Eric Bishop (Steve Evets) gets some advice from his hero, football star Eric Cantona (Eric Cantona)
LOOKING FOR ERIC (Ken Loach, 2010)
Opens Friday, May 14
IFC Center, 323 Sixth Ave. at Third St., 212-924-7771
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, 1886 Broadway at 63rd St., 212-757-2280
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With his life in freefall, postal employee Eric Bishop (Steve Evets) gazes up at his poster of soccer legend Eric Cantona and wonders what the Manchester United star would do – and then, like magic, Cantona (played by Cantona himself) appears in his room, to lend advice and help him through his myriad problems. Reminiscent of how Bogie (Jerry Lacy) guides Allan (Woody Allen) in PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM, Cantona hangs out with Bishop, talking about how he dealt with adversity on the field and off and sharing joints while discussing life. Bishop’s stepsons don’t listen to him, his second wife has left him, and he ends up in the hospital after driving the wrong way through a traffic circle. But his close group of motley friends – Spleen (Justin Moorhouse), Jack (Des Sharples), Monk (Greg Cook), Judge (Mick Ferry), Smug (Smug Roberts), Travis (Johnny Travis), and leader Meatballs (John Henshaw) – stick by him through thick and thin, especially when his son Ryan (Gerard Kearns) gets into serious trouble with a local gangster (Steve Marsh). A light-hearted, tender comedy that turns somewhat goofy at the end, LOOKING FOR ERIC was directed by, remarkably enough, British iconoclast Ken Loach, who has previously offered up such dour, serious tales as KES, RIFF-RAFF, CARLA’S SONG, and THE WIND THAT SHAKES THE BARLEY. Loach and screenwriting partner Paul Laverty were looking for a sweet, innocent film to make when Cantona actually approached them with an idea that they turned into LOOKING FOR ERIC, a nod to such charmers as WAKING NED DEVINE and THE FULL MONTY that includes clips of many of Cantona’s most spectacular goals as well as his infamous farewell press conference.
Inspired by his own childhood raised on a commune, Adam Sherman’s debut film, HAPPINESS RUNS, is filled with angst and ennui, overwhelmed by a dank darkness that very nearly strangles it. Mark L. Young stars as Victor, a high school senior living in a utopian — dystopian? — community where sex and drugs run rampant, among the kids as well as the adults, which include Victor’s incompetent mother (Andie MacDowell) and Insley (Rutger Hauer), the local guru who heals his flock by sleeping with all the women he can. When the prodigal daughter, the beloved and beautiful Becky (Hanna Hall), returns to care for her ailing father, followed by ultracool drug dealer Shiloh (Shiloh Fernandez, looking frighteningly like Joaquin Phoenix), life in this supposedly idyllic setting threatens to explode as greed, jealousy, and violence turn the not-so-free-spirited commune into LORD OF THE FLIES. HAPPINESS RUNS, which has its moments, suffers from the lack of an attractive protagonist; everyone appears to be so miserable that it is difficult to identify with any of them. In his song “Happiness Runs,” ’60s icon Donovan sings, “You can have everything if you let yourself be”; in his first movie, HAPPINESS RUNS, Adam Sherman shows that that is not necessarily always the case.
Film Forum concludes its four-week series “The Newspaper Picture” with one of the grandest of them all, Alan J. Pakula’s ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN. Even though the audience knows the outcome, following two young reporters, Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman), as they try to get to the bottom of the Watergate scandal is an absolute joy, an edge-of-your-seat thriller written by master scribe William Goldman. Pakula goes inside the machinations of the Nixon administration and the Washington Post, setting up an epic battle with an all-star cast that also includes Jack Warden, Martin Balsam, Jason Robards, Jane Alexander, Ned Beatty, and Hal Holbrook as Deep Throat. Nominated for eight Oscars and winner of two (for sound and art direction), ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN is not just one of the great newspaper pictures of all time but one of the best films of an outstanding decade for movies.
The Asia Society’s presentation of John Bush’s Yatra Trilogy concludes on May 7 with VAJRA SKY OVER TIBET: JOURNEY INTO AN ENDANGERED WORLD, a reverential documentary that examines the history of the Tibetan people, focusing on the long-standing battle with China. In 1959, the fourteenth Dalai Lama was forced into exile, finding safe haven in India. Although many Tibetans escaped with him, many stayed behind, where they practice their faith under the sharp watch of the Chinese government, which would like to name their own Dalai Lama in time. VAJRA SKY OVER TIBET is the third part of the Yatra Trilogy by producer/director John Bush, following DHARMA RIVER and PRAJNA EARTH, as Bush completes his Buddhist pilgrimage that previously took him to Southeast Asia. Bush, a Western Buddhist himself, gained remarkable access to some of Vajrayana Buddhism’s holiest palaces and sites of worship, including Jokhang Temple in Llasa, the Potala, and the Norbulinka. Bush winds his way through the Drepung Festival, traveling with a Tibetan guide whose name he can’t share because of possible reprisals. Bush narrates much of the film, along with Tenzin L Choegyal, the nephew of the current Dalai Lama, and Dadon, a popular Tibetan singer. The meditative score is by David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir, supplemented with devotional music by Dadon and other Himalayan musicians. Although it often plays too much like a travel show on PBS or the Travel Channel, VAJRA SKY, which has been personally endorsed by the Dalai Lama, is an illuminating look into a fascinating culture that is in serious danger of disappearing. “Tibetan civilization,” writes the Dalai Lama as the film begins, “forms a distinct part of the world’s precious common heritage. Humanity would be the poorer if it were to be lost.” For nearly ninety minutes, with beautiful cinematography, captivating music, and gorgeous settings, Bush, who will introduce the Asia Society screening in conjunction with the exhibit “Pilgrimage and Buddhist Art,” takes you deep inside a mysterious, peaceful, and threatened world that you will not soon forget.