Claude Mayers

‘Green Book’ you may know has been widely acclaimed by 2019, garnering Golden Globe awards for Best Movie (Comedy or Musical) and Best Screenplay. It starts out at the Copacabana in Manhattan in 1962, then goes to the Bronx. There are two terrific stars in this movie: the bouncer (Viggo Mortensen) and the stylish prodigy black jazz musician (Mahershala Ali – playing the role of Don Shirley (a real person)), who is about to launch a tour of the American south back in those dangerous times for a Negro.  The ‘Green Book’ referred to in the movie’s title, is the ‘Negro Motorist Green Book’ – a guide to find welcoming places to stay for people of color. Mister Ali won the Golden Globe for Best Male Supporting Actor, but I think both the lead actors in this film deserved the highest awards for their performances. This movie tells a timely, truly rewarding story, brilliantly portrayed, and appreciated for the all-time classic quality of its rendering by one of our finest cinema organizations. You must go see this movie, if you see just one movie this year, Claude tells you now, to start this updated set of reviews completed in January of 2019.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/green-book/

‘Happy As Lazzaro’ was a mythical Italian movie with unexpected turns and whirls of the plot and timeline. Based on a Lazarus type of protagonist initially in a sharecropper setting. Things get crazy with Lazzaro and his extreme naivete. Plus there is the Marchesa and her brat of a son, whose land is being sharecropped, who take advantage of all their unsophisticated workers.

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https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/fil…/happy-as-lazzaro/

‘Leto’ was a wonderful movie capturing Soviet 1980’s music that was surprisingly beautiful and sometimes kickass. The musicians in the movie are portrayed amidst what was happening in the western rock milieu from Bowie to Lou Reed to Blondie, whom they adored while trying to create their own music. Victor Tsoi was a hero to many,
he being the handsome 2nd lead in Leto. A movie of music to immerse yourself in, featuring street singing into the soundtrack by local Soviets of all ages on buses and trolleys, with artwork overdrawn on the cinema figures. Censorship is addressed when the developing band presented their lyrics to a communist approval process, so they could play at a government maintained venue to young enthusiastic fans.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/leto/

‘Henri Dauman – Looking Up’ is about a holocaust survivor photographer who meets success first in the magazine world, and then goes on to shoot intimate revealing iconic photos of many of the famous personalities of the past 60 years, from Marilyn Monroe to Jackie Kennedy to Elvis Presley. His well-collected and elaborately filed
contact sheets prove to be fantastic documentation of the period, that the art world seizes on to lead Dauman to his belated entry to his legendary fame. The film needs editing, as it keeps what should be outtakes of Dauman speaking, to slightly annoy us, rather than pick the best take in each framing of Henri saying whatever he reveals. Includes this fact you probably don’t know: because Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis’ manager, was actually in the USA illegally (but he
was white, white privilege, actually a Dutch citizen), Elvis NEVER performed abroad, Henri tells us.

Dauman was separated from his family as a child but was re-united with his mother in France at age 12. Unfortunately, as in ‘Dead Pigs’ (the Chinese movie) there was a problem with an ingested entity, in this case bicarbonate of soda that his mother took one night that she purchased at the chemist. Which led to her rapid death in a few days when Henri was only 13, leaving him an orphan for good, this time. His father had been shipped to Auschwitz where he was exterminated. Thereafter, Henri crossed the Atlantic to America, and resided in New York City, photographing especially buildings while Looking Up as his uniquely exploited perspective. Thus, the film’s subtitled name.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/henri-dauman-looking-up/

Allow me now to document some of the best shorts in the festival, which today you may be able to see on TV and internet channels like ShortsTV and Link-TV, plus Vimeo and Youtube. From the ‘Never Going Back Again’ shorts program: ‘Raymonde Or The Vertical Escape’ was one of the best films in the festival. Terrific colorful imaginative unique animation. French. About a dowdy older hen who has waited and sacrificed her life but now she longs for love. Two rather sexual faeries circle around her while the film progresses through several scenes. Highly recommended to see a few times before you die! But an adult film, not for kids really. Delightful overall.

