The Scarlet Blade

Writer/Director: John Gilling

A zombie-like performance from Jack Hedley is the only hint that The Scarlet Blade originates from the legendary Hammer Film Productions. Released on DVD for the first time, this English Civil War adventure is notable mainly for the presence of Oliver Reed, who brings a much-needed air of menace to the proceedings.

We’re all familiar with the stirring adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel during the Reign of Terror. But the premise of The Scarlet Blade (originally released in the US as The Crimson Blade) is that Edward Beverley (Hedley) was engaged in similar acts of derring-do more than 100 years earlier. He’s the son of a stalwart Royalist family that has been harbouring the fugitive King Charles I and guiding his followers to safety. When the story begins in 1648, Roundheads led by Colonel Judd (Lionel Jeffries) have just commandeered Beverly Manor. Edward’s father is murdered after he refuses to betray his monarch or his principles.

As the Scarlet Blade and his merry men continue their guerrilla campaign, Judd’s doe-eyed daughter Claire (June Thorburn) becomes a co-conspirator. Of course she falls hopelessly in love with the man who is top of her father’s Most Wanted list. Judd’s right-hand man Captain Sylvester (Reed) soon joins her cause, though he’s driven more by lust than altruism.

The Scarlet Blade has more than enough dramatic potential to fill its brief 80-minute running time. Unfortunately, writer/director John Gilling (The Plague of the Zombies) fails to capitalise on the love triangle or the unfolding clash of political loyalties, and the sprinkling of action scenes don’t stir the blood either.

The script is notable for an over-reliance on lines like “Can I trust you?” or (ominously) “I’m placing my trust in you”, as the characters struggle with shifting allegiances. The casting doesn’t help either, with Hedley and Thorburn (who tragically died in 1967) failing to generate any chemistry — romantic or otherwise. By contrast, Reed smoulders as the ambitious and completely smitten Sylvester, who hopes to win Claire’s heart by barging into her bedroom. But should she trust a man who tosses out such corny chat-up lines as “I’d change my coat for you any day”?

From the opening strains of Gary Hughes’s jaunty score you know we’re closer to Robin Hood territory here than the dark, twisted and sickeningly violent world of The Witchfinder General. Of course it’s unfair to compare this routine action flick with Michael Reeves’s masterpiece, which was released four years later.

The Scarlet Blade is definitely not a horror film, though a schlockier approach might have made it a lot more fun to watch. Unintentional humour is provided by the hero’s gypsy sidekick Pablo (Michael Ripper), who during one raid camouflages himself behind what looks like a giant Christmas wreath.

Elsewhere, Pablo’s wardrobe choices include a psychedelic patterned shirt and leather jerkin that look more 1960s than 1640s. Sylvester’s flashing eyes and saturnine good looks are much better served by his breastplate and red tunic — though wearing his heart on his sleeve does prove a costly mistake.

(The Scarlet Blade is released on Region 2 DVD by Studiocanal on 16 January 2012.)
- Susannah Straughan

Filmgoers may not know the name of London-based designer Sam Ashby, but they’ve probably seen his work. He created the posters for acclaimed independent releases like Archipelago, A Prophet and Weekend, British director Andrew Haigh’s microbudget gay romance. A keen cinephile, he embarked on an ambitious side project in 2010, with Little Joe (“a magazine about queers and cinema mostly”). The third issue went on sale this month, and covers a diverse range of film-makers, from underground figures like George Kuchar, to Ken Russell and Terence Davies. He spoke to me about some of his recent projects and his preference for print, in a marketplace dominated by all things digital.

Who or what gave you the impetus to become a designer?

My father is an architect, so I think I spent a long time running away from design and not wanting to follow in his footsteps. I always wanted to try something different and for a while design was too close. I left university having done a theory course (art history essentially) and I then spent a year twiddling my thumbs. I tried to get into film production and eventually found my way into a film company [Empire Design, based in central London] that was producing posters and doing trailers. I got very interested in the poster side.

Did you start out working on campaigns for mainstream films?

Empire was mainstream, but it also had a very good ethos that was all about good clean design. I really loved what they were doing. I was just a runner for 8 months, delivering packages and making tea. But I did spend a lot of time hanging out with the designers, asking them annoying questions. That’s basically where I learned what I do. Then when I left I asked them for two weeks’ work experience and they gave me one, in the design studio! So I did a few posters and it turned out I was quite good.

What was your first poster design?

It used to be on my website. It was for Breakfast on Pluto [Neil Jordan’s 2005 comedy drama with Cillian Murphy as the flamboyant Patrick “Kitten” Braden]. I’m not even sure whether they ever sent it to the film company, but it was in our portfolio and I think it got some good comments. It’s one of my favourites.

Now that you have your own company [Sam Ashby Studio], how does the commissioning process work?

It depends on the level you’re going for. Most of time you’re working with UK film distributors. Then there’s a whole other section of the industry which is the sales side and they’re trying to sell to distributors at markets like Cannes. So there you’re working for the sales agents who produce the films. In those cases the film is often not even finished, so as a designer you’re working with minimal tools. For most part, though, it’s distributors and we’d normally be pitching against one or two other studios.

Do designers usually rely on looking at trailers and stills, or is it important to have seen the whole film when you start work on a campaign?

I always see the films. I’m trying to distil an entire film into one image. But I don’t know about others. Book jacket designers don’t always read the books!

Andrew Haigh’s Weekend was different though, because the posters were developed from the work of photographers Quinnford + Scout (http://www.quinnfordandscout.eu/weekend/). How did you get involved?

I’m a friend of the director Andrew Haigh. I worked with him on Greek Pete, which was his first film. We did three versions of the poster for the festival release, all based heavily on the photographs by Quinnford + Scout. Andrew was very inspired by their work and tried to carry it over into the production design and cinematography. I don’t know how much my work was tied up with the film’s success at the 2011 SXSW (South by Southwest) Festival, but I remember Andrew saying people were asking to buy the posters even then. When the film got picked up in UK by Peccadillo Pictures, they wanted to do something different. Initially I was quite reluctant, but in the end we went with a design that tells more of a story, which they felt they had to do. I’m much happier with original posters.

How frustrating is it to see your pristine design concepts buried under lots of poster quotes and star ratings?

It’s something I get very angry about. With Weekend in particular I had real wrestling match with them over quotes. I felt I had a beautiful balanced composition and then they wanted to throw loads of quotes at it. So my job now as a poster designer is to shoehorn in loads of superfluous quotes and try and make it look nice. Sometimes you get companies who are brave enough to go for quad poster with maybe just one quote. Sometimes I have to tell myself you’re in advertising, you’re not an artist! Though I like to think there is still a level of artistry in what I do.

How did you approach designing new posters for this year’s four classic Ealing Studios releases [Whisky Galore!, Went the Day Well?, Kind Hearts & Coronets and The Lavender Hill Mob]?

