P.S: This is going to run a little long and I apologize in advance for that.

In keeping with my recent decision to expand my viewing horizons, I decided to go to my first film festival - The Dubai International Film Festival. I've really been taking in the festival atmosphere and just how different it is from regular screenings. Everywhere you look, you are going to find people similar to you who are actually interested in films rather than looking for a quick fix (which isn't bad per se). I have had a few surprise experiences as well. For example, yesterday I had planned to see two films and the first one ran a little late. I had 45 mins to get to the other one which wasn't in the same complex. I was planning to take a cab but I saw this other lady also in a hurry. And we both realized that we were rushing for the same reason, only difference being she had a car. I was able to hitch a ride and we were able to share our film experiences from the past few days. Those kinds of little joyous encounters and conversations wouldn't have been possible in normal screenings, and I am finding that out just now.

Coming to the films, I am not going to be able to watch as much of them as I'd liked but still enough (9 in total) to leave me feeling satisfied. There are three red-carpet screenings I really wanted to see - J Edgar, The Descendants, and My Week With Marilyn - but was unable to do so due to monetary considerations. They all cost 80 AED a pop (about 20-22 USD). Since I am paying out of my own pockets for all the films anyways, I decided to stay away from them to keep my concsious clean.

Without further ado...

Thursday (8 Dec) - Le Havre (2011) - Aki Kaurismaki - 3 out of 4 – Comedy/Drama – French

Besides the red-carpet screening of J Edgar, this was the only film that struck my fancy on the first day. Aki Kaurismaki should be a pretty well-known director to film fans like those on here but Le Havre was the first film I saw from him. It was a sweet and charming tale set in the eponymous tiny seaside town. Marcel Marx (Andre Wilms) is a shoe shiner who has a knack of getting himself in trouble. He is taken care of (and takes care of) by his wife Arletty (Kati Outinen) who has just been diagnosed with a serious ailment. One day as he is having lunch by the docks, he comes across an African refugee Idrissa (Blondin Miguel). He recognizes the lad from the news reels. Realizing that the first thing the police will do is get him deported, he takes him under his wing and begins his personal quest to send the boy safely to London, aided by his good-hearted friends. Meanwhile, a police officer named Monet is also on the lookout for Idrissa but not for the same reasons.

First of all, the tale is as straightforward as it sounds. There are many problems that Marcel comes across on his quest to send Idrissa away but all of them are solved in the film's own charming manner. For example, one of the best sequences is when Marcel has to come up with money to pay this guy to take Idrissa away on his boat. He arranges a concert by the local rockstar named Little Bob who does one of the best Elvis impressions I've seen. The entire sequence is such a hoot that it is hard not to laugh at it. The film is filled with many such moments. I don't think cynics will be able to appreciate the film since it has an entirely soft core and nearly everyone is good. But it is exactly the kind of film that I love.

I read James' review of one of Kaurismaki's previous films - The Man Without a Past (2004) also starring Kati Outinen - and he had this to say about the acting: "The acting in Kaurismaki's films can be an acquired taste. The director demands low key, subdued performances. The result is minimal body language, vocal styles that are close to a monotone, and a limited range of facial expressions." This is exactly how the acting in Le Havre also felt. Whether that is a good thing or a bad thing depends on what you want from the actors in a film. It worked for the roles of Marcel, Idrissa and Monet but not quite for Arletty. The two noteworthy performances came from Evelyne Didi as Yvette, Marcel's neighbour who cares for Idrissa while he is away, and Elina Salo as Claire, the bar-owner who constantly advises Marcel.

Overall, I felt it was a sweet, gently told story which was life-affirming in its own way; without spoiling things, in more ways than one.

Saturday (10 Dec) - Arthur Christmas (2011) - Sarah Smith - 3.5 out of 4 – Animation/Fantasy – English

The first Aardman film I am seeing is also supposed to be one of their best traditional animation films instead of the claymation they are known for. I felt this was a brilliant holiday film arriving just in time to put people in the joyous mood for Christmas.

Contrary to popular belief, Santa isn't a single figure but in fact a family name passed down from generation to generation. The latest Santa (Jim Broadbent) is just about reaching his twilight and everyone expects this to be his last Christmas. Despite being Santa, the whole operation of delivering the presents on Christmas eve is organized by Steve (a deliciously delightful Hugh Laurie) using his tactical team of elves and his jet the S1. Arthur (James McAvoy) is Steve's younger brother and for all intents and purposes a pain in the arse when undertaking such a huge operation. It isn't until the night is over that one of the elves discovers an undelivered present. Steve writes it off as a minor anomaly to which a tired Santa agrees. Not to be deterred, Arthur enlists the help of Grandsanta (Bill Nighy) and wrapping expert elf Bryony (Ashley Jensen) and they embark on a quest to deliver the gift before sunrise.

