Robert Zemeckis often produces movies at the fore-front of technology (Back to the Future (1985), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), Forrest Gump (1994), Contact (1997), The Polar Express (2004)). The Chicago native returned to his hometown for closing night of the 60th Chicago International Film Festival with “Here.” “Here” is also cinematically ground-breaking. Since the entire film is shot in the same living room from a single camera angle in the home of Alan and Rose Young (Rose and Al were the real first names of Zemeckis’ parents on the South side of Chicago), it is a multi-generational look at the Young family. Richard (Tom Hanks) and Margaret (Robin Wright), the reunited stars of Forrest Gump (1994), are the primary couple followed in the most depth.
A.I. DE-AGING
The A.I. de-aging (Metaphysic A.I.) really works well here. There were complaints when I first saw it used in Scorsese’s “The Irishman” in 2019. I heard none after “Here,” 5 years later. Zemeckis at age 72, with a career that began in 1972, has 35 films as director, nearly as many as writer, and 55 as producer. Other directors who started out in Chicago with their first films include Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone, Taylor Hackford and William Friedkin. Zemeckis is in storied company and this is another classic cinematic achievement in his long career.
ONE ROOM
The set of Robert Zemeckis’ “Here.”
“Here” is shot in one room from one camera angle. That sounds like a play, but picture-frame-like boxes are super-imposed on the screen at various points to depict other families in other eras who have lived in the same house. Directed by Robert Zemeckis, written by Eric Roth and Zemeckis and told much in the style of the acclaimed graphic novel by Richard McGuire on which it is based, the story travels through generations. Tom Hanks and Robin Wright are the primary stars of this tale of love, loss, laughter and life, all of which happen right “Here.” Because the camera is in one spot, at times the actors walk towards it like we might see television hosts on late-night talk shows walk up to the camera. It’s new and original. Like the split-screen technique (which I remember in 1968’s “The Boston Strangler” with Tony Curtis, although it was first used in “The Parent Trap” by Disney in 1961), I wouldn’t want to see every single film done this way, but when something works, it works. With Zemeckis at the helm, it worked in “Here.”
FOUNDERS AWARD
Director Robert Zemeckis (L) accepts the Founders’ Award from Michael Kutza (R), retired founder of the Chicago International Film Festival.
Zemeckis received the Founders’ Award from retired Chicago International Film Founder Michael Kutza, who started the festival in 1964. The award correctly applauded Zemeckis for his “impeccably crafted and deeply moving stories,” which includes the five mentioned above, as well as “Castaway,” “Flight,” “What Lies Beneath,” “Romancing the Stone” and a host of others. Zemeckis has directed three films that have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically or aesthetically” significant: Back to the Future (1985), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) and Forrest Gump (1994).
DESCRIBING “HERE’S” UNIQUE STYLE
In presenting Zemeckis with the Founders’ Award, Michael Kutza declared “Here” to be Zemeckis’ “Lawrence of Arabia.” If that accolade doesn’t resonate with you, consider that the unusual original use of a picture-frame-like box, insert atop the screen highlights everything from the dinosaur age to the present, which keeps the audience from getting the sense of claustrophobia that some of us experienced in 2022’s “The Whale,” when Brendan Fraser’s character never left his living room. The boxed skipping to various generations prevents that. It also highlights, briefly, other families who have lived in the same house all the way back to the time of Benjamin Franklin. It is a little like thumbing through a photo book and recalling the moment in time when each was taken, or turning on the radio to hear a favorite tune that instantly takes you back to a specific time in your life.
The choice of moments to guide the audience was spot-on. We see the Three Stooges and Red Skelton on the living room television set. Jane Fonda is seen doing aerobics. The “Theme from a Summer Place” saturated the air waves in 1963. Margaret is wearing the “flip” hair-do when Richard takes her home to meet his parents, a 60s give-away. The news on the television set in the background tells us that the Japanese just bombed Pearl Harbor. Thanksgivings of yesteryear are revisited and there is even drama in the living room, from characters having medical emergencies, as there would be in a home occupied all the way back to Indian days in America. Out the picture window and across the street is a house where Benjamin Franklin once lived, so we can infer that this is Philadelphia. That East coast location is further borne out by the snow that periodically falls outside the window, most memorably during Richard’s apology to Margaret for basically ignoring her throughout their marriage. Zemeckis has said, “You can examine the truth about something that happened in the past, because you’ve been able to look at it through the prism of time.” And that is what “Here” is doing.
MUSIC
(L to R) Director Robert Zemeckis, CIFF founder Michael Kutza, Lesley Zemeckis and Zsa Zsa Zemeckis, at the closing night of the 60th Chicago International Film Festival screening of “Here.”
Alan Silvestri has worked on every Zemeckis film since “Romancing the Stone,” a 40-year partnership. The music in “Here” is wonderful and adds immeasurably to the film’s appeal. It is, once-again, Oscar-worthy. Silvestri has had 2 Oscar nominations (for Zemecki’s “Forrest Gump” in 1994 and for “The Polar Express” in 2004), 2 Golden Globe nominations, 3 Grammy and 2 Emmys. Silvestri at 74 and Zemeckis at 72 utilize their maturity in this film. They have lived life and can relate to the young wife or husband whose youthful dreams are dashed as real life happens while they’re making other plans.
THEMES
The life experiences of Richard and Margaret serve as a stand-in for those of us in the audience. Richard is a talented artist. In his youth, he wanted to attend school to become a graphic design artist. Instead, Margaret gets pregnant and Richard ends up selling insurance. Later, Margaret will ask Richard why he quit painting. He answers, “I had to make a living…Do you think I wanted to be done with my life when I was 22?”
Margaret always wanted to travel. She also wanted her own house, but ends up having to settle for living with her in-laws for many years. As old age takes its toll on Al and Rose, Richard and Margaret are called upon to help them, as family does. Any time Margaret brings up her desire for a house of her own, Richard will say that it is too expensive, to the point that Margaret eventually goes to work. To his credit, Richard does draw up house plans once, but, like everything else, those plans are pushed aside until later. As the script says, “You always find a reason not to do something.”
Richard will ultimately apologize for ignoring Margaret’s desires so many times over the years. (This was the second film at CIFF where husbands apologize to the wives they habitually ignored; the first was “Nightbitch.”) Among the truisms that will be articulated by a character or characters in the film are “Time flies” and “We did the best we could.” Satisfaction that their children are realizing their own dreams comes through in the voices of the proud parents when Vanessa (played by Zsa Zsa Zemeckis, Zemeckis’ real-life daughter) goes to law school and becomes an attorney.
CONCLUSION
Director Robert Zemeckis with his Founders’ Award at the closing night of the 60th Chicago International Film Festival on October 27, 2024.
In 2007 “Entertainment Weekly” magazine named Robert (Bob) Zemeckis Number 18 on its list of “the smartest people in Hollywood.” From his first start (with co-writer and collaborator Bob Gale) when they sold an episode of “Kolchak: The Night Stalker, Chopper (#1.15) in 1975, Zemeckis has experimented with digital movie-making (“The Polar Express,” 2004) saying, “I just love all types of movies, but I was especially interested in digital cinema. I was interested in films that could be done in digital.” On October 25, 2012, when Zemeckis came to Chicago to screen “Flight” (his 2nd showing in Chicago) he said, “All film techniques should disappear and be there to serve the characters and the story.”
Zemeckis has well-served the characters and the story in “Here” with this new film technique. The picture-frame technique and the improved de-aging were original, unique never-seen-before methods to create another iconic Zemeckis film. Miramax releases “Here” on November 1, 2024. It should attract fans of “Forrest Gump” and all other classic Zemeckis films.
In 2021, when I was covering Sundance as Press, a small film entitled “Coming Home in the Dark” from New Zealand caught my eye. I watched this story based on an Owen Marshall short story and directed by James Ashcroft. It showed a family having a lovely time in a scenic pastoral setting in New Zealand, only to be taken prisoner by a pair of ruthless drifters. The husband is a schoolteacher and the two would like the father of the family to pay for something he did in his past. The ending might not have satisfied all of us, but the lead-up was brutal. I made a mental note to watch for its director (James Ashcroft) in the future.
It’s now the future. Here’s what Steven King (yes, THE Steven King) had to say about “The Rule of Jenny Pen,” which screened at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival. King tweets, “I watched one of the best movies I’ve seen this year. It’s called The Rule Of Jenny Pen, and I urge you to watch it when it appears on Shudder. Geoffrey Rush stars, with John Lithgow as a geriatric psychopath with an evil hand puppet.”
