Nica (Hani Furstenberg) and Alex (Gael García Bernal) experience a moment that changes everything in THE LONELIEST PLANET
THE LONELIEST PLANET (Julia Loktev, 2011)
Museum of the Moving Image
35th Ave. at 36th St., Astoria
Wednesday, October 17, $15, 7:00
718-777-6800
www.ifcfilms.com
www.movingimage.us
The first half of Julia Loktev’s second feature film, The Loneliest Planet, is a dazzling tour de force, as young lovers Alex (Gael García Bernal) and Nica (Hani Furstenberg) revel in all that life has to offer. Shortly before getting married, they have decided to go on a hiking trip through the Caucasus Mountains in Georgia, led by a guide named Dato (real-life mountaineer Bidzina Gudjabidze, in his first acting role). Alex and Nica are fresh and alive, their eyes filled with wonder, their faces in perpetual, infectious smiles as they make their way through spectacular landscapes gorgeously photographed by cinematographer Inti Briones. In several shots, the three hikers are barely visible walking in the distance as Briones focuses on breathtaking views of the lush green mountainside and vast Central Asian landscape (as well as, in close-up, Furstenburg’s dazzling red hair). What little dialogue there is doesn’t really matter; in fact, much of it is hard to hear, more like background noise, and what is spoken in foreign languages isn’t even translated. But when the travelers run into three locals, something happens that upends the dynamic and severely changes the relationship among Alex, Nica, and Dato, something that requires the kind of split-second decision that one can never take back, resulting in a return journey that is much darker, the smiles, laughter, and romance disappearing in a stark moment. Based on Tom Bissell’s short story “Expensive Trips Nowhere,” The Loneliest Planet recalls such seminal works as Mikhail Kalatozov’s The Letter Never Sent, Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker, John Boorman’s Deliverance, Akira Kurosawa’s Dersu Uzala, and Roberto Rosselini’s Voyage in Italy, in which location serves as a character of mystery and potential danger. Loktev, a visual artist who previously made the 1998 documentary Moment of Impact, which details her family’s very personal experiences after her father was hit by a car, and her 2006 narrative debut, Day Night Day Night, about a female Palestinian suicide bomber, has crafted a mesmerizing tale built around small subtleties and the tender, fragile nature of human relationships, in which one misstep can have shattering consequences. Mexican actor García Bernal and New York-born Israeli star Furstenberg make a terrifically believable couple, so vibrant in the first half, so tentative and subdued in the latter sections. The Loneliest Planet is having a special preview screening on October 17 as part of the Museum of the Moving Image’s “See It Big!” series, with Loktev and Furstenberg on hand to talk about the film, which opens October 26 at the IFC Center.
Winner of both the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and the Palme d’Or at Cannes, Claude Lelouch’s A Man and a Woman is one of the most popular, and most unusual, romantic love stories ever put on film. Oscar-nominated Anouk Aimée stars as Anne Gauthier and Jean-Louis Trintignant as Jean-Louis Duroc, two people who each has a child in a boarding school in Deauville. Anne, a former actress, and Jean-Louis, a successful racecar driver, seem to hit it off immediately, but they both have pasts that haunt them and threaten any kind of relationship. Shot in three weeks with a handheld camera by Lelouch, who earned nods for Best Director and Best Screenplay (with Pierre Uytterhoeven), A Man and a Woman is a tour-de-force of filmmaking, going from the modern day to the past via a series of flashbacks that at first alternate between color and black-and-white, then shift hues in curious, indeterminate ways. Much of the film takes place in cars, either as Jean-Louis races around a track or the protagonists sit in his red Mustang convertible and talk about their lives, their hopes, their fears. The heat they generate is palpable, making their reluctance to just fall madly, deeply in love that much more heart-wrenching, all set to a memorable soundtrack by Francis Lai. Lelouch, Trintignant, and Aimée revisited the story in 1986 with A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later, without the same impact and success. A new print of the original will be shown on October 15 at the Academy Theater as part of MoMA’s annual “To Serve and Project” film preservation festival, in conjunction with the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences’ monthly “Monday Nights with Oscar” programming and will be introduced by Aimée, who has appeared in several recent films following a seven-year hiatus. The MoMA series, cocurated by J. Hoberman, continues through November 12 with such films as Jacques Demy’s Lola, Andy Warhol’s San Diego Surf, Raoul Walsh’s Wild Girl, and the director’s cut of Roberto Rossellini’s General della Rovere.
