The Film Forum

Salute Our Shorts!

2012-02-23T08:13:00.003-08:00

This weekend, the Saratoga FilmForum is screening this year’s Oscar-nominatedshort films. They’re divided into three screenings: tonight (7:30 p.m.)are the Animated Short Films, tomorrow (Friday at 7:30 p.m.) are Live ActionShort Films, and Sunday (3:00 p.m.) are the Documentary Shorts.

The Academy Awards’ AnimatedShort Film category dates back to 1932 (the 5th Academy Awards) when it wascalled Short Subjects (Cartoons). From day one, Disney dominated; the firstever animated short to win an Oscar was one of Walt Disney’s Silly Symphoniescalled “Flowers and Trees”which also, as it happened, was the first commercially released film to beproduced in full color (two-color Technicolor had been around for a while).Although the poster and titles for “Flowers and Trees” reads “Mickey MousePresents,” said rodent does not appear in it. (Disney’s Mickey Mouse shortswere already a successful series in 1932, and remained in back and white forthree more years since it was felt that they didn’t need the novelty of colorto give them a commercial boost.) You can watch “Flowers and Trees” here—and remember, thiswas before LSD had been invented. Interestingly, “Flowers and Trees” beganproduction as a black-and-white short.

Walt Disney’s Silly Symphonieswasn’t the only successful cartoon series; it is actually tied with Hanna-Barbera’s Tom and Jerry cartoons for winning the most Oscars (seven each) in the BestShort Subject (Cartoons) category. The first Oscar-winning Tom and Jerry shortwas 1943’s “A Yankee DoodleMouse.”

The Oscar category ShortSubjects (Cartoons) lasted until 1971, when the Academy changed it to ShortSubjects, Animated Films in 1971 (“animated films” perhaps having a bit moregravitas than “cartoons”) and, finally, Animated Short Film in 1974.

So when you watch this year’s nominees, think about the cultural impact of their forebears, and of the legacy to which this year’s shorts are heir.

2B or Not 2B, That Is the Apartment?

2012-02-17T14:17:00.000-08:00

The Saratoga Film Forum’s“Countdown to Oscar” Monday night series of past Best Picture winners continueson February 20th, with Billy Wilder’s 1960 film The Apartment, starring Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine (in a pastlife), and Fred MacMurray.

The Apartment, a wry comedy-drama, was nominated for 10 Oscars atthe 1961 Academy Awards, and ultimately won five of them: Best Picture, BestDirector (Billy Wilder), Best Original Screenplay (I.A.L. Diamond and BillyWilder), Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (Black and White) (Edward G. Boyleand Alexandre Trauner), and Best Editing (Daniel Mandell). While Jack Lemmondisappointingly lost out to Burt Lancaster (for Elmer Gantry), when Kevin Spacey won Best Actor in 2000 for American Beauty, he dedicated his award to Lemmon’s performance in TheApartment.

Here’s a piece of film trivia: TheApartment was the last all-black-and-whitefilm to win a Best Picture Academy Award. (Schindler’s List, which won in 1994, had some color scenes.)

Although it was a hit bothcritically and commercially, the subject matter of The Apartment—Lemmon’s character lets his managers at theinsurance company for which he works use his apartment for their extramaritaltrysts—was considered fairly controversial at the time, with the SaturdayReview deeming it “a dirty fairy tale.” Itwas even more unacceptable 15 years earlier when Wilder first conceived thebasic premise, wanting to do an American version of David Lean’s 1945 UK film Brief Encounter (written by Noel Coward), in which married LauraJesson (Celia Johnson) has an affair with doctor Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) ina friend’s apartment. However, the Hays Office at the time—which enforced theMotion Picture Production Code—would not allow anyone to make a film aboutadultery in the 1940s.

Here’s another bit of filmtrivia: what other movie opened the same weekend in 1960 as The Apartment? Hitchcock’s Psycho. Those were the days!

Although way down at #80 on the American Film Institute’s Top100 Movies list, The Apartment hasbeen called an “undervaluedAmerican classic.” See what you think. The Film Forum will be screening TheApartment Monday night, February 20th, at7:30 in the Spring Street Gallery (110 Spring Street).

