Interview with Nikolaj Arcel (director of Island of the Lost Souls)

Jack Sargeant, the 2008 curator of the Revelation Film Festival, describes the Danish fantasy/adventure film, Island of the Lost Souls, as “entertaining and fun… yet twisted, weird and a little subversive.” The film’s director, Nikolaj Arcel, seems reluctant to concur. When he hears this assessment, he laughs and then coyly admits, “I’d say the movie was actually a rather obvious homage to the kind of films that Hollywood does. I do try to infuse it with my own sense of humour, and a lot of heart and soul, but I think that it’s ultimately a very classical adventure film.”

Island of Lost Souls is, however, undeniably subversive in so much as it challenges our expectations of Danish cinema. Far removed from the more arthouse tendencies of Scandivian filmmakers (particularly those associated with the purity of the Dogma 95 film movement), this fast-paced, flashy, genre film is the last thing you’d expect from that corner of the globe. Arcel agrees, “It’s very different, but the really fun thing is that I’m working in the Denmark film town, right in with all the Dogma directors. During the process of editing then, most of these guys, like [Lars von] Trier and [Thomas] Vinterberg, would come in and help me edit and it was such a surreal experience, because it was clear that this was something very different.”

Arcel’s first film, King’s Game, was a political thriller, and much more in line with this Scandinavian tradition. “It was the success of that one that left me able to make something different this time,” Arcel explains. “After I’d finished it, I came to realise that this might be my only chance to make something expensive, so I decided to do something I’d dreamt of doing since I was a little kid, and that was an adventure film, which is basically what I had been brought up on…. I was really into those escapist fantasies like E.T. or Back to the Future – the kind that have an emotional, human story to them, with all these additional fantasy or supernatural elements.”

In Island of Lost Souls, this emotional core rests with the three central characters; Lulu, who has just moved into a small Denmark town with her recently-divorced mother, her new friend, Oliver, who is wrestling with his own family problems, and Hermann, the 19th Century soul who has possessed the body of Lulu’s younger brother, Sylvester. While the fantasy dimension evolves around them, Arcel’s characters remain firmly grounded in reality. They’re recognisable, relatable human beings, struggling to cope with these extraordinary events.

For Arcel, it was also important to position a strong female (Lulu) at the centre of the film. He ponders aloud: “I guess that shouldn’t be subversive, but maybe, sadly, you could see it that way. Certainly, here in Denmark, we have this tradition, this cliché, that every time you make this kind of fantasy film, even if it is for kids, it has to be about boys – boys having adventures. Most of my scripts have a girl as a main character, and I thought that just for once it would be good to make an action film with a girl at the centre, which was a very interesting challenge.”

Despite this all, however, Arcel maintains that he’s always seen his film as one for children. “I was actually sure that it would not be a particularly Festival-ish film,” he says. “I also never thought it would translate very well. Let’s say for you Australians, for example, you don’t have that pride of ‘Oh wow, they made a Danish adventure film,’ you don’t care about that! You have so many big great films of your own, and so many other English language films of the same sensibilities, so I did not think that this would travel so well. But then it’s always so hard to predict how your own films will be received.”

It’s definitely another unexpected choice for the Revelation programme, particularly as an opening night film. Then again, though, Revelation is far from your ordinary film festival. As Sargeant described it, “The festival is all about throwing people curve balls. I really wanted to have a family film on Day One, because people would never suspect that.”

Revelation Film Festival

A zealous defender of the underground and the independent, Jack Sargeant has little time for the blockbusters of mainstream cinema. Instead, he has devoted his life to the hunt for more open and more challenging forms of filmic expression. Having written several books on the topic of underground cinema, contributed writing to various other collections and publications, and extensively toured through the world’s largest independent film festivals, he has a CV to match his passion and the perfect for Revelation Film Festival’s 2008 curator. The hunt for films beyond the mainstream has after all been his life’s focus. It’s only appropriate then, that when I arrive to meet Sargeant at a bustling Mt Lawley café, I catch him in the midst of an impassioned discussion about the latest Narnia film and its many vices.

This discussion inevitably provokes Sargeant to list a couple of independent films that have worked within a simple genre to produce cleverer results. “I’ve been doing it since I was 20, I’m wired this way!” Sargeant professes. “There’s a poster for The Velvet Underground that says, ‘So far underground you get the bends,’ and I’m like that. People ask where I found this or that film, but it’s just my world. I can sense these things. It’s like spider senses, but I have an underground film sense, just because I’ve been involved in that world for so long.”

For Sargeant, the Revelation programme evolved organically from a process that involved contacting old friends and following word of mouth. Appropriately, the final film list does mirror Sargeant’s own interests and passions. In particular, the high number of music documentaries reflects his concurrent interest in particular genres and musicians. For example, What we do is Secret, a biopic in the style of Control, focuses on one of Sargeant’s favourite bands, The Germs, while My Name is Albert Ayler and Weird Old America reflect his interest in free jazz and folk respectively. “All these music films are about stuff that I really love,” he admits. “It’s about sharing the music as much as it is about sharing the film, so will hopefully appeal to film and music buffs alike.”

While it may mirror Sargeant’s personality, the programme also paints a picture of trends in independent and underground cinema. As usual, it is dominated by documentaries; 19 to 11 features. “In terms of film as form of empowerment for individuals, anyone can make a documentary,” Sargeant suggests. “Everyone has a camera and editing software these days, so a lot of documentaries are being made, like Tarnation [which screened at a previous Revelation Film Festival] which was made for like $100. And obviously these films aren’t all getting a lot of attention. A lot more feature films are picked up by distributors, and if they’re going to be picked up and screened widely then there’s no point in showcasing them here. So, Revelation has always had a history of focusing on documentaries.”

