The Brisbane Film Festival is celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2011 and I can’t wait to get amongst it in a few weeks time. I can still remember seeing my first film at BIFF (The Basketball Diaries) way back in 1995.
The Festival runs for 11 days and commences on 3 November 2011. The same three venues as last year will be used – the Tribal Theatre, the Palace Centro and the Palace Barracks. The program isn't as "busy" as it has been in year's past so hopefully that will avoid film clashes. I also note that there seems to be a "rest day" mid way through the Festival (Mon, Nov 7) where there's only one set of screenings at 7pm. Nothing else is shown that day.
What’s great about any Festival is that you are spoilt with choices. Instead of being limited to the 3 or 4 new films that come out in the major multiplexes each Thursday, you get to choose from a wide array of genres. This year’s Festival is no exception with 135 feature films being shown (of which more than 50 are Australian premieres). If you pick up the program and can’t find something you want to see then I’ll be very, very surprised.
Tickets are on sale from October 9 and the best way to buy them is online at the BIFF website - http://www.biff.com.au/. You can also pick them up at the BIFF box-office which is located in the foyer of the Regent Cinema. It’s tragic that the Regent has now closed but it’s a nice touch that the foyer is still open and will play a small role in this year’s Festival.
On that point, it is disappointing that Brisbane doesn’t have a big theatre that it can use during the Festival. Having just come back from the Toronto (a city with only 500,000 more people), I was amazed to learn that they have 5 theatres in their city that can seat over 1,000 people. The largest is Roy Thomson Hall which can seat 2,600.
Given the closure of the Regent in mid 2010, the largest theatre in use during the Festival is at the Palace Barracks and it seats just 265 people. This makes it a lot harder to attract big name films and stars to the Festival when we can cater for so few people. It’s sad really.
Now that I’ve had my vent, it’s time to get you excited about BIFF for 2011. It’s my goal to get as many Film Pie readers as possible to the Festival – particularly those that have never been before.
On that note, here are 10 reasons why you need to get to the 2011 Brisbane International Film Festival…
1. Warming Things Up With A “Curtain Raiser”
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It can often take a little while for a Festival to gather momentum. Word of mouth doesn’t kick into full swing until the Festival is well underway. By this time, many of the great films have already been screened and some future sessions will be sold out.
In a new move this year, BIFF is having “curtain raiser” films on the two nights prior to the official opening night. For those ready to dive head first into BIFF, it’s a nice way to “ease yourself” into the Festival. For newcomers, it’s a chance to see what BIFF’s all about and what kind of films you can see.
Four great films have been chosen.
Take Shelter stars Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road) and Jessica Chastain (The Help) and is about a man who has visions of an impending natural disaster and so he builds a storm shelter in his backyard. It leaves everyone, including his family, questioning his sanity.
Tabloid is the latest documentary from Errol Morris (The Fog Of War). It’s the story of an American beauty queen named Joyce McKinney who abducted a young Mormon missionary and used him as a sex slave for 3 days in 1977. The British tabloids went crazy and many differing versions of events have been told but Morris has gone in search of the truth. McKinney is not pleased with her portrayal in the documentary and was turning up at many screenings in the U.S. to protest against the film. It would be hilarious if we saw her in Australia.
Restless (pictured above) is a film I saw in Toronto
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I’m not quite sure how the BIFF team have pulled this off but they’re creating a makeshift drive-in theatre at Hamilton – not too far from the Dendy Portside. It will be used for 3 nights and they hope to be able to fit in roughly 200 cars. It’s a tribute to drive-in cinema and I’m sure it’ll be a great way to reminisce for those who frequented them regularly in their youth. It should offer some great views too of the Brisbane skyline.
6 different films are being shown at the drive-in theatre and it launches with a BYOD to Red Dog. What does that acronym stand for? Well, it’s “bring your own dog”. Sounds like it’ll be a howling success.
Other films you can check out at the drive-in include Drive (an awesome action thriller which I saw at Toronto and stars Ryan Gosling) and the Australian premiere of Crawl (a thriller put together by Paul and Ben China – two guys based on the Gold Coast).
