Sunday, April 11, 2010
A+E, In this Issue..., Movies, Atlanta

Holy Week for film worshippers

Atlanta Film Fest sells steak, not sizzle

BY STEVE WARREN

For most of the year, Atlanta Film Festival 365 offers members monthly salons, a variety of workshops and tickets to screenings of Hollywood and independent films prior to their theatrical openings.

Call those secular activities. For those who worship the gods of cinema, Holy Week begins Thursday, April 15, as the Atlanta Film Festival kicks off its 34th annual extravaganza (the festival runs through Friday, April 23).

While many festivals bring in name filmmakers and actors and highlight high-profile movies that will be opening soon in theaters, Atlanta opts for purity, selling the steak, not the sizzle. Only a tiny fraction of this year’s features have distributors at this point. Half are documentaries, several are by first-time filmmakers and only a handful feature actors you’re likely to recognize.

There’s something for every taste in this year’s lineup, except for the fanboys who only want to see 3-D spectaculars that cost more than all this year’s entries combined. It’s usually safe to choose a documentary if the topic interests you, while narrative films are more a matter of taste.

Many features are local or regional premieres that could be hits of tomorrow or contenders during awards season. This is a place to make discoveries, not satisfy your curiosity about films you’ve been reading about, although a few have generated buzz at Sundance and other festivals.

In addition to new features and shorts, the festival offers retrospective screenings of “Crash” (hosted by Ludacris) and “Psycho” (with Alfred Hitchcock’s ghost in attendance, though you may not see him). There will also be “Coffeehouse Conversations” with special guests, at 4 p.m. daily at the Starbucks at 931 Monroe Drive, starting with “Is the Film Critic an Endangered Species?” on April 16 and ending with festival audience feedback on April 22. Except for opening night at the Carter Center, closing night at the 14th Street Playhouse and “Psycho” in Piedmont Park, all screenings are at the Landmark Midtown Art Cinema.

The festival program guide breaks the listings into 24 special interest categories. There are some environmentally aware documentaries and other politically correct selections, but overall the ratio of popcorn to trail mix looks a lot higher than last year’s festival, with numerous thrillers, comedies and horror movies that have no agenda but to entertain.

With 66 features and nearly twice as many shorts, the latter either paired with features or neatly packaged, the schedule can be a little intimidating. We’ll offer a few suggestions this week and weigh in on more individual films next week.

THE RACE IS ON
Race is always a popular topic in the City Too Busy to Hate, and it figures in the opening night documentary “Freedom Riders” and the Oscar-winning “Crash,” as well as “American Jihadist,” “The Battle for Bunker Hill,” “Alley Pat: The Music Is Recorded,” “The Last Survivor,” “9500 Liberty” and “Crossing in St. Augustine.” Nearly all are documentaries dealing with racial conflicts in different times and places.

THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT
From dance (“NY Export: Opus Jazz”) to ventriloquism (“Dumbstruck”) to female wrestlers (“Mamachas of the Ring”) to drag performance artists (“Play in the Gray”), more performing arts are showcased in the festival than in the average high school curriculum. Standup comedy is the subject of “Souled Out Comedy” and “I Am Comic,” the latter far superior to Jerry Seinfeld’s similar “Comedian.” Music and musicians are featured in the closing night “The Secret to a Happy Ending,” about Athens’ Drive-By Truckers; “Do It Again,” about an effort to reunite the Kinks; “Wheedle’s Groove,” showcasing a late-‘60s soul-funk sound from Seattle; “Broken Hill” and “Complaints Choir.”

FEED YOUR FILM ADDICTION
Meth has replaced moonshine in the Ozarks, according to Sundance prize-winner “Winter’s Bone.” In “The Things We Carry,” Korean-American sisters reunite after their mother’s death, surrounded by junkies who could have stepped out of an early John Waters film, if Waters had made dramas. (It’s better than that description makes it sound.) The impact of a mother’s drug use on her family gets the documentary treatment in “Stranded in the Motor City.” In “The Good Heart,” bar owner Brian Cox passes on the secrets of serving alcoholics to Paul Dano. There’s even Civil War-era opium use in the hilarious mockumentary “The Battle of Pussy Willow Creek.”

TOGETHER AGAIN—SEPARATELY
Atlanta actors Anessa Ramsey and Justin Welborn, who appeared in the homegrown horror flick “The Signal,” are back in new films. Ramsey acquits herself well in “Yellowbrickroad,” but the eight underdeveloped characters who investigate an old mystery in the New Hampshire woods are as hard to like as the “Blair Witch” hunters. Only “Blair” fans will like this one, which is at least better photographed. Welborn is delightfully creepy in “Love on the Rocks,” which takes too long to decide whether it’s horror, a romantic comedy or a black comedy (hint: all of the above), but is often fun once it gets into its story of a serial murderer of women and a serial kidnapper of men.

FRANCO-LY SPEAKING
Award-winning actor James Franco has added directing to his resume, and while his shooting schedule may keep him from attending the festival, his new career track will be represented by a short, “The Feast of Stephen,” and a feature, “Saturday Night.” “Feast,” part of the Gay Shorts program, is a polished gem, but “Saturday Night” looks like a student project, with too many zooms, too much shaky camerawork and artsy-fartsy switching between color and black and white. It’s saved by its irresistible subject matter, an all-access pass to a week in the life of “Saturday Night Live.” SP