Joining Revelation’s documentary hall of fame is a whole host of films focused on musicians, as well as a couple of quirky numbers such as The Last American Freak Show (the title says it all) and Hell on Wheels (which looks at 1970s’ women’s roller derby). There are several films that look specifically at individuals; Words of Advice follows William Burroughs during the last years of his life, while Gonzo: The Life and Death of Dr. Hunter S. Thomson combines archived footage and extensive interviews to present the infamous author as he has never been seen before. Some social documentaries have also made the cut, including Begging Naked, which looks at the impact the recent New York clean-up had upon the poorer portion of its people, and Flow, which focuses on water politics and economics. Sargeant is adamant that these films achieve something that more mainstream documentaries may struggle with, particularly An Inconvenient Truth.

“All these hipsters have gravitated towards Al Gore but he’s part of the power machine and I find that very troubling,” he sighs. “Al Gore’s wife Tippa Gore actually persecuted The Dead Kennedys for being obscene; she was one of the Washington Wives. And Al Gore, he wants to be in charge of America, so that’s an instant warning… [These Festival films] are different, they’re made by people who are politically directly engaged, and Begging Naked is actually made by a friend of one of the women who is the documentary’s focus.”

The programme is also dotted with a fair portion of films that explore specific Australian issues. The Tumbler is an Australian thriller that explores Australia’s experience of colonialism through its multicultural characters. Spirits, another documentary, explores the nature of Nyoongar storytelling. Sargeant adds, “It’s an amazing documentary… and I’m not interested foregrounding it as about indigenous issues, it’s just a really good film. I think that as soon as you start labelling films, people start projecting meaning on them.”

The label of “Queer,” however, is one that Sargeant has applied to some of his films, though he appreciates the gravity of the term. “There are large parts of the gay community who would rather see it called Gay Cinema or Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Cinema; it’s a political gesture on my part as a curator…,” he explains. “It’s a term that engages with a whole range of political and cultural gestures, but it’s appropriate because the Queer films that we’re screening, Pangrogeny Manifesto, Words of Advice and even Cthuli (a thriller) are all about gay and lesbian politics in a way.”

Finally, the programme also includes a focus on experimental film, with a special event showcase of work from Britain. We discuss the hesitation that seems to stop certain people from engaging with experimental film and Sargeant chews over the topic: “I don’t know what people think experimental cinema is, but it’s beautiful stuff. It’s stunning to look at, vivid, vibrant cinema. People are scared of the word “experimental,” but in The Matrix, all that dodging of bullets and floating in mid-air is experimental, and that Australian film last year, Noise, that sound of tinnitus is also experimental. Yesterday’s experiments are tomorrow’s normal cinema, so every experiment in cinema is a good one.

“Change is good, risk is good, people should want to risk things and change their perspective. That’s the importance of Rev; that it will give you something you’re not going to normally see.” At this point I ask if he has any personal recommendation, and Sargeant suggests that everyone should see simply one thing that they had not previously heard of. “Take a risk, the worst thing that will happen is that you’ll see something you don’t like,” he urges. “But at least you will have seen something that has challenged you and changed you and that you can talk about. Otherwise, you can always just go and watch Narnia.”

Is Green the New Black?

“There’s no debate in this town without me – on any issue or at any level of government or religion or even in a household. I will always be called in. My opinion is sacrosanct in this town.”

These humble words belong to Perth comedian, Paul “Werzal” Montague, one of six comedians invited to participate in the upcoming “Is Green the New Black?” Comedy Debate. Hosted by the Conservation Council, and set to take place on World Environment Day, the debate will be traditional in structure, but unique in its speakers. With Malcolm Dix, Andrew McDonald, Steven McKiernan, Xavier Susai, and Nicole Hodgson joining Werzal, the ideas expressed are bound to get a little controversial.

Personally, Werzal doesn’t consider himself ‘green,’ and admits that his carbon footprint is “probably king-kong like.” Werzal was obviously selected not for his position on environmentalism, but rather for his comedic expertise. He has been moving through Perth’s comedy scene since the early nineties, and has worked as a comedian for both the ABC and 96FM. For him, environmentalism is just “something you do.” That said, Werzal’s more pragmatic appraisal of environmentalism does leave him in an ideal position to argue for the negative side of this debate.

“I think the organisers clearly read which people made sense for which side,” Werzal agrees, “because there will be a lot of comedians on the positive side, like Malcolm Dicks or Andrew McDonald, who will inevitably leap on the bandwagon to try and impress the smelly-armpit-dreadlock brigade by harping on about the environment. The thing is that I have no objection to saving the planet. I’m into that, just let’s not pretend it’s cool. That’s all I’m saying.”

Werzal doesn’t agree that Hollywood’s recent attention to climate change issues renders environmentalism attractive. Instead, he believes that “the more you preach something, the less sexy it becomes,” even when hot young things like Cameron Diaz and Leonardio DiCaprio are heading the campaign. “The more celebrities stand up and preach, the less cool it is and the less cool they are. The thing is that, with the impact of human existence on our poor little planet earth, we’re never going to be able to relax and say, ‘Everyone’s doing a great job, just chill out for a while and we’ll get back to these practices in ten years.’ The urgency is always going to be there, and as long as people are saying ‘Do it, do it, it’s got to be done,’ it’s never going to be hip.”