The voice-actors made this film what it is. I am a huge Hugh Laurie nut and will eat up anything he does. Steve is exactly the kind of role that suits him and he played it perfectly with nary a hint of Dr. House in play. James McAvoy has a naturally innocent voice which suits Arthur. Bill Nighy as Grandsanta brought the roof down with his antics and Ashley Jensen was capably cute as Bryony, while Jim Broadbent and Imelda Staunton were decent as Mr. and Mrs. Santa.

I enjoyed this one a lot and, from the looks of the kids in the audience, I am sure they did as well. Arthur Christmas was the perfect holiday film for Christmas 2011.

Sunday (11 Dec)

Unter Schnee/Under Snow (2011) – 3 out of 4 – Ulrike Ottinger – Documentary – English voiceover narrative

P.S.: This is the first documentary I’ve seen. Ever.

DIFF organizers had a surprise for us as the film-maker Ulrike Ottinger was present during the screening to answer the crowd questions and provide her insight. Before the film, she said that the place covered in the film, the Japanese region of Echigo, is known for two things – its snow and the rich fantasy and culture. She said she had tried her best to bring out both in the film.

I agreed with her to a large extent. She was able to bring out both aspects of the region, for the most part. Thanks mainly due to the cinematography, I felt like I was actually there living amongst these people. The way the snow has been covered was particularly breathtaking but this was expected. What I did not expect was how brilliant some of the lighting in the interior sequences was. I didn’t expect such high technical quality from a documentary for some reason and that astounded me.

The main problem I had with the film was that she didn’t get the balance right. For the fantasy part, she focused on a fantasy couple of a human and the spirit of the fox, and this didn’t work as well as I would’ve liked. I, for one, wished to learn more about the culture of the people, their festivities and their cuisine instead of the fantasy aspect. Towards the end, she focused too much on the former aspect while the latter was nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t a particularly satisfying end to the film. However, I still felt it was a brilliant documentary that made me want to visit this place that is forever covered under snow.

Unfortunately, as I mentioned in the first post, I had to rush to another film after this one, I didn’t have time to listen to Ulrike Ottinger’s views on the film.

Duo Ming Jin/Life Without Principle (2011) – 4 out of 4 – Johnnie To – Thriller – Chinese

Without a doubt, the best film I’ve seen so far at the festival and one of the best I’ve seen all year. Johnnie To is apparently a famous film-maker that many may have heard about, but this is his first film I’ve seen, and I was absolutely stunned at just how outstanding it was in every aspect.

Theresa (Denise Ho) has just been told that she is one million short of her margins as far as getting new clients for a new fund her firm has begun which focuses on investing in BRIC countries. She tries to get a low-risk investor under her for what is essentially a high-risk investment. Panther (Ching Wan Lau) is a gangster who goes around making friends with any “brother” he can find. Inspector Cheung (Richie Ren) is having a tough time dealing with the expectations of his girlfriend Connie (Myolie Wu) and a tough homicide. Their lives are intertwined when a loan shark Yuen (Hoi-Pang Lo) is assaulted after withdrawing 10 million dollars from Theresa.

The film is told in non-chronological fashion but that never feels forced like in some films. In fact, that was what made it an absolute white-knuckle thriller. We are first introduced to the key event in the film and then shown the events in each of their lives leading up to that day. Unlike other financial films which focus on the 2008 recession, this is set against a more recent backdrop of the Greece crisis. As Greece goes further into debt, stock prices plummet leaving Theresa and Panther’s stock broker friend Lung (Phillip Keung) reeling and under assault from investors. The measures they take to survive the crisis form the basis for the film’s depiction of the basic human nature of greed. The characters of the inspector, his girlfriend, and Theresa’s low-risk investor served as the more human counterpart to the other characters. But even they are shown to be driven by a need to make more money from their savings – as are all of us in this world.

I had forgotten how good acting can be in Asian films because I hadn’t seen any in such a long time. The best of the lot was Ching Wan Lau as Panther who was simply a blast. He offered a lot of respite from the serious tone of the rest of the film and I (and most of the crowd) couldn’t keep myself from laughing each time he was on screen. Richie Ren as Inspector Cheung was suitably serious in dealing with the difficulties in his life. Most of the rest were good as befitted the roles they were playing but not really noteworthy.

All in all, the film was true to its name in the depiction of humanity’s moral compass. Life Without Principle is a brilliant edge-of-the-seat thriller despite having no action sequences.

