Tag: magical realism

FRIDA – Review

One of Frida Kahlo’s paintings featured in the documentary FRIDA. © 2024 Banco de México Diego Rivera & Frida Kahlo Museums Trust. Av. 5 de Mayo No. 20, col. Centro, alc. Cuauhtémoc, c.p. 06000, Mexico City. Courtesy of Amazon Prime Video

Frida Kahlo remains endlessly intriguing, in part because the Mexican artist’s colorful paintings remain striking, mysterious and even slightly disturbing and partly because of her bold, dramatic, sometimes tragic life. The artist has been the subject of several films, both narrative and documentary, and Kahlo has been played beautifully by actresses Salma Hayek and Ofelia Medina among others. But in director/writer Carla Gutierrez’s new biographical documentary FRIDA, Frida Kahlo plays herself.

Gutierrez’s FRIDA brings fresh insights into Frida Kahlo’s life and work, by putting that life into her own words for the first time, words exclusively drawn from her letters, interviews and her illustrated diary. We also hear the words of those who knew her, including husband and fellow painter Diego Rivera. The documentary is Carla Gutierrez’s directorial debut but Gutierrez is an acclaimed editor whose films include the Ruth Bader Ginsberg documentary RBG. FRIDA is excellent, both engrossing in its narrative and visually appealing, as it covers about 40 years of the artist’s life. The writer/director had unrestricted access to materials about the artist and the film includes materials never before revealed to the public.

We feel we are getting a true sense of the artist personally by hear her words. As we hear those words read by various actors, they are illustrated by Frida’s colorful, biographical paintings and by charming animations, often animating the paintings themselves. Kahlo’s color-drenched canvases are so animated anyway, that adding movement to them seems entirely natural.

The animated paintings and the voice-over readings are accompanied by a plethora of black-and-white photos and film footage, often with their own added animated splashes of vibrant color.

Frida Kahlo began life as the feisty, independent, creative child of a professional artist. Originally she planned to become a doctor, and at college she fell in with a group of pranksters. As the only woman in the group, Kahlo often dressed as a man, a cutting-edge fashion choice in the 1920s, and she participated in the pranks and had a budding romance with one of the group. Her life was suddenly changed forever by a serious traffic accident, which left her with life-long physical problems with her spine and pelvis and in pain.

While in recovery, confined to bed, she was given paints, canvas and a mirror, and thus began her habit of self-portraits, portraits that reflected her feelings and experiences in symbolic, surrealist form. Her paintings have been described as surrealist, magical realism and native for their immersion in Mexican culture, but she developed her own unique style, entirely apart from other artist movements.

The documentary covers her romance with the older artist Diego Rivera, their open marriage, and her adoption of dressing in a Mexican folk style, to express her proud Mexican identity. The film follows the couple’s travels to the U.S., their shared communist beliefs, and the couple offer of refuge to Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky when he was exiled by Stalin, among other moments in her life.

One of the most striking things about hearing Frida Kahlo’s own words is how much they reveal her personality. Her writings are sharp and witty, but also sometimes biting and even salty, which feels a bit unexpected. We hear her thoughts on wealthy Americans she met in New York and European artists she met in Paris, like Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso, both generally negative but with a pointed humor too.

Important figures from Frida’s too-short life also weigh in, including Diego Rivera, friends, fellow artists, and relatives, which helps FRIDA paint a well-rounded portrait that brings you closer to this remarkable woman artist like never before.

Hearing others who actually knew her speaking about Frida helps us realize things about her, such as how small and fragile she was, with many describing her as bird-like. That delicateness is not something revealed in her forceful paintings or even in the many photos of the artist, who often looks out at us boldly with a confident or challenging stare.

Overall, FRIDA is a fascinating, thoroughly enjoyable film about a great artist who truly painted from her heart. It is a worthy, even essential, addition to the many films about Frida Kahlo, offering the most deeply personal insights on the artist herself.

FRIDA debuts streaming on Thursday, Mar. 14, on Amazon Prime.

