NZIFF 2019 Q&A - director Sophie Hyde, Animals

NZIFF 2019 Q&A - director Sophie Hyde, Animals

My film is....
A big collaboration with a lot of great people all providing details that make the feeling of the whole. It's a lot of fun, I think pleasurable to watch and also a bit expansive, or more expansive than is expected. 

The moment I'm most proud of is....
I'm not sure. 

The reason I carried on with this film when it got tough is.....
Because they are characters and a situation that feels like it's been done a lot but not with a lot of nuance, I felt they should be on screen.

The one moment that will resonate with an audience is.......
The cocaine sex scene...no, the feeling of trying to work out your shit when your desires are so competing. 

The hardest thing I had to cut from this film is........ 
The song "Buffalo stance" which was written into the script but didn't have a place in the movie

The thing I want people to take from this film is ...... 
That friendships can be inspiring, difficult and brilliant whether they exist for a moment, a day, a season or a lifetime. 

The reason I love the NZIFF is.......
Because of the great films on offer

What I want to see at this year's NZIFF is......
Well I don't want to see it but there is another film I produced called In My Blood It Runs which is beautiful and meaningful and mesmerising and disturbing and also hopeful - that would be my hot pick. 

The one thing I'd say to aspiring filmmakers is.....Be really rigorous  about what you want to say, who you want to say it to, how you want to say it. 

Jojo Rabbit first trailer is here

Jojo Rabbit first trailer is here

The first trailer for Taika Waititi's next film, Jojo Rabbit has arrived.

In it, Waititi plays a Hitler style goofball at a Hitler camp.

The film follows a young boy (Roman Griffin) raised in a Hitler Youth camp who questions his patriotism when he realises his mother (Scarlett Johansson) is hiding a young Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie).

Deerskin: NZIFF Review

Deerskin: NZIFF Review

French director Quentin Dupieux, the guy who brought us Rubber, returns to the festival with an offbeat look at masculinity and bizarrely, fashion.

A greying Jean DuJardin is Georges, a man who appears firstly on the road, and secondly out of sorts. Clad in ill-fitting chinos, and drably coutured, his first stop is at a rest stop, where he throws his jacket in the loo, pushes it down with his feet, and retreats as the facilities begin to flood.

Having dispatched his wardrobe with veritable aplomb, Georges buys a full length, tassles and all, deerskin jacket, that comes with a digital video recorder. Dubbed The Beast by its seller, the jacket seems to exert a hold over Georges, demanding that all jackets be destroyed....

Deerskin is dubbed as a comedy, but it's not exactly laugh-out-loud amusing, more unusual and offbeat than anything.

Beiges, browns and other drab colours provide a palette of malaise that affects much of the mood of the film, and symbolises the collective atmosphere of loss.

DuJardin is committed to the lunacy and the delusion, but grounds his Georges in a kind of broken sadness that's universally recognised, before it teeters off ultimately and heads into the unhinged arena.

At 76 minutes, the film's stretched about as thin as it can go, but the descent into madness is well put together and sold mainly by DuJardin's sense of detachment and Adele Haenel's Denise's desperation to escape a crummy job and buy into the delusion.

"You can't make sense of it now, but it rocks," is one line intoned during proceedings, and may be much of the audience reaction to how Deerskin plays out, and descends into obvious genre tropes.

Ultimately, Deerskin paints itself into a corner, as is demonstrated by an ending that comes out of the blue, but Dupieux's commitment to the journey of lunacy allows it to not outstay its welcome.

Just.

Apocalypse Now Final Cut: NZIFF Review

Apocalypse Now Final Cut: NZIFF Review

It's difficult to honestly appraise the differences of Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now Final Cut given it's this reviewer's first exposure to the movie itself.

What is clear from the sprawling epic is this is the cut Coppola wanted to have as the definitive one, and the one which he's determined will be his last and ultimate take on the Vietnam movie.

For those uninitiated to the story, this is the tale of Martin Sheen's Captain Willard, who's given the job of assassinating Marlon Brando's Colonel Kurtz, who's gone wild within the confines of Cambodia and is seen as a threat by the US Military.

Assembling a small team, Willard ventures deep into territory of the forest and the unknown.

Coppola's greatest achievement is assembling the pieces early on in the first hour into action scenes which are a visual symphony that showcases CGI is not always best. As explosions rock the jungle, choppers head over, and the camera never sways from its leads, it's clear Coppola is in his element and assemblage.

But despite heightened colours and improved audio, the film's final hour descends into discord, an anti-climactic meh of epic proportions that does little to build on the promised showdown. (A pair of 21st century eyes would notice how all the characters of colour are dispatched before the final act concludes).

It's still an impressive epic, but its unwieldly sprawl does hit it quite badly in the final third of the run. However, fans of Apocalypse Now will want to witness the film in the way its creator envisioned.