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The old Dendy George Street cinemas closed their doors in late 2008 only to be reopened when the cinema took on new ownership. Now known as the Tribal, the cinema will again be shut down at the end of November following its recent sale. I don’t know if there’s a Johnny Farnham like comeback in store for this classic theatre and so this may be your last chance to see a movie inside its walls.
The theatre is being used throughout the Festival but it’s having a special “farewell bash” on the last Saturday night. It all starts at 6pm when film critic Bruce Redman will host a movie trivia night with heaps of prizes. I asked Bruce how he got the nod and he humorously told me “they wanted someone trivial”.
The trivia is followed by a huge movie marathon that will run until 6am. The programmers have picked out 7 warped films that few people will have seen. As an example, Manborg is about a half-man, half-cyborg solider who has been brought back from the dead to fight an army of Nazi vampires and demons lead by Count Dracula. Sounds like a crazy night of entertainment and a fitting tribute to the Tribal Theatre.
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I realise that not everyone likes Nazi vampire movies and so I should mention some of the more commercial offerings at the Festival.
There are plenty of quality films but BIFF has highlighted 5 special screenings as part of their “Bubbles At BIFF” promotion. The $20 ticket price includes a glass of champagne on arrival (which they can’t mention in the official program due to Queensland’s overly complex responsible service of alcohol laws) and you’ll be treated to a film that won’t be released widely in Australia for at least a few months. The 5 films are…
Like Crazy is the only one I’ve seen
Tinker Tailor Solider Spy has been touted as an Oscar contender and received a lot of buzz when it premiered at the recent Venice Film Festival. It is based on the novel by John le Carre and it centres on a semi-retired MI6 agent (played by Gary Oldman) who tries to discover who the Soviet spy is within their ranks.
Melancholia is the latest from off-beat Danish director Las Von Trier (Breaking The Waves, Antichrist). Star Kirsten Dunst won the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival but Von Trier was kicked out of the Festival (rightly or wrong) for saying that he felt sympathy for Adolf Hitler. A shame we can’t get Von Trier here for BIFF – I’d love to get a few controversial sound bites from him myself.
Goodbye, First Love is the latest from French director Mia Hansen-Love. I loved her last film, Father Of My Children, and can’t wait to see this. It’s the tale of a 15-year-old trying to overcome her heartbreak when her first boyfriend leaves for South America.
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The film that seems to be generating the most of amount of pre-Festival interest is The Orator. While I was being taken through the program by the BIFF team, Sarah Ward (Marketing Manager for Screen Queensland) told me she’d received a tonne of emails from people trying to find out if it was in the BIFF program.
The interest has come from the Samoan community here in Brisbane as The Orator is the first ever Samoan feature film to be entirely shot in Samoa, in the Samoan language and with a Samoan cast and story. As it was financed by the New Zealand Film Commission, it has become New Zealand’s entry for best foreign language film at next year’s Academy Awards. It’s the first time in history that New Zealand has made a submission.
Another film to keep on the radar is Uma Lulik, the first documentary entirely filmed and made in East Timor by an East Timorese filmmaker. Focusing on one family, it looks at the way in which the people of East Timor remember the spirits of those who have passed away. I believe director Victor De Sousa will be at the Festival to talk about his film.
It’s a shame the above two films are screening on the same day at the same time. The good news is that The Orator has a second showing later in the week for those trying to get to both.
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It’s not as costly as you might think to attend a film festival. Unlike major theatrical shows or music concerts, you won’t get charged $100+ for a ticket.
The cost of a single ticket to most films this year is $16 – up slightly from last year’s $15 but still good value if you ask me. It’s just $14 if you’re a BIFF Film Club member, full-time student, pensioner or senior.
If you plan on seeing a few films, you can pick up multi-ticket passes. The prices are $84 full / $72 concession for 6 tickets, $156 full / $132 concession for 12 tickets and $300 full / $250 concession for 25 tickets.
The price for opening night has come down this year to just $30. It includes a ticket to the Australian premiere of the English comedy Attack The Block and a post-film party that will include a BMX riding display (as a tribute to the film) outside the Palace Barracks. The film is about a group of London teenagers caught up in an alien invasion.
