The Exciting LA Film Festival 2012

LA Film Festival is a top movie festival all over the world, all the great films and stars are all get together there, now LA Film Festival 2012 is in full swing with films, parties and gatherings galore. It is quite wonderful, the first notable flick on our coverage radar is a fantastic and moving Swiss film titled "Sister." Directed by the amazing Ursula Meier and featuring one knock out performance by young lead actor Kacey Mottet Klein, the movie is powerful emotional drama about secrets, lies and family. We recently celebrated "Sister" and it’s inclusion into this year’s festival with some of the folks from the film at the lush residence of the very welcoming Bruno Ryff, the Consul General of Switzerland. It was a memorable event with a bit of everything.

 This year LA Film Festival is held in a special place, the house is magnificent. Not only are there massive amounts of room, but also in the hot California weather the massive swimming pool looks very inviting! After some very eloquent words from the Consul General Bruno Ryff, we get to hear from both "Sister" director Ursula Meier and her lead actor Kacey Mottet Klein, who talk a bit about the film and how it was made.

The best part of any party may be the food! There are a lot of kinds of food, they are all so dilicious, all kinds of food from different places and countries. And this was a Buffet-Luncheon befitting of a king, as our generous hosts provided everything from an out of this world chicken and mushroom dish to fresh bread and butter that melted in your mouth – I’m never leaving!

The party is held in the beautiful swimming pool, the programs in this party are all very exciting, all the people are very happy, because there are so many famous stars in the party, it is full of myth.

Can You Stand The Humor Of There's Something About Mary

Sometimes Western civilization declines in deliriously funny style. Why bother to list the myriad offenses given by ''There's Something About Mary,'' the proudly obnoxious new film by Peter and Bobby Farrelly, when it's easier -- definitely much too easy -- to enjoy them? In the raunchy wake of ''Dumb and Dumber'' and ''Kingpin,'' the Farrelly brothers have made a romantic comedy that's a hoot in every sense, worth a smidgen of disapproval and a whole lot of helpless laughter. But the Farrellys are as gleeful as they are crude, and they certainly aren't witless. The film works ridiculously well because it never stoops to being mean-spirited or (despite all appearances) authentically inane.
　　
There's Something About Mary features the immortal story of "boy meets girl, boy loses girl when a certain body part becomes the victim of a freak accident, boy starts stalking girl." The boy in question is a nerdy Ted Stroehmann (Ben Stiller, sporting weird teeth, ears, and hair), and the girl in question is Mary (Cameron Diaz, positively radiating charisma). There are a few more components in this simple and touching love story: a sleazy private investigator, Pat Healy (Matt Dillon with a moustache which looks like a dead earthworm), who starts stalking Mary; a dweeby architect (Lee Evans, previously seen in Mouse Hunt), who starts stalking Mary; Ted's buddy Dom (Chris Eliot, with the award-winning-caliber makeup boiling all over him), who starts. Well, by now you get the idea.
　　
Mixed up into this heartwarming narrative are the jokes, which deal with subjects including, but not limited to: masturbation, various bodily fluids, gays, serial killers, sagging breasts, and, of course, aforementioned attempts to cue humor from mental and physical handicaps and stalking.