People who know those films can see that I’ve cherry-picked ideas from different versions. So Whisky Galore! has previously used the idea of a giant bottle. This time instead of being bigger than an entire island, it’s a giant, surreal washed-up bottle. Went the Day Well? is referencing a propaganda poster from the 1940s, but maybe it’s one of the more idealistic countryside visions of England. The one I was least happy with was the tree motif for Kind Hearts & Coronets, because there was so much referencing of different posters. I’ll be doing some more Ealing re-releases next year and I’m working on some older films for the BFI, including [Terrence Malick’s] Days of Heaven. I’ve just done Meet Me in St Louis, which was fun!

What do you think is the main challenge of designing for independent releases, as opposed to blockbusters and franchise movies?

Well, something like the Twilight campaign would be challenging for my Photoshop skills! Unfortunately the nature of the market now is that smaller films are still struggling to do well. Marketing people seem to be taking a lead from the mainstream cinema and trying to appeal to as many people as possible. They think they have to spoon feed audiences because people will always just go with what’s familiar. So comedy posters always end up looking white, with big, bold red type . . . It makes my job quite frustrating to see that nice ideas still get watered down even within this smaller, art house market.
How successful are you at striking that balance between commercialism and art house with your designs?

There are definitely concepts I’ve pitched for posters where I felt I toed a very good line between the two camps – only to see the final product being completely for the mainstream. I feel I did perhaps my best ever work on a pitch for We Need to Talk About Kevin – it almost made it through. I used same font [as the final version], because it’s the one that’s used in the film, but in a much more interesting way. My design was playing off the mirroring and the idea that she [Kevin’s mother Eva, played by Tilda Swinton] sees herself in him. It’s the conceit of the film, which I think they weren’t prepared to deal with because they just wanted it to sell on the name.

What about the impact of digital technology – do you ever use a pencil?

Yes, often I’ll sketch drawings that look similar to my final concept. I like to have one stage in the “real” world — it helps develop the composition. I’m working now on the designs for Soda Pictures’ new documentary about WG Sebald, which is based on the path he took for The Rings of Saturn. There I have a clear concept of how I want it to look and I’ll do variations on that central idea. I don’t think digital has made people lazy, though. If anything, it’s had a democratising effect — there are just so many different areas you can design for now.

There are websites and blogs catering for all cinematic tastes, so why launch Little Joe as a limited edition film magazine?

That’s a very good question and one I’m still struggling to understand. I design for print essentially. I’m not interested in designing for online. When it came to my own project it was always going to be a physical object. I’d always wanted to do a magazine; it was just a question of what it would be about. At one point I wanted to do an architecture ‘zine, but when we finally came up with Little Joe it was such a clear quick idea, that it just stuck.

Did you read a lot of magazines when you were growing up?

I grew up at same time as the internet, but there were no online magazines and no iPads. I was growing up with The Face and i-D. I was completely obsessed with magazines as a child. I would pull out whole pages and create wallpaper for my room from images I found in magazines. My bathroom wall is still plastered with images from The Face.

Is there a theme for Issue 3 of Little Joe?

The whole issue is bookended by loss. George Kuchar [who features on the cover and is interviewed by Ed Halter] died in September as we were planning. Then Ken Russell died just as we were going to press. So the issue itself is dark and preoccupied with death in some ways, but I think it’s also a forward thinking issue compared with the previous two, which were quite nostalgic. I’ve also written for this one. It’s the first time I’ve presented my own work (other than design). I did interviews with [Tomboy director] Céline Sciamma and with Andrew Haigh. I also wrote an essay on Derek Jarman’s sets for The Devils.

How do you see the magazine developing?

This is a labour of love and seeing how people have responded has been incredible. The fact that we’ve doubled our print run each time proves that there is a need for it. [Issue 3 is a run of 1,000 copies.] Next year we’re also doing a monthly screening programme in London. One month it will be at the Rio in Dalston and the next month it will be at the Cinema Museum in Kennington.

Are there any contributors on your “wish list” for future issues?

I’d love to get Todd Haynes and Tilda Swinton. But I like the idea of people you wouldn’t expect and who are not necessarily related to film. I’d also like to talk to Madonna about all her strange film choices!

Little Joe No. 3 is out now and is available from www.littlejoemagazine.com

Susannah Straughan

Follow Susannah Straughan on Twitter: www.twitter.com/susannah63

Throughout November, SOS staffers will be discussing the movies that made them into film fanatics.

(click here for the full list)

Sunset Blvd.

Directed by Billy Wilder

Written by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder

1950 – USA

You must remember this. For me the love affair with movies began with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall and a world of smoke, cynicism and smouldering looks. I discovered a copy of Joe Hyams’ biography, Bogart and Bacall, while I was working at my local library around 1980. Obsessing over Hollywood’s most famous May-December romance soon led me to the black and white movies of the 40s, and many late nights watching Hawks, Huston, Curtiz and Billy Wilder.

I don’t know exactly when I first saw Wilder’s Sunset Blvd., but it was about 30 years ago and I have revisited it regularly. The film was significant because for the first time I felt a strong connection with the director rather than the stars of the film. I’d already seen some of Wilder’s comedies, but Gloria Swanson and William Holden weren’t familiar faces in the way that Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau were. So I didn’t grasp the cruel irony of casting a real star of the silent era in the role of the deluded Norma Desmond, or turning “Golden Boy” William Holden into her gigolo.

I came to Sunset Blvd. at a time when I’d already begun to immerse myself in film noir. Wilder and his co-writers Charles Bracket and DM Marshman Jr were using many of the tropes of that genre — voiceover, flashback, a femme fatale and an increasingly desperate antihero. But clearly this wasn’t a conventional crime yarn in the mould of the peerless Double Indemnity. It does begin with a corpse floating in a swimming pool, but if Holden’s Joe Gillis is guilty of anything here, it is offences against screenwriting.

In the early 80s I pored over William Bayer’s The Great Movies, a contentious and now very dated selection of 60 films from the history of cinema. Categories like “Cinema of Personal Expression” went a bit over my head at the time, but I was drawn to the section on “Films About Films”. Sunset Blvd. is listed there, along with All About Eve, The Bad and the Beautiful, Contempt and 8 1/2. I was desperate to see all of them. I may not have known Erich von Stroheim from Cecil B De Mille, but I did grasp that Wilder’s take on the movie industry was replete with what Bayer calls “self-hatred and cynicism”. As a teenager I found those qualities much more appealing than sentimentality or Technicolor glamour.
Even if you know nothing about movie history Sunset Blvd. is a compelling, witty and sometimes macabre cautionary tale about an “Ordinary Joe” who just can’t catch a break. But it acquires additional resonance for budding cinephiles prepared to do a little research. Wilder’s lacerating vision of the Hollywood Dream Factory is even starker when you know that von Stroheim, who plays Norma’s butler, directed Swanson in films like Queen Kelly and The Wedding March. Then there are those “waxworks” from the silent era who play bridge with Norma — including the “Great Stone Face” himself, Buster Keaton.