Forever Jung

2012-02-15T14:45:00.000-08:00

“I was in analysis with a strict Freudian and if you killyourself they make you pay for the sessions you miss.” —Woody Allen

The “dangerous method” in the title of this week’s Film Forum screening ADangerous Method is the psychoanalyticalmethod, the so-called “talking cure.” In the days before Prozac and otherpsychopharmaceuticals and happy pills, psychoanalysis was the preeminent method for dealingwith mental illness, and still is in many cases. Imagine, however, if ads forpsychoanalysis had to have those lengthy lists of possible side effects likedrugs do (many of which sound worse than the things they’re supposedly curing).One of them would almost certainly be “transference.” And maybe dry mouth (from all the talking).

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

Transference is defined as “a phenomenon in psychoanalysischaracterized by unconscious redirection of feelings from one person to another.”Transference can take the form of a person redirecting certain feelings from apast (especially a childhood) relationship onto a current one—such as when aperson dates someone who is a dead ringer for a parent—or it can involve apatient redirecting his or her feelings toward the therapist. While thosefeelings are often erotic, other emotions can be transferred to the therapist,such as mistrust, “parentification,” or even a kind of deification.Transference was first described by Sigmund Freud, who felt that it was anobstacle to psychoanalysis, but also that understanding the unconsciousunderpinnings of the transference was the clue to understanding the symptomsthat drove the patient to analysis in the first place.

(By the way, a somewhat related phenomenon in psychology is“projection,”or when “a person subconsciously denies his or her own attributes, thoughts,and emotions, which are then ascribed to the outside world, usually to otherpeople.” However, it would be incorrectto say that the Film Forum’s projectionist ascribes her own emotions to others.She does nothing of the kind.)

One of the dangers of transference is that it can give atherapist power over the patient and the therapist’s own counter-transferences(or exploitation of the patient’s transferences) can cause a great deal ofdamage—and is highly unethical. An unethical analyst can easily manipulate thepatient into sexual thoughts and feelings toward the analyst—and, eventually,actual sex. Or, in the case of A Dangerous Method, a patient can use transference to coerce an analyst into crossing that line.

A Dangerous Method features two of the most importantfigures in the history of modern psychology: the Big Guy himself (Freud, played by Viggo Mortensen) andhis star student Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender). The movie is based on Christopher Hampton’s play TheTalking Cure, which was in turn based on JohnKerr’s 1993 non-fiction book A Most Dangerous Method, which looked at the relationship between Freud,Jung, and a patient named Sabina Spielrein (played by Keira Knightley). (The book was the result of thethen-recent unearthing of Spielrein’s diaries, papers, and correspondence withFreud and Jung.) Spielrein was initially a patient (or “analysand,” as they arecalled) of Jung’s, in fact the “test case” of Freud’s “talking cure,” which atthe time (~1908) was still largely theoretical. She later became a student ofJung’s, and eventually became one of the first female psychoanalysts. (She isperhaps best known for her conception of the sex drive as comprising theinstincts of both destruction and transformation—she’d have had a heck of aprofile on Match.com.) Oh, and speaking of which, she was also Jung’slover—thanks to our old friend transference, as well as some ideas about pleasure implantedin Jung’s mind by another patient of his (and maybe she tried to seduce him by wearing a Freudian slip?). Spielrein later became Freud’s patientand, when he learned of the affair with Jung, he used it as a weapon in hisideological war with Jung.

What’s interesting is how Jung’s behavior confirms many ofThe Master’s then-nascent psychological tenets, becoming a textbook case ofFreud’s “return of the repressed” (or would have been if there had been anypsychological textbooks at that time).

Kind of makes that Zoloft prescription sound a lot lesscomplicated...and have fewer side effects.

The Film Forum will be screening A Dangerous Method Thursday and Friday, February 16th and 17th, at 7:30p.m., and Sunday, February 19th at 3:00 p.m.