　　
Let me make one thing perfectly clear - I don't object to jokes based on any of the above because of the subject matter. One could simply rent A Fish Called Wanda and see a good number of riotously funny sequences which deal with such subjects as marital infidelity and stuttering. No, the reason why I didn't find There's Something About Mary funny was that most of the "envelope- pushing" jokes simply didn't work. I'm somewhat dumfounded pondering how anyone could think it was possible to successfully elicit laughs from this subject matter.
　　
A prom, a crush and a cruel, cruel zipper set ''There's Something About Mary'' in motion. It seems that Ted Stroehmann (Ben Stiller in braces), a kind of Everydweeb, is destined to ruin the biggest night of his young life. Notably unsuccessful in recruiting a prom date (''If everything else falls apart, maybe'' is the best answer he gets), Ted suddenly catches the eye of Mary Jenson, played by Cameron Diaz with a blithe comic style that makes her as funny as she is dazzling. Miracle of miracles, Mary makes Ted her designated prom date for that fateful night.
　　
Stiller's character has had the memory of a disastrous prom date with Mary casting a shadow over his love life for years and decides to track down the "one that got away", only to find he has to compete with much more devious wannabe suitors. The film is completely fearless in its pursuit of laughs – no subject is taboo. You know Mary and Ted will end up together, but the Farrellys make sure that the finale isn't arrived at easily or predictably and, most importantly, that it's a lot of fun to get there.
　　
Sure, the plot may sound like your typical romantic comedy -- but not with the Farrelly brothers at the helm. These are the same guys who brought you Dumb and Dumber, with its toilet humor and political incorrectness. Instead, this is a frat guy's idea of a romantic comedy, full of jokes at the expense of disabled people and women. Sure, the guys who fall for Mary are the ultimate joke; undeveloped man-boy idiots drooling over her charms -- how many leggy blondes are doctors who love beer and football?
　　
If you can't stand this kind of humor, stay clear. And it's certainly not the thing for anyone with dating horror stories -- Chris Elliot's character won't be funny at all. But the film definitely has enough to satisfy adult gross-out humor fans.
　　
To reassure non-Farrelly fans of sound judgment, there are at least as many zit jokes here as other types of witticisms, with Chris Elliott in the abrasive role of Ted's blotchy best friend. As equal-opportunity offenders, the Farrellys also kid about a serial killer, mental illness, wizened old breasts and a half-dead dog, and they make these things unabashedly funny. The dog and its sun-shriveled owner (Lin Shaye) are the film's looniest characters, and Mary's mentally handicapped brother is one of its sweetest. The joke is on Healy when, in trying to impress Mary with his bogus compassion, he cites ''work with retards'' as his cherished hobby.
　　
Destined for instant notoriety is a sequence that starts off with masturbation and ends up with hair gel. But by the time it happens, you're sure to be either in the unaccountably innocent spirit of ''There's Something About Mary'' or on the way home. I hope it's not the latter. The Farrellys display a crazy audacity that's worth admiring, and they take sure aim for the funny bone. ''There's Something About Mary'' may be many things, but dull and routine aren't among them.