Sunset Blvd. has continued to fascinate and educate me because in some ways it feels like an underrated film. I know that’s an odd thing to say about a title that was made by a major studio (Paramount), picked three Oscars, and has enjoyed numerous re-releases and retrospectives. But it was Joseph L Mankiewicz’s All About Eve that beat Wilder’s film to the biggest prizes at the 1951 Academy Awards. The bitchy drama about a Broadway star (Bette Davis) who is outmanoeuvred by a younger rival (Anne Baxter), garnered a record 14 nominations and won six awards, including best picture.

It’s probably taken me 30 years ago to appreciate how wrong those Oscar voters were. While Mankiewicz’s film has a sparkling screenplay and some memorable set pieces it is not, in my view, a great piece of cinema. Sunset Blvd. boasts magnificent photography by John F Seitz, with Franz Waxman’s eerie score enhancing the otherworldly mood that hangs over Norma’s decaying mansion. But that claustrophobia is relieved by scenes in which Joe romances Betty and Norma makes a futile trip back to the Studio. Though we know it’s building towards a tragic ending, Sunset Blvd. maintains an element of suspense, right up until Norma’s dramatic final descent into madness.

Billy Wilder made great films before and after Sunset Blvd. and at least one — Ace in the Hole — that is arguably even more cynical. But this is the movie that really piqued my interest in all aspects of cinema and made me want to watch it again and again.

- Susannah Straughan

The Monk (Le Moine)

Directed by Dominik Moll

Written by Dominik Moll and Anne-Louise Trividic, from the novel by Matthew Lewis

France, 2011

Dominik Moll’s The Monk is so redolent with Gothic gloom, overweening piety and suppressed lust that it’s almost in danger of self-combusting. It’s held together by a towering performance from Vincent Cassel, who recently played French gangster Jacques Mesrine, and seems to exude menace without even trying.

From the moment a baby is left to be pecked by crows outside a Capuchin monastery in Spain, you know we’re in very dark territory. Despite an ominous birthmark on his shoulder, the unfortunate boy is taken in and raised by the monks. Ambrosio grows up to be a man of unimpeachable virtue and religious zeal and a beacon of hope for worshippers like beautiful young Antonia (Joséphine Japy). But things start to unravel when Ambrosio ignores the misgivings of his brothers and allows a masked and (supposedly) disfigured young novice into the community.

I hadn’t even heard of Matthew Lewis’s 1796 novel before I saw this film. It seems that Moll (Lemming, Harry, He’s Here to Help) and co-writer Anne-Louise Trividic had a mammoth task on their hands trying to condense all the characters and subplots into a coherent 100-minute package. So while Moll keeps the action moving along here, there are times when you can’t see how the various strands will fit together. A storyline involving a pregnant nun reveals the utter ruthlessness of both the abbess (Geraldine Chaplin) and Ambrosio. The wholesome romance between sweet, virginal Antonia and the lovestruck Lorenzo is conducted in sunlit exteriors that provide a visual counterpoint to the decaying atmosphere of the monastery.

I won’t reveal the identity of the mask-wearing Valerio, but if you’re familiar with the cast list you may well figure out the secret by process of elimination. This character is the key to Ambrosio’s transition from a man of God to an instrument of the Devil. Perhaps the monk was always fated to do evil because of the circumstances of his birth. You can detect a certain ambivalence in the very first scene in which he listens to the shocking sexual misdeeds of one of his penitents. But the forces of darkness that seem to leach from every one of those hideous gargoyles, finally coalesce in the slight figure of Valerio. The scenes in which Ambrosio is first poisoned and then seduced in a feverish, dream-like episode, are among the most disturbing in the film.

There’s little in the way of explicit violence or sex in The Monk — until the final scenes. But by then Ambrosio’s physical and psychological torments — blinding headaches, visions of a woman in red — have been so exhaustively chronicled that you fear the worst. Despite some of the more lurid moments — Ambrosio bangs a crown of thorns into his own head — Cassel evokes pity as a man torn apart by forces he can’t control.

Luis Buñuel planned to direct a version of Lewis’s novel back in the 60s. (He abandoned it to make Belle de Jour, but his screenplay with Jean-Claude Carrière was later used for Adonis Kyrou’s 1972 version.) Given his extraordinary track record of combining anti-Catholic themes with elements of surrealism I’m sorry we never got to see his full vision. I suspect there would have been a streak of dark humour there, too.

Moll’s film is beautifully shot by Patrick Blossier, contrasting the arid Madrid locations by day with the forbidding exterior of the monastery and its grounds at night. Despite the nature of the story, the performances are comparatively restrained. Cassel and Déborah François are particularly impressive as characters veering between outward spirituality and all-consuming carnality. So immerse yourself in the world of The Monk – with all its bells, smells and candles — and don’t worry too much about who’s winning the eternal battle between good and evil.

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

Hunky Dory

Director: Marc Evans

Writer: Laurence Coriat

If Marc Evans’ Hunky Dory is anything to go by, the long hot summer of 1976 was a lot more exciting in South Wales than in North London. My memories are mainly of drought warnings, parched lawns and Bjorn Borg winning Wimbledon. But this movie about a school production of The Tempest throws in everything from lazy afternoons at the lido, to skinheads and a spot of arson. In between there’s an awful lot of Minnie Driver. Hunky Dory has its heart in the right place, but does outstay its welcome by a good 20 minutes.

Driver plays Viv May, the inspirational and aspirational drama teacher at a Swansea secondary school. A former actress, her ambitions have now turned to staging a musical that blends Bowie and the Bard. With her Pre-Raphaelite locks, diaphanous frocks and progressive attitudes, Viv makes enemies in the staff room. The kids lend strong support — when they’re not fighting, flouncing out of rehearsals, or falling for the wrong person.

As high-school hunk Davey, Aneurin Barnard has the dark good looks and impressive vocal range that leave most of Glee’s Auto-Tuned moppets in the shade. Davey’s mum has buggered off to Porthcawl and his love for the sultry Stella (Danielle Branch) is unrequited, but you just know that the twinkly Miss May will kiss it better for him. Darren Evans is also impressive as Kenny, reluctant Caliban and the world’s least intimidating skinhead.

Your enjoyment of Hunky Dory will probably depend on your willingness to succumb to yet another slice of 70s nostalgia. With the BBC currently ploughing through the Top of the Pops back catalogue, it does feel as though 1976 has been done to death recently. But writer Laurence Coriat, who tackled the same era in Me Without You, has managed to bottle some of the sights, sounds and smells, without succumbing to kitsch. Admittedly there is a lot of swearing (mainly good-natured), but some of his dialogue sparkles. Viv locks horns and trades insults with authoritarian social studies teacher Miss Valentine (a starchy Haydn Gwynne). “Self-expression won’t butter the parsnips” retorts the rugby coach when Viv tries to justify her rather lax attitude to disciplining the budding thespians.