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https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/raymonde-or-the-vertical-escape/

‘I Am Bisha: The Rebel Puppeteers Of Sudan’ follows Omar Ganja as he brings his larger than lifesize puppet of Sudan’s longtime dictator ‘Bisha’ from town to town as a way of informing the people about the country’s goings on. Everyone doesn’t have a television or access to radio news in poverty and war-stricken Sudan, in Africa. A very interesting perspective about culture, information, and the horrid politics of another oppressive dictator taking advantage of ‘his’ people, for decades now, unfortunately.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/i-am-bisha/

‘The Driver Is Red’ is a unique short that is animated in a ‘Dragnet’ [old 1950s TV show] style. Packed with facts about Hitler and his Nazis presented very concisely, in shady colors. 1960s Buenos Aires, Argentina, Israeli secret agent hunts down Adolf Eichmann, Hitler’s prime engineer of extermination. Very informative plus intriguing for the eye, but dark, not pretty.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/the-driver-is-red/

‘Magic Alps’ follows an Afghan refugee to Italy, where authorities are perturbed by the dilemma of granting asylum for him, but not his beloved goat, whom/which he has taken with him during a prolonged journey to one day see/reach the ‘Magic Alps.’ A different kind of immigration tale.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/magic-alps/

‘Would You Look At Her’ is a short film from Macedonia, where the boys are very misogynistic, and the tomboy heroine won’t take any guff. This results in the latter being sexually (verbally) degraded on the school bus, and one of the boys grabbing her phone and flinging it out the window. She jumps off the bus to almost retrieve it, but a tractor gets to it first, running it over with its huge tires, and crushing it into uselessness before our appalled eyes. Her grandfather is very ill, and there is the diving for the cross, which if secured when the misogynistic (also) priest throws it in the river, will also result in winning the prize of a new phone, in addition to its religious ramifications. But a female has never tried to enter this annual contest. See what happens when our heroine pushes back to enter the fray. A very timely film in today’s retro-repressive environment for women’s liberation. Best line in the film: sickly grandfather is seemingly forever watching TV in the family house – his daughter jokes: “If the cross won’t cure him, the flatscreen will.”

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/would-you-look-at-her/

‘Skip Day’ is a USA/UK film about black high school kids in Pahokee, Florida skipping school one day, an annual tradition, and renting cars, driving 60 miles north to a beautiful beach, where they spend most of the day dialoguing and playing in and by the ocean. An interesting view of the black southern USA high school age experience and culture.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/skip-day/

The ‘Let’s Go Crazy’ shorts program featured a great Romanian short: ‘Offstage’ about a dignified thespian exiting an evening event by himself, two fans coming up to him, a young couple, requesting his autograph, then selfies with each of them, he finally waving them off, walking along a sidewalk, you see a woman coming up behind him with a wooden plank, swinging it…and then he is in a kitchen, duct-taped to a rolling office chair, mouth also covered. There are two people there with him, he is very perplexed, we have no idea why he would be where he is, and who these people are, and what they want with him. It seems to be a terrorist scenario, but it is much more crazy than that! Dark but hilarious!! A MUST-SEE!!!

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/offstage/

‘Milk And Cookies’ is a delightful 8 minute USA short about a little single-mothered 5 year old girl who just obsessively LOVES her milk and cookies! But she is reminded while riding in her car seat by her mother: “Weekends OK. Weekdays no way.” The plot to subvert this mantra is the story here.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/milk-and-cookies/

I hate cruise ships and cruises, which is what ‘All Inclusive’ captures flowingly and beautifully, without comment, in this eye-catching 10 minute Swiss-made film with music by Heidi Happy.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/all-inclusive/