“The Rule of Jenny Pen” premiered at Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, on September 19, 2024. The film won Best Director honors for James Ashcroft and Geoffrey Rush was named Best Actor. The storied pair (Lithgow and Rush) shared Best Actor honors at a film festival in Catalonia. The program synopsis says: “Confined to a secluded rest home and trapped within his stroke-ridden body, a former Judge must stop an elderly psychopath who employs a child’s puppet to abuse the home’s residents with deadly consequences.”
CAST
The two stars, Geoffrey Rush and John Lithgow, are phenomenal actors. (They also have producer credits on the film.) Geoffrey Rush won the Oscar in 1997 for “Shine” and has been nominated three other times (1999, “Shakespeare in Love;” 2001- “Quills”; and 2011-“The King’s Speech”). He has won many other awards in many countries. Rush plays an elderly judge named Stefan Mortenson.
Opposite Rush is another World Class actor, John Lithgow. Lithgow has been nominated for Oscars twice, has won 6 of the 12 Emmys he was nominated for, has won 2 of the 5 Golden Globes for which he was nominated, has been nominated as Best Actor by the Screen Actors’ Guild 10 time (and won 3), has 2 Tonys and has been nominated for 4 Grammys. When you put these two in showcase performances, bad guy (Lithgow) versus the retired judge (Rush), the audience is in for a treat. The screenplay is based, once again, on an Owen Marshall short story and co-adapted by Ashcroft and Eli Kent.
PLOT
John Lithgow as Dave Crealey in “Jenny Pen Rules” (photo by Matt Henley,)
“The Rule of Jenny Pen” is a character study of both men. It opens with Judge Mortenson having a breakdown in his courtroom. He ends up in a wheelchair, semi-paralyzed, but still sharp as a tack. He’s now living at the Royal Pine Mews Care Home in New Zealand, housed in a double room with roommate, Tony Garfield (George Henare), who is a Maori native once known as Gunny Garfield on the rugby field. Stefan Mortenson is not very friendly. He is fond of breaking into quotes from Hemingway (“A Farewell to Arms”) or Shakespeare. Stefan hasn’t lost a step, mentally, but is fighting against the physical ravages of aging. Stefan’s going to need all of his intelligence to fight off the villain of the piece, Dave Crealey (John Lithgow). Dave Crealey has apparently spent his entire life either working at the nursing home or living in it.
Just as we wondered what motivated the men in Ashcroft’s first film to grab the schoolteacher’s family, we wonder why Dave dislikes Stefan, whom he had not met previously. We learn mid-movie that Stefan once came into a restaurant that Dave was in and, when he saw the then-powerful man, Dave said, “There’s a man who’s made something of himself. And what have I done?” So, the Green-Eyed Monster of Jealousy and Envy has Dave prejudiced against Stefan, just as he is prejudiced against the Maori people (Dave tells a tasteless joke that illustrates this.) The script also notes, “We all get what’s coming to us in the end.” Dave has gone off his rocker and wears a small plastic doll on his hand, puppet-like, a doll he calls Jenny Pen. And Jenny Pen rules—or else.
Stefan has a bit of a superiority complex, as he spent years on the bench dispensing rulings about others’ guilt or innocence. Stepping down from the podium of power is difficult. His intelligence and education is both a blessing and a curse, when he is forced to live amongst mental cases and among many who are experiencing severe mental decline. Stefan seems to have no family who inquire about his well-being. At one point, he muses, “When did I become this bitter, lazy, stupid, forgot-myself, gave-up-on-people in the worship of what? A podium?” Stefan lodges numerous complaints against his abuser, but he is now in the position of being treated as though HE is the problem. He doesn’t like that change of status one little bit. Since the maniacal Crealey keeps entering the room that Stefan shares with Tony late at night, Stefan tries to get the former rugby star to vouch for him. He wants Tony to testify that the threats and harassment are really occurring. But Mortenson has really not built up much of a favorable rating with the other residents, as he tends to do things like correct his roommate’s quotation, even thought it’s only slightly off. (“Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.”)
THE QUESTION
The Big Question is whether Stefan will give in to the constant barrage of annoying attacks that Dave Crealey launches. It’s a battle of wills. Dave kicks Stefan in his paralyzed shins under the table. He throws urine on Stefan in his bed after dark. Dave makes threats of worse to come. Through it all, Stefan urges Tony to step up and be brave and help him fight back. It’s quite a coup when Stefan finds a way to sneak into Dave’s room and empty his inhaler stash, which gives John Lithgow a fantastic near-death scene. Dave discovers that his inhalers don’t work at a point when he needs one badly. Kudos should also be extended to the cast members playing other residents of the home. Every single one of them rings true as authentic.
SOUND
There are several moments in the film when Lithgow either dances or sings. If Geoffrey Rush is quoting great literature, Lithgow as Dave Crealey is obnoxiously singing “Knees Up, Mother Brown” or dancing so rambunctiously on the small dance floor (while intentionally stomping on the feet of others) that the floor is soon empty. Tony even admits to having found a hidey-hole near the washing machines where he will sometimes lay low when he recognizes that Dave is on the rampage. Dave’s many years both working and living at the facility have given him superior knowledge of the entire nursing home system and he uses it to his advantage and the disadvantage of others.
John Gibson does the music and high-pitched screeching sounds add to the tension. Ashcroft described the sound technicians as “purists” and the sound adds much to the mosaic of the home, with sounds of other residents in distant hallways merging with high-pitched sounds that are as intense in ratcheting up tension as fingers on a blackboard. The cinematography by Matt Henley also serves the piece well, as he closes in on the faces of the 79-year-old Lithgow and the 73-year-old Rush and the other elderly residents of the home.
CONCLUSION
Chicago International Film Festival founder Michael Kutza. IPhoto by Connie Wilson).
Try to catch “Jenny Pen Rules” when it plays near you or on television. Steven King was right. It’s a real tour de force acting class which I enjoyed at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival, seated directly in front of festival founder Michael Kutza, who even had a chair down front staked out for himself with his name on it and was, this day, in it to catch this enjoyable thriller.
“Blitz,” from British director Steve McQueen, depicts Londoners during the Blitz of World War II in 1940. The harrowing drama focuses on a young bi-racial boy (Elliott Heffernan) sent to the countryside by his mother (Saoirse Ronan) for safekeeping. Approximately 500,000 young children were sent to the countryside from London to protect them from the blitz. Young George Hanway, age 9, jumps off the train taking him to safety, and tries to return to his home in Stepney, Clifford Lane, and his piano-playing grandfather (Paul Weller) and his Mom. The blitz (short for “blitzkrieg”) took place from September of 1940 through May of 1941. Forty-three thousand civilians, primarily in London, were killed; that number represented half of Britain’s wartime civilian casualties.
GENESIS
I began wondering what caused Writer/Director Steve McQueen to go back in time, historically, and create such an accurate depiction of what it must have been like to live through the war-time bombing of London. Perhaps the germ of an idea came out of McQueen’s expressed wish to do with the city of London something similar to what Martin Scorsese has done with New York City? McQueen has a highly developed artistic background; it serves him well in “Blitz.” When asked about the inspiration for the film, he mentioned a picture he had seen of a small boy of the time being sent off to the countryside on July 5, 1940. It was this picture that guided much of the search for a young boy to play the lead role, as McQueen envisioned the blitz being seen through a child’s eyes.
July 5, 1940 British child being sent to the countryside for safety during the Blitz.
CAST
Elliott Heffernan was cast as that small child, the daughter of Rita Hanway (Saiorse Ronan), a white worker in the factory making bombs for Britain, and the son of an absent father from Grenada, who is deported, leaving nothing behind for his wife and child but a St. Christopher Medal given him by his own mother. McQueen has said, in other interviews, “To some extent he (Elliott Heffernan) carries this movie.” Elliott was 9 when filming began. “He was 8 when he auditioned,” says McQueen. “So he was a little boy, and he auditioned because he’d never done acting before. As soon as I saw him, I thought, ‘Oh, he is the truth!’ He wasn’t going to pretend to be a child. He was a child.” (“Deadline” interview).
Also carrying the movie and singing in it, as well, is Saiorse Ronan (“The Lovely Bones,” “Brooklyn,” “Atonement”). McQueen’s lead actress has two strong films out this year with “The Outrun” receiving Oscar buzz. Says McQueen of Saoirse Ronan, “She’s like Bette Davis. She’s that good.” He called her “interesting” and “fascinating. “She makes the ordinary extraordinary, the arbitrary fascinating.” The eyelash scene, where Rita asks George to “make a wish” on an eyelash plucked from his cheek was actually something that occurred naturally between Saiorse and Elliott while they were bonding between scenes. McQueen chose to take the normal gesture and use it prominently in the film.
