AFI Fest: Days Nine & Ten

With AFI Fest 2008 officially over, I've reviewed all of the important tent-poles of the festival. I'll conclude my coverage with capsules of the smaller films I saw on Days Nine and Ten, presented in alphabetical order. (Some will find their ways into theatres in 2009--look out for full reviews then.)

First, I'll link to my review of the final Centerpiece of the festival, Last Chance Harvey. Click here to read the piece over at the Bucket Reviews main site.

Adam Resurrected (dir. Paul Schrader, Germany/USA/Israel) - Last year, I defended Paul Schrader's much-maligned The Walker as an important work of political fiction, but I won't do the same for his latest abstract examination of social deviance, Adam Resurrected. As is his norm, the accomplished director gets a great performance out of his lead--this time Jeff Goldblum playing Adam, a Nazi-tortured former-circus-entertainer living out his later days in an Israeli mental hospital. But the movie sags on the whole--it's too broad and meandering in its metaphorical exploration of the sexual repression and violence related to the atrocities of World War II to achieve a lucid collective comment. For example, much of the film consists of Adam's horrible memories of serving as a dog (yes, literally) to a Nazi Officer (Willem Defoe), passages that serve nearly no purpose beyond simple shock-value in the end. Schrader's usual visual accomplishments are abundant, but don't expect to find anything satisfying in the way of a narrative. 1-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Kassim the Dream (dir. Kief Davidson, USA) - Documentarian Kief Davidson's latest spans two continents telling the amazing underdog story of boxer Kassim "The Dream" Ouma, who overcame a tragic youth as a child-soldier in Uganda to become the Junior Middleweight Champion of the World. The first half of the film examines Ouma's life story and success, and the latter follows his return to Uganda to reunite with his family after a long government ban. It's all amazing stuff on paper, but Kassim isn't that likable--he's a typical boxer, ego-obsessed and very into superficial hip-hop culture--making the doc tough to latch onto. Had Davidson taken a more critical attitude toward the material, delving into how the tragedies in Ouma's life affected his personality rather than interpreting them as unabashed tearjerker-material, then perhaps Ouma would've been a more fascinating (and in turn endearing) figure. As is, Kassim the Dream tells a remarkable life-story in an equally unremarkable way. 2-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Niloofar (dir. Sabine El Gameyel, France) - This tale of an Iraqi girl running from an arranged-marriage with an older man is interesting in that it fuses contemporary Middle East issues with an age-old story (and equally old-fashioned visual style), but the characters and performances aren't especially compelling. It's nice to see a filmmaker make the most out of simple storytelling techniques and at 82-minutes Niloofar is never a tedious sit, but the movie isn't distinguished enough for me to wholeheartedly recommend it. 2-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Playing Columbine (dir. Danny Ledonne, USA) - Danny Ledonne's controversial computer game "Super Columbine RPG Massacre!!!" doesn't strike me as the thought-provoking work of art he calls it in this ego-inflated "documentary" defense. Nor was there any point in Playing Columbine at which I was convinced that there was any reason for me to play a simulation as one of the gunman involved the most famous high-school shooting to date. But the film did get me thinking about the possibility for video-games to function as art--not just a source of recreation--and it features more than a few illuminating interviews. Ledonne's goal may have been self-promotion, but he nonetheless hits on several important points about what the gaming-industry has achieved so far and where it's headed in the future. 2-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Tulpan (dir. Sergei Dvortsevoy, Kazakhstan) - This ultra-naturalistic tale of a little-known culture does for Kazakhstan what The Story of the Weeping Camel did for Mongolia. Only problem is: if you're not particularly interested in what it's like to live as a Kazakhstani lamb farmer, then the experience will prove painful. The non-actor performances are good--if they can be considered "performances", that is--but they don't trump the tediousness of hearing a dying lamb squealing for 20 minutes in a semi-fictional movie that would've been more compelling had it been a straight-up Discovery Channel documentary. 1-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Worlds Apart (dir. Niels Arden Oplev, Denmark) - This indictment of the Jehovah's Witnesses Church in Denmark is just as culturally fascinating as it is involving on a human level. 17-year-old Sara (Rosalinde Mynster) finds she has differences with the Church and walks a defiant path toward excommunication when she falls in love with Teis (Jordan Philip Asbaek), an older guy who views Witnesses as brainwashed cult-members. Mynster is sympathetic and sexy in the vulnerable lead role and the film is never anything short of immersing. The movie admittedly runs into some problems in that Asbaek has a downright (unintentionally) creepy presence and Teis is definitely too old for Sara, making it tough f0r the viewer to accept him as a legitimate love-interest. But upon retrospect, these facts may actually enhance the movie's realism because, after all, much of the reason why Sara strays from her family and fellow Witnesses is that their strict culture causes her to want to rebel in a dramatic way, meaning she would find Teis' age and secular beliefs all the more attractive. If you don't know much about the focal religion and/or its prominence in the film's native country, prepare to be blindsided. 3-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

And that concludes my (belated) end coverage of this year's AFI Fest. See you next year.

AFI FEST 2008: Day Eight

As you've probably noticed, it's been three weeks since AFI Fest 2008 wrapped up and I haven't posted my coverage of the final weekend. The reason is simple: after the festival, there's not much incentive for me to publish reviews of the selections right away. The films I saw, with a few exceptions, aren't coming to theatres for a couple of months. Given that the reasons to post festival coverage in real-time are to give readers tips and hints about what to see at the festival and to promote the fest, I haven't seen much of a point in putting up formal coverage rather than simply reviewing the films when they are released.

But I have written short blurbs on the movies I haven't covered, and given the substantial amount of e-mails I've received requesting that I finish my coverage, I've decided to put them up. Look out for capsules on Worlds Apart, Playing Columbine, Kassim the Dream, Last Chance Harvey (full review), Adam Resurrected, Tulpan, and Niloofar coming sometime next week.

For now, I've reviewed Day Eight's selections:

First up on Day Eight was Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden's baseball drama, Sugar, which serves as further evidence (after 2006's Half Nelson) of the filmmaker-duo's skillful ability to take old-fashioned premises and turn them into piercing, unconventional character studies.

