My newest discovery - Finland's Aki Kaurismäki

My newest discovery in the world of film is Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki. Now I’m hooked, having spent the weekend watching six of his films. Thanks again to the Criterion Channel for bringing this fabulous director to my attention. Kaurismäki, 64, has been making films since 1983. And he’s won plenty of awards including being nominated for best foreign film (The Man Without a Past) for the 2002 Oscars. Perhaps he’s best known for 1989’s Leningrad Cowboys Go America. Over the weekend I watched films from two of his famous trilogies and a later film. First, Kaurismäki’s films are characterized by basic plots, minimal sets, and dialogue. Often the same group of actors appear in each film. One might think this too humdrum, but the lack of dialogue and monotone character expressions draw us deeper into the characters' thinking and motives. The first film, from Kaurismäki’s Finland Trilogy, was Drifting Clouds (1996). Here, we’re introduced to what was once a fine dining restaurant in Helsinki losing its aged patrons and facing a money squeeze, resulting in closure. This displaces the staff and in particular our heroine Illona, the head waitress, played by Kati Outinen (photo), an outstanding actress and something of a Finnish cinema icon. Down and out, she applies for other jobs but can’t find one. She finally gets a job in a dive owned by a criminal, which is forced to close due to tax violations. Her apartment’s furniture is repossessed. Will things ever look up for our Illona? The next film was the aforementioned The Man Without a Past, which won the Cannes Grand Prix in 2002 but which I found the least interesting of the films. This time our hero is “M” (Markku Peltola) and Irma (the remarkable Kati Outinen again). M has been beaten up and can’t remember his past. Irma is a Salvation Army worker. But even her life is of empty purpose. Will the two be happy?  In the next film, Shadows in Paradise (1986), part of Kaurismäki’s Proletariat Trilogy, a much younger Outinen plays a grocery clerk, Illona, who also loses her job, the third time that year “through no fault of my own.” She falls in love with a garbageman, Neander (Matti Pellonpää). How often are garbagemen celebrated in movies? The next film in the trilogy is Ariel (1988). Again, we have working class people who, through no faults of their own, lose jobs or are the victims of powers they can’t control. Our hero Taisto (Turo Pajala) is jailed for defending himself after being attacked. He meets a single mom, Ermelo (Susanna Haavisto), a meter maid frustrated by her job. They both long for escape. The final film in the trilogy is The Match Factory Girl (1990). Here again is the wonderful Outinen as Iris who works in, well, a match factory (fascinating how matches are made). A homely young woman who can’t meet men, one night she’s picked up in a bar. The relationship has unforeseen consequences. The last film I watched was made almost 20 years later with an entirely different cast and theme. The Other Side of Hope (2017) tells of a Syrian immigrant’s escape to Finland, a “good” country. Yet Scandinavia is and isn’t what Khaled (Sherwan Haji) expected. I mentioned that all these films are characterized by minimalist plots and dialogue, the characters often expressionless and seeming to move through life in a glum almost mechanical state. Tragedy besets them yet there is redemption, another Kaurismäki trait. And despite the overall gloominess there is humor, often dark and turning up when you least expect it. Finally, in every film, there are nods to a pre-digital past with older style radios and jukeboxes, always jukeboxes. The soundtracks? Finnish pop with beautiful mournful lyrics. And blues, mainly blues. And the lyrics punctuate the characters’ traumas. In The Match Factory Girl, our loveless Iris contemplates her future to, “When you give everything only to find disappointment.”

Vax passports, TIFF prices and TCM logo

 

Ontario is introducing vax passports Sept. 22, first by an informal method by showing existing vax certificates and then Oct. 22 for the phone app. Quebec already has the app. I will be spending October in Montreal. You need the app to get access to “non-essential” services likes restaurants and – ta da – movie theatres. Montreal’s Festival of New Cinema takes place in October. I intended to go. Now I’m not so sure. I’m resisting the entire concept of passports. I’m vaccinated and encourage others to get vaxxed. It’s not that. It’s the idea of giving up yet another small piece of freedom – actually, a significant piece of freedom since social life is so important to all of us – to government control. Will this become a permanent feature of daily life and what will be added to the app in the future – proof of other vaccines, our criminal records, credit scores. income tax statements? It’s not that I’m against safe environments – duh. But I’m double vaxxed. Health authorities have been telling us from day one that vaccines offer overwhelming protection against Covid. Therefore why should I be concerned whether someone sitting near me is vaxxed or unvaxxed, especially when Canada has such high vax rates? I admit this new government protocol is so powerful that it might be difficult to resist and I likely will cave. But, hey, it was just another freedom we used to have.

