Tag: Digital Media

“There’s a point in Peter Pan when Peter and Wendy are pretending to be parents to the Lost Boys. Peter says, ‘Are we playing or is this real?’ Wendy says, ‘Oh it’s a game, but it’s real.’ Eventually Peter says, ‘I’m tired of playing this game, let’s play a different one.’ But that’s the reality of our lives. We’re all playing roles.”

Brian Wimer paused. I watched the co-director of the Virginia Film Festival’s center-piece movie, CLAW, and star of Faux Paws, a VFF film about two werewolf lovers on the lam, adjust my recorder on his knee. I felt acutely aware of my reporter’s posture: perched on the edge of my chair, nodding while typing.

He smiled, blue eyes bright under wild curls. “People may think that someone starring in X-Men at Regal Cinema is the actor, but no. Every one of you is a character and a role, and you have a script,” he commented.

A drama major in college, Wimer credits his philosophy in part to the surrealist Theater of Cruelty and plays by Antonin Artaud, Eugène Ionesco, and Samuel Beckett. “You’d walk away with a lot of questions,” Wimer said. “But that alternate reality on stage was somehow more vital than your own.”

More vital than the corporate life Wimer lived after college—10 years spent in advertising, developing print, TV, and radio campaigns for brands like Citibank and Snapple. “I was always looking for something different,” he said. “Advertising promotes things you don’t need. Art supplies, often for free, something that life is lacking and truly lacking.”

After a marriage to a Yugoslavian woman at the height of the Balkan Wars and time traveling overseas, Wimer discovered a new way to pull back the curtain on reality: independent filmmaking. “I don’t want to create movies that people walk out from and say ‘O.K., that was two hours of entertainment, now let’s go eat a piece of cake’,” Wimer said. “You want to create a piece of entertainment that a little bit changes their lives.”

Wimer’s features and shorts have appeared in past Virginia Film Festivals, often as part of the Adrenaline Film Project, the 72-hour filmmaking competition in which three-person teams write, cast, shoot, edit and screen films. Despite jury and audience awards for some of his Adrenaline films, however, the high profile status of CLAW at this year’s festival came, he said, as “a very welcome happy surprise.”

CLAW is a feature-length documentary that follows the growth of the Collective of Lady Arm Wrestlers from its origins in Charlottesville to 25 cities around the world. The brainchild of Wimer, photographer and filmmaker Billy Hunt, and actor and CLAW co-founder Jennifer Hoyt Tidwell, the film, like the movement, is an exercise in collaboration: shared cameras, time bank swaps, and sleeping on foreign couches.

While support networks allow independent filmmakers to create high-quality movies on relatively low budgets, collaborative direction isn’t so easy. “Us creative types often have huge egos, so it can be difficult for us to play well with others,” Wimer said. As co-directors on CLAW, Wimer and Hunt did not share aesthetics—Wimer is prone to non-sequiturs, and Hunt “is a lot more linear”—but they respected one another’s criticism and managed to agree on over five cuts of the film.

“The movie’s not perfect, but CLAW itself is not perfect. That’s part of the beauty of it. You could plan everything perfectly, but someone could break an arm.” Part philanthropy, part pageantry, and part sport, lady arm wrestling “isn’t scripted,” Wimer pointed out. “We try to keep some of that spirit in the film, of you don’t know what’s going to happen next.”

The story of CLAW’s incredible growth is one of speed bumps, personality clashes, and yes, injuries. Flour-slinging housewives, pregnant brides, and giant bananas: the free wheeling strangeness that whips crowds into frenzies made choosing a narrative “like playing Tetris or something.” Wimer and Hunt needed to analyze the themes of a women’s empowerment movement, which some participants thought two men couldn’t do, and they needed to identify the film’s antagonist. Wrestlers smack-talked and fought, of course, but they also saw CLAW as a big sisterhood. So what were the women really struggling against?

“To a certain extent it’s the state of genders today. It’s the world of men, but it’s also the stereotypes that women have allowed themselves to be stuck into,” Wimer said. “The theme that I found was women acting out against the state of the world, regardless of whose fault it is.”

“Jen [Tidwell] will talk about a fourth wave of feminism, and others will talk about what feminism means to them,” Wimer said. “But I’m not a woman. I’m a white guy in America, and I’ve kind of got it made, and seeing these women act out in this way makes me understand their position and where they want to be.”

The playful freedom of CLAW allows women to be beautiful or gross, vulgar or prim, “to tackle their own demons about what they don’t like about themselves or the limits that have been put upon them,” Wimer said. By climbing on stage, a woman can celebrate any part of herself, from her mind to her butt to her muffin top, and exalt, however briefly, in freedom.