This movie has an authentically tatty feel to it — from the grim solitude of the local phone box, to the Chinese fish ‘n’ chip shop and the melon balls Davey’s dad buys for his new freezer. It’s just a shame that the flat and grainy-looking photography doesn’t do justice to the occasional glimpses of Welsh landscape.

My favourite high-school movie, which is also set in 1976, is Richard Linklater’s fabulously anarchic Dazed and Confused. That film put the focus solely on the students and I think Hunky Dory would have done better to restrict Driver to a supporting role here. Her Welsh accent is not bad, it’s just that she looks more Southern California than South Wales to me, and Viv’s efforts to ingratiate herself with the students feel increasingly implausible.

If you’re expecting the usual musical offerings from the likes of Roxy Music and Marc Bolan, you may be pleasantly surprised. Hearing these talented kids covering Nick Drake’s Cello Song and The Byrds’ Everybody’s Been Burned, I was reminded that there is life outside the walls of McKinley High School.

- Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

The lady from the BBC World Service was very persistent. Nanni Moretti had just spent more than an hour talking to us about his new film, We Have a Pope/Habemus Papam, and he was late for a Gala Screening. Now she wanted him to autograph her DVD of Dear Diary and a T-shirt for her daughter. I left before the weary-looking writer/director could be asked to inscribe his name on any of her body parts.

I knew that Moretti conducts his English-language interviews through a translator and that he likes to be very thorough. Most of his 20 films have a comic tone, but the man who has often been compared to Woody Allen takes his profession and his politics very seriously.

His latest film We Have a Pope is pure fiction, though some hard-liners seem to regard any attempt to make a film about the papacy as verging on heresy. Moretti said he did have some concerns about including stock footage from the funeral of John Paul II near the beginning of the movie. He didn’t want people to think that Melville (the character played by Michel Piccoli) was supposed to be based on Cardinal Ratzinger. In the end he decided that the pictures of the coffin were so iconic that they should stay in.

Though I’m one of those who expected this film to reflect the controversies that have tarnished the Church’s image, I can see now why Moretti chose a different route. He pointed out that as soon as the film was announced, critics had made up their minds — based on their entirely imagined idea of its offensive content. But while his portrait of jolly, volleyball-loving cardinals may not be realistic, he maintained it was the less easy path to show a pope who chooses renunciation. He admitted that the image of the empty balcony, which was one of his starting points for the movie, was one that believers would find disconcerting. So a film that depicts a crisis of faith at the head of the Church is, in the end, more problematic than one about pedophile priests.

Directors and directing

Moretti was born in 1953, so I wanted to know which films and directors had made an impression on him as a young film-goer. I didn’t get a straight answer to that, though he did eventually mention his compatriots Bernardo Bertolucci, Ermanno Olmi and Pier Paolo Pasolini. When it comes to developing your own ideas about cinema he emphasised the importance of watching bad movies as well as good ones. That’s what helps give a director a frame of reference when he’s talking to his collaborators about what he doesn’t want to see in his work. Without naming names, Moretti criticised directors who think they’ve fulfilled their remit simply by tackling an important subject. He’s more interested in finding stories that engage an audience on a number of levels. Despite my reservations about We Have a Pope, the central issue of a man doubting his capacity for leadership could also work in the context of politics, business or the monarchy.

Shrinking audiences

In 2001 Moretti was interviewed at the London Film Festival before a screening of his Palme d’Or winner, The Son’s Room. He mentioned Nuovo Sacher, the independent cinema he owns in his home city of Rome, which celebrates its 20th anniversary on 1 November. Ten years ago François Ozon’s Water Drops on Burning Rocks was getting a good reception. Yesterday he was able to tell us exactly how many people (just 27) were in the audience that afternoon for Asghar Farhadi’s A Separation. His prediction was that the Iranian drama would only make one tenth of the box office it enjoyed in France. He put that down to the fact that Italy doesn’t have hardcore cinephiles in the way that France does.

Moretti also lamented the fact that in the 70s and 80s only good movies by good authors got distribution in Italy. Now, he claims, that quality control has gone. Jokingly, he pointed out that no one ever puts the blame for falling attendances on the audiences, who are so easily diverted by everything from bad weather to a clash with the latest Spielberg blockbuster. (Was this his tacit admission that We Have a Pope is going to have a hard time competing with The Adventures of Tintin?)

Attention to detail

It wouldn’t have been my choice to raise the issue of politics and — specifically Berlusconi — with Moretti. He did say that he was not optimistic about the future of Italy under Berlusconi’s leadership. He addressed every issue with equal gravity, but the two questions that left him speechless concerned his views on the Italian Left and his own performances on screen (he has acted in many of his films).

Earlier Moretti talked about the importance of attention to detail and ensuring that you do the boring parts of your job well. (He checked the correct pronounciation of actor Jerzy Stuhr’s name with a Polish journalist.) His own dedication to media commitments tells me that this is one director who practises what he preaches.

- Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

Better this World

Directed by Kelly Duane de la Vega and Katie Galloway

If Michael Moore had made Better this World we’d probably know Sarah Palin’s recipe for mixing the perfect Molotov cocktail – Alaskan style. But this sobering documentary is the work of Kelly Duane de la Vega and Katie Galloway and was first shown on PBS last month. It’s the story of two budding political activists who fell foul of an agent provocateur and America’s unforgiving political climate.

David McKay from Midland, Texas (home town of George and Laura Bush) and his childhood friend Bradley Crowder were just two ordinary guys who wanted to protest about the state of the nation. As the alarming prospect of a McCain/Palin Presidency loomed, McKay and Crowder went to the Republican National Convention in August 2008 and ended up in a heap of trouble.

The pair arrived in Saint Paul, Minnesota with the intention of using their home-made riot shields. But heavy-handed security and the theft of those shields diverted them from peaceful protest. During a fateful trip to Wal-Mart, they purchased ingredients for some firebombs, which were never used. In 21st century America, two naïve wannabes plus eight Molotov cocktails equals several years in jail.

If you’ve seen Fahrenheit 9/11 or have even the vaguest idea about homeland security, you’ll know how easy it is to find yourself under investigation by the FBI if you stick your head above the parapet. On one level, you feel outraged on behalf of these two essentially decent young men, who faced hard choices about whether to betray each other in return for shorter sentences. They both come across as honest and articulate in the on-camera interviews and recorded phone calls that tell their story.

But sympathetic though McKay and Crowder are, their plight is overshadowed by the role of Brandon Darby, the humanitarian who became an FBI informant. It was his high-profile role in the Hurricane Katrina relief effort that made him a hero to McKay, Crowder and others. But they didn’t know he was informing on them and – they later contended – inciting the protestors to take more direct action.

We hear Darby talking up his role as a saviour of New Orleans, but this film mainly shows other people’s reactions to what he did in 2008. I found myself fantasising about how a Michael Moore-style Brandon & Me documentary might play out, with the bearded crusader pursuing this sanctimonious FBI stooge round America. Better this World ends with Darby phoning G Gordon Liddy’s radio show, which demonstrates just how far he’s moved across the political spectrum.