MUSIC
For composer Hans Zimmer, this is a deeply personal movie. His mother was evacuated from Germany and spent the war years in London. He remembered her stories about living in Mayfair, with bombs dropping all around. Zimmer reflected on his childhood when composing the score. He constructed it from a child’s perspective of terror and chaos, opening with an orchestra of children’s recorders. Zimmer’s score for this film is mentioned as a probable Oscar nominee. There are also many period songs utilized in the film and much (too much?) singing.
Back in 2016, when McQueen received the Artistic Vision Award here in Chicago, he said, “Sound is so important in film. People need to lean in to listen. It gives them something to do”.
CAST BASED ON REAL PEOPLE
Leigh Gill (“Joker,” “Game of Thrones”) portrayed “Mickey the Midget,” a Jewish East ender, Mickey Davies, a local optician and community organizer who stepped up to help make the time spent underground in the subway more humane. (Buckets for rest rooms, for openers.) There was a movement to memorialize Mickey IRL, but it died when Boris Johnson was Mayor of London.
Benjamin Clementine (“Dune: Part One”) portrays Ife, who was based on the real-life E.I. EKpenyon, who was a law student from Nigeria who became an air warden in Marleybone. Ife (translated as “love” in Nigeria) teaches George to sing “Alleluia” as George accompanies him on his route, telling the locals to honor the blackout during the blitz. [Like all the horror movies where you know it’s a bad sign when someone is going to go to the attic or the basement, the well-meaning promises that Ife makes to George about returning him to his home the next day seem based on shifting sand.]
Paul Weller (“Grosse Pointe Blank”), a true musician, plays Gerald, or Grand-dad, as he is called. McQueen said seeing a picture of Paul McCartney with his father and a piano in Paul McCartney’s original house triggered the selection and one of the more haunting images (spoiler alert) is of Grand-dad’s dead body after he becomes one of the victims of the blitz. The camera lingers on his face in the rubble.
There were two Black clubs in London at the time. One was the Shim-Sham and, on the Piccadilly side, there was the Café de Paris, which the locals frequented because it was below ground and, therefore, considered safer. Onscreen, the local bandleader, Ken “Snakehips” Johnson is well-played by a young Black man in a white tux and tails who introduces a stunning Black singer in a white dress who sings “Oh, Johnny.” (Both were impressive.) Sadly, two bombs entered the ventilation shaft to the underground club and a scene is set in the remains of the club that involves young George, which seemed to be reaching a bit in depicting the adventures of the 9-year-old.
PICARESQUE HERO
Young George, with his mother and grand-dad, as he is leaving for the countryside.
Filmed at 13 locations around England and London, McQueen has said of “Blitz,” “It’s a very dark fairy tale. It’s the Brothers Grimm. And that’s the journey George goes on.” In the English-speaking world, the term “picaresque” is used loosely to refer to novels that contain some elements of this genre; e.g. an episodic recounting of adventures on the road. An English Literature major, I recognized enough picaresque elements of “Blitz” to recognize that the term applies to the adventures that young George has while trying to return home. While some of the adventures held your interest—especially the accurate re-creations of such things as the flooding of the tube (which actually occurred and killed 34 people)—having them ALL happen to George on his journey seemed a bit much. (Mid-film I wrote, “Film needs a bit more to sustain it when it’s simply George being taken advantage of.”)
CONCLUSION
Saiorse Ronan and co-star Elliott Heffernan in Blitz.
In some ways, the comparisons to “Belfast,” which opened the 58th Chicago International Film Festival, are valid. Both turn the clock back on time, although “Blitz” does so in a much more arresting style, visually. The opening scene alone, where an old-style leaky canvas firehose is proving almost impossible to control while fighting the fires in the streets of London, is riveting. Others along the way, especially the scenes of how life went down in the tube (subway) are equally mesmerizing.
The attempts to recognize real heroes like Mickey Davies and to preach a bit in one subway scene (“We are all equal members of this country, willing or not…Treat each other with compassion and respect.”), while laudable, come off a bit obvious to everything going down around us in the world today. We can applaud the message and hope that it is internalized by everyone, but, in this country, at least, we are about to go to the polls to vote for a new President, and one of the candidates has made a mockery of that message. One critic used an expression “muffled by good intentions,” which applies, but even more than that, there was something so old-fashioned about the film that it surprised me it was a Steve McQueen film.
The movie opens in theaters on November 1st and will be streaming on Apple by November 22nd. There is also an Apple special that is a “behind-the-scenes” look at the making of “Blitz” that should be truly entertaining, just as researching some of the real-life background for the film proved to be.
It’s a powerful film. It will resonate with anyone who hopes we learn from the mistakes of our past and forge better paths to peace.
Five Oscar-eligible shorts have come to me recently. They are “Tea,” “Corpse Fishing,” “Anuja,” “Heart of Texas” and “Deck 5B.” There are more to come, but here’s how the first five struck me, listed in the order I enjoyed them:
Michael Gandolfini, son of James Gandolfini, star of “Tea.”
- “Tea” was directed by Blake Rice and starred Michael Gandolfini (“The Many Saints of Newark”), son of James Gandolfini. This hilarious short follows a young man rehearsing to ask out the girl of his dreams, when a sudden hornet sting throws everything into chaos.This offbeat comedy premiered at Cannes as the only U.S. film in the Short Films Competition and qualified to be considered for the 2025 Oscars®. It qualified for Best Short Film at the Nashville Film Festival, Tirana International Film Festival, Woodstock Film Festival, Palm Springs and HollyShorts. I thought immediately of the 1999 film “Election” (Reese Witherspoon and Matthew Broderick) where a bee sting renders Broderick into someone more closely resembling the Hunchback of Notre Dame than the previous smiling teacher supervising the school election. Similarly, young Gandolfini is immediately in dire straits after being stung, appearance-wise and health-wise. It falls to Olivia Nikkanen to save the poor guy. Olivia (“The Americans,” “Boardwalk Empire,” “The Little Foxes”) is best known for her work as a series regular on the Netflix hit series THE SOCIETY (2019) and for her recurring arc on SUPERGIRL (2015). This short spoke to me because it seemed to represent the growing portion of the U.S. male population defined as “incels.” Incels are involuntarily celibate, usually white and male, and often found online. They would like to have a girlfriend, but, for a variety of reasons, that isn’t happening, despite their best efforts. Some incels then become hostile towards all women, but in this amusing short, we hope that the two might actually connect, although it certainly takes a lot for young Gandolfini to get through to his would-be female rescuer that he’s suffering from anaphylactic shock and this is a real health emergency, not just a flirting technique.
“Corpse Fisherman:” Yan aboard the corpse fisherman’s boat in a home-made life preserver.
- “Corpse Fishing” – Set in southern China in the Hubei Province, this enigmatic short follows a despairing girl named Yan as she strikes a deal with a stranger to go fishing for bodies in a desperate attempt to find her missing father. This incredible story is inspired by Wei Xinpeng, a real ‘corpse fisherman’, who scans the river looking for cadavers, which he then sells back to grieving families. This film was presented at the Tribeca Film Festival and was part of the official selection at HollyShorts. The 16-minute film has qualified for the Academy Awards and, indeed, the very thought that there is a job called “corpse fisherman” was enough to grab my attention. Wei Xinpeng, a real ‘corpse fisherman’, scans the river looking for cadavers, which he then sells back to grieving families. He charges $100 to look and $1,000 to bury the body. Yan—who has been futilely searching for her father who disappeared—speaks with the corpse fisherman; he is so grateful to have company (the odor of decomposing bodies on his boat makes him a social outcast) that he offers her the opportunity to travel with him down the river and, for each day she withstands the horrible smell of decomposing bodies aboard his small
Corpse Fisherman short
boat, she will earn a peek at a body. There are three corpses aboard the boat when Yan throws in with the fisherman, who puts a home-made life preserver on the young girl after she tells him that she cannot swim. We also learn that her mother disappeared and she was told that “the heat drove Mother mad and she went North to recover.” The film was written and directed by Jean Liu and is part of an initiative called “Rising Voices,” which seeks to give under-represented filmmakers a chance at success. Indeed’s “Rising Voices” was created in collaboration with Lena Waithe, Hillman Grad Productions, and 271 Films. The idea was to give the financial production of a national TV spot and, instead, invest it in ten BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) directors creating short films. The directors each received $10,000 script payment and $100,000 to make their film. Through 4 seasons, over 2,000 industry jobs have been created in this fashion, with many of them going to people of color who have been historically under-represented. For a reviewer born in Independence, Iowa, on the Wapsi-Pinicon River, the idea of a corpse fisherman in central China was mind-blowing.
