MOVIES LETTERBOXD
TOP PICK OF THE WEEK
Beau Travail With Criterion Collection’s new 4K restoration of French auteur Claire Denis’ 1999 tour de force, her already stunning imagery is enhanced to reach its full potential. Set in a French Foreign Legion camp in Djibouti, the verdant greens of soldiers’ uniforms and the vibrant blues of the Indian Ocean contrast even more brilliantly against the igneous heat of the African sun. Loosely based on Herman Melville’s novella Billy Budd, Sailor, this blistering drama focuses on former Legion officer Galoup as he reminisces about his career leading the troops. Specifically, he recalls the time a younger, stronger and more charismatic man joined the squad, consuming him with jealousy, implied to stem from his own repressed sexuality. Unafraid to probe the pressures and pitfalls of masculinity, Beau Travail, which translates as “Good Work,” argues that intensive athleticism can be both elegant and brutal. Abstract images of shirtless men relentlessly performing training rituals are rhythmic and hypnotic, yet devoid of glamorization—Denis opts to cultivate an authentic atmosphere rather than the typical propagandistic action that dominates domestic military movies. It’s why she remains one of the best working directors. NR. MIA VICINO. Cinema 21’s Virtual Theater.
BEAU TRAVAIL OUR KEY
: T H I S M O V I E I S E XC E L L E N T, O N E O F T H E B E S T O F T H E Y E A R. : T H I S M O V I E I S G O O D. W E R E C O M M E N D YO U WATC H I T. : T H I S M O V I E I S E N T E R TA I N I N G B U T F L AW E D. : T H I S M O V I E I S A P I E C E O F S H I T.
ALSO PLAYING Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets While most Oregonians haven’t set foot in their local for months, we’ve all passed that one obscure watering hole and thought, “Has this place been open the whole time?” Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets is an ode to just that kind of dive. Experimental filmmakers Bill and Turner Ross train their lenses on Las Vegas’ Roaring ’20s on its final day in business, and we meet the affable barkeeps, trauma-soaked vets, wayward youngsters and shaggy loners toasting farewell to their only sense of community, no matter that it feeds on their marginalization and addiction. The weeping, the slurred professions of love, the gallows humor, the last dances—it’s as profoundly affecting as it is authentically scuzzy, but there’s a trick afoot. The amateur performers are clearly operating from some vague script, even if they are completely plastered. The sad-bastard country soundtrack is a little too on pitch and, in fact, the interior of the bar is not even in Vegas. Winner of the True/False Film Festival’s True Vision Award, Bloody Nose waltzes at the forefront of creative cinematic nonfiction. And this premise blurs the line between fact and fiction perfectly. After all, there is no stark reality for the spiraling barfly. The tears look damn real, and they flow like swill. NR. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. On Demand.
Boys State Politics makes strange bedfellows, and as the new VOD release Boys State showcases, large-scale political simulations bring about some weird-ass dormmates. The documentary by Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine, the married couple behind 2014’s Sundancewinning The Overnighters, follows an engaging quartet—Reaganobsessed double-amputee Ben, loquacious Chicago expat Rene, hunky silver-spooner Robert, and progressive Mexican American Steven—among the 1,100 teens invited to participate in Texas’ 78th annual Boys State. Remarkably, apart from some sneering glimpses of a young Dick Cheney, Rush Limbaugh and other members of the literal old boys’ club, the camera rarely stops to relish the scenes of future policy wonks at the peak of teenage awkwardness. Considering that the documentary opens with a George Washington quote warning us about the tyranny of political parties and features spliced footage of a raccoon sifting through garbage, the filmmakers appear helplessly drawn to the nihilist joys of rooting on participants as they fashion fake platforms to sell fake campaigns for a fake governorship in a manner that is troublingly real. And while Robert’s exceedingly electable brand of swagger is surely intended as a cautionary tale, there’s no reason why natural charisma should be any worse a qualification for leadership than instinctive talents for demagoguery or manipulation. Even if this game isn’t rigged, the best players feel inherently suspect, nevertheless. PG-13. JAY HORTON. AppleTV+.
