The Biffes - A wrap-up

The 8^th Annual Biffes wound up on the 4^th of Feb. Scroll down for my top 5 picks from the festival.

This edition of the fest definitely went large. Barring a few technical glitches and irate audience members, it seemed to be a pretty smooth affair. Kudos to the organizers.

We'll miss watching the best that world cinema has to offer, and the fact that you could just enter a darkened room without prior knowledge of the movie being screened (which is how I like to operate, most of the times) and be whisked off to faraway exotic places, with actors mouthing lines in strange tongues and yet acknowledge our common humanity (that sounded clichéd as fuck).

In case you needed it, this festival definitely serves as a reminder to cut the cord, and explore film industries other than our own and Hollywood. And move away from the sanitised, polished, nonsensical mainstream.

As mentioned earlier, the venue was a nightmare to get to, however the films screened were all top-shelf (most of them at least). So without further ado, my top 5 films + shorts from the fest (a reminder: these are my personal picks from amongst the films and shorts that I watched).

The Films:

1.Phoenix

A tale of a Jewish woman - in post World War 2 Germany - seeking out her husband, who might have betrayed her to the Nazis. Haunting music, memorable scenes and an accurate reconstruction of what a post war city might look like, all make this the pick of the lot for me.

This is also a study of the Jews on one hand - with some of them wanting to go back to the way things were before the war and the concentration camps, and others wanting nothing to do with Germany or Germans, yet unable to let go of the past and move on – and the Germans on the other, with their widespread denial of the knowledge of the atrocities perpetrated on the Jews.

2. Taxi Teheran

This more or less takes place within the confines of a Taxi (driven by the director, Jafar Panahi). He pretends to be a taxi driver in this docufiction, and secretly films his various passengers. It offers a fascinating insight on Iran and into the lives of its average citizens, and the oppressive regime that they live under.

To be honest, I hadn’t heard of Jafar before this film. I did some digging around, post my viewing, and it looks like real life is stranger than fiction. It turns out that he was arrested by the Iranian govt. In 2010 and sentenced to a six-year jail sentence and also prohibited from making films for 20 years. All his films since then have been made in extreme secrecy and taken out of Iran in a clandestine manner, as he’s prohibited from traveling, as well. This government interference into filmmaking is tackled in a humorous sequence in the film, when his niece talks to him about the various dos and don’ts of filmmaking, as instructed by her teacher.

3. Absolution

A Finnish film, Absolution tackles themes of loss, guilt, conscience, revenge etc. It proves that a film can be entertaining without having to spoon-feed its audience with dull minutiae. The actors are excellent with their eyes and body language doing most of the talking, established through tight close-ups.

4. Victoria

Reviewed earlier.

5. Mustang

A Turkish coming-of-age film, it focuses on the lives of five sisters growing up in a conservative society. It reminded me of a lot of movies that Star used to play back in the day – the-coming-of-age of young females against a repressive, conservative society. It follows the same patterns, and you can see the story developing a mile away. One complaint is that time doesn’t seem to lapse logically, and spaces between events seem to be cut short just to fit a particular narrative. However, the leads were all very good, and seemed to live their parts, and the way the film has been shot is gorgeous. It makes me want to pack my bags and head to Turkey immediately.

The Shorts:

        To be precise, I should say “Short”. Out of the 3 shorts that I watched, “Leeches” is by far the best. I reviewed it in a previous post, and you can find it here.

Well, that’s about it for this edition of the Biffes. It's time to sail the friendly seas again, argh. Cheers until next time.

A BIFF-e day. There and back again.

The 8^th annual Bangalore International Film Festival or BIFFES finally rolled around this weekend. Though, with the proliferation of various film sites, discussion boards, and near constant bombardment of information throughout the year, most of the films on display were ones that the tuned-in film buff would have either already seen, or heard of.

Let’s begin with the choice of location – The PVR in Orion Mall, Mordor Rajaji Nagar. Beats me as to why they would choose that place. The previous edition was held in the CBD vicinity (near M.G Road and Cunningham Road), and conveniently accessible from any corner of the city. This edition, not so much. The message from the organisers seems to be one of “Fuck off, we don’t want anyone watching these films”. A few of my friends have decided not to attend this year’s fest, and a couple of others, might just go for a day or two. I fall into the latter category, as well.

Now that we’ve got the wonderful choice of location out of the way, let’s get down to business.

I set out for the fest on Friday, the 29^th, with H. I particularly wanted to watch “Victoria”, this had been hyped up by a few discussion boards that I frequently visit. However, I was pretty much going in blind. All I knew was that it was a German film, and shot in a single take. The film was supposed to be shown at 2:20 in the afternoon. We set out at around 1 (there had been mentions of special bus services from all over Bangalore to the venue, to make the journey easier. But alas, that was not to be. The idea seems to have fizzled out). 