I looked over this year’s Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) offerings but among the films garnering the most media attention I saw only one, Edgar Wright’s Last Night in Soho, that stirred any interest. It wasn’t available online but only for in-person tickets. I checked out a few other films but at prices of $19 - $26 per, call me cheap but I wasn’t going to ante up for something I was ambivalent about.

Turner Classic Movies has changed its logo. Yes, I know most things must change and this was probably an attempt by TCM to attract younger viewers with buzzier graphics but an unadorned sans-serif font. I lamented several years ago when TCM dropped its film opening introduction showing city dwellers on apartment terraces gazing at a giant TCM Feature Presentation sign. I used to rebel against change. Now I know it’s just inevitable. 

A film world in the sky

Usually, even on long overseas flights, I find it difficult to focus on inflight entertainment. But last month, on an especially long Atlantic crossing, if only to fight boredom I summoned enough concentration to watch three films going and three coming back. First, I have to tip my hat to Air Canada, whose in-flight entertainment selection has really risen a notch or two. The movie choices include not just the old standbys like drama and comedy but independent, foreign and classic films, plus several individual language categories. So, here’s what I watched:

Going: Steven Soderbergh’s 2020 Let Them All Talk. There was a time when Soderbergh was edgy (Sex, Lies and Videotape 1989, Full Frontal 2002) though he has swayed too often into the mainstream. But this flic is simply a bland TV movie that will appeal because of its gossipy premise of three old friends reuniting on the Queen Elizabeth 2 and starring Meryl Streep, Candice Bergen and Dianne Wiest. Pedro Almodóvar’s The Human Voice (2020) is a one woman show starring Tilda Swinton, based loosely on a Jean Cocteau play. Swinton, as usual, is fabulous as a woman raging against her psychological demons, one in particular.  And finally, for comic relief, Wayne’s World (Penelope Spheeris 1992) with Mike Myers and Dana Carvey. It will take you back to every crazy person you knew in high school and beyond.

Returning: Adaptation (Spike Jonze 2002) a semi-autobiographical story of screenwriter Charlie Kaufman’s (Nicolas Cage) attempt to adapt a screenplay of New Yorker writer Susan Orlean’s (Meryl Streep) book on the tantalizing underworld of hunting priceless orchids. I am so tired of Streep, who has long become the bland go-to actress for myriad roles. I liked this idiosyncratic film when it first came out but this time around it seemed overly long and a little too cute. Blackbird (Roger Michell 2019) was a real find. A study of a family of emotionally cold, estranged individuals, there’s great performances by Susan Sarandon, Kate Windslet, Sam Neill and Lindsay Duncan. Finally, The Good Liar (Bill Condon’s 2019), based on the novel, is a sharp tale of a confidence man (Ian McKellen) and his mark (Helen Mirren), with an unexpected detour into a Second World War subplot. Seeing two seasoned artists like Mirren and McKellen is evidence the best of British crime and spy dramas isn’t dead.

I cut my Netflix cord (so to speak)

There. I did it. I pulled the plug on Netflix. After spending $16.94 per month, month in and month out, on a subscription for years, I finally got fed up with not getting my money’s worth. Fact is, when it comes to movie watching, Netflix for me is an afterthought. It’s only after I’ve surveyed Turner Classic Movies (TCM) schedule and Criterion Channel’s excellent programming, and for want of something different, do I think “Oh yeah, I have a Netflix subscription!” But nine times out of 10 Netflix’s offerings have left me disappointed. (I’m not a TV series fan.) So, I’ve cut the virtual cord so to speak. Over the past year, at $16.94 a month, I’ve probably watched four Netflix films. That works out to $50.82 per film. A little more expensive than the bricks and mortar cinema! Will I come back with tail between my legs? Possibly. But given my constant disappointment with the website’s mediocre and narrow offerings, I can’t see the point.

