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Joe Cillo

When did you last call Mom and Pop?

By Joe Cillo

BE GOOD TO YOUR PARENTS….OR ELSE!

Appreciating your parents is the only hope for civilization.
The Chinese Government & Lynn Ruth

China has decided it is a punishable crime for adult children to neglect their parents and I think that is a very wise decision. Wouldn’t it be wonderful for us all, if every nation followed suit?

It is about time someone took steps to stop the shameless way grown progeny are treating their parents these days. Elderly parents sit at home in their wheel chairs or on the sofa, counting the moments ‘til one of their offspring remembers that they are too weak and tired to get to Tesco’s; the hours tick by, their tummies gurgle, their heads ache and they stare at the door, praying it will open and the heir to their estate will appear bearing bubble and squeak and even a bit of pudding.

After all, parents have every right to expect their children to be there for them. Didn’t they clean up Junior when he got a bloody nose?  Didn’t they give their little princess dancing lessons so she could express her inner feelings? They let her get that disgusting tattoo of Frankenstein chewing a bunny and they never said a word when she appeared at the breakfast table, her hair dyed purple and three rings in her nose.

And that was before they became teen-agers.

They looked the other way, when their little darlings sold pot to the neighborhood grade-school kids, and the countless times they threw up on the couch from an overdose or got too affectionate with one another.  Remember that?

Didn’t they sacrifice that extra cruise, and the trip to see penguins copulate on an iceberg just so their son could go to university and their daughter could afford that abortion?  Of course they did.

And that is why the Chinese Government decided to step up to the plate and remind us that we owe Mummy and Daddy big time.  They were the ones who kept us alive through the bullying, the bike accidents, the shattered limbs and broken hearts.  Now, it is the children’s turn to keep their parents comfy and warm ‘til they breathe their last.  After all, there is always time to change the will, if they feel unloved.

Not that it will be easy if the law becomes universal. Take Mary Louise:  There she is galloping though her day, getting the kids to school, packing their lunches, rushing off to the office, picking up her darlings, and taking them to tap dancing and soccer, driving home, giving the house a quick dust, fixing dinner, greeting the father of her gang with a drink, serving food, cleaning the kitchen and collapsing in front of the telly.  At midnight, she and her hubby stagger up to bed, too exhausted to do what they used to do before they tied the knot. Suddenly, she sits bolt upright, snaps her fingers and says, “OH MY GOD!!!  I forgot to visit Daddy.  Now, we’ll never pay off this mortgage.”

And if her partner is a good sort, he says, “Don’t worry darling. I will visit you every Tuesday and bring chocolate.”

Farah Goes Bang

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=8]

road trip buddy comedy, sex farce, chick flick
US, 2013, English, 90 minutes, color

description
Farah Mahtab, a woman in her 20s, tries to lose her virginity while campaigning across America for presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004. Farah and her friends K.J. and Roopa follow the campaign trail across historic Route 66 on their way to Ohio, the central battleground state of 2004, seizing control of this charged moment in their lives and the life of their country. Roopa aspires to a job in politics, K.J. brawls her way through a personal motivation to end the war in Iraq, and Farah struggles to locate not just her desirability, but her desire. Though they’re advised to focus on “purple” states where Kerry stands a chance of winning, they naively campaign in states like Texas. We know how the election turns out–but will Farah meet her personal goal for their American odyssey?

farahgoesbang_tkt.jpg

contributors
cast Nikohl Boosheri, Kandis Erickson, Kiran Deol, Michael Steger, Samrat Chakrabarti, Lyman Ward
director Meera Menon
producers Laura Goode, Danielle Firoozi, Erica Fishman, Liz Singh
screenwriters Meera Menon, Laura Goode
cinematographer Paul Gleason
editors Meera Menon, Kate Hickey

summary review
Funny, interesting, filled with a number of interesting themes and ideas. Very well produced with good production values. Quite remarkable for a first film.

ratings
script/story [rating=8]
acting [rating=9]
cinematography [rating=8]
technical quality [rating=8]
afterglow [rating=8]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=8]

 

trailer

see imDB info here

Farah Goes Bang

 

The Retrieval

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=9]