The closing night film is also $30 and is for Pedro Almodovar’s latest The Skin I Live In (pictured above). I missed this at TIFF but my partner in crime in Toronto, Sam Dagan, went to the screening and came back with many positive things to say. He said it tells the story of a plastic surgeon played by Antonio Banderas who perversely addresses the question - as people change how much of it is really them and how much is just skin deep?
In a good move this year, the closing night festivities have been moved from Sunday night to Saturday night (similar to other major film festivals). So whilst there’s still one more day to go and the Festival isn’t officially “closed”, it’s a better time to schedule it as people can let their hair down and have a few drinks (which is often tricky late on a Sunday evening).
Another film which is slightly more expensive at $20 is Talihina Sky: The Story Of The Kings Of Leon. Fans of the band won’t want to miss this documentary and I believe the BIFF programmers are working behind the scenes to see if they can get The Kings Of Leon there for the screening. They’ll be in Brisbane performing a show at the Entertainment Centre just two days after the film is shown.
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One of my favourite movie genres is the documentary and it’s obvious that Richard Moore, the Head of Screen Culture, shares a similar love.
This year’s program includes many documentaries and to help distinguish it from other Australian festivals, there’s a $25,000 cash prize going to the doco chosen as the best of the Festival. This makes it the richest prize on offer for a documentary filmmaker in this country. A four member jury has already been selected to judge the films and select a winner which will be announced at the Festival’s conclusion.
There are too many documentaries to go through here but as a sample, you may be interested in…
Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope (pictured above) which is the latest from Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) and looks at the crazy fans that go to San Diego’s Comic-Con each year.
The Tall Man had its world premiere in Toronto and reconstructs the events that led to the death of Cameron Doomadgee on Palm Island back in 2004.
The Trouble With St Mary’s looks at rogue Brisbane priest Father Peter Kennedy and how he and his parishioners broke away from the Catholic Church for their views on issues such as same sex marriage and the role of the pope.
A Bitter Taste Of Freedom provides an insight into the life of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya who was murdered in 2006 for her articles which criticised the Russian government for their part in Chechnya.
You’ve Been Trumped is one I won’t miss given my love for golf. It’s the story of an ordinary guy who tried to stop Donald Trump from tearing up the Scottish landscape and building a golf course.
If you’re interested in actors and filmmakers, you’ll find documentaries focusing the camera lens on South Korean director Kim Ki-duk, legendary actor Tony Curtis, renowned Australian director Paul Cox and popular English actress Charlotte Rampling.
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Fantastic Fest is an annual film festival in Texas and it’s developed a reputation as one of the biggest in terms of genre films. I’m talking about horror, science fiction, fantasy, action and cult.
Lars Nilsen, a programmer from the Fantastic Fest, will be flying out to Australia and will be bringing a film with him on the plane. No one knows what it will be – including all the members of the BIFF team.
Sounds like it could be a really fun night!
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The Human Centipede 2. The film was denied classification by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) as they felt the film posed “a real risk of harm”. Wow. 32 cuts were made to the film (totalling just over 2 minutes) and they managed to get it through the BBFC with an 18+ rating. It’ll be interesting to see what version we get here at BIFF and I’m sure it’ll draw a big crowd.
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The program includes many iconic films. Older audience members can relive the experience of seeing them on the big screen. Newer audience members can experience them for the first time.
There’s a tribute to director Arthur Penn and some of his best work from the 1960s and 1970s. You can see The Left Handed Gun (with Paul Newman), Bonnie & Clyde (with Warren Beatty), Alice’s Restaurant, Night Moves (with Gene Hackman) and The Missouri Breaks (with Jack Nicholson and Marlon Brando).
There’s also a salute to Australian surf movies. I didn’t know we’d made this many but the list includes Puberty Blues (director Bruce Beresford will be at BIFF), High On A Cool Wave and Morning Of The Earth. Most are screening as part of a “Surfin’ Saturday” that will include a couch discussion on surfing movies with free snacks and beverages.
Frederico Fellini’s La Dolce Vita will screen along with a documentary that shows what went on behind the scenes of this landmark film. It’s a film I’ve never had the chance to see so perhaps I can remedy that at BIFF.
That’s 10 very good reasons if you ask me to get to this year’s Brisbane International Film Festival. You’ll be able to follow my own progress during the Festival on twitter at @icestorm77 and on my website at www.thefilmpie.com.
I better see you there!