German Gems 2012

2012 has welcomed in another edition of the German Gems film festival at the Castro Theater in San Francisco.
This year I opted to partake of one film:

Uber uns das All (roughly 'Over us the Sky')

This film, Director+Writer Jan Schomburg's first feature (!) is an investigation into the nature of romantic relationships. What we make of them, what we will do for them, what we will allow to happen for the sake of them. Martha, the main character is set to join her successful Medical Research husband in Marseilles where he accepts a foreign research/teaching post. Inexplicably, he commits suicide soon after he arrives. In what ensues, Martha finds out that he never was a Medical Researcher, a lie that had been going on daily for 4 years and that he may have been having a secret affair with her best friend..
In the shock of all of this Martha, consciously or not, seeks to find a replacement for her lost husband. She finds him in the person of a professor of German history who after numerous shocks over the situation, apparently acquiesces and they form a new life together...

It is a puzzling movie. Free from 'big studio' demands for tidy stories, many important issues such as 'well what was her deceased husband ACTUALLY doing anyway ?' are left completely unanswered. The movie is pleasingly vague and we're left with trying our best to live in Martha's head as the tale unfolds.

The after movie Q&A session with the Director/Writer/Producer was most interesting. Questions about 'what happened that we didn't see' were met in the spirit of: 'we both saw the movie, you know as much as I' (ha ha.. very good !).
It turns out that Georg Friedrich who played the character of the history teacher is usually typecast in mainstream German movies as a bad, tough character. The interviewer mentioned that Friedrich is usually 'the bad Austrian' (I'm not sure what that means culturally speaking !). The director said that after Friedrich read the script 'he (Friedrich) was in tears that someone actually wanted him to portray a history professor' :-)

Nice experience German Gems. Thanks for another great festival !

Fishbone Documentary

Around the 80's a completely unique and wacky band appeared on the scene: 'Fishbone'. I became aware of them for the first time when their Music Video send up of the Jimmy Stewart movie 'It's a Wonderful Life' made it to broadcast (photo 2). It was crazy and original and I loved it !

This past weekend a documentary that chronicles the rise and fade of this fantastic band premiered at the Roxie Theater in San Francisco. The lead singer Angelo Moore was present along with the filmmaker to answer questions after the movie. Before the screening Angelo did a music + spoken number up on the stage (see photo 1). On the saxophone, I could have believed that he was channeling 'Trane, very accomplished !

It was asserted in the movie that the band had trouble with being 'classified' by Columbia/Sony and that this was part of the reason that they never hit it big. I can thoroughly believe that. They are/were completely unpackage-able for neat tidy consumption (I wonder what the iTunes 'genius' music-style-correlator would make of this truely genius band ?).

I highly recommend the documentary if you're even mildly interested in them or want to hear about a band that could only have come to life in the U.S. (till now, I think there is still not another band like them in the U.S. or anywhere else)...

German Gems 2011

Bummed that I've missed 2 years of the San Francisco 'Berlin and Beyond' German Film Festival

http://www.goethe.de/ins/us/saf/prj/bby/enindex.htm

I was excited to see that another film festival 'German Gems' was on screen this weekend in SF.

http://germangems.com/

I caught a film each on Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday's film 'The Architect' was the unfolding over a disasterous weekend of a highly dysfunctional family coming to terms with itself. The sordid details of the situation would have made for an hour plus of grimacing and squirming if not for the liberal application of humor throughout. Recommended viewing !

Sunday's film 'Celebration of Flight' is a documentary centered around a (then) 78 year old retired pilot's dream of building and flying his own airplane. On the surface, not an unusual story. What makes this case so special is the magnetic personality of David (the pilot), and the fact that he was building this plane in the garage of the house that he built on a hill in the middle of the tropics of the Dominican Republic. His friendships with the people of the Island are quite an uplifting affirmation of life. During the Q&A, it came up that the filmaker sacrificed quite a bit the making of her self-financed film which took many years to complete. Happily, she reported that she got Clint Eastwood to see the film and as a result may get some backing to create another feature film about the life of David. From the glimpses of that life that we got this afternoon from the film and the Q&A session, a film about his life adventures would make an engrossing movie indeed.

Paris Opera Ballet "La Danse"

Yesterday, I ventured out to my first public entertainment venue since the ACL surgery to catch the last screening of 'La Danse' at the Roxie Theatre in SF. After sitting to view the 2 1/2 hour documentary my knee was killing me and it was painful to walk the few blocks back to the train station but the movie was well worth the physical discomfort cost !