Drama | History | Western, US, 2013, English, 92 minutes, color

description
Set during the Civil War, we follow 13-year-old Will, a fatherless black boy who has taken up with a bounty hunter gang. Gang leader Burrell sends Will on a risky mission to retrieve Nate, a wanted black man with a lucrative bounty on his head. To ensure Will’s return with Nate, Burrell threatens the boy with death if he doesn’t bring back his quarry. Will and his fellow gang member Marcus (another black man) find Nate digging graves in a Union graveyard and convince their unwitting prey to follow them back to Burrell’s gang, under the ruse that they’re leading him to see his dying brother. Along the way, the initially aloof Nate and Will begin to bond, developing an unexpected surrogate father-son relationship. As unforeseen events complicate the journey and Will grows closer to Nate, he is consumed by a wearying decision and a moral dilemma: Should he deliver Nate to the gang, or tell him the truth and risk death if the gang finds out he let Nate go?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
director Chris Eska
cast Tishuan Scott, Ashton Sanders, Keston John, Bill Oberst Jr., Christine Horn, Alfonso Freeman
producers Jacob Esquivel, Jason Wehling
screenwriter Chris Eska
cinematographer Yasu Tanida
editor Chris Eska

summary review
An outstanding, satisfying film. Visually beautiful, thematically complex and poetic, it builds to an inevitable tragic and sorrowful dénouement‎ but ends with a sliver of hope for the future. Lingers in the mind.

ratings
script/story [rating=9]
acting [rating=9]
cinematography [rating=9]
technical quality [rating=9]
afterglow [rating=9]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=9]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJqhzbTJ7kE

imDB info here
The Retrieval

 

Mt. Zion

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=3]

Art House & International | Drama
New Zealand, 2013, English, Maori, 93 minutes, color

description
Turei’s family are hard-working potato farm workers in rural New Zealand. A talented musician, Turei dreams of his band being the support act for Bob Marley’s 1979 tour. But it’s a dream that challenges the traditions and values of his upbringing and sets him at odds with his family – particularly his father, a true man of the land.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
cast Stan Walker, Temuera Morrison, Miriama Smith, Ngawai Herewini, Troy Kingi, David Wikaira-Paul
director Tearepa Kahi
producer Quinton Hita
screenwriter Tearepa Kahi
cinematographer Tearepa Kahi
editors Paul Maxwell, Tearepa Kahi

summary review
Interesting insight into rural Auckland in the late 1970’s. Terrific music and the ceremonial welcome dances are the only highlights of this film, because the dialog is unintelligible. The decision to have Maori dialog with no subtitles is a disaster – you can’t understand what is going on, particularly where the scenes are all talk. Needs to be-done with subtitles.

ratings
script/story [rating=6]
acting [rating=6]
cinematography [rating=7]
technical quality [rating=1]
afterglow [rating=1]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=4]

trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_Na-eWY4IY

see imDB info here
Mt. Zion

 

ownerBuilt

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=1]

Animation | Theatercast | Documentary  | History
US, 2013, English, 49 minutes, color

description
Aural performance remade into an animated movie. combining theater, animation and storytelling. Based on actual accounts of events occurring on New Orleans’ Danziger Bridge September 4, 2005. Storyteller/narrator Noel reanimates the events of the past through a staged performance of Hurricane Katrina’s devastating effects on his home and community. Katrina and the ensuing aftermath destroyed Noel’s community, neighborhood and home. But he is rebuilding, and as he rebuilds, he tries to evoke the memories of what was, through the enlistment of his personal archives. His memories are complicated by the tragic Danziger Bridge events. As Noel reflects back on what has been lost, the story he tells about his neighborhood is affected by the story of innocent people attempting to cross a bridge in search of safe haven, and for Noel their plight clarifies the questions that arose in the aftermath of Katrina.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
director Lawrence Andrews
producer Lawrence Andrews
screenwriter Lawrence Andrews
cinematographer Lawrence Andrews
editor Lawrence Andrews

summary review
An earnest effort to recast an oral performance into a movie format. Animation crude, visuals muddled, references obscure, sound murky. Doesn’t work.

ratings
script/story [rating=4]
animation [rating=1]
cinematography [rating=1]
technical quality [rating=1]
afterglow [rating=0]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=1]

 
video

see imDB info here
ownerBuilt

 

Collapse

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=2]

Dance | Drama | Allegory
US, 2013, English, 97 minutes, black & white

description
After 15 years away, Thorson (played by Russell Murphy, former San Francisco Ballet principal dancer) returns to the ballet company where audiences once flocked to see him. He has choreographed a ballet for troubled times but it’s not going to be easy to finance new work with funds for the arts drying up. As his original scheme collapses and he loses heart, a new experience, both transcendent and terrifying, seizes him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
director Rob Nilsson
cast Russell Murphy, William Martin, Anita Paciotti, Michelle Anton Allen, Dan da Silva
producers Rob Nilsson, Michelle Anton Allen
screenwriter Rob Nilsson
cinematographer Deniz Demirer
editors Stuart Sloan, Drow Millar, Deniz Demirer, Gustavo Ochoa

summary review
Interesting technically with its black and white, noire approach, extreme angles and close-ups. Becomes a mish-mash of pretentious avant images and muddled ending. A failed effort.