Here, Fleck and Boden's subject is Miguel "Sugar" Santos (Algenis Perez Soto), a young baseball player nicknamed by his teammates for his sweet tooth. Early on in the film, Miguel and two other players are recruited from their Dominican Republic training-camp to play minor-league ball for an Iowa-based team. What immediately follows is a traditional (but totally pleasing) examination of culture-shock as Miguel moves from the Caribbean to the Midwest, but Fleck and Boden only use this setup as an easy way to gain viewers' sympathy for the character before taking a deeper approach. The audience initially bonds with Miguel in the way they would a typical underdog athlete, perhaps even more than they usually would due to the "stranger in a strange land"-element. It's hard not to develop a love for the guy when he walks into a distinctly American diner, for instance, and tries to order eggs, only to discouragingly concede defeat and ask for his usual French toast when his English isn't good enough to tell the waitress how he would like them cooked. (This, of course, is followed by the token pay-off scene in which she brings him all three types and he eagerly learns how to pronounce the terms "scrambled," "over easy," and "sunny-side up.")

But Sugar quickly becomes all but you're average baseball film, studying a young man who has come to the Land of Opportunity with few resources beyond baseball, a game that allows very few potential players prosperous futures. Fleck best expressed the feeling that dominates Sugar's second-half in the Q&A following the screening: "It's clear the movie won't end with Miguel playing his first game at Yankee Stadium." The story isn't so much a knock on the idea of the American Dream as it is a realistic look at how many Dominican boys are brought up with dreams of playing baseball and how few actually end up like Sammy Sosa. Boden and Fleck explore what happens to those who don't make it to the Majors through their fictional protagonist, and the results are just as interesting on a human level as they are as a fact-based look at a sport. Miguel remains an endearing protagonist throughout--and at a far deeper level than the film's initial set-up leads us to expect. By the end of the film, he's become a complex man (I'll leave it at that in an effort to not give too much away).

Just as critical to the Miguel character as Boden and Fleck's assured writing and direction is Algenis Perez Soto's performance. A non-actor the filmmakers found playing baseball in the D.R., Soto is a natural, handling the comedic and dramatic material concerning his character's misadventures in America just as well as he does the baseball passages. Boden and Fleck were right to choose him because his work lends a fresh, unpretentious feel you can't get from someone who has the expressed intent of studying a character. Sugar never comes across so naturalistically that it imitates a documentary--that would defeat the movie's purpose of toying with the payoff of a traditional premise--but it certainly seems realistic. In fact, the only time the movie feels forced is when Fleck and Boden interject with attempts to artificially relitivize the material. In one scene, a Barack Obama magnet appears on Miguel's Iowa caretakers' refrigerator--totally unnecessary, if prophetic--and in another Spike Lee's Katrina doc When the Levees Broke plays on the TV in the background. Sugar would have been better off without these gratuitous additions: it is otherwise a heartfelt, sharply focused, and thought-provoking look at a person who even die-hard baseball fans may have never even considered. 3-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

Finishing off the day was the AFI's excellent tribute to Danny Boyle, which concluded with a screening of his latest film, Slumdog Millionaire. Click here to read my praise-filled review on the Bucket Reviews main site.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Seven

I approached Day Seven of AFI Fest feeling fresh and ready to go after having skipped two days to watch the election unfold. What a fitting way, I thought, to see two films that received solid reputations and strong buzz out of other festivals. The result, once again, was that one fell short of expectations and one lived up to them.

Ji-woon Kim’s The Good, the Bad, and the Weird is a lively throwback to Sergio Leone Westerns—hence the title spin-off—and early martial-arts films. The movie is beautifully photographed and boasts an invigorating sense of adrenaline, but it’s also totally disposable. Given its outrageous-seeming 130 minute-running-time, I am tempted to say that many of The Good, the Bad, and the Weird’s problems that stem from a lack of substance could have been solved had director Kim and editor Nam Na-Young chopped it down by 45 minutes. But never once during the film did I feel as though I was bored—in fact, my senses were challenged with incredible “how did they do that?” imagery every step of the way—so I can’t say that the length was an issue. Instead, I think Kim has attempted to make the type of pulpy, substance-less action-film that only works when the director’s name starts with Quen- and ends with –tin Tarantino.

The premise is even simpler than that of the usual Tarantino film: a mysterious map is being carried and dozens of assassins are vying to steal it because of the treasure it may lead to. The competition is eventually whittled down to three, as you may have guessed: the good guy, the bad guy, and the weird guy. Lots of sweeping shots ensue. There’s a breathtaking sequence early on in which map-hunters are violently knocked off by each other, one at a time. There’s another particularly striking scene that results from a prominent character being kidnapped. Notice that I’m trying to keep the details to a minimum. Truth is: if I were to describe the best scenes in The Good, the Bad, and the Weird, then I would be robbing potential viewers of most of the movie’s charms, which are purely visual in nature. Without its images and its energy, the movie would be nothing. Whereas Tarantino’s Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction achieved substantial heft through well-written dialogue and cultural-commentary, Kim’s effort can only boast pretty pictures. Ultimately, The Good, the Bad, and the Weird, while not without its charms and entertainment-value, is only a motion picture in that indeed consists of moving pictures. 2 Buckets out of 4.

Next up was something much better.

While writer/director James Gray’s knack for crafting distinct moods and tones was readily apparent in last year’s We Own the Night, I would’ve never guessed from watching that dirty-cop flick that Two Lovers would be the poignant experience that it is. Told from the distant, yet still intimate perspective of the introverted, yet still charismatic Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix), who rebounds from a failed engagement by falling in love with two different women (Gwyneth Paltrow and Vinessa Shaw), the movie is erotic and unpredictable—often at the same time.

The titular lovers that Leonard finds himself almost uncontrollably pursuing couldn’t be more different: Sandra (Shaw) is the daughter of a Jewish businessman working to merge his dry-cleaning company with Leonard’s father’s and Michelle (Paltrow) is the drug-addled upstairs-neighbor who’s dating a married corporate-hack but has a subconscious need for chaos that drives her to Leonard. Leonard is trapped in the middle of the two, still not fully recovered from his failed previous relationship and thus allowing the whims of the two women—Sandra is obsessed with him and Michelle texts him late at night when she feels lustful—to influence his own. And despite the fact that Leonard is rather reserved through it all, the viewer feels a deep bond with him – his frustration, his passion, his confusion, his regret, his longing. All the while, he experiences a quietly complex relationship with his parents (Moni Moshonov and Isabella Rossellini), who are the ones who first introduce him to Sandra and would like to see him marry her but silently realize that Michelle is electrifying his existence.

