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Helen M Jerome reviews
From a personal point of view, I simply cannot recall having such a ball at any previous London Film Festival.,
Highlights included: Czech Dream, a hilarious, satirical documentary made by a couple of Prague film students (Vit Klusak and Filip Remunda) who dupe their countrymen and raise all sorts of heated debates about venality, capitalism and the EU when they advertise and create a non-existent hypermarket; Whisky, which is the best downbeat Uruguayan comedy set in a sock factory I have ever viewed (no, really) and positively must be seen; and Mondovino, Jonathan Nossiter’s compelling and revealing two and a half hour investigation into the murky world of wine.
More European treats came in the shape of Italy’s Caterina In The Big City (right), Paulo Virzi’s comedy of social-climbing,and My Father Is An Engineer, the latest of Robert Guediguian’s Marseille-set movies, which bizarrely combines the story of the nativity with parallel romantic liaisons and an inexplicably catatonic paediatrician and still manages to be life-affirming.
Of course, there were also some pretty impressive big budget blockbusters now heading for your local multiplex. Mira Nair’s follow-up to the exuberant Monsoon Wedding is the vibrant Vanity Fair, where Reese Witherspoon masters an English accent and some dodgy Madonna-style dancing in sumptuous colonial settings. Jonathan Demme achieves the impossible in almost matching the power of the original cold war paranoia thriller in his timely remake of The Manchurian Candidate – with Meryl Streep in the Angela Lansbury/Lady Macbeth role and back on Oscar-winning form (go on, have a flutter). And as the posters might say, if you liked Hero, then you’ll love House Of Flying Daggers, which boasts the same director, the same kind of outrageous stunts, three measured performances from Zhang Ziyi, Takeshi Kaneshiro and Andy (Infernal Affairs) Lau, and the best bamboo forest fight scene youll see this year!
More American treats in the festivals chocolate box were Woody Allen’s bittersweet Melinda And Melinda, which starred Will Ferrell and Chloe Sevigny in parallel plots, managed to make the audience think and laugh and must surely rate as a return to form. Zach (Scrubs) Braff’s impressive directorial debut, Garden State (right) brought the students out in numbers. Then there was Tod Williams’ bleak Door In The Floor, which coaxed a career-best performance from Kim Basinger and another brilliant turn from Jeff Bridges who must be in line for an Oscar this time. And my own best soundtrack and impersonation awards go to the same film, Ray, in which the incomparable music of the late Ray Charles and Jamie Foxx’s incredible portrayal of this legend almost raise Taylor Hackford’s film above the usual formulaic biopic. Almost.
Oh, and there’s even some heartwarming news from the home front in the shape of Mike Leigh’s gritty film about a 1950s backstreet abortionist Vera Drake (right), immaculately played by Imelda Staunton, and Pawel Pawlikowskis My Summer Of Love, featuring two promising newcomers, Emily Blunt and Natalie Press and the usual bravura performance from Paddy Considine, filmed in gorgeous purples and golds over a long, hot summer in Hebden Bridge.
There were many talks, masterclasses and debates, in which cerebral and not-so-cerebral filmmakers and thespians were lightly grilled, but surely the most bizarre was the final screen talk, with I Heart Huckabees director David O Russell. Here, the festival’s artistic director Sandra Hebron had to keep the eccentric filmmaker in check, coax him into talking about his previous work (Spanking The Monkey, Flirting With Disaster and Three Kings), hear some rather strange audience questions and leave time for a couple of songs from Russells friend and composer, Jon Brion – with the director joining in on vocals.
As well as giving yours truly immense pleasure, the festival also spread itself across the capital city, broke records for audience attendance and sold out almost half the screenings. Much of the credit must go to the sheer dedication and unflagging enthusiasm of Hebron and festival programmer Michael Hayden and their team, who spent the previous months attending other festivals and watching thousands of features (so we don’t have to) to whittle them down to the most stimulating of the bunch. For this, much thanks. Can’t wait until 2005.
Review copyright © Helen M Jerome 2004.
Weblink: The London Film Festival 2004
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.