EVERYDAY

A new movie from acclaimed British filmmaker Michael Winterbottom is always a highly anticipated event for avid cinephiles, and even when like 'TRISHNA'  his last one, they are far from perfect they are still streets ahead of so many other independent movies.  And an added joy is the fact that one is never sure what genre he will tackle next as each movie is always an enormous leap from the last.  This however, may be where my love affair now ends, or at least cools down rapidly, and I never ever thought the day would come when I could sum up a Winterbottom movie with this one word : tedious!

What may have seemed like a brilliant idea on paper when it was conceived over five years ago, turned out in reality to be quite badly thought-out, and rather dumb one.  Essentially this is the story of Ian a working class petty criminal who is imprisoned for drug offences and the movie tracks how it affects his wife Karen struggling with bringing up their four small children on her own over the next 5 years.  It was filmed like a documentary, literally a few weeks at a time over the whole five years, (and there was I  puzzling how the children looked like they were getting bigger .... cos they literally were).  

Despite using two of his excellent regular actors playing Ian and Karen the understated John Simms and the diminutive tough cookie Shirley Henderson (in her 6th Winterbottom role) it was still just like watching paint dry as the whole 87 minutes consisted of Karen dragging her children in buses and trains back and forth on long journeys to visit their father at the latest prison he had been moved too in some other remote part of Britain.  I sat there right to the bitter end hoping that something of consequence may eventually happen, but nothing did.  I'm not sure if Mr Winterbottom had assumed that we would be so impressed with this slightly daring way of filming a feature movie, that we wouldn't notice that there was no plot at all to keep us remotely interested in this poor wretched family and how their lives would turn out once Ian was eventually free again.

The only redeeming feature is the ever reliable Ms Henderson but I dont think even she, or Mr Winterbottom's name on the marquee, or Michael Nyman's wonderful score is enough to justify enyone having to sit through this.  The plan is to show it on Channel 4 TV in the UK, and then a theatrical release in other countries after that, but dont hold your breath as I think it wont be around for very long.

★★★

QUEEN TO PLAY

I have always loved how French movie makers  stretch their imaginations when it comes to dealing with 'amour', but using an obsession with chess to help a repressed housewife rekindle her sexuality was just a tad too far fetched for me. 

Helene is a chambermaid in a luxury hotel in Corsica and after a putting a full day of work in, she goes home to her dockworker husband who ignores her and choses to spend all his spare time playing cards at his pal's house.  One day at the Hotel Helene spots a couple playing chess and really having fun at it. And she gets hooked just like that! For some reason she thinks that this could be the way to get her husband interested in hanging out with her again, so she buys him an electronic chess set for his birthday.  It goes down like a lead balloon!

Helene meanwhile has a second part time job house cleaning for a very grumpy widowed American Professor who she persuades to teach her how to play chess properly. He does and she finds she has a real talent for it and actually ends up playing and winning tournaments.  Which is just as well, as her husband up to the moment Helene starts coming home late, hardly notices her at all. He (like me) can hardly believe that chess is the sole reason for the new spring in his wife's step so he starts secretly following her.  The Professor may have a wee crush on his maid, but she's just in love with chess.  Oh yes, and her husband too.

This odd wee movie is made watchable by the wonderful Sandrine Bonnaire who is a joy as the obsessed Helene, although why any husband would ever want to ignore a treasure of a attractive wife like this is a mystery to me.  So too was the casting decision to put Kevin Kline in his first French movie as the Professor with the ailing lung problem.  I really cannot think what was remotely remarkable in his performance that justified having a major American star in this unassuming small French movie.

Not a bad movie (thanks to Ms Bonnaire) but not one worth going out of one's way for, unless you think that chess is the way you could get your man back in bed with you too.

★★★★★★

FAMILY TIES

When Israeli filmmaker Nitzan Gilady crammed his parents and two grown up brothers and one sister in lawn into an RV to travel thousands of miles across country for a week to go visit the Grand Canyon I was very skeptical.What on earth could happen over the Passover holiday with the family living on top of each other in this tiny space that would make this fly-on-the-wall documentary interesting?  Actually a lot as it happens, and without the normal distractions of their usual daily routines the family started unloading some of their emotional baggage that they had been avoiding dealing with, and the result was totally fascinating.

