Friday, March 7

“Goliath”

Our first film of the year (year 12 for me, hard to believe): a narrative done by some local favorites and previous creators of shorts, the Zellner brothers. This story features a very lonely guy, working a dead end job, just completing a divorce whose final straw is his cat “Goliath” going missing.

The film ostensibly belongs in the “mumblecore” genre of independent film, and as such is typically subtle and introspective. Much of the film’s time is spent along with the main character on his downward mental spiral, with a smattering of black humor. The most excruciating of scenes was one that ran maybe several minutes of he and his soon-to-be ex silently signing huge stacks of paper. Did the audience feel his pain, I dare say so!

Anyhow, the film culminates with the protagonist having a fairly severe meltdown when he discovers a sex offender lives in his neighborhood and decides that he is somehow responsible for Goliath’s death and attacks him. End scene, he gets a new cat, and all is well with the world.

Though there are some really nice moments, like the guy walking around his neighborhood with a portable generator and a can opener hoping to lure his cat out or him lurking around outside his sex-offender neighbor’s house with a pruning pole saw pruning his trees, then his art car, then his front door, the film’s pace overall can be describes as glacial. I found the character’s engaging and plot, though certainly secondary to experiencing this poor guy’s existential crisis, logical enough. Right up until the end that is. The jump from his breakdown to a sunny moment without any consequences of his actions is kind of hard to swallow.

Anyhow, not a bad little flick. I’m certainly no expert, but I suspect a bit more editing could have picked up the pace of this one and not lost a lot of it’s punch.

“Second Skin”

This was the first documentary of the year, something I always look forward to. Over the years, it seems like I’ve been more engaged by the documentaries than by the features for whatever reason. This one didn’t disappoint on that account. “Second Skin” is about gamers, a popular subject for docs at the festival since “Darkon” a couple years back, and “King of Kong” last year.

This time, the filmmakers took on MMORPG players (World of Warcraft, Everquest, Star Wars Galaxies, etc.) in particular, centering largely on the stories of a few individuals and groups, sprinkled with some “expert” outside analysis. Although the gamers’ stories were engaging, Mindy pointed out that the third-party “expert” analysis was a bit on the light side. Overall it was very well put together and didn’t suffer too badly from the “where is this going?” syndrome that many an indie documentary can.

“Second Skin” follows the lives of mainly 6 gamers, mostly young, white men (three married, three single) and, for some of them, their wives/girlfriends/close family members. Although the large, enthusiastic posse of subjects that showed up for the screening we’re clearly positive on the movie, I had a hard time reconciling this with the fact that the main subjects all came off at least a little pathological and/or obsessive about their game playing, or worse. The point is made very clearly over and over that MMO playing consumes a very large amount of these peoples’ time. Enough that it has an impact on everything else in their lives: their relationships, jobs, even their health. One of the single men even goes for 12 step help at one point to stop his WoW addiction. The filmmakers go on to profile the woman who runs said 12-step group, inspired by the apparently game-related suicide of her son. Girlfriends and wives interviewed light heartedly joke about how addicted their male companions are, but it’s clear there’s a root of genuine concern behind the chiding.

Being that the central dramatic tension in this film is what kind of trouble the subjects’ gaming habits will cause them in the execution of their lives, it’s hard to come away from this film with any other conclusion that the games are in and of themselves a problem. They present many shocking statistics about extreme gamer behavior and attitude as well as testimony of experts that, on the whole, seems to likewise damn them if not personally, then as consumer victims of a multi-billion dollar video game industry. Although there are brief moments taken with another gamer who is confined to a wheelchair, explaining that the game is a liberation for him, and they also give some time to some of the players to compare their habit to more socially accepted hobbies and behaviors, the body of evidence presented strongly implies that there’s something different and more troubling about gaming in particular than going out drinking or working on a car project in the garage, or what have you.

