In The Sumptuous Reel Worlds Part 1

In The Sumptuous Reel Worlds Part 1

Imagine a 30-day mass media experiment. The programmers of the 47th San Francisco International Film Festival take over the major broadcasting networks and stuff the cultural arteries of deep-fried America with their ingeniously prepared detox spectrum of fresh and daring films from more than 45 different countries.

You’ve probably already heard the buzz about Morgan Spurlock’s “Super Size Me” , a thoroughly essential escalation of art as a weapon. In glorious , hilarious and humble Moore-like style , this work takes the corporate beasts hostage , and grills to a blackened crisp the very franchise that commandeers one of our civilzation’s unique brands of slow McDeath.

But the real beauty of this festival lies in the cinematic panopticon of world affairs and lyrical lives far from the nauseating and ubiquitous Hollywood-centric , commodities-only menu. This rare diversity of curated and obscure treasures simultaneously provides deliciously rich escapes to elsewhere and plunges us deep into a looking glass darkly. This year’s program takes the pulse of creativity from Iceland to Peru to Lebanon to Afghanistan to find the peoples’ creativity is thriving and limitless , while sharply reminding us that cultures everywhere are endangered , under seige, in horrfic conflict and need the world’s immediate attention and/or a new kind of self- respect to begin affecting change.

OK , so Spurlock is now threatening to take his ” 30 days” experiment to Fox TV as a series , but we the refreshed and inspired international cinema lovers might begin to picture a more subversively spliced Morgan meets Kubrick fantasy, an exponential tad to the letf of network television reality, something in Imax proportions perhaps, hardly self-inflicted, and particularly suited to the ultra-american fetish for vengeance :

2 weeks, 316 hours, 18,960 minutes of SF Film Society’s celluloid catalogue played to network executives, coporate CEO’s, members of congress ( in particular the third of whom who reportedly never even applied for a passport ) , criminal heads of state ( who can’t name the US-sponsored president of Pakistan or find Kosovo on a map ) all strapped to their seats , eyes clamped wide in Malcolm / Alex de Large-style , subjected to this breathtaking scope of life on earth in an incessant loop, until someone screams out an innovative plan for providing the masses some real channels of culture to feed our newly cultivated desires for a regular diet , a continual stream , of multi-cultural genius and renewed sensitivity to all our diverse lives.

OK, so before this weltschmerz and rage-induced immoral celluloid daydream becomes just another made-for-tv screenjob pacifier and the anxiety of this dear decadent bubble banquet of international cinema is over in , fuck ! 4 days, we are still left to seriously consider what medium(s) of communication will form such poetic and humane , hopeful to drastic acts in a beyond-the-reel world to awaken us from our supremely destructive and myopic planetary domination script ... get us up off our spectator asses , and put us at the center of a similarly creative and elevated living theater with all the wealth of the world interacting with us.

“ Maybe, just maybe, the United Nations could be reinstituted as a seriously recognized power by replacing politicos and corporate lobbyists w/ a congress of film directors representing their countires as they tour the globe as a travelling Film Festival circus... and we’ll have midnight screenings for all those wierder persuasions ! ”
Jesse Helms screams.


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Coming soon : more reviews of some of the best in hard-hitting political documentaries and glimpses into the film fringes and the 4-corner excursions. And get yourself over to Kabuki Theater, PFA or Century Cinema in Mountain View for whatever’s left of the cinematic feast. It can be a bit of a potluck gamble at $12 a pop , but here’s a few we think you won’t be disappointed:

“ Squint Your Eyes”, “Checkpoint “ , “Carandiru”, ”Mon Idole”, “The Five Obstructions”, “ L’Esquive “, “In Satmar Custody” ... to each her own. it really works best to pick intuitively what information and emotional mix your being needs now.... go forth, the menu is rich !

Also check at http://www.enemycombatantradio.net for upcoming audio interviews.