Being Evel: NZFF Review

Being Evel: NZFF Review

Evel Knievel was a presence in the 1970s, a star-spangled daredevil hero that America needed to boost its morale.

With his cane and fur-coat appearance on the Johnny Carson Show opening this doco from Johnny Knoxville, that has as much energy (and occasionally rhapsodising from uber-fan Knoxville) as you'd expect from the MTV generation, the stall is set out early on.

Knievel was a showman, a hustler in his stuntman heyday - wrapped in his white leather costume with the American flag emblazoned onto the outfit, he was the hero that America needed in the wake of Nixon and Vietnam.

But it wasn't always so - and that's where this doco gets the Knievel legend really right. By bringing us in on his past growing up in Butte Montana, (mainly via Knoxville's demonstrative and exhaustive knowledge about the man), we get an insight into the bluster that the showman concocted.

From selling the most insurance policies by working a mental hospital and constantly hustling, Rob Knievel was already on the way to creating a persona for himself and it was only his decision to jump over cougars and rattlesnakes (one of the doco's laugh-out-loud tall tales) that sent him careering off into the world of fame.

Exhaustive is perhaps the best way to describe this piece, as it concentrates on anyone who worked with or met the man and the myth of the red, white and blue suited legend. But Oscar-winning director Daniel Junge never loses sight of the man on the bike, thanks to plenty of photos, archive footage and of course scenes of Knievel performing his daredevil tasks.

Some of the footage is horrifying - in the pre-Jackass days, seeing a man hurt himself when a stunt went wrong was never as guilty a pleasure as it is now; unlike Knoxville et al, Knievel never carried out these stunts to fail or get a cheap laugh - he was embodying the real-life superhero aspirations to soar above the skies. But the shots (replayed a few times) of Knievel going head-over-the-handlebars at Caesar's Palace on December 31st 1967 are shocking as he looks like a rag doll thrown to the wind.

But it's when the braggadocio and bluster are dropped that Junge delves more into the man himself, giving us a fascinating glimpse at a man who occasionally let the show slip and let the nastier man out. Certainly the warts-and-all approach helps to demystify him without taking anything away from his achievements; these chink-in-the-armour looks are sickeningly thrilling.

While Junge propels things along as zippily as Knievel on his bike, some of Knoxville's enthusiastic fanboying and affection occasionally gets in the way as he discusses the impact on extreme sports that the legend created. But for the most part, the multitude of talking heads don't hinder this doco, thanks to Junge's steady hand, a never-ending source of material and a peek into the mind of a man who represented an ideal.

Granted, the final section is missing one key question and it's frustrating; when seeking atonement for his behaviour, it's not asked if he pleaded for forgiveness from Shelly Saltman, whom he went to prison for assaulting - it's a minor oversight that should be corrected.

All in all, Being Evel captures the thrill of this influential man, the idea and of the zeitgeist as America tried to get back on its feet - and Junge, along with Knoxville, make a great job of covering a lot of ground in this piece.

In fact, you could say that Being Evel is wheelie good.

Sherpa: NZFF Review

Sherpa: NZFF Review

Jennifer Peedom's documentary on the Sherpas and Nepal is inevitably infused with a bittersweet touch, and is a scathing look at the unfolding industrial dispute on Everest.

Armed with a camera crew and with the intention of giving the Sherpas the moment to shine she felt they had been missing all these years, she couldn't have foreseen the tragic events that would brutally interrupt the 2014 climbing season - and after completing editing, the earthquake that struck almost exactly one year on.

In 2013 the discord on the ground threatened to boil over with a fight brewing between the Sherpas and those climbing the mountain being the final straw. It was this in mind, and Peedom's perception that the Sherpa race has been ignored despite doing the majority of the work that set the documentary in motion.

But what emerges from Peedom's utterly thrilling and yet equally sickening piece is the bitter curelty of timing. Against a backdrop of whether the Sherpa are working too hard to capitalise on a season that grants them ten times the average wage and ensures their families have food, nature intervened on 18th April 2014, bringing an avalanche that killed 16 Sherpa and setting the debate into a chain of urgency that's as fragile as the snow hanging on the side.

Sherpa is never anything less than shocking as it exposes the widening gap between commercial venture and human life and there won't be many who don't fall squarely into the Sherpas' camp after the tragedy unfolds (that an American client claims terrorists have pushed them off the mountain when the Sherpa essentially strike fearing for their lives speaks volumes to their plight and the Western perception of entitlement).

Sherpa is formidable film-making, one whose ending will be changed in light of the 2015 Nepal Earthquake but one whose ethical and moral issues will resonate with many for years to come thanks to Peedom's unswerving eye and concise skill.

It's jaw-dropping stuff, and not always for the reason you'd expect.

Unmissable.

When Marnie Was There: NZFF Review

When Marnie Was There: NZFF Review

"It's such a sad story" are among some of the words spoken in the final run of Studio Ghibli's latest, When Marnie Was There, based on Brit writer Joan G Robinson.

