Tag: Willem Dafoe

LEFFEST – Lisboa & Sintra Film Festival 2019

 

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We at Camera Coverage have been attending to the 2019 edition of the biggest film festival in Portugal and thought of speaking a little bit about the films we have been able to see. We got our heads around the whole section of the films in competition to the festival’s awards, and some of the new releases on other sections of the festival. Between all of these we thought of making our brief selection of films that are for us the highlights of the festival. Also, from Wednesday forth we are thinking of making more focused texts on what we think is our favourite of the festival, and the films that were awarded by the selected jury of the festival – that are to be announced in the 24th of November.

For our list we have picked three highlights from the festival selection in the competition.

Atlantis, by Valentyn Vasyanovych

 

 

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This year’s competition was packed with two films from the old Eastern Block that find themselves in somewhat the same category. These are The Criminal Man, by Dmitry Mamuliya and the afforementioned Atlantis, by Valentyn Vasyanovych. Both of these films are paced with care and drag the viewer into a very slow pacing, being easy to put them in what some call the “slow-cinema” category. However, while Atlantis presents consisted cathartic and poetic imagery, The Criminal Man seems to be a film in which there is a great central scene – arguably greater than any scene in Atlantis – and feeling a bit empty in comparison. Atlantis is a film that has its setting in a dystopic post-war Ukraine, following a main character suffering from PTSD. There are many scenes of despair, many moments where we may be led to think that Vasyanovych really has no hope for his country and his people after the consequences of the war. By the end though, we are faced with this flash of light, as poetically depicted as any of the shades of grey previously presented in the film, that remind us that the power of love and humanity  is strong enough, not only to be reborn from the remnants of such war, but I would even say taht there is here a suggestion that this light may even prevent us from falling into this dark utopia if we keep it close to us.

Beanpole [Dylda], by Kantemir Balagov

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Arguably one of the most talked about films in the festival scene, Kantemir Balagov’s Beanpole deserves every bit of the attention it has received. The film deals with a plethora of complex themes, and presents them with, however extreme, 100% believable situations. The fluid sense we have – much of it provided by a sober set and art design – between all of these is impressive. From war trauma, to poverty, to complex romantic and motherhood dynamics, Beanpole seems to gather all of this seamlessly. It is a beautifully shot film, with a strong sense of colour and aesthetics, including a dynamic camera that switches from being handheld and really shaky to fluidity and steadiness at a pace that is hard to notice as we are mesmerized with everything that is being portrayed. The sense of pathos in Beanpole is the probably one of the strongest from the festival, and the performances are certainly the most convincing. A cinematic treat for the eyes, and an always important reminder of what extremes can the human soul deal with.

Fire Will Come [O Que Arde], by Oliver Laxe

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A personal favourite of ours, O Que Arde by Oliver Laxe is one of the most subtle and gentle depictions of the complex nature of human beings. Between the beautiful landscapes of Galicia and their absolute destruction there are humans and their complex, but nonetheless consequential, relationships. We follow Amador through his journey back home from being imprisoned for causing a massive forest fire in his region. He deals with his everyday chores in the countryside, next to his mother Benedita – a charming powerhouse of a 80 year old woman. There is a sense of silence and of the ephemeral throughout the whole of the film, despite the absolute chaos that is the nature of human existence. Even when filming the forest fire scenes there is a sense of calm, a sense of beauty and a sense of sobriety that gives opportunity to the viewer to mingle on the many subjects the film can extract from our lives. Family, ecology, social life, the rural world, decadence, destruction and limits. All of these and none of them at the same time. O Que Arde is without a doubt one of our 2019 favourites.

Other honourable mentions:

Tommaso, by Abel Ferrara
Balloon [Qi Qiu], by Pema Tseden
Atlantics [Atlantique] (out of competition), by Mati Diop

 

At Eternity’s Gate (2019)

Directed by Julian Schnabel

 

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“Maybe God made me a painter for people who aren’t born yet”

 

On At Eternity’s Gate Julian Schnabel, director of the critically acclaimed Le scaphandre et le papillon (2007) turns again to the art world for inspiration. 23 years after Basquiat (1996), inspired by the troubled life of street artist Jean Michel Basquiat, it’s now time for an exploration of the later days of Vincent van Gogh. Despite the many decades that separate the life and death of the two artists, both were misinterpreted visionaries whose works came to be known as revolutionary after their deaths.