Much of the movie’s poignancy rests in the performances of Phoenix, who crafts a multi-dimensional man out of a sparingly written character, and Paltrow and Shaw, both of whom lure the viewer in just as they do Leonard. But all of the emotions are anchored by Gray’s deft direction. Structurally, Two Lovers is more complex than its simple love-triangle might let on; each time Leonard shifts back and forth between the two women, substantive character-development is achieved. The structure also maintains a sense of suspense that enhances the story: because the viewer doesn’t know which of the two Leonard will ultimately be with—if he ends up with anyone at all—they are able to feel the frustration and passion involved in his constantly switching mindset. Gray also deserves credit for co-writing the movie’s screenplay with Ric Menello, but it’s the way that Two Lovers is assembled that makes it the stirring picture it is. Great acting and filmmaking make this one a must-see. 3-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Nine, Part 1

I'm almost caught up on festival coverage--only Days Seven and Eight to go--but before I do that, I'd like to highlight yet another film I saw in advance of the festival that has its premiere tonight. What makes this one different from the pack? It's free to attend.

Rest assured: that The World We Want is showing for free is not a reflection of its quality. This is a cleverly-structured and eye-opening (if not enlightening) documentary on the various problems the world faces, always involving and never preachy.

The movie works well because it's told from the perspective of teenagers trying to tackle world-problems through a universal school project. In the project, 14-to-16-year-old students work to enact solutions for problems plaguing their local communities. Director Patrick Davidson and crew follow the finalists of the project, who will share their work in Washington D.C. and be judged for a winning-prize. Some particularly memorable examples include Americans who try to rid school lunches of saturated fats, Russians who talk to government officials to ban casinos in Samara, Indians who work to preserve and light tourist-attraction landmarks near their school, and Indonesians who protest the harsh taxation of local silversmiths.

From the teenager's point of view, all of these issues are boiled down to the essentials and, as a result, earn the viewer's sympathies easily. And to see young people attempting to enact reform on, say, mob-controlled casinos or taxation of silversmiths, is something remarkable. The audience learns about some little-known local problems and becomes involved in the cast of characters working to solve them in the process.

The picture also functions as a nice travelogue, with the filmmakers not only visiting finalists in the aforementioned countries, but also those in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Colombia, Jordan, and Senegal. The photography is surpisingly aesthetically-pleasing given that the movie was shot on an HD-camera for what was presumably a shoestring budget. And it's all well-assmbled by director Davidson, who brings both heart and awareness to the issues. 3 Buckets out of 4; screens tonight, Sat., Nov. 8 at the Mann Chinese 6 at 7 p.m.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Four, Part 2

Day Five of AFI Fest 2008 represented a new opportunity at the festival for me: the ability to see films on weekdays. Last year, I was still going to school full-time in San Diego, so I was only able to catch weekend programming. While I would not take advantage of Tuesday or Wednesday’s line-ups due to my fixation on the presidential election, it was nice to be able to see a few selections on Monday and Thursday.

The day before a black man would become the President elect of the United States, I saw Anthony Fabian’s Skin, the true story of a South African woman named Sandra Liang (Sophie Okonedo) who was denied the rights her white parents and brother enjoyed because she was born with brown skin acquired from generations-old genes. Think of the opposite of the Anthony Hopkins character in The Human Stain, only living in a culture where being black meant being oppressed.

The most interesting part of Skin is not the rare genetic inheritance that long pained the life of its protagonist. Instead, it’s how the people around Sandra respond to her skin color. After a short flash-forward in time, the viewer is first introduced to Sandra when she is a young girl (played by Ella Ramangwane). Her parents are enrolling her in the same whites-only school as her older brother. Sandra is allowed to attend despite an apprehensive administration, but she is soon kicked out when a racist teacher makes up a reason to beat and boot her, causing her father (Sam Neill) to engage in battle with the government over her official race. One would think he’d become a tolerant guy because of the ensuing hardships, but he doesn’t at all. When Sandra begins to date his general store’s black supplier, her father immediately tries to end it because of the man’s race. In other words: he thinks it’s a-OK to persecute blacks, just not his black-appearing daughter because she has white parents. And the chaos doesn’t stop there. After Sandra marries the man and shuns her family as a result, he turns out to be abusive, suggesting that she was subconsciously attracted to him because he possessed the very same tragically violent qualities embodied by her father.

While Skin tells a remarkable story drenched in painstaking themes about fate, it isn’t a remarkable film. This is primarily because storywriter/director Anthony Fabian sticks to a rote approach to his narrative. He embraces Hollywood Style to an unhealthy extent in that the film becomes stuck in the standard “true-story” mold and the characters are never explored in detail on stylistic or thematic levels. Fabian clearly chose a simple structure so that he could convey the true story factually—when introducing the film, he made sure to point out everything onscreen was true—but in doing so he robbed Skin of its emotional authenticity. In other words, Fabian invested so much of his attention in sticking to the facts that he didn’t have any time to flesh out his characters emotionally, meaning that they are not in fact entirely honest representations of real people because they do not reflect many of the emotions essential to the story. Had Fabian allowed his actors to reach a little bit more in their work—perhaps embellishing a bit, but discovering greater truths in the process—Skin would’ve been a better movie. (Given Sophie Okenedo’s previous performances, we all know that she especially could’ve turned a good lead performance into a tour-de-force had the movie’s style and structure provided her more room to roam.)

Alas, Skin is a lot like many of the other films that have been made about the human tragedies committed in Africa’s recent history, certainly not as inspired as the memorable ones. Viewers interested in the general subject-matter will do far better renting the Okonedo-starrer Hotel Rwanda or the also-South Africa-based Tsotsi instead.

2-1/2 Buckets out of 4.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Three

After enduring a pretty mediocre session of movie-going for Day Two of this year's AFI Fest, I hoped the festival would redeem itself on Day Three. After the first of two movies I saw, I thought it would. After the second, I was not as enthusiastic about the notion.

I'll start with the good...

Last year, I saw the Palme d'Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days at AFI Fest and it ended up as my favorite film of 2007. That experience alone boosted my expectations for The Class, this year's recipient of the prestigious award, to insurmountable heights.

The Class certainly isn't as good as its Romanian abortion-drama predecessor, but few films are. Rest assured: this picture is an intense, involving exercise in cinema verite with terrific performances and thought-provoking social commentary. It is deserving of its already-stellar reputation.