He explains his position by likening conservation to toe-nail cutting, as something that you can care about only in so much as you know it has to be done. “It’s a pragmatic issue, like teeth-flossing or monogamy,” he adds. “It’s something you do because the consequences of not doing it are worse than doing…. I object to the premise of ‘green is the new black’ because it kind of implies that green is somehow sexy, that it’s cool or hip. It’s neither cool nor hip, or sexy or mysterious like black. It’s not fun, it’s not good times, it’s not something you feel special doing, it’s just something you do.”

With such passionate conviction, it will be interesting to see Werzal under the pressure of rebuttal. He believes, however, that comedy is ideally pre-disposed to respond to such questions. “It’s a temptation to get too political or too preachy but you’ve definitely got to do this,” he emphasises. “I think what comedy has to do is look at what we’re being told and ask questions of it. A lot of these issues are present to us as, ‘We must…’ And what I want to do, as a comedian, is ask ‘We must… what?’ or ‘We must… why?’”

Spanish Film Festival

Few people can boast about having watched over 1000 Spanish films in just 11 years, but this precise achievement is Natalia Ortiz’s unusual claim to fame. As the founding director of Australia’s Spanish Film Festival, she’s spent over a decade jumping through Spanish cinemas on the lookout for that special “something.” Her years are now marked by the familiar build-up to another festival, by seasonal trawls through DVD previews, and annual trips to international film festivals in search of cinematic goodies. And every year she emerges with a wide-reaching selection of the best that Spain has to offer.

“It never gets dull,” she explains, in her rich Spanish accent. “The most interesting thing about putting the programme together is that you always have to consider the wide audience. On the one hand, you have your Australian audience. On the other, you have to think about the Spanish community, and not only the young Spanish community who are really up to date with what is happening in Spain, but also the older part of that community, who feel as if they don’t understand what’s happening in Spanish cinema these days. So I try to bring in some classical films for them. And for me that’s the exciting part; that the audience is really wide and we have kids who are 7 years old through to 70 year-olds, and we’re trying to reach all those people, and present all of them with fresh films every year.”

No where are these conflicting intentions better exemplified than in Ortiz’s choice to include a ‘spotlight’ on Spanish actress Maribel Verdu. An icon for Spaniards, Verdu has produced over 50 films of varying genres, so this showcase offers ex-patriots the chance to get a little nostalgic. Simultaneously, Verdu is on the verge of Hollywood success, so in a way this is Ortiz’s pre-emptive attempt to familiarise Australians with her image. “Normally people do tend to present these spotlights at the end of an actor or actress’s career, but I can see that she is going to be a huge star internationally. She’s shooting now a film with [Francis Ford] Coppola, so I thought it was about time for us to show off to Australia that we’ve got a ‘new’ actress coming up. And now she’s reachable like never before, so it’s the perfect time for us to share this icon that we grew up with, with the rest of the country.”

Such specific focuses are, however, not usually sufficient for drawing in a non-Spanish Australian crowd. So, this year, the festival’s promotional buzz has instead focused around its inclusion of a few high-budget horror films, sending hype to an all-time high. As Ortiz notes, however, Spain has long been infatuated with the genre, especially with thriller and horror. She snorts congenially at the idea of a horror film emerging from France, and thus reflects Spain’s long-standing cinematic identity as one of the only European countries not to shy away from genre.

“We’ve always been interested in thrillers and horrors in Spain, and this year it just coincides that the ones that have been released have been well received internationally. You’ve got films like [REC] and The Orphanage that are being viewed all over the world, so I think that’s what makes it seem different, as if we’re producing more. Maybe some people who have not been following Spanish cinema will assume that this is new for Spain, but in fact we’ve already had previous films from the director of [REC] in this festival. We have been producing these kinds of films from years.”

Despite some remaining misconception, it’s with an obvious pride that Ortiz describes her festival’s role in familiarising Australian cineastes with Spain’s own filmic traditions. She clearly associates cinema with a loose form of cultural education, adding, “At the beginning [11 years ago], the vast majority of the audience did not know much about Spanish cinema, but now you can see, from responses and questions, that they are getting a greater knowledge and understanding of the cinema. It’s a process.”

For Ortiz, though, that more educational function of the festival can only ever be a bonus. It’s obvious that her primary focus is instead on uncovering powerful stories that Australians might not otherwise see. When she’s watching movie after movie, Ortiz isn’t so much looking for a film that reflects contemporary Spain as she is for a film that is honest in its storytelling. “In the end, I just want honesty,” she stresses. “You can see, and the audience can feel it straight away too, if the film director is trying to hard to please someone and is not honest with the story. For me, it doesn’t matter if it’s a big or small production, or from a film school in Madrid or Barcelona, I don’t mind where it comes from, so long as it’s honest and has that minimum quality.”

It’s this hunt that has increasingly lead Ortiz towards Spanish co-productions. “A lot of the most fascinating films in Spanish cinema are emerging from this co-operation with not only Latin America, but also places like Morocco and European countries. It makes sense, I mean, at the moment people are moving all over the world, so to limit your people’s stories to particular places and cities would be very restrictive and very unrealistic. In fact, I think the richness of what is happening at the moment comes from the fact that we’re living all over the world yet we all enjoy the same sort of stories. Making films with other people and telling trans-national stories is the richness of our current reality. For me, not only in terms of finance, but also in terms of storytelling, the future is co-production.”

And it’s also this search that often draws Ortiz towards debut directors, with almost half of 2008’s programme coming directly from first-timers. With a laugh, Ortiz admits that she’s gotten pretty at good at intercepting talent over these past 11 years. “What’s really great is we’re now starting to see the first or second film released from directors whose short films we screened years ago. So I look at that and say ‘Oh I was not so wrong there!’ and it’s very satisfying, of course.”


Director’s Picks:
Spanish festival director Natalia Ortiz chooses her favourites.

