Best of the Fest

The Santa Fe Film Festival made a welcome return to early December, if not to its glorious form of the past.  Let's not put too much pressure on it. The festival had a good run for about seven years in the '00s, and maybe it's working its way back to that level. We caught eight films this year. We start with the most commercially viable one and then rank the rest in order of preference.

"Rust and Bone" (B+) - I had high hopes for Jacques Audiard's follow-up to his epic "A Prophet," which is my favorite movie of the past few years. This new one is making early Top Ten lists, and Marion Cotillard's performance is powerful. But it doesn't add up or cohere as a story. I'm growing increasingly grumpy with any use of CGI lately, and I was distracted throughout by the technique of removing Cotillard's legs; the director lingers on her stumps as if unable to resist the urge every ten minutes or so of saying, "Looks real, don't it??" Technicalities aside, the actual connection between her sad character and the brute she falls for is rather weak. And the climactic scene of a frightening accident is superbly crafted but ends up standing out from the rest of the film and giving the whole production an oddly Hollywood ending. Wonderfully shot, though, throughout, and always engaging.

"Shun Li and the Poet" (A-minus) - A quiet, touching film about two immigrants forming a simple bond across cultural lines. It is set in a seaside town near Venice, Italy. Shun Li is from China, and she's working off some sort of debt as an indentured servant, hoping one day to earn enough to win back her freedom and her son, who is being kept from her. Bepi is Yugoslavian, known among his fellow fishermen as "the poet" for the simple rhymes he comes up with. When Bepi and Shun Li start to hang out, the small town talks, and her overlords are not happy. The rest unfolds believably and beautifully. (Trailer)

"Violeta Went to Heaven" (B+) - A powerful biopic of Violeta Parra, the Chilean folk singer and national hero. This smartly blends amazing music (all of Parra's songs are performed by actress Francisca Gavilan) with the story of a deeply troubled woman struggling to control her relationships with her children and her lovers. It could have been 15 minutes shorter, but I was mesmerized throughout. (Trailer)

"A.K.A. Doc Pomus" (B+) - An uplifiting and often giddy documentary about the prolific songwriter Doc Pomus ("Save the Last Dance for Me," "Teenager in Love," Ray Charles' "Lonely Avenue," "Little Sister," "This Magic Moment," "Viva Las Vegas," "Can't Get Used to Losing You," etal.), this is thoroughly entertaining and emotionally moving. Pomus contracted polio at age 6, requiring the use of crutches and eventually a wheelchair the rest of his life, making the story behind "Save the Last Dance" especially poignant (even as recounted by his ex-wife). This is a hagiography in many ways, so we don't get the full picture (his split from songwriting partner (and cousin-in-law) Mort Shulman is glossed over, as is Pomus' fall from the radar in the 1970s). But this is sheer fun, and you won't believe how little you know about the output of one of the greatest pop songwriters ever.

"Barbara" (B+) - A tight, efficient, low-vibe thriller about a woman sent to an East German town in 1980 to work as a doctor at a hospital while double-dipping as a spy for the West. This is a pale companion to the brilliant "Lives of Others," but it's lifted by solid lead performances by Nina Hoss (looking like an older Farrah Fawcett) and Ronald Zehrfeld. You can see the ending coming, but that doesn't detract from its effectiveness. This is old-fashioned human storytelling.

"Amour" (B) - I've been thinking about this for a week, and I still can't decide whether this is more frightening or tedious. An elderly couple are hit with the inevitable: one of them starts to decline physically. At its best, the couple and their grand apartment create a dread that reminded me of "Rosemary's Baby." And the subtle humor lends it gravitas. But at its worst, the story wears you down by making the same point repeatedly as it creaks toward a predictable ending. The leads, Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva, are compelling, but Isabelle Huppert, as their distracted daughter, is lost; she is symbolic of the thinness of the story overall. If you've ever cared for a loved one at the ugly end of existence or as they try to recover from a stroke, you'll be jolted by unsettling scenes of caregiving; but after a while, you might wonder what the point of such an exercise is.

"Hitler's Children" (B) - A strong doc about the descendants of the Nazi regime leaders.  Half their stories are rather dull (including Bettina Goering, who ended up in Santa Fe and, along with her brother, decided to become sterilized). A few are quite moving, including Niklas Frank, who writes and lectures on why we needn't respect or admire our parents, and Rainer Hoess, who returns to Auschwitz to witness the exact spot where not only Jews were killed but where his family had lived in comfort among the horrors. At the screening, some in the audience openly wept.

"In Another Country" (B-minus) - Another missed opportunity with Isabelle Huppert. This Korean film places her in three vignettes, held together by the wonderful human frailty of miscommunication. While some of those scenes, especially between Huppert's character and the young life guard, are funny and touching, the repetition dilutes the whole endeavor. Not funny enough to be a comedy, nor touching enough to be an effective drama.