‘With Thelma’ is a French/Belgian short about two gay guys who have been summoned to watch the toddler niece of one of them, because her parents cannot return from overseas yet due to a natural disaster that has occurred. At times hilarious, the little girl is a great ham and loves the camera, and the lads focus theirs sometimes to excess, but mostly entertainingly in this era of iphones, when everyone can be a cinematographer.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/with-thelma/

‘To Plant A Flag’ starts with what looks like two astronauts in full white gear traversing a barren landscape in their bobbing space-buggy. Their mission is to plant a flag on a mountain, but things go awry when they end up confronting a hostile farmer who they underestimate, being two goofy turkeys actually themselves. Interesting humorous convolutions of the plot. A Norwegian/Icelandic production.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/to-plant-a-flag/

‘How To Swim’ is an Israeli film about a young pregnant woman befriending an older magnanimous woman in a mall, but our heroine is not what she seems…Very good! Don’t want to tell you too much of the story to spoil it for you…..

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/how-to-swim/

From the ‘New York Women In Film And Television: Women Calling The Shots’ annual program we first of all have ‘Death Metal Grandma’ about 94 year old holocaust survivor Inge Ginsberg wanting to fulfill her dream of being
the front-singer for a heavy metal band. Inge actually has written songs for Doris Day and Dean Martin; is a poet; and gets her opportunity to compete on a national talent show. Check the web for her videos. Charming film.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/death-metal-grandma/

‘Hair Wolf’ is one of the best films in this year’s festival. Taking place in a Brooklyn hair salon for black women, the film surreally satirically incorporates hot-button historical and cultural points of black consciousness, with dynamic
colorful cinematography and humorous melodrama. LOVE IT!!! Find this one somewhere. It’s good for you in this time of increasingly disappointing racism and hate in Trump’s America. A much-too-short 12 minutes of soul candy!

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https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/hair-wolf/

‘Thin Ice’ is a tense humorous short taking place inside a Nederlands ice-rink. The attendant has a beautiful ditzy young lady in front of him insecurely babbling on, while he is surveilling this man sitting on a bench across the rink with a backpack, and his scarf pulled up over the lower half of his face. Terrorist paranoia and a plot that surprisingly quickly thickens to its climax….

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/thin-ice-glad-ijs/

‘The Little Goddess’ is similar to ‘I Am Bisha [Sudan]’ being about third-world street theater, filmed in full brilliant color. From India, the pre-teen young Goddess in the show is approached by a casting director to audition for a part that could be her big chance to escape from her oppressive poverty-stricken town. But her parents do not approve. Opportunity calls versus the family restrictions of ethnic tradition in the setting of possible female emancipation.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/the-little-goddess/

‘As Shadows’ is a southern USA short taking place in a late-night diner. The young female protagonist sitting in her booth interacts with a young man whom we are unsure about. Will he take advantage of her, or will he free her from whatever her trapped life has in store for her?

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/as-shadows/

‘Lessons From A School Shooting: Notes From Dunblane’ parallels the 2012 Sandy Hook, Connecticut school massacre with the Dunblane school massacre in Scotland 15 years previously. The two priests involved as major characters in the tragedies get to interact in this movie and express the emotions, heartbreak and slow-but-painful yet insufficient healing that is occurring, but needs to occur much more optimally, or may never happen, in the souls of the town and especially those of the parents and families of those killed.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/lessons-from-a-school-shooting-notes-from-dunblane/

Ah, now I get to share with you comments about what is always the best bet for the best show in the Hamptons International Film Festival: the children’s shorts program, this year entitled: ‘ZOOM! Shorts For All Ages’ – – if you appreciate animation…. ‘Bilby’ was my favorite. It takes place in the outback (e.g., Australia) and from start to finish is a magic delight. Confrontations with snakes and lizards and other predators takes place, as Bilby attempts to survive, additionally having to reluctantly accept helping a defenseless baby bird. Beautiful imaginative terrific cartooning. Actually, a CLASSIC!! that will never grow old. 8 perfect minutes of cinematic ecstasy!