1. Seven Billiard Tables :: Screening as part of the spotlight on Maribel Verdu, Seven Billiard Tables is the tale of Angela (Verdu)’s attempts to restart the local billiard hall her recently-deceased father left behind.
2. The Orphanage :: In this top-earning horror film, a young boy befriends some disconcerting playmates when his family moves into an abandoned orphanage. From first-time director Juan Antonio and producer Geillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth).
3. Scandalous :: This comedy/musical charts the disgruntled Luis’s attempts to understand the women in his life (wife, daughter and grand-daughter), after each of them abandons him within a single day.
4. Desperate Women :: Another comedy about hunting lost lovers, Desperate Women sees two ladies madly chasing after their dream man and son, who had previously been thought dead. This film’s appearance in the festival marks its world premier.
5. Under the Stars :: In his first feature film, Félix Viscarret presents a mediocre trumpet player whose life is complicated after his father’s death throws him into a whole new reality. It’s a warm drama, with an edgy quirkiness.

Interview with Sam Riley

Post-punk pioneers, Joy Division, are one “those” bands.. One of those bands that inspire a quasi-religious following and widespread reverence from fans and musicians alike. One of those bands that never seem to stop attracting new listeners, topping various “all-time best song lists” over years thirty years after their break-up. One of those bands with a frontman whose dark decline that has now become a pop culture legend.

It was, therefore, a big deal when production began on Control – a new, no-holes-barred biopic that charts Ian Curtis’s rise to success, and subsequent descent into personal darkness. From the outset, director Anton Corbijn made clear his intentions to look beneath the surface of Curtis’s facade, and to not shy away from his infidelity or battles with epilepsy and depression. Little-known actor Sam Riley (who ironically played Mark E Smith in 24 Hour Party People before his short role was cut in post-production) is happy to laugh about the pressure he felt taking on the role of Joy Division’s frontman. “It was out of my control,” he jokes, somehow not yet sick of a pun that he must have heard many times before.

“He wasn’t anyone I personally revered or idolised,” Riley eventually admits, “so it wasn’t until I went onto the internet and looked at a Joy Division forum that I started really panicking. After it was announced that I would be playing Curtis, I foolishly went back to look again and there was mass panic and fear. The fans were all looking at photos of me and commenting on how I looked nothing like Ian. Which I don’t think I do normally – no one has ever said I have done. And then the fear kicked in.”

Corbijn, however, obviously saw something that Riley didn’t. He claims to have seen “something of Curtis” in Riley the first time he laid eyes on the young actor. “I can’t imagine that to be true,” Riley denies, “I think he’s a photographer, and what he saw was a snapshot of me; outside, smoking and shivering in the cold, wearing an overcoat. No, I don’t think we have the same aura. Though I don’t know what his was, as I never met him.”

Either way, Riley’s performance has been celebrated by even the most devoted Joy Division fans, with New Order themselves applauding the film. Riley credits his success to the fact that Corbijn never asked him to play a “rock star.” He explain; “I could deal with the pressure because my instructions were to play a young man with an exceptional talent, who chased his dreams, fell in love with two people and then had it all get too much for him – not to play the son of God.

“After all, [Curtis] is not a classic in many respects,” Riley continues, “On stage, he isn’t the strutting rock star that a lot his heroes are. He looks very vulnerable at his most manic, and the clothes and the hair almost make him look childlike. And it’s not all sex, drugs and rock and roll – the rock and roll was his life passion, the drugs were prescribed medications for epilepsy, and the sex was with his wife and girlfriend, who he loved. So it’s not the classic rock story in any respect.”

Rather than merely replicating the exterior of the musician then, Riley dove into an intense research stage, focusing his attention upon the singer’s complex interior and writhing contradictions. He read and re-read Deborah Curtis’s novel Touching from a Distance (which details Curtis’s infidelity and was the greatest inspiration for the Control screenplay). “The book really gives you the most insight into him as a character,” he emphasises, “And it isn’t the most flattering look at a young man, but that didn’t put me off; that was just more interesting. He was very complicated, he was very young, and he was only a teenager when he got married. I mean that wasn’t so unusual those days, but it was still probably too early to make that decision. And he was petulant and moody, but also good fun and very compassionate towards people, from all accounts.”

In attempting to fully understand Curtis, Riley also drew upon his own experience as a musician, comparing it to Curtis’s. “There are actually some things we have in common,” he explains, “We both dreamt of being rock stars, we both came from the same place in England, and I understand some of his fears. I’ve never contended with epilepsy and depression, but once you start seeing the world through his eyes than it’s not particularly hard to understand the dilemmas and problems he was faced with. He wasn’t a conscience-free rock and roller who I might have had trouble relating to, he was a thoughtful guy and really resented himself for putting his wife and child in that position.”

It would appear as if Riley actually encountered more challenges in attempting to capture the more superficial details of Curtis. He recalls how he spent seemingly endless days watching the very limited selection of Joy Division video footage available today (totalling in just over one hour), in an attempt to appropriately gauge Curtis’s idiosyncratic dance moves. “The only connection we have musically is that the music I played was similar to the music that Ian looked up to, because I revered David Bowie and Iggy Pop and The Doors, just has he did. But there’s where the similarities end, in terms of our performance roles.”

Nonetheless, after many days of dance practise, Riley felt he had finally managed to grasp something of Curtis’s style. He also believes that the live music scenes (in which he actually sings, almost perfectly replicating Curtis’s distinct tone), just “clicked” because of the particular casting choices. “We loved playing together, we loved being a band,” he recalls enthusiastically, “and once we’d got our costumes on had our haircuts it all just fit. You’d have a tough time convincing us that we weren’t Joy Division, because we loved it.”