Better this World isn’t a polemic because the views of McKay, Crowder and their families are expressed in fairly mild terms – more sad than angry. But there is an element of suspense over McKay’s determination to go to trial, rather than just plead guilty and accept jail time. It’s not Law & Order, but we see and hear the impact of his decision on his father, girlfriend and Crowder. How far would you go to help a friend?

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

The Kid with a Bike / Le Gamin au Vélo

Directed by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne

Written by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne

France/Belgium/Italy, 2011

The style of brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne might not sound immediately appealing to someone who has never seen one of their films. The Belgians usually avoid working with big stars, glamorous locations or lush orchestrations. Their themes include poverty, unemployment and the everyday struggles of people on the margins. But Cannes Juries love them — Rosetta and The Child are both past winners of the coveted Palme d’Or. This year’s Grand Prix winner, The Kid with a Bike, is another brilliant example of no-frills film-making that grabs you from the shot and makes you care.

That title is reminiscent of Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948), but here 11-year-old Cyril (Thomas Doret) has lost both his dad and his beloved vélo. (There’s no mum, either, but this is never explained.) We learn that Guy (Jérémie Renier) has no intention of retrieving his son from the children’s home and – even worse — the bike has been sold to make some quick cash. But Cyril’s desperate quest does yield one huge slice of luck, when he (literally) runs into hairdresser Samantha (Cécile De France), who buys the bicycle and agrees to foster him at weekends.

The Dardennes’ preference for close framing takes us straight into Cyril’s crisis-hit world and keeps us there throughout the 90 minutes. This, combined with the breakneck pace of the film, reflects the urgency of how the boy deals with his problems. For the first 20 minutes it feels as though we’re being dragged from one nondescript to location to another, as Cyril runs, cycles and scales walls. Like him, we’re barely aware of the surroundings or of the adults peripherally involved in his drama.

In his first movie, the blonde and rather melancholy Doret plays Cyril as an appealing mixture of naiveté and guile. He has no trouble escaping from the children’s home or getting into his father’s apartment block with a lie about a doctor’s appointment. But the bicycle seems to be a magnet for trouble and, combined with his tendency to put his trust in the wrong people, leads him into further scrapes. It’s the awkward relationship between the rootless and troubled Cyril and his new guardian Samantha that provides the emotional heart of this film.

Cécile De France (Mesrine: Killer Instinct, The Singer) brings a star quality that’s perhaps unexpected in the low-budget world of a Dardenne brothers film. We never learn much about Samantha’s backstory or personal life, apart from her willingness to put this boy’s welfare before her boyfriend’s wishes. Like Cyril, we just have to take her at face value. De France brings great warmth and an understanding of the hard choices involved in being a parent – even when you’re not one. Samantha is never aggressive but she won’t be pushed around either, as when she forces Guy to face up to a difficult conversation with Cyril.

In The Child Jérémie Renier played the feckless young father who sells his own baby. His character here is older, but hardly a model of responsible parenthood. Why does his new life leave no room for his son? In the short scene where Cyril finally tracks him down, the pair are shown stirring pans in a restaurant kitchen. But the domesticity is a cruel illusion: Guy is just granting him a few minutes before trying to banish him from his life.

One of the reasons I liked this film so much is that there weren’t any overt political messages or cartoon villains. We don’t see much of the children’s home or the people who run it, but it doesn’t appear to be a model of Dickensian cruelty and neglect. Cyril’s life is hard because he’s just a boy with no control over how adults behave. He looks for a male role model but his trust is abused by his father and – most shockingly – by local drug-dealer Wes (Egon Di Mateo). I found it sad but completely convincing that Wes could lure Cyril into a criminal act, with soft drinks, video games and flattery. Meanwhile, the stoic Samantha appears willing to sacrifice just about anything to help Cyril but meets with distrust, lies and even an outburst of violence.

There aren’t many laughs in The Kid with a Bike but, thankfully, it’s not awash with sentimentality either. With well-judged performances and brief but effective bursts of music, the Dardenne brothers bring light into Cyril’s world and the hope that things might turn out well for him.

- Susannah Straughan

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Masterclass: Barry Ackroyd

“The most peaceful place you can be on a film set is when you put your eye to the camera.”

On Monday night at the BFI, British cinematographer Barry Ackroyd talked to Screen International Editor Mike Goodridge about his 30 years in film and TV. It’s a shame there wasn’t a full house in NFT3 and that I had to sit at an uncomfortable 45-degree angle to see the discussion. The good news was that Ackroyd’s eloquence matches his skills behind the camera and he sounded like a poet as he alluded to the “flow” of his work.

If there’s one word you probably wouldn’t use in association with Ackroyd’s recent films it’s peaceful. This is the guy who shot Ralph Fiennes’s Balkan-set Coriolanus, Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker and United 93. Given his talent for depicting war zones, it’s perhaps not surprising that he cites Andrzej Wajda’s Kanal, a film about the Warsaw Uprising, as a key influence. But he learned his trade and travelled the world making corporate documentaries, so he also admires DA Pennebaker, the Maysles brothers and his mentor, Chris Menges.

Beginning with Riff-Raff, Ackroyd has so far made 12 films with Ken Loach – the same number as Alfred Hitchcock and Robert Burks. (He was due to shoot Route Irish, but was bumped in favour of Menges.) Ackroyd chooses his words carefully, but you get the impression that while he greatly admires Loach, he finds his approach quite rigid in terms of lighting (naturalistic) and camera positioning. After we watched a harrowing confrontation from Raining Stones (1993), Ackroyd said he could still recall the pungent aftershave worn by loan shark Tansey (Jonathan James).

He talked about the technical challenges of choreographing multiple camera operators, working in relay, on Paul Greengrass’s United 93 and Green Zone. Watching a clip from the end of United 93 you could see that the actors had almost forgotten about the presence of the cameras, as they dived around the mocked-up fuselage. Apparently, some of them later disappeared off into a dark corner and cried.

He didn’t meet Bigelow before starting work on The Hurt Locker, though she’d obviously been impressed by his work with Loach and Greengrass. Shooting on a low budget using Super 16, the emphasis was on verisimilitude (one of Ackroyd’s favourite words) and making viewers feel what it’s like to be in the kill zone. Ackroyd said a key element of capturing the opening explosion that kills Guy Pearce’s Thompson, was to convey the full force of the blast. There’s something almost balletic about the slo-mo shots of gravel, dirt and body being hurled into the air.

What surprised me most about Ackroyd is that he seems so emotionally invested in the intense cinematic worlds he helps to create. I’d always imagined the cinematographer to be a remote figure, whose role was to translate the director’s vision onto film. He said he could still recall how he trembled when he first picked up a camera to capture some Letraset titles for a film-school colleague. Despite his impressive list of TV and film credits, that mixture of anxiety and excitement has obviously stayed with him.

