While my brother was watching bicycle-related movies out in Portland, even one that he and his wife & daughter made, we were busy watching indie films here at the Wisconsin Film Fest.
We started with Art of the Steal, about the Barnes Collection. It was a well-made, trying hard to be fair documentary, but its prevailing opinion is that the city of Philadelphia is the party that’s stealing the art, and IMHO, it was always Barnes. He amassed this incredible collection, that’s published in thousands of art books (and as one of Bill Gates early digitization projects on CD), but he kept it in his own building in Merion PA. He wanted to limit how many people could see the real thing and how they could see it. True, he bought and paid for every piece in the collection – he got lucky and purchased at a time when modern art was undervalued – many times in the movie somebody says, “well, it’s his art and he can do whatever he wants”. Yeah, right.
Next we saw The happiest girl in the world, about a Romanian girl who sends in juice labels and wins a car – that her father plans to sell immediately to fund a business venture. Part of her prize is getting to be in a commercial for the juice and most of the movie is spent filming the commercial.
Thursday we went to the UW marching band concert instead of any movies – another kind of experience, mostly good, except for the interpretation of music from Miss Saigon, complete with soloist with non-working mic, and small Asian child used as prop.
Friday it was Madison symphony, Russian masters, Philippe Bianconi plays Rachmaninof.
Finally back to movies Saturday, and it was probably the best night. First Shameless, about a Czech weatherman who leaves his wife because her nose is too big. He ends up with an older woman who is a popular singer; the wife finds a cute boyfriend and is his (the weatherman’s) parent’s favorite.
Then Girl With Dragon Tattoo, the hot ticket of the fest. This was the Swedish version; the US is coming in 2012. It was a good thriller and a great adaptation of a complicated book.
Sunday we spent all of a cool sunny April day in the dark watching movies: Everyone Else, that the New Yorker said don’t go see on a date; Paddle to Seattle – 2 guys who did the old video game Yukon Trail backwards – Skagway to Seattle, instead of vice-versa; and Bomber, the family road trip from hell – one reviewer called it the Brit Little Miss Sunshine.
We had a longer break between Paddle to Seattle and Bomber – Mark wanted coffee, I wanted ice cream. The line was ridiculous at the Union – so I walked to the ice cream place up State Street – and got free ice cream from one of John’s friends working there.
