Wellington Film festival — We Recommend…

God! Where to start? We’re about a third way through the pro­gramme & EVERYTHING so far looks like a must see. Kudos to Mr Gos­den & his team this year.

Dis­claimer: Our opin­ions are not infal­li­ble, we saw a promis­ing­ly enthralling doc­u­men­tary a few years ago called Hybrid… and it was lit­er­al­ly watch­ing corn grow… inter­spersed with the most bor­ing home movie com­men­tary… we’ll try to shield you from its ilk…

Then again, we have seen some won­der­ful films that did not sound at all promis­ing in the pro­gramme.

So… in no par­tic­u­lar order… lib­er­al­ly quot­ing with­out acknowl­edg­ment from the pro­gramme… what we’d see if we had unlim­it­ed time & mon­ey. You have our 100% guar­an­tee that you will like these movies… or we will call you a dum­b­ass.

Hid­den: Big French com­e­dy crowd pleas­er. Because it’s French, it’s “Art” right? This will be good. Also, it has two of the most ubiq­ui­tous, and charis­mat­ic French stars, Daniel Auteuil & Juli­ette Binoche.

Howl’s Mov­ing Cas­tle: Japan­ese Ani­me mae­stro Miyaza­ki Hayao takes on Dianne Wynne Jones chil­dren’s nov­el. Will be eye pop­ping­ly fam­i­ly friend­ly.

Rize: For fans of (and any­one curi­ous about) Krump­ing… a hip-hop dance sub­cul­ture.

The Child: Young man con­sid­ers sell­ing his baby on the black mar­ket. Expect har­row­ing thrills, heart-break & heart-warm­ing (guess­ing here), and superb act­ing.

The Lost World: Pre-King Kong stop motion dinosaur effects based on the Arthur Conan Doyle nov­el. Only frag­ments of this have exist­ed since short­ly after it was first released (long sto­ry). But this restored ver­sion is near­ly intact, as it first screened. With a live music orig­i­nal score from pianist Jan Pre­ston & sax­o­phon­ist Peter Boyd.

The 5000 Fin­gers of Dr T: We’ve actu­al­ly seen this… freaky-assed movie about a boy who hates his piano teacher. Screen­play by Dr Seuss. Pret­ty much what you’d imag­ine & more. Um… if ever there were a movie to legalise cannabis for.…

Bom­bon — El Per­ro: Heart­warm­ing sto­ry about a cur­mud­geon & his dog.

Lit­tle Sky: Heart­warm­ing & heart-break­ing sto­ry about a guy… and some­one else’s tod­dler (not in a dodgy sense, if you get my drift).

Rolling Fam­i­ly: Heart­wa… OK, we’ll stop say­ing that. Extend­ed fam­i­ly & their camper­van.

The World: Bei­jing glob­al-theme park & the denizens with­in. …go-get­ters, gang­sters, social climbers and sleaze­balls. But hey, that’s show-busi­ness.

36,quai des Orfevres: Daniel Auteuil & Ger­ard Depar­dieu (what sort of film fes­ti­val would it be with­out these two?) as vet­er­an cops vying for the same pro­mo­tion.

The Ax: Black com­e­dy about an unem­ployed cor­po­rate type who sees a niche in elim­i­nat­ing (lit­er­al­ly) his com­pe­ti­tion.

A Com­mon Thread: Chick flick involv­ing hand-weav­ing & embroi­dery. Expect it to be heart­wa… and visu­al­ly sump­tu­ous.

The Intrud­er: Claire Denis lat­est. French Art-house at it’s finest. Expect to be per­plexed about what’s going on (yes, this IS a rec­om­men­da­tion!)

Kings & Queen: French… tragi­com­e­dy, could­n’t make much sense of the pro­gramme notes in the quick scan I per­formed, but has Cather­ine Deneuve. So it must be good.

Look at Me: Con­tem­po­rary French cin­e­ma at its best. Who are we to argue? Young opera singer tries toescape the shad­ow of her super­star nov­el­ist father. Prob­a­bly very, very amus­ing.

2046: Two of our favourite beau­ti­ful peo­ple, Tony Leung & Mag­gie Che­ung (yes, they have both made movies with oth­er peo­ple) in Wong Kar Wai’s lat­est (If we read this cor­rect­ly, this is the sequel to his In the Mood for Love which also fea­tured these two). Also has hot­ties Zhang Ziyi, Gong Li, Cari­na Lau. Lucky Tony… HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!

Elec­tion: Mega-vio­lent tri­ad movie.

Hari Om: Light & live­ly Indi­an road movie. Looks great.

Tony Tak­i­tani: Adap­ta­tion of Haru­ki Murakami’s short sto­ry. Appar­ent­ly “stylised” isn’t a strong enough word…

3‑Iron: We’ve read about this… from the direc­tor of the beau­ti­ful Spring, Sum­mer, Fall, Win­ter… and Spring. A drifter breaks into hous­es, makes him­self at home, and then repairs the appli­ances & gen­er­al­ly makes things bet­ter than they were when he entered. Then he comes across an unhap­py wife in one of them…

Life is a Mir­a­cle: A cir­cus, a love-sick don­key, and a home made bear. Sounds like a John Irv­ing nov­el. But it’s actu­al­ly mad-cap sound­ing antics in war torn Bosnia. Real­ly.

