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| gromit |
 Posted: Mon Mar 11, 2013 2:37 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9016
Location: Shanghai
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China Heavyweight is a fairly strong docfrom the Chinese-Canadian documentary director Yung Chang who previously made the very good Up the Yangtze doc in 2007. The English title is a little odd, as there are exactly zero heavyweights in the film, and the main ex-boxer/coach is a bantamweight (55kg/120 Lbs). I assume they are going for the double meaning of China Heavy-Weight as in a heavy burden in China, on these poor folks looking for a path towards a better life. Their parents are awfully good at piling on pressure and guilt-tripping. They also promote the film with a photo of the Chinese bantamweight looking a good deal like Ali, probably no accident since we see some Ali photos here and there in the boxing dorm and gym.
The film follows a boxing coach in Sichuan Province who recruits young students primarily from one middle school which has set up a boxing program. Two of his proteges make it to the provincial finals, which gets them on to the provincial team, which is quite good considering Sichuan Province has a population of over 80M, more than any country in Europe except for Russia. Though boxing is a fairly new sport in China, having been banned from 1959 - 89, it has been fairly heavily televised in China for the past two decades. Most big Western pay-per-view matches in the US are shown live on Chinese cable TV for free. As my father says, China must have paid their $49.99.
Anyway, it's a good film, with plenty of scenes of the rather grueling training and basic living conditions. We also meet some of the families and hear their concerns. While not everyone agrees that boxing is a good path, they all seem in agreement that being a farmer is a hard life best avoided if possible. There aren't too many options and the coach serves as a role model as someone from the area who nearly made it.
You do get a sense that the discipline and training will pay off in any future endeavor, at least to some extent. Though a number of the amateur boxers have fairly unrealistic dreams of what they can accomplish. It's also good to see that a group of female students are also recruited to be boxers, probably largely because in China the female athletes tend to be more competitive internationally than the men. But also, China is genuinely pretty good at providing opportunity for women. Unfortunately the film concentrates on two older teen males, and the younger girls are only briefly in the film. There's one deleted scene which features the girls in their dorm discussing their thoughts about boxing, followed by some sparring sessions. I wish they had kept that in the film.
A pretty good film, providing a glimpse into poor rural China, where everyone more or less laments their fate, and is unable to appreciate the natural beauty around them while striving to get ahead. |
Last edited by gromit on Tue Mar 12, 2013 10:18 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Mon Mar 11, 2013 2:42 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| Marj--Affleck was uncharacteristically good in Argo, but I still preferred Arkin and--you don't know this guy's name, but he played the scary guard at the airport gate toward the end of the movie and for me practically stole the whole show, in a foreign language, no less--Farshad Farahat. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Mon Mar 11, 2013 4:21 pm |
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Gromit, the airport scenes in Argo were completely fictional. In reality the Canadians and the Americans who they were protecting, (the Argo crew would also have been there), got through without any problem and flew off to Switzerland, I think, very quickly.
The movie wanted to make the escape nerve wracking and they did. |
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| Marj |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 12:51 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
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Location: Manhattan
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billyweeds wrote: Marj--Affleck was uncharacteristically good in Argo, but I still preferred Arkin and--you don't know this guy's name, but he played the scary guard at the airport gate toward the end of the movie and for me practically stole the whole show, in a foreign language, no less--Farshad Farahat.
Arkin is always great. I mentioned Affleck because he ended being part of the group trying to escape. I didn't care about any of the others. I ask you, how can a film be suspenseful if you don't care about the escapees.
Billy, I must have dozed off by the time they got to airport. But I'll watch it again, and keep my eye out for him. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 9:11 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6967
Location: Black Hills
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From yesterday's NYT "Arts Beat" dispatch from SXSW....
