Films – Page 42 – Spinning Platters

SFIFF59 Spotlights #3: Phantom Boy / Chevalier / Shorts 1 / Shorts 2 / Animated Shorts

A scene from Alain Gagnol and Jean-Loup Felicioli's PHANTOM BOY will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016.

Today, it begins! The San Francisco International Film Festival(SFIFF) runs from today, April 21st through Thursday, May 5th. We’ll continue to bring you spotlights of amazing films at the festival, and cover special events and awards. But allow us to give you one last preview of the program with spotlights on two more features and three excellent short film programs. Full program available here.

Phantom Boy
(France/Belgium, 2015, 84 min, Global Visions)

A scene from Alain Gagnol and Jean-Loup Felicioli's PHANTOM BOY will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016. — A scene from Alain Gagnol and Jean-Loup Felicioli’s PHANTOM BOY will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.

From the filmmaking team that brought us 2010’s A Cat in Paris comes another fun, beautifully drawn adventure, Phantom Boy. In the film, a young cancer patient with a unique power to engage in out-of-body excursions teams up with a cop to stop a deranged gangster from taking over New York City. Constantly hilarious, always engaging, and totally charming, this film is an instant crowd-pleaser and should be on the top of everyone’s must-see festival list.

Screenings:

Sunday, April 24rd, 1:00pm, Alamo Drafthouse

Tickets available here.

Continue reading “SFIFF59 Spotlights #3: Phantom Boy / Chevalier / Shorts 1 / Shorts 2 / Animated Shorts“

SFIFF59 Spotlights #2: Five Nights in Maine/Frank & Lola/And when I die, I won’t stay dead/Notes on Blindness

SFIFF

Spinning Platters continues its preview coverage of the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, which opens tomorrow, Thursday, April 21st. Information and tickets are available here.

To whet your Fest appetite, here we spotlight two of the Festival’s features and two documentaries.

Five Nights in Maine
(USA, 2015, 82 min, Marquee Presentations)

Sherwin (David Oyelowo) and his mother-in-law Lucinda (Dianne Wiest) share a moment at her Maine house.

When an adult dies unexpectedly, whose grief is greater – the surviving spouse, or the surviving parent? Are such comparisons even fair? Such are the heady questions that writer/director Maris Curran explores here, in a picture thematically similar to the recently released Demolition. After his wife Fiona (Hani Furstenberg) dies suddenly in a car crash, city-dweller Sherwin (David Oyelowo) visits Fiona’s terminally ill mother Lucinda (Dianne Wiest) at her isolated house in rural Maine. Though both try to maintain a polite façade with each other as they process their loss, issues of blame, recrimination, and bitterness slowly rise to the surface, forcing the two to confront past and present emotional wounds. A pas de deux between two of today’s best actors set against a stunning backdrop of fall light and foliage, Curran’s film is a flawlessly executed meditation on how we deal with life, loss, and love.

Screenings:

Saturday, April 23rd – 5:00pm, Alamo Drafthouse
Monday, April 25th – 1:00pm, Alamo Drafthouse
Tuesday, April 26th – 8:45pm, Alamo Drafthouse

Tickets for Five Nights in Maine available here.

Continue reading “SFIFF59 Spotlights #2: Five Nights in Maine/Frank & Lola/And when I die, I won’t stay dead/Notes on Blindness“

Film Review: Miles Ahead

Cheadle is mesmerizing in his seemingly-effortless trading of cinematic duties for this thrilling tale.

If there is only one thing that you learn about jazz, it’s not the instruments that make it up, nor the time that it was most popular, or even the players that were significant in its creation. That one crucial thing is that jazz is an improvisational story being told in musical form; it has its own cast of unreliable narrators who are making up the tale as they go, each twist and turn more intriguing than the last. It is a palette for painting pictures where the hues and overall artistic movement could shift at the drop of a hat. Whether the story is based on the truth, or a marvelous work of fiction, is less important than the journey there, and the anecdotes told along the way are what add the most excitement to it all. It is, therefore, very appropriate to take an approach to creating a biopic about a jazz icon in a style that best reflects the character of the music — a feat undertaken spellbindingly by actor Don Cheadle, who both stars in and directs Miles Ahead, the 2016 tale of musical virtuoso Miles Davis.

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Film Review: The Jungle Book

The Jungle Book adds incredible visuals to the bare necessities.

The Jungle Book (the book) was written by Rudyard Kipling as a collection of stories in 1894. They featured anthropomorphic animals, with a few of the stories revolving around a young “man cub” named Mowgli. Audiences are probably most familiar with the 1967 Disney animated adaptation — a jolly musical featuring the iconic songs “The Bare Necessities” and “I Wan’na Be Like You.” With Disney’s recent string of reviving their classic animated films into live action (with a lot of integrated CGI), the aim seems to be to incorporate characteristics of the original written works. In Jon Favreau’s (Elf, Iron Man, Chef) new directorial effort, The Jungle Book does indeed blend the darker aspects of Kipling’s original writings with the playful jubilee of the animated version. Because of this, the shifting tones can be a little off balance. However, The Jungle Book is a thoroughly engrossing adventure, with benchmark visuals and stellar voice work.