Meanwhile, I’ve been watching lots of movies that Criterion Channel films the website will be dropping at the end of the month. As well, TCM devoted a day this week to the films of Gloria Grahame. My new discoveries (and many film buffs will laugh because they know so much more about films than I do and be surprisied at my discoveries come lately) are two female stars of the 1950s. They’re Jane Russell and, yes, Gloria Grahame. They add to my also recently discovered Barbara Stanwyck, as a group as dynamic a standout of women you’ll find in the movies…. Jane Russell has it all – siren looks (with fabulous Brick Girl hair), and a tough-as-nails demeanor matched by her awesome sense of self. And, of course, always a pointed quip. Accused of money-

grubbing in The Revolt of Mamie Stover (Raoul Walsh 1956) she replies, “When you talk about money you’re slumming, when I talk about money I’m scared.” … Gloria Grahame is at once slight in build, demure, yet cool and calculating. In Human Desire (Fritz Lang 1954), her character, Vicki, plays all the men for fools. “Most of the men I know can see much better than they can think,” she says, a classic response to men’s telescopic desire for attractive looks. 

As the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) (Sept. 9 -18) warms up for another year – this time with some in-theatre screenings and some virtual – you can at least thank Covid for one thing. The masses who live outside Toronto can now watch festival films on their computer screens/TVs, thanks to the “democratization” (my words) of festival content. It was always a pain lining up for those TIFF films among the hordes in downtown Toronto anyway. 

And don’t forget, Windsor International Film Festival’s WIFF Under the Stars opens tonight to drive-in movie lovers at Windsor’s downtown Festival Plaza. It’s the second year for the highly successful event, which focusses on Hollywood modern nostalgia and family-focused fare. Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade kick things off at 7.45 pm. 

Two bad movies

What makes for a bad film? It’s all a matter of opinion of course. And mine obviously differs with the world’s elite cineastes. Take for example Bruno Dumont’s 1999 film L'humanité, which won the top prize at Cannes and awards for best actor (Emmanuel Schotté) and actress (Séverine Caneele). The Criterion Channel describes the movie as probing “the wonder and horror of the human condition.” The opening is unsettling and exploitive, showing the close-up of the vagina of a murdered young girl, flies alight on the corpse. I had to cover my eyes.   The film tracks the movements of Pharaon, a police detective who’s seemingly dimwitted as he is alienated. The back story is he lost his lover and child in an accident. The film is exceedingly quiet (as in hardly anyone says much) and languid as we follow Pharoah on his daily rounds, leading to, well, not much of anything. This is interspersed with graphic depictions of sex by neighbor Domino (Canelo) and her boyfriend Joe (Philippe Tulear).

Again, unnecessary and voyeuristic. These elements, folks, are basically the entire content of this almost two-and-a-half-hour flick. The thought occurred to me: I could make a better picture…...The second movie was Alan Rudolph’s 1985 Trouble in Mind (also on Criterion). I’ve always enjoyed the films of Rudolph, a protégé of Robert Altman, for their hilarious insights into the absurdities of modern relationships. But here he concocts a very staged crime story that descends stupidly into cartoon.  He’s got an interesting cast - Kris Kristofferson as Hawk, Keith Carradine as Coop, Geneviève Bujold as Wanda, even Eighties drag queen Divine as a straight Hilly Blue crime boss. The plot is about Hawk returning to Rain City aka Seattle but immediately getting into trouble with a cast of nefarious characters frequenting Wanda’s Café. The stultifying interior shots are matched by roll-your-eyes cops-and-robbers action sequences. And Carradine’s character devolves into a villain worthy of Batman. So, a wasted cast and soundtrack featuring the iconic Marianne Faithfull. All I could think of was why would someone (i.e., Rudolph) expend so much energy making such a senseless empty movie.

The glories of Rowlands and Fiorentino

The opening of cinemas hasn’t blunted my desire to visit them, I’m happy to say. Following seeing Zola (Janicza Bravo) with a “live audience” two weeks ago I may go to see Summer of Soul (Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson) this weekend. Of course, ha, I will be on the lookout as to how many people deliberately leave their pre-booked seats to create even more social distancing from other audience members.

When I get a Criterion Channel email notifying that a whack of films will be leaving the site by the end of the month I jump to attention. Finally, this will force me to watch films I might have otherwise lackadaisically ignored despite how extremely good they are. It’s computer screen vs big screen syndrome. Such was last night when I watched yet another great John Cassavetes film, Minnie and Moskowitz (1971) starring Gena Rowlands (photo right) and Detroit-born Seymour Cassel. Cassavetes is one of my favorite directors, who died way too soon. And Rowlands – I just looove her – one of my fave actresses. And like Bogart and Becall they were married, a romance made in cinematic heaven. This is a quirky story about two, uh, rather quirky individuals who meet and fall in love. But what’s striking is Rowlands. I’ve never seen her so young. She’s beautiful, of course, but so young her face hasn’t filled out with the expressive cheeks, the look she’s normally associated with…. My second feature was Fred Zinnemann’s 1950 The Men starring Marlo Brando. It’s notable for being Brando’s first feature and he doesn’t disappoint. This is the kind of movie that makes you constantly wonder how they coaxed such good performances out of the cast. The story takes place within a post-war veteran’s hospital for paraplegics. It’s also a love story with a charming, misty-eyed final scene with Brando (Ken) and Teresa Wright (Ellen) who bears an uncanny resemblance, or vice versa, to Andie MacDowell.

