Christine Powley
ANATOMY OF A FALL
The winner of this year’s Palme d’Or is a carefully crafted courtroom drama that takes us into a case where the star witness is the blind son of the accused murderer.
A legal battle where the lawyers have a field day ensues but what happens to the family relationship at the heart of the drama?
ANSELM 3D AND PERFECT DAYS
I’ve pulled a swiftie here as festival darling Wim Wenders has two films in this year’s line up.
A documentary about pre-eminent German artist Anselm Kiefer or the story of a humble man who seems to have cracked the meaning of life.
Treat yourself and see both.
ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT’S ME, MARGARET
When I was at High School there was a long waiting list for this book by Judy Blume.
I am not sure if it still packs the same emotional punch for today’s internet-hardened teens but for their mothers and grandmothers this is a welcome trip back to the good old, bad days.
ASTEROID CITY
Wes Anderson claims that he makes a determined effort not to repeat himself but somehow all his films come out looking like Wes Anderson movies. Luckily, enough of us like Wes Anderson movies for him to keep going. This time Tom Hanks and Scarlett Johansson are his big name recruits.
BAD BEHAVIOUR
Jane Campion’s little girl Alice Englert is picking up the family batten with her directorial debut. She teases us with a story of mother-daughter conflict that is determinedly not based on real life. Jennifer Connelly is at a wellness retreat led by a shady guru played by Ben Whishaw who talks just enough sense to get us wondering if he is legit.
She is troubled by her relationship with her daughter played by Englert but is this the way to resolve their tensions?
BILLION DOLLAR HEIST
The North Korean state-sponsored hacking industry has been explored in podcasts, now it hits our screens in animated form and it is still a wild ride.
I was conflicted about this one. Beautifully filmed through the sad eyes of a donkey it makes you reconsider how we treat animals but it refuses to give us a happy ending. Instead it ends in the most heartbreaking of ways. Definitely not one to take your children to.
FALLEN LEAVES
A chance meeting of two lonely people offers the possibility of finding a way out of their loneliness, but are some people just not cut out for social connection, no matter now much they think they want it? A romantic comedy from Aki Kaurismaki, the master of Finnish melancholia.
When a serial killer believes he is doing God’s work and the surrounding society seems to believe him, justice can be hard to come by. He’s cleansing the holy city of Mashhad of sex workers and the Iranian police are not that bothered. A woman journalist starts to work on the story and soon is in as much danger as the women on the streets. Before we get too judgy, it is not that long ago our institutions shared the same indifference to violence against marginalised women.
KIDNAPPED
I love a period drama and this seems to be the only one this festival, but here the rustling silk gowns are those worn by clerics. The Mortara case is largely forgotten but in 1858 the Vatican’s instance that a Jewish child who had been secretly baptised by a servant girl was no longer to be raised by his parents — as Jews were forbidden to raise Christians — led to international outrage.
Tramping, it’s our birthright but not always the best option when you just want to feel the serenity. Comic actor Tom Sainsbury is a master of finding the manic edge that can lurk behind our laid-back image and here he exploits it for both comic and thriller vibes.
ONLY THE RIVER FLOWS
A detective obsessively working a case that started with an easy arrest, that did not pass the smell test, is drawn deeper and deeper into the reality of village life in 1990s China where everyone has secrets they are determined to keep from the repressive authorities.
It’s a trick title. These memories are not soft focus romantic cliches of the city of light. Instead Mia was caught up in a terror attack on a Paris bistro. She feels divorced from her old life and is compelled to connect with others who shared her ordeal.
SUBJECT
I love documentaries but sometimes there is an uncomfortable feeling that our peep into someone else’s life is exploitative. This documentary goes back to subjects of some the past decade’s most popular docos and finds out what they think about the experience now.
Jeremy Quinn
The International Film Festival is once more back at full strength, which most importantly for Dunedin audiences means a welcome return to the splendour of the Regent. Everyone will have their thoughts about what to choose for the perfect schedule. These are the ones that stand out for me.
ON THE ADAMANT
French documentarian Nicholas Philibert has often been compared to observational film-maker Frederick Wiseman. His latest film shows how attitudes have changed around mental health, focusing on a drop-in centre that literally floats on the Seine, a warm and welcoming sanctuary for those most in need.
HOW TO BLOW UP A PIPELINE
Not an adaptation of Andreas Malm’s 2021 non-fiction book, which argues against "strategic nonviolence" as a form of climate protest, but rather a fictional thriller in which a group of young activists, inspired by Malm’s manifesto, come together to literally blow up a Texan oil pipeline. May or may not double as an instructional manual.
SALVATORE: SHOEMAKER OF DREAMS
A documentary about an Italian shoemaker wouldn’t normally be my cup of espresso, but this tells the story of Salvatore Ferragamo, who left Italy in 1915 to go to Hollywood, working as a shoe designer throughout the silent era, and so doubles as a glimpse into early cinema history through a rather unique lens.
Another Italian doc about an artist working in cinema, although the subject here will be far more familiar to movie lovers. Ennio Morricone, who died in 2020 aged 91, wrote more than 400 film and television scores in a career spanning over 60 years, including for Giuseppe Tornatore (Cinema Paradiso), who directs this loving tribute.