Thirteen years pass, and Ted is still pining away for Mary, so his friend Dom (Chris Elliott) persuades him to send a detective named Pat Healy (Matt Dillon) to find her. Except when Healy finds Mary, he decides he wants her for himself.
　　
Like the other Farrelly Brothers' movies, nothing is out of bounds here, and there are a lot of things that, after laughing, you wonder if you should have laughed. But you laugh just the same.A near-perfect script, crack comic editing, and some really great performances synergize here to make one of the great comedies of the '90s (along with the other two Farrelly flicks).

How Can Loss Also Be An Occasion For Learning, Sharing, And Emotional Maturation?

THE SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS follows four high school girl friends who separate for the summer and vow to keep in touch by way of a pair of blue jeans that magically fits all their different body sizes perfectly. They mail the jeans to one another, along with letters to keep up with what's happening in each other's lives. Lena (Alexis Bledel) is shy and quiet, on her way to Greece to visit relatives; aspiring documentary-maker Tibby (Amber Tamblyn) resents being stuck working at a local Wal-Mart-type store; golden girl Bridget (Blake Lively) is dealing with her mom's suicide and distant father as she heads to soccer camp in Mexico; and young writer Carmen (America Ferrera) goes to North Carolina to visit with her long-absent father, Al (Bradley Whitford), who announces he's about to marry Lydia (Nancy Travis), whose two blond teens seem complete opposites of Carmen. During their vacations, they explore their emerging sense of independence, while figuring out how to maintain relationships with their families and with each other, and each girl learns a valuable life lesson.
　　
Families can talk about the film's depiction of loyalty and loss, especially as each of the girls loses something precious, but also gains experience and faith in herself and her best friends. How do you support your friends when they feel sad or angry? How can you be mad at someone but also, at the same time, still love him or her? How can loss also be an occasion for learning, sharing, and emotional maturation?
　　
We're dealing in symbolism here so it doesn't pay to question the physics. It's a tribute to the story's involving charm and the angst-filled journeys of the four girls that the jeans' flexible characteristics are, if not plausible, at least accepted. After all, "These aren't just jeans," declares the Paris Hilton-esque Bridget (Blake Lively) "they make things happen." And happen they certainly do.
　　
The four girls - Tibby (Amber Tamblyn), Carmen (America Ferrera), Lena (Alexis Bledel) and Bridget - have been a foursome since their mothers met at a pre natal exercise class. Despite their differing backgrounds and privilege, the girls have formed a tight bond, one which is being challenged as they all go their separate ways in life. Having discovered the jeans' special properties, the girls draw up a manifesto outlining the rules for the ownership of the pants which will be passed around every week. The rules vary from the unhygienic (they can't wash the pants) to the revelatory (they have to disclose what happened while wearing them).

Four friends - Tibby (Amber Tamblyn), Lena (Alexis Bledel), Carmen (America Ferrera), and Bridget (Blake Lively) - who have done everything together their entire lives find themselves, on the summer of their 16th year, separating for the first time. In order to keep themselves close even while separated, they agree to share a pair of second-hand jeans that magically fits all of them while they go on their separate life altering adventures.
　　
It sounds like it should be incredibly trite, but it never really is, despite a few alarming dips into the waters of clich. Strong, if slightly overdone, performances from the four leads carry a well-crafted film along to its emotional but never quite poignant ending. Director Ken Kwapis keeps events flowing smoothly between the four stories with skillful intercutting, giving each story its due time to build. The only one that gets a short shrift is Bridget's, which feels like it's building to an emotional realization but never quite gets there. Carmen's story of estrangement from her father (Bradley Whitford) and his life is the best of the bunch; her emotional confrontation with him is well done by everyone involved and rings true with pathos and turmoil.
　　
The only real problem with the film is the dialogue, which isn't bad, but is so self-aware and adult it often does not fit coming out of these supposed teenager's mouths. And the younger the characters get, the more adult their dialogue is. Twelve-year-old Bailey (Jenna Boyd) who is dying of leukemia sounds like an old man talking about mysteries of life. Certainly the knowledge of impending death will create a certain amount of lucidity for anyone, but there are some thing's twelve-year-olds can't know because they haven't had the life experience yet. It sounds too often like the writer is speaking instead of the character.

With that understanding they all go off for the summer. Bridget heads to Mexico for soccer camp, Lena visits her grandparents in Greece, Carmen visits her estranged father and his new family while Tibby remains at home, working in a local store and making a documentary. Through their various experiences, the film explores poignantly, under the sympathetic and patient guidance of director Ken Kwapis, the emotional vulnerability of being a teenage girl. It deals with loss, love and identity. Away from each other, they begin to discover themselves. But away from each other they also have pangs of loneliness, which is why they are always so excited when it's their turn for the jeans and they are reconnected with their sisterhood.
　　
The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants is a sweet and moving drama with strong performances from all four girls who each bring a very different presence. It does allow itself to become a little maudlin at times, but its virtues make such weaknesses forgivable. Aimed squarely at a female market, there's enough in Traveling Pants to make it a good fit for a wider audience.

Never Let Me Go, A Story About Three People's Emotional Entanglements

If ever proof were needed that cultural snobbery is alive and well, it’s right here. ‘Never Let Me Go’ is a film so ashamed of its own genre trappings that it goes to extreme and illogical lengths to pretend they don’t exist. Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield play Kathy, Ruth and Tommy, pupils at a strange English boarding school who slowly learn that they’re being bred for a grim purpose – and one we can’t fully reveal without a spoiler.