Picture Me Big Time

2012-02-09T12:41:00.000-08:00

Believe it or not (add Jack Palance-esque rasped ellipsishere), there is a whole cinema classification called “age-changing films” (aka“body-swapping”). Because I grew up in the 1970s, the classic of the genre willalways be the original FreakyFriday (1976), but the 1980s* brought aslew of young-and-old-switch-bodies movies. There was the magic potion thatswitched Kirk Cameron and Dudley Moore in Like Father Like Son (1987), the oriental skull that switched Fred Savageand Judge Reinhold in ViceVersa (1988), and the (creaky) GeorgeBurns vehicle 18Again! (1988). There was also Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) in which Kathleen Turner wakes up and is backin high school (a terrifying thought).

One variation on this theme was an Italian film called Da Grande (1987) in which 9-year-old Marco, smitten with histeacher, wishes he could be a grown-up...and, when he wakes up in the morning,finds himself in the body of a 40-year-old.

If that last film sounds a wee bit familiar, it’s because itwas believed to bethe inspiration for the mega-hit Big (1988), with Tom Hanks starring as a 13-year-old whowakes up in the body of a 30-year-old.

Big will be screenedat the Saratoga Film Forum, Saturday, February 11, at 7:30 p.m. as part of theFilm Forum Family Flick series. In keeping (vaguely) with the theme of Big, the Family Flick screenings are run entirely bykids who choose the film, man the projection booth, sell the concessions, andgenerally run the show. The Family Flick series is sponsored by the NordlysFoundation and all proceeds will be donated to charity. If you happen to knowany kids who might be interested, let us know at films@saratogafilmforum.org.

*The genre was revived in the 2000s.

Film Forum Screening Like Crazy

2012-02-08T12:02:00.000-08:00

No, that doesn’t mean that the Saratoga Film Forum isfeverishly screening movies 24/7 (or, for that matter, screening its calls).Rather, it means they will be screening the movie Like Crazy this weekend. Sorry for the mix-up.

Like Crazy has earnedits share of accolades (74% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, andproduce doesn’t lie), as well as a brace of Sundance awards (the Grand JuryPrize for Dramatic Film as well as a Special Jury Prize for Felicity Jones).Young director Drake Doremus made the most of a small budget (under$250,000)—it was shot on a Canon EOS 7D DSLR digital camera (you can snag onefor under $1500 at Amazon). Said Doremusin an interview: “We shot on this consumer camera called the 7D, the Canon7D. It’s a still camera, but it takes videos, and you put film lenses on it,and it looks great.” The actors also didtheir own hair and makeup, and the dialogue was improvised. Doremus was clearlyinfluenced by his French New Wave forebears (Godard’s Breathless, e.g.). (More and more “films” today are being shot on consumer or prosumer grade digital cameras. And, yes, in case you’re wondering, the first cinematic feature to be shot on an iPhone has already been released.)

The story itself, about a love affair forced intotransatlanticism by an expired student visa, is based on Doremus’own experiences when his then-wife was having visa issues and was sent backto Austria.

Even without a lavish budget, the movie has a lot oftexture—and texting, as the two younglovers are separated for the bulk of the movie.

The film is unabashedly romantic—and anyone who has ever endured a long-distance relationship (and/or been in their 20s) can sympathize. By the way, is there anyone you want, need, love, and/or miss like crazy? You can customize the movie poster for Like Crazy using your own photos. Check out the movie’s “poster creator” over on Facebook.

Screening times are Thursday and Friday, February 9 and 10, at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, February 12, at 3:00 p.m.

“What we’ve got on our hands...is a dead shark”

2012-02-03T05:32:00.000-08:00

1977’s AnnieHall was a turning point for Woody Allen as a filmmaker, marking as it didthe transition between his “early funny films” and the more serious (but oftenno less funny) later “relationship” movies. (Allen’s previous film was 1975’s Love and Death, a broad satire of 19th-century Russian literaturethat, among other things, involved a plot to assassinate Napoleon. A morejarring juxtaposition of films there has never been.) Annie Hall was also a turning point in that it was Allen’s first Oscar nod, winning Best Picture, as well as Best Screenplay and Best Director.

Allen’s original title for Annie Hall had been Anhedonia, a psychoanalytic term that means “the inability toexperience pleasure from activities usually found enjoyable.” It’s hard toimagine why United Artists had a hard time coming up with a marketing plan forthat! Interestingly, what became Annie Hall was originally planned to be a murder mystery,although that element was jettisoned in favor of a straight romantic comedy. Itwas revived almost 20 years later for Allen’s 1993 film Manhattan Murder Mystery which re-teamed Allen with Diane Keaton (the titularAnnie Hall).

