Film n. 5: Hunger

Would that it were so simple

I watch over and over again old movies, when I'm home. 
It is one of the greatest pleasure in life, I reckon.
There is always something new to discover: an image we forgot, a perfect dialogue we've missed, an interesting look we didn't notice the first time we watched them.
Tonight I've seen for the third time The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) by Norman Jewison, with Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway.
A classic movie. A very good one.
The plot is intriguing but by far the three things that work best in the film are the dialogues (absolutely brilliant), the wonderful music by Michel Legrand and the magical chemistry between Thomas Crown (McQueen) and Vicki Anderson (Dunaway):

As usual, I was struck by something amazing that for some strange reasons I had previously missed. After their first date, Crown drives Anderson back home, at night.
In front of her house, while still inside the car, they start the following, simple and yet wondrous, dialogue (without changing the tone of their voices):
TC: Tomorrow...
VA: What about it?
TC: Us, dinner.
VA: Marvelous.
TC: About six?
VA: Perfect.
My goodness, would that it were so simple, as the Coen Brothers would put it.
An affair starting like this, in the most natural, casual and lighthearted way.
I wish it could happen in real life, but well, we know what real life is.
It's... complicated!

'71

Have you ever been passionate about a subject that doesn’t have anything to do with your life? 
I confess I was, many times. 
Most probably, though, the worst case of all is my huge interest for the Irish Troubles.
Don’t ask me why, but since a very young age I started reading anything about the long and tiresome internal war between catholic and protestant in Northern Ireland. I believe I read every novel and seen every movie on this subject. I also have my own ideas about the best novel written about it (Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson) and the best movie made about it (Hunger by Steve McQueen). 

A couple of weeks ago, I found out there was a new movie about the Troubles and, of course, I immediately went to see it. I didn’t expect much and so, as it is often the case when expectations are low (isn’t the same in real life?), I liked it very, very much. 
I am talking about the movie ’71 by Yann Demange. 

The movie is about a 24 years old British soldier, Gary Hook, who is sent to Belfast in 1971, together with a bunch of very young comrades, to keep under control the explosive situation between catholic and protestant. Clearly enough, nobody knows, even his superiors, how to deal with this strange war. During his first mission in the earth of the catholic enclave, something goes wrong and Gary and another guy are left in the hands of the “enemies”. The other guy is shot to death, but Gary manages to escape. Alone, scared, injured, the guy can count only on himself and on his lucky star to get out of that awful and nightmarish situation. Will he be able to survive?

Compared to many movies about the Troubles, this is a very original one. First of all, this is not about a catholic guy but about a British soldier (very rare!) and, secondly, it is a real thriller (unique!). Forget about all the movies trying to explain why this war started, or movies about the real story of some catholic “martyr”. This is a pursuit movie, where the guy is chased from the beginning until the end and you, as spectator, jump on your seat every two seconds because you’re too scared or too agitated to watch another scene.
Catholic and protestant are put on the same level, here. The movie is quite smart in elucidating complex situations with simple shortcuts: yes, it is a bad war, yes, there are bastards on both sides, yes, instead of solving it, there were people willing to make it worse, and yes, too many families have been uselessly devastated. I have to say that this approach was very refreshing and at the same time even more powerful in dragging you in this unbelievable hell. 

Yann Demange, the film-maker behind this little gem, is – weirdly enough - a French chap, but he has a very British upbringing (he directed, among other things, the first season of the TV series Criminal Justice with Ben Whishaw). His mise-en-scène is beautiful, and the rhythm of the movie impeccable. The credit for such a great result surely goes also to the actor who plays Gary: British Jack O’Connell, already appreciated in Starred Up by David MacKenzie and now about to enter stardom as the main character of new Angelina Jolie’s movie, Unbroken. O'Connell carries the entire movie on his shoulders in a very convincing way. His desperate face mixed with his stubborn willing to survive win the audience’s attention and create an immediate and total identification. You suffer for him and with him from the beginning till the end, and you want him to be saved, at every cost!
In the distance, Belfast and his fires shine of a new light.
All of a sudden, I have a new film in my top five of best movies about the Irish Troubles!

