Kevin's August '11 Digital Week IV

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Monday, 29 August 2011 12:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

Blu-rays of the Week

The Beaver (Summit)

Mel Gibson's performance as a depressed husband and father who uses a beaver doll to "speak" for him is eye-opening but overdone: why would a middle-class American speak in a Geico-lizard accented voice except to allow Gibson to show off? Still, he and director Jodie Foster make a believable married couple, and Foster smartly allows breathing room for the teenage son's (Anton Yelchin) budding relationship with the pretty valedictorian (always spot-on Jennifer Lawrence).

Too bad scriptwriter Kyle Killen's clever idea goes nowhere; Foster's restrained directing and the cast partly compensate. The Blu-ray image is decent; extras are Foster's commentary, deleted scenes and a making-of featurette.

Blood Simple (MGM/Fox)

I've always thought of the Coen brothers' 1984 debut feature as Blood Simpleminded, so contrived is its plot and so impossibly imbecile are its characters. Even the vaunted visual cleverness is just that: the Coens' emptily stylish shots are so relentlessly tacky and naïve that they must be ironic: except even as irony, they don't work.

There are, admittedly, a few cheap thrills as well as a certain chutzpah in their insistence on forcing such gimmickry down audiences' throats. The Blu-ray image is good and grainy; Kenneth Loring's audio commentary is little more but cheerleading.

Boris Godunov (Opus Arte) and Le Songe (Arthaus Musik)

Russian Modest Mussorgsky's epic Boris Godunov, in a version combining his first attempt in 1869 and one in 1874, is seen in a 2010 Turin, Italy staging with conductor Gianandrea Noseda leading the orchestra and Russian singers Orlin Anastassov (Czar Boris) and Ian Storey (Grigory, pretender to the throne) leading the way. Andrei Konchalovsky's vibrant production looks terrific and Mussorgsky's impassioned score is teeth-rattling on Blu-ray.

Choreographer Jean-Christophe Maillot's film Le Songe, a ballet based on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, alternates Felix Mendelssohn's beguiling score with electronic noises I'd hesitate to call music. Still, the dancers are wonderful, the beautiful visuals transfer well to Blu-ray and it sounds impressive too.

If... (Criterion)

Lindsay Anderson's 1969 classic, a rare successful film allegory, was followed by his later failures O Lucky Man and Britannia Hospital. A young, nasty Malcolm McDowell leads revolting boarding school students against stuffy headmasters in a riotous black comedy that still resonates over 40 years later.

By alternating black and white with color and fantasy and reality, Anderson balances menace and exuberance in equal measure. The Criterion Collection's perfect-looking Blu-ray is another winner, with extras comprising McDowell's commentary; actor Graham Crowden interview; 2003 TV program with McDowell and others; and Anderson's 1955 short about a school for the deaf, Tuesday's Children.

In a Better World (Sony)

Susanne Bier's flawed exploration of two families dealing with the consequences of their sons' actions stacks the dramatic deck so obviously that, despite the efforts of a good cast, it never becomes the complex psychological drama it intends to be.

Bier is a humane filmmaker, but she labors with hammer and tongs until her point is made and re-made. The often spectacular visuals are rendered beautifully on Blu-ray; extras include Bier and her film editor's commentary, deleted scenes and director interview.

The Perfect Host and Trollhunter (Magnolia)

David Hyde Pierce has a blast as a fey dinner host who opens his door to a robber in The Perfect Host, an unhinged black-comic thriller that loses its bearings after the first half-hour (it was expanded from writer-director Nick Tomnay's short). The Norwegian chiller Trollhunter, a Blair Witch Project knockoff (why are those still being made?), has effective moments of horror but mainly bounces along as an action-filled B-movie spoof.

Both movies have fine Blu-ray transfers: Trollhunter's grainy look is especially memorable. Host's extras include two making-of featurettes; Trollhunter's extras include deleted/ extended scenes, bloopers and behind-the-scenes featurettes.

Poetry (Kino) and Secret Sunshine (Criterion)

Korean director Lee Chang-dong makes slow, evocative character studies that amplify their protagonists' messy lives and the societies they inhabit. 2007's Secret Sunshine follows a young widow whose decision to return to her late husband's hometown causes more difficulties than she could have imagined, while 2010's Poetry follows a grandmother struggling with early-onset Alzheimer's, taking a poetry writing course and dealing with her beloved grandson's crime.