Although Annie Hallwould mark a departure for Allen (more fully realized in his next film, 1978’sBergman homage Interiors), it doesn’t lack for comedy. The Marshall McLuhancameo, the lobsters, the “spider the size of a Buick,” “a large, vibratingegg”...Annie Hall is still one ofthe funniest movies ever made. But, like the old joke that ends the film—“twoelderly women are at a Catskill mountain resort, and one of them says, ‘Boy,the food at this place is really terrible.’ The other one says, ‘Yeah, I know;and such small portions’”—there is a more serious message lying below thesurface.

See what you think. The Film Forum will be screening AnnieHall Monday night, February 6, at 7:30 inthe Spring Street Gallery (110 Spring Street) as part of the Monday night “Countdownto Oscar” Best Picture Winners series.

Marginal Revolution

2012-02-01T12:22:00.000-08:00

There has been no shortage of documentaries about the 2008financial meltdown and related issues. Inside Job, which the Saratoga Film Forum screened last year,was perhaps the highest-profile of these. 2009’s Collapse was another, and the Enron-collapse doc The Smartest Guys in the Room dates from 2003. But “financial dramas”—let alonefinancial thrillers—have tended to be few and far between. 2010’s The Company Men was a bit of a flop and got mixed reviews (includingonly a 67% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer). HBO’sToo Big to Fail, based on the nonfictionbook by Andrew Ross Sorkin, has been described as a dramatized version of InsideJob. (Metacritic has a pretty thoroughroundup of recession-themed films here.)Speaking of HBO, one of my favorite “finance films” was 1993’s Barbarians at the Gate, which, though not without its suspense, was playedmore as a black comedy, thanks to a screenplay by the late great Larry Gelbart.There is also TradingPlaces, speaking of dark financialcomedies. (Wall Street and Boiler Room round out the master list of Wall Street flicks.)

The idea of a “financial thriller” may sound somewhatoxymoronic, although in the book world, it is a growinggenre. One of the challenges of this genre, is grokking the lingo. Evenafter reading the explanation of a margin call,it’s still a bit of a mystery. So the challenge of a good financial thriller isto ramp up the suspense while keeping exposition sounding less like an MBAthesis.

About 20 minutes into Margin Call, Peter Sullivan, a fairly junior member of aninvestment bank (loosely based on Lehman Brothers), begins the initialexplanation of what is happening that will end up triggering the financialmeltdown. “It’s fairly complicated,” Sullivan begins. “Simplify!” urges tradingfloor head Will Emerson (Paul Bettany), who no doubt speaks for the viewer.That Sullivan is played by Zachary Quinto, whose most famous role (arguably) isthat of Mr. Spock in the 2009 Star Trek reboot, perhaps lends a tone of “technobabble” tothe proceedings, but it gives us just enough to let us know what’s happeningwithout offering “too much information.” Emerson then tries to further explainto his boss Sam Rogers (KevinSpacey), who says, “Just talk to me in English,” a sentiment repeated by theBoss of All Bosses John Tuld (Jeremy Irons) in an early morning meeting.“Speak as you might to a small child or a golden retriever.”

“Look at these people,” says Sullivan, as he and hiscolleague Seth Bregman (Penn Badgley) drive through the streets of Manhattan,“wandering around with no idea what’s about to happen.”

And that’s the issue with movies like Margin Call, particularly post-Occupy Wall Street. With theeffects of the 2008 financial crisis still profoundly affecting many of us, isit too soon to accept moral ambiguity on the part of the folks that helpedcause it? Can the bankers be humanized?