“Anuja.”
- “Anuja” came in third for me, for many of the same reasons that “Corpse Fishing” grabbed my attention. It is a film set in Delhi, India, and the star of the film, Sajda Pathan, is, herself, an orphan from the streets of Delhi who lives in a home for children rescued from the streets. They are provided food, shelter and education and there are thousands of them. Anuja’s older sister is portrayed by Ananya Shanbhag as Palak. Ananya is employed in a sweat shop sewing clothing. She is very resourceful and hard-working and has figured out a way to use scraps of material to make bags, which she and her younger sister, Anuja, sell on the streets of Delhi. Anuja, however, is a 9-year-old math wizard. She is claiming to be 14 and working, illegally, alongside her sister in the sweat shop. If she will take
Anuja and her older sister in Delhi.
advantage of the opportunity afforded her to break out of the yoke of illegal child labor she can take a qualifying exam and attend the Williams Boarding School, which will give her a chance at a better life, but also take her away from her older sister. Adam J. Graves is the Writer/Director of “Anuja,” which highlights the nonprofit organization the Salaam Baalak Trust in its efforts to rescue homeless children from the streets of Delhi. Watching young Sajda watch the film for the first time with the other children in the home was touching.
- “Deck 5B -This captivating film follows a mother who is torn between the needs of her young child and her own desires. The drama won “Best International Short Film” at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and has qualified for consideration for the upcoming Academy Awards. Director Malin Ingrid Johansson was born and raised on a farm in the Swedish countryside and might be one of the few directors who knows how to operate a tractor as well as a camera. Malin’s previous short MADDEN premiered internationally at the Berlinale ‘23, claiming multiple awards at various international film festivals. Lead actress Alma Pöysti is an acclaimed Finnish actor who has made significant strides in Scandinavian cinema, earning accolades such as ‘Best Actress’ at the Finnish Film Awards for her role in TOVE and ‘Best Actress’ at the 2023 Gothenburg Film Festival for FOUR LITTLE ADULTS. Her recent works includes lead roles in Netflix’s A DAY AND A HALF and Aki Kaurismäki’s Cannes Film Festival’s Prix du Jury winner FALLEN LEAVES, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination. It’s not that Alma Poysti doesn’t do a good job with the story of a mother aboard a boat (cars on boats that cross the English Channel, for instance) who is heading for a tryst with a new boyfriend who also has a child. The little boy is a typical little boy and not particularly cooperative in helping his mother connect with a potential new boyfriend. The short film was well done, but it was too ordinary. Nothing screamed, “Wow! Look at that!” I enjoyed it, but I wondered how much of its acclaim could be laid at the feet of the accolades the lead actress has garnered for other parts.
- “Heart of Texas” – After receiving positive news that she’s one of three song-writing finalists from a potentially life-changing radio contest, an aspiring country singer Janie May (Lauren Noll) races to the studio after her overnight diner shift when she collides with an undocumented worker — changing the course of both their futures. Gregory J.M. Kasunich’s THE HEART OF TEXAS has screened at HollyShorts, In the Palace International Short Film Festival and Sidewalk Film Festival, accumulating 14 accolades so far during its festival run. The film has qualified for the 2025 Oscars®.Director and co-writer Gregory JM Kasunich is an award winning film, commercial and music video writer, director, and producer from Pittsburgh, PA. His body of work includes projects for Taylor Swift, The Pentatonix, The Summer Set, DreamWorks, Disney, Lucasfilm, General Mills, DirectTV, Mattel, iHeartRadio, and many others. Star Lauren Noll is a Los Angeles based actor and filmmaker with a Master’s Degree in Acting from Harvard University. Since arriving in LA post-grad school, in addition to acting in various films, commercials, and music videos, Lauren’s curiosity around other roles in filmmaking led her to write, direct, and star in her first award-winning short film, “Honor” (2020), a personal drama about the encounter of a queer student with Brigham Young University’s honor code office. She followed that filmmaking debut with “Gen V” (2021) for which she was granted a development deal with Adi Shankar’s Bootleg Universe, and “Clean Slate” (2022), which was awarded a grand jury prize at the Collaboration Filmmakers Challenge, and “The Heart of Texas” (2023), which has garnered her six acting awards to date. She is currently preparing for her feature film directorial debut.
Lauren Noll of “Heart of Texas” short
Saimi (Jaana Saarinen) ja Mielensäpahoittaja (Heikki Kinnunen), Mielensäpahoittajan Rakkaustarina, Solar Films. Credit: Solar Films.
The Finnish film “Long Good Thursday” screened at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival on Wednesday, October star 23rd, with star Jaana Saarinen in attendance. Director Mika Kaurismaki is not the first to tell the story of the Grump, portrayed by Finnish comedy star Heikki Kinnunen. There are a series of novels concerning the character, who has become a national icon in Finland.
The Grump, as he is popularly known, is “more of a sour milk kind of guy” (as one of his own son’s describes him). As the film opens, brothers Hessu (Likka Forss) and Pekka (Ville Tihonen) are touring a nursing home with their father. He is not impressed or amused. In fact, he flees the scene and goes to a favorite hillside to talk privately with his wife, dead from Alzheimer’s disease. Even on their way to the nursing home the Grump chides his grown sons about speaking directly to him. “You can talk directly to me. I’m not a house plant yet.” Sadly, this idea of younger folk talking past you or over you is real life; age-ism is alive and well in the U.S. and, apparently, in Finland, as well.
THE PLOT
Jaana Saarinen on October 23, 2024, at the showing of “Long Good Thursday” at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival.
Heikki’s character of the Grump, outfitted in an animal hat that rivals that of the MAGA fanatic who took over Congress on January 6th, is plain-spoken and a hard worker. When told to take it easy he says, “I haven’t taken it easy since I was 9 and my father took me to cut trees in the forest.” Looking at pictures of son Hessu’s holiday with his family, the Grump sees nothing but suffering. He gives a list that mentions sun burn, among other holiday afflictions. The Grump hasn’t danced since the early 70s.
One day at the local supermarket, he is attracted by a wonderful scent that hints of chainsaw oil, pine bark and sawdust. He follows that scent to the check-out lane, where the owner of the pheromone that has attracted him is in a bit of an embarrassing situation. She has forgotten her wallet while trying to check out with her groceries. The Grump offers to pay for the damsel-in-distress’s purchases. This leads to the Grump becoming friends with the free-spirited Saimi (Jaana Saarinen).
Heikki still talks regularly to his deceased wife and tells her “in terms of eternity, nothing will change” but, for the here and now, he would very much like to spend more time with the attractive Saimi. When there is no answer to his musing, he says, “Silence was always a sign of consent for us.”
“Long Good Thursday” from Finland at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival.
The pair go camping on the Jawa motorcycle with side-car and, coincidentally, meet a celebrity in the woods. They encounter Finnish Sportsman of the Years 1972 and 1976, Lasse Viren, one of the Flying Finns, and Heikki says, “This is the best day of my life.” However, Heikki reassures his wife that he is still going to join her in eternity and that “ordinary is enough” will remain their life motto. The Grump is experiencing happiness and joy because of the sunny disposition of his new female friend, Saimi. He praises her wonderful aroma, which she acknowledges as perhaps the “most real” compliment she has ever received.
Saimi, who is a photographer, takes numerous photos of the Grump. They become the basis for a Helsinki art gallery show, to which she invites the Grump. She never suspects that he will take offense at her use of his image in her art. This causes them to go their separate ways, as Heikki flees the exhibit and takes a bus home, saying, “I am not some circus animal to be laughed at by the art circles of Helsinki.”
Jaana Saarinen of “Long Good Thursday”
Here’s a timely historical precedent for this plot. Remember when Jennifer Lopez publicly released the film version of her romance with Ben Affleck as “The Greatest Love Story Never Told?” Remember what happened next? Somehow. J-lo didn’t anticipate that taking every single private love note or e-mail ever sent her by Ben Affleck (who, over the years, had saved them and put them in a book as a gift for her) if publicly shared would offend her new (4th) husband. Lopez claims it was a case of “I didn’t see THAT coming.” Everyone else did. And that’s not even factoring in her investment in an alcoholic brand when her new husband is on the wagon and a recovering alcoholic.
In this film, something comparable happens, but there is more after the supposed break, just as there is more in the Grump/Saimi story.
