Film Distillery

A Review of Euphonia

Euphonia is quite the achievement.  It is a film that is hard to describe, short on plot and ultimately one needs to be able to just let the film wash over them.  I thought the acting was strong, the cinematography was beautiful, and the sound design was some of the best that I’ve ever seen in a low budget film.

Will Euphonia be for everyone?  Almost certainly not.  If you need traditional narrative to enjoy a film, this may not be your cup of tea.  If you’ve ever liked a Terrence Malick film, there is a chance that you will really like this movie.

I went in to watching the film knowing nothing about it.  Perhaps this is a help.  I almost feel like telling people that I loved it, but they will probably hate it.  The reception of a film like this seems like it can be heavily colored by preconceived notions of what the viewer is going to see or experience.

If you can keep your expectations low (remember this film is an odd 53minutes long and was shot for less than $1,000 and has almost no dialogue) you might have a shot at enjoying it as much as I did.

Luckily for you, you can watch it on Vimeo.

euphonia from ornana films on Vimeo.

2 Great Foreign Thrillers on Netflix

It seems if you really want to watch some great movies on Netflix, you would be smart to peruse the foreign titles.  I’m always trying to think of genres that could be made on an indie budget, but could still appeal to a broader audience, perhaps even become a cross over success.  I’ve always liked thrillers for this reason.  In the same way that an audience doesn’t necessarily care who stars in a horror film, the audience of a thriller are showing up for a fun, taught, fast paced, inventive, engaging film and if the filmmakers successfully delivers, there will likely be an audience.

I can’t quite stomach most horror without a large and equal dose of comedy ala Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, Evil Dead 2, or Shaun of the Dead, so a thriller seems like a natural fit for me.  Thrillers are kind of like the guilty pleasure of watching an action movie, but with less bad dialogue and a lack of buildings blowing up.  I think horror films and thrillers are a natural fit for independent filmmakers, but it doesn’t seem like there are really that many indie thrillers.  Please let me know about the great indie thrillers that I’ve probably missed.

If you want to see some great thrillers, you need to look no further than your netflix foreign film instant view.  There were two films that caught my eye and I thought to myself “give it a shot”.  I thought they were both great and can heartily recommend them, but wanted to mention that I didn’t watch the trailers before watching the movies themselves.  After watching the movies I went and found the trailers and I cannot stress enough that your movie watching experience will be enhanced greatly by NOT watching the trailers.  Both of these trailers just give too much away.  I know distributors want to get people to watch the films, but it seems to be a bit short sighted to show bits from the entire film just to get people to watch.  It seems to me a better approach would be to craft a trailer from the first few minutes, that is short and thrilling and leaves audiences a chance to enjoy the film.

Don’t watch the trailers until after the film.

Sleepless Night

Sleepless night is a French crime thriller.  The film wastes no time getting started and begins with a daylight chase and robbery.  Two men sit in a car waiting and then pull masks over their heads and begin pursuit of another car.  Eventually they catch the car and steal the contents of a duffel bag, but not before things go seriously awry.  

The rest of the film largely takes place in a huge nightclub where bad people are holding someone hostage until they get back the contents of their duffel bag.

The film is pretty straight forward, but the performances are good and the staging is interesting and there is just enough plot turns to keep you interested.  The performance by Tomer Sisley was great and he carries the movie with his character’s focus.

Headhunters

Headhunters, from Norway, on the other hand is less drama and much more of a very twistily constructed thriller.  This film is carried less by the deep feelings of the main character and more by the intricately plotted script.

This film gets going very quickly and then proceeds at a pretty much breathe taking pace until the final frame.  It is a very fun ride.  

As set out in the first scenes, our main character is a smart calculating man who, even at 5’6” is able to have a gorgeous, tall, wife and an amazing life style.  How can he do that when he works as a corporate headhunter?  He’s told his wife that he inherited money, but the truth of the matter is that he has been stealing paintings from homes and selling them on the black market.  With this income he has been barely been able to keep his head above water.  He’s keeping just ahead of all of his lies.

Then a miracle happens when he finds out that a man has a painting in his home that is worth an amazing amount of money.  This may be the answer to all of his problems, but it isn’t.  It’s just the beginning.

It turns out that you really, really, really don’t want to steal from the wrong person.

This film has relentless pace, inventive plotting, bizarre characters and is just a fun, if bloody, film to watch.

Is it deep drama?  No, but it is an exciting thriller.  Give it a shot.

Match Your Veronica Mars Donation

So I saw earlier today that the group that created Veronica Mars is creating a feature film based on the television series.

It’s a funny video and my family likes the show.  Then a bunch of friends posted about the kickstarter video and I was mentioning to my friend Adam that if he was going to fund Veronica Mars, then he should match with a real indie project.  

I knew that my family would not, not let me get involved in the VM project, so I just put my money where my mouth is and donated to not 1, not 2, but 3 other Kickstarter projects.  I looked through the listed projects and found a short called Night Before The Morning Sun that looked interesting, from Israel no less, and decided I would throw them a little money. 

I like to support local stuff so next I found a project that wants to show 3 films at the LA River and anyone who knows me, knows that I love outdoor screenings and alternative venue screening.  So I threw them a small amount of money.  

So I thought I was done and bounced back to Facebook to post about all of this craziness.  When I got back to Facebook I saw that my friend  Mark Stolaroff is producing Henry Barial’s new feature The House That Jack Built and they have a Kickstarter campaign.  I love these very talented filmmakers and so I had to donate to them as well.  Check out the campaign here:

So that’s the tale of how I went over budget on Kickstarter tonight.  It was worth it though.  I guess that makes me a patron of the arts.  I checked my KS profile and since it’s inception Mara Donahoe and I have backed 21 projects.

Warner Brothers doesn’t need your help, but the independents do.  If you helped Veronica Mars match it by donating to an indie Kickstarter campaign.