Director J.C. Chandor wrote Margin Call in the days after Lehman’s dramatic failure, and, ashe toldthe New York Times, wanted to understand the human side of afinancial crisis, or “the decision-making process that got us into thismess....Everything in my gut said don’t lie here.” Chandor’s father was aMerrill Lynch investment banker, and he got to see the human side of the “WallStreet banker” firsthand, the ups and the downs. Thus, Margin Call is not intended to condemn the system, and ifnothing else, it aims for a calm, realistic portrait of the industry. From the Times:

“A lot of what our film is reallyexploring is that it’s easy to vilify, it’s easy to moralize and judge andblame people for what happened,” Mr. Quinto said. “And not inappropriately,completely! But there’s also a whole swath of people who were just doing theirjobs, who weren’t complicit in the decision-making process that led to all ofthis.”

That is, do we paint everyone in a large industry with thesame brush?

Oh, Oscar!

2012-01-27T04:55:00.000-08:00

This year's Oscar nominees were announced earlier this week. In February, the Film Forum is screening the Oscar-nominated short films. Check out the updated roster here.

As ever, the nominees were not without controversy. Feel free to use the Comments section to share your thoughts—which nomination was deserved? Who got robbed?

Speaking of Oscar, in February, the Saratoga Film Forum is presenting a countdown to Oscar night. Each Monday night the Film Forum will screen a past Best Picture Oscar winning film. See the schedule here. All Monday night screenings are at 7:30 at the Spring Street Gallery, 110 Spring Street, and are free and open to the public.

Milling Around

2012-01-25T10:22:00.000-08:00

Calling all art lovers. Afterthe Saratoga Film Forum’s Friday evening screening of The Mill & The Cross, Rachel Seligman, Associate Curator at the TangTeaching Museum and Art Gallery at Skidmore College, will lead a discussionabout the film. “I have taught Bruegel in the past and have always loved hiswork,” Rachel tells us. “The conceit for this film is such an unusual one thatI was very intrigued and curious about it. And the more I’ve read about it,the more excited I am to see it.”

Rachel and the Film Forum go along ways back—and in fact she was the Film Forum’s first paid employee.Friday’s screening starts at 7:30 p.m. For more information, please visit the Saratoga Film Forum’s Web site or Facebook page.

While You Were Art

2012-01-25T04:22:00.000-08:00

Those of you who may have beenfans of the old 1960s TV show Wild Wild West no doubt recall the episode where the evil Dr. Loveless invents adevice that lets people travel inside paintings. The device is used fornefarious purposes (inhabited paintings placed in royal houses were designed tofacilitate the theft of royal jewels, etc.), but having seen the episode at animpressionable age, I have always thought it would be pretty cool to travelinside a painting (of course, this would depend on the painting...). Whilethose of us who require glasses often have the experience of being in anImpressionist painting, generally, though, we can only imagine what theoil-on-canvas-based life would be like.

Now, however, Polish filmmaker LechMajewski takes moviegoers inside a painting, specifically, Pieter Bruegel theElder’s 1564 painting The Way to Calvary.The movie is The Mill& The Cross, which will screened atthe Saratoga Film Forum thisThursday, Friday, and Sunday. This is not a first for Majewski, who is himselfa painter; his 2004 film The Garden of Earthly Delights involved reenactments of scenes from the titulartriptych by Hieronymus Bosch, which sounds like it would put the “trip” in“triptych.”

The Mill & The Cross goes even further than simply reenacting apainting—it uses computer graphics and heavy-duty compositing to simulateBruegel’s visual style and place the actors within extrapolations andinterpolations of what is on the canvas, in some ways “finishing” Bruegel’swork. The film brings the 16th-century Flemish master into the 21st century,and this “bringing Bruegel forward” is not just visual, but thematic as well.

Bruegel the Elder(so-called in retrospect to distinguish him from his son, also a painter, whobecame known, cleverly enough, as Bruegel the Younger) was known for what hasbeen called “genre” painting; his works often featured peasants and the dailylife of a fairly typical village. This was quite rare at the time, andBruegel’s works have been important documents of 16th century Flanders. Part ofthis “everyday” life also unfortunately involved torture and execution, and thepainting—and film—depict victims strapped to Catherine wheels, ravens peckingaway at them. At the time, Flanders was occupied by Spain, and by all accountsit was a brutal occupation. As a result, the crucifixion of Christ depicted inthe painting is performed not by the Romans, but by the Spanish. Bruegelinvented a style of painting perhaps known as “protest art.”