The premise is simple: François (François Bégaudeau, playing himself in a screenplay he co-adapted from a book he wrote) is a teacher at a public high-school outside Paris that is full of troubled students, nearly all of whom are the children of immigrants or immigrants themselves. The film takes place over a year and chronicles the daily problems of his François' French class, which is so rowdy and unfocused due to its members' conflicting ethnicities and hardship-filled home-lives that it rarely proves able of cracking a book for more than 10 minutes at a time.

While the story may seem dull on paper, it is riveting on film. In the vein of the nouvelle vague filmmakers that put his country on the map in the 1950s and '60s, director Laurent Cantet employs a minimalistic fly-on-the-wall approach, capturing the raw intensity of the situations that arise with bare finesse. François' class is tested repeatedly: one boy misbehaves repeatedly but the school is afraid to punish him because his father will send him back to his African homeland if he is expelled, two girls sit in on the grading-process as student representatives (common in France) and then inappropriately gossip about the dismissive things teachers say about certain students, François gets so flustered he calls said girls "skanks," et cetera. All the while, Cantet never tries to provide easy relief for his audience; he is committed to making viewers feel the conflict in plot-points.

Cantet's approach does particular justice to two of the film's main goals. Firstly, it serves as a testament to just how enormous the problem that François and the other teachers in the school face is. This is a big issue in France's political decisions right now, especially with a record-high immigrant-population, and the film's intense depiction of its severity very well may impact future legislative decisions made. Secondly, said intensity highlights how good Bégaudeau is his (apparently very personal) role. There's a moment in which he merely sits and thinks after a stubborn and frustrating after-class conversation with a student who isn't applying herself like she used to that is one of the most powerful silent-scenes I've seen in any film all year.

The Class will not only be of interest to the French; adventurous American moviegoers will find plenty to latch onto as well. The movie doesn't lack anything that a good domestic inspirational-teacher movie like Freedom Writers boasts; the themes about the uniqueness of teacher-student relationships, finding one's identity in adolescence, and using education to escape from real-world problems are all present, just not as obvious or as preachy. (This is a good thing, in my view.) The Class essentially tells a familiar story, but it does so exceptionally by stripping style down to the essentials and crating thoughtful socio-political messages. Cheers to Cantet, Bégaudeau, and co-writer Robin Campillo for making a movie that is both intelligent and entertaining. 3-1/2 Buckets out of four; screens again Sat., Nov. 8 at 10 p.m.

I'm unwilling to spend nearly as much time talking about Hunger, British videographer Steve McQueen's film debut about imprisoned Irish Republican Bobby Sands' (Michael Fassbender) fatal will-power during the 1981 IRA Hunger Strike.

Hunger isn't too concerned with the historical details of the strike: Sands is provided four long takes (two of which go on for so long they'll undoubtedly be praised by film-school students even though McQueen merely employs a stationary camera) to explain the cause and his passion for it to a priest. These aren't really involving on a content-level; they are only engrossing in that they prove actor Fassbender is a more skilled thespian than his performance in 300 led us to believe. Fassbender is able to command the screen for long stretches of time, meaning he was probably once a stage actor. Keep an eye out for his name in the future.

But the rest of the movie consists almost exclusively of a bunch of shots of Sands' body as he grows progressively weaker from not eating. It's a painful and tedious experience... and not in the way McQueen wants it to be. The fact that he puts the viewer through hell proves nothing because it doesn't lend to an enhancement of the narrative. In fact, more times than not, it feels like McQueen is indulging in brutal imagery because it looks cool--he sure likes extreme close-ups of flesh--not because it portrays a hunger-strike experience in a painfully authentic manner. I tired of the experience very early on because it didn't teach me anything valuable and there was no reason for me to be taking part in it. 1 Bucket out of 4.

AFI Fest 2008: Fast Forward--Day Six

I'm zoomin' back and forth in time on these festival-posts to a near-incomprehensible extent, aren't I? Such is the problem I face in trying to cover current programming that I saw early before I fully catch up with past reviews.

So for those of you who haven't done the math: I've posted all of Day One and Day Two, none of Day Three, some of Day Four, and now Day Six. (I didn't attend Day Five because my eyes were fixed on the election and because only a few low-profile features were scheduled because programmers knew there would be quite a few in my position.)

But I digress. I wanted to cover a film playing tonight before it screens. It's called A Good Day to be Black & Sexy and, no, it has nothing to do with Barack Obama.

The film was written and directed by first-timer Dennis Dortch and consists of five short segments, linked by common themes about African-American sexual relationships in modern America. There's a woman who refuses to reciprocate oral sex when her husband gives it to her, another who is frustrated by her married boyfriend's lack of commitment, a first-generation Asian-American who's scared to tell her family she has a black partner, et cetera et cetera.

A Good Day to be Black & Sexy is effective for about a half an hour--around two segments worth--but it wears out its welcome quickly and becomes episodic. African-American audiences may enjoy the movie more than I did because it was made with them in mind--think Tyler Perry with less religion and more sex--but that doesn't excuse the fact that it's a decidedly mediocre effort. Dortch may be on to something --the multi-story structure admittedly suits his style well--but it's not hugely apparent in the final cut. And not a single performance in the picture stands out as being particularly inspired. Count it a missed opportunity. 2 Buckets out of 4.

A Good Day to be Black & Sexy screens tonight, Weds., Nov 5. at 7 p.m. and Fri., Nov. 7 at 12:45 p.m.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Two, Part 2

Whewwwf. Can you believe it's Wednesday already? I certainly can't... and I don't want it to be, either. Not just because my candidate in yesterday's political horse-race lost, but also because I'm three days behind in my coverage of AFI Fest. Yikes indeed. But no matter. Some of the films I saw over the weekend that I haven't yet written about still have showings left at the festival and many will see theatrical release in near future, so my reviews are no less valuable now than they were a couple days ago.

Turning the time-clock back to Saturday...

Bent Hamer's O' Horten meanders in ways that only a Scandinavian dramedy is capable of. This Norwegian-import very muchwas made in the vein of the work of neighboring-Finlander Aki Kaurismaki, but its attempts at subtle dark comedy and quiet emotional resonance are futile compared to those of the veteran filmmaker. The picture is deliberately anti-narrative, reveling in wide-shots of starkly beautiful ice-filled landscapes set to Kaada's transfixing original score, until it reaches a dreamlike final act in which its newly-retired train-engineer protagonist Odd Horton (Baard Owe) stumbles upon an unlikely friendship (or something like it) late one night in a smoke-shop. Ultimately, the experience doesn't quite gel together, making the viewer wish writer/director Hamer had stuck to the simple and enjoyable wonders of the opening acts and not gone for the opaque whimsy that he does at the end. The film's conclusion is unrewarding because its adherence to the abstract fails to rationalize what has come before it in a moving way, as an unexpectedly logical one may have. Alas, O'Horten feels plodding and a bit empty on the whole, which is a shame given that Owe is terrific in the lead role and the film boasts good production values. 2 Buckets out of 4.