ratings
script/story [rating=3]
acting [rating=6]
cinematography [rating=8]
technical quality [rating=8]
afterglow [rating=1]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=2]

 

trailer

Zaytoun

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=6]

Adventure | Drama | Thriller War
UK, Israel, Hebrew, Arabic, 2012, English, 110 minutes, color

description
Beirut, 1982. During the 1982 Lebanon War, an Israeli fighter pilot, Yoni, is shot down over Beirut and captured by the Palestine Liberation Organization. Fahed, a precocious young Palestinian refugee who is angered by the death of his father in an Israeli air attack, agrees to help Yoni escape and lead him out of the city if Yoni will get him over the border and back to his family’s ancestral village. As they embark on a hazardous road trip across the war-ravaged country, Yoni and Fahed move from suspicion and mutual antagonism to a tentative camaraderie as they make their way closer to the place they both call home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
cast Stephen Dorff, Abdallah El Akal,  Ali Suliman
director Eran Riklis
producers Fred Ritzenberg, Gareth Unwin
screenwriter Nadir Rizq
cinematographer Dan Laustsen
editor Herve Schneid

summary review
The film starts out strong but devolves fairly rapidly into a sentimental, road buddy tale. Not possible as reality so best to enjoy it as a feel-good, fable of enemies growing to endure/like love each other.

ratings
script/story [rating=4]
acting [rating=8]
cinematography [rating=8]
technical quality [rating=8]
afterglow [rating=4]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=6]

 

trailer

see imDB info here

Zaytoun

 

Beside Still Waters

By Mill Valley Film Festival
[rating=5]

Drama , US, 2013, English, 76 minutes, color

description
Daniel Thatcher, a young romantic, recently lost both parents in a car accident. No friends came to the funeral: now he’s losing the family home. The weekend before he moves out, Daniel hosts a memorial celebration and insists his friends attend. He also invites his ex-girlfriend, Olivia, hoping to rekindle their old romance. Things quickly take a turn for the worse as no one shares Daniel’s good old days nostalgia. And when Olivia finally arrives, she brings her new fiancé. As the night progresses, the house brings out the adolescence in everyone. What follows is an evening full of drinking and dancing. Laughter and secrets. Sex, drugs, mischief and regret.

Next day everyone faces the revelations of the night before, including Daniel, who finally confronts his friends about their absence at his parents’ funeral. Again, Daniel finds himself alone and brokenhearted. He has to let go of the past, to mourn, forgive. In doing so, Daniel begins to see that the flaws in the people he loves intertwine with their beauty. As everyone leaves the house for the last time, childhood memories come flooding back, and Daniel is left with the hope that the friendships of his past will become the family of his future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

contributors
director Chris Lowell
cast Beck Bennett, Will Brill, Brett Dalton, Erin Darke, Ryan Eggold, Jessy Hodges, Britt Lower, Reid Scott
producers Jason Potash, Paul Finkel, Chris Lowell, Mohit Narang, Steven Gorel
screenwriter Chris Lowell, Mohit Narang
cinematographer Tim Naylor
editor Nick Houy

summary review
The stage is set for an interesting exploration of ongoing friendship over time but the players and characterizations do not ring true. Might he better and more interesting as a sitcom.

ratings
script/story [rating=5]
acting [rating=7]
cinematography [rating=8]
technical quality [rating=8]
afterglow [rating=3]
[rating=0]
Overall [rating=5]

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUPf64iVs24

imDB info here
Beside Still Waters

 

An Abundance of Autumn Shows to Enjoy in SF

By Linda Ayres-Frederick

 By Linda Ayres-Frederick

The fall is here and with it the new season of theatre to enjoy from new work to older chestnuts interpreted afresh.

In the mood for a rock-musical? The Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning Next to Normal plays at Gough Street Playhouse produced by Custom Made Theatre with a cast that brings out the best in both script and lyrics. CMT’s Artistic Director Brian Katz keeps the pace moving on Erik LaDue’s cleverly functional set, remarkably lit by Maxx Kurzunski. Stellar performances abound in the challenging emotional life of the Goodman family that Tom Kitt (Music) and Brian Yorkey (Book & Lyrics) examine. A tale of how one suburban family copes with mental illness (specifically bi-polar disorder) encompasses each family member’s coping mechanisms plus the doctors and friend involved. Life itself is the antagonist who has dealt the challenge. With Musical direction by Armando Fox assisted by Mark Dietrich, actor/singers  Lisa-Marie Newton, Danny Gould, LaMont Ridgell, Mackenzie Cala, Jordon Bridges and Perry Aliado all rise to the occasion. Next to Normal plays Thurs – Sat at 8pm Sundays at 7pm through Oct 27, 1620 Gough (at Bush) SF 94109. Up next: the West Coast Premiere of Peter/Wendy opening Nov. 19. Tickets:  www.custommade.org or info@custommade.org.