A found-footage video essay from Sweden that scours the infinite depths of YouTube in an attempt to condense the history of the moving image into an 88-minute bite-sized morsel. The fact that Ruben Ostlund is an executive producer may give some indication as to the tone this might be going for.
The strangest of the films in this year’s Incredibly Strange lineup, although by all accounts it plays straight with its rather ludicrous concept. It’s a Japanese reboot of a cult ’60s TV series that follows the adventures of a team of scientists investigating kaiju, while being unaware that one of their members is able to transform into a giant robotic alien superhero.
If that’s not weird enough, then this ultra low-budget Kiwi comedy might be. A story of an everyday nobody who inherits psychic powers after dying for six minutes, which he then must use to help fight the all-important cosmic battle between good and evil. I’m interested in how this turns out given it was made on the smell of an oily pie wrapper.
EO
This might be my most anticipated film of the festival, which I’ve heard described as if Robert Bresson teamed up with Gaspar Noe. If that’s not a recommendation, then I don’t know what is. As far as psychedelic phantasmagorias about sad donkeys go, it could be one of a kind, although from all accounts this is simply a late-career masterpiece from 85-year-old Polish veteran Jerzy Skolimowski.
MONSTER
Japanese director Kore-eda Hirokazu is a little bit hit-and-miss for me. I wasn’t taken with his last two features made outside of Japan, but he returns there for his latest, which arrives with a truckload of kudos and a best screenplay award from this year’s Cannes Film Festival.
This modern-day musical-western, loosely based on Bizet’s Carmen and set among violent gangs on the US-Mexican border, sounds original to say the least. The Australian outback doubles for the Mexican desert here, and the trailer suggests an interesting mash-up of genres with a unique visual style.
I LIKE MOVIES
Low-budget Canadian indie from first-time director Chandler Levack has all the hallmarks of any number of those ubiquitous festival entries from the early ’90s. Centred around a movie-loving outcast who practically lives at the local video store, it obviously has my name on it.
THE INNOCENTS
Horror is noticeably absent from this year’s lineup, with the exception of this 4K restoration of the 1961 gothic-horror classic. Most famous for its widescreen, black-and-white cinematography and a reputation for being one of the few films from a bygone era that can still creep the bejesus out of a modern audience.
MARS EXPRESS
French animated dystopian cyber-punk sci-fi noir that channels Robocop and Blade Runner? Yes, please.
BREAD AND ROSES
Gaylene Preston’s landmark film about the life of trade unionist and Labour MP Sonja Davies previously screened at the festival in 1993, meaning this will be the first time local audiences will be able to experience it at the Regent, albeit in a brand new 4K restoration.
BEYOND UTOPIA
My pick from the Political States documentary section, mostly because the premise of a camera crew being present as refugees illegally cross the border between North and South Korea sounds like the kind of dangerously guerrilla film-making that makes for a compelling and perhaps devastating watch.
REALITY
A single-location, real-time thriller based on an actual incident in which a 25-year-old air force veteran, with the unlikely name of Reality Winner, was raided by the FBI for potentially leaking classified documents on Russian interference in the 2016 US election. Interestingly, the dialogue is mostly taken verbatim from transcripts of recordings made by the agents, so it’s as accurate a rendering of events as is possible.
Rebecca Tansley’s dramatic reimagining of the NZ Opera production, by Dunedin composer Kenneth Young, that was performed in October last year as part of the Dunedin Arts Festival, tells of Janet Frame’s time at the Seacliff Mental Hospital, although the primary focus is on a (fictional) nurse, played by Anna Leese, who is torn between empathy and duty. Sure to be a highlight for Dunedin audiences.
ANIMATION NOW! #3 THE REALM OF HORROR
While horror is in short supply this year, fans may want to check out this programme of scary animated shorts, featuring at least one Disney non-approved title, a French film called Mickey’s Descent into Madness, which imagines Mickey, Donald and Goofy as troubled Vietnam vets. Don’t tell the lawyers.
MAY DECEMBER
Todd Haynes is one of the most interesting directors working today. No two films of his are the same, yet they’re all brilliant in their own way. This dark satire stars Haynes regular Julianne Moore as a woman who had an affair with an underage boy many years ago, and is still dealing with the consequences.
Legendary German film-maker Wim Wenders had an improbably high hit rate in the ’70s and ’80s before sinking into the cinematic doldrums. His latest, the story of a Tokyo toilet cleaner, is said to be a stunning return to form, maybe even the perfect summation of his career.
DISCO BOY
If you loved Beau Travail but felt it needed more dancing, then this might be the movie for you. The story of a Belarusian man who joins the French Foreign Legion to fight militia in the Niger Delta, only to discover he’s missed his true calling as a raver. Definitely an unusual way to approach a heavy war film dealing with issues of colonialism and exploitation.
A documentary narrated from beyond the grave by Hitch himself (played by impressionist Alistair McGowan) contains clips from every one of his 52 features. Film historian Mark Cousins is the master of drawing connections, so it will likely be a fascinating overview for newbies and old hands alike.
The festival
Whānau Mārama NZIFF 2023
Ōtepoti Dunedin
August 3 to August 20
Screenings are shared between The Regent Theatre and Rialto Cinemas