The same sense of freedom shows in Wimer’s on-camera work. “I didn’t give him much direction and much of that was on purpose,” said Doug Bari, the writer, director, and co-star of Faux Paws. “Brian does his best work, his most vulnerable work, when he flies by the seat of his pants a little.”

After four years at work on a script written with Wimer in mind, Bari began production of the film, which follows two werewolf lovers who flee from their lycanthrope reservation to werewolf-tolerant Maine with bounty hunters in pursuit. “Brian borders on being fearless,” Bari said. “And I knew he’d do anything we wanted him to.”

Which included sleeping in glued-on wolf hair for three days. “It’s weird and amazing,” Wimer said of the film. “I don’t think people could walk away and help but think about it.”

Films like Faux Paws and movements like CLAW may owe some of their success to the Charlottesville arts scene, which Kevin O’Donnell, a singer/songwriter and supporting actor in Faux Pas called “a haven where people’s dreams can be visualized and heard.” But even though self-expression “is welcomed and encouraged in this town,” day-to-day life still reflects social norms.

“As nice as Charlottesville is, we’re still searching for another reality that is more satisfying,” Wimer said. “When you walk into a place like CLAW, for those two hours you get to behave differently. You come away going, ‘Oh wow, how do I do that? How do I get the feeling of CLAW in my life?’ And it’s tough because it’s about not accepting the roles. At age 43, I can say that most of my life has been a role-playing game, and I want to start writing the script myself.”

He glanced out the window, at the sunlight and people milling past. “What do we want the story to end up saying? Is it a happy ending? Because we’re writing it right now. We’re writing it every day.” he said. 

The red carpets are rolling out as the Virginia Film Festival returns for its twenty-sixth year. While the schedule once again offers the caliber of cinematic fare, guests, and events that have made it a local institution, this year’s line-up distinguishes itself by beefing up the local and independent offerings with more slots for undiscovered filmmakers.

“We have made a conscious decision to bring in more filmmakers who are young in their careers, but have tremendous potential to further reinforce our reputation as a festival that supports emerging talent,” said Jody Kielbasa, UVA’s vice provost of the arts and film festival director.

With something for everyone, the festival kicks off with director Alexander Payne’s acclaimed Nebraska. The film tells a haunting, darkly comic story of an estranged father (Bruce Dern) and son (Will Forte) on a bizarre journey. An award-winner at the Cannes Film Festival, Nebraska was also nominated for the prestigious Palme d’Or.

The film that beat out Nebraska for the Palme d’Or is the notoriously sexually explicit Blue is the Warmest Color, which leads this year’s contingent of foreign films. Among the outstanding dramas is Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, and on the indie side is Computer Chess, another hit on the film fest circuit.

Festival guests include producers Ron Yerxa (Nebraska, Charlie Countryman) and (UVA grad) Julie Lynn (The Face of Love), familiar faces from previous VFFs. Representing Hollywood’s golden age is Hitchcock muse Tippi Hedren, who will appear at the screening of the director’s The Birds.

As always, filmmakers in Virginia and Charlottesville are amply represented. The documentary CLAW chronicles the off-the-wall history of Charlottesville’s own Collective of Lady Arm Wrestlers. Screenwriter Matthew Jones is (locally) premiering his new thriller, A Single Shot; resident experimental film guru Kevin Everson is presenting some of his latest work; and Scott Haze, who attended school in Albemarle County, will be here for a Q&A about actor/director James Franco’s Child of God.

The large stock of documentaries includes promising titles like Our Nixon, featuring Nixon aides Dwight Chapin, John Ehrlichman, and H.R. Haldeman’s pre-Watergate home movies of the ousted president. Producer Brian Frye and Governor Gerald Baliles will be on hand to oversee the proceedings. The popular Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction chronicles the life and career of the unforgettable character actor/singer.

The festival will screen only a handful of classics, with a major highlight being Douglas Sirk’s subversive All That Heaven Allows starring Rock Hudson. The centennial of comic Danny Kaye’s birth will be commemorated with his beloved family-friendly medieval farce, The Court Jester, and influential animator Ray Harryhausen, who died earlier this year, is memorialized with his Saturday-matinee fantasy favorite, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad.

