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Gregg Araki is this year’s Filmmaker on the Edge Award recipient.
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Emily Rios and Jesse Garcia in “Quinceañera.” |
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Youth, truth and much that’s uncouth
Highlights of the Provincetown International Film Festival
By Howard Karren
Banner Correspondent
Here on the Outer Cape, cineastes, film buffs and movie lovers of all persuasions get but one chance a year to thoroughly overindulge their favorite pastime, and that’s at the Provincetown International Film Festival. This year, from June 14 through 18, there are more than enough screenings and events to satisfy an enthusiast’s greediest expectations.
If you’d like to talk with filmmakers in an intimate setting, there are breakfasts and late-night parties throughout. If you’d rather sample the work of the festival’s award winners — Filmmaker on the Edge Gregg Araki and actress Lili Taylor — a handful of superb films by each are there for the picking. If you’d like to sing along with that greatest of nanny fantasies, “Mary Poppins,” get to Town Hall by noon on Sunday. Or, if you’d prefer to relive the way movies were commonly experienced before they became the fodder of laptops and cell phones, take a trip down to the Wellfleet Drive-In on Thursday evening and catch Spielberg’s timeless adventure “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” with Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones, and the 1988 coming-of-age romance “Mystic Pizza,” which helped launch the careers of Julia Roberts and the aforementioned Lili Taylor. But among the dozens of dramatic films and documentaries offered at the festival, a few standouts are worth noting.
The people that ought to see “Forgiving the Franklins” probably won’t. However obvious its points, the way it makes them is original, observant and more than a little shocking. The Franklins, a devout and stressed-out mom, dad, teenage son and younger daughter, face the frustrations of heartland life with a stiff upper lip. Then wham! — a near-lethal car accident turns their world upside-down. After an encounter with Jesus in what looks to be purgatory, they return to Earth transformed. Suddenly, nakedness and sex, which had once made them uptight, are a source of joy and uninhibited exploration. “Forgiving the Franklins” is adult fare, but for those not deterred by nudity and kinky sex, this debut film from writer-director Jay Lloyd is a must-see.
The Festival Centerpiece, “Quinceañera” was an award winner at the Sundance Film Festival, where a few of the best documentaries showing in Provincetown also appeared. Other outstanding films include the intimate slice of life “Small Town Gay Bar”; “This Film Is Not Yet Rated,” an amusing and genuinely investigative look at the prejudices, incompetence and corruption of the MPAA’s ratings board; “Unfolding Florence: The Many Lives of Florence Broadhurst,” directed by Australian auteur Gillian Armstrong, of “My Brilliant Career” fame; and “Wordplay,” an engaging portrait of New York Times crossword-puzzle editor Will Shortz.
The festival’s Youth & Diversity Program includes another documentary, “Thin,” a haunting view of the victims of anorexia nervosa by still photographer Lauren Greenfield. Greenfield is known for her shimmering, ironic take on Valley Girl life — how apt for her to examine the ugly flip side of teenage beauty.
Among the many films at the festival on gay and lesbian subjects, the low-budget Filipino entry “The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros”) is one of the most impressive. Another foreign flick that comes well recommended is “Head-On,” a German-Turkish production presented by John Waters. Although the ever-subversive Waters usually scours the exotic (and erotic) fringe for his annual festival pick, this time he’s gotten dead serious: “Head-On” depicts a doomed romance between suicidal expatriate Turks living in Hamburg and is more likely to elicit tears of sorrow than laughter. But like most of the program at the festival, it’s a one-of-a-kind opportunity. Don’t miss it.
For a full schedule of films, locations and times, pick up a festival booklet in public locations around town or at the Film Fest main box in the Aquarium Mall, 209 Commercial St., Provincetown. Tickets are also available at the box office or through capetix.com.
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In the Arts
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Jun 15th, 2006