Here are some loose quotes from Stummer about the creative process: Strummer on being asked “Does inspiration just come pouring into you?”  “Hell no, you beat it out of your head.” He then goes into a riff about crossroad puzzles writers and how those writers do the same kind of work and there is no award ceremony for them.  As he says, “It’s work.”

And being asked about opinions he says “I don’t have opinions.  Some guy said if you have opinions you can’t see.” And “I write the lyrics as late as possible so they can be fresh – about what’s happening now.” 

Watching the tour footage I was struck by the music, how very sexy it was, yet during most of the documentary I saw very few women. There was only one hell-of-a-nice guy busting his ass to make sure that his second record with the Mescaleros made a profit for his record company.  The documentary follows Strummer and the band as they work, setting up, handing our flyers in Atlantic City, banging on the door of radio stations to ask for interviews.  If this was a sex- drugs-and-rock-and-roll-tour, I sure did not see it on the screen.  Those guys were working it and working it hard.

What I did see is a really great guy, one who loved the music of both Nina Simone and Woody Guthrie (the song Johnny Appleseed is his homage to Guthrie).  It was bittersweet for me to watch this documentary because I was probably the only out-of-touch writer who did not realize that Strummer was dead.  So I watched it and thought, boy that guy can really play, I need to start following that band, buying the CD’s etc. etc. and then at the end of the documentary there is the final screen - Joe Strummer, 1952-2002.  Ouch!   
 

The Prisoner of the Iron Bars is a visually disturbing documentary of the world’s most notoriously overcrowded and neglected prison in Sao Paulo, Brazil, known as Carandiru.  This is extremely rare footage shot just months before the prison was imploded in December of 2002, due to horrific conditions.

The film is a bit too long, but certainly gave me, as a viewer, the rather uncomfortable and dreadful feeling that I myself was trapped with those inmates inside of Carandiru.  Since that seems to be the intended affect, I am able to forgive the length, but be warned, it is not an easy film to sit through.

Paulo Sacramento’s brilliant decision to hand over the cameras to the inmates gives us a rare glimpse behind the bars of prison life, at it’s most extreme.  There is graphically disturbing footage of neglected medical conditions, grotesquely overcrowded cells (sometimes up to as many as 14 people), and photographs taken of corpses stabbed hundreds of times, some missing body parts, some with slit throats.

Despite the unsettling nature of this film, The Prisoner of the Iron Bars is a fascinating view into prison life and demonstrates how human beings that are placed in unbearable conditions find ways to not only survive, but band together to make the best of a severely hopeless situation.  Through this film we become witness to the underlying emotional need for these inmates to feel human again through a unique look into their day-to-day activities.

We watch rap artists perform various rap songs about the injustice of Carandiru to a crowd of followers.  We listen to several inmates, some who just want to be reformed.  We see the ways in which drugs and alcohol are secretly produced and sold.  We are shown the infestation of rats and the abusively drunk prison guards.  There are at times quiet moments of loneliness and despair through poetry and song.  We are invited along on the simple journey one inmate takes us, peering out the window at the envied subway, past the boarding house of flirtatious girls, to the rising sun of a new day, a new anxiety.  We see the separated gay division of the prison, where most of the men have found it valuable to their survival to become whores.  Cigarettes are their currency.  The parole officer listens to people daily, and denies them in such a routine manner; you have to wonder if he wears earplugs.  It makes HBO’s Oz (a dramatization of prison life) look like a luxurious resort.

The Prisoner of the Iron Bars is a shocking, disturbing and compelling film that made me feel thankful for my life.  Afterwards, I found the need to take a long walk to appreciate that little thing of freedom that is so often taken for granted.

“

Satan’s Little Helper is a tongue-in-cheek, campy slasher flick that can best be described as a film which would pair nicely with a glass of chianti and a good batch of brownies.

I was pretty sure what to expect, as the film’s synopsis calls it a horror-comedy.  I was, however, pleasantly surprised in that unlike so many other films of this genre, Satan’s Little Helper is completely original, and the humor comes from the absurdities of the individual situations, as opposed to the now formulaic method of spoofing classic horror films.

Satan’s Little Helper tells the story of rather simple characters in a sleepy New England town clumsily stumbling along a path of bizarre misunderstandings, naïve to their imminent danger. 

Amanda Plummer stars in the role of Merril Whooly, an open-minded, drug-induced, psychotic mother oblivious to the potential dangers of exposing her children to sex, drugs and Satan Worship.  Merril and her husband Dean (Wass Stevens) give their 9-year-old child Douglas (Alexander Brickel) a video game called Satan’s Little Helper, in which the hero of the game runs around attacking innocent people on the street.  High scores can be obtained from massacring blind people, old ladies with canes, etc.  Douglas becomes so obsessed with the game that he begins to idolize Satan.  Can you blame him?  I mean, as Douglas so eloquently puts it, Satan “is cool”.

Having a rather inappropriate crush on Jenna, his scantily-clad older sister (Katheryn Winnick), that no one seems to find strange, Douglas’ jealousy of Jenna’s new boyfriend Alex (Stephen Graham) turns into hatred.  Therefore, like any young Satan-worshipper worth his salt, Douglas wanders the town on Halloween day to find a Satan to kick it with.  

As luck would have it, Douglas finds a sex-starved serial killer dressed up for Halloween in a Satan costume wandering around in broad daylight with bloodied townspeople, propping them up as various Halloween displays.  Of course this is normal to the townsfolk, and everyone just thinks that these are elaborate special effects.  In awe of Satan’s utter cool “special-effect” work, Douglas asks Satan if he wouldn’t mind killing his sister’s boyfriend to eliminate his competition.  And as we all know, Satan just wouldn’t be Satan if he declined such an offer, so the duo embarks on a ridiculously funny and often-times politically incorrect killing spree. 

This is all well and good until someone gets an eye poked out, or in this case their guts pulled out.  So Douglas comes to the embarrassing realization that he has placed his own family in grave danger.  What?  

In a divine balance of humor and graphic violence, Satan’s Little Helper is a decadently fun yet suspenseful film, packed with laugh-out loud situations and a plentiful buffet of blood and guts to sink your teeth into.

www.tribecafilmfestival.org.

The Spectator begins in as an assistant in Flavia’s home.  Through an eventual build of friendship between Valeria and Flavia, Valeria finally meets Massimo under a series of uncomfortable circumstances.  An underlying sense of intimacy and jealousy among this potentially explosive triangle is left to the interpretation of the audience’s imagination.  It is this room for interpretation that acts as a key ingredient, making this film so emotionally engaging.  The tables eventually turn in such a way that Massimo becomes obsessed with Valeria to a degree that disrupts Valeria’s comfortable sense of control and distance.

What makes The Spectator so enticing is its complexity.  Celebrating the romance of a throbbing heart, this film offers an abundant bouquet of sensuality stemming from longing; meanwhile harboring a piquant flavor of emotional chaos, resulting from the fear to love.

Cinematographer Giuseppe Lanci’s work is gorgeous, expertly conjuring visually prevalent tones of sensuality and despair. 

As The Spectator is Paolo Franchi’s first feature, I have no doubt that this film will be a launching point for a successful career.  Bravo. 

www.tribecafilmfestival.org.