Across the street from the Borough of Manhattan Community College at 199 Chambers Street, which serves as one of the largest film-screening venues serving the Tribeca Film Festival. The festival runs through Saturday, May 2. (Courtesy of Tribeca Film Festival)
Whether you like comedies, dramas, thrillers, or documentaries, the Tribeca Film Festival affords movie fans the unique opportunity to screen films in the company of the director and actors responsible for the work on screen.
In the spirit of the multicultural city of New York itself, this year’s festival features films from 36 countries. The following are reviews of four buzz-worthy foreign films gracing the festival.
Cuban Documentary: ‘The Lost Son of Havana’
The Lost Son of Havana follows retired major league baseball player Luis Tiant as he returns to Cuba for the first time in nearly 50 years.
Luis Tiant can do the impossible—he can get fans of both the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox to agree on something. While loved and respected by Yankee fans for his two years in pinstripes, Tiant’s glory years were undeniably spent pitching for the Bosox.
During his Boston stint, Tiant did everything humanly possible to end their World Series frustrations. Yet more painful for Tiant than the team’s championship drought was his 46-year exile from his native Cuba. His storied career and dramatic homecoming are now documented in Jonathan Hock’s The Lost Son of Havana.
Baseball is a national obsession in Cuba, and it was the Tiant family business. At one time, Luis “Lefty” Tiant Sr. had been a star pitcher for the Negro League’s New York Cubans and the Cuban professional league, but his eventual obscurity left him temporarily disillusioned with the game.
HOMECOMING: Luis Tiant in a scene from the documentary 'The Last Son of Havana', which depicts his return to his homeland after nearly a half-century of forced isolation. (Courtesy of Tribeca Film Festival)
To Hock’s credit, he seems to harbor no illusions about the nature of Castro’s regime. After all, he and Tiant had a difficult time getting the authorities to authorize their entry permits. They were traveling under the auspices of an American amateur baseball team playing a “goodwill” game with their Cuban counterparts.
As a condition of approval, the small crew of Lost was required to play in the match, essentially guaranteeing a lop-sided American loss, which they note, may well have been the point. Though the political situation is largely unaddressed, a corner of a Havana park dedicated to animated baseball discussions is tellingly described as the probably the only place where free speech exists in Cuba.
In between scenes of Tiant’s tearful reunions with loved ones, Hock details the highlights of his eventful years in the Majors. While showing early promise, an arm injury nearly ended his career. However, the dominating fastball thrower was able to reinvent himself as a crafty pitcher, much as his father was. Time and again, Tiant was written off, but he kept clawing his way back into the league.
His is a career with many highlights, but baseball analyst Peter Gammons convincingly argues Tiant’s game-four victory in the 1975 World Series was his finest moment, won on pure guts alone. To use a sports cliché (and this is certainly the time for it), as a player, Tiant had heart.
Lost is a well-crafted documentary, featuring a peppy, Cuban-inspired soundtrack by Robert Miller. The talking-head segments are a cut above average, featuring warm reminiscences by Carl Yastrzemski and Carlton Fisk that Boston fans should particularly enjoy. It also has some big names attached to it, including its producers, the Farrelly Brothers of “There’s Something About Mary” fame, and narrator Chris Cooper.
Tiant is star though, and he always seems quite likable and engaging throughout the film. It is a compelling story that should have broader appeal than most sports-related documentaries. It premieres on Thursday, April 23, and screens again on April 27, April 30, and May 2.
Brazilian Documentary: ‘Only When I Dance’
BRAZILIAN DREAMS: Featured Dancer Irlan in a scene from the documentary 'Only When I Dance.' (Courtesy of Tribeca Film Festival)
Their circumstances are too mean and their skin is too dark to be accepted by the snobbish Brazilian ballet companies. The only road to a successful dance career for Irlan and Isabela runs through the international dance competitions. If they place highly, they can win an opportunity to study abroad, and even sign on with a foreign dance company. However, competition will be fierce.
Dance is defined by sacrifice—particularly that of Irlan and Isabela’s poor but loving parents. A ballet career looks like a ridiculous long-shot for their children, but there do not seem to be a lot of other prospects in Rio’s favelas. Fortunately, they also have a no-nonsense coach to keep them focused.
Finzi’s approach brings to mind “Hoop Dreams,” giving nearly as much time to the parents as she allots to the young dancers. Since it documents real life, it also does not conclude in a storybook ending for all involved. Refreshingly though, Finzi displays confidence in her subjects, showing their complete competitive performances (usually clocking in around 2 minutes) unedited. Indeed, these are some of the strongest scenes of the film.
Especially memorable is Irlan’s decision to perform the avant-garde “Nijinsky” after making the first round of cuts in a Swiss competition. It is a bold choice, but his performance is remarkably powerful, yet we have to wonder if it is too nontraditional for the judges’ tastes.
It is impossible not to root for these young people when watching Dance. They are extremely hard-working and absolutely committed. Without a doubt, they are good kids, but in terms of personality, they are kind of boring. Like Olympic gymnasts and figure skaters, all they know is training.
