Day 3
Monday, June 13
In Memory of My Father (Christopher Jaymes, 2005) 55
Somehow this intense, but often comical, family confessional pulls it off. Solid performances all around, especially Jeremy Sisto, Judy Greer, and Jaymes himself, and quite affecting as well. Structured similarly to The Celebration (which the director says he saw later and loved), it transitions from room to room and character to character without skipping a beat and everyone involved feels like a fully conceived human being, rather than a conveniently place mouthpiece to pipe in from time to time. It takes some pretty hard blows on Hollywood insiders as everyone is exceedingly self-involved and we quickly learn that the father could likely have topped them all. It never points any fingers or completely villainize anyone - there are varying degrees of a-holes at this party (and though the father is lying dead in his room upstairs, it is a party) but they all have their issues and we come to care for them despite it all. A pleasant surprise considering most of the world premiere's I saw here this year and last haven't amounted to much. I actually hope this one picks up a distributor as it would likely do well in select independent theaters.
Unfortunately I missed the screening of The Aristocrats b/c I showed up late and they threw me in the back of the wait list. It should get a wide release and definitely a DVD, so I'll live.
In Memory of My Father (Christopher Jaymes, 2005) 55
Somehow this intense, but often comical, family confessional pulls it off. Solid performances all around, especially Jeremy Sisto, Judy Greer, and Jaymes himself, and quite affecting as well. Structured similarly to The Celebration (which the director says he saw later and loved), it transitions from room to room and character to character without skipping a beat and everyone involved feels like a fully conceived human being, rather than a conveniently place mouthpiece to pipe in from time to time. It takes some pretty hard blows on Hollywood insiders as everyone is exceedingly self-involved and we quickly learn that the father could likely have topped them all. It never points any fingers or completely villainize anyone - there are varying degrees of a-holes at this party (and though the father is lying dead in his room upstairs, it is a party) but they all have their issues and we come to care for them despite it all. A pleasant surprise considering most of the world premiere's I saw here this year and last haven't amounted to much. I actually hope this one picks up a distributor as it would likely do well in select independent theaters.
Unfortunately I missed the screening of The Aristocrats b/c I showed up late and they threw me in the back of the wait list. It should get a wide release and definitely a DVD, so I'll live.
posted by Derek at 3:48 PM
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