It is anything but easy to find some sort of an overriding theme in a festival’s programme, which is as rich and varied as that of Rotterdam’s. Apart from the finest selection of films coming from renowned festivals all over world, Rotterdam also exhibits rare gems both in its Maestros and Aces and in the Retrospective section. In this festival review I aim to focus on films dealing with coming of age problems since this year there were quite a number of films, in the competition section and in other sections, too dealing with teenage or adolescent life. This was often coupled with minimalist devices to get the message through reducing dialogues, stories and visual elements to the bare essentials. Whether it is due to tight budget or artistic choice, or both, is only secondary to the outcome, which is often fresh and inspired.
Glue (Glue, historia adolescente en medio de la nada) by Alexis Dos Santos is a good example of minimalism paired with the growing pains of teenage life. Made clearly on a shoestring, first feature Glue follows a small group of teenagers headed by Lucas (Nahuel Perez). Dos Santos examines changes both mental and physical that these kids go through as precisely as the school doctor examines Lucas in the opening scene. He lists all the elements of teenage life from friendship, sexuality, drugs to rebellion and high hopes in the middle of nowhere exploring a period of transition filled with dreams and disillusionments.
Manuel Nieto Zas’s movie, La Perrera (Dog Pound), was also in competition for the prestigious Tiger Awards. Although its protagonist is in his twenties now, the film shows quite a number of similarities with the before mentioned Glue. David (Pablo Riera) has passed his teens but still has not found the right path. In the absence of his girlfriend he is wasting his time hanging out with friends and does not even bother to see a doctor about his STD. The only job he is willing to undertake is building a house for his father but in the lack of any expertise the outcome is rather dubious. La Perrera is a real existential drama without much drama and more emphasis on the everyday actions showing snapshots of a perishing generation, captive of its own boredom and lethargy.
At a young age people might not see the possible consequences of their actions. Sometimes it is enough to make one mistake and someone can be stigmatized for a lifetime. This is exactly what happens to the heroine of Li Yu’s Dam Street (Hong Yan). High school student, Xiao Yun (Liu Yi), becomes pregnant from her classmate, which makes her an expel from school and, as a consequence, an outcast of society. The only person who seems to really care about her is a young boy, who follows her like a shadow and who, by accident, turns out to be her son, she long believed dead. But in Li Yu’s film there is no forgiveness for those who sinned once, especially in a society, in which traditions and conservative views still very strongly determine people’s thinking.
French cinema has always had a strong tendency to existentialism and individuals dueling with themselves and their surroundings. José Ascla’s film Alex seems to continue this tradition. Alex (Marie Raynal) is a strong woman, at least so she appears. She works for two and in her free time she is trying to renovate a rundown country house to make home for herself and her teenage son, who is presently under care. However, her battling with the neighbours, the elements and with herself for a better life looks as hopeless as refurbishing the derelict house. The whole building procedure turns into a metaphor for piecing together the pieces of Alex’s lonely life and her longing for completion and content.
In their quest for identity young people like to play with destiny and assume different identities to experience what it feels like to live others’ lives. However, what once started as an innocent game fuelled by curiosity and, often greed, might turn fatal leaving no hope or no way back. Exchanged identity is the starting point for Gela Babluani’s movie 13 (Tzameti), which is a tightly constructed minimalist thriller with the 20-year-old Sebastian (George Babluani, the director’s brother), in the centre, who finds himself in the middle of a game called Russian roulette. As the titlesuggests, the unlucky number 13 is bound to bring ill-fate for its wearer no matter what the outcome of the game is.
Less atmospheric and way more light-hearted is Miranda July’s Me, You and Everyone We Know. The film beautifully captures the lives of some small town, everyday people, each exhibiting some sort of idiosyncrasy. There’s one common thing in all of them: longing for love and attention. Miranda July performing artist, the writer director of Me, You and Everyone We Know remarked, ?This movie was inspired by the longing I carried out as a child, longing for the future, for someone to find me, for magic to descend upon my life and transform everything. It was also informed by how this longing progressed as I became an adult, slightly more fearful, more contorted, but no less fantastic.”
Although he is no longer a teenager, the aspiring writer Jim (Casey Afflec), is still striving to find his ways in life and win the heart of a beautiful nurse played by Liv Tyler in Steve Buscemi’s Lonesome Jim. With all the trials and errors there is still more hope for Jim than to the protagonist of Gavin Hood’s Tsotsi, a local hoodlum, who is fighting an everyday battle for survival in poverty and AIDS striken South Africa. Gangster life and tyrannical gangs are not unknown to Chinese culture either, as it becomes apparent from Han Jie’s Walking on the Wild Side (Lai xiao zi). Every religion offers solutions and advice on life for its followers still even the most deeply religious people have doubts occasionally, just like Ruth (Nathalie Press) in Josh Appignanesi’s Song of Songs, who instead of finding answers to her questions during her visit to the Holy Land, becomes more doubtful and unsure of her faith. Teenage or adolescent insecurity, frustration and supression might lead to extremes, as we can witness in Thomas Clay’s The Great Ecstacy of Robert Carmichael. Anna Kazejak-Dawid, Jan Komaso, Maciej Migas début feature Ode to Joy (Oda do Radoski) captures the lives and feelings of young people truthfully, similarly to Vranik Roland’s Black Brush (Fekete Kefe), which was one of the features representing Hungary.
The International Film Festival Rotterdam has never been famous for stars coming in large numbers to pose on the red carpet, rather for the mere quantity and quality of innovative independent films. This year, however, the festival proudly presented more than three hundred filmmakers presenting their films or taking part in the festival’s CineMart programme.
(2006.07.14)