Q&A
Asked whether any of the lines in the film were improvised, Saarinen acknowledged that some were. She pointed to a scene with the couple walking through a field, where she points to a dark spot and declares it to be a certain kind of mushroom, only to be contradicted by the Grump who says it is “deer shit.” Jaana also admitted that, in one scene, she did not actually cut down a tree with a power saw. In regards to her character of Saimi, she said, “I’d like to be more like her, more accepting. That was the most valuable lesson for me.” Jaana also said that the water in the swimming scene was not that cold and the yard 30 or 40 kilometers from Helsinki where they shot the film was exactly as we see it onscreen. The unusual car belonged to the owner of the house and worked.
The film has wonderful music from a Japanese composer who contacted the director and asked if he could contribute his music. Tetsuroh Konishi’s contribution is wonderful, and the cinematography that took place in the area just outside of Helsinki contains lovely pastoral images from cinematographer Jari Mutikainen.
CONCLUSION
Connie Wilson & Jaana Saarinen of “Long Good Thursday” in Chicago on 10/23/2024.
This was a funny movie that suggests that it’s never too late to be happy in your old age. The 69-year-old director has been directing since at least 1978; it shows. The actors truly embody their roles and the film strikes just the right balance between humor and drama. As the lead actress’ daughter told her mother, “It doesn’t drag; it lingers.” It was a lovely character study of love and affection continuing to exist in maturity. The somewhat open-to-interpretation ending leaves you wanting another episode so we can learn what happens between the Grump and Saimi. Even the young cast members, said Jaana Saarinen, put down their cell phones during filming. “Everyone watched while we were filming.” That tells you a lot about the quality of a film when viewers under 30 will put down their electronic devices long enough to watch real life unfold.
“Long Good Thursday” was a real find, for me. If you can find this poignant Finnish film from accomplished director Mika Kaurismaki (with Heikki Kinnunen and the beautiful Jaana Saarinen co-starring) streaming, it will be a wonderful find for you.
(Trailer is in German; Film is dubbed in English)
On September 5th, 1972, 900 million viewers nationwide watched the first-ever live-and-in-color feed of the Olympics from Munich, Germany. A Palestine terrorist organization known as Black September chose this date, two weeks into the Olympic games, to send 8 operatives into the Olympic Village and take most of the Israeli Olympic athletes hostage. Director Tim Fehlbaum (who also co-wrote with Moritz Binder and Alex David) focuses on the ABC sports team, with Jim McKay on the air in archival footage. The ABC crew stepped up to broadcast the event live to the world. Sportscasters like Howard Cosell and Jim McKay and the late Peter Jennings (who said “I’ve been a war correspondent for 5 years, and yet I’ve never been this close to the Israeli-Arab conflict.”) are also featured.
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) did not accept “September 5,” because they feared demonstrations and protests if it screened. “September 5” made its North American premiere at Telluride. It made its World Premiere at the Venice Film Festival on August 28, 2024. Based on the great reviews Paramount is distributing the film to theaters beginning November 29th, expanding to more theaters on December 13th. It was even difficult to find here in Chicago, with no mention of it in the program and little fan-fare in advance.
THE CAST
Peter Saarsgard is a journeyman character actor who can always be counted on to do a good job. He’s fresh off the 8- episode revisiting of “Presumed Incident,” where he played Tommy Molto, but I’ve been following his career closely since at least the Carrie Mulligan co-starring 2010’s “An Education.” In this one he portrays Roone Arledge, the ABC network big wig who is on the job in Munich. Arledge is running a tight ship, including ordering armed German Polizei out of his studio.
That studio, it should be noted, was meticulously recreated to duplicate the actual studio where Roone and his team had to cover groundbreaking live news as it happened. John Magaro (“The Big Short,” “The Many Saints of Newark”) portrays Geoffrey Mason. Mason has to step up and orchestrate the coverage of the terrorist event on the fly, doing whatever he can to put a picture on the air that will tell the story of Israeli athletes’ lives hanging in the balance and telling the world in real time. At the end of the ordeal, Arledge calls the beleaguered Mason into his office and says, “I know it may not feel like it, but you did a hell of a job.” Arledge also points out that more people watched the Munich Massacre unfold on television than watched Neil Armstrong walk on the moon.
Also instrumental in the cast and in the historical event was ABC German/English interpreter Marianne Gebhardt (Leona Benesch), whose bilingual ability allowed her to monitor German police radio and interpret German news reports for the crew. Benesch—the only female in a sea of men—at one point is sent on a coffee run, prompting a member of the ABC staff assembled to say, “You just sent away the one person who could understand this.”
Historians have generally agreed that the Munich massacre was mishandled from the very beginning. In fact some accuse the German government of a 40-year cover-up. All of the hostages were killed. Two managed to escape because of the early heroism of one of their teammates. Although the ring-leader of the Black September group and his second-in-command were killed at the Ferstenbeldbruck air base, there were actually 3 survivors of the original group of 8 Palestinian assassins. It is incredible to learn from reading up on the raid, that the three Black September survivors were released one month later in a prisoner hostage exchange after Lufthansa Flight 615 was hijacked. (*That isn’t in the movie, but you can look it up.)
THE ATTACK
“September 5” (1972) in the ABC control room during the 20th Olympics in Munich.
As the film’s title makes clear, it was September 5 of 1972—two weeks into the 20th Olympics—when the terrorists struck. Additional reading shows that Schmuel Lakin, the Israeli delegation head, had previously expressed concern about the security of his Israeli athletes. The location of their apartments within the Olympic Village was not ideal. There had been rumors of something like the Munich Massacre occurring, coming from a reputable intelligence source, but the Germans ignored the rumors, wanting no lingering taint of the German Hitler Olympics to mar the 20th. There were even reports that various security scenarios had been explored. What actually did occur matched rather precisely Scenario 21. The terrorists, carrying duffle bags with weapons, had only to scale a 2 metre (6 and ½ feet) chain link fence to gain access to the Israeli team’s lodging. In fact, later, it came out that the assassins were even helped in that task by a group of athletes also climbing the fence, who were either from the U.S. or Canada. They assumed (incorrectly) that the 8 terrorists sneaking over the fence were fellow athletes like themselves.
The attack took place at 4:10 a.m. on September 5th and 300-lb. wrestling referee Yossef Gutfreund would be the only one in the room to look through the peephole, see men with guns, and attempt to hold the door closed while rousing his teammates. Thanks to Gutfreund’s action, Tuvia Sokolovsky and Gat Tsobari would escape via the second floor balcony. None of the rest of those taken prisoner would be so fortunate. They were either shot and killed in Apartment 3 or died at the airport during a totally botched attempt to escape to Cairo after being ferried to the airport in helicopters.
Almost nothing went right during the rescue attempts, primarily because hostage negotiators and special ops forces were not a top-of-mind priority in 1972. Immediately after the Munich massacre special teams were formed in Germany to deal with any such future threats. At the time, the local Bavarian police were unequipped and ill-trained. They tried various methods to rescue the athletes, none of which worked. It didn’t help that the local forces did not cut the power to the athletes’ Olympic Village apartments, so the terrorists were able to see on television exactly what the polizei were attempting to do to apprehend them. The German Constitution forbids the German Army from operating on German soil, a nod to German WWII history. We see and hear the sports team, realizing that the terrorists may have seen their feed from “the bird” satellite overhead, say, “Was it our fault?” So many mistakes are made by the locals that one crew member mutters, “No wonder they lost the war.”
TENSION
Lorenz Dangel’s music adds a great deal of tension to the white knuckle ride. There is great camerawork from Cinematographer Hansjorg Weissbrich. There is also a well-acted conflict between John Magaro as Geoffrey Mason and Ben Chaplin (“The Thin Red Line,” “Murder by Numbers”) as Marvin Bader. The disagreement is over repeating the rumor that all eleven hostages have been released, when Mason does not have two confirmed reliable sources. Bader turns out to have been right.
CONCLUSION
I was in Munich just before the 1972 Olympics as Germany was preparing for the event, having spent the summer in England as a foreign exchange student. I wanted to return for the Olympics, which the city was then constructing. By the time 1972 rolled around, I was married with an infant, was teaching school, and we had landed on the moon. I’ve always remembered the optimistic, cheerful, spirit heading into the games. Munich was my favorite city in Germany.
The disagreement over whether to suspend the games after the Munich Massacre and the failure, since then, to properly memorialize the eleven athletes who lost their lives, just adds another layer of tragedy to the grim fact that these athletes were murdered in cold blood, for no reason other than being Jewish (and, in one case, a U.S. citizen and Ohio native, as well as an Israeli citizen). This 52-year-old event seems timely with the Gaza Strip tragedy dominating our news cycle and the conflict threatening to grow larger every day.
Other excellent revisitings of the Munich Massacre can be found in Steven Spielberg’s “Munich”(2005), about the attempts by Mossad to track down and kill the perpetrators and, also, in “One Day in September,” Director Kevin MacDonald’s Academy Award-winning Best Documentary at the 72nd Academy Awards.