12 Years a Slave

When I thought about a perfect Xmas movie to write about today in my blog, I unexpectedly thought about the new Steve McQueen film, 12 Years a Slave. 
I had the chance to see its avant-première a couple of weeks ago in a Paris cinema and I was eager to share my feelings about it with my readers.
Nobody else, I guess, would consider it a good movie for the Xmas time, but I do.
I am fed up with Xmas stories and fairy tales, I’d rather prefer to talk about an awful, tragic, real story: maybe it is not a bad idea to face the inhumanity of human beings on Xmas day! 

Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor)

Steve Mcqueen, a British film-maker, is famous for his tough movies. From the story of Bobby Sands, the IRA revolutionary who starved himself to death (Hunger), to the story of Brandon, a NY sex addict (Shame), McQueen is not exactly the entertaining movies kind-of-guy. And I sincerely love him for that. For his third movie, he decided to go even “closer to the bone” relating the true story of Solomon Northup (the film is based upon Northup’s autobiography, having the same title). 
Northup, in 1840, was a free black man living with his family not far away from New York. A fine violin player, a well respected man in his community. One day, he accepts the job offer of two gentlemen, not knowing that the offer hides the most dreadful humbug: he has been sold as slave and sent to the Southern states to work in cotton plantations. The shock, for this cultivated man, is unspeakable. For 12 long years he will be obliged to work in the worst human conditions and be subject to the cruellest physical and mental punishments by his owners. When the hope is almost lost, Northup has the chance – unlike so many other slaves – to get back to freedom and write about his uncommon story...  

Northup (Ejiofor) and Epps (Fassbender)

If your reference in movies about slavery is Gone with the wind or The Colour Purple, well, forget about them, but if you want to know what really meant to be a black slave in the United States of America around 1840, well, this is the right movie for you. As it was the case for his previous films, McQueen is not here to gild the pill. Slavery is a shameful stain on American history, and it will always be. No matter what. This a story of rage, of survival, of dignity. McQueen shows it with his particular way of filming: very rigorous plans, scarce music, no useless scene, no-frills. He goes to the core of the story, straight away, without even giving you a chance to escape. Furthermore, this is not, at all, a heroic kind of movie. Northup is not better than any other slave. He is just more cultivated than they are. Which is a minus, not a plus, in a situation like this. The less you know, the less you feel, the better it will be for you. Northup is speechless, as we are, witnessing the misery, the cruelty, the non-sense of the whole situation. He is not brave, he is barely able to survive, keeping a feeble hope to go back to life and human condition.

Epps (Fassbender), Patsey (Nyong'o) and Northup (Ejiofor)

McQueen should be also complimented for the incredible cast he has been able to assemble. This is the best cast of the year: to play Solomon, he has chosen a great but underestimated (until today, I hope) British actor, Chiwetel Ejiofor, whose performance is absolutely astonishing. It could have been so easy to overdo to play this character, but Ejiofor follows the path of a perfect understatement. In the role of a female slave, the newcomer Lupita Nyong’o, an actress from Kenya, grab you heart and never let it go, becoming pretty quickly unforgettable. Also actors having minor roles here are unforgettable: Paul Giamatti as the pitiless slaves seller, Paul Dano as the awful slaves manager in one of the plantations, Benedict Cumberbatch as a more human plantations owner, and Sarah Paulson as the cruel wife of Mr. Epps, the last owner of Solomon. To play Edwin Epps, the bad, bad guy of the story, McQueen turned to his acteur-fetiche, the German-Irish actor Michael Fassbender, proven that their relationship will be remembered as the Scorsese-De Niro liaison of modern time. Fassbender, perfect Southern accent and eyes injected with the red of hanger and booze, is a strange kind of persecutor: tortured by his feelings for a black slave, he is struggling in a more human way than expected. This is what great actors manage to do: you want to hate them but in the end you feel sorry for them… 
The only feeble point in this chain of fabulous actors is, as usual, Brad Pitt: having the charisma of an artichoke, his 5 minutes on screen are simply soporific.