RATING: 3.5 out of 4 stars

WENDY – Review

Over the last few years the “Mouse House” has gone “all in” on doing live-action remakes of their Animated features film classics. Now we’re not talking about the Pixar flicks, though CGI has certainly been enlisted to give the more fantastic elements. Though it stuns me to say it, kudos to the Hollywood Foreign Press and their Golden Globe awards for pointing out that one such remake was not “live-action” but rather a computer-animated feature. These raids of the Disney “vault” target mainly their 1937 to mid-1990s output. Last year was almost a deluge with digital “re-do’s” of DUMBO, ALADDIN, and THE LION KING, with LADY AND THE TRAMP streaming on the Disney+ app. Ah, but one hasn’t been “tech’d up”. Maybe because it originated in live-action, on stage because unlike most of the classic fairy tales (the Grimms, Anderson, etc.) it’s just a bit over a century old. And the approach by the filmmakers is quite unlike the big “D”, very gritty, grimy and modernized, set in the states (mostly) and starring a very diverse cast of untrained, first-time actors. Pretty much like the producers’ last flick, the strange, magical BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD eight years ago. They’re making their mark on this familiar tale by doing a switch on its title. Rather than that boy who “never grew up”, they’re focusing on WENDY.

It is indeed Wendy who we first meet as an infant, cradled in the arms of her mother Angela Darling (Shay Walker) as she runs (cook, waitress, and “busser”) a ramshackle diner, where it’s always “eggs o’clock”, precariously close to the railroad tracks somewhere in Louisiana, USA. A brief dissolve and Wendy’s a toddler, tossing eggs on the grill, walking the counter, and watching her older twin brothers Douglas (Gage Naquin) and James (Gavin Naquin) dance to the “jukebox”. The years pass and pre-teen Wendy (Devin France) is entertaining the boys with her own crafted magical stories, filled with monsters and pirates. The kids long for their own real adventures as they gaze out the bedroom window, above the diner, mere feet from the trains. One night she spies a grinning boy beckoning her from the top of a slow-moving boxcar. Climbing out onto the overhanging roof, Wendy leaps onto the train, quickly followed by the twins. They soon catch up to the boy of eight or nine years. Peter (Yashua Mack) wears shorts and a ragged schoolboy jacket as he gestures to them with his “sword’ (a kid-sized machete). To the shock of the Darlings, Peter pushes them out of an open boxcar, into the river below. Nearby one of Peter’s friends waits in a canoe. They all climb aboard and paddle to a lone island with a smoke-belching mountain at its center. Exploring this strange place, the Darlings meet with several other kids, including a boy from their town who has been missing for years. But he’s not aged a day. Peter tells them that they will spend their days having fun and they will never grow old. All sounds great, but Wendy wonders whether she saw a scraggy, long-haired old man lurking in the forest. And what is the mysterious glowing giant fish in the lagoon?

Once more, as with their previous film, the producers seem to have struck cinema “gold” in the casting of their lead actress. Newcomer France gives a remarkable performance as the title character eschewing showy histrionics for a restrained and very natural portrait of a young woman suddenly living out her daydreams. Through her round expressive eyes we see her sense of wonder over the strange land and its breathtaking creatures (human and animal). But she’s also very grounded, as she tries to watch over her older brothers while feeling homesick, riddled with guilt imagining her mother’s heartache over their absence. She’s a great counterpart to Mack’s Peter, who only seems to be care about himself in his quest for fun adventures. His playful antics can suddenly shift to childish rants and tantrums, as he insists that everyone must follow his impulses. The Naquin twins are all rambunctious energy, always on the move until a tragedy alters them, emotionally and physically. Walker, as their hard-working mom, is a nurturing force of nature, as she puts on a brave face, adoring her “angels” despite her own hardships (just what became of the patriarch).

In creating this new spin on an iconic story, director Benh Zeitlin, who co-wrote the screenplay with sister Eliza, sprinkles magic throughout, both in the “real” settings (the diner practically rattles off the ground with every passing train) and in a most unique take on “Neverland”. That locale is the island of Montserrat, south of Antigua, site of an active volcano which looks to erupt with every step of Wendy and these “lost boys”. Steam shoots from random spots on its rocky beach, adding an air of constant danger, but delighting Peter, who thinks he can speak with the mountain spirits. There’s a nice radiant warm glow to the photography, perhaps due to its use of 16mm (little electricity on the isle). The older film stock helps add to the surprisingly effective special effects as the kids float amongst the fantasy fish and fauna seamlessly (no dark lines or wise are seen). Zeitlin guides the acting “newbies” with great skill, making us feel as though we’re watching kids from the neighborhood at play. It’s engaging compelling “magic realism” that renders Barrie’s tale fresh and urgent. WENDY floats on a whimsical cinematic trip through our old childhood dreams.