“September 5” is a well-done look at the 22 hours that the ABC sports crew made history covering the Munich Massacre. It’s appropriate to remember the innocent victims: Moseh Weinberg (1st victim, shot); Yossef Romano, shot, left to bleed out, castrated; Yossef Gutfreund; Kehat Schorr, shooting coach; Amitzur Shapira, track and field coach; Andre Spitzer, fencing master; Yakov Springer, weight-lifting judge; Eliezer Halfin, wrestler; Mark Slavin; David Berger, dual American/Israeli citizenship; Ze’ev Friedman, age 18. U.S. Gold Medalist Mark Spitzer, himself Jewish, asked for a security escort and left Germany immediately after the Munich Massacre.
Try not to miss this one when it hits theaters on November 29th.
Marielle Heller walked the Red Carpet outside the Music Box Theater on Monday, October 21st at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival in support of “Nightbitch,” which she co-wrote and directed. The screenplay is based on the book by Rachel Yoder. Heller’s previous directing forays include “Diary of a Teen-aged Girl” (2015), “Can You Ever Forgive Me” (2018) and “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” (2019). Amy Adams and Scoot McNairy play a husband and wife parenting a toddler, played by twin tow-heads Arleigh and Emmett Snowden.
“I’m never going to be smart, happy or thin ever again. And I’m pretty sure I’m turning into a dog,” says the Mother character. That line sums up the plot. All mothers in the audience will be able to relate—up to the dog part, anyway. The theme of a hassled Mom trying to cope with daily life at home with kids reminded me of Jason Reitman’s 2018 film “Tully,” but Charlize Theron had three kids and there was no werewolf-ian metamorphosis involved.
Marielle Heller on October 21, 2024, at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival.
As she took the stage to accept her Visionary award, Marielle Heller said, “This is one of my most personal films. I’m just thrilled to be bringing it here tonight.” The 98-minute film’s tag line? “ Motherhood is a bitch.” The IMDB classification lists Body Horror, Comedy, Horror, and Dark Comedy. If you liked “Can You Ever Forgive Me” which earned Melissa McCarthy an Oscar nomination, you’ll like this one. If you’re a Mom, you’ll like it twice as much. (Amy Adams won a TIFF acting award for her role.)
Q&A
After the film screened, Heller shared some insights into the production. The feeling that this could be “any city” and “any Mom” was intentional. Specifics are missing on purpose, including names. Heller is delineating the marital playbook where the wife gives up her career and her dreams to stand by her man. She is thinking, “How many women have delayed their greatness while the men around them didn’t know what to do with theirs?” Adams’ character was a successful artist and worked in an art gallery before she and her husband decided to have a child. Now, as the script says, “The whole concept of motherhood that we’re sold is basically bull-shit.”
SCRIPT
One scripted exchange between the couple has her husband saying, “What happened to the girl I married?” to which Amy Adams responds, “She died in childbirth.” The absence of specific names for our married couple is intentional. One scene (that others wanted to cut) was “the kale salad scene.” Heller described it as a difficult one for Amy Adams to play and “the heart of the film.” As she explained, “It’s that feeling of becoming more and more invisible as you age.” (Tell me about it. No, don’t. I live it daily.)
In the scene, the waiter seems to disregard Amy’s order of a kale salad on more than one occasion. The actor playing the waiter asked the director why the waiter doesn’t seem to respond to Amy Adams repeated request for a kale salad, as she dines out with former work colleagues. Heller told him, “Your ears are not tuned to the sound of any woman over 40.” Adams declares herself a “sand cow” and says, “The woman that I used to be, she’s down here in my intestines, buried in kale.”
SETS/CASTING
Marielle Heller on the Red Carpet outside the Music Box Theater in Chicago during the 60th Chicago International Film Festival on October 21, 2024.
One interesting fact was that the team looking for a house to use for filming looked at over 60 of them. Heller said, “There was more effort to make the movie seem effortless than you could imagine.” (She stumbled upon the house at 2 a.m. on Zillow). She explained that the house they were seeking should demonstrate a certain level of good taste, but “with a layer of baby crap over the good taste.” The most difficult casting was that of the BookBaby Moms. Best BookBaby Moms scene is where each confides an anecdote about their failures as keepers of the household’s pets, whether a bird, a fish or a cat. The sharing occurred after Adams said, in response to inquiries from her BookBaby friends about the couple’s recent separation, “I just had to break out of it. And I killed the cat this week, which made me aware that I’m not doing well emotionally.”
HUMOR
It is dead-pan delivery of lines like the one about the cat that will amuse anyone with a sense of humor— especially any woman who is a new mother struggling to keep her head above water. The script (a collaboration between the author of the book and Heller) is particularly good. It conveys laughs that are truisms that hit home, as when Adams says, “I needed to dig around in the dark and just find myself again.” She salutes all women who have given birth, citing “That shared bond of all you’ve given up for the continuation of the species.”
One of the best and most humorous techniques that Heller uses throughout the film is to show the socially correct response, contrasted with the actual REAL response. One such exchange occurs in the produce aisle of the grocery store in response to a work colleague who asks Amy about being home all day with her new child. (REAL response, unsaid:“I would like to feel content, but instead I feel like I’m trapped within a prison of my own making.”) Instead, she trots out the socially and politically correct response. Scott McNairy as the husband finally admits, “I didn’t see all that you were giving up by being at home.” (An apology is tendered, which Heller said made some people feel uncomfortable. As for herself: “We need to see more men apologize in movies.”) Responding to the platitude “choose happiness” with a strong slap would be the real response. “I’ll try” is what women are conditioned to respond.
DIFFICULT SCENES
There are multiple dogs in the film. When asked about the difficulties of working with animals, Heller said, “With every dog there is a trainer who is talking off-camera. I didn’t know how chaotic that would feel.” She also embraced more unscripted spontaneity than in past films,
because of the small child (actually two twin boys) whose immediate responses needed to be captured. The twins were wonderful in their part and any mother of a small boy will be able to relate to the antics of the toddler.
Asked about one of her favorite scenes, Heller singled out the scene that was her favorite scene to watch with an audience. It involved Amy’s increasing feeling that she is somehow changing and becoming more animalistic. Heller’s brother, Nate, (who played the singing male leader of the Book Babies club) accused his sister of liking gross things. In the scene Amy Adams examines some changes her body is undergoing and takes action. As someone who has a friend who absolutely loves the “Dr. Pimple-popper” television segments, I’ll leave the specifics up to you to discover when you see the film in December (it premieres December 6th), but suffice it to say that it hasn’t been done on film in any movie I’ve seen.
Marielle Heller, Director of “Nightbitch,” onstage at the Music Box Theater during the Q&A at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival on October 21, 2024.
CONCLUSION
You’ll want to put this one on your “Things that make you laugh and cry at the same time,” —especially if you’re a Mom (as I am). If you’ve ever found yourself saying, “I don’t want anything or anyone else needing me or touching me,” then this is the film for you. Remember this scripted line if you’re still just giving the politically correct response to those questions about life with a new baby, “Insist on your joy. Time is short.”
Words to live by and a good reason to see “Nightbitch.”
Writer-Director Antonio Piazza (“Sicilian Ghost Story”), who spoke with me one-on-one on October 20, 2024.
Directors Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza, who directed “Sicilian Ghost Story” in 2017, return to the screen with “Sicilian Letters,” the story of an attempt to capture real-life Mafia crime boss Matteo Messina Denaro. The crime boss known as the last godfather was hunted for 30 years and was finally captured January 16, 2023 outside a medical facility in Palermo where he was seeking treatment for colon cancer under an assumed name. Over 100 police were involved in his apprehension that day. He was transferred to a prison with a cancer medical facility, where he died 8 months later (September 25, 2023), after slipping into a coma on September 24, 2023. At the time of his death, aged 61, it was estimated that Matteo—who had been sentenced to life in prison in absentia for the death of Giuseppe DiMatteo in 2012—was worth $4 billion dollars.
Lucia Rasso (Barbora Bobulova) with whom Matteo hides in “Sicilian Letters.”
Matteo, portrayed by Elio Germano, was known to be a cold-blooded adversary. He once killed a rival (Vincenzo Milaggo from Alcamo) and then strangled the man’s pregnant girlfriend. Matteo had been familiar with guns since the age of 14. At one point, he tells the woman harboring him (Lucia Rasso, played by Barbora Bobulova) that he was responsible for avenging her husband’s death and that he murdered the killer when he was only 17. Matteo also bragged, “I filled a cemetery all by myself.”