Bass (Brad Pitt)

The UGC Les Halles, the cinema where the avant-première was taking place, informed people buying tickets on their site that Steve McQueen would have been present to the screening. When the film was over, a couple of people arrived, announcing a “big surprise”: McQueen couldn’t make it, but the two main actors, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Lupita Nyong’o, were there. I guess that the audience was still so shaken by the movie, that seeing in flesh and blood the two actors was kind of an emotional shock. Ejiofor and Nyong’o were welcomed by a standing ovation and a long, long and big applause, and they were sincerely overwhelmed, looking at each other in disbelief.

Nyong'o and Ejiofor at the screening in UGC Les Halles, Paris - December 10

Well, I want to use this image, so simple but powerful: real feelings created by fictional scenes, to wish you a Merry Xmas, dear readers.
I hope it will be as human as possible!

Zazie D'Or 2011

As usual... forget about Oscars, Baftas, Golden Globes, Golden Lions, Golden Palms, Golden Bears, Césars, or any other Cinema award you can think of. The most prestigious and most exclusive one, the ZAZIE D'OR, strikes back, ready to let you know what was the very BEST of Cinema in 2011! Ladies and Gentlemen, the winners are...


The Zazie D'Or for BEST PICTURE 2011 goes to
ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA by Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey)
This is not just a movie, this is a metaphysical experience. Ceylan drags us into a journey through the Anatolian landscape at night to let us realize at the end of it that we have made a trip into the deepest part of our souls. Without bothering God, Job's invectives, dinosaurs, and the earth seen from the moon, he talks about the beauty, the mystery and the pain of our existences in a way impossible to forget. A Masterpiece. A real one.

The SPECIAL ZAZIE D'OR 2011 goes ex-aequo to
A SEPARATION by Asghar Farhadi (Iran)
The struggles of this couple in modern Iran is one of the most intelligent and subtle tales ever seen on screen . You suddenly understand more about this country and its religious issues than if you have read tons of books about it. Dialogues are amazing, actors to die for, this is just unmissable.

and to
SHAME by Steve McQueen (US/UK)
The descent to hell of a sex addict in a cold and alienating New York brings back the golden couple of contemporary cinema: British film-maker Steve McQueen and his partner in crime Michael Fassbender prove, after their outstanding film debut Hunger, to be here to stay. Lucky us!

The Zazie D'Or for BEST DIRECTOR 2011 goes to
NICOLAS WINDING REFN for DRIVE (US)
This film-maker elevate the simple act of driving to the rank of sublime art. First time in my life that I thought it was pity not to have a driving licence. Mesmerizing! (and Ryan Gosling does the rest)

The Zazie D'Or for BEST ACTRESS 2011 goes to
ZOE HERAN for TOMBOY by Céline Sciamma (France)
This incredibly young actress (12 years old) playing a girl pretending to be a boy is not only credible but absolutely PERFECT in the role. Her talent let me speechless. Chapeau! 

The Zazie D'Or for BEST ACTOR 2011 goes to
MICHAEL FASSBENDER for SHAME by Steve McQueen (US/UK)
The best performance of the year by far. And if you can't see it, you're blind.

The Zazie D'Or for BEST SCREENPLAY goes to
AKI  KAURISMÄKI for LE HAVRE (France/Finland) 
&
The Zazie D'Or for BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY goes to
TIMO SALMINEN for LE HAVRE by Aki Kaurismäki (France/Finland)
Finnish genius Aki Kaurismäki delivers a movie about immigration and solidarity in his own particular, irrisistible style. It is helped in doing so by long-life collaborator Timo Salminen, the maestro of the kaurismäkian light. The world like it should be...   