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SFIFF59 Spotlights #1: Microbe & Gasoline / Dead Slow Ahead / Very Big Shot / Granny’s Dancing on the Table

SFIFF59

It’s that wonderful time of the year, again! Yes, time for the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF). The 59th edition of SFIFF will be hosting its two week celebration and screenings of incredible cinema from around the globe — April 21 through May 5. Year after year, Spinning Platters is here to provide you with tons of SFIFF coverage before, during, and after the event. Let’s start you off with four spotlights you should check out when SFIFF59 rolls around…

Microbe & Gasoline
(France, 2015, 105 min, Global Visions)

A scene from Michel Gondry's MICROBE AND GASOLINE will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016. — A scene from Michel Gondry’s MICROBE AND GASOLINE will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.

Writer/director Michel Gondry’s newest cinematic entry may be his most charming to date. The whimsical tale of two adolescent friends (nicknamed Microbe and Gasoline) building a mobile tiny house for a chance to roadtrip across France to meet girls and explore the world is everything you’d want it to be — funny, inventive, and entertaining. Gondry’s usual DIY visual panache is less on display — maintaining focus instead on the two young lead characters whose conversations and musings on life transcend audience age groups. You’ll love Microbe & Gasoline!

Screenings:

Sunday, April 24rd, 6:00pm, Victoria Theatre
Tuesday, April 26th, 5:30pm, Alamo Drafthouse

Tickets available here.

Continue reading “SFIFF59 Spotlights #1: Microbe & Gasoline / Dead Slow Ahead / Very Big Shot / Granny’s Dancing on the Table“

Film Review: Demolition

Vallée’s newest meditation on grief could finally mean Oscar for Gyllenhaal

New friends Karen (Naomi Watts) and Davis (Jake Gyllenhaal) find themselves in a tense situation. — New friends Karen (Naomi Watts) and Davis (Jake Gyllenhaal) find themselves in a tense situation at a function honoring Davis’s recently deceased wife.

How do we process sudden loss? Is there a right or wrong way to grieve, and how can we keep grief from overwhelming us? These are the weighty questions director Jean-Marc Vallée continues to contemplate in his somewhat uneven but emotionally arresting new picture Demolition. While not as strong as either Wild or Dallas Buyers Club, Vallée’s previous two films that explored death and grief, Demolition nonetheless is worth recommending based both on its raw and unique way of depicting the grieving process, and also on the strength of Jake Gyllenhaal’s exceptional performance as a man left shell-shocked by the unexpected death of his wife. Continue reading “Film Review: Demolition“

Film Review: The Boss

The Boss gets to a hilarious point, and then avoids it the rest of the way.

Melissa McCarthy has been a central figure in the female-led comedic renaissance in modern cinema. 2011’s Bridesmaids kicked off a constant flow of adult comedies featuring female leads, and the results have been great. That isn’t to say that female-led comedies were never produced before, but they were few and far between — about one to every ten male-led adult comedies (a guesstimate). The Boss is the latest entry in the new wave of such films, and while it’s not nearly as funny as others, it gleefully crosses the politically incorrect line on a few occasions while criticizing some of our society’s most antiquated views of women of all ages. And when it does, unfortunately not often enough, it’s hysterical!

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Film Review: Midnight Special

The boy is Special, and so is the film

Roy (Michael Shannon, l.) will do anything to protect his very special son Alton (Jaeden Lieberher).

Writer/director Jeff Nichols (Mud, Take Shelter, Shotgun Stories) continues his collaboration with the terrific actor Michael Shannon to great effect in his utterly engaging new science fiction film Midnight Special. Unlike another film by a well known writer/director that opened today, Nichols’s film grips you from its opening minute and keeps you enraptured for its nearly two hour run time. A film that pays homage to others of its genre while still managing to be totally unique, Midnight Special is well worth your box office dollars. Continue reading “Film Review: Midnight Special”

Film Review: Everybody Wants Some!!

Nobody will want any of Linklater’s tedious newest

Remember that time in college when you sat around your buddy’s room, listening to records, smoking pot and talking about Carl Sagan and old Twilight Zone episodes? Or that time you went to a super freaky party thrown by theater majors? Or that time your housemate got totally bent because you beat him at ping pong? You don’t? Well, writer/director Richard Linklater sure does, and he’s going to make you relive all those experiences and more in his meandering, occasionally funny, but mostly dull new picture Everybody Wants Some!! When you need not one, but two exclamation points to take the place of genuine excitement in your film, you know you’re in trouble. Continue reading “Film Review: Everybody Wants Some!!”

Film Review: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Why so serious?

Face to face. Angry man v angry man. Grumble v grumble. — Face to face. Brooder v brooder. Mano y mano (with guns and gadgets)

“Hey everyone, Batman is fighting Superman!” <<everyone rushes to the schoolyard>> “Aw, is it over?” “Yeah, it didn’t last long and it wasn’t too exciting, but they promised to fight someone else together next time.” There you have it — that’s a pretty good summary of the disappointing DC tent event, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. What ends up functioning as a 2 hr 40 min movie trailer for an pending Justice League movie is enjoyable at times but mostly a mess of style over substance. Anyone familiar, and probably critical, of director Zack Snyder’s work won’t be surprised by this. There was so much (tentative) hype for BvS that it would’ve been nearly impossible for it to live up to the expectations, but hey, The Force Awakens pulled it off so BvS has no excuse. BvS is disappointing on so many levels, save a surprisingly stellar Ben Affleck as Batman, because its favors more over less, background over foreground, and a serious tone over a fun one.

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