This sentiment ideally echoes the advice that Riley received from Bernard Sumner himself (guitarist and keyboardist in Joy Division), when several of the cast members made the most of an invaluable opportunity to meet New Order. He remembers; “The weekend before we were starting filming, they happened to be playing Liverpool, so they invited Anton [Corbijn], Samantha [Morton, who plays Deborah] and the boys [in the band] to go up and watch them play. Then we met them backstage, and everyone was talking to their counterparts, though mine wasn’t there of course. I spoke mainly to Bernard, who gave me confidence because he said that I had something about me that was similar to Ian. And he said that we should have fun, because they had fun being Joy Division. And that was the sum total of advice that we received from New Order, because that’s the way that they are. “

At this point Riley again mentions how happy he was to later learn that New Order “loved the film.” I point out that that is indeed a compliment of the highest order, and he retorts with another laugh, “Indeed! You could actually say that it was a compliment of the highest new order!”

Interview with Elysia Zeccola

They say that Italians are all about family. Elysia Zeccola, the manager of this year’s Lavazza Italian Film Festival, jokes about the all-enveloping nature of her father’s “big Italian family, who made it impossible for her English mother to avoid adopting the culture and learning the language." Even work is a family affair for Zeccola, who has spent the last eight years organising the festival alongside her father, Antonio (the managing director), who actually proposed the original vision for an Italian film festival eight years ago.

“Back then, we saw how well the French one was doing and we just thought, ‘Why isn’t anyone organising an Italian festival?’ It seemed strange, because Italy has got such a long established and well respected film industry and so many fantastic films, so we decided to start organising one ourselves,” she reflects, “In the first year we picked up a selection of films and screened them only in Melbourne and Sydney, and pretty much from the second year onwards we’ve just expanded, because there seems to be such a demand and people just enjoy those films so much. We’re getting more and more films and also expanding at each individual location. In Perth it was just at Paradiso initially, and it’s moved to Paradiso and Luna on SX.”

Zeccola makes no claims to understand the festival’s ever-growing popularity, but she does emphasise the particular power that film can have over Italian migrants living in Australia. “So many Italian films touch on immigration themes – and whether they’re talking about immigration to Canada or America or Australia, they’re looking at experiences that all migrants can sort of connect with,” she stresses. “Even for second or third generation migrants, these are films about people who have moved from small villages and travelled across the world to live in another country, and as you watch them you realise that that’s what your parents have also done and it’s quite interesting.”

Zeccola herself certainly used film as a means to connect with her own Italian identity. From the age of 11 she worked a foreign film cinema and reflects fondly upon the days of “sitting up the back watching the film, once you’ve ripped everyone’s tickets.” It was in this dark space that Zeccola first tasted Italian celluloid, and quickly found herself hooked. “I’d definitely watch a lot of these films, and slowly it became so important for me to learn Italian,” she remembers, “because after I saw all these Italian language films I felt very much that I had such a strong connection with the country.”

This year, the film festival programme presents a wide range of Italian films, all of them united in box office success. “They aren’t all blockbusters, but they are all films that have reached a certain level of success and have gained good reviews in Italy,” Zeccola explains. “It’s a combination of factors. Some of them have stars and actors that people are interesting in seeing, while some are just films that have really succeeded in touching hearts through their themes.”

There is certainly a diverse range of subject material on offer. Personally, Zeccola recommends Manual of Love 2 (Manuale D’Amore 2), the sequel to Italy’s record breaking romantic comedy, that returns once again with four more interconnecting love stories. She also speaks highly of One Hundred Nails (Centochiodi), the final fiction film from Palme D’Or winning director, Ermanno Olmi, who has decided to from now on only produce documentaries. This film delves into the heavy themes of theology, love and friendship, after a country librarian awakes to find 100 rare manuscripts nailed to his library floor.

“They’re all so varied! There’s such a great mix there because Italians are always churning out so many great films, which makes my job easy,” Zeccola laughs. “People say that Italian films are always about passion and infidelity and adultery, and there certainly is a lot of that going on, but there’s also so much more to it.”

Interview with Nicholas Maksymow

No film student worth their salt could deny Russia’s epic influence upon cinema history. It was here that montage techniques were first pioneered and refined, and it was here that some of film history’s greatest masterpieces were born. So many years and one iron curtain later, and Russia is again eager to reassert its position on the international cinema landscape. The 2007 Russian Film Festival Russian Revolution is a tribute to Russia’s fast growing cinema industry, and, this week, it makes its way into our part of the globe.

“Russia’s film production is increasing at an incredible rate!” exclaims the festival director, Nicholas Maksymow, “Firstly, there are lots of private bodies who provide funding for budding filmmakers, and if that does not work there is always the state funding board. What’s happening there now is similar to what the AFI did in the late seventies to revive the Australian film industry. There’s this strong, creative reenergising.”

Luckily, Russian filmmakers are also enjoying a lucrative success at the Russian box office. This year they are expected to retain over one quarter of the total national box office takings. “Unlike Australians, Russians don’t really experience that kind of ‘cultural cringe’,” explains Maksymow. “There really isn’t a pressure to be Western, because Russians are so proud of all their art and above all their cinema… Films like Daywatch and Nighwatch and Wolfhound are obviously Russian films trying to copy Hollywood, but there is still this unique ‘Russianness’ about them, and there’s no pressure to get rid of that. In fact, that’s why people seem to enjoy them so much.”