After what seemed like an eternity, we reached Shelob’s lair Orion Mall, a lot lighter on the pocket due to the auto (I can foresee being penniless on the streets, and the subject of a documentary if I attempt to visit every day of the festival).

The security guards saved the mall from destruction by patting a few thousand crotches, and we were finally ushered in.

Contrary to my belief, the venue was actually packed (though I believe this was due to the initial euphoria). After fidgeting for a few minutes, wondering if we’d get seats – due to the first-come-first-served policy – we were finally let in. As far as I could tell, out of the various movies playing at that time, “Victoria” had the most people in line, waiting to get in. I guess the hype is real. 

Once inside, we were treated to the traditional Indian “technical glitch” inauguration. The film started, played, stopped, started again, and on and on. A lot of people got frustrated and walked out of the screening. We were wondering whether we should head out and catch another film, as well. I finally checked with one of the interns running around, if the screening was cancelled. He assured me that it wasn’t, so we took our seats again and waited for the auspicious time when things would get rolling. That proved to be at 3:10. Just a miniscule 40+ minute delay, no biggie.

I really loved the opening of the film. The opening credits started rolling on a black background, overlaid with a faint German techno-ish track, that gradually increased in volume.  The dum-tss, dum-tss really took me back to my partying days, back in the day. The opening shot was a kind of a blurry image of people swaying around to techno, under the strobes. Sob :( 

Link to that scene (with some dirty German goodness): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nZyRlIgFLY

As for the film itself, it's a one-shot take, which follows a young Spanish woman – Victoria – living in Berlin, through a wild night (and I mean really wild). All the events take place over a period of a few hours, from pre-dawn to the morning. Also worth noting is the fact that the film appears to be shot in natural light.

As much as I’d like to get on the hype train and praise this film, I’d have to say that it is an average film. It's your typical heist-gone-wrong feature. People might find the premise surprising, or struggle to comprehend how Victoria ends up doing the things she does. Though there are a lot of logic leaps in the film, Victoria’s motives are not a surprise at all. From the opening scene, where we see Victoria dancing alone in a club by herself, and attempting to talk/flirt with the bartender, to the scene where we see her talking with (what we assume are) a bunch of (creepy) guys, it’s obvious that she’s a loner and desperately craves company, and wants to fit in. She also wants to cut loose and really live life, something she missed out on as a child. This is made all the more apparent when she talks about her past to her soon to be romantic interest (one of the afore-mentioned creepy guys)

So yeah, like I said this is an average film that gives out a “been here, done that” vibe to the viewer. However, it is definitely worth a watch for the single, long take, as well as the filming, done in natural light. It’s refreshing to watch a heist film without the abrupt Hollywood-style scene transitions and loud obnoxious music and effects.

Next up, H wanted to watch a bunch of shorts playing in screen 5 (along with a Q&A with a few of the shorts directors), I reluctantly agreed and we went in. Screen 5 happened to be Gold class, so we put our feet up and prepared to dig in. 

The first short was “Chameleon” by Arun Shankar, about an individual suffering from “Bipolar disorder”. This was the worst of the lot, with hammy acting, and loud saas-bahu type music. However the most unforgivable aspect was the fact that bipolar individuals were portrayed as violent lunatics and people to be scared of. It adhered to all the tropes of mentally ill people portrayed as unhinged lunatics, out to kill everyone, made famous by numerous crappy films.

The next short was “Lucky Star” by Priya Amritraj focusing on illegal immigrants in the US. Though overtly preachy and PSA-like, this was well made, with good acting (though it seemed a bit too polished and professional at times. Props to girl who played the protagonist). Also starring ex-Bollywood baddie, Gulshan Grover.

Last up (we didn’t watch the final short – The Projectionist), was “Leeches” by Payal Sethi. This was about the practice of old Arabian Sheikhs coming down to Hyderabad and paying off and marrying very young, virgin, muslim brides, and divorcing them once they have sex. There was quite a famous case/controversy around a decade back about this very practice.

This short was the pick of the lot. Very well made and felt damn authentic. Acting was top-notch. The lead is the irritating “hipster chick” from that piece of shit film, “Margarita with a straw”, but here, she is in fine form. Even though it was a short feature, it was fully realized and felt like a full-length film. I see a bright future for the director, Payal, provided she doesn’t fall into the typical Bollywood trap.

Our last feature of the night was the Swedish “Alena” – a film about a misfit at an elite boarding school - in screen 2. This was a rather predictable feature leading up to the expected twist/reveal before the ending. Though for a change it tried to work in elements of the misfit becoming popular, and the popular kid kind of becoming an outcast, ultimately, it was a very derivative film, typical of the numerous films we had seen in this genre. Though, there were underlying themes of class differences, mental disorders, immigrant experience and blah blah, we were pretty much tuned out by the time the film ended. 

Thus ended a very long day, we paid the Uber driver a tiny Smaug-ian fortune to ferry us back to the Shire.

Fin.