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Capsules

CAPSULE: OPEN (2023)

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Open can be rented or purchased on-demand.

Recommended

DIRECTED BY: Miles Doleac

FEATURING: Lindsay Anne Williams, Miles Doleac, Jeremy London, Elena Sanchez, Amber Reign Smith

PLOT: Kristina comes to regret pursuing her long-time fantasy of dating her teen idol when she and her husband explore sharing an open marriage.

Still from OPEN (2022)

COMMENTS: Be advised: if you have an aversion to New Wave music, you will want to avoid this movie. Over its run time, there are some dozen or so interludes featuring ’80s style studio music videos wherein Kristina Corbin’s subconscious processes her situational and emotional circumstances. Her youthful dream of fronting a glamorous synth-rock band is the pulsing heart of this quietly satisfying romantic comedy, and while the segues slip into the narrative like clockwork, they never feel unwelcome.

Ultimately unwelcome, however, is Erik LaRoux, an erstwhile teen idol whom Kristina adored growing up. When she and husband Robert’s marriage hits the rocks—triggered by a recent miscarriage—they are unsure how to proceed. They feel, they know—it must be!—that they’re good together, and that they shouldn’t split up the metaphorical band; but they’ll be damned if they can figure out what direction to go. And so, Kristina makes a suggestion: an open relationship. The first act of Play runs like a cute-‘n’-clever little relationship dramedy, with Kristina hooking up with a charismatic has-been, and Robert falling in bed with a long-time friend.

Open is very much an “all well and good” kind of experience. It shuffles along, capably attaining its realistic ambitions. The characters are all likable (even Erik, before his dark turn) and the songs hover around the better side of average. Sometimes the band is mediocre, other times they flirt with genius. (The tune “Aspic” merits bonus points for the choral couplet, “Damn it to Hell, get me out of this stinking putrid well/I need some elevation for my aspic to gel,” a line which prompts the husband-keyboardist character to exclaim, “‘Aspic’? Really?”) Even when it begins to flounder in the third act, Open is still charmingly executed.

In the end, I was kind of surprised—in a good way. When the closing number queued up, I was hit with the sentiment, “It’s over already?” So, be advised: anyone looking for a fun, mature, and tuneful romantic comedy would do well to take a look at and listen to Open. It’s got heart, brio, and plenty of good advice: “Grab love by the balls, but don’t twist ’em too hard when you feel small.”

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Doleac, whose previous features have been horrors of deliciously demented delicacies, tries his hand at a quirky musical thriller – and the result is completely darling and truly absorbing.”–Bill Arceneaux, Moviegoing with Bill (festival screening)

Capsules

CAPSULE: LYNCH/OZ (2022)

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Lynch/Oz can be rented or purchased on-demand.

Recommended

DIRECTED BY: Alexandre O. Philippe

FEATURING: Amy Nichols, , , , , ,

PLOT: Six directors and one critic give their thoughts on the connections between The Wizard of Oz and the complete works of .

Still from Lynch/Oz (2022)

COMMENTS: Director Alexandre O. Philippe has made a career out of making films about other filmmakers’ films: George Lucas, , and are among his previous subjects. This modestly structured doc—nothing but experts reading their own personal essays over film clips—tackles his weightiest subject yet. The Wizard of Oz is a massive icon in pop culture, and, within his sphere of influence, David Lynch is equally influential. The result is not as narrow and academic as you might fear; although the movie expects the viewer to have a working knowledge of Lynch and Oz, the topic is broad enough to serve as a jumping-off point for reflections about movies, American culture, and the artistic process itself.

The essays are roughly arranged in order from most to least enlightening. Nicholson’s opening chapter (“The Wind”) is, in my view, the best; I think her position as the only critic on the panel gives her the widest lens through which to view the subject. Rodney Ascher focuses on Oz as a perfect story template (it’s basically the Hero’s Journey with doppelgangers). John Waters is a mid-show change-of-pace: he doesn’t analyze Lynch’s films intensively, but plays to his talents as a raconteur, telling stories about meeting Lynch (and nuggets like the time he dressed as the Wicked Witch for a children’s Halloween party). Karyn Kusama gives us the most direct evidence of the connection: Lynch’s unelaborated response at a Mulholland Drive Q&A, “there is not a day that goes by that I don’t think about The Wizard of Oz.” Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead dig into Lynch’s obsession with Judy Garland. David Lowery’s segment is probably the least on-topic—and the most concerned with his own personal output—but nevertheless contains fascinating theories about the purpose of childrens’ films (setting kids up to deal with the disillusionment of adulthood and the real world). Phillipe’s contribution is mainly in selecting the clips and images that illustrate and expand on the authors’ words, an exhaustive task that’s not as simple as just fast-forwarding to the appropriate spot in Oz or Wild at Heart; there are also archival Lynch appearances to sort through, and excursions into everything from Gone with the Wind to Star Wars to Videodrome.