Viewers seeking a more realistic experience should look no further than Olivier Assayas' Summer Hours, an engrossing French drama about grown siblings (Juliette Binoche, Jérémie Renier, and Charles Berling) coping with the loss of their mother by considering the future of their ownership of the home she lived in. Note that I wrote "engrossing" and not "emotional." Summer Hours lacks poignancy because the characters are not relatable everyday people ; they make up the typical elitist, artsy-fartsy French crowd. In one scene, a character resents the decision that the siblings made to give away certain famous art-pieces in the home, a feeling that present financially-burdened moviegoers (at least in the U.S.) will find to be a bit distant from their sympathies. Nonetheless, Summer Hours finds exceptional authenticity in the way the siblings interact regarding the home, which they grew up in and spent countless hours enjoying over summers with their children. Two of them could care less about the house--it holds sentimental value, but this value is less desirable to them than the money they'll bank from selling it--and one sees the need to keep it to stay true to his mother. In this very conflict, Assayas engages in seamless character-development, showing how these people have grown over the years and have become who they are today. There isn't a whiff of sentimentality or manipulation to be found in the exercise, either. While I may not have left Summer Hours touched, there's no reason I should have. This is a movie about families that strives for so much more than the typical teary-eyed melodrama. There was simply no reason for Assayas to explore cliches here because they wouldn't have added anything to the story, and that he realized this is a testament to his measured judgment as a filmmaker. (No, I wouldn't say the same thing about Demonlover, just in case it was bothering you.) Keep an eye out for this film; it's worth seeing. 3 Buckets out of 4; screens again tonight, Weds., Nov. 5 at 7 p.m.

And then there was the big Centerpiece Gala of the night, the first of three during the festival (The Wrestler and Last Chance Harvey are both slated for later this week.)

It's hard to discuss my thoughts on Steven Soderbergh's 4-1/2 hour epic, Che, within the confines of a short 'blog entry, nor to I have any aspirations to. This is mainly because the movie boasts none of the standard markings of a sprawling opus; instead, it's almost exclusively strung together by minor moments. If you were wondering what Che Guevara, the man who is equally praised by leftists for being a heroic revolutionary as he is condemned by moderates and conservatives for being responsible for dozens of brutal murders, was like on a human-level when he camped out before skirmishes in his revolutions in Cuba and Bolivia, then this is the movie for you (or at least Soderbergh thinks it is).

What I found most interesting about Che is how differently I reacted to its two parts. (It was logically split in two primarily for commercial reasons, but there were some artistic differences between the parts like theatrical aspect ratio.) Part one covers Guevara's participation in the Cuban Revolution, from the battles he fought to his relationship with Fidel Castro to the communist principles that led him to participate. It succeeds as a straightforward war film with a uniquely intimate scope, primarily because Soderbergh adheres to detail and doesn't over-glamorize Che. (No, Soderbergh doesn't depict him for the murderer he was, but given the movie is told from Che's emotional-perspective, this is forgivable). The cinematography is sweeping, especially when one considers how good it looks for something shot on digital. And Benicio Del Toro just flat-out disappears into the role of Che, instantly sucking the viewer in.

Part two of the film, on the other hand, is pretty awful. It moves with the pace of molasses, covering the "quieter" moments of Che's attempted overthrow of the Bolivian government years after his efforts in Cuba became infamous. I don't have any problem with this approach in and of itself--in fact, I think Soderbergh's refusal to go for a traditionally epic approach was noble and lends admirable intimacy to the material--but it doesn't work overall because Peter Buchman and Benjamin A. van der Veen's script contains few interesting insights on Che himself. The result is a 2+ hour saga that delves into a completely empty version of a man's psyche. And the final scenes absolutely glamorize Che in an inappropriate manner, with sympathetic POV photography that is as morally-repugnant as it is aesthetically-beautiful. Yes, Del Toro remains as good in part two as he is in part one--I don't believe there was any lapse between the parts in filming, so any difference in the quality of his performance would have been unexpected--but this can't save what becomes a yawn-inducing and arguably offensive finish to what begins as a pretty good movie. What a shame. 2 Buckets out of 4 (part one: 3, part two: 1 1/2); opens in limited release and on IFC VideoOnDemand on Dec. 12.

That's all I've got for Saturday. I caught three movies on Sunday and Monday and will report back soon on those, as well as the 13 others I plan to catch between now and the end of the festival.

AFI Fest 2008: Fast Forward--Day Four, Part 1

First, I must address the obvious question: why has festival coverage shifted from Day Two, Part 1 to Day Four, Part 1? Aren't 'ya skipping Part 2 of Day Two and all of Day Three, Danny?

The answer: yes, you are correct. But not to worry -- the abrupt shift only comes because I have not yet had time to write about my screenings on Days Two and Three (watch for those posts to come late tonight and around midday tomorrow) but want to make sure you are all aware of the big film playing today (Day Four), hence the lack of chronology.

Actually, you're all probably quite aware The Brothers Bloom, directed by Rian Johnson ofBrick fame and starring Mark Ruffalo, Adrien Brody, and Rachel Weisz. It was a big deal at Toronto and it will be very admired in circles when it's released for mass-consumption this January.

I had a chance to see the movie back in late-September at the San Diego Film Festival and, while I don't think it's a masterpiece, I'm definitely fond of the movie. Spinning an imaginative yarn about con-men brothers (Ruffalo and Brody) whose perfect conning record is threatened when they try to pull a fast-one on a charmer who is as rich as she is clumsy (Weisz), Johnson paints a colorful and captivating tale that will remind many viewers of Tim Burton's films. (His work is a lot more inspired here than it was in the overrated Brick, by the way.) And Weisz is absolutely scene-stealing and joyful and grabbing and and...*deep breath* the picture's worth seeing just for her performance. So what are you waiting for? There's still time to head over to the ArcLightand hop into the rush-line--fingers-crossed you'll make it in--for tonight's sold-out show. 3 Buckets out of 4.