The film begins with on-screen captions explaining that a medical breakthrough in 1952 has permitted the human lifespan to be extended beyond 100 years. Subsequently, the film is narrated by 28-year-old Kathy H (Carey Mulligan) as she reminisces about her childhood at aboarding school called Hailsham, as well as her adult life after leaving the school. The first act of the film depicts the young Kathy (Izzy Meikle-Small), along with her friends Tommy (Charlie Rowe) and Ruth (Ella Purnell), spending their childhood at Hailsham in the late 1970s. The school seems to be somewhat unusual. Students are encouraged to create artwork such as paintings and poetry instead of science and maths normal for school children, and their best work gets into "The Gallery." There is also a strong emphasis on "keeping yourselves healthy inside" especially when it comes to smoking. At one point, a new teacher, Miss Lucy (Sally Hawkins) quietly informs the students of their nature: they exist only as donor organs for transplants, and will die - or, rather, "complete" - in their early adulthood. The following day Miss Lucy is "no longer working at Hailsham." As time passes, Kathy and Tommy fall in love, but Tommy falls into a manipulative relationship with Ruth. Ruth and Tommy stay together throughout the rest of their time at Hailsham.

In the second act of the film, the three friends, now young adults, are rehoused in cottages on a farm. They are permitted to leave the grounds if they wish but are resigned to their eventual fate, seeing it as inevitable. At the farm, they meet former pupils of schools similar to theirs, two of which one day sight a woman in a nearby town who they believe to be a "possible" for Ruth, her "original" - the person she was cloned from. Ruth is ecstatic at the prospect, but when she, Kathy, Tommy and the two witnesses travel to the coast to re-examine the woman, there turns out to be very little resemblance. Ruth, bitter and disillusioned, rages that all donors are "modeled on trash," meaning that they are cloned from the people lowest in society, or, in her words, "in the gutter."

From the others, Kathy and her friends hear rumors of the possibility of "deferral" – a temporary reprieve from organ donation for donors who are in love and can somehow prove it. Tommy becomes convinced that The Gallery at Hailsham, was intended to look into their souls and that artwork sent to The Gallery will be able to verify true love. He hereby hints at his feelings for Kathy, but she misinterprets his words to signify that he wants to apply for a deferral with Ruth. She is visibly distressed. The relationship between Tommy and Ruth becomes sexual, putting a strain on Kathy's friendships with the two. Kathy, feeling the need to distance herself, leaves the cottages to become a "carer" – a clone who is given a temporary reprieve from donation to do the job of supporting and comforting donors as they give up their organs. Tommy and Ruth's relationship ends shortly before her departure, though it is not depicted but revealed through Kathy's narration.

In the third and final act of the film, ten years later, Kathy is working as a carer. She has watched many clones gradually "complete" as their organs are harvested. Kathy has not seen Ruth or Tommy since the cottages. While working as a carer, Kathy happens to meet Ruth again, who is frail and unwell after two donations. They find Tommy, who is also weakened, and the three of them drive to the sea as a short trip at Ruth's request. There, Ruth asks for their forgiveness for keeping them apart. She admits she has always known that Kathy and Tommy were meant to be together because their love for each other was real, whereas Ruth was with Tommy because she was jealous of his closeness to Kathy and afraid to be "left alone." She tells them it was the worst thing she ever did and now she wants to put it right, then claims she has found a means to do so: she has found the address of the gallery owner, Madame from Hailsham, whom she thinks may grant deferrals to couples in love. With some reluctance due to skepticism, Kathy accepts the opportunity. Shortly afterward, Ruth dies on the operating table when another organ is extracted.

A moment passes in which she looks at me as though I’ve just asked the head of MI5 if I can have a go on his computer. 'Definitely not answering that. No!’ she exclaims with a big, angry laugh.

At this point the film’s publicist – who has been sitting in the corridor listening in on our interview – approaches the big, round table where the actress and I are talking. He glances from me to her, her to me.

Eventually he backs away, arms out to the side and still facing us as if ready to rugby-tackle me to the ground should I attempt any more personal questions. The atmosphere in the room is terrible.