The biggest box-office hit in South Korean history, The Thieves is an overly slick, way too self-satisfied heist flick from hot director Dong-hoo Choi, who has scored previous successes with the caper movie The Big Swindle, the gambling tale Tazza: The High Rollers, and the action fantasy Woochi. Master criminal Macao Park (Kim Yun-seok) brings together two talented teams of crooks, one from Hong Kong, the other from Korea, to steal the $20 million Tear of the Sun diamond from a well-guarded casino, but when things go terribly wrong, suspicion, greed, and betrayal lead to one last chance at revenge. The all-star cast includes Lee Jung-jae as Popie, the head of the Korean contingent; Kim Hye-soo as sexy safecracker Pepsee; Gianna Jun as wall climber Yenicall; Kim Soo-hyun as young up-and-comer Zampano; Kim Hae-sook as older disguise expert Chewingum; Simon Yam as Chen, the leader of the Hong Kong group; Angelica Lee as sexy safecracker Julie; and Oh Dal-soo as young weapons pro Andrew. Personalities clash, old romances brim to the surface, and deception rules the day in this too-long movie (135 minutes) that lacks the charm of Steven Soderbergh’s first Ocean’s Eleven film and the high-tech gadgetry of the Mission: Impossible movie series. Huge plot holes compete with a general goofiness as the film just goes on and on, bullets flying everywhere as Macao meets with diamond seeker Wei Hong (Ki Gook-seo) among a flurry of cops who just can’t be that inept. The whole enterprise feels flat, offering nothing new to one of cinema’s most exciting and fun genres.
Nominated for thirteen Swedish Academy Awards, Simon & the Oaks is a soapy, sweeping Scandinavian epic about the search for identity. The first film based on a novel by celebrated Swedish author Marianne Frederiksson, Simon & the Oaks follows the confused, troubled Simon as he grows from a timid boy (Jonatan S. Wächter) into a strapping young man (Bill Skargård, son of Stellan) during the WWII era. Simon loves music and books, but his working-class father, Erik (Stefan Gödicke), wants him to forget about education and instead learn a physical trade. Simon becomes friends with a Jewish boy, Isak (Karl Martin Eriksson, then Karl Linnertorp), whose father, Ruben (Jan Josef Liefers), has moved the family from Germany to escape the Nazis. As Simon starts spending more time with Ruben, Erik becomes angry and resentful, while Simon’s mother, Karin (Helen Sjöholm), develops a dangerous closeness with Ruben, a wealthy businessman whose wife (Lena Nylén) is confined to a sanitarium. Simon is a dreamer, looking out at the horizon believing that anything is possible, talking to the whispering oak by the lake behind his house. But he lives in a changing world where everyone around him has to face startling realities centered around bigotry and genocide while protecting him from a powerful secret. Director Lisa Ohlin (Sex, Hope and Love, Waiting for the Tenor), who experienced some of the same things that Simon does, gives the film a lush, grand feel that often overwhelms its more personal story while including numerous clichéd scenes, particularly between fathers and sons, that detract from the already straightforward narrative. The film works best when Liefers is on-screen, playing a complex character who is fascinating to watch as he calmly moves forward despite the maelstrom that surrounds him. Simon & the Oaks opens October 12 at the Paris Theatre, with Ohlin appearing for a Q&A following the 7:00 screening.