I’ve been a gamer most of my life of one form or another, so I feel pretty informed about the various gamer communities. I consider myself and have frequently come down on the pro-gamer side of most of the related issues that come up. Ever since “Mazes & Monsters” in the 80′s role players, and by extension video gamers, have been under near constant assault by religious, safety, and parent’s groups. Much has also been made in the past few decades especially about the role of video games in child and school violence. Gamers on the whole are easy to demonize, and so I’m admittedly a little tentative whenever someone comes at them with a camera. We’re talking about people who aren’t going to be too approachable in terms of audience sympathy; they’re largely geeks, so there’s already one strike against them. Public opinion also is largely distrustful, thanks to media finger waving, strike 2.

I’ve had friends who were expert witnesses in court on the issue of some defendant’s gaming behavior, clearly gaming remains a very socially charged issue. It seems to me someone approaching a subject this delicate ought to take greater care about representing the humanity of their main subjects. To be fair, there are genuinely gamers like this. In fact, I’ve largely avoided MMOs myself on the basis that they seem to be an inordinately large time-sucker. It has made me take a pretty unusually deep and uncomfortable view of my own gaming. Even though I personally know plenty of non-obsessive/compulsive gamers, I know a good number who do at least marginally fit this profile, and I can’t say that their treatment wasn’t wholly fabricated, but to represent the entire community in this fashion goes against the principles of good, as-objective-as-possible doc making.

So, my conclusion? Mindy and I both obviously walked out of this one with some real mixed feelings. As I mentioned above, although many of the subjects turned out to enthusiastically support the film, the events and evidence left in the film seemed more than a little alarmist. This is not to say it was nakedly some kind of hatchet job on the part of the filmmakers, I just think they found some of the more dramatically “interesting” gamers to profile and went with it. It’s hard to say that since this is what they managed to capture and cobble together into their doc that they had any kind of agenda other than to make an interesting film. I will say that in Q & A, one of the filmmakers did mention that one of his inspirations was a coworker he had known when he was a teacher that had gotten into MMOs, bought him a copy as a gift, and then proceeded to self-destruct, not unlike some of the actual subjects of the film. If anything, Second Skin does raise some good questions, but I think it’s ultimately guilty of too-high a dose of sensationalism.

Saturday March 8

Reel Shorts 1 & 2

I’ve been a sucker for the shorts reels for several years now. There’s something kind of pure about about the indie shorts reel experience. I think it kind of encapsulates what’s going on in film in one package. Most memoreable: “Warlord”, about a comedy about a child who breaks free from the tyranny of parental oppression and goes on to become a childhood freedom fighter, sort of “Lord of the Flies” meets the suburbs. “Mr. P”, about a middle aged burnout tutoring a young ‘tween boy and getting relationship advice in return, a classic juxtaposition comedy premise really. “Crossbow”, this one was essentially a “Virigin Suicides” rehash, but really well done. It’s about a kid neglected by his parents who end up comitting suicide by cop, all told with the narration of an unseen neighborhood acquaintance. “Beijing Haze”, a story about a Chinese immigrant thinking about home and what looks to be a case of the grass always being greener. “Mr. Mustache”, well, a short doc on mustaches, as told from a weird Norwegian point of view. “The Execution of Solomon Harris”, how the tight-assed police administrator of the killing room handles the situation when an electrocution goes unfinished due to a technical glitch. No, not a comedy.

I missed out on the animated shorts this year. I may yet still catch Reel Shorts 3, we’ll see.

“Bulletproof Salesman”

I hate to say it, but this one bored to me to tears. The premise was so promising too: a doc about a guy who sells custom armored vehicles. Ultimately, the narrative was meandering if not non-existent, and the guy kind of just turned out to be, IMHO, your average high-end salesman. The Q&A with the director was more interesting. Unfortunately, it sounds like his own experiences with the subject and his perception of how interesting he would be to profile just didn’t match up to what he captured on film. I guess some people might be entranced by the idea that the guy is a war profiteer, but he just looked like your garden-variety capitalist to me.

