Micmacs, Feathered Cocaine, Heartbreaker, and More from the Tribeca Film Festival!

BananaWho strikes the Tribeca Film Festival! (Again!) It’s only been three days but I’ve got some thoughts on six programs from the festival. Without further ado…

Micmacs

Micmacs (Micmacs a Tire-Larigot) is the latest from Amélie director, Jean-Pierre Juenet. Still peppered with whimsy and delight, make no mistake that this is a children’s film that was never intended to broach the playful maturity of Juenet’s previous works, even if there are a few strippers with pastied nipples. Given that most American children aren’t likely to sit through a full-length movie with subtitles, and if they do then they deserve to see a boob or two, perhaps French children are more prepared for a little weapons-room nookie and or a lunchtime lap dance. Likewise, Juenet seems to be preparing French youth for a socially-minded future.

Bazil, is the unlucky protagonist whose father is killed by a landmine in North Africa when he is only a boy. As an adult, he is caught in a freak shootout and winds up with a bullet lodged in his cranium that cannot be removed lest it do more damage than good. Handicapable, he teams up with a veritable trash pile of unlucky characters with amazing talents, from contortionists to engineers. Together, they form a motley superhero force, and Bazil leads them on a mission to seek revenge not on the mercenary who shot him, not on the rebels whose landmine killed his father, but on the company who dealt arms to both offenders. Using salvaged, repurposed goods from the junkyard, they wreak hilarious havoc on the corrupt arms dealers.

Positively cartoonesque, MicMacs is cute and energetic, but it perhaps doesn’t strum the heartstrings quite like a Pixar flick. Nevertheless, if you are up for a light comedy that promotes disarmament and recycling, Micmacs is it!

Writer/Director: Jean-Pierre Juenet

Feathered Cocaine

This riveting documentary follows the life of falconer, Alan Parrot, whose life work has been to raise and breed falcons in the Middle East. Little did he know that his lifelong passion for the birds would lead him to become one of the founders of an ever-expanding falcon-smuggling trade in the Middle East. Parrot is easily drawn to tears when he reckons with the knowledge that his actions may have contributed to the abuse, genetic pollution, and severe decimation of falcon populations across the Middle East. But he never dreamed that falconry would lead him into the world of terrorism and the search for Osama bin Laden. Through his dealings with falcon trappers and the Arab princes who are major purchasers of the birds, Parrot knows many who meet with bin Laden regularly, and has reported this rather lucrative bit of information to the U.S. government on several occasions with no response. This is an extremely interesting documentary, but perhaps the best part is that an actual falcon wearing an actual hat has attended both screenings thus far, perched on the gloved hand on Alan Parrot himself. See it!

Writer/ Director: Thorkell Hardarson, Orn Marino Arnarson

Buried Land

Buried Land masquerades as a documentary about the war-torn Bosnian village, Visoko, that has engendered a thriving tourism economy and united its people based on the belief that there is a pyramid buried under their hills. Now, anyone who sees this hill will look at it for a while and agree that yes, it is triangular, but eventually you will not be able to deny that this is just a small mountain, like many others around the world. The movie understands this as well, at which point it morphs into a narrative about the town’s people, and how a common belief in something as mystical and hope-inspiring as an ancient pyramid can unite the community and help heal its war wounds.

It reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s greatest short story, The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World, about a poor fishing village that finds a dead body washed up on its shores and gives the dead man a story worthy of Victor Hugo, and a funeral fit for a king. (If you haven’t read it you really should. Here, go on.) In both cases, the communities play out perhaps the oldest human ritual: creating meaning in their lives by giving themselves a story.

This is a beautiful idea, which is why Buried Land was smart to blend fantasy with fact, documentary with narrative. The film does build an interesting sort of synergy, but despite its best attempts it still winds up being quite tedious. Really, I just wanted to get you to read that Marquez story. Ha!

Writer/Director: Geoffrey Alan Rhodes, Steven Eastwood

The Sentimental Engine Slayer

I don’t even know where to begin with this one. I was initially pumped for this movie because it is written, directed, produced, and starring Omar Rodriguez Lopez, the front man from The Mars Volta—a recipe for noise. Noise is a good way to describe the film—deliberately dissonant and loud with a score composed of soundscapes that are the musical equivalent of a terrorist attack. If you love The Mars Volta and early Greg Araki films, David Lynch wannabes, and Holy Mountain then this just may be the movie for you, but on a very personal basis I can no longer get my kicks on movies where “fuck” is used in literally every sentence (it’s just bad screenwriting), virginity loss is the main focus, and gay prostitutes inevitably get murdered. (Or do they?….) That’s not to say some festival-goers didn’t like the movie, because some did! Just not BananaWho. Sorry.

Writer/Director: Omar Rodriguez Lopez

Shorts: Experimental Collisions

This shorts program is straight up experimental film in the most Brakhage-Anger way possible. If you like sitting in the dark, trying to get hypnotized by shapes on the screen, these little beauties might suck you right in. There were a few, especially the first two, Grandmother’s Eye by Jonathan Lewald up there in Sweden, and Release by Bill Morrison in our own US of A. Grandmother’s Eye is a single shot that contemplates infinity, and Release uses one piece of vintage footage in every possible way, teaching us volumes about the universe contained in one little shot, and building a rhythm that peaks when it finally reveals what it’s leading up to. (Hint: It’s Al Capone!) I rather enjoyed this program, but I wouldn’t have felt too guilty if I left the screening a little early.

Heartbreaker (L’arnacoeur)

Heartbreaker is a Hollywood rom-com of the most traditional variety, except it’s better because it’s French. The basic plot: the French Mark Wahlberg (Romain Duris) plays a man who breaks up couples for a living. He is a chameleon who can be anyone he wants, as long as he is his mark’s dream hunk. And it’s sexy because he is a seducer with morals—he gives the woman enough hope and self-confidence to finally leave her unhappy relationship, without leading her to believe she’ll wind up with him, the Heartbreaker. And he has principals. If he truly believes the couple is happy, he lets them enjoy their love. Enter Johnny Depp’s real-life baby mama Vanessa Paradis, who is slated to be married within the week. She plays the Heartbreaker’s mark, but Duris’s character can’t quite discern which category she falls into. One thing leads to another, the Heartbreaker becomes the Heartbroken, and it’s basically Wedding Crashers en français.

Writer: Laurent Zeitoun/Jeremy Doner
Director: Pascal Chaumiel