Report from the Newport Beach Film Festival

How I wish I had unlimited funds and time to enjoy film festivals. This week I made my way to a few of the films being screened at The Newport Beach Film Festival. Film festivals give you a chance to see films that are way off the beaten path. Some will eventually find their way to distribution; some will disappear completely. There are very good films and films that just don’t quite work. You pick a few based on taste or what times you have available and see what you get. Festivals are also a chance to see some of the shorts that are being made.

Without going into full reviews, I’ll note what I saw this year.

The Hobart Shakespeareans
A documentary about Rafe Esquith, a fifth grade teacher at Hobart Elementary in Los Angeles. Rafe (no one calls him Mr. Esquith) is one of those ideals we wish all teachers were. He has a passion for teaching that leads him do far more than the job requires, but he gets far more than anyone can expect. His students all come from homes where the main language is not English. Yet, under his leadership, they are able to stage Hamlet by the end of the year. They not only know the lines, they understand the play.

He also teaches them guitar, has a classroom economic system, takes them to Mt. Rushmore and Washington, DC, and has them reading and understanding (remember these are fifth graders) Lord of the Flies, Of Mice and Men, Catcher in the Rye (did I mention these were fifth graders?), and Huckleberry Finn. One of the great moments of the film is watching the tears roll down students’ eyes as Huck must make the decision of whether or not to turn in Jim.

This film is set to air on PBS September 6. Check your local stations for when it will be shown where you are. A must for teachers and for all who love education and dream of what it can be.

The Raven
Short. A seventeen minute treatment of the poem by Poe. It isn’t, however, a recitation, just a reenactment of a possible interpretation. It’s not badly done, but basically, it’s a step or two above student films. I saw it because it was shown along with…

Walking on the Sky
Six friends in the aftermath of their common friend’s suicide spend a day and evening trying to figure it out. There are many stresses that play on their relationship. In many ways it’s a Gen-X version of The Big Chill, but not as good. The characters just weren’t as well developed. You can tell that there really won’t be an answer to the “why?” so you wonder why they go through all the anguish that won’t lead you anywhere.

Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher
See separate entry.

First Morning (Buoi Sang Dau Nam)
A nicely told story of a Vietnamese immigrant family in the midst of various crises. The story slowly unwraps the history and traumas of the family’s past. I suspect at some level it may also be a metaphor for the ways the Vietnamese-American community has tried to deal with some of the issues of their past. This film has picked up a distributor, so it may find its way to some theaters.

Anna Und Der Soldat (Anna and the Soldier)
Nicely done short of memory and revenge. A young woman, five years after the war, is haunted by memories Germans killing several people (who are buried in a mass grave beside her house. One day a young man comes to visit the grave. She recognizes him as one of the soldiers.

Volare
Short. An Italian immigrant boy is bullied at school. He wants to win a model plane contest (and of course the heart of a girl). His father helps, but with his own motives.

Echostop
Short. Strange film with a leaving boyfriend, and/or their meeting, and/or a new boyfriend.

West Bank Story
Short. Star-crossed lovers, finger snapping rival gangs, song and dance, Israelis and Palestinians, a wall -- all centered around competing falafel stands (Kosher King and Hummus Hut). A delightful take off on the conflict and West Side Story.

Fragile
Short. An esoteric look at death. Is life an illusion or is death an illusion?

Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher

I saw this U.S. premier of a documentary at the Newport Beach Film Festival. It focuses on Lonnie Frisbee, an important figure in the Jesus Movement of the 60s and 70s. There was a Q&A session after the film with Director David Di Sabatino, Frisbee's ex-wife and his brother.

Frisbee discovered God and was called to ministry while on LSD. (The film does a very good job of contextualizing this information.) He became a Charismatic preacher who was influential in the beginning success of both Calvary Chapel and The Vineyard. He was also gay (or perhaps bisexual) and eventually died of AIDS. Many of those who were close to him or who ministered with him abandoned him in his illness.

This is a decent look at a segment of the Jesus Movement. (Di Sabatino still wants to do a broader work on the Jesus Movement.) It's possible that I heard Frisbee at some point since I would occasionally get to Calvary Chapel while it was in the big tent, but if so, he really didn't register with me. Calvary Chapel at that time was an interesting place.

This screening was full. Keep in mind that this is a local story. I'm sure many people were there because they had known Frisbee or because their pastor was in the film.

Di Sabatino did a good job of treating fairly both Frisbee and the other people on whom the film focuses. He explains well the conservative Christian perspectives on homosexuality and sexual sins in general. (And there is more than one perspective.)

