Notes on FFM 2008 (Montreal)

22-08-2008

Long awaited Montreal's largest film festival FFM's 32nd edition kicked off yesterday by hosting the world premiere of Christophe Barratier's Fauborg 36. Yet, as of today it has gone back to the regular screening schedule with more than 60 shows per day which were scattered into 11 theaters for the next 15 days. This year's program offers lots of enticing choices from all over the world along with special focus on Bavarian cinema and launchs homages to Soviet Musicals, Allan Judd Jr. and Tony Curtis. Also Brian de Palma will be conducting a master class at FFM 2008. First day has left me with mixed reactions. I started off with a wonderfully crafted and slow paced Russian film called Shultes (2008) and moved on to the opening film Fauborg 36's second screening and completed the round with Elioso Subiela's uninspiring and inept last No mires para abajo, and impressively-shot-yet-not-subtle-enough-hence-missing-something Swedish film Varg. Among all these, Shultes ranks at the top of my list for the first day and has remained so until the end of the festival. It sets in modern day Russia with a scrupulous focus on its lead character's Lesha Shultes' day to day petty criminal life. Shultes is a pickpocket and its the only thing he is doing for communicating with the world. He steals, involves in small robbery projects and returns home to look after his sick mom. Shultes' life is portrayed in such a mechanical manner that his emotions or human relationships are carefully kept in distance in order to underline the detachedness he is undergoing. By doing so, the film seems deliberately picking up a very controlled, slowly progressing pace to be in rhyme with the emotional state of its characters. Shultes' clockwork living is disrupted by 3 encounters and leads him to a revelation and self-realization.

Edit (1 month later)

I haven't had a chance to update my daily round-ups for individual films during the festival time but among the 30-35 films I have seen my list and ratings followed as such:

1) Shultes (Bakur Bakuradze, 2008, Russia) 9/10

Masterful conception and very moderate execution of its subject matter.

2) Sonbahar (Ozcan Alper, 2008, Turkey) 8.5/10

One of the most impressive debut of Turkish cinema in recent memory. Mostly composed of static long takes which eventually allows the camera to capture of an aftermath of a political turmoil worn through its character's meanderless meandering at Hopa's ravishing lanscape -a small town at the north-east border town of Turkey- upon his release from the prison due to the diagnosis in his lungs. The film by no means strikes and engrosses at every shot it progresses evoking a very personal touch on the issues regarding political alienation, homecoming and a parantheses of time in Turkish history.

3) Diorthosi (Thanos Anastopoulos, 2007, Greece) 8/10

Similar to Sonbahar, Diorthosi follows its character after his release from the prison. Almost clinical in its approach, Diorthosi successfully manages to devise examining the racist tensions, ethnical plummets and by masterfully focussing the character's daily routines and struggle to return what he left in contemporary Greece with a very refined and pondering cinematic examination. Thanos Anastopoulos has revealed a great deal of potential with his first film.

4) Der Rote Punkt (Marie Miyayama, 2008, Japan-Germany) 7/10

With a subject can easily be trapped into lots of indie gimmicks (such as the quest of identity, past), the film manages to hold up in a delicate balance between stylistic insights and solemn pace.

5) To Verdener (Niels Arden Oplev, 2008, Denmark) 7.5/10

6) Tatil Kitabi (Seyfi Teoman, 2008, Turkey) 7/10

7) Ping-pongkingen (Jens Jonsson, 2008, Sweden) 7/10

8) Golge (Mehmet Gureli, 2008, Turkey) 7/10

9) Parking (Chung Mong-Hong, 2008, Taiwan) 7.5/10

10) Nick of Time (Old Fish) (Gao Qunshu, 2008, China) 7.5/10

11) My Magic (Erik Khoo, 2008, Singapore) 6.5/10

12) Back Soon (Sólveig Anspach, 2008, Iceland) 6/10

13) Bitter&Twisted (Christopher Weekes, 2008, Australia) 5/10

14) 9 to 5- Days in Porn (Jens Hoffmann, 2008, Germany) 5/10

15) Cactus ( Jasmine Yuen-Carrucan, 2008, Ausralia) 7.5/10

16) La Extranjera (Fernando Diaz, 2008, Argentina) 6/10

17) Absurdistan (Veit Helmer, 2008, Germany-Khazakistan) ?/10

18) La Rabia (Albertina Carri, 2008, Argentina) 4.5/10

19) Satellites&Meteorites (Rick Larking, 2008, Ireland) ?/10

20) Die Welle (Dennis Gansel, 2008, Germany) 6/10

21) Vicky Cristina Barcelona (Woody Allen, 2008, USA) 7/10

22) Varg (Daniel Aldredson, 2008, Sweden-Norway-Finland) 6.5/10

23) No Mires Para Abajo (Eliseo Subiela, 2008, Argentina) ?/10

24) Fauborg 36 (Christophe Barratier, 2008, France) 6/10

25) Home (Ursula Meier, 2008, France) 7/10

26) Don't Think About the Monkeys (Yuri Mamin, 2008, Russia) ?/10

27) Nokta (Dervis Zaim, 2008, Turkey) 5.5/10

28) Died Young, Stayed Pretty (Eileen Yaghoobian, 2008, Canada) 6/10

29) Rusalka (Anna Melikyan, 2007, Russia) 5.5/10

30) I Epistrofi (Vassilis Douvlis, 2007, Greece) 6/10

31) Your Name Here (Matthew Wilder, 2008, USA) ?/10

32) Altromondo (Fabiomassimo Lozzi, 2008, Italy) ?/10

33) Maradona by Kustirica (Emir Kustirica, 2008, France-Spain) 5.5/10

tact and contact

"The "thinking thing" of modernity conceals a past still to be uncovered, in which the relations between cogitation and perception, thought and feeling, were not what they became, and in which sensation, the primary power of the tactile being, held the keys to the life of all beasts, no less the two-legged one who would raise himself above those around him." (p. 40-41 The Inner Touch, Daniel Heller-Roazen)