| Friday 17th | 11.30pm | Kino Cinema |
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With the current trend towards vampires portrayed as no more than feral carnivores Bill Mousoulis returns to the richer terrain of Ferrara’s The Addiction and Almereyda’s Nadja. Z and X, so known by the tattoos on their necks, are a vampire couple, living in an old warehouse in inner-city Melbourne. Over the course of one night, they go about their regular business, teaming up with the poet-cannibal Seers and another vampire Vee. While these vampires don’t spark up in flames at the first sight of sun they do carry in the pit of their stomachs an uncomfortable queasiness. This sense of uncertainty is most keenly felt when they encounter the mysterious Rola.
Mousoulis subjects the vampire myth to a rigorous interrogation and steadfastly avoids cliché. It is a philosophical vampire film but it’s one shorn of the interminable philosophising that sometimes blights the genre. His editing is both bold and subtle, and brings a symphonic quality to the film. However, as well as harmony he also employs dissonance, and it seems as if the worlds of the undead and the living have never been so close. No matter, humankind goes about its daily routine unaware of the constant life and death struggle that is being played out in its midst.
Producer Bill Mousoulis
Leading Players Vanessa de Largie, Alex Spears, Patrick Boyle
Photography Shyam Ediriweera
Script Ali Alizadeh, Bill Mousoulis
Editor Bill Mousoulis
Music Spider Goat Canyon
Print Source bill@innersense.com.au
Website www.anocturne.com
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| Friday 17th | 3.00pm | Triskel Arts |
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Achieving his third screening at the Cork Film Festival in as many years (Quietly On By, 2006; Hohokam, 2007), Illinois filmmaker Frank V Ross returns with another well-observed portrayal, this time of twenty-somethings’ bewilderment in the face of new found responsibilities.
Christy and her petulant boyfriend Buddy share her parents basement with their baby Mikey. Buddy gets by as a plumber’s apprentice but Christy has had to shelve her dreams of being a writer in order to raise their child.
Sometimes it’s hard for her not to feel that she has two children to mind as Buddy struggles with the realities of his situation.
With Present Company Ross expands his usual close-to-the-bone directorial style by utilising a number of his ensemble cast in the shooting of the film. The result is a film that, while unsparing in its warts and all approach to the characters’ foibles, is as full of charm as his previous features.
Producer Frank V. Ross
Leading Players Anthony Baker, Tamara Fana, Allison Latta, Lonnie Phillips, Joe Swanberg
Photography Anthony Baker, Tommy Fana, Joe Swanberg
Script Frank V. Ross
Editor Frank V. Ross
Music Anthony Baker
Print Source fvross2@gmail.com
Website www.molehillindependent.com
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| Monday 13th | 6.00pm | Opera House |
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Pietro is a highly successful television executive whose company is in the midst of a crucial merger deal when his wife suddenly drops dead in the garden, surrounded by slices of watermelon. This leaves Pietro alone to care for their ten-year-old daughter Claudia. Soon he becomes consumed with guilt that he is not suffering enough, and believes this may be harming his relationship with Claudia.
Pietro’s inner monologue is highlighted throughout as he dreams up elaborate and compelling lists to keep his mind off his loss, and he decides to set up shop outside Claudia’s school each day, waiting to take her home. From his new perch, Pietro takes calls on his mobile phone, conducts business meetings with his increasingly frazzled colleagues on a nearby park bench, and somehow manages to appease his neurotic sister-in-law while making friends with the regular park-dwellers.
Nanni Moretti puts in a remarkably stirring and heartfelt performance and is the undoubted cornerstone of this exquisitely refreshing portrayal of one man’s response to loss and his ensuing reinvention as a voice of calm for others in need.
Producer Gianluca Leurini
Leading Players Nanni Moretti, Valeria Golino, Alessandro Gassman, Isabella Ferrari, Silvio Orlando
Photography Alessandro Pesci
Script Nanni Moretti, Laura Paolucci, Francesco Piccolo (based on the book by Sandro Veronesi)
Editor Angelo Nicolini
Music Paolo Buonvino
Print Source New Wave Films
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