We see this early descent into savagery in the film’s opening scene, when Matteo steps up to murder a goat under the direction of his father, upstaging his older brother and foiling the attempts of his sister to grab the knife herself. Matteo’s father, Francesco Messina Denaro, known as Don Ciccio, died in November of 1998. By then, Matteo had been on the FBI’s Most Wanted list for 5 years, after a string of bombings in 1993 that killed two prosecutors, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.
PLOT
The film begins by saying “Reality is a point of departure, not a destination.” In other words, as with most films, a certain amount of poetic license has been taken with real life. But, as Director Antonio Piazza told me in a conversation on August 20th, most of the story is true. In order to capture the last godfather, the police attempt to turn the former Mayor and Headmaster Catello Palumbo (Toni Servillo), who was Matteo’s godfather, into a trusted go-between. Catillo has just spent 6 years in Cuneo prison. The police tell him, “Our meeting is your chance to get back in the game.” They want him to help capture the arch criminal, who has been on the loose for 30 years. and Catello suggests that writing notes (“pizzini”) might be the way in. It is known that Matteo likes to read and Catello offers up the truism that incarcerated prisoners might be the last real readers on the planet. (Sad, but potentially true).
Catello Palumbo and Matteo Messina Denaro in “Sicilian Letters,” screening at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival.
Catello—an odd-looking individual with his comb-over hairdo—has returned to his long-suffering wife Elvira, who seems to take a dim view of her spouse. Catello’s hotel project is in jeopardy; it’s illegal because it’s in a nature preserve. His wife, Elvira (Betty Pedrazzi), is fed up with the circumstances the family has been reduced to during Catello’s incarceration. His daughter Latizia (Dalila Reas) is pregnant by the janitor at Catello’s old school, (a part well-played by Giuseppe Tantillo as the “simple and sweet” Pino Turino.) Elvira does a good job of defending Pino from Catello’s put-downs, but there were other instances in the screenplay where women are demeaned, but none stand up to their abuser. It was definitely a sign of those early 2000 times. One such scene has a male investigator, Captain Schiavon (FaustoRussi Alessi), screaming in the face of female investigator Rita Mancuso (Daniela Marra). There is a line in the screenplay that says,”It’s the men who make decisions at home.” Rita definitely seems angry and upset most of the time.
The police embrace Catello’s idea of using letters to ferret out Matteo’s location. The letters—known as “pizzini“—were small folded-up notes used to communicate with other members of the Cosa Nostra in order to avoid phone conversations. They look very quaint in the era of e-mail and pagers blowing up in Gaza. The pizzini remind of notes passed from student to student in schools from the forties through the sixties, now an anachronism. The idea is to use Catello’s relationship with Matteo as his godfather and the trust Matteo might have in Catello to “Let him hear his father’s voice from beyond the grave.” It seems to work—or does it?
TRUST & CORRUPTION
Investigator Rita Mancuso (Daniela Marra) and Catillo Palumbo (Toni Servillo) join forces to find Matteo in “Sicilian Letters.”
The issues of corruption and trust were huge in the film. One scripted line, “In this village we all spy on one another.” Matteo at one point executes a friend (Nando) who is suspected of stealing cocaine and tells him at the moment of truth that the issue is not the value of the drugs but that “It’s an issue of trust.” The female investigator Rita Mancuso (Daniela Marra) early in the investigation tells Catello not to trust the other investigators on the case. She suspects (correctly) that there is so much corruption that the police don’t really want to catch Matteo. Sicilian singer-songwriter Colapesce even composed a song for the film, “La mal vagita seve al mondo intero” which means “evil serves a purpose for the entire world.” Matteo is the center of an entire world using him for their own greedy purpose.
THE GOOD
The plot is complicated and there are quite a few characters to follow. The acting is compelling. Elio Germano, who plays Matteo, actually moved to Palermo for a short period of time to pick up the dialect and the culture (and some Sicilian mannerisms). The part of Catello’s wife (Elvira, portrayed by Betty Pedrazzi)) was particularly interesting. She was one woman of the era who spoke up. Elvira seems very fed-up with her ex-convict husband and says so. The comic touches helped lighten the mood, as when we learn that Catello’s nickname is “Straight-shitter,” which has to do with the circumstances of his arrest. Some found Catello’s odd hair-do and the comic touches distracting, but they were well-done and necessary to prevent a grim film from becoming too depressing. There is the jab at Matteo’s sister’s “taralli,” a pastry that Matteo warns is as hard as cement. The cinematography and music also served the film well.
SPEAKING WITH DIRECTOR ANTONIO PIAZZA
Matteo’s father takes his 3 children to kill a goat for the holiday meal in an early scene from “Sicilian Letters.”
The significance of the small statue described as being the most valuable in the town’s small museum was explained to me by the director, Antonio Piazza. Not only is it true that the statue was very valuable, but it demonstrated how the Mafiosa ripped off antiquities of the country for their own benefit. The statue was called “pupu.” As Director Piazza explained, the word has different meanings in Sicilian. It can mean “puppet” and it can mean “child.” Said Antonio, “In a way Matteo is a puppet and a child.” The director explained that the existence of the “Pupu” statue was absolutely true. As Director Piazza noted, “Reading the notes left behind in Matteo’s hide-out and seeing the personal items left behind opened up a whole world to us.” The puzzle in Matteo’s hide-away was one way he passed the time while in hiding for 30 years. The real Matteo actually did write a letter to the puzzle manufacturer complaining about the missing puzzle piece. Matteo also read voraciously and watched such television shows on DVR as “The Sopranos” and “Sex and the City,” plus reading an Andre Agassi book, Baudelaire, and Dostoyevsky.
CHARACTERS
Pino Tumino, well-played by Giuseppe Tantillo, is the only character in “Sicilian Letters” who comes off as pure.
“Pino Turino (who is married to Catello’s daughter) is the only character in the movie who comes out pure,” said Antonio. “Somehow he was able to read the context, which protected him morally.” Police investigator Rita Mancuso, Antonio explained, “really wants to capture the fugitive. She’s honest and idealistic and blinded by her obsession to capture Matteo.” Asked about the accuracy of other names in the film, Antonio said that only Matteo’s name was true to life; most others were changed. We discussed the state of women at this time in history and in the world. Antonio agreed that Matteo’s sister would have been pissed off that she was a woman living in a man’s world at a time when, as the script says, “It’s the men who make decisions at home.”
Matteo was very close to his father, who died in 1998. However, his father was not the womanizer that Matteo chose to be. One small change that Antonio acknowledged was that the illegitimate child is said to be a son. In reality, the child who wrote the Father’s Day essay about her MIA father, was a girl. Matteo’s sister really did feel that Matteo should acknowledge his daughter, but the film—with its father-and-son dynamic, worked better with the child being male. The second-class citizenship of girls is made clear from the opening scene of the three children with their father and the goat. I wondered if the sunglasses perched on the small child’s head (Matteo’s illegitimate son, in the film) was meant to show a passing of the torch to the next generation in the film. Director Piazza acknowledged that the RayBan sunglasses were definitely Matteo’ signature and became iconic. Photos of him on driver’s licenses, old and young, show him wearing RayBan sunglasses. (Think Tom Cruise in “Risky Business.”)
CONCLUSION
Matteo’s father, Francesco Messina Denaro (Don Ciccio) on his deathbed in “Sicilian Letters.”
The primary themes of “Sicilian Letters” concern evil, corruption, and trust. Director Antonio Piazza said, “Your reading of the film is very much true. We are asking the audience, ‘How is all this possible?’” This continued exploration of Cosa Nostra in Sicily and the 30-year search for Matteo Messina Denaro, the last godfather, was an engrossing, well-written, well-plotted, well-acted and well-directed outing which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Marius the giraffe at the Copenhagen zoo.
Ten years ago in 2014, the news that Marius the giraffe was being put down by the Copenhagen Zoo went viral all the way from Hollywood to Chechnya. This Matt Kestner directed 98-minute documentary about that Marius controversy is a nominee for the Gold Hugo at the Chicago International Film Festival. It’s a philosophical examination of life, spurred by the decision by Bengst Holst of the Copenhagen Zoo, to euthanize a perfectly healthy two-year-old giraffe, simply because Marius was fighting with his father within the zoo. Holst took a very hard-nosed clinical view of life-and-death. You get the feeling that he would have done well in the Third Reich. There is no romanticizing of the death of a relatively young animal nor any feeling that Holst is remorseful about the path he has chosen (and sticks with, despite massive criticism). Bengst Holst definitely becomes “the bad guy” of the narrative, which is nominated for a Gold Hugo for Best Documentary at the Chicago International Film Festival. The documentary opens October 20th in the United States.
