Yesterday the Seattle International Film Festival announced
its award winners, both those selected by a jury and those voted on by the audience.
I’m sure they’re lovely movies, but as usual, I have little interest in watching
most of them. My tastes tend to run in different directions, and with that in
mind, here are my favorites of SIFF 2016, in no particular order except that in
which they occurred to me. They’re all excellent and you should check out every
last one when you have the chance.
The 42nd SIFF was a pretty standard affair. There were
movies I was excited to see that lived up to or exceeded expectations, and
there were those that most certainly did not. A few movies came out of nowhere
and totally knocked me on my ass, and a handful of middling dramas made me
shrug and say, “That was fine.” As has been my pattern, I got sick as hell for
a couple days, missed a few movies, and for the seventh year in a row, I went
to the last screening on the last night. (It’s not even something I try to do,
there’s just always a film I want to see in that final slot. his year it was
The Greasy Strangler.)
As usual, as much as I love SIFF, it’s an exhausting
marathon. So as stoked as I am at the outset, I’m also glad when it wraps up. If
for no other reason than that I never have to sit through that #LighttheSIFFUp
stinger again.
Tag
Madman Sion Sono is back with the totally bonkers
Tag, which primarily consists of Japanese school girls
getting cut in half, though there are more thoughtful concerns than just gore,
horror, and fantasy.
Under the Shadow
As if living in a war-torn city in the wake of a revolution
and having to regularly head to the basement to avoid bomb attacks isn’t
harrowing enough, Iranian horror Under the Shadow throws in
evil spirits to haunt an isolated mother and daughter.
The Land
I’m a sucker for skate rats in movies, and it’s even better
when the surrounding film is as good as Steven Caple Jr.’s The Land, which follows four young skateboarders from the grim streets of
Cleveland who turn to petty crime as a way out, only to run afoul of an
unexpectedly chilling drug lord.
Hunt for the Wilderpeople
Off-kilter, heartwarming, and hilarious, Taika Waititi’s
Hunt for the Wilderpeople tells the story of a last-chance
foster kid and his grizzled pseudo-uncle kicking off a national manhunt as they
disappear into the New Zealand bush.
The Bacchus Lady
Making its North American debut, South Korea’s The
Bacchus Lady tells the story of an aging prostitute who takes in a
young runaway. A shifting meditation on aging, a scathing indictment of a
system that ignores the elderly, and a contemplation of assisted suicide, this
film is many things, but never quite what is expected.
Alone
A unique, trippy psychological thriller, Park Hong-min’s
Alone made its North American premiere at SIFF. Filmed with
a singular approach, and with a daring narrative construction, the tale of a
man who witnesses a crime is so much more than just that.
Evolution
A surreal, unsettling body horror nightmare, Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s
Evolution is like a parable set in a fever dream. In a
seaside village inhabited by young boys and their mothers, the children are
subjected to bizarre medical procedures while the women engage in erotically
charged rituals on the beach.
Tickled
David Farrier and Dylan Reeve’s documentary,
Tickled, about a sport called Competitive Endurance Tickling,
may sound like a hoot, and it is, but as the two filmmakers dig into this niche
subculture, they discover something much darker and more twisted than they ever
imagined.
Cameraperson
Documentary collage as autobiography is an intriguing narrative
premise, and in Cameraperson, Kirsten Johnson uses footage
from the acclaimed films she’s photographed over the years to construct a
memoir. Gorgeous and captivating; full of themes of war, motherhood, and
oppression; this is a compelling look at the creative process and the people
behind the camera.
Eternal Summer
Swedish writer/director Andreas Ohman’s Eternal
Summer is a whirlwind road trip romance that begins as a twee affair
and takes a much darker turn. The two leads have magnificent, authentic
chemistry, the cinematography is stunning, and if this was in English, it would
be the next big indie smash no one can shut up about.
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