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A Very Scary NY Film Festival!

Published on October 25, 2010

Despite being headlined by blockbusters The Social Network and Hereafter, the 48th Annual New York Film Festival largely featured quirky independent foreign films and—more than any year to date—documentaries!

Naturally, in choosing which screenings to attend, I went with what were probably the most disturbing films the festival had to offer. This time of year, what’s more festive than a Mexican slasher film about a tight-knit family of cannibals? Or the harrowing plight of a 19th century freak-show attraction? With the global media fixated on the rescue of the 33 miners in Chile, why not revisit the country’s defining historical era: the military coup that ousted beloved socialist president Salvador Allende, cousin of novelist and plastic surgery enthusiast Isabel Allende? With Michael Bloomberg’s recent remarks about Willet’s Point, Queens being “a euphemism for blight,” why not attend a documentary that defends the business owners and workers who make the district a Mecca for affordable vehicle repair?

In spite of subway delays and rumors of bedbugs at Lincoln Center I made it to all four screenings, and more importantly emerged vermin-free, if not a wee bit perturbed.

WARNING: These reviews may contain spoilers!

Sabina (Paulina Gaitan) and
Alfredo (Francisco Barreiro)

Jorge Michel Grau’s Somos lo que Hay (We Are What We Are) is a tender portrait of a family in crisis—a family that happens to engage in cannibalism and human sacrifice.

When their patriarch and breadwinner dies suddenly, the destitute clan’s lot goes from bad to worse. The three teenage children unite against their frazzled mother and decide that Alfredo, the oldest son, should assume their father’s hunting and gathering responsibilities.

More sensitive than his siblings, Alfredo struggles in his new role. Time after time he fails to capture his human prey. Faced with continued pressure from their mother and sister, Alfredo and his sociopath brother Gustavo go after some easy meat. They bring home a prostitute, which their mother bludgeons to death but refuses to eat. She then takes it into her own hands to bring home a victim. Time is running out, as they must perform the ritual before the many clocks in the rickety house sound their alarms.

The film is both a throwback to retro campy horror and a coming-of-age drama. Mostly, though, it is a story of family kinship. The sacrifices made by Alfredo to keep the tradition alive are compelling enough to keep you rooting for the flesh-eaters. Besides the whole human sacrifice thing, they are the average poor dysfunctional family, held together by the precocious teen daughter Sabina.

From the start of the film, when human remains are found in the gut of the dead father, the police are on the family’s trail. The banal subplot of the officer seeking fame and prestige by solving an outlandish case doesn’t resolve as one would think, one of the many refreshing aspects of the unpredictable script. Expect blood, expect guts, expect family values, but don’t expect the expected from Grau’s auspicious debut.

Caezar (Andre Jacobs) and
Baartman (Yahima Torres)

In Black Venus, Abdellatif Kechiche presents the life of Saartije Baartman, a South African slave, in unflinching detail from her rise to notoriety as a sideshow attraction in 19th century London to her untimely death in Paris in 1815.

Baartman’s physique is imposing (though typical of the women in her Khoikhoi tribe), with enormous buttocks that are a source of astonishment and prurient curiosity to European men and women alike. In 1810 her master’s brother, Hendrick Caezar, takes her to Europe to be displayed as a “wild bushwoman” in an East End freak show. In a humiliating spectacle, she is treated like a zoo animal, caged and whipped, and towards the end of each show pawed by the mystified crowd. When she expresses discomfort at being touched, Caezar unleashes psychological warfare upon her, berating and praising her at once. He begs her to stick it out and reap the monetary benefits later. Caezar showers her with gifts, even hires two servants for her, but she never sees the proceeds from her show.

In London the performance inspires outrage among human rights advocates and they rise up in Baartman’s defense, bringing Caezar to trial for exploitation and slavery. Saartije testifies, moving the court with the story of her orphaned childhood and the death of her only child, but insists she participates in the show of her own free will.

Baartman and Ceazar later team up with Réaux, a bear-trainer, and his tattooed, whiskey-swilling lover Jeanne and move the show to Paris, where they perform in high-society salons. Caezar farms Sartije out to scientists studying the physical traits of “Hottentot” or Koisan women, especially their elongated genitals. The doctors calibrate every inch of her anatomy in the attempt to prove the head scientist’s theory that her kinsman are of a different species, more closely related to primates than humans.

Réaux eventually takes over the show, making it progressively more pornographic and exploitative. When Baartman resists these changes, Réaux sells her to a brothel where she contracts a serious infection. She dies shortly afterwards of an undetermined disease.

As she is shuffled from hand to hand, Baartman is never the beneficiary of her exploitation. In the last five years of her life she is many things but always a commodity.

In death her body is sold back to the French scientists who dissect her, putting her brain and preserved genitals on display at the Paris Musée de l’Homme. Kechiche portrays the preparation and dissection in lurid detail as the two things she strove to keep to herself—her mind and her sex—are systematically removed and displayed. Even post-mortem her dignity is compromised.

Cuban actress Yahima Torres takes on the demanding role with an otherworldly grace, bringing to light the stark contrast between Baartman’s savage stage persona and her sensitive, artistic personality. The gruesome end of the film is somewhat softened by footage shown during the closing credits of Baartman’s remains being returned to South Africa in 2002.