I think back to the things I've read about Knightley before meeting her: how she always used to keep herself to herself on film sets, how, according to Carey Mulligan, 'she reserves herself for the people she really cares about’ and how, according to Knightley herself, she 'never’ attends events 'as myself, Never No! I’d rather keep some protection up.’

Like Crazy: The Film Is Youthful In The Best Of Ways.

Like Crazy is a 2011 American romantic drama film directed by Drake Doremus and starring Anton Yelchin, Felicity Jones, Jennifer Lawrence and Alex Kingston. In an interview with The Telegraph, Jones stated that the script was fully improvised and that this should be readily apparent to any viewer.

Yelchin and Jones play Jacob and Anna respectively, college students in Los Angeles who become a couple. Anna is a British exchange student who, having fallen in love with Jacob, a design student, spends the summer with him, overstaying her student visa after it had expired on graduation. She returns home to London for a family obligation, and when she flies back to Los Angeles as a tourist she is detained, denied entry, turned away, and sent back to England by Los Angeles airport immigration officials, throwing the couple into an awkward and strained long-distance relationship.Felicity Jones and Anton Yelchin play Anna and Jacob in the poignant love story ‘Like Crazy.’ Directed and co-written (with Ben York Jones) by 20-something Drake Doremus, the film is youthful in the best of ways.

Anna is banned from entering the United States for this prior violation of having overstayed her original visa. The deep love of the couple is strained by the distance and frustration of not being able to see each other except when Jacob can make the time away from his successful design business in Los Angeles to visit Anna in England. Anna's family in England hires an immigration lawyer to try to get the ban lifted and allow Anna to return to Jacob in the United States.[5] Anna's father suggests that marrying may help to get the ban lifted. Upon Jacob's return to the US, and after an undisclosed time, he begins a relationship with someone else, a work colleague. Anna continues to struggle with her feelings for Jacob and eventually phones him up suggesting that they should marry, that no other relationships that they experience are like the one they have together.

Jacob returns to the UK once again and marries Anna in a small court ceremony with her parents as witness. They are told to wait 6 months before appealing the ban on Anna's visa again, and Jacob returns to the UK after these 6 months for the appeal, which is again unsuccessful and the relationship of Anna and Jacob is compromised. They again begin relationships with other people, but Anna and Jacob still feel a profound connection with each other. Anna gets promoted at her work to a position that she is really happy about. Anna's boyfriend at the time, Simon, proposes to her.Shortly after, Anna finds out from her lawyer that her ban from the United States has finally been lifted. She gives up her job, her current boyfriend and her apartment and she returns to Los Angeles to Jacob. Jacob greets Anna at the airport with flowers and the two have the reconciliation that they didn't have after Anna was first banned, although it seems to lack the passion you see earlier in their relationship.Reunited and without any legal impediments to being together, Anna and Jacob are shown to be starting a life together. The film closes with the two in the shower reminiscing their initial courtship. They appear somewhat strained likely because their journey together has had many ups and downs. The movie ends with both characters reflecting back on a cascade of clips of their initial encounters together. The future of Jacob and Anna's relationship is unclear.

A love story is both a physical and emotional tale, one that can be deeply personal and heartbreaking for an audience to experience. Director Drake Doremus' film Like Crazy beautifully illustrates how your first real love is as thrilling and blissful as it is devastating. When a British college student (Felicity Jones) falls for her American classmate (Anton Yelchin) they embark on a passionate and life-changing journey only to be separated when she violates the terms of her visa. Like Crazy explores how a couple faces the real challenges of being together and of being apart.

The characters seem to be discovering their emotions right in front of our eyes, and this is not simply because the scenes came out of improvisations. It's because the actors understand the essential seriousness of what they are attempting, which is nothing less than a delicate, layer-by-layer rendering of mirth and passion and heartbreak. Yelchin and Jones want to do justice to these emotions because so much is at stake in getting them right.