NZIFF

The New Zealand International Film Festival has been in town, and we’ve been to see some international films. This is an opportunity to see some films that may not get a general release, particularly foreign-language films released outside their home country. 

We made our selections from the brochure and went along to see:

Asteroid City: the latest from director Wes Anderson, with an ensemble cast including Tom Hanks, Scarlett Johansson and Margot Robbie; set in the eponymous desert town, it’s a play-within-a-play scenario that revolves around a youth astronomy awards ceremony. It’s suitably weird.

Paris Memories: a French film, where the protagonist is a survivor of a terrorist attack in a central Parisian brasserie. At first she has no memory of what happened, but with the help of a survivors’ group, starts to piece together what happened to her. Very well put together and moving.

Only The River Flows: a Chinese detective film noir, following the investigation into the death of a woman in a rural Chinese town. It started out reasonably well, but got a bit confused. The overall plot was weird, as there was no actual detective work involved – they just all pointed their fingers at the local madman. Why was he mad? Don’t know. Why did he kill? Don’t know. Ultimately confusing and a bit pointless.

River: a Japanese film set in a rural hot springs hotel, where the staff and guest get caught in a two-minute time loop. Their attempts to, firstly, understand what is happening to them, and secondly, find a way out, are amusing and frustrating in equal parts. They eventually figure out a way, and everyone gets to learn something about themselves and each other. Really enjoyed this one!

Mars Express: a French anime, where the protagonist is a female private eye investigating a computer hacker on Mars, and then a missing girl. The characters are human and robots, and they dig further into the underworld of Mars, including brain farms, robot prostitution, and secret code embedded in robots. Very strong visually, I wish there was an English-language version so I didn’t have to read the subtitles and miss what was going on on screen.

That’s all, folks!