Upcoming views are:
Seung-Jun Yi’s Dalpaengee Eui Byeol/Planet of Snail (2011) – Korean Documentary about the travails of a blind and deaf man and his disabled wife.
Nick Murphy’s The Awakening (2011) – British Horror film starring Rebecca Hall and Imelda Staunton set in 1920s England.
Dreiviertelmond/Three Quarter Moon (2011) – German comedy/drama about a taxi driver who helps a young girl search for her mother.

I may catch a couple of other films if time permits.

Cool write ups, Balaji. I was interested in Arthur Christmas mostly because of Jim Broadbent (amazing actor), so it's good to hear it's good. I can't say I've heard of any of the other movies you've seen, but they definitely sound interesting and they'll be on my radar.

I'm glad you're seeing these lesser known movies as opposed to the 3 red carpet showings you wanted to see. It's much more fun to read these write ups than another take on J.Edgar's bad makeup and closet homosexuality.

Monday (12 Dec)

Dalpaengee Eui Byeol/Planet of Snail (2011) - Seung-Jun Yi - 3.5 out of 4 – Documentary – Korean

This was a heartwarming documentary following the travails Young-Chan, a blind/deaf man, and his wife Soon-Ho who is considerably shorter than him because of spine injury. I felt it was delicately constructed focusing on how they overcome their seemingly insurmountable disabilities in day-to-day life.

One such brilliant scene was when the tube light in Soon-Ho's room stops working. She is too short to reach it while Young-Chan can reach it but cannot do anything about it. She guides him through the process and they get it working. That was enough to leave me with a huge lump in my throat. The film was made up of a number of other similar scenes, some involving Young-Chan's similarly disabled friends. There are also constant essays in the film heard as voice-overs and all of them were apparently written by Chan himself.

If at all anything can be said against the film, it is that it is too slow-paced, even for a documentary. However, that is hardly a negative. All in all, I felt it was a really touching film in the way it depicted the relationship between Young-Chan and his wife. Definitely worth a watch if it strikes your fancy. (As an aside, the film-maker was present in this one as well but due to having to rush for the next film, I missed his thoughts again.)

The Awakening (2011) - Nick Murphy - 3.5 out of 4 – Horror/Drama – English

Florence Cathcart (Rebecca Hall), who has recently lost her lover in the Great War, is a so-called ghost-hunter who exposes hoaxers and charlatans. Her determination towards her job stems not only from a will to prove that there is no supernatural but also a hope that she may find proof that they “do” exist, which will finally allow her to find peace after her loss. She is visited by Robert Mallory (Dominic West) who wants her to come to his boarding school and explain sightings of a ghost who might’ve caused the recent death of one of the school’s boys. The matron in the boarding school Maud (Imelda Staunton) is a fan of her books and takes an immediate liking to her presence. As Florence delves further into the mystery, she slowly finds herself losing grip of her own sanity and beliefs.

The film’s two biggest strengths were the setting and Florence’s characterization. The 1920s England added a lot to the atmosphere. Since women in Britain weren’t expected to be educated at the time, that made Florence a unique protagonist. And the director as if to further illustrate his point has her smoke a lot, talk about the hallway paintings and other characters exclaim about her status, thus really giving her a really regal and educated look. In terms of the former, the isolated confines of the boarding school reminded me a lot of Shutter Island and The Shining (which I really should see again); while it was not really a unique location for a horror movie, I felt it had been utilized well.

Besides having a lot of drama on Florence overcoming her past – the film’s title was indicative of this transformation – it had many traditional horror moments. There were a number of boo moments where many in the audience gasped (mostly members of the opposite gender) and an equal number of chilling moments which left me with that tingling feeling down my spine. And the best part was that they didn’t happen when I predicted them too. I am bored of predictable horror but felt that wasn’t the case here.

Man, those Brits can act. Rebecca Hall was the heart of the film. Since Florence is our window into the film, its success depends on her performance. And she absolutely nailed it! She acted a lot with her eyes to depict the confusions arising in Florence’s mind and was able to convince us of the loneliness and helpless she was feeling. Dominic West, who I haven’t seen a lot, and Imelda Staunton made for a great supporting cast, but this is Hall’s film from start to finish.

Fortunately, I was able to sit in the Q&A session for this film with Nick Murphy who provided great insights. He told that the role was partially written with Hall in mind after seeing her stage and BBC performances. I was able to pose a question to him about his twist and how it affected multiple viewings. For me, this is a film where knowing the twist only made me want to see it multiple times and he was in agreement with this assessment. Overall, it was a really enlightening half hour post-screening.