Biopics and homages of van Gogh are too many to describe in this review. From Vincent Minelli´s Lust for Life (1956), to the Akira Kurosawa´s marvellous tribute in Dreams (1990) where the painting Wheatfield with Crows (1890) is referenced in one of the shots. In 2017 came out Loving Vincent, an animation film using 65,000 frames of oil painting on canvas, inspired by the painting technique of van Gogh.

This film focuses approximately on the last 2 and half years of the Dutch artist. It begins with van Gogh (William Dafoe) meeting the also acclaimed French painter Paul Gauguin (Oscar Isaac) and their stay in the French small town of Arles. All the known episodes about the artists life, from the breaking apart with Gauguin, the cutting of his own ear as well his stay in a mental asylum and controversial death are represented in this film.

One of the great things about At Eternity’s Gate is the great performance of William Dafoe in this picture. Although having almost twice the age of van Gogh at the time of his death, Dafoe establishes a believable portrayal of the anguish and pure joy the painter experienced during this period of his life. The director focused with great care at the expressions in the faces of the actors, with the constant use of close-ups. Like Dreyer in The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), the close-up on someone’s face does an astonishing job of making the spectator feel the pain as well the joy the character must be feeling at the time. The scenes where van Gogh paints, the switch between the focus on the quick brushstrokes and the emotions manifested by his face truly transports the viewer to the pure bliss of painting. These few scenes are when the film really outshines itself, together with a warm but at the same time gloomy solo piano soundtrack.

Schnabel experiments a lot with the camera work. Besides the above-mentioned close ups, which work quite well and give texture to the film experience, the overemphasis on a half-blurred lens in some scenes starts to get a little bit tiring after a while. The sound experimentation works better. In the church scene, where Gauguin announces his departure to Paris, leaving van Gogh completely shattered inside is a great example of this. The lines spoken by Gauguin repeat in van Gogh’s head at the same time he is hearing more information from the French painter. It helps to represent better the pure exasperation that van Gogh was surely feeling at the time.


The echoes of Gauguin’s voice inside van Gogh’s head

Van Gogh is represented as a fragile man where the only person who appears to comprehend him is his own brother. A powerful bond which is well represented in this film, especially in a scene where the two lie down in an hospital bed, after one of van Gogh’s breakdowns. He feels that the world doesn’t comprehend him, and laments when he says, “I have a menacing spirit around me.” The connection between mental illness and acts of pure genius is sometimes hailed as logic and unavoidable. As if madness is the only way of achieving greatness and that every genius has a little bit of a madman inside him. This image of a deranged gift is unjust, and a lot of times given to artists like van Gogh. In one of his many marvellous letters to his brother Theo he refers that a “grain of madness that is the best of art”. He knows his limitations and how deeply they affect him. The film tries to explain, with all its flaws, that the mental problems were an issue that incapacitated him to do even more, and not the source of all his brilliance.

The painting where the title was drawn from represents a figure of an old man with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands, in a clear sense of despair. In a way, Schnabel tries to make van Gogh a martyr of his own geniality. The last scenes of the film almost try to glue the image of saint-like to the painter. The forgiveness of his alleged killers (his suicide it’s still an unsolved mystery to this day) give him a Christ in the cross kind of aura.

Sorrowing Old Man (At Eternity’s Gate)  (1890) by Vincent Van Gogh; oil in canvas; Kröller-Müller Museum,Otterlo

  At Eternity’s Gate tries to transport the viewer closer to the experience of the Dutch painter using every tool possible. It’s not a perfect film but tries to give a fair representation of van Gogh away from the mad genius stereotype. It shows all his brilliance as a painter and his difficulties as a man. The experience of painting on cinema at its best.

 

7 out of 10