Maksymow connects this sense of “Russianness” with the Russian artistic drive to paint realistically complex pictures of daily life, that accurately scan the whole range of the emotional spectrum. “For instance, in one movie you might cry, you might laugh and you might feel scared,” he emphasises, “There is so much emotion going through one film and that’s what life is like in Russia at the moment, because it’s so unpredictable. In everyday life people go through both laughter and hardship, and Russian film is all about capturing that realistically.” At this point, he laughs about how the highest rating Australian film to have ever been screened in Russia was Lantana – a fact that he attributes to Lantana’s complex, realistic, and unquestionably dark, treatment of human emotions.

If there is one section of human life, though, from which Russian cinema steers clear, it is contemporary Russian politics. While the world reels in response to news about Russia’s (often brutal) censorship of political journalism, the film industry is safe in its detachment. Maksymow explains, “The journalists get into trouble because they’re overtly political, and trying to push a certain view, while cinema is still seen as a democratic form of the arts, in the sense that it’s not really political at all. Filmmaking doesn’t really touch sensitive political issues in Russia; it’s more about making fun of the old politicians and examining our past than looking at the contemporary situation.”

Cinema and politics therefore enjoy mutual support and respect in Russia, a phenomenon reflected by the fact that Vladimir Putin (the Russian first head of state to ever visit Australia) officially opened the festival in Sydney last week. Significantly, Putin’s visit to Australia (for the APEC summit) corresponds with the 200 year anniversary of Australia’s relationship with Russia. Maksymow ponders on how all these aspects work together to strengthen international cultural understandings, as he reflects, “While obviously our relations, and Putin’s visit, have been mainly political and economic… festivals like these fill in the cultural aspects… I believe that what we’re trying to do by having Russian film festivals in Australia is giving not only those of Russian heritage, but also Australian citizens, a chance to see something they would not usually see.”

Interview with Megan Spencer

Megan Spencer is the perfect poster girl for GenerationX. She reifies pop-culture as a deity, she explodes with awe for those who dedicate their life to the cultivation of an obsession and she finds poetic beauty in the seemingly mundane. “Pop culture replaced our god,” she laughs, without a hint of irony. “It replaced our children and our mortgages – for a while, anyway. And pop culture, in a sense, has replaced art. I don’t mean to sound like a philistine but I guess I find the most artistic gratification and profound poetic experiences usually through pop culture.”

Certainly, as Spencer herself admits, it takes a significant dose of “crazy one-eyed fandom” to centralise an entire career around a love of cinema, which is exactly what she’s done. In fact, Spencer has skipped through the entire spectrum of Australia’s film industry – as a reviewer for both radio and television, as the artistic director of Perth’s own Revelation Film Festival, and as a filmmaker in her own right, specialising in a raw, ‘guerrilla style’ portraiture.

No prizes for guessing the kind of subjects that Spencer chooses for her own documentaries. So far, she has consistently focused upon exploring the lives of passionate, unique individuals devoted to their personal obsessions. From fanatical AFL supporters to professional dominatrixes, Spencer has no qualms about entering social spheres that are far removed from her own, and from the realities inhabited by most of her viewers. In her latest DVD release, Lovestruck: Wrestling’s #1 Fan, she tracks almost ten years in the life of Sue Chuster, Australia’s most devoted wrestling fan.

Chuster doesn’t fit the expected demographic of a wrestling fan, and yet she’s dedicated the last 35 years of her life to the sport, has travelled to America twice in hot pursuit of wrestling superstars, owns over 4000 wrestling DVDs and videos, and has plastered her house shift in a make-shift wallpaper composed of over 4000 wrestling photos. It would have been dangerously easy for Spencer to adopt a condescending or ridiculing perspective with this film, but instead she has injected it with a warm, heartfelt and emotionally sensitive tone.

“If it was a superficial look at her, then it could have been become that, but that was never my intention. I wouldn’t want to make a superficial film about anyone. And I was determined to dig deeper with Sue and hang in there until that deeper reason presented itself. She is a bit more of an extreme figure… But I admire the way people can take something that is seen as banal or everyday or of no cultural value and turn into something that has enormous value, even if it’s just personally to them. I think those sorts of stories are really valuable and really entertaining and really reflective of who we might actually be.”

Unfortunately, Spencer believes that the heartfelt honesty with which she represented Chuster is also the reason why she had so much trouble obtaining funding from broadcasters and public boards. In the end, Spencer was restricted to releasing her television-friendly fifty-minute film through DVD – a not entirely regrettable decision, because it did allow her the space to include over thirty minutes of special features.

“I think [broadcasters] are scared of real people, and of not presenting them in a controlled way,” she elaborates. “In parts of Lovestruck, sometimes the subject is making the film and I don’t put in any voice-overs telling you how to receive it or react. And I think we have a pretty generic, formulaic approach to television documentaries in this country. I am generalising [but many directors]… try to clean their films up, and they end up second guessing their audiences which is something I refuse to do and don’t need to do and don’t want to do, and if it keeps me on the margins then I’m happy to stay there.”

Interview with Nicholas Maksymow

No film student worth their salt could deny Russia’s epic influence upon cinema history. It was here that montage techniques were first pioneered and refined, and it was here that some of film history’s greatest masterpieces were born. So many years and one iron curtain later, and Russia is again eager to reassert its position on the international cinema landscape. The 2007 Russian Film Festival Russian Revolution is a tribute to Russia’s fast growing cinema industry, and, this week, it makes its way into our part of the globe.

“Russia’s film production is increasing at an incredible rate!” exclaims the festival director, Nicholas Maksymow, “Firstly, there are lots of private bodies who provide funding for budding filmmakers, and if that does not work there is always the state funding board. What’s happening there now is similar to what the AFI did in the late seventies to revive the Australian film industry. There’s this strong, creative reenergising.”

