THE WEDDING SONG (Le Chant des maiees)
Directed by: Karin Albou
Running time: 100 minutes
Release date: October 23, 2009 (limited)
Genre: Art/Foreign, Drama, War and Romance in French and Arabic with English subtitles
Distributor: Strand Releasing
MPAA Rating: N/R
In this coming of age period piece set during the Third Reich's occupation of Tunis in 1942, the story opens with a quasi-documentary sequence that spirts off into a narrative setting of the friendship of two 16 year old adolescent girls Nour (Olympe Borval) a Muslim and Myriam (Lizzie Brochere) a Jew who live and share the same house in a modest community in harmony. Each girl secretly desires the other's life: while Nour regrets that she doesn't go to school, Myriam dreams of love and romance. Myriam is also envious of Nour's engagement to her cousin Khaled, unfortunately Khaled can't find work which halts his marriage to Nour. Myriam's mother Tita (Karin Albou) decides to marry her daughter to a rich Jewish doctor who she doesn't love, and Myriam's dreams of love and romance dwindles away.
As the Nazis enter Tunis pursuing the policies of the Vichy regime and imposes restrictions on Jews, Khaled who is a confused young man takes a job as an informant for the German Army. With rising political upheaval and Khaled's help in locating Jews, the two girls must take sides and drift apart. However the more they grow apart the more they need each other.
Filmmaker Karin Albou centers the artistic direction of this movie using cold shades of color which encouages Tunisia's exotic image. The setting is also filled with tension and apprehension of what the once harmonial neighborhood of Tunis is about to endure.
This film features bold and dynamic performances by newcomers Lizzie Brochere and Olympe Borva. Director/writer Karin Albou brilliantly crafts the dimension of two young emancipated women's lives in an environment that is repressive towards women.
MOTHERHOOD
Directed by: Katherine Dieckman
Running time: 90 minutes
Release date: October 23, 2009 (limited
Genre: Drama and Comedy
Distributor: Freestyle Releasing
MPAA Rating: PG-13
This dramedy turn character study of motherhood in urban NYC is fascinating and hilarious. Starring Uman Thurman as Eliza Welch a former fiction writer who now resorts to blogging with her own site called "The Bjorn Identity." She is married to an absent-minded eccentric husband named Avery played by Anthony Edwards and have two young children. Her domestic lifestyle has put her creative ambitions on hold. They reside in one of those "once in a lifetime" situations; two rent-stabilized apartments in a walk-up tenement building in upscale Greenwich Village.
The plot developement strengthens when Eliza decides to enter a contest and write 500 words answering the question, "What Does Motherhood Mean To Me", run by a parenting magazine. Uma Thurman is unique as an energized mom and creating a role that is quite good. She has a great supporting character with Sheila (Minnie Driver) her best friend who is pregnant and without a mate.
I personally enjoyed the children of the Welch family. Six year old Clara (Daisy Tahan) who attends kindergarden is perky and fun to watch. The toddler of the household is Lucas played by David and Matthew Shallip, who innocently finds mischief. This is the meat of the plot where Eliza shows how exhausting it is to raise kids along with the overwhelming task of running a household, battling for parking space during alternate side parking showdowns and prepare for a birthday party.
The audience will be entertained with the playground park mothers and nannies with kids while watching the many backdrop sequences of the NYC everyday people.
This is a fun-filled study on being a mom with solid performances by a good cast.
(UNTITLED)
Directed by: Jonathan Parker
Running time: 96 minutes
Release date: October 23, 2009
Genre: Comedy, Musical/Performing Arts and Romance
Distributor: Samuel Goldwyn Films
MPAA Rating: N/R
This a satire that makes fun of nuance personalities of New York's comtemporary artsy world. Two competitive brothers; one who is eclectic and plays piano named Adrian Jacobs (Adam Goldberg) and the other brother Josh (Eion Bailey) who is a commercially successful painter.
Though the plot is a little pretentious it centers on how the two brothers are showcased by a stunning woman named Madeleine Gray (Marley Shelton), who commissions art showings and concerts in the Chelsea area of the city. Josh who is the stable and favorite of the Jacobs parents is in love with Madeleine, however she has fallen for Adrian who puts on bizarre avante-guarde musical concerts. The complications of the story is when Josh's highly commercial art work is sold to corporate clients discreetly out of the gallery's backroom which limits Josh's creative talent.
The theme of the film is not to be realistic and luckily so, because it doesn't hit its mark with dry trendy humor. Perhaps one could say that the tone and the amount of restraint in the humor is fun to watch. However it does not deliver in its funny interplay. The simplest way of looking at comedy is to say that it surprises, startles, shock or delights us and the essentail aspect of all comedy is that it goes beyond the ordinary, the dull and the familiar. This movie lacks most of these elements and I found myself searching for understanding of this vague idea of what is really funny in relation to analyzing and understanding it.
AMELIA
Directed by: Mira Nair
Running time: 111 minutes
Release date: October 23, 2009 (wide)
Genre: Drama and Biopic
Distributor: Fox Searchlight Pictures
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Amelia, is a dramatization of the life of Amelia Earhart. Based on the books
East to the Dawn by Susan Butler and
The Sound of Wongs by Mary S. Lovell this film chronicles Earhart's rise to fame and follows the relationship between Earhart and her husband, publisher, manager and promoter George P. Putnam.
Hilary Swank as Amelia Earhart, Richard Gere as George Putnam and Ewan McGregor as Gene Vidal are the major characters of this lavish movie.
The film opens up as she is piloting a plane in the clouds and most of the audience can guess this is her last flight. Soon after the film sequence flashes back to how she becomes the first woman to fly across the Atlantic (as a passenger), the film shows how she is thrust into the role of America's Sweetheart. In this lengthy movie the story written by Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan take liberties by sugar-coating this biopic with an elaborate mixture of a romantic/business relationship she has with George Putnam which turns into a marriage. Reality has it that Earhart was promoted into this stardom of the skies merely by a staged means of publicity. The clever Putnam marketed her for personal recognition and she went along with it for exposure, money and fame.
While the film glorified her existence and purified her long lasting extra-marital sexual affair with pilot Gene Vidal, it lacked any form of excitement. Of course, she was an inspiration to people everywhere during the depression years, the film and Hilary Swank's performance did capture the personality of a woman flirting with danger and standing up as her own. The plot placed a heavy emphysis on her larger than life charisma and how outspoken she was. Richard Gere and Ewan McGregor's performances were at best alright. This is not due to their acting credibility but from the standard theme characters they were scripted to play. However, it became tedious as the story of this famed aviatrix rolled on.
The final scenes predictably gave both Amelia and George a destined outcome. Unfortunately, it gave me a lackless movie to endure.
(FOR MORE FILM REVIEWS by Gerald Wright go to [url=http://www.HDFest.com]www.HDFest.com, [url=http://www.CriticalWomen.net]www.CriticalWomen.net and [url=http://www.FilmShowcase.Blogspot.com]www.FilmShowcase.Blogspot.com )
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