Spinning Platters brings you two final spotlights from the 57th San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF), which closed on Thursday with Chris Messina’s film Alex of Venice at the Castro, with many of the cast there for a fun Q&A. You can check out the Festival award winners here, and be sure to keep your eye out for many of these films as they are released throughout the year.
Alex of Venice
(USA 2014, 87 min)
The Mindy Project’s Chris Messina makes his directorial debut with this emotionally rich drama about the dissolution of a marriage. In the Q&A following the film, Messina cited Kramer vs. Kramer, Hannah and Her Sisters, and All the Real Girls as influencing his picture, and, indeed, all the best tonal elements of those films can be felt here. Strong performances from Mary Elizabeth Winstead as workaholic environmental attorney Alex, Katie Nehra as her more free-spirited sister, and Don Johnson as their actor father on the verge of a health crisis solidly anchor the film. Messina, as Alex’s unhappy husband George, and young Skylar Gaertner as Alex and George’s son Dakota round out the cast nicely, with Gaertner’s portrayal just as nuanced and sensitive as Justin Henry’s in Kramer vs. Kramer. A side story about Alex’s father appearing in The Cherry Orchard is a bit of a heavy-handed metaphor, but that’s just one small quibble with an otherwise excellent first feature. Continue reading “Final SFIFF Spotlights: Alex of Venice/Begin Again”