Bruegel's The Way to Calvary

And yet if you look at thepainting (click here for a higher-resolution version), you’ll notice themilling crowd (as it were) going about their business blind to many of thehorrific events around them, as if they have become immune to them.

Majewski spoke about Bruegel’sattitude toward the subjects of his painting in arecent interview:

[H]e is a realist in looking at human conditions. He is aprofound observer. I feel a lot of compassion in his paintings, a softening forFlanders and its people. He is compassionate in his depiction, but realistic…itis the inbred condition of human beings, that’s the way it is…to be cynical youhave to be on purpose, so to say.

...

His message is timeless, anything important happens, you mostlikely won’t see it because you just don’t see beyond your own nose…theforeground is less important…Bruegel’s attitude is truthful, I mean people goafter the incidents that catch their eyes, but that’s not necessarily the mostimportant thing happening around them.

Times have changed, but not toomuch:

People have to be particularly stronger today as we areattacked by many aggressive disruptions, whether we like it or not. Disruptionsto our train of thought are constant; if you want to communicate with yourselfthere will be constant interference – radio, TV etc.

And, above everything, the mill.For Majewski, the mill is the primary symbol of both the painting and the film,representing the divine. There is a scene in the film when the blades stop andthe world stands still. What should we make of this?

Cult Following

2012-01-18T08:44:00.000-08:00

When we hear the term “cult film,” the first thing thatcomes to mind is something along the lines of an old John Waters film, Plan9 From Outer Space, or perhaps thequintessential cult film Rocky Horror Picture Show. So when we hear that Martha Marcy MayMarlene is a “cult film,” the firstquestion we may ask is, “Do I have to stay up until midnight to see it?” and/or“What did I do with those old fishnet stockings?”

Martha et al.,however, is not that kind of cultfilm but is instead a film abouta cult—and, rather than midnight, it will be screened at the Saratoga Film Forum Thursday andFriday, January 19th and 20th, at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, January 22nd at 3:00p.m.

Films about cults aresurprisingly few and far between, at least beyond those TV “movie of theweek” tales common in the 1970s and 80s about brainwashing and deprogramming.Dramatically, 1981’s Ticketto Heaven was the product of a late70s/early 80s “cult mania” as the Moonies, Guyana, and others were in the news at the time, while1999’s Holy Smoke!(starring Harvey Keitel and Kate Winslet)takes a more Eastern route.

Martha et al. takes adifferent approach, and becomes much more of a psychological—perhaps evenexistential—thriller than a cautionary tale about brainwashing. NewcomerElizabeth Olsen (she is the younger sister of Mary-Kate Olsen and Ashley Olsen)stars as all three title characters: her proper name is “Martha,” while “MarcyMay” is the name bestowed upon her by the leader of the cult she has foundherself a member of, and “Marlene” is the generic name all the women use when theyanswer the phone. Soright off the bat you can see there’s a bit of an identity crisis in themaking.

Martha was led to join the cult—which is based in theCatskills—because of things that had gone wrong in her earlier life, althoughwe don’t really know a great deal about what those things might have been. Allthe women in the cult are damaged psychologically in some way, and those kindsof damages are often what lead people to join cults.

The other thing that lures impressionable people—particularlyyoung people—into cults is a charismatic leader. Let’s face it, few cults wouldbe successful if they were run by complete shlumps. So Patrick (John Hawkes) isthe charming Svengali, playing the guitar, extolling a seemingly appealing countercultural philosophy, and knowshow to push all the right buttons of impressionable young girls (and a fewboys).

We only see the workings of the cult in retrospect, and in pieces. Marthahas escaped the cult and fled to the home of her older sister Lucy (SarahPaulson) and Lucy’s husband Ted (Hugh Dancy). It’s not the most comfortable ofreunions, especially since Martha is silent on where she had been and what shehad been doing; for all Lucy and Ted know, she just ran away from a boyfriend.However, as she readjusts to living with Lucy and Ted, she has flashbacks toher life in the cult, triggered by everyday activities. Her experience of cultlife was at such an impressionable age, she is now unsure how “normal” peoplebehave. To wit: in the cult, sex was a communal activity, and at one pointMartha freaks out Lucy and Ted by, um, joining them. Awkward, to say the least.