BENGST HOLST: aka THE BAD GUY
Television interview with zoo director Bengt Holst, who condemned Marius to death.
Holst appears in the film articulating his view that death is a part of life (which, of course, it is). He calls dying “the natural conclusion to life” and says, “Everything is life. We take life all the time. We now have a surplus to put down,” in regards to Marius the giraffe.
The backlash is immediate and harsh. One letter writer tells Holst, “You deserve to die a cruel death.” Offers come in from Sweden and the United States to give Marius a new home, but the Copenhagen zoo director rejects all offers suggesting that one zoo, in particular, is no better than a pet shop and might attempt to sell Marius for financial gain. Holst says things like, “We can’t act like death isn’t part of real life. This isn’t Disney. Death is a sad thing in our lives. You can’t live without death. It’s a sad thing, of course, but it belongs together. We’re all left alone in the end.” Another pragmatic, hard-nosed remark: “For some to survive, others must die. That’s how nature works.”
CONSCIOUSNESS
Marius.
One question that the film asks is if animals like Marius have consciousness. “Because we know we have consciousness. Do giraffes have it?” As Max Kestner says, “You look for the consciousness of other things.” One good line is “How much cognition and what kind? That’s the right question.”
The shots of owners with their pets— dogs, swans, pigs and horses— certainly makes an argument for kindness towards animals, an emotional commodity in which Holst seems lacking.
A PETA representative enters the debate saying, “They’re their own beings. Leave them alone. They’re just like us.” But Holst disagrees, saying, “We can’t even explain how a thought comes into being” and “It doesn’t matter if Marius lives or not.”
Do pets have consciousness?
ROUGH
Still, it is hard to deny that Holst has correctly pointed out that all beings on planet Earth will ultimately come to the end of their time on the planet. He is nothing if not pragmatic about the end we all will face. The next chapter in his determination to teach us all a lesson in the natural circle of life seems harsh, however. There is a public butchering of Marius’s carcass, followed by feeding the meat to the lions at the zoo. It gets even more brutal when a young girl’s pony is euthanized onscreen. That animal, too, is fed to the carnivores at the zoo.
I accept the fact that “in the midst of life we are in death” but there are a number of little kids watching Marius the giraffe being publicly butchered. Holst praises the curiosity of little kids at such a time. Judge Jeanine Piro called it a bloody spectacle and referenced it as the start of serial killers like Jeffrey Dahmer, who first killed animals. While not a Judge Jeanine fan (nor a Fox fan) I had to agree that watching Marius be cut up wasn’t exactly family friendly viewing.
I can speak to the trauma that a small child may experience when witnessing an animal being butchered—especially one that seemed quite sweet and docile.
When I was the age of the young children shown watching Marius’ being butchered, I was present for the slaughtering of a hog that had broken its leg on an Iowa farm. Of course, my father didn’t know that the animal was going to be strung up by its hind legs and have its throat slit, in full view of his 8-year-old daughter, but that’s what happened. I had nightmares for weeks. I remember the horrific noises of the dying animal. It is still vividly etched in my Little Golden Book of Unfavorite Childhood Memories. It is one thing to explain the circle of life and how Marius has gone to his great reward. But to display every aspect of Marius’ butchering and show lions eating the friendly giraffe might have been a bridge too far.
Marius’ remains.
FUZZY FOCUS
What is the meaning of life? How did life evolve? Does life end at death? Is life heading for something specific? Is there an end goal to life? Is the opposite of life not death, but loneliness, because all of life is about relationships? Is death a transformation?
There are no religious answers in this one. There are no definitive scientific answers, either, but the documentary does lean towards the scientific in search of explanations for why Herr Holst seems to act heartlessly and without any true fond feeling for poor Marius—an animal he claimed to love. You come away with the definite feeling that Marius could have been saved, but not while Herr Holst was in charge. As a sometimes Texas resident I got the feeling that Bengst Holst and Governor Abbott of Texas would get along famously.
For me, I enjoyed the philosophical discussions and sidelights. The experts choose to answer the question about life’s purpose using physics and saying that there are really two categories: the purpose you give to your own life and the purpose you claim for life, in general. After that, you have to roll up your pant legs and wade into the deep discussion, parking romantic religious illusions of a gauzy focus reincarnation or reunion after death at the door. It can get a tad pedantic, but it interested me, even though some might find it less-than-riveting.
Carnivores eat meat.
CONCLUSION
This is a film that will stir up animal activists, engage those of us asking ‘What Is the meaning of life?,” and leave viewers with more questions than it answers. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I do think that just the “pro” versus con argument of Marius’ life or death (“To be or not to be?”) would have been enough for the film, but it ambitiously took on the universal questions of life. At times, the philosophy became pedantic to the point of growing dreary, but then it comes roaring back with an animal death or a young girl witnessing the death of her pony.
With humans described as “just another evolutionary branch on the tree of life” we hear one of the scientists say, “Oh, shit! I hate humans!” Since it is a human who has decided in his infinite wisdom that Marius must die, without much support for his point-of-view, the human contention that life on earth is about the survival of the fittest does paint a picture of human life on Earth as terrible and horrible, without any higher purpose but predation, ending in death. But there is a muted plea for some sort of equilibrium between life and plants on the planet that will prevent man from turning Mars into a cold bleak planet or Venus into a boiling one. Watching Hurricane Milton ravage Florida while writing this, I certainly agree that we must be better stewards of the Earth. I mourn the opportunity that electing Al Gore would have given us 24 years ago to start on that journey of saving our planet.
Tackling a documentary in 98 minutes that addresses All of the Big Questions of Life, inspired by the death of a giraffe, is very ambitious. Maybe TOO ambitious. But Writer/Director/Editor Matt Kestner keeps the train on track, with expert assistance from a team of 6 cinematographers (Jacob Sufussen, Maria Von Hausswolff, Sturla Brandth Grovlen, Emil Aagaard, Masafumi Seki, Noah Collier) and with the able editing of Michael Haglund. I’ll be thinking about this one for a long time.
The first thing that struck me about “Okie” were the gorgeous cinematic images. Kudos to Director of Photography Wojciech Kielar. There are so many panoramas and rural vistas that are shot with wide lens beauty. Creston, Illinois, never looked better. The music is good and the acting is top-notch, with Scott Michael Foster (“Greek,” “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” “You”) playing the lead, Louie Mulgrin.
BACKGROUND
From “Okie,” which screens this weekend in Chicago at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival on both Saturday and Sunday.
Then I read up on the husband/wife team, Kevin Bigley and Kate Cobb, who are responsible for this truly outstanding indie film. They’ve been collaborating as a team for a decade and Katie, whose directing debut this is, is currently working on a residency at Princeton, providing visual content for a Princeton student working on his PhD in composition. She is also the female lead in the film, portraying Louie’s old girlfriend, Lainey Gamble. Katie has had acting roles in television’s “Shameless,” “Scandal,” and “Grey’s Anatomy.” In 2014 she founded a production company called BigCobb productions and worked for “Funny or Die” producing content. Next up for the team will be a film called “Dirt,” which husband Kevin Bigley will also write. Kate Cobb, the director of “Okie,” graduated from Theater School at DePaul and was named Best Director at the UCLA Film Fest for her film “Dandelions.” Kate and Kevin make a dynamic producing team. I’ll be certain to watch for their next outing, because this one is great.
PLOT
Okie fair scene
Here is the plot line of “Okie” as released by the BigCobb team: Louie Mulgrin, a wealthy writer, returns to his beleaguered Oklahoma hometown after his father passes away. The town, a weathered setting, and its people have served as the subject matter for Louie’s writing. He has done relatively well writing fictionalized versions of friends and family. When Louie drops into town to pick up a few things from his deceased father’s house, he is reunited with his childhood friends, including Travis Young—who suggests that Louie ought to have enough time to hang with his old buddies for a day or so. The fair is in town and there are beers to be drunk at parties to be held.
CONCLUSION
Travis Young is portrayed by the writer and one of the co-stars of this indie film, Kevin Bigley (“Bojack Horseman,” “Animal Control,” “Upload”). Kevin is not only one-half of the creative team behind this expertly shot 82-minute indie film, Kevin is also the writer of wife Kate Cobb’s next film project, “Dirt.”
I’ll return to “review” more completely on November 5th , with a few questions about plot points. I wanted to post this for any Chicago International Film Festival patrons who can still see this great flick this coming weekend (10/19 and 10/20) at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday at the Gene Siskel Film Center (164 N. State St.) and 11:45 p.m. on Sunday at the AMC Newcity 14 on North Clyburn Avenue.