Part 2: NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS 2010

The final days of the New Directors/New Films 2010 Fest. Last year's Raindance Fest Best UK Feature winner Down Terrace screened last night and there's a New York Times video blog posted this morning. Nabbed for summer US distribution by Magnolia's indie arm Magnet (world-wide rights) the film recently screened at the Slamdance Fest alongside compatriot Gerard Johnson’s serial killer Tony with both films proving that these are distinctive if not quite fully fledged Brit cine voices in no way 'ape-ing' Shane Meadows or Guy Ritchie. Down Terrace director and co-writer Ben Wheatley shot with 2:35 wide-screen on an HD (Hi Def) Red camera (DP Laurie Rose) using long, single documentary style 2 and 3 shot takes a la Godard in this social-realist black farce or as the press notes would have it: "The Sopranos if imagined by Mike Leigh or Ken Loach" - though the film lacks such character depth always elicited by those directors.

Released by UK distributor Artificial Eye at the end of May (IndiePix in the US), Women Without Men (screening again tonight) is also shot on HD and won the Silver Lion at last year's Venice Film Festival for artist Shirin Neshat (her first feature directed in collaboration with Shoja Azar). The look is totally stunning, never swamping and always nurturing the film's subject matter of four Iranian woman surviving the daily round on the 1953 eve of the CIA-backed coup that deposed Mohammad Mossadegh’s democratically government in Tehran and reinstated the Shah. While history contextualises the female plight for a wider audience, one almost wishes that Neshat had stuck solely to the women's' story rather than opening it out, such is the awesome power of her imagery - and it would be hard for anyone to leave this film without being profoundly affected.
Didn't get a chance to see Last Train Home but by most accounts it's another offering not to miss.

Closing night film I Killed My Mother (J'ai tué ma mère) written, directed and art directed by Xavier Dolan opens akin to Antonioni's urban alienation with mother and son choreographed (irritatingly and persistently) against symmetrical colour field backgrounds. Then an interesting use of language kicks in (echoes of playwright Bernard-Marie Koltès) as characters fight each other in contemporary vernacular but shaped in the poetic lines of Claudel (or Alfred de Musset who's cited in the film itself) - "the frail poetry of another era". Certainly an accomplished first feature but as a whole rather disappointing. We await the next one, however.

Another French offering The Evening Dress (La Robe du soir) (1st feature by Myriam Aziza) fares far better with riveting newcomer Alba Gaia Bellugi as the 12 year-old Juliette who develops a crush on her teacher, Mrs. Solenska (Portuguese-born singer Lio). Every Day is a Holiday (Chaque jour est une fete), the debut from Lebanese director Dima El-Horr's, proves far less interesting than her female counterparts in the festival - the film bathing itself in sub- Marguerite Duras sensibility.
Some will find more to take home in How I Ended This Summer than others. But Alexie Popogrebsky remains a director worth keeping track of as anyone who's seen his earlier films will vouch for.
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