Both films are leisurely but impressively controlled, with enchanting performances. The Criterion Collection's Secret haes a gorgeous transfer, director interview and on-set video piece; Kino's Poetry has an equally excellent transfer and on-set interviews.

Strike (Kino)

Continuing to release more classic silents on Blu-ray than any other company, Kino presents the great Russian director Sergei Eisenstein's first feature. Made in 1925, Strike is filled with idealistic agit-prop for the Communist state as well as indelible, powerful imagery. The restored copy of the film, despite scratches and visual debris, looks fantastic: the soundtrack, newly commissioned, is played by the effective Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra.

Extras include Glumov's Diary, Eisenstein's first short; and Eisenstein and the Revolutionary Spirit, a 38-minute interview with French film scholar Natacha Laurent about Eisenstein's truncated career and artistry.

Wrecked (IFC)

Like last year's unfortunate Buried with Ryan Reynolds as a contractor in Iraq who finds himself in a coffin with little time left, this hackneyed thriller with Adrien Brody lacks crucial suspense in a nameless man's dilemma when he finds himself in a badly crashed car in the middle of a forest surrounded by two dead bodies, cash and a gun.

Director Michael Greenspan finds scant variety in the material, resorting to flashbacks hinting at what happened and bringing in a mountain lion and other animals. Ultimately, however this shaggy dog story has little rhyme or reason, despite Brody's seriousness. The Blu-ray images (shot in the Pacific Northwest) are flattering; extras include making-of featurettes.

DVDs of the Week

The Bleeding House and Neds (Tribeca Film)

While The Bleeding House, a minor horror movie about a straight-laced family being terrorized by a maniac, is negligible, Neds--Scottish actor Peter Mullen's latest and his third devastating directorial effort following Orphans and The Magdalene Sisters--shows Mullen in supreme command of another messed-up slice-of-life tale as a 1972 Glasgow teen tries escaping the hell of his drunken, abusive father and delinquent older brother.

Extraordinary acting by mainly unknowns (with Mullen as the drunken dad) distinguishes this hard-hitting drama. Too bad the English subtitles, instead of making the thick dialects clearer, show the actual slang, rendering everything useless. Each film includes two deleted scenes; The Bleeding House also includes an alternate ending.

Cell 211 and Police, Adjective (KimStim/Zeitgeist)

The enterprising KimStim label has released two IFC Films that would otherwise have fallen completely under the radar. Cell 211 is a familiar but enthralling action pic set during a prison riot, where a guard on his first day pretends he's a prisoner to survive.

Police, Adjective, another example of the current Romanian film renaissance, is a deliberately paced, often dull but at times spectacularly minimalist look at a detective working a routine case. Both films are at least worth a look; it's too bad that only Cell 211 has an extra: a making-of featurette.

Daguerreotypes (Cinema Guild)

This charming 1975 portrait of neighbors on the Paris street where the director has lived for over 50 years now is another light-hearted but endlessly watchable Agnes Varda documentary. She introduces us to the people on the street, their shops and their customers, showing once again that she is the most perceptive documentary filmmaker around.

The disc includes several Varda shorts, including Rue Daguerre in 2005, the follow-up that shows her street over the past 30 years, that consolidate Varda as our most optimistic and good-humored social portraitist.

Everwood: Season 4 and Two and a Half Men: Season 8 (Warners)

These two hit shows, in different ways, have gone as far as they could with their characters. Everwood, the slightly cloying family drama starring Treat Williams, ends its run with its fourth year on the air, while Two and Half Men, as amusing as it is, is better known for its now former star Charlie Sheen's offscreen shenanigans.

Everwood's 22 episodes are complemented by deleted scenes and alternate endings; Two and a Half Men's 16 episodes include no extras.

CDs of the Week

British Composers Series: Bliss; Britten, Berkeley and Rubbra (EMI)

While fans of this superb quartet of British composers already own most of the recordings in these re-releases, they are still indispensable for completists who may be missing a work or two and those wanting an introduction. The valuable five-disc Arthur Bliss set includes many of the underrated 20th century master's best works (A Colour Symphony, Oboe Quintet, Checkmate ballet), along with a disc of Bliss conducting his own works like the Miracle of the Gorbals ballet and the vivid Music for Strings.

The other five-disc set pairs a lot of Benjamin Britten (Peter Grimes, Rape of Lucretia) with works by Edmund Rubbra (including his rarely-heard Piano Concerto) and Lennox Berkeley, whose disc features ear-opening performances of the masterly Horn Trio and lovely vocal and choral works.

