What to catch at IFFBoston’s Fall Focus at the Brattle
Where can you see films featuring delicious French food, beautiful Japanese mountain villages, Finnish karaoke bars, and — my favorite characters — the killer budgies?
At the Independent Film Festival Boston’s Fall Focus, starting Thursday and running through Oct. 23 at the Brattle. (A post-festival bonus screening of “The Holdovers” plays at the Brattle Oct. 30 at 7 p.m.)
“There are a few themes that thread through many of the films that we hope the audience will discover,” said Brian Tamm, executive director of IFFBoston. His favorite pairing happens Friday with Aki Kaurismäki’s “Fallen Leaves” (6:30 p.m.) and Christos Nikou’s “Fingernails” (8:30 p.m.).
“Both focus on the uncertainty of finding true love in the modern world,” he wrote in an email.
I’ve seen both films, and while I’ve never been a fan of Finnish director Kaurismäki’s strange cinematic universe, “Fallen Leaves” wore my resistance down and won me over. The tragicomic love story between two Helsinkians won this year’s Cannes Jury Prize.
A double feature with “Fingernails” makes sense in that both films take a rather askew look at romance. “Fingernails” has a science-fiction edge to its love triangle between Jessie Buckley, Riz Ahmed, and “The Bear”’s Jeremy Allen White: There’s a machine that can determine if two people are destined for true love. (It requires fingernails, so be ready to squirm.)
Buckley and White test positively as a couple, but then Ahmed enters the picture. Complications ensue.
In choosing the fall slate (the main festival is in the spring), Tamm said, “We keep an eye out for the titles that will get people talking towards the end of the year, so you’ll see a lot of films that won awards at major festivals, or were selected to represent their countries at the Oscars.”
One of those films is “Dream Scenario” (Saturday at 9 p.m.), which has a possible Oscar nominee in Nicolas Cage. Cage plays an ordinary man (imagine that!) who somehow keeps appearing in the dreams of friends and strangers, alike. I hesitate to reveal more, but if “Nicolas Cage as a potential Freddy Krueger” doesn’t whet your appetite, nothing else I say will.
Another candidate for Oscar consideration is the Juliette Binoche film “The Taste of Things” (Sunday at 7:30 p.m.), France’s submission for best international feature. I covered it in my last New York Film Festival dispatch. It’s a sumptuous feast for the eyes — a gigantic slice of French food porn and romantic longing. A must-see!
If you want a Massachusetts-set neonoir, look no further than the opening night’s film “Eileen” (Thursday at 7:30 p.m.). Set in 1964 and based on Ottessa Moshfegh’s page-turner, this one has earned raves for Anne Hathaway and Thomasin McKenzie as two women who forge a bond while working at a prison. A crime causes their plans to go horrifically awry.
I’ve been raving about the killer parakeets in Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” (Oct. 23 at 7:30 p.m.) since I saw the film at the Toronto International Film Festival. And now, you can see my cutlery-wielding pals in all their badass glory at the Brattle. Your life will be changed!
To take the heat off of me, I asked Tamm for his own suggestions for festival-goes. For those seeking new voices in film, he recommended the lyrical, Mississippi-set tale “All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt” (Sunday at 12:30 p.m.) and Mexico’s Oscar submission, Tótem (Sunday at 2:30 p.m.), a film about a surprise birthday party that is also a funeral of sorts.
He picked the animated feature “Robot Dreams” (Saturday at 12:30 p.m.), about a robot and his dog, for the kids.
And for Wim Wenders fans, Tamm recommended the director’s latest, “Perfect Days” (Sunday at 5 p.m.), noting it’s “a director working at the top of his form.” I wasn’t crazy about “Perfect Days,” so we have a dissenting opinion. Go see it to determine which one of us is wrong.