This is only a sampling of the celluloid marvels set to unspool in our darkened theaters this week. Check out the schedule at virginiafilmfestival.org, and don’t you dare leave your cell phone on.—Justin Humphreys

Choice cuts: Best bets for your film festival docket  

All That Heaven Allows

Douglas Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows is perhaps the quintessential example of the genre somewhat pejoratively referred to as the “housewife melodrama.” Years of reassessment by queer and feminist film directors and critics have rehabilitated the reputation of the genre in general, and Sirk’s work in particular (his other notables include Written on the Wind and Imitation of Life). It’s impossible to imagine the work of Rainer Werner Fassbinder without such films, and Todd Haynes’ 2002 award-winner Far From Heaven is practically a re-make of Sirk’s original. Like the best of the genre, All That Heaven Allows utilizes lush, classic lighting and cinematography to dramatize internal conflict. In this case, widow Jane Wyman’s affair with her gardener Rock Hudson meets the disapproval of her upper-class peers. While the drama is heightened somewhat by what we now know of the stars’ personal lives (Wyman’s failed early marriage to Ronald Reagan and Hudson’s closeted homosexuality), there’s more than enough repressed angst onscreen already. (November 10)—James Ford

Blue is the Warmest Color 

If you’ve heard about Blue is the Warmest Color, you know it’s filled with long, explicit lesbian sex scenes. (If not, you’ve just been told.) You should also know it’s one of the most honest portrayals of a young person’s life ever put on film. In its three-hour running time, we follow Adèle as she slowly comes out (to herself, but not her family), finds love (and nearly obsession), and makes a life as a young professional.

And we see every aspect of Adèle’s life, from the way she thinks to the way she eats to the way she sleeps (alone and with Emma, played by Lea Seydoux), to the way she handles her first job. There are countless beautiful scenes, but for my money, its best expression of human emotion is watching Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos), a teacher, dance with her kindergartners at a school function, as she tries not to burst into tears after a particularly messy break-up. Blue is the Warmest Color is wonderful, and a must-see. (November 9)—David Riedel

CLAW

When it first began, in the back room of the Blue Moon Diner in February of 2008, few would have dreamed that CLAW would go so far. At first, Charlottesville Lady Arm Wrestlers was merely a fun idea that caught on quickly—women in absurd costumes matching muscles to raise money for charity.

Within three months the crowd had grown so large it had to be moved to the parking lot behind the diner—and now, five years later, it’s become a legitimate pheno-menon known as the Collective of Lady Arm Wrestlers, with chapters sprouting up around the country. Charlottesville-based photographer Billy Hunt (known for his fun, high-concept portraiture) was there from the beginning, and together with local director Brian Wimer, he’s made the definitive document of the CLAW movement. In addition to a fascinating peek into a subculture that’s allowed women to re-frame their identities and overturn the traditional attitudes towards feminine roles, you can also expect absurdity, spectacle, drunken revelry, and a few broken bones. (November 9)—James Ford

Computer Chess 

The novelty of Computer Chess’ look isn’t the point—it was shot with retrofitted Sony AVC-3260 tube cameras—but it goes a long way in making you feel as if you’re in 1980. We join a group of programmers in an unnamed city at a cheap hotel for a convention showcasing their latest and greatest creations: computers that can play chess against other computers. The computer that wins will face Henderson (Gerald Peary), a human player who’s never lost to a machine.

The characters are people we’ve come across at some point in our lives, and the beauty of Computer Chess is that they’re great with machines but terrible with each other. Much of the comedy is derived watching Peter (Patrick Riester) try to interact with people, including a couple that wants to involve him in a threesome. There’s also Papageorge (Myles Paige), an officious programmer who loses his hotel room and spends the bulk of his time trying to find a place to sleep in a hotel filled, inexplicably, with cats. Watch for an excellent Wiley Wiggins—the kid who grabbed his nose a lot in Dazed and Confused—as a programmer looking for deeper meaning in the circuits. (November 7)—David Riedel

The Deflowering of Eva van End

Director Michiel ten Horn and his co-writer, Anne Barnhoorn, take from Wes Anderson, add cruelty (albeit mild cruelty), and let the perfectly staged cameras roll. How else can one describe the shot compositions, which are expertly planned and executed, and the increasingly outlandish behavior of the participants? In fact, it feels like it has a touch of Todd Solondz thrown in, too.

The Deflowering of Eva van End is a satire, albeit a breezy one, of married life, school, the suburbs, and contemporary notions of beauty. Eva (Vivian Dierickx) is a miserable teenager, an outcast, and from the looks of it, she doesn’t like herself much.

When she brings German exchange student Veit (Rafael Gareisen) home, her family is shocked. Soon after, beautiful Veit—as his character must in a movie like this—starts to have a profound effect on everyone. Eva, who spends most of her time as the audience surrogate, ends up in bed with Veit (that’s not a spoiler—it’s the title of the movie).