The Brothers Bloom screens tonight, Nov. 3 at 7 p.m. and Sat., Nov. 8 at 3:15 p.m.

AFI Fest 2008: Day Two, Part 1

Before covering the three films I saw on Day Two of AFI Fest--those reviews won't come until later as I have limited time before screenings begin today--I'd like to cover the big movie showing tonight at the festival, which I had a chance to see at a press screening.

Arnaud Desplechin's A Christmas Tale is a movie that will have hardcore art-film enthusiasts raving and everybody else snoozing. Yes, it's true that the movie is pretty darn amazing on a technical level: it tells the story of an extended-family of 15 gathering over Christmas and never loses sight of a single character. Every persona is well-developed and, indeed, the viewer feels like they know each of them. Ice the cake with some lovely cinematography courtesy of veteran Eric Gautier and you've got yourself what would seem like a masterpiece on the surface.

And yet A Christmas Tale is no masterpiece. In fact, it may not even be a good movie. The reason is simple: however well-constructed its characters and situations are, they never connect with the audience on an emotional level. Desplechin's work is so technically competent that it practically begs to be viewed as an exercise rather than the deeply poignant experience that it should be. There is a sense that the filmmaker loses touch with his characters by overanalyzing them; they should be rough around the edges but the film's execution doesn't allow for this.

Desplechin's harmful overzealousness in A Christmas Tale does not just show in the fact that he spends a lot of time indulging in each of his characters. It also rears its ugly head when he structurally implies up-front that the experience will be an greatly emotional one. Desplechin inserts all of the film's conflicts and dramatic meat into the first act of the movie--we learn right away that the family's matriarch, Junon (Catherine Denuve), has been diagnosed with terminal leukemia; that she lost a 7-year-old son decades ago, likely because she passed the disease on; that her next-eldest son, Ivan (Melvil Poupard), became her favorite because he took the deceased's place; and that her youngest, Henri (Mathieu Amalric), will soon be giving her a bone-marrow transplant despite being banished from the family in a legal-agreement by her depressed daughter, Elizabeth (Anne Consigny)--to show that he's going to use the rest of the movie to work on emotional-development. (If that sentence seemed long and complicated, then this movie, which plays like 25 of them strung together, isn't for you.) Oh, and don't forget that A Christmas Tale is indeed about its titular holiday, meaning its frontloaded structure suggests a genre-defying movie in and of itself because, after all, when was the last time you saw a Christmas movie about character-development?

The above represents precisely the irony of A Christmas Tale: it focuses so much on developing its characters and yet the characters never once move the audience. Part of this is because they collectively represent a dysfunctional family and dysfunctional families are rarely involving unless their antics are neurotically funny (forget about touching). But a lot of it is because Desplechin just wants the film to be perfect, which is the antithesis of what his characters are. They should be a family of humans experiencing authentic problems as they come together to celebrate a holiday; instead, they're pawns in an artistically-drunken Christmas movie that wants to make sure you know it's not like the rest of its kind. The result is a motion picture that will leave most viewers yawning well before its cumbersome 152 minutes have passed. 2 Buckets out of 4.

A Christmas Tale screens tonight at 6:45 p.m. with a Tribute to Arnaud Desplechin and again on Fri., Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m. at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

AFI Fest 2008: Day One

2008's AFI Fest not only represents my second time attending the festival, but my first anniversary of living in Los Angeles. One year ago, I moved into a tiny studio on the fifteeth floor of a monstrous Downtown high-rise... and I'm thankfully still here to talk about it today. While the smog, traffic, and hoards of Angelenos on city-streets can make L.A. a tasking place at times--I often escape back down to suburban San Diego for some peace and quiet on the weekends--I also owe it a great deal of respect. I can confidently say that, if not for L.A., my writing would be weaker and my access to films would be far more limited than they are now.

Last year, I began my festival with Chang-dong Lee's Secret Sunshine, a terrific drama/whodunnit that still hasn't seen U.S. release. Make sure to keep watching for it. This year, I decided to start my festival with another Korean film called The Chaser, directed by first-timer Hong-jin Na. I didn't expect much walking into the theatre because I hadn't heard anything about the movie, but I was soon taken by complete surprise when I learned in the programmer's introduction that it competed for this year's Palme d'Or at Cannes. When the movie came up on the screen, I was blind-sided once again. From the first ten minutes, I could tell that it would be one of the most stylistically-enriching exercises in pulp since the one Quentin Tarantino provided us with fourteen years ago.

The Chaser tells the story of a psychotic killer not unlike those in the Saw and Hostel series, who takes prostitutes back to his home only to mame and kill them. The movie isn't your standard torture-porn flick, though; in fact, folks like Eli Roth really should watch it to learn a thing or two from Na's refreshing debut. The story-web cast is complex.

Young-min Jee (Jung-woo Ha) is a regular client of Joong-ho Eom (Yun-seok Kim), an ex-cop-turned-pimp whose call-girls seem to be disappearing on him by the second. Young-min has been killing them, but Joong-ho doesn't realize that the two who have gone missing were both with Young-min until after he dispatches Mi-jin Kim (Yeong-hi Seo) to Young-min's home. Joong-ho thinks Young-min is selling the girls into sex-slavery, which, as he pieces together as the movie goes on, would be a far better fate than the torturous one they're actually suffering. Joong-ho chases Young-min throughout the movie, even catching him very early on only to see a beaureocratic police-force release him because they have no evidence to hold him on. Complicated situations ensue with Mi-jin's single-digit-aged daughter and Joong-ho's assistant (who he calls "Meathead") along for the ride.

The Chaser revels in socio-political commentary on the state of the South Korean police, stomach-churning violence that serves a far greater purpose than it does in the Saw series, well-paced chase scenes with stunning cinematography, a Shakesperean tone of unescapable dread, and the feeling that it is the work of the next great Asian action director. It has its problems, yes, running for about a half-hour too long at 125 minutes, but theyare negligible when one considers what a find it is. I can't think of a better movie I could've seen this Halloween. 3-1/2 Buckets out of 4; screens again Thursday, Nov. 6 at 12:30 p.m.