A session of 100 minutes was only long enough to do justice to one aspect of Ackroyd’s work. Though he relished the challenge of doing Dominic Savage’s Out of Control (2002), there was nothing about his TV movies with Stephen Poliakoff. I would have thought a sedate period drama like The Lost Prince was about as far removed from The Hurt Locker as you could imagine.

I haven’t seen Coriolanus yet, but I’m looking forward to it.

- Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

50/50

Directed by Jonathan Levine

Written by Will Reiser

USA, 2011

Will Seth Rogen ever grow up? His contribution to Jonathan Levine’s comedy drama 50/50 is peppered with expletives and those trademark looks of disbelief at the failure of women to fall at his grubby sneakered feet. But it’s Joseph Gordon-Levitt who is the star of this film. Rogen’s role is to turn 50/50 into a funny and affecting hybrid of the cancer movie and the slacker dating comedy. It shouldn’t work but it does.

In Seattle, 20-something radio journalist Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is drifting along in a (largely) sex-free relationship with gorgeous but selfish artist Rachael (Bryce Dallas Howard). When his nagging back pain turns out to be a rare and invasive cancer, Adam initially relies on Rachael and best mate Kyle (Rogen) for support and chauffeuring services. But he’s less comfortable when trainee counsellor Katie (Anna Kendrick) probes him about his feelings and his distant relationship with his worried mom (Anjelica Huston).

You know what you’re going to get with a cancer movie – scenes of head-shaving, violent puking and the grinding tedium of the chemo room. I’d be lying if said that Will Reiser’s script doesn’t include all of these elements and more. But the success of this movie lies in not simply using the trajectory of an illness as an excuse for excessive amounts of navel-gazing and sentimentality.

Reiser based 50/50 on his own battle with cancer and real-life friendship with Rogen, and there’s an ease about the way the dialogue flows that comes from lived experience. Gordon-Levitt and Rogen are a good fit as the chalk ‘n’ cheese pals whose characters are established within the first five minutes of the movie. Adam is the neat freak who is conscientious about his work and his health, but finds it difficult to confront issues in his love life. Kyle’s role is to drive him everywhere (Adam has no license) and point out his worrying tendency to date “needy bitches” who withhold sex. A forthright exchange in a coffee shop about blow jobs (or the lack of them) sums up their relationship well.

If you’re thinking that Gordon-Levitt is just there to be a foil for Rogen’s unrestrained antics, you’re wrong. He is a highly intelligent actor with a wonderfully deadpan delivery, as anyone who saw Brick can testify. The pre-cancer Adam does come across as a bit of a wimp, but his illness has the effect of reinvigorating him, while simultaneously sapping his energy. “I recycle” he protests, on learning he has a very long and unpronounceable tumour eating away at his spine. (“The more syllables, the worse it is.”) But he doesn’t require any dialogue to convey the depth of his distaste at Kyle’s unhygienic (ball) clippers or Katie’s mobile rubbish tip of a car.

As a buddy movie, 50/50 delivers the goods, with a full quota of embarrassing pick-up scenes, botched dates and some great one-liners. On the serious side, it often manages to head off schmaltz by keeping the scenes short – as when Adam finally tells his mother the bad news, or when he’s saying his goodbyes before a major operation. But with too many montages and an excess of generic indie pop, the hospital scenes sometimes feel like they’ve been extracted from an episode of Grey’s Anatomy.

The most predictable aspect of 50/50 is the relationship between Adam and Kendrick’s improbably youthful doctor (in fact she’s not yet qualified). Maybe I’ve seen too many romantic comedies, but it seems blindingly obvious that she’s the perfect antidote to the superficial and manipulative Rachael. Their scenes obviously don’t have the spark of the Adam/Kyle “bromance”, but Kendrick’s tentative efforts make Adam get in touch with his feelings are funny and well-written.

Anjelica Huston pitches her performance well as a woman burdened with a largely absent husband (he has Alzheimer’s) and a son who keeps her at arm’s length. But it was while watching 80-year-old Philip Baker Hall as a cancer patient gleefully consuming macaroons laced with dope that I saw a long and bright career ahead for Seth Rogen.

Susannah Straughan

- John McEntee

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We Have a Pope / Habemus Papam

Directed by Nanni Moretti

Written by Nanni Moretti, Francesco Piccolo and Federica Pontremoli

Italy / France, 2011

We Have a Pope gets off to a colourful start, with the masses in Saint Peter’s Square feasting their eyes on a sea of red capes, white lace and ecclesiastical bling. On paper, Nanni Moretti’s film promises swinging satire and perhaps some searching questions about how the Roman Catholic Church chooses its leader. Unfortunately he’s bottled it – serving up a comedy so mild it should come with a Papal Seal of Approval.

Michel Piccoli stars as Cardinal Melville, chosen by his peers to be the new Pope after lengthy deliberations and much collective boredom. It turns out that no one really wanted the job (“Not me, Lord”), so Melville is just the poor schmuck who’s drawn the short straw. In a wonderfully anti-climactic moment he fails to appear on the balcony to greet the faithful, instead collapsing behind the scenes with a howl of anguish.

Moretti and his co-writers Francesco Piccolo and Federica Pontremoli give us a promising set-up with all the trimmings. Scenes of pageantry and media hype are effectively juxtaposed with the fragile and doubt-ridden mortals who comprise the College of Cardinals. One of them has a face so cadaverous it looks like the work of El Greco. In this unprecedented crisis, top psychoanalyst Brezzi (played by Moretti) is drafted in to counsel the anxiety-stricken Pope-elect. But he just ends up being sequestered along with all the Cardinals, while Melville sneaks off on an extended walkabout in the Eternal City.

During his distinguished career the 85-year-old Piccoli has gazed upon many of the heavenly bodies of French cinema – including Bardot, Deneuve and Béart. It’s a bit hard to reconcile that virile screen presence with the white-haired and rather frail figure we see playfully waving to the Swiss Guards. While Melville’s problems may be put down to parental deficit disorder, Piccoli is hampered by a far more straightforward case of a meandering script.

If you were hoping for skeletons in the papal closet, forget it. Apart from a few angry outbursts, punctuated by chats with his stressed-out spokesman (Jerzy Stuhr), what we get is a weary old man who once harboured dreams of being an actor. A consultation with Brezzi’s wife (also a shrink) yields a couple of gags but doesn’t go anywhere. Our runaway Pontiff needed something more solid on which to anchor his anxieties than a local production of The Seagull.

Back at the Vatican, there’s a plump Swiss Guard gorging himself in the Pope’s suite, while Brezzi tries to keep the cardinals happy with a volleyball tournament and advice about their pharmaceutical intake. But it’s the middle section of this movie that appears to have been flattened by a massive dose of Mogadon. Moretti’s peculiarly Italian brand of neurosis can be fun – in moderation – but what we need is more of Stuhr’s enterprising spin-doctor and a genuine sense of tension.