Nitzan's father was a Yemeni Jew who had moved to Israel at a very early age where his mother promptly died and he ended up in a Boarding school. His own father was a distant figure in his childhood resulting in him growing up tough, slightly hard, and determined to succeed.  The determination also translated in giving, or rather imposing on, his wife and their three sons every opportunity in life that he felt he never had.  Like his own father before him he was tough, and was uncomfortable showing or dealing with any of his feelings.

Nitzan's older brother was a rebel in his youth and pain in his father's side as he refused to take life seriously. The only son to be married  .... although his wife was in the RV she was not filmed as the marriage dissolved soon afterwards.  He was still the family drifter.

The younger brother had served time in the Israeli Army and was now suffering from shell-shock.  He was diffident, moody and very temperamental as a result and was struggling to deal with life in general.  It was accepted that he would always need to live at home with the parents as he was far too volatile to be left to his own resources.

And then there was Nitzan.  He had escaped from Israel to NY so that he could eventually come out of the closet which he did so at the age of 30, but it took him another 5 years before he even dared tell his very conservative parents.  They know he is gay but refuse to talk about it at all, until one night on the trip Nitzan forces the issue and makes his father confront his bigotry, which to a lesser extent the mother also has.  It is a pivotal moment in the film and the raw emotion of these two opposing views : one based in ignorance and real fear, and other rational one from an unhappy filmmaker who just wants his father's love and acceptance is heart-wrenching and highly emotional.

In fact it is the same demand that all three brothers have of this very rigid old man who does obviously love all his sons even though he may never be able to actually come to terms with the fact that none of them have turned out how he really wanted them to be.

Trapped in the RV for the week forced them to talk as a family...shout even...as well as the never-ending scenes eating matzo and cracking sunflower seeds. I think the fact that the Father not only went along with his son's idea of making this movie and showing some of the more uncomfortable exchanges which didn't always show him in a flattering light, spoke volumes about his inner desire to change.  And it said even more about how resilient this family no matter what they need to confront.

Anybody who had to deal with raw emotional exchanges with their own family (isn't that all of us?) will really relate to this wonderful wee documentary, although in my case, it has put me off RVs for life!

★★★★★★★★

THE COMEDIAN

I could never ever be a Psychotherapist. It's not just because I have no patience, but the fact I just completely loathe whiners. It's also the reason why I was so irritated by this new wee film that is currently doing the Festival circuit.  Don't be fooled by the title, it is not funny in the least, even when Ed, a call-centre phone operator by day, tries his hand at stand-up comedy at night.

Ed has confused feelings about his Elisa his flatmate which get even more complicated when he gets picked up by Nathan, a young black youth, and they go back to Nathan's rather squalid flat and have some hot torrid sex. When all three of them go out together hear a a band play, Ed loses the plot and goes off on his own. I too lose what little plot there is, but hang on in case something actually happens. But it doesn't.

There is an overly long scene where Nathan and Ed encounter some nasty little homophobic schoolgirls on a bus, but that got nowhere. Meanwhile Ed whined.  About his job, his comedy gigs, Nathan, Elisa, and live in general.  He couldn't see any point to any of it.  It was the only time he and I were on the same page.

Redeeming features?  None! It's British and its bad. This movie is totally dull and irritating and a complete waste of 70 minutes of anyone's time.

LAURENCE ANYWAYS

Thirtysomething Laurence is a very successful and popular high school teacher, and loves his girlfriend Fred and their very full and happy life together in Montreal. Yet despite all that he has going for him he always has a perpetual nagging sensation that something is amiss.  Deep down he has always really known that essentially he feels like a woman trapped in man's body, and it isn't until he finally confesses this urge to Fred, that his  ... and her ... life change for ever.

This all could have stacked up to be a regular weepy melodrama with the potential for an Oscar grabbing role, but this work is the creation of cinema's enfant terrible Xavier Dolan and true to his usual form he throws everything at this making it a startlingly beautiful movie that has the capability of stunning one into silence. As Laurence with unflinching bravery starts his transition and risks every thing that he loves, Dolan focuses mainly on Fred as she sees it all unravel and leads to them having totally different lives over the next decade.

As much as Fred wants to support Laurence in his choice she cannot cope with either the external pressures from society or with her inner demons that keep challenging her even though she can never ever stop loving Laurence as the years go by. As Laurence's successful second career as a poet brings 'her' fame and some fortune, even this will not stifle 'her' quest to get back with Fred and 'she' goes to some extraordinary lengths to try to make this happen.