The Personal History of David Copperfield Bonk! Bonk! Bonk! Bonk! In a single scene from The Personal History of David Copperfield, David (Dev Patel) bangs his noggin four times, channeling the deliciously manic energy that director Armando Iannucci (The Death of Stalin) brings to this adaptation of Charles Dickens’ novel. Tales of orphans looking for love and profit are ripe for slick sentiment, but Iannucci amplifies the story’s comedic absurdities without sacrificing its emotional force. At 119 minutes, the film is too trim—an extra half-hour would have allowed Iannucci to more credibly chronicle David’s transformation from a child laborer in a bottling factory into a gangly yet graceful gentleman. Yet there’s no resisting the cast (especially Peter Capaldi as the merry charlatan Mr. Micawber and Ben Whishaw as the pious swindler Uriah Heep), and while Iannucci revels in the story’s goofier episodes—including the theft of a concertina from a pawnshop— he captures David’s growth with moving sincerity. “Don’t worry,” David tells his younger self in a fantasy scene. “You’ll make it through.” At a moment when too many of us are wondering if we’ll make it, that message of resilience is at once inspiring and comforting. PG. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Virtual Cinema.
She Dies Tomorrow Amy (Kate Lyn Sheil) knows for a fact she’s going to die tomorrow. She’s seen things. Heard things. She knows. Obviously, her best friend Jane (Jane Adams) doesn’t believe her at first. But then Jane begins having the same ominous visions. Now, Jane knows for a fact that she’s going to die tomorrow. As does Jane’s brother (Chris Messina) and his wife and
her friends, etc., etc. In most mainstream thrillers, we’d probably see the characters team up to fight death, but writer-director Amy Seimetz is detached from narrative convention, and her kaleidoscopic sophomore feature is, honestly, a lot less thrilling than it sounds. This is by no means a negative— it’s contemplative and challenging, harnessing dread from the fatal contagion of existentialist-fueled anxiety. In Seimetz’s neon-soaked world, death is a natural process, something to resign to instead of futilely resist. Though some viewers may find the aimless ambiguity baffling, this is a film to fully feel with all senses—to marinate in—rather than agonize over the intentional lack of logic and answers. Anxiety itself is often irrational, so this is Seimetz’s impressionistic response to that all too ubiquitous frustration. Embrace it. R. MIA VICINO. Google Play.
Martin Margiela: In His Own Words No matter how often haute couture may borrow from Hollywood imagery, the silver screen rarely flatters our more fashion-forward designers. Films about the people behind the big-name clothing labels tend to accentuate their most cartoonish eccentricities—showing so-called visionaries leaning into the silliest flourishes of their own branding with a grim determination that borders on self-parody. The same cannot be said about the new documentary Martin Margiela: In His Own Words, which examines the career of the famously private avant-garde Belgian style icon, who abruptly left his own studio after his final 2008 show. The film does present an engaging opportunity to evade Zoolandrian caricature when fleshing out a designer known for his deconstructive strategies steeped in found-object whimsy—he has
turned everything from a leather butcher’s apron to a broken dish into high fashion. And Margiela’s participation as narrator allows for thoughtful reflection and, since only his hands are shown, keeps the fashion world’s answer to Banksy wrapped in an air of mystery. However, director Reiner Holzemer never bothers to speculate how his subject’s guiding passions interrelate, resulting in a portrait that’s never quite as lively or unconventional as Margiela’s creations. For all but the most hardcore fashionista superfans, less really isn’t more this time. NR. JAY HORTON. Virtual Cinema.
Measure for Measure If you ever wanted to see a Shakespeare movie with a mass shooting, now is your chance. The Bard may have written Measure for Measure as a comedy, but director Paul Ireland has reimagined it as a grim crime flick. The film updates the story (and the dialogue) for modern-day Melbourne, where two young lovers, Jaiwara and Claudio (Megan Hajjar and Harrison Gilbertson), are wrenched apart by a false accusation. Their last hope is Duke (Hugo Weaving), a slovenly gangster whose imperious beard is matched only by his power in the Australian underworld. Weaving (who also played the sinister Agent Smith in The Matrix) is as lordly as ever, and Hajjar and Gilbertson are sweet as two kids whose towering passions belie their tender ages. Yet their performances can’t conceal the film’s failure to answer the questions about love, loyalty and religion that it raises. Jaiwara is a Muslim immigrant, but Measure for Measure callously dismisses faith as an annoying obstacle to her love life. It’s enough to make you wonder if the film believes in anything at all, or if its pretensions are as flimsy as Duke’s signature burgundy bathrobe. NR. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. On Demand.
Willamette Week SEPTEMBER 16, 2020 wweek.com
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