“Dreams with Sharp Teeth”

This one was fun. A long overdue documentary on Harlan Ellison. Not to detract from the filmmaker’s achievement here, but this is really a slam dunk, as the guy is such a character you could probably just have fed-exed him a camera, told him to shoot a bunch of footage of himself at random and have him mail it back and you’d get something good. Besides that, the man is one of the great Sci-Fi (and other) writers of recent times, and despite (or perhaps because in some cases) of his eccentricities, has had an influence on if nothing else, the nerdier end of the spectrum of the writing arts. Ever since introduced to me in college ( I think I can blame Charlie S. for that), I’ve had a special affinity for Harlan and his work. First, the guy is a quality/integrity snob. Second, he’s a pro-intellectualist in an increasingly anti-intellectual time in our history. Third, and perhaps the part I identify with the most personally, he’s just a little too wound up about his own sense of justice. Gotta love him.

Sunday March 9

Film 101 panel

Since I splurged for the badge this year (yes, I’ve temporarily flown the prole coop ) I decided to hit up some of the panels, see what I’ve been missing. Film 101 was out at the Carver center theater (not a bad little theater actually) featuring some local film industry folks. To be honest, I’m not sure how totally edified I was by what they had to say. I got my impression reinforced that it basically just takes a lot of exposure and practice. ‘Nuf said.

HE Interview

Since I hadn’t had enough Harlan Ellison abuse from the night previous (he did the after film Q&A, also, told the joke about the bear wiping his ass with the rabbit to the crowd right before the screening), I went and saw Harry Knowles have a chat with him. As it turns out, they’re best buds from way back. I’ve often wondered what it is about Knowles that he’s infiltrated the industry so thoroughly, but after finding out that he managed to charm the otherwise almost apparently uncharmable curmudgeon Harlan Ellison, I’ll believe anything. Harlan is full of bizarre stories about the various showbiz industries he’s been involved in over the years, often involving himself and someone more famous than himself. You can’t deny, the man is a world-class yarn-spinner. And to think, as he often likes to say, he’s just a Jew from Ohio.

“Full Battle Rattle”

I think this has been one of my favorite docs this year. Full Battle Rattle follows the training of an Army unit through the National Training Center’s “Medina Wasl” facility in the Mojave desert. Medina Wasl is a fake Iraqi town, staffed by role players, the government and civilian population of which are all Iraqi. Another unit of US Army soldiers play the part of insurgents in the area. So, the basic idea is, a unit about to be deployed to Iraq makes one last stop at this training facility to get a practice shot at what things in Iraq will be like, including how to deal with the locals, what to expect from insurgents, etc.

I felt it was a pretty even-handed take on the whole subject. Some audience members at the Q & A felt it was more of a propaganda piece, but I didn’t see that. I guess this is a good example of how much what you see is what you bring with you to the viewing yourself. I also had the chance to go out to the Dog & Duck (one of my favorite local pubs, as it turns out) after the movie with the directors and a few of the soldiers and Iraqis profiled in the film, now just back from their 15 month deployment. Meeting them and chatting them (primarily the colonel, one of his lieutenants and another soldier from the training facility itself) up about both their experiences in Iraq as well as their experiences in the movie really underscored the limitations of the documentary format for me.

A lot of what was shared was done under conditions of much drink and was occasionally fairly personal, so I’m not going to share specifics here. Suffice it to say that, although I think the film was well made overall, there’s really just no way a film can be completely comprehensive. This may seem like a real “duh” moment, but I’ve never really confronted this effect in such a detailed way. Sure, some of this just makes dramatic sense; you don’t want to bog your delicate narrative down with extraneous information, but for a director trying to make a fairly objective doc, it must be excruciating to try and figure out how you influence the message by what you knowingly leave in or edit out. Either that, or just forget it and go work for Fox, I figure.

More reviews to come as I find time to write them up.

-D.