Weill: Threepenny Opera Selections and Other Songs (Capriccio)

Kurt Weill's classic scores are heard in historic recordings (1928-1944) of Weill, wife Lotte Lenya and other cast members performing excerpts from The Threepenny Opera, and selections from other works like Mahagonny and Happy End.

While the sound quality on these two discs leaves much to be desired, that's part of the charm as we hear the composing genius and his very best and closest interpreters giving us run-throughs of such classics as "Mack the Knife" and "Alabama Song."

For more by Kevin Filipski, visit The Flip Side blog at http://flipsidereviews.blogspot.com

Off-Broadway Review: 'Olive and the Bitter Herbs' Goes Down Easy

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 27 August 2011 20:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

Olive and the Bitter Herbs

Written by Charles Busch

Directed by Mark Brokaw

Starring Dan Butler, David Garrison, Julie Halston, Marcia Jean Kurtz, Richard Masur

Being undisciplined is playwright Charles Busch's modus operandi: from Vampire Lesbians of Sodom to The Tale of the Allergist's Wife, Busch relies on clever lines and campiness far more than common sense and plausibility; his newest, Olive and the Bitter Herbs, continues in that vein.

This frivolous sitcom set in an apartment in the Kips Bay neighborhood of Manhattan has a punning title that refers to its protagonist, the salty old actress Olive, whose acting career consisted mainly of commercials, small television roles and regional theater. Best known as "the sausage lady" in a long-forgotten TV ad, Olive, who lives alone, unceasingly complains about her awful next door neighbors who party past 9 PM and whose cheese smell wafts through the paper-thin walls. Carol, the co-op board president, also bugs her, since she's the building's last rental holdout.

Then there's the ghost she sees in her antique mirror, a benevolent spirit that may or may not be connected to her helpful but flighty middle-aged friend Wendy; her cheese-eating neighbors, gay couple Trey and Robert; and Carol's father, the genial, thrice-widowed and eligible Sylvan, all of whom end up at her apartment for a Passover Seder she neither wanted nor encouraged.

Busch's play is a series of blackout scenes that lead up to and away from that unfortunate Seder, which in itself could be an uproarious short play if Busch had concentrated on it. For anyone who has attended one of those ritual family meals, Busch's biting take will leave one falling to the floor in a heap of laughter.

Seder aside, the rest of Olive is so comedically formulaic that only well-placed darts of gleefully nasty dialogue keep it from evaporating completely before its two-hour running time abruptly ends. Of course, the funniest, saltiest and--yes--bitterest lines come from Olive. After she explains what suffering and slaughter the various Passover foods symbolize at the table, she deadpans: "I forgot how much I enjoy this holiday." And when Trey tells her that he's a fiscal Republican, she retorts: "But you're gay. That's like me, a Jew, voting for Eichmann. You vote for someone who doesn't want you to exist?"

In order to pass off this running-in-place exercise with deeper meaning, Busch ends his play with a long-winded unraveling of the connections between the characters and the ghost in the mirror (who, lame plot device that he is, is forgotten about for awhile).

It's only the combined talents of an accomplished cast led by Marcia Jean Kurtz, whose Olive shoots off Busch's snappiest lines with remarkable aplomb, Mark Brokaw's zesty directing and Anna Louizos' snazzy East 30s apartment set that make Olive and the Bitter Herbs go down rather easily.

Olive and the Bitter Herbs

Primary Stages @ 59 E 59 Theaters

59 East 59th Street, New York, NY

http://primarystages.org

Previews began July 26, 2011; opened August 16, closes September 3

For more by Kevin Filipski, visit The Flip Side blog at http://flipsidereviews.blogspot.com

Mostly Mozart Festival - Week 2

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 24 August 2011 05:00

Written by Jack Angstreich

As part of its special focus this year on the music of Igor Stravinsky, in a relatively bold move, the Mostly Mozart Festival invited the impressive musicians of the International Contemporary Ensemble to perform an arresting all-Stravinsky program of chamber works on Monday, August 8th, at Alice Tully Hall.

In a capitivating coup de theâtre, the program opened with a series of works played in quick succession: the intriguing Study for Pianola; Fanfare for a New Theater, an austere work here performed by trumpeters placed in the balcony; the curious Lied ohne Worte, for two bassoons; the challenging, brief trio, Epitaphium; and, finally, the odd Three Pieces for String Quartet.