The Zazie D'or for BEST ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK goes to
ALEX BEAUPAIN for LES BIEN AIMES by Christophe Honoré (France)
French director Christophe Honoré and his alter-ego musician Alex Beaupain definitively are the Jacques Demy/Michel Legrand of modern era. Every single song is a little jewel and all the actors are amazing singers (Catherine Deneuve, Chiara Mastroianni, Louis Garrel!). Special mention to the song inspired by Morrissey!

The Zazie D'Or for BEST DOCUMENTARY 2011 goes to
RITALS by Sophie and Anna-Lisa Chiarello (Italy/France)
The story of four Italian brothers emigrating from Southern Italy to France becomes the epic, moving story of a family and its own legacy. What does it mean to belong to a country? What is the price you pay for leaving your own terra and the people you love to go looking for a better life in another place? This beautiful, powerful documentary tries to answer to these questions and so much more... Bravissime Sorelle Chiarello!!!

The JEREMY IRONS PRIZE (Man of my life Award) for 2011 goes to 
MICHAEL  FASSBENDER (German/Irish Actor)
Che ve lo dico a fare???!!!
Michael, as you know, the only way to receive this award is to knock at my door. I am a bit worried because the prizes are piling up at my place: I already have here for you the Man of my life Award 2009, now the 2011, not to mention the Zazie D'Or  for Best Actor 2011. I mean, you really should stop by. The sooner, the better, my dear...

A special thanks to Sergio "Saccingo" Tanara, the creator of the Zazie D'Or drawing!

It's a Shame!

Everybody knows that the Oscars are the most important cinema awards in the world.
This doesn't mean, of course, that they are the best. 
Actually, they are not. 
Still, for people involved in cinema, to win an Oscar means a lot, and very often it means to have a career, if not a life, changed.
Everybody knows as well, or at least my loyal readers, how much I love Michael Fassbender. Stupidly enough, especially after his nomination to the Golden Globes, I thought he would have had an Oscar nomination for his incredible performance in Shame by Steve McQueen. He didn't, and I think it is a real shame! 

Sadly enough, it wasn't my only deception: I think it is a pity not to have nominated Tilda Swinton for her amazing role in We need to talk about Kevin by Lynne Ramsay, or Albert Brooks for his great role in Drive by Nicholas Winding Refn (I mean, why Drive is not present at all???) and I am also shocked to hear that Once upon a time in Anatolia by Nuri Bilge Ceylan is not among the 5 nominations for the Best Foreign Film. 
Let's cheer up, though, because there are reasons to be happy: the success of The Artist by Michel Hazanavicius, a movie I really loved, the two nominations for the Iranian masterpiece A separation by Asghar Farhadi and the unexpected nomination for Margin Call by J. C. Chandor in the category of Best Original Screenplay.
The missed nomination to Fassbender, reminded me of something that happened back in 1988. That year, the Academy forgot to nominate an actor who deserved that award more than anybody else: Jeremy Irons, for his double role in Dead Ringers by David Cronenberg.
A couple of years afterwards, Irons was nominated and won the Oscar for Reversal of Fortune by Barbet Schroeder. During his acceptance speech, he pronounced the following statement: "Thank you also, and some of you may understand why, David Cronenberg!" The audience started clapping. That Oscar, as a matter of fact, was more for the Cronenberg movie than for the one he was receiving the award for.
I am pretty sure that one day, in years to come, Michael Fassbender will make the same kind of speech, and he will pronounce the famous statement: "Thank you, Steve McQueen!"
We will all understand why.

The (Golden) Iron Lady

 A couple of weeks ago, something incredible happened to me.
The reason why I have waited so long to write about it is that, immediately after, I went away for my job and I didn't have much time to dedicate to the blog. Nevertheless, this event couldn't get out of my mind, and I actually think it will stay there for ever: I had a glass of champagne with Meryl Streep! 
Yes, I know, it sounds unreal, but I swear: it is the truth.
On January 6, Ms. Streep was in Paris for the French avant-première of The Iron Lady, the film about former UK Prime-Minister Margaret Thatcher, together with the director of the movie, Phyllida Lloyd. I had an invitation for the event through my friends at Pathé (Véronique, je t'aime!), and so I had the chance to see the movie and the Master Class following the screening, where the actress and the director talked about their experience.