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https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/bilby/

‘Elizabeth Sees’ is an animated Canadian short from the brilliant Val Magarian. Elizabeth is Val’s wise but blind aunt, whose life she documents with various types of imaging and artistically enhanced documentation. Music is lovely too. Highly recommended!!

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/elizabeth-sees/

‘Ian’ is about a physically challenged young boy who perseveres in the face of adversity. Lovely animation. Actually is about a real childhood friend of Argentinian director Abel Goldfarb, whom we get too see in real footage at the end of the film, smiling and optimistic.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/ian/

‘One Small Step’ was the audience award winning short about a young girl who dreams of becoming an astronaut, in spite of being female. Her father is fully supportive. Endearing story. Animation, I give it an eh, as it is done in that hackneyed cliche Japanese style. Uplifting. In this time of the woman aspiring to be treated with justice, dignity and equality.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/one-small-step/

‘Two Balloons’ is about two spaceships and love and two lemurs whose ships these are, that are trying to connect. Unique cartooning. American.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/two-balloons/

‘Starlight’ was about the weary old man who lights the stars at night. Depth of the images in a dark sky dimension is the main feature of the cartooning. 5 minutes/no dialogue.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/starlight/

‘Undiscovered’ – Sasquatch wants a picture of himself. Even he has vanity. Cartooning fair, with brown and pink darker coloration.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/undiscovered/

‘Two Medusas’ is about a high school Halloween costume contest, where our protagonist discovers that another girl is also going to be Medusa, just like she had decided to be, expecting to win. The confidence and doubt of contest competition plays out.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/two-medusas/

The Narrative Short Film Competition Program was not quite as good overall as the other shorts programs I attended, but it did have ‘Fence “Ghardi”‘ which won the Best Narrative Short Film Award. Set somewhere in Kosovo, a young boy is intrigued by a Roma boy and a dog that hang out outside the metal fence that surrounds his house that he has to climb through. His existence inside his home is shown to be quite frustrating, so we
often see him negotiate the athletic manuevers to scale that fence.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/fence/

‘Caroline’ is about three children whose single mother leaves them in a very hot car. 6-year-old Caroline, the eldest, has to become the leader of the trio, as concerned bystanders notice the endangered children, and are about to take appropriate action while the mother is missing. Takes place in Texas.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/caroline/

‘Feathers’ is shot in 5 chapters, about a boy growing up and anger. A peacock is featured in the most important scene. Quote from the film: “Don’t let anger confuse you.”

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/feathers/

FYI: winner of audience award for Best Narrative Film was ‘The Hate You Give” which is already released into the theaters of America. A movie about a young black couple in modern racist USA. Just as a technicality as an HIFF filmgoer for 20 years: this was a so-called ‘Spotlight Film’ which I usually do not attend because 1) these films are usually commercially released soon after (or even during or before) the festival, while the international and short and other films may be more difficult to ever see again;
2) Spotlight films cost $28 to attend, which is kind of a crazy price to pay to see a movie – other films and programs are $15 at HIFF.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/the-hate-u-give/

See reviews of films previously posted on Oct 4 and 5 for other great shorts you might want to see: especially ‘Provence,’ ‘Fauve’ and ‘Cross My Heart’ – all superb works you may enjoy on different levels depending on your preferences, ‘Provence’ being the most beautiful.

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I would like to also mention four other films that I wish to see, that I missed this time around:
‘The Happy Prince’ about Oscar Wilde;

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/the-happy-prince/

I heard that ‘Time For Ilhan’ was very good, about the first Somali Muslim woman to be elected to a legislative office in the USA.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/time-for-ilhan/

And one more, ‘The Biggest Little Farm’ winner Audience Award for Documentary Film. City chef moves north of Los Angeles to live a different life on a new patch of land.

https://filmguide.hamptonsfilmfest.org/films/the-biggest-little-farm/

See you later this year, when the world comes to the Hamptons again, cinematically…

(C) 2019   Claude Mayers