“The fact that The Wizard of Oz and David Lynch can go hand-in-hand and communicate with one another,” Lowery explains, “the fact that we can have this conversation about ruby slippers and ‘,’ is one of the most beautiful things about this medium.” Indeed, Lynch/Oz is about the influence of one on the other, but it’s also about all sorts of creative cross-pollinations and new perspectives. Cinema, and the arts in general, are all about conversations between human beings over time. Lynch/Oz is obviously aimed at a select few cinephiles, but if your breadth of knowledge is wide enough, you’ll find plenty to get you thinking—and if not, you’ll discover plenty of new corridors to explore in the labyrinths of cinema.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“An enjoyable, if not entirely satisfying, look at a strange cinematic affinity…. Though frustratingly unfocused and sometimes overreaching (even compared to Philippe’s other docs, which are never what you’d call precision-crafted), the film is consistently enjoyable, with just enough flashes of insight to justify its existence.”–John Defore, The Hollywood Reporter (festival screening)

List Candidates

APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: ONCE WITHIN A TIME (2023)

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RecommendedWeirdest!

DIRECTED BY: , Jon Kane

FEATURING: Sussan Deyhim, Tara Khozein, John Flax, Apollo Garcia Orellana, Brian Bellot, mystery celebrity guest

PLOT: Curtains open on a glowing, chanting golden tree woman, then children watch a couple with wicker cages around their heads wander through incidents of apocalypse, technology, and wonder.

Still from Once Within a Time (2023)

WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Simultaneously ancient and hyper-modern, Once Within a Time is as an apocalyptic dispatch from the far reaches of reality. A bold and foolish (in the complimentary sense) work of cinematic art, dense with imagery and symbolism, this is octogenarian Godfrey Reggio‘s first narritivesque film—his vision of what it means to be a human being in the 21st century, teetering on the brink of cataclysm, but balanced by wonder and creative possibility.

COMMENTS: Godfrey Reggio announces Once Within a Time as a “bardic fairy tale”; an imposing description, but one that the film lives up to. Set to a new score by Philip Glass—with snatches of other music floating through the mix—it’s a carnival of free-flowing imagery and ideas, a techno-gnostic hymn about cataclysms and the birth of new worlds. After the red curtains pull back, we are launched into scenes of an Earth goddess singing from her glowing heart, and innocent children spinning on a merry-go-round. Then, Adam and Eve appear, only to have their equanimity quickly destroyed by a digitized Apple. Cell phones recur as dire artifacts: as cages, as monoliths, as bricks on a road that leads to an audience of faceless puppets. We watch a dance of harlequin emojis. Entertainers and demagogues speak gibberish. UFOs zoom into dreamspaces and blast giant robots with their ray guns. Monkeys experiment with virtual reality goggles. There’s a reference to 2001 that will probably draw laughs, and maybe cheers, from savvy live audiences. There is even a special celebrity guest whose appearance I don’t want to spoil, who speaks in John Coltrane solos and acts as a pied piper. And throughout it all, reaction shots of children, bemused, delighted, taking in the helter-skelter as best they can, their little minds gathering fuel… hope for the future.

The visual aesthetic is faded yet bright, digital but evocative of finely aged film stock. The style and imagery brings to mind experimental films of the 1950s-1970s, specifically : the wicker baskets around the lead adult’s heads like the birdcages of the Pleasure Dome, the UFOs possibly on loan from Lucifer Rising, the whole thing seasoned with occult premonitions of a New Age Dawning. There are fleeting scenes of destruction, decay, despotism, mushroom clouds: but the imagery returns, unfailingly, to dwell on innocent children at play, and themes of creation and re-creation. It ends on a Botticelli tableau, with children as angels and Venus yet to emerge from her throbbing egg sac.

A new Philip Glass score is, of course, something to celebrate. The soundtrack here is more of a suite of short pieces than a large scale composition, moving through numerous flavors to illustrate the Reggio’s many different settings. Glass’ hypnotic minimalism may not get the chance to do its accumulation-by-repetition thing here, but he makes up for with a wider palette of colors: unfamiliar elements like chanting, accordions, and even African percussion offer the composer new settings for his ideas. The contributions of Iranian singer Susan Deyhim (who also plays the tree) are most welcome.