 Bay One Acts Festival 2013 has two programs playing at The Tides Theatre. Featuring the work of Bay Area Playwrights, Program One’s six plays include work of Tracy Held Potter, Sam Leichter, Daniel Hollowy, Bennett Fisher, William Bivins and a devised piece based on T.S. Eliot’s Love Song of Alfred J. Prufock by Allison Combs. Program Two (which this reviewer saw) features work by seven other playwrights. Nancy Cooper Frank’s Inexpressibly Blue takes on perennial cheer versus the darker view of aging while Ignacio Zulueta’s 3 Sisters Watching Three Sisters cleverly mirrors the Chekhov classic. Jeff Carter’s Pinteresque Break of Day shows two maternally dependent brothers faced with the challenge of what to do with their mother’s recent remains.  Daniel Hirsch’s Shooter examines the psyches of three now incarcerated perpetrators of shootings.  Lauren Gunderson’s Two Pigeons Talk Politics humorously gives two birds’ eyes views of the human dilemma.  In Michael Phillis’ Babes two Moms try their damnedest to remain politically correct giving their infant son his first lesson on procreation. Megan Cohen’s My Year takes us through the surprise party for a very reluctant Birthday celebrant.

Kudos to BOA for offering their audience different voices, perspectives and journeys that resonate no matter what time or place they are set in. For tickets and schedule playing through Oct 5 at 533 Sutter Street, SF  www.bayoneacts.org or www.brownpapertickets.com

The Magic Theatre’s revival of Sam Shepard’s Buried Child is worth the trip to Ft. Mason just to see Rod Gnapp as patriarch Dodge, Denise Balthrop Cassidy as wife Halie and Lawrence Radecker’s Father Dewis. Family secrets are revealed in this dark American classic that premiered here in 1978. Loretta Greco directs. Plays through Oct 13. www.magictheatre.org

 Coming up:

 Free Reading: Sunday, Oct 6, 7pm. Joy Cutler’s hilarious new play Pardon My Invasion at the Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason Street, (at Geary) SF. Strong Language Advisory. www.phoenixtheatresf.org.

NEW EMPLOYMENT IDEA FOR WOMEN OF A CERTAIN AGE

By Uncategorized

Sugar Grannies?

Older women are like French bread.
The crust is tough, but soft in the middle.
Lynn Ruth

Teaching is such a poorly paid profession that many young educators have joined a dating website called Sugar Babies.  This is a service that pairs young women with older men for “companionship.”  They charge an average of $3000 a visit. Personally, having gone out with several very old men myself, I think they are giving themselves away.  Do they realize what they are getting into?  Once they discover that chronic erectile dysfunction, loss of memory and incontinence are but the tip of the iceberg, they will realize that the current fee is cheap at the price.

It seems to me that there is a neglected market here.  Why can’t older women do the same in reverse?  I am all for creating a website for Sugar Grannies to offer their services to younger men.  The benefits are so obvious.  There isn’t a young man in the world who can figure out how to romance a partner properly on his own.  The only person who can teach him these days is his father….and you know how unlikely it is that a daddy has any technique.  The older a man is, the more his strategy was get ‘em drunk, give ‘em a roofie or pay for a quickie. By the time he is settled and locked into a relationship, he thinks the best way to get laid is to remember to take out the trash.

The truth is that every young Lothario needs an impartial coach, and what safer, better teacher than a woman of a certain age?  Think of the advantages: no worries about becoming an unexpected father; no inconvenient time of the month; no problem if she gets possessive…she’ll kick off in a year or two anyway.

Every woman knows that young men in their twenties make marvelous raw material for women like me.  Think of it!  A dowager can teach him patience; she can show him what foreplay really means; she can encourage him when he is done before she has begun.  Sadly by the time men hit thirty, they are no longer good candidates. They get locked into nasty habits like never bathing, smoking too much pot and wanking in the shower)

I believe a service like this could well become a necessary prerequisite for a relationship of any kind. Every woman should insist that her partner-to-be enroll in a 6-month training period with an older woman to learn the ropes of a romantic communication and mutual satisfaction.  A course like this is far more important than a prenuptial agreement.  The truth is, if you get a young man trained soon enough, you won’t need a pre-nupt agreement.  He will be properly housebroken and ready to love.  In short, with proper discipline and good reinforcement, an older woman can transform any little devil into a keeper.

And let’s not forget the advantages to the national economy.  Women over 70 will no longer need government assistance.  After all, $3000 a night can buy a lot of oatmeal and the AARP takes care of the rest.