NYFF ’10 Reviews: ‘Carlos,’ ‘Oki’s Movie,’ ‘Film Socialisme’

The 2010 New York Film Festival wraps up this weekend on October 10, and while you may have read other reviews on these films from Cannes 2010, here’s another take:

“Carlos”
Oliver Assayas hopes you like your counter-revolutionary rebels naked and set to post-punk. The seductive “Carlos,” opening this weekend in truncated form, is a three-part epic detailing the life and affiliations of terrorist networker Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, known to many as Carlos the Jackal. As played by Edgar Ramirez, he’s got good looks, a soft voice and movie-star swagger. It’s not hard to see how he charmed those with similar interests into taking his side.

“Carlos” begins with the upstart rebel lacking ambition, merely interested in working his way up the ranks, unconcerned with his cause. He’s naturally oblivious when that cause, originally rooted in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, passes him by, and with no tenet worth fighting (or dying) for, concessions are made to survive, globetrotting to various countries with no extradition policy. In the meantime, he seduces men with his promises of revolution and anti-capitalist rhetoric, and women with his washboard abs, playful fingers and natural aggression.

“Carlos” works wonderfully in its three-part harmony arrangement, which is why we’re saddened to see it cut down. In part one, his ravenous chase for power leads him to become point man for a few botched operations. When failure becomes his reward, he takes it as a lesson in exile in part two to stage more ambitious operations, with an ill-fated siege of the OPEC headquarters that ends in a plane full of hostages sitting on a tarmac waiting for an engine refill. Part three finds Carlos, the former rock star, at his most pathetic, on the run under various identities as his potbelly and womanizing finally defeats him long before the authorities arrive.

Assayas has always been an outspoken political filmmaker, but he’s wise to let the material speak for itself, filling almost every frame with Ramirez’s lupine sexuality and slurred accent. The director doesn’t take sides in using a broad canvas to create truly global cinema, with a scope that allows for multiple countries to provide a backdrop for backroom dealings, the languages spoken at length nearly in double digits during the five-and-a-half-hour run time. Most efficiently, it’s a portrait of a time when all “political revolutionaries” realized that the cause everyone answers to is the almighty dollar, and as Carlos watches the Berlin Wall fall, it’s as if he’s finally aware his pretensions have no place to find sanctuary. [A] [Compare to our original Cannes take.]
“Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives”
Uncle Boonmee is dying, and his loved ones are gathered to usher him into the afterlife. But shed no tears for the elderly farmer, because in Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s world, it’s only a transition phase. He soon starts seeing spirits, visions of the past, but when they appear to others, its clear they are nonthreatening. Boonmee’s son returns as a hirsute ape spirit, while his wife appears not to warn him, but to assure him. Passage into the next life will be merciful, full of bliss.

Weerasethakul makes a detour, showcasing a princess longing for beauty only to find acceptance in the arms of a chatty catfish. In showcasing this illicit connection, which is never revisited, our story becomes inexorably tied to the connections between the farmer and his land, the princess and all she rules over. Symbiotic, no, but certainly sensual, yes, a call to give up material obsessions and merge with the land, for it will flatter our spirits if we accept them. It’s in this attitude that Boonmee, a restless spirit in life, is able to settle in death. Warm and funny, “Uncle Boonmee” is touching in an altogether unexpected way. [A] [compare our original Cannes take]
“Film Socialisme”
Jean-Luc Godard’s latest is more of a video essay than a film, a playfully rebellious diatribe against capitalism and the accompanying defiance of art. Godard’s first location is a cruise ship, populated by a microcosm of high society, from the disinterested bourgeoisie to the affected, troubled difference makers who think grousing and infighting will create change. The perspective shift is sudden, unprompted, to a gas station where a young girl dreams of going to America, speaking English to her being a reflection of true success. A film crew tries to interview her about her desires, but is shooed away from the locals, Godard playfully condemning the information seekers and those unwilling to provide insight. This is all a guess, of course, since most of the film is either untranslated or willfully obtuse, using inaccurate subtitles for the number of languages spoken, only three words appearing onscreen at a time to reflect whatever opaque themes are being addressed. The film closes with a furious rush of still images and archival footage to connect the dots between varying ideologies. From the man who pioneered the French New Wave, it’s aggression with a sarcastic smile, as if he’s now rejecting the art form he’s evolved to extremes. It’s defiant, often funny, but truly, honestly bewildering, constantly defeating whatever thesis you’ve arrived at within seconds, a messy game of hotfoot amongst topics suddenly taboo and otherwise demented. And it’s brilliant. [A-] [compare our polar opposite Cannes take]
“Oki’s Movie”
Hong Sang-soo is a South Korean director that piques our interest if only because, unlike his contemporaries (folks like Playlist favorite Bong Joon-ho), he isn’t interested in genre. Not in the slightest. Instead, he makes odd, meandering dramas that have less to do with plot and more to do with character, slathered in rich, high-minded philosophizing and some broad social criticism thrown in for good measure. The last movie we saw of his, “Night and Day,” was during 2008’s New York Film Festival. Whereas “Night and Day” was obscure but still accessible, a dreamy, not-entirely-coherent film about extreme culture clash, his new film “Oki’s Movie” is almost impenetrably strange.

Like Godard’s WTF-worthy NYFF entry “Film Socialisme,” “‘Oki’s Movie” takes place in three movements. In each section the same actors are present but take on different roles. In one, the protagonist is a professor – in the other, a student. Sometimes he’s married. Sometimes he’s not. It’s hard to figure out and even harder to care. As far as experimentation goes, guess there’s something to be said for this kind of thing, although the repetitive (and, we’re guessing, ironic) use of graduation staple “Pomp and Circumstance” is enough to drive anybody up the wall. If you’re willing to simply go with it, ‘Oki’s Movie’ offers some potential chuckles, especially if you have a degree in philosophy or if you like your films with a lot of experimentalism but not a lot of plot. Without any emotional foothold, though, “Oki’s Movie” is weirdness without purpose, clever without smarts, and even at 80 minutes, a total slog. [C-] — Gabe Toro and Drew Taylor