Luckily, Russian filmmakers are also enjoying a lucrative success at the Russian box office. This year they are expected to retain over one quarter of the total national box office takings. “Unlike Australians, Russians don’t really experience that kind of ‘cultural cringe’,” explains Maksymow. “There really isn’t a pressure to be Western, because Russians are so proud of all their art and above all their cinema… Films like Daywatch and Nighwatch and Wolfhound are obviously Russian films trying to copy Hollywood, but there is still this unique ‘Russianness’ about them, and there’s no pressure to get rid of that. In fact, that’s why people seem to enjoy them so much.”

Maksymow connects this sense of “Russianness” with the Russian artistic drive to paint realistically complex pictures of daily life, that accurately scan the whole range of the emotional spectrum. “For instance, in one movie you might cry, you might laugh and you might feel scared,” he emphasises, “There is so much emotion going through one film and that’s what life is like in Russia at the moment, because it’s so unpredictable. In everyday life people go through both laughter and hardship, and Russian film is all about capturing that realistically.” At this point, he laughs about how the highest rating Australian film to have ever been screened in Russia was Lantana – a fact that he attributes to Lantana’s complex, realistic, and unquestionably dark, treatment of human emotions.

If there is one section of human life, though, from which Russian cinema steers clear, it is contemporary Russian politics. While the world reels in response to news about Russia’s (often brutal) censorship of political journalism, the film industry is safe in its detachment. Maksymow explains, “The journalists get into trouble because they’re overtly political, and trying to push a certain view, while cinema is still seen as a democratic form of the arts, in the sense that it’s not really political at all. Filmmaking doesn’t really touch sensitive political issues in Russia; it’s more about making fun of the old politicians and examining our past than looking at the contemporary situation.”

Cinema and politics therefore enjoy mutual support and respect in Russia, a phenomenon reflected by the fact that Vladimir Putin (the Russian first head of state to ever visit Australia) officially opened the festival in Sydney last week. Significantly, Putin’s visit to Australia (for the APEC summit) corresponds with the 200 year anniversary of Australia’s relationship with Russia. Maksymow ponders on how all these aspects work together to strengthen international cultural understandings, as he reflects, “While obviously our relations, and Putin’s visit, have been mainly political and economic… festivals like these fill in the cultural aspects… I believe that what we’re trying to do by having Russian film festivals in Australia is giving not only those of Russian heritage, but also Australian citizens, a chance to see something they would not usually see.”

Interview with Anna Broinowski

Out of the often overwhelming mass of documentary genre clones and failed attempts at objectivity, there rises one, recent, unique offering. From director Anna Broinowski, Forbidden Lie$ explores the controversy surrounding Norma Khouri, the international best-selling author of an autobiographical novel about Jordanian honour killings, who was later exposed as a fraud and a con-artist. Rather than simply forcing one perspective or opinion upon her audiences, Broinowski plays with the notion of truth, spin and fact, encouraging viewers to question the film they are watching as much as they question Khouri herself.

“I think that people who say that documentary filmmaking is the most truthful form of filmmaking are not correct,” Broinowski asserts, “I think that the minute you point your camera at someone, whether it’s a drama or a doco, you are shaping reality… Every decision is personal, and it’s all about your opinion of the subject. I was keen to explore that in the film, and Norma’s tendency to deceive people became the perfect springboard for me to mirror stylistically what she does to people’s minds.” Drawing more inspiration from con movies like Catch Me If You Can and Ocean’s 11 than from the well worn conventions of documentary filmmaking, Forbidden Lie$ is peppered with CGI, fast paced cinematography, snappy cutaways and dramatic re-enactments.

The dramatic impact of the film is certainly enhanced by the fact that all Broinowski’s interview subjects presented such animated testimonies that they feel almost staged. “None of them were scripted, and I too was gob smacked,” she remembers, “I just couldn’t believe my luck when this high-up lawyer in Chicago said to me, point blank, to the camera, having just met me, ‘She is evil and diabolical.’ I think it wasn’t so much good fortune, but the fact that Norma polarises people around her, so you can’t have a mediocre response to her. So it was delightful, because everyone was passionate about her, whether for or against. And I was like a kid in a toy store, because I had this cast like something from a thriller, and the only difference was that they were real.”

Like many of the people she interviewed, including sophisticated minds in media, publishing and law, Broinowski was also not immune to the charm of this sweet talking woman. She describes herself as initially being a “Norma convert,” and remembers how her initial vision for the film was one that would redeem Khouri, and prove the media’s negative spin on her to be entirely incorrect. “Norma is so likeable you really want to believe that she’s no where near as cunning or as diabolical as these crimes that she’s done would make her out to be,” Broinowski stresses, “She’s really audacious, she’s feisty, and she has a strong spirit. In many ways she’s a post-feminist icon… and you can’t help but admire that. And how do you marry that up with the fact that she tricked an old woman out of her life savings and her home?”

Naturally, this vision had to shift, as promised evidence and interview subjects disappeared, and Khouri’s story became more and more tangled. Broinwoski insists though, that this film shouldn’t be about judging Khouri, so much as about judging the system in which we live, that allows people like her to thrive. “The film’s message is ‘trust no one, believe no one, question everything, corroborate everything’,” she concludes. “I think that we have lost contact with the importance of truth. As a society, we have become so cynical that we know longer care about the fact that we’re being spun to by the media and by politicians. We need to fight again, to make truth and facts and investigation important once more.”