The Hole In The Ground: NZIFF Review

The Hole In The Ground: NZIFF Review

Debut director Lee Cronin's The Hole In The Ground plays with primal fears, familiar tropes and jump scares and spins them round into something compelling and deeply unsettling.

Seana Kerslake plays Sarah, who's moved to a new life in the Irish countryside, along with her son Chris. Clearly unsettled by the past, and troubled by the need to relocate, Sarah's further rattled when  a neighbour screams at Chris that he's not her son.

As the doubts and the odd behaviour start to build up, Sarah's forced into a course of action and paranoia that escalates quickly, but whose foundation is already on dodgy ground - what exactly is going on?

The Hole In The Ground may use a lot of old school ideas, crescendoing sound, and the fear of what lies in the forest, but what Cronin's crafted is something of tension, suspense, and genuine dread.

Its offbeat approach to unsettling proceedings works best as a two hander between Kerslake and James Quinn Markey, who plays Chris. Kerslake in particular is ferocious and vulnerable, tapping into every mother's fears as the slow pace unfolds, leaving the audience's imagination to run wild and jump to (wrong) conclusions.

In passing the film bears similarities to Invaders From Mars, and its paranoia of doubles, but Cronin subverts some of that to play on a mother's most basic fears. The Hole In The Ground may wobble a bit towards the end, but as a domestic horror, and a primal button-pusher, it's second to none.

Ant Timpson talks the Incredibly Strange at the 2019 NZIFF

Ant Timpson talks the Incredibly Strange at the 2019 NZIFF

Hello Ant, every year you put the Ant into Antagonistic in these Q&As, how are you feeling this year?
Does anyone actually read these Q&As – be honest now.
Do I have to feign faux fury to even get a nibble from your readership? Surely I should switch it up and play nice and be authentic. Isn’t that the new hot thing. Authenticity. Ok well I’m going to try it here.

Let's get the obvious out of the way first, a Civic premiere and a place in the main programme for your directorial film Come To Daddy - I want to just say that's great, there's nothing like a Civic premiere. Tell me more about this one and how it's been playing abroad, and how that translates to a sell-out cinema.

Well I don’t take it lightly – it means a lot to be in the programme let alone get a Big Night at the Civic.  I’m sure from the outside it looks like I’ve just slipped my film into the excel sheet of scheduling and hoped no one would notice but the reality is I was so paranoid about the fest playing favourites that I went out of my way to make sure it went through the normal process.

And that meant from Bill through to the other programmers – they all had to give it a tick. There was no way I was going to programme it in my own section of the festival – I do have some limits of shame. So the world premiere was at Tribeca and it was a thrill to go to NYC for my first film. I mean it’s DeNiro’s fest and there are Taxi Driver locations right nearby. So yeah absolutely jazzed about premiering there and then when audiences and critics gave it the thumbs up it all added up to a pretty much perfect launch for the film.

Since then I’ve seen the film in various countries with all manner of audiences and it’s been interesting to see how things play in different cultures. In terms of sell-out cinema – it’s at The Civic – I don’t think anything sells out except for opening night and a couple of others but I sure hope more than a few friends turn up for it.

What's the scene been like for the selections this year - is there one film you didn't get that you want to name and shame, in the hope that the power of this Q&A will see its distributors cringe and reconsider?
The Lodge was the film that we should be playing. But it didn’t work out.

Which is a huge shame because the film is very good and I know the directing duo very well.

In fact we hung out in Seoul where both our films were in competition. They’re very inspiring and funny as hell. Which you wouldn’t get from their films! Goodnight Mommy etc – they’re connected with Ulrich Siedl and his production company and ar surrounded by brilliant artists.

And of course the Danzig vanity trainwreck VEROTIKA is something I don’t think I could have snagged before its world prem – I even knew one of the producers and could have made it happen.

GREENER GRASS is another film that I had the filmmakers on side but there were many things in the air  - it ended up waiting to hear from Locarno to be first international festival.

So that was frustrating on a few levels. For one – it’s directed by two women and would have upped the genre gender imbalance.

Deerskin is an intriguing look at a man falling apart and a predilection with fashion - why the interest in this one, and no parallels with anyone you know?
Well  Quentin Dupieux’s aka Mr Oizo films fit my section like a well-worn deerskin jacket.

Deerskin

So it’s a no brainer that his new film that just played Cannes was going to make an appearance. Anyone who has seen his films like RUBBER & WRONG know what they’re in for.

If you need to confess something about your predilection for horrible attire and an emotional imbalance then this is probably not the place to do it Darren.

The Hole In The Ground continues our obsession with mothers and weird kids, as well as haunting atmospherics - it's quite the powerful piece for a debut.
I’d seen Lee Cronin’s short Ghost Train on the circuit and could see that he was a confident director with horror material – and so there was some anticipation about his debut feature.

I don’t think it’s reinventing the wheel but then again – not many films do – rather it takes material that feels familiar and then mixes it up a bit. I just feel it’s a solid well crafted piece that delivers the chills for those looking for some. Just very confident and features a really strong performance from the lead Seana Kerslake.

