Actor Shia LeBeouf is a bit of an oddball. A precociously talented child actor (Holes, Disturbia and Constantine), these days the Transformers actor is more well known for his behavior off the screen rather than on it. Plagiarizing other people’s work, wearing a paper bag over his head proclaiming he is no longer famous, and getting arrested for trespassing, misdemeanor drunk driving, and disturbing a Broadway show are just a few of the headlines he’s had to deal with over the last few years. But the thing is, no matter how much of a troubled brat he is, he can act, something he proves in the crazy genre bending The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman.
Here are my picks for the week:
Actor Shia LeBeouf is a bit of an oddball. A precociously talented child actor (Holes, Disturbia and Constantine), these days the Transformers actor is more well known for his behavior off the screen rather than on it. Plagiarizing other people’s work, wearing a paper bag over his head proclaiming he is no longer famous, and getting arrested for trespassing, misdemeanor drunk driving, and disturbing a Broadway show are just a few of the headlines he’s had to deal with over the last few years. But the thing is, no matter how much of a troubled brat he is, he can act, something he proves in the crazy genre bending The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman.
Here are my picks for the week:
The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman
Staring: Shia LaBeouf, Evan Rachel Wood, Mads Mikkelsen & Melissa Leo
Directed by: Fredrik Bond
Screening: Rialto Selection, Saturday 20th September, 8.30pm
I’m not really too sure how to describe this debut feature from director Fredrik Bond. It’s a romance set within the dark Romanian underworld that’s filled with crazy characters binging on drugs, acting on hallucinations, and putting their lives on the line for one girl, a beautiful musician called Gabi. Shia LeBeouf plays Charlie, a young man with the ability to talk to dead people, who on a whim heads off to Romania on his O.E. The film kicks off well enough and features an excellent cast, but this psychological romantic thriller (if that’s what you can call it) is more concerned with style than substance, and slowly looses its way. The star of the show however is Shia LeBeouf who slips easily into this role of a lost young man. He really is superb.
Le Havre
Staring: André Wilms, Blondin Miguel & Jean-Pierre Darroussin
Directed by: Aki Kaurismäki
Screening: Rialto World, Monday 15th September, 8.30pm
Le Havre was a hit at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, winning the FIPRESCI Prize, the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury as well as the Palm Dog Award. And yes, it is an acting award for dogs! From Finland’s most famous director Aki Kaurismäki, Le Havre is a wonderfully warm, offbeat film filled with dry, deadpan humour. A modern day political fable set in a timeless France, it tells the story of Marcel Marx (Wilms), an articulate, worldly shoe shiner, who takes in a young African refugee Idrissa (Miguelon) on the run from police. Marcel then calls upon his small group of loyal friends to help get Idrissa to London to be with his mother. Humanity at it’s best; this is an absolute charmer.
Morden: Queen of Light
Staring: Claudia Galli & Richard Ulfsäter
Directed by: Rickard Petrelius
Screening: Tuesday 16th September, 8.30pm
Camilla Lackberg is a popular Swedish crime writer whose books, set in the tiny west coast fishing village of Fjällbacka, have sold over 10 million books in 55 countries. Her novels center around writer and amateur sleuth Erica Falck and her husband Patrick Hedström, a local cop who together solve a series of grim murders. Like in Lackberg’s novels, the films in the Morden series have two stories running alongside each other, one from the past and one from the present day. It’s Christmas time in Queen of Light, and when the young woman playing Lucia in the Lucia celebration goes missing, it brings back memories of another Lucia who heartbroken threw herself into the icy channel many years ago. If you’ve read Lackberg’s novels, don’t shy away from these Scandi-noir adaptations. The characters are the same and very well represented, but the stories are all new.