3 Out of 4
WENDY opens everywhere and screens exclusively in the St. Louis area at Landmark’s Tivoli Theatre

SORRY TO BOTHER YOU – Review

Lakeith Stanfield stars as Cassius Green in Boots Riley’s SORRY TO BOTHER YOU, an Annapurna Pictures release.

Director/writer Boots Riley’s ambitious, inspired social satire SORRY TO BOTHER YOU sets its protagonist, a young black man trying to make a living as a telemarketer, in a world nearly like our own but imbued with the surreal, magical realism and even science fiction. The comedy is excellent but the director also makes hold-no-punches points about our country’s unequal economic system.

Bitingly funny, creative and intelligent, SORRY TO BOTHER YOU is a welcome breeze shaking up the summer doldrums and our comfortable assumptions.

Lakeith Stanfield is outstanding as Cassius Green, a likable African American every-man living in Oakland, California, who is struggling to just trying to pay the rent but ambitious to get ahead in life. His girlfriend Detroit (Tessa Thompson) is an aspiring performance and visual artist but works a minimum job as a sign-twirler. Cassius drives a junker car and lives in his uncle’s garage, but the uncle is on the edge of foreclosure. Just in time, Cassius lands a job at a telemarketing firm, RegalView, but new opportunities really open up for him after an older worker named Langston, played by Danny Glover, tips him off to use his “white voice” (provided by David Cross) when selling to customers. Soon he’s making sales and he finds himself conflicted between moving up the corporate ladder and standing by his co-workers as they strike for better wages.

It’s a classic conundrum but Riley uses it as a springboard that takes us through some unusual twists that touch on race, capitalism, prisons, economic opportunity, artists, and other social issues in a fearless and effective fashion. Cassius finds himself lifted from poverty into wealth and material comfort but also finds himself at odds with his own values.

The “white voice” that Cassius and other black characters use are supplied by actors Patton Oswalt, David Cross and Rosario Dawson. Riley mines the “white voice” thing for comedy gold, but never loses the pointed nature of the joke.

This film is the feature film debut for Riley, the head of San Francisco Bay area hip-hop collective The Coup. The film met with critical acclaim when it debuted at Sundance and has been highly anticipated by film buffs.

One can see some parallels with GET OUT but this production was well underway when that film came out. The film starts out in the similar territory as workplace comedy OFFICE SPACE but gets much more surreal as it goes, particularly after Cassius discovers a sinister plan by the company’s celebrity CEO. In an inspired bit of casting, Armie Hammer plays billionaire CEO Steve Lift, a creepy performance that is perhaps Hammer’s best. Another company the billionaire is involved in is called WorryFree, a combination workplace and housing “option” marketed to working people but which looks a lot like prison and offers life-long contract that sounds a lot like slavery.

The director is aided greatly by lead Lakeith Stanfield and a strong supporting cast that includes Omari Hardwick, Jermaine Fowler, Steven Yeun, and Terry Crews. Stanfield seems to be having a moment now. More audiences might recognize him from his small but affecting part in GET OUT but he also delivered a remarkable performance in the less-seen but moving CROWN HEIGHTS, a true-story drama about a young Caribbean immigrant falsely convicted of a crime whose childhood friend fights for years to free him. Stanfield should have received more attention for that affecting performance but perhaps this role will give this gifted actor the fame he deserves.

Sometimes comedy can say hard things more effectively than if they are said directly, as anyone who has seen DR. STRANGLOVE can attest. SORRY TO BOTHER YOU starts out with laugh-out-loud comedy and pointed situations and visual jokes anyone might recognize, but then the film goes deeper. And deeper – down a rabbit hole that runs under our socioeconomic structure, until Cassius Green is Alice in a nightmarish Wonderland that is a fun-house mirror of our own.

This sharp-witted comedy touches on social media, twisted reality-show entertainment, and makes other social commentary in a pointed but comically effective fashion. Where director/writer Boots Riley might lose some audience members is when the film veers directly in science fiction, with an uncomfortable turn that some, particularly black audiences, might find disturbing. Others will follow along with the director in this risky move.

SORRY TO BOTHER YOU is not perfect but it is pretty darn good, a brilliantly ambitious social satire that has the courage to say things about this society that need saying. Boots Riley deserves credit for his willingness to say what he has to say, even when it makes his audience uncomfortable, and Lakeith Stanfield deserves recognition for his winning performance as the ordinary/ not ordinary guy at the center of this excursion into modern madness.

RATING: 4 1/2 out of 5 stars