The credits call this (rather than "A film by. . .") "A Bible story by David Di Sabatino."That tells you a bit of his vision here. It's not that it is a story taken from the Bible, but he sees in Frisbee a lot of biblical characters (such as John the Baptist or Samson) and imagery (such as prophecy and healing).

One of the things that struck me (coming from a denomination that has openly gay clergy) is that in the film's discussion of attitudes after he is booted from his ministry at The Vineyard, one of the people says that churches wanted his anointing, but not him. My denomination wouldn't have a problem with him being gay; we would be very uncomfortable with the anointing.

As I mentioned there were many people in the audience for this screening that were involved in some of the churches of ministers who don't come out too well in this film. The people weren't antagonistic, but they did raise some questions about some things that Di Sabatino omitted from the film that could have suggested that some of them did in fact reconcile (at least on a personal level) with Frisbee before his death. He admitted that he knew of these stories, but that he wasn't sure such late hour attempts at reconciliation were valid. He also said that it was something he may have to consider more and perhaps include in a reedit.

As yet, there is no distribution deal for this film.

Some good resources:
Website for the film

Peter T. Chattaway's interview with Di Sabatino

The Upside of Anger

For centuries Anger has been included in the Seven Deadly Sins (Pride, Envy, Anger, Sloth, Greed, Gluttony, Lust.) This list may not seem all that bad, after all they aren’t acts, they are attitudes. But that is what makes this list so “deadly” – they are attitudes that can control our lives and eat away at us. This corrosiveness is the center of The Upside of Anger.

The film begins as Terry has discovered that her husband has gone. It is obvious to her that he has run off to Sweden with his assistant at work. That begins the anger that builds throughout the film. Through an alcoholic haze she lashes out at her four daughters and anyone else who gets within range.

Her neighbor, Denny, a former baseball player now radio personality, comes within range, but seems somewhat exempt from the barrage of anger because he drinks with her and she sees him as inherently inferior. Soon he’s a regular part of the household, serving as a bit of surrogate father for the daughters.

Denny and Terry make an interesting pairing. The surface differences are obvious enough. She is an upper-middle class woman who epitomizes the bourgeoisie; he is a retired ballplayer trying to get by on his name. Her home is immaculate; his is a mess. She is well enough provided for to be able to withstand this life change without financial struggle; he scrapes by signing autographs and making appearances at shopping malls.

But below that level there are much more intriguing differences. Denny is open and non-judgmental; Terry, in her anger, judges everyone and everything. Denny knows no boundaries (or at least doesn’t observe them); Terry expects everything to be done properly (even when she fails to observe propriety).

The real difference though is how they relate to their pasts. Terry is mired in her life because the absence of her husband. That gives her a reason for her anger, which gives meaning to all she does. She cannot move forward in her life, because to do that she would have to let go of that past and the anger and meaning it provides. Denny on the other hand has discarded his past. He may make his money off selling bits of that past (his autograph), but he refuses to talk about baseball, even on his radio show that is supposed to be about baseball. That past to him is something that he can’t live in anymore. It was good for him, but to move on with his life, he’s had to leave it behind.

As the film plays out, there are many changes going on within the family. The youngest daughter is trying to learn about love, an older daughter may be learning a bit much about love. The daughters get opportunities that don’t fit with their mother’s plans for them – good opportunities, but not to her liking. The anger that is stored up in Terry keeps being directed toward her daughters, whether they deserve it or not. Yet as dysfunctional as all this is, the story is done with enough humor that we are eager to watch.

Eventually some things happen that calls her away from her anger and gives a new perspective on that anger. In that shift we really see just how much damage the anger has done, not just to those at whom it was directed, but to the one who is angry. As with so many things that we view as harmful acts, the agent is often just as much affected as the recipient.

Joan Allen gets to show many sides of this character and demonstrates again why she is held in such esteem as an actor. While the rest of the cast does good work, Allen is the real focus.

I do have one objection to raise about the film. Maybe it’s just one of my pet peeves, but I really hate when a filmmaker goes to all the work to create a film that makes a point, then doesn’t trust the audience enough to allow them to figure out the point. Instead, as in this film, there is a verbal explanation given just in case you didn’t know what the film was about. That’s the downside of this film.

The Upside of Anger serves as an opportunity to see not only the way anger manifests itself, but also the effect that anger can have on us all.

Manson's Memo 4/14

A great deal of the news lately has focused on the death of Pope John Paul II. Protestants are often hard pressed to know how to respond to such a death. After all, we don’t recognize his authority over the church. But at least we’ve come a long way from the days when the Pope was looked at as the Antichrist.

