What I have learned already is that this is a tough assignment. Fun, but a little more taxing than I’d considered. While I think I’m doing OK and will hopefully get better I’m not really doing justice to some incredible films. So seeing as I had three very good pieces of cinema to watch today it only seems fair for me to embed the tiny reviews here and then expand on them a little.

First up was Paul Koutecky and Miroslav Janek’s CITIZEN HAVEL:

LFF: Citizen Havel on 12seconds.tv

Knowing a little about the Velvet Revolution, but hardly anything about what followed in the Czech Republic this documentary was a real eye opener. I admit to dragging my heels a little towards the South Bank this morning. The sun was out and it seemed crazy to spend two hours in a dark room with revolutionary types. Thankfully from the very outset Citizen Havel is so warm an illustration of one man that you are immediately drawn into the heady days of 1992 and follow very closely this former political dissident as he becomes the first president of a very new country. As political documentaries go I’ve never seen anything quite like this film as the people behind the camera are given unprecedented access to a series of unprecedented events.

Other key figures of the period pass through (Blair, Bush and even a saxophone tooting Clinton), but Vaclav Havel remains front and centre and always an intellectual first, a state leader second. It’s an often hilarious look at a normal man standing up for what he believes in suddenly thrust into an international spotlight, holding the country together as others try and bring him down.

A treat of a movie and highly recommended, it plays on the 22nd and 26th of October. Full details here.

I don’t mind him having a girlfriend as I serve a different set of needs. Mainly Ukrainian in scope.

This afternoon I saw Shotgun Stories and after a pretty bleak festival it was a breath of fresh air and something that I thoroughly enjoyed. Once home I dug out the day’s press crap in order to find out what exactly Jeff Nichols had done previously, as I was keen to see what he’d cut his teeth on to get to this great little movie. I was shocked to find that this was his first full length feature.

It’s a remarkable achievement. The film is a sober and refreshing look at revenge and shows a maturity that makes me want to see everything that Nichols has been involved in. Here’s what he has to say about Shotgun Stories:

There is no victory in revenge. This is an idea I chose to explore with Shotgun Stories, a film tracking a feud that erupts between two sets of half brothers following the death of their father. So often in literature, film, politics and society, revenge, and more importantly the execution of revenge, is considered success. Whether it’s Edmund Dantes fulfilling his pledge to ruin Danglars in The Count of Monte Cristo or Hans Gruber falling to his death in Die Hard, the euphoric feeling we get as an audience watching the villain meet his or her comeuppance is undeniable. With Shotgun Stories, I wanted to work against this notion. I wanted revenge to be an awkward thing to exact and a cause not necessarily championed by the audience. Violence is an unusual task for these characters, just as it is for most people. Their anger and emotions are validated, but their reactions to those emotions are not precise. My hope is that Shotgun Stories gives an honest portrayal of normal, hard working people responding to the pain and heartbreak they find, and at times create, in their own lives.

I noticed that he’s also worked on The Rough South of Larry Brown which makes perfect sense as the film evokes the work of Brown very well, especially something like Father & Son. I’d love to see Nichols go on to adapt his work or even some early Cormac McCarthy.

While this seems to be a career best for Michael Shannon he’s surrounded by a great cast (the actresses are all especially good) and Nichols knows how to frame a shot. Sometimes dwarfing the actors in the landscape, the film was shot in 35mm and looks beautiful throughout. Plotwise it revolves around slowly unwinding tension and violence between two sets of half-brothers. The stark drama serves the action well and it has a suitably masculine feel about it, with things not said sometimes proving more powerful than the very authentic dialogue.

One of my favourite movies so far, it plays on the 19th and 21st of this month at the London Film Festival. If it doesn’t get a decent wide release after that then there’s no justice.

“We’re stuck in the fold of a map in the middle of Romania.”

A wet Monday morning, a 10.30am start and a large turnout for the first press screening of the festival, which is a pleasant change. Sometimes these things are as empty as a church or a training bra.

This morning’s movie is billed as a “Balkan farce” so I was naturally expecting just the usual die hard film nuts, but the place is half full. A lot of industry pass holders I see and not that many press. I assume there’s a certain curiosity to see what this young guy came up with before the taxi he was travelling in was crushed, killing him and his career stone cold dead.