Dance is completely earnest and achingly well-intentioned. To its credit, it lets the audience see first-hand the gifts of its young subjects, rather than simply relying on others to characterize their performances. Though admirable in their seriousness, the young protagonists unfortunately come across a bit one-dimensional. Still, those with a passion for dance, or an interest in Brazilian culture, will find it a fascinating documentary. It premieres on April 26 and screens again on April 27, 30, and May 2.
Danish Thriller: ‘Fear Me Not’
Christoffer Boe (R) and Emma Sehsted Høeg in a scene from 'Fear Me Not.' (Courtesy of Tribeca Film Festival)
Something is wrong with Mikael. He has taken a leave of absence for reasons undisclosed. His wife Sigrid is ready for him to get back to work, but he is in no hurry. Hearing his brother-in-law will be testing a new anti-depressant, Mikael volunteers for the study. Popping the new happy pills seems to work wonders for his self-esteem, according to the record he keeps in his diary (which the audience hears through voiceovers, in a smoking-gun violation of the Dogme canon).
Unfortunately, the growth of Mikael’s sense of self comes at the expense of other parts of his psyche—notably conscience and empathy. When melee breaks out among the test subjects in the pharmaceutical company’s waiting room, the trial is called off, and Mikael is instructed to destroy his remaining stock, which of course he does not do. Those pills are just too good.
Deciding his admittedly materialistic wife is an obstacle to his mental blossoming, Mikael viciously manipulates her into a state of collapse. Slowly but surely, Mikael has evolved into a sociopath. However, despite its initial premise, Fear should not be dismissed as a clichéd demonization of the pharmaceutical industry. The truth is actually far deeper and more unsettling than a standard Hollywood morality tale.
Ulrich Thomsen, familiar to art-house audiences as the emotionally frozen pianist in Christoffer Boe’s “Allegro” and the traumatized brother in Thomas Vinterberg’s “The Celebration,” plays yet another disturbed Dane as Mikael. Thomsen is astutely understated in Fear, making his transformation a subtle process and giving his horrific acts a cool detachment that is creepily effective. Young actress Emma Sehsted Høeg is also quite impressive as Mikael’s pre-teen daughter Selma, in a smart, realistic performance that never seems precocious.
Despite its glossy look, Levring’s Dogme roots are still traceable in Fear. Rather than take viewers on a white-knuckle ride, he would rather transport them to a very dark place and leave them there. The result is an intelligent but very dark spin on the psycho-in-the-family thriller. It premieres on Saturday, April 25, and screens again on April 26 and 28.
Iranian Drama: ‘About Elly’
IRANIAN LIFE: A scene from 'About Elly', which premieres on Sunday, April 26. (Courtesy of Tribeca Film Festival)
Given such regulations, Asghar Farhadi’s latest film is particularly notable, relating the interactions of two married couples and their friends on a disastrous holiday at the beach. Screening at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival, Farhadi’s About Elly, gives audiences a peak at the kind of cinema Iran has largely forgone.
When her husband’s friend Ahmad returns to Iran for a visit, Sepideh is determined to fix him up with her children’s schoolteacher, Elly. Though the reluctant Elly only agrees to stay for a night, Sepideh plays hardball as a matchmaker, hiding her purse to keep her at the beach house the next day.
While threatening to walk home anyway, Elly is left to watch the children playing in the surf. Suddenly, the sea turns stormy, nearly washing away one of the children. After rescuing him, the vacationers realize Elly is missing. Was she lost to the ocean’s undertow, or did she negligently slip away, leaving the children unattended?
At this point, the holiday turns decidedly ugly, as each action the group takes seems to only make matters worse. Sepideh and her friends come to realize how little they really know about Elly when faced with the grim prospect of notifying her family. In fact, they do not even know her full name. What they start to discover radically alters their perception of the possibly late schoolteacher, and is quite revealing of Iranian attitudes towards women in general.
For the record, the head scarves stay on throughout the film, even when Sepideh dives into the water in search of Elly. However, there is some physical contact between the sexes, but it is hardly romantic. Blaming her manipulations for the tragic turn of events, Sepideh’s husband begins beating her until he is restrained by another woman.
Farhadi creates a tense, uncomfortable atmosphere that is completely believable. His cast projects an unaffected naturalness that heightens the film’s realism. Despite some substantial cultural differences, Elly is a logically constructed cautionary tale of good intentions gone seriously wrong.
A cold, compelling film, it hints at the kind of cinema we might see if Iranian filmmakers had greater freedom to depict more intimate drama. It premieres at Tribeca on Sunday, April 26, and additionally screens on April 27, 29, and May 2.
Joe Bendel blogs on jazz and cultural issues at jbspin.blogspot.com and coordinated the Jazz Foundation of America's instrument-donation campaign for musicians displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
For more information on show times, and to purchase tickets, visit www.tribecafilm.com/filmguide/