Much of the discussion of his papacy has had to do with his role in the fall of Communism in Europe and about his travel. He was not content to stay in Rome and let people come to him. He went throughout the world to see those who would never get to Rome.

Although I disagreed with many of John Paul’s positions and doctrines, I still appreciated him for his ministry. John Paul was an amazing example of servanthood. He accepted a job with no retirement benefits (after all, no one has retired from that job for centuries). When he became Pope, it was with the knowledge that he would die as the Pope.

As the College of Cardinals prepares to elect a new Pope, the news people have to find stories. I’ve found a website that gives an Irish bookmaker’s odds on various Cardinals being elected. There will be lots of speculation. However, often the person chosen to serve as Pope is one of the Cardinals who had no plan of becoming Pope. They have this job thrust upon them. And it is one that they accept knowing that it will be more than they have ever done before. And they will do it because they feel called by God to do take on this awesome responsibility.

It is the rare person who gets such a ministry offered to them. It is a rare person who can accept such a ministry. But each of us is called to the ministry that God sets before us. We also are called to be servants to the world around us.

As the world remembers the ministry of John Paul II, let us each remember the ministry that we have been given and strive to be as faithful.

The Ballad of Jack and Rose

On an island off the east coast live Jack and his nearly adult daughter Rose. They are the only two people remaining at what was once a thriving commune with dozens of people. The setting seems idyllic, but is in decline. Jack and Rose live in near isolation from the rest of the world, but the outside world is encroaching quickly. Rose has known no other life than this, but she needs to learn because Jack could soon be dead.

There is a good deal of Edenic imagery in this film: a man and woman, a natural paradise, a snake that plays a key role in the film. The story isn’t so much a retelling of the Eden story as it evocative of that story. It wants us to think in terms of Eden, even if Eden is getting pretty run down. Central to this story is the innocence of Rose. She is completely undefiled. She doesn’t see TV. She rarely sees other people. Her whole world revolves around her father, whom she adores – perhaps way too much. As she considers his possible death, she tells him “If you die, I’m going to die.”

But because Jack is dying, he brings into this seemingly perfect world some outside influences, his girl friend and her two teenaged sons. The whole dynamic changes and Rose is not pleased. She seems to have some pretty serious Electra issues. She doesn’t want to share her Eden. She certainly doesn’t want to share her father. The scene that seemed so tranquil with just the two of them, becomes much more volatile and dangerous with the others intruding on their paradise. We discover that even in her innocence she is capable of surprisingly sordid behavior.

Coming out of the film, my wife and I spent a fair amount of time picking at the plot. There are storylines that aren’t as fully developed as they could be, such as a battle between Jack and a developer. There are questions about the way the characters act that don’t seem quite right. Such problems do distract from the overall effect of the film. But the performances are sterling and the general trajectory of the story overcomes the flaws.

What makes the film powerful though is not so much the plot itself, but the mythic quality that it evokes. Myths are stories that are true. They may or may not be factual, but we value them because they teach us the truth. We know they are true because we know when we hear or see the stories that we are seeing what life is really like. The Ballad of Jack and Rose is that kind of story. It may be a bit extreme, but it is certainly the truth about what it means to be innocent and to lose that sense of innocence that comes with new knowledge. Hence the hints about Eden – an important story about innocence and its loss.

The whole idea of the now dead commune reminds us of the death of idealism and the naïveté of the sixties. Jack is the last vestige of that time, and now he is dying. He keeps trying to fight for those convictions, but we know that the time has long passed.

The story builds to what we expect to be a serious exclamation point, but instead we get a somewhat welcome, if not quite satisfying question mark. There is, though, a wordless post script that adds a touch of hope to the film.

Even with its flaws The Ballad of Jack and Rose is a strong story that lets us consider our own struggles between our innocence and a more worldly knowledge.

Dear Frankie

Nine year old Frankie only knows his father through the letters they share. For as long as Frankie can remember, his father has been away on a ship traveling the world. Frankie has learned a great deal of geography and has collected many stamps that his father has sent.

Because Frankie is deaf, and because his mother moves frequently, Frankie has very few friends beyond his home. Certainly his mother and grandmother love him, but there is still something missing from Frankie’s life.

One day, one of Frankie’s classmates brings him news that his father’s ship will be in port soon. This creates something of a problem for Frankie’s mother. All these years, she has been writing the letters to Frankie to cover up that they are on the run from his father. How will she deal with the ship’s arrival without disappointing her son or admitting the lie? She seeks out a man – a man with whom she has no past or future – to hire to serve as Frankie’s father for a day.

This seems a set up for a plot that one might expect to be fairly predictable. In many ways it is. Most (but not all) of the plot I could see coming. But the film is so well done that I just enjoyed watching it play out. I came out of the film far more affected than I had expected to be.