It's the story of Anna, a shy girl, an outsider who moves to the country to be with her aunt and uncle to help her get better from her asthma. However, while she settles into life there, she fails to garner any new friends in the area due to her inability to socialise and overcome her outsider depression.

But that changes when she becomes enchanted with a mansion on the banks of the shores near where she's staying. There she meets the mysterious blonde girl Marnie, and the two form a secret friendship...but Anna's convinced she's been there before - what is the mystery of Marnie?

When Marnie Was There is a pretty standard Studio Ghibli fare - which is to say it's the usual mix of gorgeous animation, beautiful water-coloured painted backgrounds and amusing moments. And so, nothing to be sniffed at or dismissed.

But there's a vein of sadness that runs pretty heavy in this piece, which mixes child depression, alienation, neglect and abuse into the pot as Anna tries to work out the mystery that haunts her. And unfortunately, it doesn't quite work as well with the central intrigue feeling like it's drawn out a little too long in places, and the piece is book-ended by some seriously garbled quick exposition that tries to join the dots, fill in the blanks and conclude it nicely.

It's not that there's anything inherently wrong with When Marnie Was There in the slightest; it's more that it appears to lack the emotional heft of prior outings. Certainly, the dubbed version I attended had some bright vocal work from the likes of Hailee Steinfeld and John C Reilly. And while the visuals are as gorgeous as ever, the flow seems to be a little disjointed with viewers spending as much time confused as Anna does throughout, keeping the connection a little at bay.

While the themes of friendship and being an outsider are fully embraced and expanded upon, the issues that Anna faces are going to feel very real to some and for that universality, Ghibli is to be commended.

There's no doubt that the ultimate reveal of what's actually going on is heart-breaking to say the least, and the tragedy of it all is wonderfully conveyed thanks to a subtlety of story, but When Marnie Was There didn't quite hit the rich resonant highs I'd been expecting for Studio Ghibli's latest.

Ixcanul Volcano: NZFF Review

Ixcanul Volcano: NZFF Review

Small scale stories on the international stage is what the New Zealand International Film Festival is all about.

And this latest from Guatemala certainly offers an insight into a world most of us are unlikely to ever see into.

It's the tale of 17-year-old Maria, who works on her family's coffee plantation and who is facing an arranged marriage that would guarantee her family's fate and secure their life. But Maria has other plans in this variant of Romeo and Juliet thanks to the secret love she harbours for plantation worker Pepe.

Ixcanul Volcano is one of those films where by virtue of the story, very little happens but each dramatic moment is a seismic one. It may be sombre and low key but it's quite affecting in places thanks to Maria Mercedes Conroy's performance which just pitches it perfectly.

There are a few dramatic shocks throughout as well and some of the story's elements aren't quite as conclusive as perhaps you'd expect, but that's probably a good thing - the social commentary on life in Guatemala and for those in small villages is an eye-opener, a reminder that life isn't always neatly resolved and that the human condition is still prone to suffering and pain while paying the piper.

Slow and a film to lose yourself in, Ixcanul Volcano has haunting imagery, a volcano in the background and in some scenes, an urgency that's hard to deny; dramatically, it's a slow burner but the journey is worth taking.

808: NZFF Review

808: NZFF Review

There's no doubting that the drum machine is iconic in so many of the sounds we grew up loving and the music we groove to.

However, there's none more influential than the Roland TR-808 drum machine, which put the boom into so many of the floor-fillers throughout the ages.

Launched back in the 80s, the machine still figures in pop music today and this latest doco decides to go back to the beginning to trace its roots and its effects on the industry by talking to key players.

Narrated by Zane Lowe with occasional bursts of bombast, the piece talks to the likes of Rick Rubin, The Beastie Boys (who provide some much needed verve and banter), Afrikaa Bambaataa, Strafe, and Lil Jon to name but a few to see what the machine brought to the table.

And while it's fair to say that director Alexander Dunn's piece concentrates predominantly on the effects of the 808 on the American music scene, it's also perhaps fair to say that anyone not interested in these musical stylings may not be taken in by this.

808 dances a little too much to the beat of its own drum and could have benefited from a little more focus and a little less on the talking heads front.

Particularly given that maybe a third of the interviewees have little too insightful to say about the 808 other than how influential it was (something we'd already garnered by the effects on the film) - in fact the best moments come from the aforementioned banter between the Beastie Boys as they lose their own thread, Soulwax who discuss how they bought an 808 from a studio which had the iconic beats of Marvin Gaye's Sexual Healing pre-programmed in and Golide who gets swept up in his own enthusiasm.

But in between the constant shots of knobs being twiddled, close ups of the 808 and records, it seems like the visual creativity to tell this story is missing a little in all the repetition.

Ironically, for a machine that loops and keeps playing, that's what 808 the movie offers - a lot of the same thing over and over again. It's not that it's not serviceably put together, but more that it needed a little editing and trim; certainly the final 30 minutes feels like the thread has been lost. (And the lack of the acid house scene in the 90s is a criminal oversight)

Thankfully, an interview with Roland's Ikutaro Kakehashi puts a great spin on the machine and provides the insight that's a little lost in all the preceding hagiography.

