Blog From The Bench

Toronto Film Festival 2007

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 15

The premise of Jacques Nolot’s Avant que j’oublie (Before I Forget) is perilous: a film about a detached, cynical HIV-positive writer in his late 50’s dealing with the banal, everyday realities of life, the film on the surface seems to propagate a number of negative stereotypes regarding homosexual men of a certain age (this is the clichéd world where leering older men with money joylessly buy the services of younger men, haunt the corners of cafes and bars and endlessly complain about how empty and emotionless their lives have become). But Nolot, a prolific French actor who not only wrote and directed the film, but stars in it as well, has stripped all traces of sentimentality from his film, in turn making it a film that is as poignant as it is difficult. The third film in a trilogy supposedly depicting the gay lifestyle in relentlessly matter-of-fact, the film itself can be hard to sit through—the long, seemingly endless shots patiently capture the most banal of occurrences and moments—counteract potentially sensationalistic material (one example: a business transaction can end with “what do I owe you?” “Nothing. I want you” and pants are indifferently taken off and a blowjob commences). A film more fascinating to ponder after the fact than while actually watching, I walked out of the screening not liking it much, but my feelings have become much more favorable in the days that have since passed.

New Wave master Jacques Rivette has certainly confounded both admirers and detractors with his period piece Ne touchez pas la hache (Don’t Touch the Axe). At first glance it seems that in his old age Rivette (who turned 79 in March) has gone the route of Truffaut and succumbed to the “cinema of quality” that he and his fellow critics and filmmakers in the Cahiers du cinema crowd railed against so famously in the 1960’s. A seemingly straightforward adaptation of a Balzac short story about the tempestuous relationship that springs between a gruff general (played by Guillaume Depardieu) and a willowy, headstrong duchess (Jeanne Balibar), this was the film that baffled me the most out of all of the films that I saw at TIFF. Not because it’s a difficult or extremely complex film, but because I was completely at a loss as to why I liked it so much. But some time for reflection and a really insightful article in the last issue of Film Comment (currently is not available online) helped me to realize that a large part of what makes Rivette’s film so fascinating is how he dissects and depicts the mechanics of performance and theatricality, but instead of bracketing it in the form of the theater-within-a-film that define much of his most famous work, he strips away the framing device and lets the “play” perform as the film itself. Depardieu and particularly Balibar are stunning, turning in extremely broad, theatrical performances that are at the same time sketched with authentic little moments, emotions and mannerisms. The film is being released stateside as The Duchess of Langeais, and I for one will jump at the chance at taking another look at this dazzling, multi-faceted film.

Finishing out the festival for me was the provocative Help Me Eros, written and directed by Tsai Ming-liang regular Lee Kang-sheng. Seeming taking up the fascination with naked bodies and sexual positions of last year’s Shortbus, what sets Lee’s film apart is the direction he takes the material, replacing Mitchell’s endearing optimism with a bleak pessimism. Revsolving around a number of loosely-connected individuals who all are experiencing depression in varying degrees, we follow them as they attempt to use sex as a means to reach out to someone else (sound familiar?). The film looks amazing—the neon lights, gaudy colors and deep shadows of urban Asia looks as voluptuously beguiling as it has for many an Asian auteur—and after adjusting to the sad rhythms of Lee’s film it becomes a moving examination of how despite all of the technology and comforts of modern life humans still manage to feel as isolated as ever.

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So ended my TIFF 2007 experience, an amazing ten days filled with a really high percentage of excellent (or at least compelling, at the very least) cinema. I’ve learned a lot about the festival experience—the buying of tickets, the structuring of showtimes, my own personal capacity for consecutive film watching, etc.—and look forward to taking part in another major film festival, and hope to do it sooner rather than later. If my return to school was not an inevitability next fall, I’d say I’d without a doubt be back for TIFF 2008. I’ll be covering the much more small-scale San Diego Film Festival next weekend for DVD Verdict, and I suppose that will have to suffice for now.

Thanks for reading,

-jesse