The Sea Inside: This year’s Best For­eign Film Oscar win­ner. The true sto­ry of a Span­ish quadraplegic who fought the Span­ish gov­ern­ment for the right to end his life. Not near­ly as gru­elling as it sounds…

The Way­ward Cloud: At last! The Art-house sleaze! The sto­ry of a Taipei porn star which does­n’t sound very tit­il­lat­ing.

9 Songs: More Art-house sleaze! Michael Win­ter­bot­tom’s con­tro­ver­sial fea­ture about a love affair. Con­tro­ver­sial for the hard­core sex… but appar­ent­ly it’s ten­der, heart-warm­ing & all in the best pos­si­ble taste.

The Queen of She­ba’s Pearls: UK/Swedish sweet, com­ic hymn to post WWII Eng­lish­ness. A beau­ti­ful, mys­te­ri­ous for­eign­er (swedish) enters the lives of an Eng­lish fam­i­ly & she’s the dead ringer of their dead moth­er.

Yes: Sal­ly Pot­ter’s lat­est. Has Joan Allen in it as a mol­e­c­u­lar sci­en­tist so it must be good.

Palin­dromes: More Todd Solondz weird­ness about the ter­mi­nal­ly uncool in Amer­i­can sub­ur­bia.

Under­tow: Con­tem­po­rary South­ern Goth­ic movie thriller. We can’t resist them.

4: Right from the pro­gramme here: “The fer­al and the heavy metal­lic vie for dom­i­nance in this extra­or­di­nary assault on the sens­es, the year’s most trans­fix­ing­ly baf­fling movie — which among oth­er things, pur­ports to reveal the mean­ing­less­ness of the num­ber 4…” No need to read any more, We are SO there! Although we quite like “a howl­ing orgy of decrepi­tude and decay” also.

Home­grown — Works on Film & Home­grown — Works on Video: I mean… you HAVE to don’t you? Besides, these are always fas­ci­nat­ing & enter­tain­ing.

Kekex­ili — Moun­tain Patrol: Superbly pho­tographed eco­log­i­cal man­hunt movie.

Look Both Ways: Very fun­ny sound­ing Ock­er com­e­dy about an eter­nal pes­simist.

Me and You and Every­one We Know: We’ve read (good things) about this one too — true indie fea­ture about rela­tion­ships.

My Sum­mer of Love: And this one too. UK com­e­dy dra­ma about infat­u­a­tion. Sports great per­for­mances from its young cast, appar­ent­ly.

Whisky: The first Uruguayan sock fac­to­ry movie you have prob­a­bly ever seen.

Fic­tion Artists: One of those clever & hilar­i­ous com­pi­la­tions of clips from old movies, this time show­ing Hol­ly­wood’s depic­tion of the tor­tured artist.

Banana in a Nut­shell: We only heard the term ” “http://www.publicaddress.net/default,2017.sm#post2017”>Banana” recent­ly. And now here’s a film about one.

Dou­ble dare: A doc­u­men­tary about Xena’s stunt dou­ble, Zoe Bell. and vet­er­an stunt­woman, Jean­nie Epper.

Enron — The Smartest Guys In The Room: Yeah right.

Sedi­tion: The sup­pres­sion of dis­sent in NZ. Could be an eye open­er.

The Man from Laramie: We’ve seen this too. The great­est movie star ever, James Stew­art, search­es for the man who killed his borther in this lush west­ern direct­ed by Antho­ny Mann. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

East of Eden & Rebel With­out a Cause: Ever won­dered if james Dean could live up to the post-death hype? Won­der no more… check out the less­er known Nick Ray films too, they’re all going to be great.

Kung Fu Hus­tle: “Like a gonzo fusion of Taran­ti­no & Tex Avery” (Looney Toon mae­stro). Ultra­vi­o­lence. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

High Ten­sion: As the title sug­gests. A white knuck­le ride about a girl & her chain­saw. “One film you won’t want to take home to meet mum”.

Inside Deep Throat: Doc­u­men­tary sleaze, so that’s alright then!. It’s not about Water­gate.

Overnight: Doc­u­men­tary moral­i­ty tale about a blowhard who blew his big chance in Hol­ly­wood. You won’t feel sor­ry for him.

Because the Welling­ton­ists are such avid musos, we’ll also be going to ALL the musi­cal doc­u­men­taries… and there are sev­er­al, includ­ing: Sor­cer­ess of the New Piano; Touch the Sound; A Labyrinth of Time; Fall­en Angel — Gram Par­sons; Hank Williams — Honky Tonk Blues; The dev­il and Daniel John­ston; DIG!; Brasileir­in­ho; and Be Here To Love Me — A Film About Townes Van Zandt.

And that’s it! There are many more that we missed that you might quite like (in fact, enthu­si­as­tic word of mouth always fol­lows sev­er­al films we decide not to both­er with), so do check out the pro­gramme, and/or the web­site.