Dolan never shows any restraint and very little heed to being p.c., so with his fine sense of high drama, he makes this such a compelling tale. It's not just the story, but the way he makes it so visually stunning and peppered with some rather inspired music choices that make it so memorable.  He's cast do him, and the movie, real credit too. Laurence is imaginatively played by Melvil Poupaud ('A Time To Leave', 'Mysteries of Lisbon' etc), and his unpredictable mother is played by the wonderful Nathalie Baye ('Tell No One', 'Venus Beauty Institute' etc) but it is the remarkable tour de force performance by Suzanne Clement ('I Killed My Mother') as Fred that stole the movie and earned her a Best Actress Award at Cannes's Un Certain Regard.

French-Canadian boy wonder Xavier Dolan is now at the ripe old age of 23 and this is his third multi-award winning movie that he both wrote and directed.  The first 'I Killed My Mother' in 2009 was the start of his mutual love affair with Cannes Film Festival who have always given him awards for all three films.  This ground-breaking debut was based on his own relationship with his mother (who he didn't literally kill) but sadly the success was tinged with difficulties as his US Distributor went belly up and the movie has been trapped unseen in legal limbo ever since.  The second one in 2010 was 'Heartbeats'  a delightful romantic comedy about a love triangle with Dolan playing one of the leads too.  

Dolan is an anarchic genius, over-indulgent and at times maddeningly annoying ..... but a genius nonetheless and all three of his movies are remarkable works that rank very high on my list of all-time favourites.  The only reason that I am marking this slightly less than perfect, is that coming at almost three hours long, it badly needed a new editor.  The current one is Xavier Dolan.

★★★★★★★★★

HYSTERIA

At the end of 19th Century in Victorian England there was no such term as 'orgasm', well for women anyway, and probably no need for one because according to this rather absurd comic movie, they weren't getting them anyway. Many wealthy older women would traipse to Dr Robert Dalrymple's Consulting Rooms displaying an array of symptoms including nervousness, insomnia, exhaustion, depression, cramps, and sexual frustration which he  diagnosed as 'hysteria'. The Doctor's prescribed method of dealing with this was by massaging the genital area, decently covered under a curtain, eliciting 'paroxysmal convulsions', far from recognizing that he was in fact inducing orgasms.

The Doctor was so overwhelmed by the demand for this service that he employed Granville Mortimer, a young ambitious Doctor who had become fired from so many other positions as he keeps question the orthodoxy of his senior colleagues.  Young Mortimer was soon a big hit with all the old dears who could not get enough of his talented dexterous hand, so much so that he very quickly got carpal syndrome and was unable to butter toast let alone satisfy the  craving of his 'patients'.   

Meanwhile Dalrywmple sees in the young man not only a worthy successor for the rather lucrative 'practice' but also a potential husband for Emily his younger daughter.  His older daughter Charlotte is another matter entirely.  Against her father's wishes she has set up a Settlement House as a home for prostitutes and the poor homeless even though its his money she uses to fund her schemes.  She actually thinks her father is a crackpot and charlatan for 'exploiting' these desperate and lonely old women, so eventually she storms off in a huff, and he cuts off access to the money she needs to keep the Home open.

Mortimer's best friend Edmund is an amateur inventor and one night while the two are testing his latest prototype of an electric duster, Mortimer gets a flash of inspiration.  The duster is quickly forgotten and the whirling machine is converted into what becomes the first ever vibrator.  It saves Mortimer's job and his overworked hand and makes the old women ecstatic and the three men very rich indeed.

It's a silly story so the end is equally rather nonsensical with Mortimer dumping the tame daughter for the fiery one and then spending all his new found wealth keeping the (ex) hookers happy by funding their Home.

It is all very lightweight and so ridiculous that it had to be true, and is it kind of.  History does confirm that it was one Mortimer Granville that patented a 'personal massager' when back then, but the rest of the story should be taken with far more than a pinch of salt if you want to sit through this.

Two notable things about this run-of-the-mill not very funny rom-com.  Firstly on the plus side, Maggie Gyllenhaal as Charlotte is the only one that really sparkles in this piece, whilst on the other (minus) side there is the very scary sight of a post-operative Rupert Everett whose beard couldn't hide his pumped and pulled face. Really Rupert haven't you got one real friend to tell you what an absolute mess you have made of your looks?  It was the only thing in the movie that was truly hysterical! 

