the relationship between a taxi driver and his fare

Goodbye Solo

Monday 21 Feb, Gibsons Heritage Playhouse, 7:30pm

Presented by the Sunshine Coast Film Society

Ramin Bahrani is a director who is finding a style of American cinema that is different from both Hollywood commerce and indie-Sundance drear: his new movie is an instantly gripping, funny, quietly persuasive drama that held me from the first frames.

Souleymane Sy Savane gives a superbly likeable performance as Solo, a Senegalese taxi driver in North Carolina. One day, he picks up a morose old white guy called William, played by Red West, who offers Solo $1,000 to take him to a remote and dangerous beauty spot on a certain date. The exuberant and compassionate Solo suspects that William wishes to make away with himself, and so tries to involve himself in his life, even insisting that William coach him for his upcoming Airline Flight Attendant exam.

The film has been likened to Kiarostami's 1997 classic & Palme d'Or winner, The Taste Of Cherry, which it has much in common with stylistically and thematically. However Goodbye Solo is nonetheless entirely distinctive: about friendship and perhaps also about the impossibility of ever really knowing another person.

For more information on Goodbye Solo which screens tonight at Gibsons Heritage Playhouse see the Sunshine Coast Film Society website.

Review by Peter Bradshaw at the Guardian.co.uk

Image credit: axiomfilms-shop.co.uk

man's best friend

My Dog Tulip, Monday 7th February, 7:30pm

Gibsons Heritage Playhouse (brought to you by Sunshine Coast Film Society)

Adapted from a semi-autobiographical novel by J.R. Ackerley, My Dog Tulip is an eloquently told woofs and all portrait of Ackerley’s intimate relationship with his best friend, a cheeky Alsation.

The film’s hand-drawn animation by the directors Paul and Sandra Fierlinger and Christopher Plummer's conversational narrative combine to make “My Dog Tulip,” one of the most sophisticated dog movies ever created. Animated with 58,320 beautiful minimalistic drawings and swirling pastel colours, the film’s quaint and unassuming look both perfectly suits the story and narration and belies its more risqué elements.

With next to no dialogue, directors Paul Fierlinger and Sandra Fierlinger rely on Christopher Plummer's extensive voice over lifted from Ackerley’s writing. With wry, acerbic flair Acklerley discusses all aspects of dog life – spiritedly embracing the less than sophisticated subjects of poop, fornication, ass whiffing and other doggie matters.

It is through Acklerley’s observations about Tulip that the narrator emerges as a strong character. Not unlike the protagonist of Notes on a Scandal, Acklerley’s perspective is both high-minded and scandalous, painting a picture of a loner and borderline misanthrope who observes human behaviour from a distance – and, in this instance, canine behaviour from close-up.

With it’s mixture of brevity and profundity, lofty ideas, low brow humour and a lovely visual style, My Dog Tulip plays like an adult picture book littered with candid and concise illuminations on the dynamic between pooches and people.

The film works both as a deep and affecting personal ode to the bond between man and dog and as a piece of frivolous entertainment. Like Adam Elliott’s sublime claymation Mary and Max, My Dog Tulip can crack poo jokes one moment and make poignant soul-tingling observations the next, while never jeopardising the sense that this is real art. And very good art, too. Review by Luke Buckmaster at Crikey.com.au 

For anyone interested in animated art, it is well worth reading an insightful interview with film makers Paul and Sandra Fierlinger on BMFI's blog here



bandit is officially a sexy word

...and this particular sexy bandit happens to be Lee Pace (Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day) who stars in The Fall, the latest offering by the Sunshine Coast Film Society.

Screening tonight at the Gibsons Heritage Playhouse, the Fall is a visually stunning masterpiece that blurs the line between fiction and reality. If you’re up for a lushly detailed fairy tale about 5 mythical heroes, coupled with the heart-breaking friendship between an injured actor and one of the most adorable little girls on screen, then this is what you’re looking for.

Upping this movie's cred, is that the cinematic poster for The Fall was based on the Salvador Dali painting, "1935_03_Face of Mae West Which May Be Used as an Apartment", circa 1935.

Come check it out tonight. Doors open at 7pm with the film starting at 7:30pm. For more information see Sunshine Coast Film Society. Oh, and here's a preview trailer to view as well...

Images: Allmoviephoto.com