WI Film Fest "Report".

BMcCauley | 4/16/2007 9:50 pm | Cinematerial

So, being poor and busy, I only made it to two Film Festival films. And they were in the same place, MMoCA. On Saturday night, I saw Francois Dompierre's "All The Days Before Tomorrow". This film, about two friends who should definitely be more than just friends but aren't, is delivered in the flashback/flash-forward style that is so popular these days with the likes of Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu and Michel Gondry, both filmmakers that Francois Dompierre cited as influences in a fairly heavy French-Candadian accent during the Q and A session that followed the sold-out screening. This method of story-telling did not suit the film very well. It seemed to complicate a very simple narrative. But then again, why not? Right? But Dompierre certainly didn't try to justify this method, though everyone at the Q and A session seemed to be confused by the story. He even acknowledged that the story is confusing. So why deliberately use a confusing story-telling method for an otherwise conventional story? To add to an already problematic story there were these, I don't know what you'd call them, "dream" sequences, shot in black and white, featuring Richard Roundtree, in which the male lead discusses metaphysical issues. These segments didn't seem to have any place in the film. But I won't go on about the film. I haven't thought enough about it to make a cogent criticique, though its not a film that inspires much thinking. I did, however, find the Q and A session following the film illuminating. Dompierre, who seems like a very warm, intelligent person, spoke about the difficulties of selling an independent film without a star and his struggle to get the film made. That was worth the price of admission, even if the film wasn't, though I wouldn't be so quick to say that the film wasn't worth the price of admission. For all its problems, the film did have some quality naturalistic acting from its male lead, played by Joey Kern. His performance might also have been worth the price of admission. Hell, the performance of Alexandra Holden as Allison, the female lead, was also very good, but I just found her character, whom M. Dompierre said he based off a girl he fell in love with in real life, incredibly irritating. And I feel like that's important.

The other film I saw was Lars Von Trier's new one, "The Boss of It All". The atmosphere for this film was great. Another sold out show. I had to wait in line an hour to get tickets for this one, just as I did for "All the Days Before Tomorrow". I was ushered in by an adorable Film Festival volunteer to the very last seat in the house. I was grateful. The film was hilarious. About an actor hired to play the boss of a company run by a man too afraid to fess up that he's the actual boss, it was shot and edited in an incredibly haphazard style with tons of jump cuts and odd reframing, but the jokes, which centered around the actor's obession with Gambini, the cultural rift between Icelanders and Danes, and the cowardice of the actual boss, were incredible. I really enjoyed this one. And I've never heard an audience laugh so hard. I hear too that Von Trier used a new piece of camera equipment called Automavision which selects shots at random. It really showed. But I thought it added to the film. As Von Trier stated at the beginning of the film, he wanted no one reading into the film beyond its comedy. And there certainly will be no reading into Von Trier's shot selection.

I enjoyed my first Wisconsin Film Festival. It did wonders to the atmosphere here in Madison, with all of these people who don't set foot in downtown Madison showing up in their Sunday (and Friday and Saturday) bests.

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