Quote: Two other films screened at the festival on Sunday provoked vivid crowd reactions. First was the world premiere of “Milo,” Jacob Vaughan’s offbeat horror/comedy starring Ken Marino as Duncan, a man with a demon creature living in his intestines. When things get stressful, the creature emerges and wreaks havoc on those causing problems in Duncan’s life. The audience, which included distributors and some of the cast and crew, settled into the movie’s tone and chuckled plentifully. A team of respected comedy actors in supporting roles, including Patrick Warburton, Stephen Root and Kumail Nanjiani, help increase the laugh quotient. It’s the kind of movie that could go either way with an audience, but the crowd went for it more frequently than not.
I'm almost afraid to ask how the creature "emerges."
Article also addresses Marc's experience (posted prev. page) on seeing Burt Wonderstone - the effect of a lively Austin audience (with cast members sprinkled in there). |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 1:19 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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Joseph Gordon-Levitt's feature-length directorial debut "Don Jon" is a winner. I expect it will be a critical and commercial hit. This story of a porn addict who slowly and hilariously finds ways to communicate with real women is funny, insightful and beautifully acted by Levitt, Scarlet Johansson, Tony Danza and Julianne Moore. I loved it and so did the audience. Several scenes inspired cheers and applause from the crowd.
Tony Danza and Gordon-Levitt were complete charmers at the post-screening Q&A. |
Last edited by Marc on Tue Mar 12, 2013 1:29 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 1:26 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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| "Holy Ghost People" is a southern gothic revenge tale that takes place within a religious cult of Appalachian snake handlers. It reminded me a bit of "The Wicker Man" and "Martha Marcy May Marlene." A spooky movie that avoids cheap scares. Recommended. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 1:28 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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| "Upstream Color" is the oddest film I've seen in years. I was both bewildered and entranced by it. I'll get back to you on this film that is either a masterpiece of some sort or a load of bullshit. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 2:18 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9016
Location: Shanghai
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 9:09 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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| All this talk of current film seems to have electrified the forum. |
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| Ghulam |
| Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2013 2:05 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Upstate NY
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The French film Rust and Bone has characters we are not used to seeing in films, both handicapped in their own way, both raw and very real. Marion Cotillard is superb. Directed by Jacques Audiard of A Prophet.
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2013 5:18 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Marc wrote: All this talk of current film seems to have electrified the forum.
Is this a pun on "current"? If so, it's a little bit too subtle for me. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2013 8:57 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6967
Location: Black Hills
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Ha!
Those who aren't in Austin may find it hard to be electrified, beyond hoping these films show up in our neighborhoods someday. I'm pretty stoked about the intestinal monster film. Sounds like a gas! |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Thu Mar 14, 2013 8:52 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6967
Location: Black Hills
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| Dead Man Down is one of those films you buy a ticket to because it's the late winter multiplex doldrums and you just want to see something moving on a big white screen. The critics didn't seem overly fond of the film, but I was surprised at how much I liked Noomi Rapace in this. Though constructed as a revenge thriller, built from off-the-shelf parts, it contains a fairly compelling romance in the two-damaged-people-find-each-other mode. If one can go with the notion that Noomi has been disfigured in a car accident (a challenge, given that this is Movie World disfigurement where a stunningly pretty woman has some lines and rough patches painted on her face and is still stunningly pretty with magnificent Swedish cheekbones intact and glowing) and thus lost her career as a beautician, then one is rewarded with a fairly compelling performance. Just avert your eyes when Terrence Howard starts emoting and you'll be fine. |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Fri Mar 15, 2013 8:49 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Find myself actually looking forward to a Nicole Kidman movie for the first time in...well, forever. Hoping to catch Stoker tonight. This obvious riff on Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt sounds like it goes the master one better. The director is the great Chan-wook (Oldboy) Park and the co-star is the great Mia (Jane Eyre) Wasikowska, so I can handle the dreaded Kidman.
Also lusting after The Call, which Manohla Dargis loved. The Dargis rave would normally alert me to a loser, but in this case I'm going anyway despite the presence of another of my less-favorite femme stars, Halle Berry. The story of a 911 call gone horribly wrong, the thriller co-stars a newly grown-up Abigail Breslin. I'm hoping Breslin makes the adult transition better than most, because as a child she's been amazing. |
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