LEFT : (from left) Diana Peñalver, Fabiola Arace. RIGHT: Diana Peñalver.
Miami International Film Festival número 32 is upon us, and this year's edition features the expected assortment of European cinema of quality, hard-hitting documentaries and the latest from some local filmmakers. (I'm looking at you, Billy Corben. Dawg Fight had better be good.) Of course, the reason so many festivalgoers brave the parking headaches, the long lines and the not-particularly-cheap ticket prices are to catch new Spanish and Latin American films, some of which might not even make it to a theater near you.
This year's MIFF is no exception, and as is sometimes the case, some of the titles en español come to us from first-time directors. As is also often the case, the results are by turns invigorating, promising, uneven and downright clunky. Three of the following four titles are first features. The odd man out is this year's Opening Night selection. Without further ado, here they are.
LEFT :(from left) Emilio Edwards, Francisco Celhay. RIGHT: Francisco Celhay.
The Good
Bruno, the sexually ambivalent protagonist of the Chilean drama In the Grayscale, is a catch. A talented architect by trade, the handsome, mid-30s career man appears to lead the kind of lifestyle you see idealized on a daily basis in prescription pill commercials: beautiful wife, adorable son, comfy abode in Santiago. So it's more than a little disconcerting that at the start of director Claudio Marcone's naturalistic character study, he's shacking up for the night at his granddad's workshop.
What gives? Bruno (Francisco Celhay), you see, wants to take a time-out from his marital duties. "I need to be alone," he says to his wife Soledad (Daniela Ramírez) as she continues to struggle with hubby's increasing emotional distance. A businessman under pressure to deliver results hires Bruno to create something that will inspire awe and wonder from residents, a structure of some sort that captures the soul of the city. What would it look like? Bruno's drawing a blank, so when he asks for help in the project, along comes Fer (Emilio Edwards), a historian who makes a living as a city tour guide, and of course he'll show this quiet, soft-spoken cutie patootie around.
Screenwriter Rodrigo Antonio Norero amasses all the elements of the typical boy-meets-boy scenario, but he has no intention of going the festival crowdpleaser route. Aided by Marcone's lived-in mise en scène and cinematographer Andrés Jordán's naturalistic lensing, the filmmakers explore this clash of worldviews, placing Bruno's long-suppressed urges in sharp contrast to Fer's exuberant confidence. Fer prides himself in being able to see relationship prospects in rigid black-and-white terms, but he understands Bruno's reticence, the notion of his sexuality as being something that shape-shifts and evolves. (Celhay comes across like the young Ricardo Darín, only more cuddly.) Kudos to Marcone and Norero for refusing to pigeonhole their bond in easy terms, and for refusing to tie their story in a neat and tidy bow. They've made a sensitive, smart – and yes, very sexy – tale of lives in flux with more than a passing resemblance to Andrew Haigh's Weekend. In this age of "It Gets Better" and "Love Is Love," we've become accustomed to cheer for those who live openly over those who shy away from being out as they continue to figure things out. How refreshing, then, that in In the Grayscale, Marcone's clear-eyed humanism gives both points of view their due.
In the Grayscale screens Saturday, March 7 at 6:30 p.m. at Regal Cinemas South Beach and Monday, March 9 at 7 p.m. at the Coral Gables Art Cinema.
LEFT :(from left) Elena Anaya, Cristian Bernal. RIGHT: Elena Anaya.
The Bad
Wild Tales (Relatos salvajes) was one of the buzziest titles in competition at Cannes last May and then went on to cause a stir in Toronto later that fall. It became a smash hit in its native Argentina and a conversation piece across Latin America. The victory tour reached a high point with a Foreign Language Feature Oscar nomination, and now it arrives in South Florida to kick off MIFF. It's understandable why audiences are going gaga for writer-director Damián Szifrón's sextet of revenge-fueled yarns. These bite-size bonbons of malice stoke our schadenfreude in all kinds of slick, gleeful ways. And yet I would be lying if I said I didn't feel anything but utter repulsion at Szifrón's topical misanthropy, the off-putting way he deals with his ripped-from-the-headlines situations with zero empathy and the attention span of a gnat.
The storytelling opportunities in each Tale are palpable: plane passengers suddenly realize they're somewhat connected to each other; a roadside diner waitress comes face to face with the man responsible for her family's misery; a petit bourgeois driver engages in a battle of wills against the blue-collar trucker who – goddammit! – won't let him pass in a dusty highway; a hapless engineer becomes trapped in a calamitous chain of events after his car is towed; a wealthy patriarch takes desperate steps to make sure his son is not arrested for his involvement in a hit-and-run; and a Jewish princess discovers an unsavory side to her husband … at her wedding reception. But through most of the film's swift two-hour running times, I was always conscious of Szifrón poking his finger at me in "isn't this hi-LAR-ious?" mode. His Relatos , are ultimately more interested in showcasing Damián Szifrón's skills behind the camera than the troubling subject matter he explores in such facile, inelegant manner. Give this shallow calling-card concoction the boot. Boo!
Wild Tales screens Friday, March 6 at 7 p.m. the Olympia Theater at the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts.
LEFT :(from left) Erica Rivas, Diego Gentile. RIGHT:(from left) Walter Donado, Leonardo Sbaraglia.
The Ugly
Beauty pageants are a national obsession in Venezuela, or so writer director Carlos Caridad-Montero keeps telling us in his misguided satire 3 Beauties (3 Bellezas), which follows a single mother who grooms a daughter for beauty-queen fame since she's little while another daughter glowers in resentment. It's rich territory for a camptastic dark comedy, but Caridad-Montero lacks the chops needed to pull off this tall order. His South American What Ever Happened to Baby Jane wanna-be veers listlessly from target to target, but nothing sticks. A fairly offensive howler of an ending caps off this whopper of a missed opportunity.
3 Beauties screens Monday, March 9 at 9 p.m. at Regal Cinemas South Beach and Wednesday, March 11 at 9:30 p.m. at Cinépolis Coconut Grove.
LEFT :(from left) Leonardo Sbaraglia. RIGHT: Ricardo Darín.
Somewhere In Between...
What became of those Latin pop one-hit wonders from the 80s? In the case of the agoraphobic Lupe (The Skin I Live In's Elena Anaya), the lead role in the Spanish dramedy They Are All Dead, you hole yourself up in a Madrid apartment for a decade making apple pies for a living while your superstitious Mexican mom raises your son. Tragedy struck for Lupe's band, Groenlandia, taking her brother/partner in crime Diego (Nahuel Péres Biscayart) from her, but as the Day of the Dead arrives in 1996, though, the dearly departed simply shows up and refuses to leave, Doña Flor and Her Two Husbands-style. It's a bracing dose of magic realism that sounds terrific on the page, but first-time writer Beatriz Sanchís' approach to the supernatural aspects of her ghost story is awkward and often ill-conceived. Anaya's performance, though, as well as the tentative baby steps she takes to reconnect with her estranged teenage son, go a long way toward making this Sundance-y movie with Amerindie tendencies more palatable than it has any right to be.
They Are All Dead screens Monday, March 9 at 9:30 p.m. at Cinépolis Coconut Grove and Wednesday, March 11 at 9:30 p.m. at the Coral Gables Art Cinema.
The 32 Miami International Film Festival kicks off March 6 at several venues across Miami-Dade County. It runs through March 15. Go to http://www.miamiff-tickets.com/events/ for a complete schedule.
