a&e | FILM REVIEWS
Gale Family Forces Child’s Pose. Luminita Gheorghiu stars in a film written by Ra˘zvan Ra˘dulescu and Ca˘lin Peter Netzer and directed by Netzer. Reviewed by Josef Woodard
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amily matters in deep, sometimes agonizing ways in the stark but remarkable Romanian film Child’s Pose. This is a tale of tragic circumstances in which the central event — a child’s death in a preventable accident — is never seen but is powerfully felt on multiple levels. From there the film proceeds with a hypnotic and naturalistic flow, moving slowly but steadily with an expanding range of submerged themes and plots. Issues of legal NEW WAVE ON THE BLOC: The prize of SBIFF’s manipulations, imbalances on the socioeconomic Eastern Bloc series, Child’s Pose stars Bogdan front, protecting one’s family at the expense of jusDumitrache as a man facing manslaughter charges tice, and finding a path to human compassion all following an accident. circulate through the film in ways we don’t always see coming. Child’s Pose was named the winner of the prestigious with her humanity buried under layers of stern control Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival, but freakishness. In one painful exchange with her son, who has grown it was also one of the very best films screened at this year’s Santa Barbara International Film Festival and the prize of weary of her meddling, he urges her to back away from the festival’s renewed Eastern Bloc series — a potent exam- the child, advising her, in her middle age, to get “a lover, a ple of the strengths of the so-called “Romanian New Wave.” hobby. Some people go to the Pyramids.” Her comeback, But as intriguing as Child’s Pose is on its own terms, as painfully true to the heart of this story: “People find fula fairly experimental piece of cinema, at the heart of it all fillment in their children.” Said quality of “fulfillment,” a is a truly stunning turn by Romanian actress Luminita loaded word and notion in terms of family values and Gheorghiu, who plays the powerhouse mother of the parent-child relationships, reaches an emotional fever accused. Something about her riveting, film-anchoring pitch in the gripping final scene, a tearful confrontation of performance is reminiscent of the emotionally complex pained parentages. From that in-our-face emotive climax, work of Gena Rowlands in John Cassavetes’s A Woman the more purely filmic touch returns as she watches her Under the Influence (we detect a Cassavetes-esque grit son in the rearview mirror, without sound, making his own and pulse in the cadences and rough, realistic textures gesture toward compassion. We are rapt, both as cinema of Child’s Pose, too). But whereas Rowland’s character is lovers and human beings: the best combo — and a rare one. coming unhinged, Gheorghiu’s is a controlling gale force, ■
Fast as You Can Need for Speed. Aaron Paul, Dominic Cooper, and Scott Mescudi star in a film written by George Gatins and John Gatins and directed by Scott Waugh.
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Reviewed by D.J. Palladino
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here isn’t one idea in this movie more interesting than anything Roger Corman ever made. On the other hand, the casting and the offhand beauty of this movie are way beyond VISUALLY ARRESTING: Need for Speed, much like its any of Corman’s drive-in fare, even with video-game source material, is nothing if not gratuitously Spielberg and Coppola at the helms. eye-catching. Director Scott Waugh is a former stuntman who made a couple of features and produced the stunning 2003 surf movie Step into Liquid. kids. Still, watching Paul and Poots making winsome eyes Let’s nominate him right now for B-Moviemaker of the at each other while the spires of Arizona appear in the morning sunlight is way more spectacular than it sounds. Decade, an award show I would actually like to see. Plenty of reckless racing, macho posturing, and Need for Speed features an utterly charismatic cast that includes some of the most intriguing young faces in film superbly stupid cameos fill the time between, including today, including Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul, An Education’s our own Michael Keaton as a kind of Internet Greek choDominic Cooper, and the seemingly ubiquitous Imogen rus. But there are also some gratuitously beautiful shots Poots. They all get chances to light up the action, even after of Mount Kisco, New York, and the Bay Bridge from the you put aside dumbass scenes like one where the charac- Embarcadero at high tide. I’m not sure if it’s exploitative ters refuel on the highway during a hell-bent 45-hour drive junk or a great directorial debut, but it’s certainly a film from New York to San Francisco. Don’t try this at home, that’s hard to forget. ■
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march 20, 2014
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