About ten minutes before the lights dim, Tom from Solace in Cinema walks in and takes a seat next to me. We’re both seeing as much of the festival as we possibly can and this will be the first time I’ll have someone whose opinion I trust to bounce ideas off after the screenings. Tom’s site as I keep telling anyone who will listen is the only UK film website worth paying attention to. The guy knows his stuff.

As if to underline this as the film starts we seem to be the only people in the room who are laughing out loud at the scene of a Romanian family being chased down the spiral staircase to a bomb shelter by a clanging, rolling unexploded bomb. As it finally rolls to a halt without killing anyone we see the stamp: MADE IN CALIFORNIA.

It’s a great way to open a movie and I find myself warming to the dead guy immediately. Nemuscu, an obviously talented bastard ,gets taken out in something as stupid as a car accident and Michael Bay who spends a lot of time surrounded by heavy ordnance is still alive. There’s no fucking justice in the world.

Based on a real incident and set in 1999, California Dreamin’ tells the story of a NATO train carrying communications equipment and American marines destined for the Serbian border. When a local station manager stops the transport at a small village because of a 50-year old grudge against America, a battle of wills begins between the corrupt official and the Marine captain in charge.As the hours turn into days the needs of the village and the Americans becomes intertwined. This first and sadly last feature by Christian Nemescu is a remarkable movie. It’s a tad overlong at 155 minutes, but the version screened at the LFF is the film as was left by Nemescu and while it would have perhaps benefited from one final edit it still tells a complete tale filled with humour, sadness and a sense of futility. It’s also filled with strong performances from the mostly Romanian cast and Armand Assante in the best role I’ve seen him in in years.

Always an interesting actor, but often lost in questionable movies (Judge Dredd anyone?) he finally got a role that reminded me exactly what he can do given the right material. Assante’s Captain Jones is an American soldier outmaneuvered by local corruption, broken bureaucracy and left adrift on the wrong side of the language barrier. Watching him try and deal with a situation he is completely unprepared for is a joy. The scenes between him and this unexpected nemesis in the form of Razvan Vasilescu’s Doiaru are wonderful to watch as bribery, threats and an offer of friendship all come to nothing.

The plight of the Americans and their complete failure to understand what exactly is going on around them is filmed with a light touch rather than the broad farce that was billed, leading to a funny, but ultimately melancholy movie. The village embraces the American arrival, its hopes represented on screen in the form of the mayor, a fine comic turn by Ion Sapdaru. He sees the unexpected military presence as a chance to turn around the fortunes of the village and he immediately invites the company of soldiers to the village’s centenary celebrations despite the fact that they had already been celebrated the previous month. There’s a lot of charm in the scene where everything vaguely American is dragged out to the central square for the party, from bad oil paintings of Schwarzenegger, Stars & Stripe neckties and a gypsy themed Elvis impersonator.

The plot deftly moves around several characters over five days. The local factory workers see the visit as an opportunity to get their complaints heard on a larger stage and immediately go on strike. Meanwhile the local girls see the Americans as a replacement for the young men of the village and perhaps a way out of the place altogether.

Doiaru’s daughter already at odds with her father is determined to win herself an American and Nemescu shows real skill here in not only bringing her character to the fore, but also creating space for the unpopular school nerd, Andrei. He finds himself suddenly in her circle as the only kid who speaks English and able to play Cerano between the girl he secretly loves and the Sergeant she has her own heart set on.

The last section of the film seems a tad obvious as the American’s finally move on completely unaware of the chaos they have left behind, but California Dreamin’ is a great introduction to the festival as far as I’m concerned and something I look forward to seeing again.

Next up: Danish necromancy

The Times BFI London Film Festival runs from the 17th of October until the 1st of November, but it started for me yesterday morning. By the end of this week alone I’ll have been to 16 press screenings with maybe another 40 or so to follow.

My review to watching ratio usually falls apart after the first week as the films pile up, but this year I’m determined not to fall behind. If you see me slacking punch me on the arm.

I saw three movies yesterday and one this morning with two more to follow today including an evening screening of Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited. Doesn’t leave much time for writing in between.

Thankfully I’m back on coffee. It’s going to be a long (but fun) month.