★★★★★★

5 BROKEN CAMERAS

Emid Burnat is a Palestinian farmer who works the same land that his family have done for generations in Bil'in on the West Bank and this movie is his firsthand account when the village is threatened by the encroaching Israeli Settlements.  This highly personal documentary film bears witness to how the non-violent resistance by the villagers to having their land is appropriated, is met with an armed military force that is both shocking and  deadly.

In 2005, Burnat's fourth son Gibreel is born at the very same time that the Israelis start building a Separation Barrier that annexes part of village's farm lands.  Burnat gets his first camera ostensibly to record the latest addition to his family, but actually turns it on to the resistance movement that starts to deal with this latest threat to their livelihoods.

Very soon into the conflict, these events begin to affect his family and his own life. Daily arrests, violent attacks, bulldozers knocking down olive trees, the loss of life and regular raids in the village scare his family. One by one his brothers and friends get arrested and jailed, as he eventually does himself. At each setback the villagers persistence and resourcefulness remains consistently high resulting in the Security Forces fighting back even dirtier as they start paying night time visits to the village to arrest young teenage boys.

Throughout the next 5 years as his son grows up and the protest continues to escalate due to the controversial aggressive response by the Israeli security forces, without any regard for his personal safety, Burnat keeps filming right from the centre of the action. Five of his cameras get damaged one way or another and the third one actually took the bullet intended for him thus saving his life, although leaving him seriously wounded. 

In 2007 the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the Barrier be re-routed, but this was simply ignored as more and more Settlements were built on the land.  Eventually some four years after the Court Ruling did some small parts of the lands get restored and the Barrier was removed.  Meanwhile not too far in the distance, the Israels constructed a giant concrete wall instead.

As the need to co-ordinate their resistance more grew, the villagers were joined by some impassioned Israeli activists who supported the cause throughout, and it is equally interesting to note that Burnat turned over all his footage to Guy Davidi, an Israeli filmmaker, for him to co-direct the finished film with him.

Mr Burnat's roots may have been in farming but his observations particularly in his philosophical narration has turned him into a fine journalist.  The way that he relates each passing episode of the villages turmoil to how it will effect his young growing family gives the whole piece a very personal resonance.  Whatever one's on take on the deeply entrenched views of both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, when unarmed men and children are fatally shot right in front of Burnat's camera, then it is impossible not to be positively angry and embittered too

It's a tough movie to watch but should be compulsory viewing just to admire how one tiny village stood up to a big bully and refused to back down.  Also check out 'BUDRUS' from 2007 also about another Palestinian village's fight back when the Israeli's threaten to seize all their land too.

★★★★★★★★

TAKE ME HOME

Thirtysomething Thom  is having another bad day. He fails to convince an Agent to give him his first  break into photography, his Landlord has evicted him for not paying the rent yet again, and the illegal taxi cab he cheaply bought at an auction won't start.  It does eventually and Thom sets out into the streets of Manhattan to try to pick up fares in his fake cab.  Luckily for him Claire has had an equally bad day.  She had caught her husband red-handed flirting with his new secretary when she went home unexpected, and her mother has just called to tell her that her father that she is estranged from has been hospitalized in California after suffering a heart-attack. Totally distraught and not knowing where to go, Claire rushes into the street and hails a cab and demands that the driver just 'drive!'.  And so Thom does exactly that as Claire sinks into the back seat and just sobs her heart out.

By the time she wakes next morning a horrified Claire discovers that they are now belting down the Freeway in Pennsylvania, and her 'journey' has started in more than one sense of the word.  

This rather charming wee film is part road movie and part romantic comedy and as  they deal with series of mini dramas, the two strangers run the whole gamut of hate and anger to more than a tender affection for each other by the time they reach their destination. They run out of money  ... just in every road movie ... and the balance of power between the two changes constantly. Thom must come clean with the whole web of lies and deceit that he has used to conceal his real life, and Claire equally must deal with her need to be in complete control of her emotions that shuts everyone else out of her life.

The movie was a labour of love as it is written, directed and produced by the actor Sam Jaegar ('Parenthood', 'Eli Stone' etc) and if that is not enough, he stars as Thom too.  His real life wife Amber Jaeger ... a very fine actress indeed .... plays Claire and the very obvious chemistry the pair is  a very big plus point to the movie's success.