We Have a Pope ticks all the right boxes in terms of lighting, set design and cinematography. The best scenes in the film show the lone figure of Melville crushed by the sheer opulence of his surroundings, the burden of history and the weight of expectation. The climactic scene in which the cardinals finally track down the escapee in a theatre is also well choreographed.

If the Catholic Church had hired Moretti to make a commercial he could hardly have done a better PR job – all those lovely costumes, genial characters and not a whiff of scandal. But you do wonder how the film-maker who lambasted Berlusconi in The Caiman/Il Caimano could have gone so soft. Perhaps he had one eye on the hereafter.

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

She-Monkeys

Director: Lisa Aschan

Writers: Lisa Aschan, Josefine Adolfsson

In Spartacus, Crassus and Antoninus coyly discuss sexual preferences in terms of snails and oysters. When it comes to Sapphic teen dramas centred on the world of sport, it might simply boil down to a choice between synchronised swimming and equestrian vaulting. While Céline Sciamma’s Water Lilies was all lingering poolside gazes and hypnotic synthesisers, Lisa Aschan’s equally impressive She-Monkeys treads a much darker line between desire and athletic rivalry.

She-Monkeys begins with Emma (Mathilda Paradeiser) trying out for the vaulting team on which Cassandra (Linda Molin) is the undoubted star. Blonde, poised and supremely confident, Cassandra initiates the new recruit into this highly competitive world and helps with her training. But their growing intimacy is undercut with both recklessness and cruelty. Meanwhile, single dad Ivan (Sergej Merkusjev) has his own problems dealing with the burgeoning sexuality of Emma’s younger sister, Sara.

From the outset She-Monkeys depicts a level of intensity between its leads that goes way beyond friendship or budding sexual attraction. Cassandra’s early promise “I can teach anyone anything” proves ominous when her repertoire extends to the robbery and humiliation of an amorous youth. Molin plays her as the more extroverted and physically demonstrative of the pair – a declaration of love is accompanied by a fit of giggles. But when affection turns to possessiveness, you start to wonder who’s really calling the shots here.

The script by Aschan and Josefine Adolfsson convincingly exploits all the uncertainties and ambiguities of first love to construct a story in which we’re never really sure what’s going on. Paradeiser and Molin are well cast, both fearlessly embracing the physical and emotional intensity of their roles. But Emma comes across as the more fully developed character, the one who steals into Cassandra’s bedroom late at night and shows an increasing interest in rifles.

A budding lesbian romance that extends into psychological thriller territory would be impressive enough for a debut feature. But where She-Monkeys really excels is in depicting the shy Emma as part of a fractured family unit that lacks a maternal figure. The distracted Ivan appears totally out of his depth trying to be both mother and father to cherubic seven-year-old Sara. Her unsuitable swimming attire (trunks and no top) raises uncomfortable issues for the adults and sends Sara off in search of the perfect bikini.

Isabella Lindquist’s extraordinary performance as the precocious Sara almost steals the movie. We’re conditioned to pass judgment on men who give even a hint of an unhealthy interest in young girls. But the writers of She-Monkeys bravely turn this idea on its head, by making Sara the instigator of what is (verging on) inappropriate bedroom contact between her and Ivan. They later return to the controversial “scratching” (on the arm) that Sara craves, when she spends the evening with her beloved cousin Sebastian.

It’s all very well pushing sexual boundaries on film, but doing it in a responsible and intelligent way that doesn’t overshadow the rest of the movie is quite an achievement. Watching Sara strutting her stuff in that leopard-print two-piece is cute, funny and thought provoking. But the climax of her story arc also foreshadows what’s happening in the main plot.

Aschan, who worked on a couple of episodes of The Killing/Forbrydelsen, has already picked up awards at Berlin and Tribeca for She-Monkeys. She says she was inspired by the western genre – hence those rather incongruous shots of a tumbleweed – but I picked up more of a thriller vibe around the atmospheric use of the stables and equestrian arena.

There’s effective use of exteriors here — including shots of a horse galloping across a beach and a lakeside picnic that turns nasty. But overall it’s an unspoken threat rather than heady romanticism that looms over these team-mates. In the beautifully lit scene where Cassandra tenderly puts a drunken Emma to bed, you wonder whether she’s intent on comforting, seducing or just controlling her. Emma’s conflicting emotions are summed up in her enigmatic response, “I want to be like I was before.”

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

The Bird (L’Oiseau)

Written by Yves Caumon

Directed by Yves Caumon

2011, France

A decade ago Sandrine Kiberlain starred in Claude Miller’s thriller Alias Betty, as the bereaved mother at the centre of a bizarre kidnap plot. Her character in Yves Caumon’s The Bird has also lost a child, but this is a very different kind of story – a character study that puts the focus squarely on Kiberlain’s superlative performance.

The Bird does take its time revealing the backstory of Anne (Kiberlain), an attractive but rather aloof blonde who works as a kitchen hand in Bordeaux. Fending off the attentions of handsome chef Raphaël (Clément Sibony), she returns to an empty apartment, a sink full of dirty dishes and unexplained noises that keep her awake.

Caumon’s screenplay prefers the slow accumulation of details about Anne’s daily routine, rather than much in the way of dialogue. Only after 20 minutes, when she bumps into an old friend in the street, do you realize that this woman did have a child and a family, and that she’s been living away from the area. Later she meets her ex-husband to lay flowers at the grave of their four-year-old son. He has a new partner now and is far more open in expressing his feelings than Anne is.

Grieving mothers have been memorably portrayed in lots of films, from Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People to Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole, but The Bird doesn’t fall into the pattern of stories in which women seek answers or just struggle to hold together the remains of their family. We know from her husband’s comments that there’s tension surrounding his decision to move on and start a new family. But Anne isn’t without emotion or a desire for companionship. She’s moved to tears by a Mizoguchi film, and later picks up a fellow film buff (played by Serge Riaboukine). But their tryst ends in mutual frustration due to her passivity.

Rather than explore these relationships in greater depth, Caumon uses the discovery of a bird trapped behind a wall to signal a slow emergence from Anne’s hermit-like existence. The moment when she finally takes a mallet to the plasterwork is satisfying – both for her and audience. I must admit that I found the symbolism of the trapped pigeon (or it might be a dove) a bit obvious in what is otherwise such restrained drama. If you’re expecting a Kes-like intensity between Anne and her new house guest, you’ll be disappointed.

In fact, the cathartic scenes in The Bird come near the end, when Anne returns to the family home she’s been so reluctant to let go. Finally embracing her loss, she imagines these rooms still filled with all the clutter and life of the people she has lost.

Despite the solitary nature of the leading character, Caumon’s script isn’t without humour and lighter moments. “You’re hard!” complains the wounded Raphaël after Anne questions whether his unexpected job offer includes having to sleep with him. Despite their differences, there’s a companionable ease about the way Anne and her ex discuss what’s to be done about their house. Even what might have been a sombre drive to the cemetery is shot with a fluidity that makes it feel liberating rather than depressing.