The enterprising young conductor Pablo Heras-Casado took the stage to lead the ensemble in several more substantial works. These included: the delightful Ragtime; the strangely opaque Concertino; and the similarly disorienting "Dumbarton Oaks" Concerto.

An unexpected highlight was the discovery of the ingenious Eight Instrumental Miniatures. This was surpassed only by a thrilling performance of the concluding work, the Concerto for Piano and Winds, featuring as soloist the magnificent Peter Serkin.

My pleasure in this program was considerably enhanced by attending an entertaining pre-concert lecture given by Juilliard faculty-member Kendall Durelle Briggs.

The Tuesday and Wednesday all-Mozart Festival Orchestra programs at Avery Fischer Hall, featuring the excellent Concert Chorale of New York, were preceded by splendid pre-concert recitals of the outstanding Partita No. 2 of Johann Sebastian Bach, brilliantly performed by pianist Ilya Yakushev.

Conductor extraordinaire Ivan Fischer opened the concerts proper with luminous readings of Mozart‛s ever-popular Ave Verum Corpus. Without a break, celebrated organist Kent Tritle played a brief prelude as the chorus left the stage, leading immediately into an impressive account of another stalwart work, the magisterial "Jupiter" Symphony.

The evening concluded with a moving performance of the exalting, rarely played, Vesperae Solennes de Confessore, featuring gorgeous singing by soprano Lucy Crowe. A weakness here was the insertion of liturgical chants between movements, less than impressively sung by a baritone in the Chorale.

On Thursday evening, the International Contemporary Ensemble returned to Alice Tully Hall for a more wide-ranging program, here conducted by Matthias Pintscher.

The concert opened with the delightful Adagio for Glass Armonica (K. 356) by Mozart, here arranged for a small chamber ensemble by Salvatore Sciarrino.

A mystical ultra-contemporary work by Pintscher, Occultation, followed and Sciarrino then led a bracing account of the difficult Chamber Symphony No. 1 by Arnold Schoenberg.

The program's high-point, however, was its close -- a mellifluous reading of the beautiful Mozart Serenade for Winds in B-flat major, K. 361, the "Gran Partita".

The Ensemble soon repaired to the more intimate Kaplan Penthouse for another heterogeneous selection. A late-night presentation opened with the New York premiere of the likable Serenade in Homage to Mozart by contemporary composer Jonathan Harvey, based on the "flute" motif from The Magic Flute.

An early work by John Zorn, Christabel, for five flutes was also unaccountably rewarding. The world premiere of Steve Lehman's Lenwood and Other Saints Who Roam the Earth, a duet for flutes, was less accessible.

But another world premiere, Phyllis Chen's Chimers, was a delightful surprise, featuring electronically enhanced music from an altered toy piano played by the composer herself.

The apotheosis of the program, however, was a wondrous performance of the lovely Mozart Adagio and Rondo for Glass Armonica and Chamber Ensemble (K. 617), the last work of chamber music completed by the composer -- a vehicle here for Dennis James, the astonishing virtuoso of the exotic instrument.

For his pre-concert recitals on Friday and Saturday, the superb pianist Jeremy Denk was originally scheduled to perform Phrygian Gates by minimalist composer John Adams --his self-described "Opus 1".

But Denk announced that he was not yet ready to play the piece and, instead, substituted the intricate, challenging, Final Piano Sonata No. 32 by Ludwig van Beethoven, which was heard here in a riveting account.

The all-Beethoven Festival Orchestra concerts proper, led by Louis Langrée, opened with powerful readings of the second Leonore Overture, featuring a dramatic trumpet fanfare by a player positioned in the balcony, to memorable effect.

Denk then took the stage for subtle but lively accounts of the Second Piano Concerto. At the Saturday program, Denk was mesmerizing in an encore, the brilliant third movement ("The Alcotts") from the eccentric, monumental "Concord" Piano Sonata of Charles Ives.

After intermission, the fine soprano Christine Brewer joined the orchestra for a memorable performance of the haunting recitative and aria, "Abscheulicher! Wo eilst du hin?" from Fidelio -- she was especially strong in her higher register.

The program closed with an exuberant account of the buoyant Eighth Symphony. At the Saturday concert, it sounded better than I have ever heard it played.

Alice Tully Hall
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
70 Lincoln Center Plaza
New York City
212-875-5050

Runs August 2 - 27, 2011