This modest wee film is by no means perfect as the plot drags at times and some of the dialogue could have been better, but with some rather wonderful acting in particular and the fact that its very mature  for rom-com, makes it both refreshing and entertaining. And full marks to Mr Jaegar for resisting the temptation and avoiding tying up all the loose ends to make a tidy finale.

The movie picked up two Audience Favorite Awards on the Festival circuit, and I can see why.  If you are a tad romantic you'll end up being as fond of this movie too just in the way that Thom was of his passenger by the time he collected final payment.

★★★★★★★★

JOSEPHINE BAKER : BLACK DIVA IN A WHITE MAN'S WORLD

Ask anyone today what they know about the great Josephine Baker and they will inevitably trot out the fact that she scandalized tout Paris in the 1920’s by dancing wearing nothing more than a bunch of bananas.  In this (far too short) film on her life we learn there was so much more to this multi-faceted woman than her glittering show business career and that in later life she was a Decorated French Resistance Hero in WW2, and then in the 60’s was the only female speaker alongside Martin Luther King at the famous civil rights ‘March on Washington’.  

Born in 1908 to a black mother and an absent white father in St Louis, she dropped out of school at 12 years old and lived on the streets before eventually landing a job as a dancer in the chorus locally which led to a move and a new gig in New York. By the age of 19 she had become the scandalous and sensational star of the Follies Bergere in Paris with the help of those bananas and other props like her pet cheetah with his diamond encrusted collar.

In the 1950’s when she returned to the US as a star and a hero she was feted with a ticker tape parade in Harlem but she still suffered the indignities of segregation like all black performers at the time who were considered good enough to entertain (white) polite society as long they stuck to using the ‘coloureds only’ toilet and entered the Clubs through the kitchen door.  Baker confused the audiences of that period even further by appearing not in the traditional attire of black performers but by dressing head to toe as the chic Parisian that she now was.

In later life she was so much in the forefront of the US civil rights movement, that Coretta King even asked her to become its Leader after her husband was killed.  At the same time back in France Ms Baker  also adopted countless orphans and  established this enormous family of her own.

She didn't always make the right choices with people in her life, and when she was in her 60’s and discovered that her hubby had blown all her money, she had to go back to work again.  I remember that part well, cos as an impressionable young man in my very early 20’s I got to see her perform at the London Palladium, still every inch a star but thankfully sans bananas.

She may not have had the most perfect life, albeit that it was packed with some very heady moments, but she did have the most perfect ending.  At the age of 75 after a sensation reception given to her by the audience at her ‘retrospective’ concert at Paris’s L’Olympia, she went back to her hotel to rest, and then died peacefully in her sleep that night.

This brief look at her life included a wealth of glorious archival footage but it does beg for a full length documentary and one soon whilst there are people still around who were touched by this incredible woman who against so many odds, achieved so much.

★★★★★★★★

WHERE DO WE GO NOW?

If we believed Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki's wonderfully preposterous concept that if all the villages in the Middle East were run by women there would by no conflicts or war at all.  In this delightful satirical tale she actually has us believe that in one such case, it is more than feasible, it's actually possible.

From the opening glorious scene when a tight group of black clad women in a set choreographed march sweep through the dusty countryside until they reach the cemetery together, you are totally engaged.  This is where all their young men are buried, and some older ones too, victims of unending and seeming pointless violence. The women now break off into groups, the Christians to their side of the cemetery, and the Muslims to the other side.

The village itself is cut off from the outside world by a ring of landmines, and most of the time the two factions of the locals live happily side by side.  Especially the women who congregate most days in a cafe run by Amale a beautiful Christian widow who  is making eyes at the handsome young Muslim man who is decorating the place, when she is not egging the  women into action  Here they gossip and strategize to keep their men from fighting.  They succeed for the most, but in the fragile peace it doesn't take much to kick-start the hot-heads into losing their tempers.  When a trouble maker sends goats into the Mosque the response is to secretly fill the Font in the church with chicken blood, and then the two religious factions in the village are at each other's throats once more.

The women almost in despair, come up with the crazy idea of importing a group of Ukrainian Hookers from a nearby big city in the hope that all their menfolk will be dazzled by their beauty (and their flesh!) and that the girls will help them come to realize that all men are the same (!) regardless of who they worship.