'La Danse' is a camera roaming the environment of the Paris Opera Ballet institution to give a view of the life that exists within its walls. For people like me who will never be professional dancers, it's a glimpse into a world only imagined. The camera looked at all facets of the Ballet: the dancers, the directors, the costume and makeup staff, the cafeteria staff, the custodial staff, the building repairs, even a nice sequence that started by gazing upward at the beautifully ornate ceiling of the performance hall proceeding all the way down to the Paris sewer beneath the building looking down showing the fish swimming in the sewer water !

The primary point of view of the movie though is (as I interpret it) from the point of view of a dancer in the company. Hence, the bulk of the footage concentrates on rehearsal. That's rehearsal, rehearsal, rehearsal. Thus, appropriately, there is comparatively way less footage of actual performance. It's right that it should be this way since most of the dancers time will be spent in rehearsal. Right after some performance footage, scenes cut straight to the next days rehearsal just as the dancer would experience life.

If you're not interested in dance, or watching professional dance rehearsals, this movie will be 2 1/2 hours of sheer boredom as there is no plot and there is no focusing in on any 'personal story'. It's the professional's life here. The quality of the dancing is superbe, bringing gasps from the movie audience myself included. The company was shown to have a balance of classical and modern dance. Indeed some of the energy looked like Michael Jackson Amplified (and with greater training and discipline !). Spectacular !

A few interesting non-dance moments from the movie stuck in my mind:

- cut to the executives (in a modest office BTW) planning what they were going to do for visiting American 'premium donors', those individuals that have donated more than $25000 US to the dance company. One of the donor groups ? People from Lehman Brothers..

- In countries like France, Germany.. there are Ballet/Dance companies that are state organizations. The Paris Opera Ballet is a state company so it's the 'same' as working for the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) here. You're a government employee with the same concerns as gov't employees everywhere. In particular a meeting was shown in which the Director explained that the Dancers in the company were recognized as having on average a 'different useful working life' as compared with other gov't workers therefore they didn't have to wait until 65 to be eligible for their gov't pension, instead they are eligible at age 40 for the same benefit. The director added that the high level of achievement of the company was key in that decision and that 'slackening of standards' might put the special consideration in jeopardy.

- In one rehearsal scene a dancer could not shake her habit of pausing her movement with her leg swung back behind her (in Arabesque). This undoubtedly coming from a lifetime of training that way. "She keeps thinking that there is an Arabesque there, when there is none" the choreographer and others keep saying...

- The artistic director describing dancers as being:
1/2 Nun and 1/2 Boxer
Being both the Jockey and the Horse
Being both the Driver and the Race Car

- A choreographer trying to describe the feeling that he wanted from a pair of dancers:
C: "It is like the XMen movies, they want to be in love but because of their dangerous powers they cannot and must stay apart"
D: "Like Edward Scissorhands !"
(editorial comment from me: Hollywood rules the entertainment world...)


A movie worth watching if you're interested in dance and one to avoid like the plague if you're not !

One More from Berlin And Beyond

Today I went to another screening at the "Berlin And Beyond" film festival. I had not planned on posting about it since I already mentioned the movie that I saw there yesterday, but today's movie "Evet, I do !" ("Evet, Ich Will !") was so outstanding that I have to mention it ! The movie makes comedy out of 'forbidden marriages'. Each of the protagonist-couples has to deal with parents and relatives who disapprove of their choices of partner along cultural lines: Turk + Kurd, Turk + German, Turk + African-American, Gay Turk + Gay German. Though the particulars of each situation are different, human nature is what it is and it's not hard to recognize the absurdities and laugh out loud at them.
There was a Q & A session after the movie with the directory/writer Sinan Akkus (he's the person on the left in the photo). It was astounding to learn that this was his FIRST feature length movie and that today's screening was only the 2nd time that this movie has been seen in public. I truly hope that he can get some distribution for this gem, it's a very entertaining hour and a half that shouldn't sit on a shelf unviewed except by a just few hundred people.

Berlin and Beyond Film Festival

Yay !
It's time for the annual "Berlin & Beyond" Film Festival in San Francisco screening films from Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Today I went to see "DIE ENTDECKUNG DER CURRYWURST" (The Invention of the Curry Sausage). Despite the title, it really wasn't about the invention of the Curry Sausage (though that did take place). It was the touching tale of a passionate but ill-fated love affair taking place in final weeks of WWII Hamburg. Nicely done. The hostess introduced the movie noting that 'many cities in Germany claim to be the birthplace of the Curry Sausage, in this version, the Curry Sausage was invented in Hamburg, even though the movie isn't really about that'.

As an added plus, the star, Barbara Sukowa was present for the screening (see photo, Sukowa is on the left).

If it shows up in your local video store (or Netflix), "Invention of the Curry Sausage" gets the thumbs up from me !

I'll probably catch some more flicks tomorrow...

http://www.berlinandbeyond.com/