VIFF 2020

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just purchased my tickets to some in-cinema screenings. seeing:

- Summer of 85 (the new Ozon, and my first Ozon in fact!)
- Undine (the new Petzold)
- Another Round (the new VInterberg)
- a restored version of Dennis Hopper's Out of the Blue (40th anniversary... this was filmed in Vancouver)

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Holy fuck out of the blue was good. May go again in a few days

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Literally all the leads are incredible but Linda Manz seriously delivers one of the all-time great performances

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2 sorta disappointing movies today:

SUMMER OF 85 (ozon): ok i was REALLY digging this vibe at the beginning, it felt like dolan directing a rohmer script based on a highsmith novel or something. then it kinda got ridiculous... i want to check out more by ozon tho, cos apparently lots of his movies are about sexuality and queerness and youth and all that, just, not... ridiculous
3/5

UNDINE (petzold): going in i thought this movie was gonna be about puking, or pooping, or maybe fasting... but undine is just the main character's name. apparently this is a not-extremely faithful interpretation of some classic german novella. i dunno. it hit lots of notes, but i didn't like the way they sounded together, if that makes any sense. could get no clear tone from this at anytime. it was a constant mystery to me, but not in the way that i think it was intended to be. anyway from doing some reading, it seems like the original novella is some SRSLY emo shit, which normally i would like. but emo shit needs to go deep (hehe pun), somehow, somewhere... and this just skirted the top of damn near everything, sorta melodramatic, sorta megically realist, sorta metaphysical, sorta about undine, sorta about christoph. only my second petzold, but for me, this doesn't hold a fucking candle to TRANSIT

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something else interesting about the ozon, if you like math: the timespan of the events in the movie is 6 weeks, and that's stated in narration. it then shows 6 weeks in hours, minutes, and finally seconds. The # of seconds stood out right away, but i wasn't sure why: it was 3,628,800. Then I realized... that's exactly 10! Not sure if that's intentional, by Ozon, or the writer of the source material, or just a complete fluke... but factorials always seemed really poetic to me so I really dug that

[nrh]

UNDINE (petzold)

just a total disaster. i think in the last watched thread i said this was the worst movie i'd ever seen by a director i liked and i guess that may be an understatement but i don't know, i kind of stand by it.

if it helps at all talked a lot to a few people who have seen more petzold than i have and they are equally confused.

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ANOTHER ROUND (vinterberg)

this was good. as a recovering addict who still loves drugs, and desperately hopes he can someday find a middle ground where he can use drugs recreationally and not be a fucking junkie about shit, there is a lot to chew on here. really sober (hahaha) look at drug use, not glorifying, but not villainizing either. it's also nice to see a movie about middle-aged teachers just broing out, it was pretty endearing. the plot pacing was a bit all over the place, and i would've maybe preferred a tighter, sparcer storyline, but that's just me. also the pre-credits scene, when you look back on it after seeing the whole movie, is beautiful and sad and haunting

3.5/5 (i might change this to 4/5)

[Holdrüholoheuho]

it was a constant mystery to me, but not in the way that i think it was intended to be

can't wait to watch the mysterious "Undine" once i will get the chance.
thx Bure for regular reporting from VIFF!
i like it and i hope more ppl here on the forum will do the same once attending some film festival.