The plan has a real chance of working but then one of the young men is killed in an accident outside of the village and the distraught mother and female neighbors hide the body so as not to give the men an excuse to get back to killing each other.  They know the truth will out eventually and so they concoct the most ridiculous scheme to deal with this ....... that is both wonderfully funny .... and actually works.

What makes it works is the enchanting group of women with their heartwarming camaraderie that Miss Labaki has gathered together to make this totally captivating wee crowd pleaser of a movie that won the audience award at the Toronto International Film Festival last year. Miss Labaki who's previous movie was the equally wonderful 'Caramel' wrote, directed and also plays Amale : so a real labor of love for her.  

It won't solve the crisis in Lebanon, or give us World Peace, but for almost 2 hours it will make us pretend that it is actually possible.

★★★★★★★★★

DARK HORSE

In 1998 I was in my hotel room in NY checking out Village Voice when I came across news that some Distributors had disowned Todd Solonz's new movie 'Happiness'.  I'm not sure if it was the rape, pedophilia, suicide and murder or the bizarre sexual phone caller that had particularly upset them, but once I read the piece I hot-footed it down to the Angelika as fast as I could. I was totally convinced that anything that could stir up such controversy was something that I had to check out especially as I had so loved Solonz's first feature 'Welcome to the Dolls House'. 

Some 14 years later and I am a huge fan of Solonz's work.  I must profess that I don't always totally passionately love each movie, but I both thoroughly enjoy and respect them, for after all he so captures dysfunctional  characters and behaviour better than any other filmmaker.  And that is just up my street!

For his latest movie which is billed as a drama, Mr Solonz has created a rather brilliant deadpan comedy that is a somewhat compassionate tale about a couple of life's losers.  Tubby 30-year-old desperately sad Abe still lives at home with his unhinged controlling father and his irritating smothering mother who both seem to actively dislike their own son.  He also works    ostensibly as a numbers cruncher at his father's real estate developer but most of the time he just idles away daydreaming. His one act of trying to assert himself is the incongruous bright yellow Hummer he drives everywhere.

Abe meets Miranda at a Wedding and asks her out on a date after exchanging only a few words.  Well, not exactly 'exchanging' as Miranda is recovering from a recent break up  and is taking so much medication she is practically comatose.  Without the energy to refuse Abe she not only agrees to the date, but almost immediately afterwards, to marrying him too.  Even this doesn't really bolster Abe's low self esteem that much, and when he and his new fiance run into her ostentatious ex boyfriend who believes he is much better than Abe, he agrees.

The only way that the unlikeable Abe would ever be happy is in the fantasies that he has and that usually include shy retiring Maria from the Office who he imagines as a seductive man-eater who cannot keep her hands off him.

Solonz is at his best with the scenes which are excoriating uncomfortable to watch whilst at the same time extremely funny such as when Abe's dour father and exasperating mother try to make polite with Miranda's annoying parents when the families meet for the first time.  

The fascinating thing  about this  .... as with the main characters in previous Solonz's movies .... we may sympathize with Abe, but we can never actually like him.  I guess we feel part pity and part contempt.  He is one of the walking wounded .... and deeply dysfunctional ....but then, what chance did he ever have with that family.

Great cast : Jordan Gelber as Abe, Selma Blair as Miranda but it is the permanently manic Christopher Walker and the scarily odd Mia Farrow playing the parents who seem just a tad too realistically for me.

This is by no means an obviously brilliant film, but like 'Happiness' way back then, but it is one of those  movie you will not stop thinking about and mull over in your minds for some time after.

P.S.  1998 was also the same year I moved to the US and my own dysfunctional life.

★★★★★★★★

TOM WOLFE GETS BACK TO BLOOD

Now in his ‘80’s, the writer and journalist Tom Wolfe is regarded as one of America’s great literary giants. Not just highly-successful but as an ingenious self-promoter quite infamous too.  One whose works are well read and reviewed although not necessary well-regarded by all his literary peers.

In the early part of his writing career Wolfe was a journalist and in the late 1960’s was responsible for a movement that became known as  ‘New Journalism’ essentially a combination of  news writing and journalism which used literary techniques deemed unconventional at the time.

