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theater

Reporting from Slamdance – a few final films

February 27, 2021 by Darrel Manson Leave a Comment

A few more films as I wind down my coverage of Slamdance Film Festival. It has been a wonderful experience, as most film festivals are.

In Jim Bernfield’s documentary feature Me to Play, Dan Moran and Chris Jones, two actors with Parkinson’s Disease, set out to perform Samuel Beckett’s Endgame. Jones describes the project at one point as “two actors with diminishing physical abilities playing two characters with diminishing physical abilities trying to get through the last stages of their lives.” The film is built around the five weeks of rehearsal leading up to the single performance. Along the way the two actors share the ways the affliction has changed their lives. For actors, their bodies and voices are essential not only to their profession, but to their sense of who they are. This film serves well as a look into the kinds of struggles people face with debilitating diseases, and the bits of hope they can find along the way.

Race and rage are the focus of The Sleeping Negro, directed by Skinner Myers. In a frequently surreal film, a young black man is trying to get by in the world, but the rage he carries over the racist system leads him to push away the people closest to him. He argues about racism with both a black friend and his white fiancée, both of whom don’t think racism is as bad as he claims. In many ways, the rage is directed at himself. He is conflicted to be trying to find success in a world that is racially unjust and wanting nothing to do with it. The film serves as an introduction to some of the ways the African-American experience can wear on the emotional and psychological well-being of people.

After America, directed by Jake Yuzna, grew out of a project involving criminal justice de-escalation workers in Minneapolis. They used theater workshop techniques to portray their struggles with their real-life pressures. There are a series of different storylines, some of which converge briefly. The film seems to be going off in several directions at once, making it a bit chaotic. Some of the stories focus on relationships, connections, loneliness, brokenness, feelings of uselessness. Some bits have a surreal feel to them, especially when much of the film takes place in an empty shopping mall. There are other visual shots that show the emptiness that the characters feel they are living in.

Filed Under: Film, Film Festivals, Reviews Tagged With: Parkinson's, racism, surreal, theater

Cyrano, My Love – So Many Loves

October 17, 2019 by Darrel Manson Leave a Comment

Cyrano, My Love is an intersection of live and art. It could be debated which is imitating which as we follow fin-de-siècle French poet/playwright Edmund Rostand as he struggles to create the play which brought him fame and success, Cyrano de Bergerac.

The film opens as Edmund (Thomas Solivérès) is opening an unsuccessful play. He is gaining a reputation as “a young poet who writes flops”. His supporting wife encourages to continue. But then, a few years later, the realities of life (and two young children) are creating pressure. But writer’s block has set in. Sarah Bernhardt (Clémentine Célerié) suggests he write a play for the famed actor Constant Coquelin (Olivier Gourmet). Coquelin needs a play by the end of the year (three months off) or he will lose his lease on the theater. Edmund promises him a play, in verse, but so far all he has is the title.

Edmund has an actor friend, Léo Volny (Tom Leeb), who has fallen in love with Jeanne (Lucie Boujenah), a costumer. He wants to woo her, but doesn’t know how to make an impression. One night below her window, Edmund feeds Léo lines. When Jeanne goes to a different town, Edmund (in Léo’s name) begins a correspondence with Jeanne. Jeanne is falling in love with Léo (she thinks) through the letters. But for Edmund, Jeanne has become his muse as he channels this experience into the play. Those familiar with Cyrano de Bergerac will recognize the parallels with that story.

Edmund is writing the play on the fly. Rehearsals begin with just the first act written. As preparations continue, he must balance demands from his wife, from the play’s producers, and various actors and actresses. As with the real play, Cyrano, My Love evolves into farce, but with a satisfying ending for everyone.

There is a topical and tonal similarity to the 1999 Best Picture Oscar winner Shakespeare in Love, which director Alexis Michalik cites as an inspiration in press notes. The relationship that Edmund cultivates with Jeanne is one of love, but a very different kind of love (from Edmund’s perspective) than the romantic love of Shakespeare in Love. However, the way that relationship becomes embodied in the play Edmund is writing is similar to the earlier film not only thematically, but also as entertainment.

What makes this an interesting love story is that we get a multifaceted view. Various aspects of love twist and intermingle through the plot. Love here ranges from sexual attraction (Léo for Jeanne), emotional attraction (Jeanne for Edmund), intellectual aspects (Edmund for Jeanne), and the committed life of marriage between Edmund and his wife). Each of those experiences of love is important, but being able to bring them together in our lives is truly golden.

Photos courtesy of Roadside Attractions

Filed Under: Film, Reviews Tagged With: cyrano de bergerac, fin de siècle, French, theater

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