I recently rediscovered the actress Linda Fiorentino (photo left), in the neo-nor film The Last Seduction (John Dahl 1994). Wow. Tough talking, hard as nails, this suffer-no-fools femme fatale has got to be one of the sexiest actresses over the past 40 years. In fact, she’s a live version, only with black hair, of Jessica in Robert Zemeckis’s 1888 Who Framed Roger Rabbit! 

But I was disappointed in Running on Empty, Sidney Lumet’s 1988 supposed take on former Weather Underground terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn’s life on the lam. A good cast (Judd Hirsch, Christine Lahti, Martha Plimpton and River Phoenix) is wasted in this slim plot that barely touches on the politics, both macro and micro, of 1960s America and how it affected these radicals personally. Any causal viewer might have thought this was just another story about a typical, um, domestic family.

And move over Alec Baldwin. You’d have nothing on Robert Mitchum as the personification of Donald J. Trump. While watching Peter Yates’ 1973 The Friends of Eddie Coyle it donned on me. Mitchum, with his A personality and gruff piercing frown, is the pure embodiment of Trump. He could play him in a nanosecond. 

Not everyone's I-75 trip to Paradise

I saw my first in theatre post-Covid (I know technically we’re still in Covid) film yesterday. The last time I’d been inside a theatre was in February 2020 in Tampa Bay, Fla. (interesting as per review below). The venue for the film: Cinema du Parc, my favorite Montreal art house cinema. The film? Janicza Braco’s Bravo's Zola. How appropriate. Here I am in Montreal – where theatres are open compared to eternally shut down Ontario – and the movie I’m going to see has a Detroit theme. That’s the only reason I saw it. But disappointingly, Detroit plays hardly a significant role at all. But about the Covid theatre-going experience. I went to an early afternoon matinee. The ticket seller was very friendly, and I had to choose my seat electronically, on a graph set of squares that I dubbed a video game. He said it resembled “Battleship.” Then downstairs I went into this three-screen theatre in a small near-downtown subterranean shopping mall (part of the appeal). Only two seats had been picked before I arrived. I picked mine in the row behind and two seats away because it was central. (All individuals or groups were separated by two seats.) Then a couple arrived to fill those seats. Then a couple of guys arrived to sit to my left. After 10 minutes, the couple got up and moved several rows to the front. In the age of Covid one must always ask (at least I do): are people moving away from me because it’s a health risk or in this case they want a better view of the screen? Then the guy in my row sitting closest to me switches to the seat on the other side of his friend, further distancing himself. Again, a health precaution? As for mask-wearing, masks were required when moving around the cinema but not at your seat. And only two people were allowed in the washroom at any time. As for the movie, while Detroit starts out as its setting and where Aziah "Zola" King (Taylour Paige) meets Stefani (Riley Keough), that’s about it for the Motor City’s presence. And, when in Detroit, the characters are all inside buildings. There are no visual clues this is Detroit at all. 95 per cent of the film takes place in Tampa, where the two women drive with X (Colman Domingo) and Stefani’s clueless boyfriend Derrek (Nicholas Braun). There, as per the plot, things turn out not to be as advertised. Stefani had lured Zola into the fanciful trip by saying both could strip at a nightclub for big bucks (Zola is a part time stripper). The story descends into a maelstrom of events from which there is seemingly no escape. While this is a dark comedy, I’d never have gone to see it otherwise had it not been for the Detroit factor, which turned to be immaterial. But technically, this is an almost brilliant film. From the opening multiscreen glamour shots of the two women next to each other applying makeup with an inverted harp score to the crazily disjointed images on their trip south and what happens in Tampa Bay, the soundtrack – with its bouncy score and crazy whistles – laughingly undermines any potential plot seriousness. And Paige and Keough are superb, especially Keough who, despite the film’s title, is really the central character and has by far the more expressive role. So, beware: the film’s a thrill but the subject matter not everyone’s I-75 trip to Paradise.