine, Hunter and his escape, going across the bridge?

12.The women, their heroics, participating in the rescue? Steiner and his giving himself for the others in death?

13.Samuel, his return as a mutant, the fight, Hunter destroying the machine, issues of faith or not? Hunter’s final attitude? Samuel and his final words – achievement?

14.The picture of the humans, the leader, Constantine, his decisions, the plans to take people to Mars? The humans being saved?

15.The usual themes of this kind of futuristic film – how well and interestingly presented?

MIRRORS

US, 2008, 110 minutes, Colour.
Kiefer Sutherland, Paula Patten, Cameron Boyce, Amy Smart, Mary Beth Peil, John Shrapnel, Jason Flemyng, Julian Glover.
Directed by Alexandre Aja.

Mirrors, for most audiences, will prove to be a genuinely scary movie. This is quite an accomplished film, more a terror film rather than just what we think of as horror even though there is some explanation given that involves ghosts and some demonic powers. It is based on an effective Korean ghost film, Into the Mirror, which worked well because of Asian beliefs in spirits. Mirrors takes the basic themes but relocates them to New York, this time the hulk of a fashionable department store that was burnt out (the original used a store that was operating) but was built on the site of an closed down psychiatric hospital.

While there is a death before the credits, Mirrors generally keeps the terror with atmosphere, especially with the huge mirrors in the darkened store, though there are a couple of scenes and a climax that are blood-drenched.

Keifer Sutherland plays a New York detective who has shot someone in the line of duty and is on suspension but has drinking and nerve problems which have a destructive effect on his wife and children. He becomes the night guard of the store and begins to experience weird sounds and sights. Is it his mind or is it happening in reality?

The film works on the premiss that our mirror images can confront us and can wreak violence - and this extends to several characters in the film.

The production is good to look at, the tone set during reverse images of the New York skyline during the credits, with the facade and the interiors of the store. The plot eventually takes the detective to Pennsylvania, an abbey and a nun who has the power to stop the evil.

French director Alexandre Aja made the effective remake of Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes. Here he has made a thriller that is more wider audience friendly - if that is how you can describe an cinema terror experience.

1.A terror film? Scares? Touches of horror? Beyond the natural?

2.The adaptation of a Korean story to the United States? The French sensibilities of the writer and the director?

3.The title, mirrors and reflections, the other self in the mirror, psychology and the double persona, mirrors containing images, imprisoning images, those behind the mirrors trying to get out? How well did the film use all these themes?

4.The visuals, the credits and the double image of New York? The range of mirrors throughout the film, the reflections? The subway death and the mirror? The Mayflower and its walls? The ordinary house, table surfaces, water surfaces? Deadly mirrors? The cracking of the mirrors and their mending? Danger, Ben covering the mirrors, painting them? Michael scraping them? The end and Ben trapped behind the mirror looking at reflections?

5.The prologue, the atmosphere of fear, the chase, the security man trapped, the mirrors, his other self, slashing his throat? The body in the morgue?

6.Ben and his background, his experience as a detective, Amy and his children, his visits, the maid and her fears, his job after being suspended as a detective, his having shot someone? The Mayflower tour, the daytime security man? The information? His predecessor and his death – and Ben later receiving the parcel of newspaper cuttings? At work, the noises, seeing the body, the hallucinations? The break and the healing? His cutting his hand? His own reflections? His search of the building? Discovering St Matthew’s Hospital?

7.Ben and his short temper, easily upset, his drinking, anger, erratic behaviour, his wife and children trying to comprehend, his wife and her forensic work, at the morgue? His return to the house, removing and painting the mirrors?

8.The information about the Mayflower, the files? The number of people under experimentation, their deaths, the certificates? Behind the mirrors?

9.The doctor with his information about the deaths, Anna and the documents, the inconsistencies, Ben driving to Pennsylvania, meeting the family, the mysterious name on the mirror? Anna’s brother, his telling the truth?

10.Ben going to the convent, the reception by the nuns, Anna talking with him, considering his proposal, his giving her the photo of wife and children, going to her room, her decision to go to New York? Her motivation?

11.Ben and Angela, her help, his staying with her, her job, going to the bath, her mirror image, the grotesqueness of her death? Ben’s grief and anger?

12.Larry, on the police force, the investigation, his helping Ben with the information? The meeting in the taxi? The files?

13.Ben, the final mirrors, his fears?

14.Michael, in the mirror, his mother’s concern, Daisy, their father’s absence, Amy’s image? Michael remaining behind the mirror? The water images, Amy saving him from drowning?

15.The exorcising of the spirits, Anna going to St Matthew’s (*?Hospital?) in the chair, blindfold, her surrender for the sake of others? The explosions, her death, the attack on Ben?

16.Amy and the children saved?

17.Ben surviving, the seeming happy ending, the reflections, the truth that he was trapped behind the mirror?

18.The different ways for creating mood, suggestions, audiences identifying with the characters, scares and fears?