The runtime is listed as 51 minutes, but the credits take up the final 8, so the film itself is a manageable 45-minute experience. Watching this on a big screen with an appreciative audience would be magnificent; it makes perfect sense that it debuted at NYC’s Museum of Modern Art. It is uncommercial, personal, specialized, and fated to be underseen, but Once Within a Time is a major cinema event in 2023. Make it a point to track it down when you can.

Once Within a Time official site for trailer and screening calendar.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…this strange new experiment — less scripted than staged — revisits early cinema with the same doom-laden playfulness that [Reggio’s] previous work used to push the medium forward. “–David Ehrlich, IndieWire (contemporaneous)

List Candidates

APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: THE DRAUGHTSMAN’S CONTRACT (1982)

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Recommended

DIRECTED BY: Peter Greenaway

FEATURING: Anthony Higgins, Janet Suzman, Anne-Louise Lambert, Hugh Fraser

PLOT: At the finale of the 17th-century, the wife of a boorish aristocrat contracts with a draughtsman to contrive a series of drawings; unexpected pictographic clues appearing in the artist’s renderings suggest a deadly conspiracy.

WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Greenaway tackles his first feature-length narrative with such structure, symmetry, and formalism that it might conceivably collapse into its own pretentious confinement. However, regular spikes of ornate bawdiness and cryptic banter, alongside Nyman’s jaunty film score, render the whole affair so baroquely flippant that the inclusion of a living garden statue is merely the ultimate, strange garnish on this eccentric appetizer to Greenaway’s impending career.

COMMENTS: “It has been fancifully imputed that Mr. Neville saw you as a deceived husband.” If that withering—and scandalous—insult vexes you, I strongly recommend against attempting to endure Peter Greenaway’s high-falutin’ whodunnit. On the other hand, if you wish to pry, peep, poke, and peek at the behind-closed-doors (and at times, on-the-lawn-somewhat-obscured-by-a-parasol) doings of the sickeningly wealthy and witty, the droll and devastating—veritably, the very cream of late-17th-century excess—Greenaway’s soufflé of mannerisms, ostentation, lines, lists, longitudes, and lasciviousness baked into this country-house mystery will not only fit the bill, but fit it perfectly with a stretch of laced linen that will leave you petrified to touch it with your coarse peasant hands.

Mr. Neville (Anthony Higgins), whose observations Mr. Noyes infers from prior insinuations and sketch-work, is a draughtsman by trade, and a haughty rake by inclination. On the eve of Mr. Herbert’s departure, Neville attends a soirée hosted by Mrs. Herbert, who wishes, she claims, to furnish her husband with a set of exterior drawings of their estate as a gift upon his return, in hopes of salvaging, at least, some civility in their marriage. Initially disinclined, Neville agrees only after much pursuit by Mrs. Herbert (and her daughter, Mrs. Talmann), and the inking of a curious contract which delineates recompense both financial and sexual. Mr. Herbert leaves for business, and Mr. Neville ensconces himself as he begins his work—and play.

I beg your indulgence for what is, even for me, an excess in flowery language; but such is the overwhelming effect of this strange matrix of conflicting impulses and shifting conspiracies. Greenaway kicks the door down for this one (doubtless because its vertical line displeased him) and comes swinging in full force with his painterly mise-en-scène and artful dialogue thronging the screen and speakers. Frames within frames, within frames; candlesticks joining and isolating conversers, sometimes positioned as an extension of a phallus-above-the-table (Neville’s, naturally); ordered chaos—there is nothing, it appears, left to ill-rendered whim nor faith in dreamscapes.

The “conflicting impulses” mentioned play out primarily between the pristine structure of the film (pacing, staging, scoring, framing, &c.) and the often-hilarious, invariably biting dialogue, which itself is masked with powder-splotched cosmetics and finery that could pass for a migraine. And Greenaway looooves sex on shameless display. As if imitating the outward prudish mien of its characters, The Draughtsman’s Contract conveys all manner of carnality, some of it extreme, while only ever exposing a single breast on screen. Anthony Higgins—witness to this breast, among other parts and places—is perfectly cast as the cocksure draughtsman, believing he is outwitting the conspiratorial axis of Mrs. Herbert and her daughter. Though doomed from the start, he careens toward his fate on a cloud of magniloquent artistry, wit, and lasciviousness.

