MORAL CREMA CINEMA CLUB - NEW YORK FILM FESTIVAL 62
This October we attended the 62nd annual New York Film festival as fans of film, not press. But that doesn't stop us from reviewing the experience, one film at a time. This is part one of two, with an intermission. The reviews are in order of when they were watched. Please enjoy:
MEGALOPOLIS - AMC Lincoln Center
When does an empire die? Does it collapse in one terrible moment? No, no... But there comes a time when its people no longer believe in it.
You can replace an empire with movies, a director, an institution etc. It’s a fact that people no longer believe in Francis Ford Coppola and in movies in general. Water cooler talk is about long tik tok threads like who tf did i marry. Adaptations and recognized IPs are the only projects investors believe in.
So why not be glad and rejoice in a self funded passion project like Megalopolis? It’s not like Coppola is some small unknown director scraping together a shoestring budget, he's a wine baron selling everything to make an extremely expensive movie. But it’s not a movie, it’s a fable.
As a piece of mythology it works, no clear story line, elements added inconsistently like a piece of oral history, the tropes and ideas are all there. It's something post-film, and as Coppola is a large part of the history of film, and part of a dynasty with his daughter Sofia, it's fitting that he provides his perspective on its end.
The last time something was distinctly post-film with a theatrical release beyond art galleries was with last year's Aggro Dr1ft, which saw Harmony Korine's idea of something beyond what a movie can be. I think both are a good start, but not quite there yet.
ANORA - Alice Tully Hall
Despite the subject matter of Anora being pretty depressing in theory- poverty, exploitation of sex workers, loneliness, etc, this movie is really funny and left a glimmering impression. Like past Sean Baker films, its comforting in a way, like, we’re all so fucked up, its not just me, and even if it isn’t okay, itll be okay. That's how I see it anyway. The reason being, the road to get there is so beautiful and full of sick humor. The opening sequence is no holds barred- purple lights and a row of lap dances, and while it starts you feel the energy and excitement of a guest in a private club. as the audience, were the clients getting a lap dance from the screen, but as it switches to the back room where girls are eating out of tupperware in bright white light with no performance, the image gains dimension. You aren't just watching anymore, you're in it, being dragged along to a rich Russian 21 year old's mansion, lavish New Years Eve party, the boardwalk with his friends. This movie makes you want to hit the vape that you might not even have.
During a q+a with Baker and lead actress Mikey Madison, baker answers that though his films Starlet, Tangerine, The Florida Project, Red Rocket, and now Anora aren't technically a series (a cinematic universe) they're thematically related through their central characters involvement in sex work. Which he says wasn't exactly planned or purposeful, and that in Starlet, his first film in the thematic 'series', he came across different stories within each character and actor that could be their own movie.
Sean Baker also said Mikey Madison's favorite movie is Possession, and “Who wouldn't want to work with someone whose favorite movie is Possession?” So when is my invite coming, Sean?
HARVEST - Alice Tully Hall
We went to see Harvest because of director Athina Rachel Tsangari’s work on the Yorgos Lanthimos films Kinnetta, Alps, and Dogtooth; Dogtooth being one of the best films of all time; and Caleb Landry Jones’s whose work in Twin Peaks and Brandon Cronenberg’s Antiviral stand out to me. Other than that, I knew nothing about this movie going in. I had to keep asking what this was and why did we get a ticket to it. The film had a painterly quality to it, remaining in the Scottish countryside landscape, I couldn’t tell at first if this was a remote village or set in the past. It’s about a small village where outsiders are shunned, community is strong between locals, and the whole thing gets ruined by an aristocrat who wants to kick everyone out and make a profit on it. As Tsangari said in the Q&A, it’s a story that has been told many times, and continues to happen, and will be told again. This isn’t a wallpaper film, but it’s definitely a painting film. You can stare at it, admire the beauty, contemplate the themes, but a lot of it is in your head. I could tell without knowing prior that this was based on a book, as the main character played by Caleb Landry Jones rarely speaks, and most of the narrative is propelled by voiceover. It felt like there was no other way to show and not tell, because there wasn’t much to show. Tsangari says this is a movie about nothing, with a main character who does nothing. There are moments in the book where he isn’t even present as an observer, and only relays what he thought had happened. Despite there being violent moments, two men stuck in the gallows, a woman getting her hair cut off for being accused of witchcraft, a bar being burnt down, it’s still quiet, ambient, flattened like the map the cartographer is making throughout the film. The colors are beautiful, and everything has a name, and then it runs its course.
THE FRIEND - Alice Tully Hall
If you want to watch a movie that has Bill Murray in it for Bill Murry, The Friend is not that movie. If you want to watch a movie that has Naomi Watts in it, this may still be the case. If you want to watch a movie with a dog in it, this is the movie for you. When all the actors, filmmakers, and original author, sans Murray, joined the stage, I felt most starstruck by the dog. If I had watched this on a plane, I’m sure I would have loved it. Another book adaptation with a voiceover, only this time it’s meta, as the movie is about writers. There are marks of the modern world, iMessage, bluetooth calls in the car, Christmas and an entire winter in New York City with no snow, but it still feels like the way the world used to feel. For that, it was great, it was optimistic and feel-good, though it tried to tug at your heartstrings it never really felt that serious. I used to feel a certain way about New York City, about holidays, about my future, and this was aestheticized and cutesy, being a writer in multiple cute trench coats galloping around New York City in a perfect Manhattan apartment inherited from a dead gay dad complete with his vinyl record collection of opera music. Every sad part was just more romantic, and life felt really easy. The solution to her problem was incredibly easy, and it was strange she didn’t think of it before. How am I going to keep a dog in my no pets allowed perfect apartment? Do what everyone does and say it’s a therapy dog. You’re actually mentally disturbed so it won’t even be lying, I mean your best friend who you wish you married just killed himself. This took me back to a life without many consequences, so rose colored glasses tinted my view, but in reality it’s a Hallmark movie, just a little bit higher quality. And again, it goes through an entire winter with no snow. Just like we haven’t had snow in how many years?