Martha Marcy May Marleneis the sister film (so to speak) of director Sean Durkin’s 2010 short film “Mary Last Seen” which, like Martha et al., also played Sundance and Cannes. The twostories, while related, evolved together. Said the press notes for the Cannesscreening of Martha et al. (via InContention.com):

The script for MARTHA MARCY MAYMARLENE took time to evolve. “I started in 2007 and was writing for a couple ofyears before we started to think about making it. It takes place in the summerand we wanted to shoot it in New York, so we had a three to four-month window.We tried to get it going in 2009 and the script wasn’t quite right. I had neverdone anything as a director to show people, either. I’d made a student shortbut it wasn’t something I wanted to show people since it wasn’t representativeof what the feature film would be.”

Durkin decided to shoot a shortinstead that summer, MARY LAST SEEN, casting actor Brady Corbet in a role thathe would reprise for the feature film, as a cult member who becomes Martha’sboyfriend. “I wanted to direct a short that was related,” recalls Durkin, “butI didn’t want it to be about Martha. I had all this rich material about howpeople get involved in cults, but that’s not what the script was about. I knewBrady Corbet was going to be playing Watts [in the feature] and wanted to dosomething with him as the same character. That’s where the short came from.

What makes people join cults and, perhaps more importantly,why do they (usually) stay, often to live in ways that are at odds withconventional morality—or even legality? Why do cult members give themselvesover so willingly to their leaders (if Jim Jones comes to mind,well, he should)? I have never been a member of a cult, so it is only throughmovies such as Martha Marcy May Marlenethat I can get some idea. But as unusual (or horrific) the cult’s actions mayseem to us as outsiders, think about how our normal activities may seem tosomeone who has been so conditioned by a cult. What is “normal” anyway?

Kidding Around

2012-01-12T11:12:00.000-08:00

In this age ofcomputer-generated animation à la Pixar, it’s nice to see that some“old-school” techniques are often still the best school. Wallace and Gromit are twoanimated characters—a man and a dog, respectively—created by what iscolloquially known as “claymation”—plasticinemodeling clay is applied to metal armatures, and the figures are filmed usingstop-motion photography, or one tiny movement at a time. It’s a time-consumingand laborious process, but the results speak for themselves, as you’ll be ableto see on Saturday night, January 14, when the Saratoga Film Forum screens threeW&G short features as part of the “Family Flick” series.

Wallace and Gromit were thebrainchild of the UK’s Nick Park, who has a long history in animation. In 1985,he was hired by Bristol-based Aardman Animations (which produces the W&G films), and one of his earliestclaims to fame was working on the cutting-edge stop-motion-animated music videofor Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer” (the dancing chickens were his). In 1989, ashort film about talking animals living in a zoo (“Creature Comforts”)was spun off into a much-loved series of advertisements for the UK ElectricityBoard, which have since been named among the top20 TV ads of the past 50 years.

Park created Wallace and Gromitin 1989 and the first W&G short was A Grand Day Out withWallace and Gromit which, along with The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave, will be screened on Saturday. The series has goneon to win numerous awards, including three Oscars.

An extensive interview with NickPark can be found by clicking here.

By the way, the Film ForumFamily Flick is a new series launched last fall in which the screening is runentirely by kids who choose the film, man the projection booth, sell theconcessions and generally run the show. If you happen to know any kids whomight be interested, let us know at films@saratogafilmforum.org.The Family Flick series is sponsored by the Nordlys Foundation and all proceedswill be donated to charity.

Journeymen

2012-01-11T06:49:00.001-08:00

“We’re all looking for someone,”sang The Moody Blues back in 1968’s “Dr. Livingstone, I Presume” off theclassic “journey” album In Search of the Lost Chord (I use “journey” rather than “trip,” which, whenreferring to 1968, is a word one uses advisedly). When we think of spiritualjourneys, we often think of it in the context of a search for God, but itdoesn’t always have to be. Case in point: the Emilio Estevez film TheWay, showing this weekend at the Saratoga Film Forum. TheWay is a classic “road movie,” a genre thatlong predates actual movies, and illustrates, through its four main characters,that we are all on our own, respective, individual journeys. From TheAeneid and The Odyssey, to The Canterbury Tales, to The Wizard of Oz, to Easy Rider, to...well, even to It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World...we’re all looking for someone...or something.