As far as I could determine, the extras on Kino Lorber’s 40th anniversary, 4K release of The Draughtsman’s Contract were lifted straight from the preceding UK-only disc. Though they are scant, the included introduction from Peter Greenaway is a delightful and informative ten-minute essential, outlining the director’s intentions and providing a brief history of the film. The even briefer interview with Michael Nyman succinctly and charmingly relates how these two lovers of lists began their collaboration. Last, and by no means least, the video and sound are perfection in itself—and as Greenaway would observe, it is the deft combination of those elements that filmmaking is all about.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Agatha Christie this ain’t, but it is weirdly wonderful… the film shows a unique talent getting to grips with narrative cinema to create something which is as engaging and alluring as it is baffling and perplexing.”–Mark Kermode, BFI

Capsules, Shorts

CAPSULE: “THE WONDERFUL STORY OF HENRY SUGAR” (AND THREE OTHER WES ANDERSON ROALD DAHL ADAPTATIONS)

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Recommended

DIRECTED BY:

FEATURING: , , , , , Rupert Friend

PLOT: “Henry Sugar” describes a man who learns how to see while blindfolded, and uses that skill in blackjack; the other three short adaptations involve a boyhood kidnapping, a poisonous snake, and a rat catcher.

Still from The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (2023)

COMMENTS: In 2021, Netflix bought the rights to the complete works of British children’s author . The jewel of this legacy, from Netflix’s perspective, is “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” from which they have produced a very horrible indeed Willy Wonka prequel film starring a discombobulated Timothée Chalamet. The acquisition left them with a number of smaller properties to exploit, however, including dozens of short stories. Up to the plate steps Dahl stan Wes Anderson (who adapted The Fantastic Mr. Fox as a feature film in 2009) to tackle four lesser-known tales.

The longest and most important of the miniseries is the 37-minute “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar,” which Anderson and Netflix chose to premiere at the Venice International Film Festival. It is a relatively simple but exotic fantasy about a man who studies an ancient yogic text to learn the art of X-ray vision so that he can cheat at blackjack, but ends up bored, wondering “what’s next?”. The plot and moral are slightly flimsy, but Dahl’s craft is in the telling rather than the destination. Anderson honors the author’s talents by keeping almost all of Dahl’s prose intact, with exposition and asides related by the actors speaking directly to the camera: first Fiennes, as Dahl himself; then Cumberbatch as Henry Sugar, describing his own thought processes beside his dialogue; then Patel, narrating a flashback; then Kingsley, narrating a flashback within the flashback. Diving even further into artificiality, Anders eschews the magic afforded by film for humbler forms of stagecraft. Backdrops are hoisted into the flyspace to reveal new settings; stagehands visibly hand the actors props; makeup artists walk on set to swap wigs and glue on facial hair; a bookshelf, wall and door slide in from different directions to instantaneously create a new set. The effect might be termed “whimsically Brechtian.” There is no ironic bite to Anderson’s procedure here; in conjunction with the preservation of the original prose, which casts the actors as slavishly at the beck and call of Dahl’s written instructions, these visible dressings serve as a reminder of the function of imagination in constructing a story as it’s related. It’s as if we’re watching from the perspective of Wes Anderson’s mind’s eye as he listens to the stories. With their emphasis on baroquely detailed settings and de-emphasis on emoting, Anderson’s works often feel narrated anyway, rather than enacted—like pop-up picture books read by a parent to a child at bedtime. This series follows up on Asteroid City‘s cognizance of the process of its own creation, likely taking the theme as far as it can formally go.

If you hunger for more after “Sugar”—and chances are you will, for these bon-bons are simple to digest and have a wide-ranging appeal—three shorter (a uniform 17 minutes each) stories follow, each in the same style, each with a few new surprises to offer. “The Swan” is a surprisingly gruesome tale of childhood bullying; “Poison” tells of a man lying deathly still in bed, afraid to move because of a deadly snake napping on his abdomen; and “The Rat Catcher” affords a nice grimy role for Fiennes and a chance for Anderson to indulge in a few seconds of stop-motion animation. The six featured actors appear throughout the four films in various combinations, often in multiple roles within the same short. All are charming, recommended, and delivered with perfect efficiently.

If you add the runtimes of the four shorts together, you get 100 minutes of celluloid, which is essentially a second 2023 feature for Anderson. It’s turned out to be a zenith year for the auteur (who also endured a series of viral memes early in the season). Having, I presumed, here reached the limits of what he can do with self-aware theatricality, it will be fascinating to see what challenge Anderson takes on next.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Neither twee nor saccharine, Anderson’s aesthetic tends to mirror the auras and oddball personalities of his films. In a work suffused with stupefying mysteries, the strange visions Henry Sugar teems with echo its drifters’ wide-eyed wonder as well as their creator’s. It’s an infectious feeling.”–Leonardo Goi, The Film Stage (festival screening)