I have to confess I was quite disappointed by the film: I didn't like the structure of it, there was something fake about the whole construction of the scenes and I thought this was a burden to the fruition of the story. One can only admire the persistence of Ms. Thatcher, who clearly struggled every day as a woman in a world of men, but her reasons, the things she has done, the decisions she has made, what kind of person she was, well, that's another whole story, and I didn't clearly understand which was the movie's point of view. This was particularly sad for me because I greatly admire the work of Abi Morgan, the screenplayer, who previously wrote the BBC tv series The Hour and, together with Steve McQueen, the movie Shame. Anyway, there was one thing I absolutely admired and adored in the movie, and that was Meryl Streep's performance. I mean, she doesn't play Margaret Thatcher, SHE IS Margaret Thatcher, and there are no adjectives to describe her work on this. I guess the audience in the cinema agreed with me, because when Meryl Streep appeared after the movie, there was a spontaneous and very long standing ovation. Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert and Louis Garrel were part of our team (I saw them!).

For a series of circumstances too complicated and a bit private to explain, few minutes after all this was over, I found myself seated at the same table with Meryl Streep and Isabelle Huppert at the bar of a very fancy parisian hotel, drinking champagne. Well, my boss was with me, and this is actually the only reason why I was there and I had this incredible chance (Grazie, Capo!). As it happens often to me in this kind of situations, I completely loose any sense of reality (something I am lacking of even in my every day life)  and I keep looking around, asking myself: Is this real? Is this really happening? It is also one of those few, very few circumstances, where I become shy and I am not able to speak a single word. I gaze upon people in disbelief, as if they were still on a screen instead of being seated close to me. And last, but not least, I have the bad habit to think about all the questions I am dying to ask and I know I can't, because it is just not possible in a situation like that, where people talk about everything but cinema. As a result, I didn't hear about a single word they were saying, I simply stared at Ms. Streep thinking about how gorgeous, gentle, intelligent, nice, curious, talented, and perfect, she looked. 
Then I heard my boss saying something about me and my passion for cinema. Ms. Streep looked at me and said: Oh, really? This is great. At that point, I confessed I was a cinema blogger. When she heard about it, Ms. Streep gently put her hand on my knees and said, with the sweetest voice: Then, when you write about actors in your blog, please, try to be not too severe with us! 
I was totally amazed by this. Don't you think it is the most incredible thing to hear from the mouth of the best actress in the world? 
On the screen she is an Iron Lady, but in real life, believe me, she is a Golden one.

Shame

If there was a movie I was dying to see this year, it was Shame, by British director Steve McQueen. 

For two main reasons: because I thought his first movie, Hunger, was a masterpiece, and because I am convinced that Michael Fassbender, who played in both McQueen’s movies, is THE best actor around (and that’s been the case for the last 3 years). When I found out, a couple of weeks ago, that the cinema MK2 Bibliothèque was hosting the French avant-première of the movie and that the director and the actor would have been present in flesh and blood, I basically lost my mind. I think I have been the first one in Paris to buy the ticket (literally two seconds after the tweet announcing the sale) and, well, I was right: the screening went sold out in few days. Yesterday night was the big night and I was lucky enough to find a seat in the first row (actually, I was amazed by how fast I could run to grab a place on my high heels!). The cast joined us at the end of the movie: Steve McQueen, Michael Fassbender and young actress Nicole Beharie talked briefly to the audience.