The Way takes place along El Camino de Santiago, or The Wayof St. James, a popular pilgrimage route to the Cathedral of Santiago deCompostela in Galicia, Spain, where it is believed that the remains of theapostle St. James are buried. Originally a trade route in the pre-Christianera, The Way became a popular Christian pilgrimage route starting in the 8thcentury and even today draws walkers from around the world. In fact, TheWay was filmed on location, and doesfeature many actual pilgrims.

However, “The Way”—singular—is abit of a misnomer. There are actually a variety of routes that are collectivelyknown as “The Way of St James,” depending upon where you are starting out. Andtradition has it that “The Way” starts at one’s own doorstep. So even in thecontext of an ancient tradition, we all have our own, individual journey.

In The Way, Tom’s (Martin Sheen) journey begins in Los Angeles.He’s had an adversarial relationship with his son Daniel (Emilio Estevez).Daniel was a wanderer, and Tom felt his son’s life lacked focus. (See, Tom isan ophthalmologist, so he wouldfind a lack of focus objectionable...) Daniel, on his own journey, sets out towalk The Way of St. James, and is killed en route during a storm in thePyrenees. Wracked with guilt, Tom sets out to collect the body, has itcremated, and decides to himself walk The Way in tribute to his late son,scattering Daniel’s ashes along the way.

Along The Way, Tom reluctantlyjoins up with three other pilgrims, each on his or her own, decidedly secularjourney—or so they say. The Dutchman Joost (Yorick van Wageningen; I bet he got“Alas, poor Yorick” a lot) is walking The Way as to lose weight for hisbrother’s wedding; Sarah (Deborah Kara Unger) is a Canadian chain smoker whovows to break the habit once she gets to the end of the trip; and Jack (JamesNesbitt) is an Irish writer trying to break his writer’s block, and tries usinghis fellow walkers’ journeys as fodder.

As befits a road movie—andcharacterizing it as such is not intended to belittle or trivialize it—thejourney and the sharing of stories become more important than the destination.What do the characters ultimately find? The film may seem frustratingly mum onthat—but that’s exactly the point. What do any of us on our own personaljourneys find? Or, by the time we’ve found it, does it even matter?

The Way as a movie also had its own unique journey. Inspiredby Emilio Estevez’s son Taylor, who had driven the length of The Way with hisgrandfather, the film did not have a lavish budget, and shooting on locationrequired using a small crew and only available—that is, natural—lighting; nighttimescenes were shot using literally candles and firelight. After its release, italso did not have a lavish promotional budget, but it eventually became a ravesuccess, initially on college campuses, by way of word-of-mouth buzz.

As you watch The Way, think about whether would you ever make that kindof journey. What would you hope tofind? Or would you just not worry about it and “take it as it comes”? And whatkind of journey are you on now?

Welcome to The Film Forum!

2012-01-10T10:48:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the new official blog of the Saratoga Film Forum, the community organization dedicated to bringing a wide variety of quality films to downtown Saratoga Springs, New York. The Film Forum screens the best alternative, indie, arthouse, foreign, animated, documentary, and classic films Thursdays and Fridays at 7:30 pm, and Sundays at 3:00 pm at the Saratoga County Arts Center at 320 Broadway, with additional “classic” films screenings at the Spring Street Gallery, 110 Spring Street. We also schedule special events throughout the year. To stay up-to-date on the latest happenings at the Film Forum, sign up for our mailing list here, and/or find us on Facebook.
One of the hallmarks of the “offline” Saratoga Film Forum is its sense of being just what its name says, a “forum” where film aficionados can gather and not just watch movies but discuss and debate them, as well. Thus, the purpose of this blog is to offer something a bit different than the usual review or promotional blurb. Here, we will be commenting on the movies we are currently showing, going behind the scenes, looking at some of the larger, overarching themes, placing a film in the broader context of film history, and so on. We encourage movie lovers to comment on any post and share their views—but please be civil.
Thanks for reading—and we’ll see you at The Film Forum.