With her angular features and ethereal beauty, Kiberlain demonstrates that she can command an audience’s attention even when she’s just brooding or staring quizzically at that offending wall. It’s a role that feels like a natural extension of her enigmatic schoolteacher in the romantic drama Mademoiselle Chambon. The Bird does conclude on a satisfying though appropriately low-key note, but its lack of dramatic incident may prove frustrating for some viewers.

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

Early One Morning / De Bon Matin

Writer/Director: Jean-Marc Moutout

2010, France / Belgium

Are work-related problems driving you over the edge? Just minutes into Jean-Marc Moutout’s Early One Morning, a middle-aged businessman starts his day by coolly gunning down a couple of colleagues. As the killer waits quietly in his office, Moutout spends the next 90 minutes explaining what drove him to this shocking act of violence.

With its focus on the ongoing banking crisis and workplace stress, Early One Morning could have been conceived as a scathing satire or a pitch-black comedy. Instead Moutout, who also made the workplace drama Work Hard, Play Hard (2003), has taken the serious approach. What follows is a sad, thought-provoking but never mawkish story about the unravelling life of middle-aged bank executive Paul Wertret (superbly played by Jean-Pierre Darroussin).

The film begins with Paul’s meticulous preparations for what will be his final morning at BICF in Annecy, the bank he’s been with for almost 30 years. We return to key moments like his final bus ride, right at the end. By then, the flashbacks of recent events at the office and in Paul’s home life have built up a compelling psychological portrait. Every small action assumes greater significance when you understand what led him to this crisis.

The problems at BICF are, we learn, not unusual. The financial crisis has resulted in a loss of two billion euros. Now the board has brought in hatchet man Alain Fisher (Xavier Beauvois) to “get results”, as he so succinctly puts it. Under pressure from Fisher over his flagging sales performance and with creepy young analyst Fabrice (Yannick Renier) waiting in the wings, it’s not long before Paul starts to crack.

Moutout’s script deftly cuts between home and the workplace, demonstrating the corrosive effects of Paul’s stress on his otherwise happy marriage to Françoise (Valérie Dréville). In between we hear his conversations with a shrink and the devastating admission that he feels like crying all the time.

Darroussin’s softly spoken Paul has the haunted look of a man who knows that his professional success has been achieved at too high a personal cost. With his cell phone pressed to his ear, he scuttles from one humiliating meeting to another.

Darroussin’s subtle performance and the flashback structure prevent Early One Morning from turning into another depressing tale of a good man crushed by the ruthless corporate machine. We do see Paul, his wife and teenage son Benoît (Laurent Delbecque) in happier times, too. My one reservation is the subplot involving the family and a student from Mali, where Paul and his wife helped to build a school. I’m not sure we need any further embellishment of the aura of goodness and rectitude that surrounds him professionally.

Though Fisher and Fabrice are the men we see killed at the start of the film, there are no lip-curling villains here. As Fisher, Beauvois is a believable combination of insincere (he calls everyone “buddy”) and totally unconscionable. Moutout’s point is that having a good track record and being devastatingly honest won’t cushion you from the harsh realities of business life. When he is wrongly blamed for getting a female co-worker sacked, a guilt-ridden Paul tries to persuade her to sue for unfair dismissal. But by taking everything personally, he ends up destroying himself.

With carefully chosen selections from Beethoven and Handel, Early One Morning builds slowly towards an inevitable but still shocking conclusion. Those final minutes in Paul’s office have taken a long time to elapse and all who knew him will feel the aftershock for months – perhaps years.

- Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival

Americano

Written by Mathieu Demy

Directed by Mathieu Demy

France, 2011

As a first-time director, the last thing you want to be is forgettable. One way to avoid that is to emulate Orson Welles by taking on the additional roles of writer and star. A slice of Tarantino-style auricular torture always gets an audience’s attention, too. In his feature debut, the partly autobiographical drama Americano, Mathieu Demy does both. He also throws in Salma Hayek in a fishnet bodystocking for good measure. This isn’t Citizen Kane or Reservoir Dogs – but it does have its moments.

Demy, the son of directors Jacques Demy and Agnès Varda, uses clips here from his appearance in his mother’s 1981 film Documenteur. Fortunately this is less pretentious than it sounds. The 9-year-old boy he played then, is now grown up and living in Paris with girlfriend Claire (Chiara Mastroianni). But Martin and Claire have reached a crossroads in their relationship. When he learns that his mother has died in LA, Martin reluctantly boards a plane to sort out her affairs and embark on a journey into the past.

Demy, who was recently seen in Céline Sciamma’s Tomboy, is a likeable though slightly diffident leading man. For 40 minutes it’s intriguing to watch Martin rediscovering a city he’s rarely visited since his parents split up and he moved to Paris with his dad. Though he switches effortlessly between speaking English with a patronising lawyer and dealing with the emotional demands of his mother’s best friend (Geraldine Chaplin), you can sense his frustration. Those brief flashbacks to the shaggy-haired Martin struggling to get into an empty apartment, suggest his mother wasn’t always there for him.

But the Venice Beach section of the film is soon swallowed up by the Peckinpah-sized black hole known as The Road Trip to Mexico. You know what I’m talking about. The moment a protagonist crash-lands in Tijuana in pursuit of drugs, money or a missing person, he’s in deep trouble. The mystery at the heart of Americano turns out to be Martin’s childhood friend Lola, who stayed in touch with his mum and is in line to inherit her apartment. In his attempts to learn more, our hero is robbed, beaten and sexually humiliated. He barely escapes with both his ears intact.

The sight of Hayek performing a striptease, clad in a red wig and not much else, is arresting. But when Martin starts hanging out at the sleazy Americano club you wonder what’s next — a cameo from Quentin Tarantino or an orgy of vampiristic violence. The dingy back room encounters between Martin and Lola are a bit reminiscent of Jacques Demy’s Model Shop (1969), but dramatically they’re pretty aimless. Martin’s lassitude reflects a lack of control by the director, as though he doesn’t know where this story is headed either.

Americano is a bit of an oddity. Though it’s attractively shot with some dryly scripted scenes, it sits awkwardly between two continents – like its main character. Demy just about holds things together as the embattled Martin, but the supporting roles here all feel underwritten. You’ll probably figure out that Lola isn’t what she seems long before Martin does, but there’s little in the way of back story for Hayek to work with. Carlos Bardem looks as though he could play the snarling club boss, Luis, in his sleep.

It’s left to the characters in the French scenes that bookend the movie to hint at how this story might have developed. Back home, Martin’s dad (played by Jean-Pierre Mocky) and Mastroianni’s Claire are frustrated and angry but unable to exert any influence. “Are you drunk?” she asks when a dishevelled Martin finally phones to say he misses her. “You never say things like that. I’m worried.”

Susannah Straughan

Visit the official website for the 55th BFI Film Festival