Tag Archives: 2019 Reviews

SIFF 2019: Eastern Memories (**)

May 25, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 25, 2019)

Using excerpts from 100 year-old journals by Finnish linguist G.J. Ramstedt as a narrative, directors Niklas Kullstrom and Martti Kaartinen retrace his experiences in two countries. He was sent to Mongolia to study and compile a written record of the language, then was later assigned to a diplomatic post in Japan-where he studied the Korean language (I know-a little confusing).

While his studies were primarily academic, his journals reflected a more subjective take on the geography and people of the respective countries. The directors juxtapose Ramstedt’s century-old musings with modern travelogues of the locations he wrote about. Despite the intriguing premise, the film is deadly dull in execution-not helped by dry and perfunctory narration.

Behind the Music, Documentary

SIFF 2019: Who Let the Dogs Out? (***)

May 25, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

Who let the dogs out? Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn, because I have hated that tuneless ear worm since I first heard it in 2000. That said, my opinion holds no sway in the grand scheme, because it remains one of the most ubiquitous anthems of the last 20 years.

For me, the biggest question is: “Why?” However, for “cultural curator” Ben Sisto the nagging question is “Who?” …as in, who actually wrote the song? Triggered by a “sloppy” Wikipedia entry regarding authorship of the Baha Men’s one-hit-wonder, Sisto went on an 8-year quest to solve the mystery. As Sisto runs the chalk backwards, the story becomes curiouser and curiouser; both Roshomon-style mystery and treatise on the objective psyche.

60's Counterculture, Behind the Music, Documentary, Rock 'n' Roll

SIFF 2019: David Crosby: Remember My Name (***1/2)

May 25, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

David Crosby marvels aloud in A.J. Eaton’s film that he’s still above ground …as do we. Cameron Crowe produced this doc, edited from several days of candid interviews he conducted with the 77 year-old music legend. Crosby relays all: the sights, the sounds, the smells of six decades of rock ‘n’ roll excess. I was left contemplating this bittersweet line from Almost Famous: “You’ll meet them all again on the long journey to the middle.”

Documentary

SIFF 2019: Honeyland (***)

May 25, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

Filmmakers Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska spent three years documenting the daily hard-scrabble life of Hatidze Muratova, a “bee hunter” who lives in the Balkans. She supports herself and her elderly mother by selling raw honey to local village merchants. When a family of Turkish itinerant farmers sets up camp next door, the delicate and carefully cultivated balance of her bee colony’s productivity is potentially threatened. A unique meditation on human nature…and on nature itself.

Conspiracy a-go-go, Politics, Thriller

SIFF 2019: The Realm (*1/2)

May 24, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on June 1, 2019)

In this conspiracy thriller, a low-level Spanish politician becomes an unwitting fall guy for the systemized corruption in his district. He decides to blow the whistle on his backstabbing colleagues before he is forced to resign his post. It’s a good premise and has a promising start, but the narrative becomes more and more preposterous, to the point of self-parody. I sensed the film makers were aiming for Three Days of the Condor…but unfortunately what they ended up with was this 2-hour turkey.

Eco-doc

SIFF 2019: Anthropocene: The Human Epoch (***)

May 20, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

Co-directors Jennifer Baichwal, Nicholas de Pencier and Edward Burtynsky put the band back together for this update on their cautionary 2007 eco-doc Manufacturing Landscapes. In my original review of that film, I likened the photographic imagery to “…a scroll through Google Earth images as reinterpreted by Jackson Pollock or M.C. Escher”. I’m sad to report there’s been little improvement on humankind’s mistreatment of our planet-as evidenced by this likewise visually striking and equally sobering document.

War

SIFF 2019: Monos (****)

May 20, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

Lord of the Flies meets Aguirre: The Wrath of God in this trippy war drama. A squad of teenage South American guerilla fighters undergo intense training for an unspecified contemporary conflict. Initially, it’s just a game to them; but after a bloody skirmish, they rebel against their adult commander and flee into the dense mountain jungle with a female American hostage in tow. Brutal, visceral, and one-of-a-kind. It’s the Apocalypse Now of child soldier films.

Neo-Noir, Thriller

SIFF 2019: The Invisible Witness (**1/2)

May 20, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

This neo-noir/murder mystery unfolds via flashbacks. A well-to-do businessman accused of murdering his mistress consults with a defense attorney 3 hours before he is to be taken into custody and officially charged. He claims to be the victim of an elaborate setup. The circumstantial evidence does not seem to be in his favor. Some moments of genuine suspense, but otherwise by-the-numbers genre fare that was rather obviously made while driving under the influence of The Usual Suspects.

Documentary, Politics

SIFF 2019: Putin’s Witnesses (****)

May 18, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

While watching this extraordinarily intimate behind-the-scenes look at Vladimir Putin as he (sort of) campaigns for the Russian presidency in 2000, I began to think “OK…the guy who made this film is now either (a.) Dead (b.) Being held at an undisclosed location somewhere in Siberia or (c.) Living in exile…right?” I was relieved to learn that the correct answer is (c.) – Director Vitaly Mansky is currently alive and well and living in Latvia.

In 1999, Manksy (a TV journalist at the time) was assigned to accompany Putin on the campaign trail; hence the treasure trove of footage he had at his disposal for creating this unique time capsule of a significant moment in Russian history.

The most amazing sequence doesn’t even involve Putin…Mansky and his cameras are right there in the living room of noticeably unwell outgoing president Boris Yeltsin as he anxiously watches TV coverage with his family on election night in 2000. When former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev pops onscreen in an interview, Yeltsin (likely half in the bag) flies into a rage, yelling at the TV and demanding that it be turned off (Armando Ianucci couldn’t have written a funnier scene).

Conspiracy a-go-go, Documentary, Politics

SIFF 2019: Cold Case Hammarskjold (***1/2)

May 18, 2019 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 18, 2019)

Initially, Mads Brugger’s documentary promises to be straightforward investigative journalism regarding the mysterious 1961 plane crash in Zambia that killed UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarsjkold. But around the halfway mark, Brugger pivots, now claiming (admitting?) it may all just be a wild conspiracy theory. Either way, it’s a riveting political thriller (and if true-very disconcerting). I was reminded of Orson Welles’ (more playful) semi-documentary ‘F’ for Fake, which teases the viewer’s perceptions regarding what it’s “about”.