The beat goes on, and sadly, in places, this doco about a seminal piece of kit is prone to doing the same.

Turbo Kid: NZFF Review

Turbo Kid: NZFF Review

The Incredibly Strange goes retro with this film, expanded from a concept submitted for the anthology The ABCs of Death.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world of 1997, it's the story of the Kid (Munro Chambers in a sweetly powerful role), a vulnerable yet capable loner in the wastelands who spends his time reading the comic book Turbo Raider and looking for bits and bobs to trade to get by.

It's a world ruled by evil overlord Zeus (Michael Ironside, keeping it on the right side of malevolent and OTT), and one where water is scarce and a commodity worth dying for. When the Kid inadvertently finds Apple, a pink-haired, blue-eyed hyper annoying girl, she latches onto him and becomes his puppy-dog companion. A loner by nature, the Kid isn't best pleased by this, but takes her under his wing - a move that proves to be specially prescient given that BMX-mounted goons roam the wastelands - and soon the Kid and Apple are on a collision course with Zeus.

There's an endearing sweetness to Turbo Kid which is infectious.

Sure, it's got a fair amount of gore and splatter within, but beneath the blood, there's a huge beating heart and a tender love story bursting to get out.

It helps that the Kid is so eminently likeable, with a back-story that's admittedly predictable but the set-up of the film and the world around him is so accessible that this retro-thrill's innocence can't fail to win you over.

The design makes the most of the settings and the synth-heavy OST by Le Mathos is a real stand-out, perfectly encapsulating the kids action adventure series of Saturday mornings of yore. There are a few crowd-pleasing moments of retribution doled out to the bad guys and some inventively silly takes on the slice/dice mentality gel well and get the requisite laughs.

But it's the characters which make Turbo Kid work and elevate it through the tender pastiche of cheesiness and fun that surrounds it. Chambers works well as the Kid, bringing a new take on a guy in a red suit saving the world, Laurence Leboeuf's Apple is enthusiastic, yet never annoying, a smart savvy take on the buddy of the piece and Ironside brings the required menace as the bad guy, Zeus, but never overplays his hand, snarling when he needs to do and delivering his lines with bloody relish; but the real hero of the piece is a mute baddie and Zeus' sidekick, Skeletron.

Under just a metal mask, with a shock of hair and a buzzsaw weapon attachment, Edwin Wright's nervy and spiky energetic baddie is a cult icon in waiting, delivering the kills from the crossbars of the bike and giving the audience a villain to boo at but also to love. Underneath TURBO KID's splatter and gore lies a big beating heart that commands your genre love

Ultimately Turbo Kid is a retro-infused blast of nostalgia-tinged cinema; a good time box office piece, with a conclusion that hints at more options to explore this Mad Max with BMX bikes world - and thanks to its warmth and earnest heart, I'd be happy to visit again.

Experimenter: NZFF Review

Experimenter: NZFF Review

Realising that exploring social experimenter Dr Stanley Milgram was likely to be a controversial choice, the writer, director, and producer of it all, Michael Almereyda could have been on a sticky wicket.

However, by choosing to break the fourth wall conventions in this biopic a la Bronson, he removes the controversy of the man himself and ends up providing a more rounded insight into Milgram.

The film begins with Milgram's most incendiary experiments into the human condition, wherein he managed to put two subjects - a teacher and a pupil - into a room and made them administer shocks to a stranger. Based on Milgram's childhood growing up as a Jew and being influenced by events in the Holocaust, Milgram's reasoning for his trial appears sound - what could provoke any right minded person into such horrific action?

The Milgram experiments clearly had ripples and ramifications and Almereyda's exploration and presentation of them is nothing short of a shock to the system.

By using the aforementioned fourth wall convention and using photos for backgrounds for some events and meetings, it's a bolt upright reaction to what transpires on the screen. (And even has a feel of TV series Masters of Sex about it in its recreation) - but in many ways, it's a film that defies convention for a man who ultimately defied his own conventions.

Sarsgaard is a cool crisp slice of clinical perfection as Milgram, each word carefully delivered for maximum impact and each dryly wry witticism despatched with ease; there's plenty of humour in this film that's essentially a snapshot of a biopic.

By keeping it free of the minutiae of Milgram's life and investing us solely in pivotal moments at certain points in time, Almereyda's concocted something smart and involving.

Exposition serves for explanation and shifts of time periods within the film, and the discussions raised within will likely provoke some incisive and robust debate as the movie ends. However, rather than bogging down the film in stuffy discussion, thanks to some excellent casting (look for the cameos who make up the subjects of the initial Milgram experiment) and a great performance from Sarsgaard and a return to form for a long time absent Winona Ryder as his wife, Almereyda provides a film that hits squarely and confidently what it wants to do.

It may skirt around some issues and some of the ramifications of the experiments (there's an unexplored inference that Milgram was being tailed and one of his colleagues dies early in age, both of these are left to linger frustratingly rather than be delved deeper into), but Almereyda's never interested in anything more than using the style and the effortless ease of his leading man to deliver a fascinating take on a thrilling subject.