Also on my list of films to cover today is Margarita Jimeno's Gogol Bordello Nonstop, a documentary delving into the history of the titular gypsy-punk band that has its premiere at the festival tonight. I'm not familiar with the band's music beyond the songs used for film-soundtracks (Everything is Illuminated) or its members beyond the fact that they all appear in Madonna's new bomb of a directing-debut Filth and Wisdom, which explains why I found the doc pretty uninteresting. Beyond familiarizing the viewer with the paradox that is gypsy-punk, Jimeno doesn't delve into anything profound about the band's origins or its purpose, nor does she allow time for any long-passages of concert-footage (I'll admit the music is catchy--"Start wearin' purple / wearin' purple..."). The result is a film that will only appeal to hardcore Gogol Bordello fans. I assume that AFI only programmed it because of the success of a similar niche-music film that sold out three shows at last year's fest, Heima featuring the compositions of Icelandic band Sigur Ros. 2 Buckets out of 4; screens tonight at 7:10 p.m. and Weds., Nov. 5 at 12:30 p.m.

That's all I have for now; I will return tonight or tomorrow morning with three more reviews. Until next time, may the film-going forces of the world force be with you.

2008 San Diego Film Festival Coverage: Part Two

Oh how time flies when one's life is full of schoolwork and screenings. I may have gotten to writing two early reviews during this past week, but I never posted on my second and final day at this year's San Diego Film Festival. As I had predicted, it was indeed a better one than the first. Unfortunately, the selections I caught were still far from what would desire out of a semi-large film-festival.

The best movie of the day I saw was, as expected, The Brothers Bloom. Just take a look at the picture's pedigree and strong festival-buzz and you'll see why I knew it would turn out that way. The Brothers Bloom isn't a mastepiece, but it's a solid piece of filmmaking from budding young director Rian Johnson. Johnson made 2007's high-school-set neo-noir Brick, which wasn't a very good film but it definitely showed promise. In this follow-up, Johnson has taken to less dark and less complicated material, although The Brothers Bloom is similar to the former work in that its success mainly rests in its ability to keep the audience guessing about plot-twists. These are aplenty here, and for the most part they succeed in captivating the viewer admist the film's terrifically fast pace. And the cast is excellent, too: not only are Adrien Brody and Mark Ruffalo engaging as the titular con-artists siblings, but Rachel Weisz is downright show-stealing and mezmerizing as the rich Jersey girl they try to pull one of their cons on. I wholeheartedly recommend The Brothers Bloom; a full review will be published on Bucket Reviews prior to the film's December release.

I was not so fortunate in my selection of Remarkable Power, which I based entirely upon the presence of actors Kevin Nealon and Tom Arnold (why I saw Arnold as an enticing factor I'll never know). The movie is a broad farce about a late-night talk show host's elaborate plan to stay on the air after his show is cancelled and involves a slew of unmemorable characters. The most prominent among them is Ross (Evan Peters), an obnoxious teenager living in LA's Koreatown who becomes obsessed with the phony impowerment he is provided by a series of self-help tapes he discovers on a 1AM informercial. Much of the film's plot concerns Ross' self-defense murder of the star of said infomercial. Don't ask. Don't care. Remarkable Power isn't funny, suspenseful, or entertaining. And it won't be coming to a theatre near you anytime soon. Even when the thing fatefully goes straight-to-video, it won't be worth seeing.

Last up for me at this year's festival was the Closing Night Presentation of the new documentary Morning Light, which follows a team of young sailors assembled by sailing-enthusiast and film-financier Roy Disney. They sail from California to Hawaii in the 2007 TransPac Yacht race. The doc plays more like an MTV-special than a family-friendly documentary--it's full of artificial-feeling drama and hokey empowerment of its college-aged subjects--but proves moderately entertaining and does justice to the considerable skill exhibited by said subjects. Morning Light isn't a film one should actively seek out during its upcoming limited run, but it makes for an enjoyable sit. My best advice is to wait for the DVD. A full review will be posted to Bucket Reviews within the next ten days.

And that concludes my coverage of this year's San Diego Film Festival, which was rather abysmal on the whole despite my condensed-schedule designed to avoid such a result. Out of the six pictures I saw, I only rated one above 2-1/2 Buckets (The Brothers Bloom). Much as I hate to say it, I may not return to SDFF next year, marking the first time I've skipped the festival since 2005. Hopefully the SDFF programmers will give me a reason to attend (ahem -- better bookings please, guys).

2008 San Diego Film Festival Coverage: Part One

I always make a concerted effort each year to attend the San Diego Film Festival, mainly because it feels like my duty as a San Diego native to foster the "growing" program. And yet, each year I attend, I can't help but feel like the selection is getting more and more intolerable. Rarely do programmers book foreign films or experimental features. It seems as though SDFF is stuck in commercial-territory, although I don't know why given the fact that it seems less commercially successful with each passing festival. My first day at the event this year was Friday--I had to skip out on Thursday given my now out-of-town academic obligations--and not a single showing I attended was even close to being sold out.

All that said, I really don't mean to bash the folks who run SDFF. They're hard-working, always nice, and this year even graciously provided me with a free pass to catch screenings. But it's depressing that hardly any film on this year's line-up will see a theatrical release; most of the selections will be doomed to see straight-to-cable fates. (Even some good movies I've seen at the festival in years past--the Jeremy Renner/Gabrielle Union vehicle Neo Ned comes instantly to mind--have suffered this exact pattern.) In fact, 2008 marks the first year I've skipped a day I could have attended the festival--Saturday--due to complete apathy for the choices. To my credit, I did use the day to catch the festival's Thursday-night opener, The Lucky Ones, in a regular theatre, and liked it very much. So kudos to programmers for scoring that one.

Today is Sunday, and the three movies that I'm about to see look to be the best offerings at the festival: The Brothers Bloom, Remarkable Power, and Morning Light. Two of them already have releases slated--one with an Oscar campaign--and the other has good buzz. Yes, I've whittled down my choices this year to the bare essentials, but can you blame me? Perhaps I'll actually leave SDFF this year with a 50% recommendation-rate as a result. Watching Friday's mediocre crop, all I could think about was how much better this year's AFI Fest would be. Here's what I caught:

Lost in the Fog is a nice little documentary by first-time director John Corey about a special racehorse, but being "nice" isn't enough to make the movie worth seeing in this case. I was interested in the movie's portayal of the horse's San Francisco-based owner, Harry Aleo, for the first thirty minutes, but once Corey turned the focus almost solely on the titular horse, the doc got old quick. Yes, I can respect the fact that Lost in the Fog may have indeed been a one-of-a-kind competitor, but what's stirring about this story on a human-level? Not much, and hence the film fails to win over those of us who aren't horse-racing enthusiasts. The picture isn't unpleasant, but it's mediocre in the sense that it doesn't reach for anything nearly as special in the cinematic-world as that which its subject did in the equestrian-realm.