Interview with Glen Hansard

When we meet, Glen Hansard is looking a little battleworn. His hands alternate between rubbing his eyes open and, almost nervously, fiddling with a grey pick, which he twirls through his calloused fingers with acrobatic ease, and occasionally taps against the bench. “To be honest, I’m almost missing all this success, because I am so busy,” he sighs, looking suddenly even more exhausted. “This is not a complaint, but I need to take a break just to get some perspective. Perspective is important, both with great success and great failure. Also, they say that if you don’t take time to celebrate when your ship comes in, it’s just another day at the office.”

Hansard certainly does have cause to celebrate recently. After seventeen years of leading Irish independent band, The Frames, he’s receiving a new kind of media attention. As the lead actor in Once, a touching romance/drama about a Dublin busker who falls in love with a Czech migrant, both his musical and personal profile have received a welcome bolster. This comes just in time for a current tour with Bob Dylan, and the release of his band’s new album, The Cost, a beautifully emotion recording which includes several songs featured in the film.

“The movie was just a three week bit of fun with some friends, and it never had any significance at all to my career, except now it does,” he reflects, sounding almost a little shocked by his own success. “Now, this film has brought us a huge amount of new audience. In an ideal world, you’d hope that you could write a song and people would respond to it in a certain way, but the world isn’t that simple and the media really doesn’t hasn’t had much to say about us in a while. There is no ‘myth,’ if you like… And now, we haven’t done anything different to how we’ve always done it, but there’s this film, and sometimes people just need something like that to latch onto. And this has just brought a whole new wave of energy around the band. It’s definitely reenergised the audience, which has in turn reenergised the band.”

Initially, Hansard’s role in Once was not as high-profile. Working with director and ex-band member John Carney, he was to produce a set of songs in concurrence with the script. For Hansard, working under Carney’s direction was an unusual power reversal. “I was working on his project, whereas before [in The Frames] he’d always been working on mine,” he explains, “It was such a perspective shift, having to ultimately adhere to John’s vision, and also such a good thing. When you spend a long time being the one who makes the art, you tend to get that ‘I’m right’ attitude happening a lot, so it is good to work on someone else’s art and, even if you don’t agree, they will say ‘well, this is me vision,’ and that’s that.”

Hansard’s role shifted dramatically, though, when Cillian Murphy (arguably a dubious casting choice) pulled out of his role as the lead actor. Given Hansard’s strong connection to the main character, it was suggested that he fill those shoes. “I honestly didn’t feel that comfortable about it,” Hansard confesses, looking slightly awkward, “But John just said, ‘Trust me, I will get a good performance out of you.’ And all I asked was that he promise to fire me if he had to, because I don’t want to be in a shit film. All he said was, ‘I won’t let you be.’ So that was the deal we all struck with each other. In the end, I wasn’t acting very much… John just kept on saying, ‘stop acting, and pull back a bit more.’ Sometimes I would really stop acting altogether and just read the lines and he would say, ‘Now that’s perfect.’ He just wanted us to be ourselves.”

As Murphy departed though, so did the producer and the film’s financing. “We had no lead and no money,” Hansard remembers, “We had to convince all the crew to work for free, meself and Mar [Irglova, the lead actress] worked for free, and we made the film in seventeen days as that was all the crew could give us.” Overnight, Once had become a project financed entirely by love, a factor which definitely shines through the final product. Suddenly, several sharp cost cuts were made; the Dublin scenes were filmed on long lenses without official permits, the musical recordings were done in Hansard’s bedroom rather than in a studio, and the entire film was shot on HD instead of on the intended 16mm film stock.

“It felt really good, though,” Hansard emphasises, “If you’re doing something like this where everyone is working for free – and I’ve been in this situation with my band many times before – you have to get as much out of these people as possible, so there’s a high energy. We were knocking out about four or five scenes a day.”

Perhaps this is the reason why the film feels so natural and organic; although that may also be attributed to the fact that so much of the film was improvised. Hansard clarifies, “What I love most about music is doing it live, when it’s all in the moment, and everything is real and happening right there, so that, when you fuck up, it’s almost part of the beauty of the performance. That’s what a performance is – imperfect…. And I think John understood that really well, that it had to be improvised in order for it to be enjoyable. A lot of directors are really precious about their dialogue, but John said, ‘If you can find a better way to get to that same point, you should do it.’” Naturally, the fact that Hansard is essentially playing himself, and that he is now actually romantically involved Irglova (this is the one point in the conversation during which he looks significantly more awake), helped infuse that improvisation with a poignant sense of reality.

For Hansard though, it seems that Once is about more than the love between two people. “John described the movie as a ‘love song for Ireland’ – but it kind of depicts a Dublin of about fifteen years ago. I mean, it’s all shot on the streets of Dublin now and with no extras, but Dublin now, like Australia, is full of wine bars and cappuccino cafes now, and we’ve got all the high-end designer clothes shops and people are driving around in Range Rovers flaunting their wealth. What we wanted to do was make a film about Ireland before that happened. Also, the Irish were once famous for their friendly welcome… but when we had to deal with immigration we became quite cruel and quite the opposite. My character in the film actually just represents older Ireland, the guy who just accepts the girl, and likes her for who she is, while there’s no real talk about her past and her Czech history or her poverty.”

Significantly, Once did not receive a raving response upon its release in Ireland. (“Irish people don’t see Irish films,” Hansard explains.) Perhaps this is the reason why Hansard, believing the film would never be successful enough to actually warrant a soundtrack, decided to go ahead and record the film’s songs on a separate album, together with Irglova. “We ended up making this record called The Swell Season, which was just a basically an album of the songs from Once,” he reflects, and then laughs, once more recalling that now familiar tone of disbelief, with which he adds, “We figured Once would never be seen by anybody.”