As the story develops in Dear Frankie, Frankie, his mother, and this father-for-hire all get far more than was bargained for. The relationship that develops in the brief encounter is filled with grace.

Part of that grace grows from Frankie’s longing for a father and his ready acceptance of this stranger as the father he has never met. That longing is seen in the letters he writes week after week. Even without ever seeing his father (or even a picture of him), Frankie believes that his father is real and cares for him. He never really asks much of his father; the letters just tell of the things going on in his life. So when this man appears, Frankie is ready to accept whoever he is and understand that this is the love that his father has always had for him.

Another aspect of grace is seen in the relationship between Frankie and his mother. It is to make Frankie feel more complete that she has kept this fabrication going all these years. She has put a good deal of work into this effort, imagining an itinerary for the ship, finding stamps from around the world, and writing these letters with the love that she would wish his father would to have. It turns out to be as much of a reward for her as it is for him. Since Frankie is deaf, the letters are the only way she can hear his voice.

But the key aspect of grace in the film is this hired father. Everything about him resonates grace. He enters the relationship as if he truly belongs there. We get the feeling that for this day, he does not so much act as Frankie’s father as he becomes Frankie’s father. More and more, we come to understand that the things he does do not grow out of some sense of job description, rather they are founded upon love.

As all these expressions of grace interact, we see the many ways that grace begets grace. There is both a grace of giving and a grace of receiving. As each bit of grace is given and received, it rebounds in such a way that all those involved are blessed in the process.

Perhaps that’s why I was more affected by this film than I expected – because this story is a bit of grace that is shared with us. If we receive such grace, we will be blessed.

Oldboy

A Seoul businessman, after a night of drinking, disappears. Oh Dae-su finds himself in a room very similar to a motel room – a bed, a TV – but with a hole in the door through which his food is slid in, much like a jail cell. Periodically he’s gassed. The TV serves as his only contact with the world. He learns that he is wanted for the murder of his wife. He stays in this room, with no human contact for a year, then two, then three…. Finally, fifteen years later he is released, without any explanation of who had done this to him or why. He wants revenge.

There have been many films about revenge. Kill Bill Vols. 1 & 2 have something of the same feel about them as Oldboy. A terrible injustice has been done, but why? Just like the Tarentino films, there are loads of fights and lots of gore. Even some of the non-violent scenes have their share of gore, such as eating a live squid in a sushi bar (apparently not unheard of in Korea.)

The story is filled with twists and turns – so many that to describe the plot would either be useless or would tell too much. A great deal of the fun of the film is the discoveries as they unfold. By the end, though, we have met one of the most amoral characters in film.

The theme of vengeance is central to this film. Dae-su’s search for vengeance is the engine that drives much of the film. But in time we discover that there is another level of vengeance that has created the entire situation. Those two struggles for retribution battle against each other – first one, then the other getting the advantage.

The film, though, is not only focused on the seeking of vengeance, but also the lack of satisfaction and the futility of vengeance once it is achieved. The films ends with both sides getting some measure of the revenge they sought, but also suffering tremendously at the hand of the other. In some ways each can claim a victory, but in a fuller picture, both have been utterly defeated.

Too often, that is the case when we seek vengeance – whether it is on a personal level or on a geopolitical level. The injuries we have endured cry out for us to do something to avenge ourselves. But in the process of seeking that vengeance, we are likely to lose as much ourselves as those we seek vengeance upon. It becomes a cycle of revenge going back and forth until all participants and those around them are destroyed.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus spoke of retaliation: You have heard that was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you…if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also. Mohandas Gandhi said: An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

In Oldboy we see just how terrible the seeking of an eye for an eye can be. (A tooth for a tooth takes on special meaning in this film – but I promised I wouldn’t tell you about those plot points.)

March viewing journal

Here's what I saw in March:
3-1-05 - Ryan (short)
3-1-05 - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
3-2-05 - Alice's Restaurant
3-3-05 - Boxcar Bertha
3-4-05 - Up and Down
3-5-05 - Millions favorite of the month
3-5-05 - After Life
3-5-05 - Laws of Attraction
3-7-05 - Tortilla Soup
3-8-05 - Short Cuts
3-14-05 - Robots
3-17-05 - AKA
3-18-05 - Fifty First Dates
3-19-05 - Monsieur N.
3-19-05 - The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill
3-20-05 - Shaolin Soccer
3-27-05 - Bon voyage
3-27-05 - In the Cut
3-30-05 - Oldboy
3-30-05 - Dear Frankie

My viewing list for the year