Antonia Zegers as Nancy

Who would set a darkly comedic love story amid the military coup that left tens of thousands dead or disappeared? Pablo Larraín, that’s who. Based in Chile during the last days of Salvador Allende’s presidency, Larraín’s Post Mortem features Mario, a moth-eaten autopsy transcriber, in romantic pursuit of Nancy, an anorexic burlesque dancer.

It doesn’t take long for Mario to win Nancy over with his pallid, frowsy charm, and they’re soon involved in a perfunctory physical relationship.

On the day of Allende’s assassination, Nancy is nowhere to be found and bodies flood Santiago’s tiny morgue. Mario is instructed by military personnel to record only the names of each cadaver along with the approximate age and number of bullet wounds. The only full autopsy conducted during the massacre is that of the president, the sordid details of which are almost gleefully dictated to Mario by the coroner.

The film revives the debate surrounding the ambiguous circumstances of Allende’s death. After the grisly, controversial autopsy, Mario and his colleague argue over whether he was killed or took his own life—a real dispute to this day unresolved.

The film’s erratic pacing and terse dialog make for somewhat tedious viewing. The lovers’ self-absorbed indifference towards tragedy on a massive scale is off-putting, making it hard to muster any sympathy (or laughs for that matter), especially during the violent last scene.

Pablo Larraín is known for his dark, deadpan humor—a humor often lost on viewers and critics alike. The Guardian’s Xan Brooks described Larraín’s second film, 2008’s Tony Manero, as “like being accosted by a disturbed loner on a late-night bus. Assuming we survive, we may one day find it funny.”

Like its predecessor, Post Mortem is not so much funny as it is awkward and macabre. The premise may seem comedic in theory, but in execution it is unspeakably grim. It’s been over a week now, and I’m still waiting to see if, in retrospect, I can find anything remotely humorous about Post Mortem.

Queens’ “Iron Triangle”

Willet’s Point, Queens, the maze of illicit auto-body shops threaded by swampy dirt roads, has been in the cross-hairs of municipal developers as far back as 1960. The city is always devising ways to put the land to use but has thus far never succeeded.

In August of 2009, Mayor Michael Bloomberg won the rights to rezone the area, proposing the construction of a hotel, a convention center, shops, office buildings, and “mixed-income” housing. The many small businesses in the area are once again being threatened with eviction by the city.

Verena Paravel and J.P. Sniadecki’s Foreign Parts is a glimpse into daily life in the junkyard, seemingly worlds away from the rapidly gentrifying metropolis. Among the hundreds who commute to work every day to the flood plains of Willet’s Point are a few who actually live there. The documentary centers around these residents, the real faces of Willet’s Point who genuinely have nowhere else to go.

There is the mentally disabled Julia who lives in a van among the chop-shops and earns her living shaking down auto-workers for spare change. Her plight is dismal but the filmmakers present her as a benevolently impish character who loves to dance and whose deep faith in God keeps her afloat.

Sarah and Luis are a young couple who also sleep in vehicles around the junkyard. Luis earns a pittance as a “touter,” directing customers through the labyrinth to the shops where their particular model of car can be serviced. When Luis is picked up by police and jailed for several months, Sarah has to fend for herself. She carries a steak knife for protection and counts down the days until Luis’ release on a hand-drawn calendar. In a rare divergence from the film’s observational style, Paravel comes out from behind the camera when Luis calls her cell phone to let Sarah know he has been released. In a question-and-answer session after the screening at the Walter Reade Theater, Sniadecki expressed an unwillingness to pretend that there isn’t a person behind the camera, saying that in some instances directors have to interact on-screen with their subjects. The results of their participation are some of the most poignant moments in the film, like Luis and Sarah’s tearful reunion and a scene in which Julia dances salsa with the camera.

78-year-old Joe Ardizzone has lived in Willet’s Point since pheasants and other wildlife grazed freely on the marshy plains. He has dedicated his life to the preservation of the area and the rights of business-owners and workers therein. We watch as he attends community board meetings and pursues local policy-makers in search of information on the proposed development plan to no avail.

Foreign Parts attests to the legitimacy of the small businesses that draw hundreds of motorists to Willet’s Point each day. Chop-shop owners are shown amid their meticulously cataloged racks of car parts, and workers perform skilled reparations on even the most obscure make and model of vehicle.

The question remains as to what will become of these scrappy entrepreneurs when the mayor’s development proposal goes into effect. So far no plans to relocate or reimburse the business owners have been put forth. Residents and workers remain optimistic that, as always, something will arise that keeps the development from happening. But if the plan goes forth and the miasma of Willet’s Point is finally razed to the ground, Foreign Parts has at least encapsulated both the harmony and the chaos of Queens’ final frontier.

It’s always exciting to see one of the first screenings of a film that could very well become a cult classic or an important historical reference. I am privileged to have been able to attend the New York Film Festival and, in writing these reviews, I was able to relive the experience over again, pushing past my first impressions into a (hopefully) deeper understanding.

-Ariana Costakes

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