Just as Lost in the Fog won't interest anyone who isn't a horse-racing fan, The Wrecking Crew probably won't grab the attention of non-music-diehards. The doc is directed by Danny Tedesco, son of Tommy Tedesco. "Who?" you might ask. Yeah, Danny thought you might say that. Tommy was the guitarist for "The Wrecking Crew", a group of studi0-musicians who did the instrumentals on countless studio albums in the late '50s and early '60s. The bunch turned in tracks for The Monkeys and the Beach Boys, among others. At their height, they would lay down an album a day -- six tracks in the morning, six at night. Yes, the story is interesting, but perhaps it was only meant for an hour-long HBO special. Danny Tedesco's version is an overlong indulgence in his father's career and the musicians that surrounded it, which is understandable but not cinematically-forgivable. After sitting through The Wrecking Crew for 95-minutes, I had more than had my fill of the material. The movie proved to me that the group was indeed amazing, but did little more to captivate me beyond that.

Jacob Medjuck and Tony Dean Smith's Summerhood was perhaps the most enjoyable movie of the day because I could see it in full detail (out of the three, this was the only one shown in 35mm), but it was also probably the most rote and uninspired selection of the bunch. The movie is a rumination on the pains and pleasures of childhood summer-camp, told through the emotional-POV of a nine-year-old boy known by fellow campers as Fetus (Lucian Mesel). The topic could've been ripe for nostalgia had it been handled in a more original way, but Summerhood is a completely cliche and indulgent take on the subject matter. The only area in which it branches out is in its surprisingly adult take on the actions of the camp-employees, which proves more oddly-unsettling than its does humorous. Sure, some of the kid-actors are charming, but who really cares when the movie is as shallow as this one? Daddy Day Camp was a more profound take on the topic. Summerhood may get a small theatrical release because it is narrated by John Cusack, but it won't be very successful if it does.

Now it's time for me to catch some films that may actually be good for a change. Please don't disappoint me, Rian Johnson -- The Brothers Bloom is first on my agenda!

Prelude: Showing This Weekend at TVIFF

One of the many angles of a high school shooting is explored in Oscar Velasquez' Prelude.

My Fall film festival season may not be kicking off until Friday, Sept. 26 when I begin coverage of this year's San Diego Film Festival, but don't let that keep you from getting a jump on me this weekend if you live in San Diego, Los Angeles, or the Inland Empire. The Temecula Valley International Film Festival kicks off this Wednesday, and there you will have the unique opportunity to catch my friend Oscar Velasquez' short, Prelude, which is currently making the festival rounds.

Prelude intertwines short segments of the lives of students and parents who are connected in an instant when they or a loved one is afflicted by a high school shooting. The film was made on a shoestring budget as Oscar's final project at the Los Angeles Film School, but you wouldn't guess it given its impressive aesthetics. Shot on gritty 16mm by gifted D.P. Trevor Masid, the imagery mainly consists of grungy, geometric compositions that set the mood well.

Certain actors' performances fare better than others--Germaine de Leon's turn as the focal shooter in a one-line part detrimentally suffers from trivial scripting and self-indulgent delivery--but such variance is an unfortunate consequence of the constraints of making a first film. Oscar occasionally gets a little too caught up in his narrative too, relying on a contrived situation with character Carmen (Dominique Concepcion) to carry dramatic-heft in the film's final third that comes off as exploitative when it should actually be emotionally-jarring.

Despite its flaws, Prelude makes for a worthy watch and a serviceable addition to a growing body of films that explore the complexities of today's youth. If you're attending TVIFF, it will undoubtedly be a solid addition to your festival-schedule.

Prelude screens in Shorts Program III at TVIFF on Thursday, Sept. 18 at 6PM and on Saturday, Sept. 20 at 9PM. Writer/director Velasquez will be present for the Saturday screening.

San Diego Comic Con 2008 - DAY FOUR

The last day of Comic Con was a short one for me--I only attended two panels--but it marked a solid finish to a worthwhile convention. Both panels were considerably involving and I was able to sit really close to the action (second row!) due to the Sunday-standard lower-attendance level.

Both panels took place in Ballroom 20, the largest room at the Convention Center other than Hall H. I arrived early for my first panel, so I ended up catching the tail-end of the Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay DVD release program with stars John Cho and Kal Penn and directors Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg. Nothing much was said of consequence--when is it during a stoner-comedy panel?--but the trio did formally announce that a third film in the franchise would be made. Oh how I can't wait until I have the privilege of enduring such drivel...

Next up was the panel for the much-discussed "reboot" of the Friday the 13th franchise that will be released next year. Producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form and stars Jared Padalecki and Amanda Righetti (and a few others whose names I don't recall) were on hand to unveil the teaser-poster and theatrical trailer. These didn't look like anything special, but they did show more promise than those of the standard teenage slasher movie usually do. Perhaps Marcus Nispel, the director who brilliantly revived the Texas Chainsaw Massacre series, will be able to breathe new life into what was never a very good franchise in the first place...

My last panel for this year's Con was that hosted by Rogue Pictures. The first film featured was 25/8 with a sole panelist, writer/director Wes Craven. The title refers to the human's need to stay one step ahead of evil (which operates 24/7). Other than that, the panel really didn't flesh out what the movie was about outside of the fact that it is related to a serial-killer terrorizing children in a small-town. Craven seems to be confident in the material, which is reason enough to be excited for the film.

Finishing the panel was a look at David S. Goyer's The Unborn. Joining Goyer were stars Odette Yustman, Meagan Good, and Cam Gigandet. My eyes were focused on the startling looks of the two actresses the entire time, so I didn't really come to understand exactly what this horror-effort is about. All I know is that Goyer is a very talented guy and his cast--who spoke very highly of him, by the way--is wholly appealing. And the visuals in the trailer they brought along with them were quite striking. It should be a fun time.

After the panel finished, I followed the advice offered by the official Comic Con schedule and took one last lap around the Exhibit Hall. (Errr... slow walk-through, that is; the place has become such a zoo, it's nearly impossible to enjoy.) On the whole, 2008's convention offered a tremendous time. I'll definitely be back for more next year.