You Don't Nomi has a pun even I'd be proud of as a title. But why the need to defend the trashfire that is Showgirls with this doco?
Well it’s actually a lot more than just that – that’s the hook for the doc but it actually looks at the world of Verhoeven and offers just as much from the negative perspective as the positive. It has a surprisingly emotional weight in its last third that comes as a shock after all the humour preceding it.

I saw the film in the week it was on screens on first release. We knew it was a misfire but also felt it was utterly compelling and mesmerising – and that really is the marriage of a cocaine-addled script and a brilliant director who misread the cues.

Equally The Amazing Johnathan Documentary seems to be a film about obsession and delusion....
The less said about this doc the better. The trailer shows way too much. Don’t watch it. Just go see it.
If you like docs like TICKLED that take a turn down unseen paths – then you’ll like this a lot. It’s Benjamin Berman’s first feature but he’s very experienced and it shows in how this all plays out.

What's going to give me the high that I got from that opening scene of Climax at the Hollywood Theatre last year - Violence Voyager, Mope or Knife + Heart?
Well CLIMAX is a very special film so nothing like that.

But the opening of MOPE is something to see with an audience. Just for how much you want to shift in your seat and maybe pretend you aren’t in the cinema watching it.

Knife + Heart is an excellent film – another Cannes hit – and has been wowing audiences all over. It’s not what people probably expect. And Violence Voyager is unlike anything folks would have seen in a cinema – there’s going to a collective WTF noise once it begins and the film’s unusual primitive style takes their synapses hostage.

Koko-Di Koko-Da looks fairly surreal - is this the film likely to tip me over the edge this year?
You’ll either admire it a lot like I did and find the subtext somewhat profound or easily think it’s a mean-spirited exercise in style that has fun manipulating the audience – or you might find it both.

Whatever way you take it – I think it’s something that people will want to talk about after they’ve seen it. If you’d seen the director’s films before this you’d be very unprepared for what happens in this one.

Tell me about Vivarium, whose director is coming for a Q&A as well...
Well I was a big fan of Lorcan Finnegan’s debut feature – an atmospheric eco-thriller/horror that really built up and had me on edge.

VIVARIUM is a super ambitious psychological satirical thriller that is beautifully crafted and performed. It has its roots in Twilight Zone’s literary canon – and mines the essence of what made Rod Serling’s original series so ground-breaking.
Configuring real world societal issues and placing them in the fantastic.  And Lorcan is a very open and honest Irishman who will be fun at the Q&A.

What's the one film from your selection that you'll be pissed off if it doesn't sell out?
I have way too many other things in the world to be pissed off about than whether a film gets an audience along to it or not.

I’ve programmed the section and now people either come a long or they don’t. Some will do well. Some not so well. That is the law of film festivals. It has no bearing on the film’s merit now or in the long run.

For many this will be the only chance for audiences to see them in a cinema with a crowd and that is something that should never be over-looked.

What can you recommend from the main festival programme, and why should we see them?
There are a lot to recommend. Andrei Rublev. Art of Self Defense. Bacurau. The Day Shall Come. Escher. Fly By Night. In Fabric. La Flor. The Lodger. Monos. The Whistlers.

How many more of these Q&As do you think you can endure, and what exactly does the festival have over you that forces you to do these annually?
I appreciate your persistence in cut and pasting the same questions each year. You really outdo yourself.

Also you’re the first film reviewer I know alive who hadn’t seen APOCALYPSE NOW  - take a bow, good sir!

What's the one question you're glad I didn't ask you, and how can we ever repair this fractured relationship??

You can ask me anything, big D. I’m an open book. Like the Bible. Our relationship is fine. Fractured is more fun than inert.

You can find more details of when the Incredibly Strange section is playing at nziff.co.nz

Hail Satan?: NZIFF Review

Hail Satan?: NZIFF Review

Hail Satan?'s high-level trolling documentary is something of a wry amusement as it starts, but what emerges later on is an expose of the widening schism between the US and the freedom of expression.

Director Penny Lane's doco serves to show the contrasts between those in the Satanic Temple and their perception in the media. After all, some of the chapter are part of a beach-tidying commitment for a year.

It appears the message is one of benevolence, and those levelled with criticisms of going to hell are met with a "I believe it and I'm very supportive of it" response that's both amusing and also indicative of the good nature of those in the Temple.

As the so-called Satanic Panic spreads, and the more trolling and playing with media the Temple does, Lane pivots perceptions and the doco becomes an intriguing look about how different people are treated over events, rather than as themselves.

A tongue in cheek approach seems to be Hail Satan?'s raison d'etre, but it also by weaving in video interview clips and media stunts seems to give the doco an offbeat feel that's hard to shake, but worthy of smiles. However, Lane never resorts to mockery of her subjects, and the piece is all the better for it.

Less religious fervour, more a plea for tolerance, Hail Satan?'s devilish charms are not hard to resist.