There are other films about strangers coming to town and sparking change, from Pasolini’s Teorema to Hal Ashby’s Being There, and while The Deflowering of Eva van End doesn’t break new ground in the story department, its visuals are sharp, with tight editing and camera work, and there’s excellent production and costume design. And it has a happyish ending. (November 8)—David Riedel

I Used to Be Darker

At what point do we put away childish things and live as adults? For Bill (Charlottesville’s Ned Oldham), that’s now. For his soon-to-be-ex-wife, Kim (Kim Taylor), that’s later. It’s not entirely fair to pigeonhole either of them in such a manner, and director Matthew Porterfield and his co-writer Amy Belk do well to show Bill and Kim as complete, difficult people at crossroads in their lives.

Further complicating things is the unannounced arrival of Taryn (Deragh Campbell), Kim’s niece, who’s run away from her home in Northern Ireland and found them in Baltimore. The camera gives the actors plenty of room and there’s great music, with a standout performance by Taylor. Campbell and Oldham are also excellent. (November 8)—David Riedel

If We Shout Loud Enough

For 10 years, the Baltimore band Double Dagger made obnoxious, yet infectious, art-punk, gaining notoriety for its live shows, which were frequently provocative and occasionally very good. Its secret weapon, and possible recipe for success, is that the band members all had day jobs as graphic designers (the name comes from a term from typography), and its show posters, album covers, and T-shirts were all impeccably designed, frequently outshining the music contained within. Though the group called it quits in 2011 (there was an ill-attended yet memorable stop here in town on the final tour), a new documentary about the band is bringing more attention than ever. If We Shout Loud Enough uses the band’s members, and its music, as a window into the passionate world of underground DIY music. The director will be on hand for a Q&A following the screening. (November 7)—James Ford

Kevin Everson’s Short Films

Though most locals know him as UVA’s film professor, Kevin Everson is a well-established and widely admired filmmaker in his own right. A regular on the international art and film festival circuits, Everson is alarmingly prolific, cranking out dozens of films and videos per year, that range from quick, conceptual shorts to full-length experiments. They often examine multiple facets of African-American culture in ways that are clever, conceptually rigorous, and cinematically engaging. His 2011 feature Erie was one of the single best works screened at the Virginia Film Festival in recent years, and this year’s 50-minute program of short films will showcase selections from Everson’s short works. (November 8)—James Ford

Le Joli Mai

When Chris Marker passed away last year, he left behind a unique and wide-ranging body of work that continues to be admired and treasured by film lovers around the world. A unique mixture of essay film, political documentary, fictional construction, and cinematic poetry, his films are difficult to describe or classify but even harder to ignore. 1963’s Le Joli Mai is a two-and-a-half hour portrait of Marker’s hometown of Paris at the end of France’s war in Algeria. The film is being shown for the first time in U.S. theaters to celebrate its 50th anniversary. (November 8)—James Ford

Museum Hours

Filmmaker Jem Cohen may be best known for his work with musicians—he shot Document, the Fugazi documentary, as well as the unforgettable Benjamin Smoke and a handful of classic music videos—but his broad body of work stretches well beyond that, from the gorgeous hand-crafted lo-fi snapshot experimental films he’s been making for decades to his narrative cuts. In recent features like Chain, he’s controversially upturned traditional distinctions between fiction and non-fiction styles, creating confusing yet insightful films that at first appear to be unusually intimate documentaries before gradually revealing themselves to be carefully staged stories. Museum Hours tells the tale of a relationship between an art museum security guard and one of the museum’s visitors. Shot in Vienna, the film reportedly contains copious footage of classic works of art, lovingly photographed. (November 10).—James Ford

A Single Shot

Sam Rockwell is one of the best actors working today. Wholeheartedly and unselfconsciously committing himself to projects both inspired and tragically flawed—even if the film he appears in is sub-par (and they often are). Rockwell is always a captivating presence, portraying sympathetic and foolhardy schlubs with remarkable subtlety and range. He stars alongside equally dependable actors William H. Macy and Jeffrey Wright in the new film A Single Shot, a promising neo-noir thriller with a wintry setting that recalls Fargo, A Simple Plan, and the recent Thin Ice. (November 9)—James Ford

Last year’s HBO film The Girl depicted the relationship between Alfred Hitchcock, the master of suspense, and his discovery of Tippi Hedren, who went under contract with Hitch in 1961 and starred in his films The Birds and Marnie.