His first novel 'The Bonfire of The Vanities' was published in 1987 and was a runaway critical and commercial success and was on the NY Bestselling List for weeks and then eventually it was made into a Hollywood Blockbuster.  It cemented Wolfe’s growing reputation, and now the author in his signature white suit became a NY ‘landmark’ and national celebrity.

It took him some 11 years to publish his second novel, and 'A Man in Full' was published in 1998. The book's reception was not universally favorable, though it received glowing reviews in Time, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal and elsewhere,  and was No. 1 on the NY Times Best Selling list for 10 weeks. It wasn't just authors John Updike and Norman Mailer that disliked it, but also a great many citizens of Atlanta where the book had been set.  They had welcomed Wolfe into their homes and lives for him to do his research and then were devastated to read how he had portrayed their town. Some prominent locals viewed the novelist as a pen-wielding Gen. William T. Sherman, devastating Atlanta anew.

Now in 2012 Wolfe is about to publish his next follow up which his new publishers are reputedly paying him some $7 million for.  This time the setting is Miami …. my home  town … and when Wolfe visited the city on several different occasions he allowed filmmaker Oscar Corral to follow him around to record him doing his very thorough research.  

Wolfe met with local journalists, police (the Chief is an old friend) industrialists, art-collectors etc and he even got to meet people in the ‘hoods’ when he visited some of our sketchier areas such as Overtown.  The Mayor and Council Officers were all tripping over themselves to heap praise on Wolfe and welcome him so enthusiastically. So much so that I cannot be at all convinced that Mayor Diaz has ever actually read any of Wolfe's works but such is the nature of so much of our city, he was attracted simply by the man’s celebrity alone.

Corral‘s interesting movie gave a wonderful insight as to how this great writer starts to formulate his ideas and how by being on the ground he can authenticate them more and add essential local color. Interestingly enough what was only revealed in the Q & A after was the fact that Wolfe have covered the Cuban Revolution in 1960 for the Washington Post (for which he won an award from the Newspaper Guild) which made sense of how well he connected to Miami’s Latino community.

If anything the movie was just far too reverential and almost fawning in part : the man is very good, but he is not God after all. My worry is that when ‘Back to Blood’ is finally published later this year will all these people still be as keen on extolling Mr Wolfe’s virtues, or will they like some of Atlanta's good folks be canceling his invitations to lunch?

If you are a Wolfe fan, you'll love this.  If you are a Miamian passionate about your city, you may want to hold off a while.

P.S. I saw this at the World Premiere at 'O' Cinema but it has just been announced that PBS TV have acquired the film, so it will be on your small screen in the near future.

★★★★★★★

FOLLOW MY VOICE : WITH THE MUSIC OF HEDWIG

Back in 2003 Chris Slusarenko a record producer had the idea of getting some cutting-edge musicians to record a tribute album consisting of all the songs from 'Hedwig and The Angry Inch'.  And all the proceeds from the sales of the album would go towards helping fund the Harvey Milk School for gay, bisexual and transgendered kids in NY just as it was about become an accredited high school.

It was a great concept using the music of Hedwig's composer Stephen Trask's brilliant soundtrack being sung by these stars against a backdrop of the troubled lives of some of the teenagers it was going to help. The kids however had neither heard of John Cameron Mitchell of 'The Inch'  when he went talk about the project in one of movies very few scenes where there actually is a real connect between the project and its beneficiaries.  It was rather telling too that all of Slusarenko's rota of his personal musical idols that he cajoled and outright fawned over to perform were completely unknown to the kids whose tastes were firmly routed in more mainstream pop stars. 

The kids stories were touching and raw as they talked about all the hate they had to deal with from both their peers and their families.  What took the edge of some of these revelations was the clumsy editing juxtaposing the kids with the recording sessions that made for such a confusing visual mishmash that spoilt all the good intentions in validating the project in the first place.  The lack of a focus in the movie itself meant that the film constantly meandered all over the place,  which was irritating to say the least.

The music was unquestionably the star of the show, particularly the recording sessions with The Polyphonics, Rufus Wainwright and especially an exceptional delightful Yoko Ono. She was totally wonderful, and I had forgotten how many good songs 'The Inch' contained.

The movie was full of good intentions but unlike the very successful album, itself fell down short. Pity that, but if you want to get a hint of how good the Harvey Milk School may be, and are fan of 'The Inch' you may still want to check out this DVD.

★★★★★★