McQueen, Beharie, Fassbender - Paris, November 23 - Photo by Zazie

McQueen, Beharie, Fassbender - Paris, November 23 - Photo by Zazie

It was very quick and I was still under the movie’s spell, so everything seemed a bit dreamy to me. The public couldn’t ask any question, and maybe it was better like that, because the only question I could have placed under the circumstances to Mr. Fassbender would have not been of the highest quality: Are you photoshopped???!!! Or, alternatively, the one I have prepared but I didn't have the guts to ask:

Zazie, the blogger with NO Shame - Photo by Spissetta

Shame relates the story of a descent into hell, the story of an addiction that brings Brandon, a 30something living in New York, onto the abyss of self-destruction. We are not talking about drugs or alcohol, here, but we are talking about sex. Brandon’s days and nights are built around this. He literally spends his time fucking around, seeing porno movies, making porno chats, or wanking at every hour, both at home or in his office’s toilets (because, yes, he manages to have a normal job). The unexpected arrival in his apartment of his sister Sissy, a musician without a place to live and some evident issues to solve (the film remains very vague on the subject, but it is clear that in the family something went quite wrong), breaks the fragile equilibrium and the routine of Brandon’s existence. The consequences, for both of them, will be very heavy and Brandon will be obliged to face the desperation that’s eating his life from the inside. 

At his second movie, Steve McQueen can already be admitted to the court of the grand. A first picture is sometimes a concourse of lucky circumstances and good events, a second one, no. McQueen has a personal, special style (every scene is necessary, there is no place for redundant shots in his cinema), important screenplays and no fear whatsoever to dig into the deepest, scariest, most unsettling parts of the human being. In fact, his cinema is a cinema of the extreme. But for one thing, yes, he has been very lucky: in finding an actor willing and daring to follow him on this path. For Hunger, Fassbender starved himself and lost 30 kgs (at the end of the movie you can literally count the bones on his chest), for Shame, he has been ready to deliver himself completely. He shows on screen the most intimate parts of his body, and the most intimate gestures. Nothing has been spared to the poor guy: the actor is pissing, masturbating, fucking, saying and doing the most outrageous things in front of the camera. And the camera is always onto him, the camera is almost possessing him. No surprises he won for this role the prize for Best Actor at the last Venice Film Festival. This is a one-of-a-lifetime performance that deserves an Oscar (but I doubt that our friends in Hollywood will be bold enough to give it to him. Don't worry, the Zazie d'Or is on its way!). Even Carey Mulligan, who plays his sister, an actress that I have always found mediocre until now, proved to be a great actress if in the right hands. 
Shame is an insanely intense movie, full of unforgettable moments.
From the saddest version of New York, New York ever heard, to the sudden lightness and innocence of a real, normal (and unique) date, till the obsessive orgy scene where Brandon’s face is transfigured by a grimace of desperation instead of being blessed by an expression of pleasure. This movie is tough, gripping, compelling, intelligent and brave.
I assure you, the only shame here, would be NOT to see it!

And the winner is...

Zazie is very happy!
Yesterday night, one of her favourite actors, the German/Irish Michael Fassbender, won the Coppa Volpi for the Best Performing Male Actor at the Venice Film Festival. The movie for which he won this award, Shame, is by British artist Steve McQueen. 
If you are a reader of this blog, you know that I've been talking about this guy since a very long time. As a matter of fact, since I've seen him playing in the first movie by McQueen: Hunger, a real gem, a movie about the story of Bobby Sands, the IRA guy who starved himself to death in an Irish jail in the early 80's. Fassbender's performance was simply O U T S T A N D I N G and I would have covered him with prizes for what he did in that movie.

Our man has been clever enough to make great career choices since then. He played in Inglorious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino, Fish Tank by Andrea Arnold, Jane Eyre by Cary Fukunaga and X-Men: First Class by Matthew Vaughn, among others. At the Venice Film Festival, he was present with two movies: Shame and A Dangerous Method by David Cronenberg. I mean: this guy knows what he is doing.
Of course, he has already received the most important prize of his career a couple of years ago: the famous "Man of my Life Award" of the Zazie D'Or 2009 edition.
Michael, the award is still here at my place... now that you have learned a bit of Italian for the Venice Film Festival, maybe it is time for you to come along and take it.
The address (and my love for you) remained the same.