The movie revealed the director’s obsessive desire to control and seek favor from his “ice cool blonde” leading ladies, a set secret that was revealed when Hedren spoke out for the first time in 1983.

Hedren’s film success dwindled after falling out of favor with Hitchcock, and she blames his extensive control for “ruining her career.” In the ’80s, Hedren turned her focus to animal rescue and founded the Shambala Preserve at her home in the California desert.

Hedren will appear at the Virginia Film Festival’s screening of The Birds on November 8 at the Paramount. She spoke with C-VILLE Weekly by phone about Hitchcock, The Birds, and her love of big cats.

With a slight wink toward an attraction to danger, she set the scene when she answered the phone, “I’m looking out at three beautiful tigers in front of my house,” said Hedren. “Behind a fence, however.”

How did you get the name Tippi?

My father gave it to me. My baptismal name is Nathalie Kay Hedren, and he thought that was too much, so he started calling me Tupsa, a Swedish term of endearment. It went from Tupsa to Tips to Tippi. I’ve never been called Nathalie.

Hitchcock discovered you, groomed you, then cast you in The Birds.

Yes, I was a fashion model with Eileen Ford in New York for years [before].

You’ve made it known that the attic scene was the worst part of filming The Birds. What was your favorite scene? 

The [attic scene] was exhausting. My favorite scene was at the very beginning of the flim with Rod Taylor, when we were in the pet store. It was just fun, and flirty.

Did the cast take you under its wing?

They were fabulous to me—all of them. They were consummate actors, and The Birds was my first film. Then, of course I had Alfred Hitchcock as my drama coach.

The relationship took a dark turn.

Yes, unfortunately.

Did he ever admit to or apologize for his obsessive behavior towards you?

Never. Never. It’s really a horrible situation because when somebody has an obsession, it’s a mental situation. I’m sure it’s unbearable for the person that has the obsession and the person who is the object.

Did you become friends or compare notes with other Hitchcock actresses? 

Yes. Kim Novak. Nobody ever talked about it. Nobody ever did, until I did.

I believe I am the one who broke the silence. This was happening even when he made the silent films. It was happening with an actress named Anny Ondra. It was terrible because his wife had just given birth to Patricia, and he started with an obsession.

When was the last time you spoke with Hitchcock?

When I was doing The Countess of Hong Kong in London. The studio wanted me to have a meeting with Mr. Hitchcock and Alma. It was a very uncomfortable time, and I don’t know what the purpose of it was, except for publicity.

What did you think of Sienna Miller’s portrayal of you in The Girl?

I think she did a fabulous job. The film turned out to be very honest. They did me the favor of asking me to be involved with the writing of the script. It’s a very true story.

How did you feel about your daughter becoming an actress after your own difficult experience? 

I felt kind of surprised because Melanie [Griffith] had seen me. It’s not an easy job. You’re always looking for work, and you’re talked about. I would’ve never thought about telling her ‘you need to be a doctor.’

I think you need to give everyone a chance to do what they want to do, in whatever their interests are.

Have you returned to Bodega Bay?

I go back to Bodega Bay often. I was just there on Labor Day. I stay in the area where the film [The Birds] was made. It’s kind of like going back in my life to a very important life-changing event. It’s so much fun to sign autographs, and meet the tourists coming to the area. When they find out that the actress from the film is there, it becomes a huge event.

How do you feel about a remake of The Birds?

I hear that often, I hope it doesn’t happen. I hope they don’t do it because anytime a Hitchcock film has been copied, it never works. With all of the special effects that exist now, it would be an extravaganza, and the story is what’s interesting here.

You live on the Shambala Preserve and have rescued many big cats. How did this come about?

I did two films in Africa in ’69 and ’70. Environmentalists there were telling us that we needed to create awareness and save these animals. So we looked around, and the answer came quickly when we went on a photo safari in Mozambique.

We came across a house that had been abandoned by a game warden. A pride of lion had moved in and they were sitting in the windows, napping on the veranda, cubs playing. It was absolutely gorgeous.

When we went to shoot the movie [Roar with then-husband Noel Marshall], we were going to use Hollywood “acting” animals, but they said it couldn’t work because of the number of cats together, so we used our own animals. The first one was a rescue, and it went on. In the ’80s we had 150 big cats, and we have rescued close to 250 big cats over all these years.

I know these animals so well, and I don’t understand why there aren’t federal laws against the breeding for pets or financial gain.

Which was more dangerous, the lions or Hitchcock? 

I can’t even compare. The animals are much more honest. (laughs)