Tribeca dispatch #9

[Pierre-Alexandre Despatis suffers for his cinema. Now covering his second edition, our official festival reporter and multi-function human cyborg will provide us the sights (plenty of cool pics!), the sounds, the reviews and the occasional interviews of the still very young 5th edition of the Tribeca film festival. Below are some of Pierre-Alexandre’s reviews in easy to read, insightful capsule form. Enjoy!]

MIST IN THE PALM TREE
Tribeca's selection of experimental films has been a wealthy bunch this year. This anti-film by Carlos Molinero and Lola Salvador relates the biographical flashes of Santiago Bergson and focus on a few events that that marked his life. As his daughter notes, "It's as if he never existed"– no one remembers him! Of course, Bergson never existed and even his daughter is played by three separate actresses living in three different places. The poetry of the film is very reminiscent of Chris Marker's LA JETEE with remarks like "I have photographed the future" and a very interesting montage of still images and archival footage dating from the first half of the century. The film is composed of 6 segments. While some are better than others, overall the film, and especially the third segment which imitates a silent film with inter-titles, is purely exquisite. The mix of archival footage with the narration and industrial/house music makes up for a very fascinating film to watch – and watch again. The theater was full (400 seats) on a Friday night for the fifth screening of the film, let alone the film is an experimental film(!) – and most of the people stayed for the Q&A. This is another indication of the film's compelling narrative and visual treatment. Definitely, one of Tribeca's best films this year.

THE TV SET
Jake Kasdan’s THE TV SET tells the tale of a TV writer (Duchovny) who is faced with many problems as a studio has agreed to shot a pilot of the series—he soon discovers that they have very different artistic visions. The usual! Already on day one, problems emerge; the series is centered around a brother who kills himself, and for the casting of the lead, the writer bring in 2 actors—one very bad, and one very good—knowing his first choice will be selected, of course. Well, not quite; the brother killing himself thing is deemed too depressing by the studio and, surprise-surprise(!), the TV execs prefer the very bad actor. From then on things go to the worse for the writer. The film is funny throughout, but it manifests itself in a light tone. It's nothing compared to the adventures found in Mamet’s STATE AND MAIN movie set, which was pure fun to delve into. THE TV SET lacks in the wittiness department, yet on some level remains a fair watch.

BLESSED BY FIRE
Tristán Bauer's film opens with a fake documentary sequence during which an agitated protest in the Argentinean streets is filmed by a TV crew. The remarkably well-shot footage is soon followed by the sirens of an ambulance going to rescue a war veteran. From then on, the film combines a very interesting parallel montage, alternating between the atrocities of the war that lead to the man's suicide attempt with footage of him and his family after his suicide attempt. This kind of juxtapositioning is not new by any means but here it's well balanced. Both the war footage and the modern footage are compelling in the manner in which they are combined together. The film’s strong points include: the superb and dramatic cinematography as well as an intense narrative. BLESSED BY FIRE goes beyond the usual war film genre conventions and plays with the genres' conventions and allies’ drama, action and sometimes comedy in a quite innovative manner.

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