Two hopefuls in the Oscar derby–Out of the Furnace directed by Scott Cooper, and Lone Survivor directed by Scott Berg–make their official premieres at the AFI Film Festival, an eight-day event (11/7-14) which at press time was coming to a close in Hollywood.
Out of the Furnace and Lone Survivor are the exceptions to the rule at AFI, which falls late in the festival calendar, meaning that many of the Oscar contenders had already debuted at festivals ranging from Telluride to Toronto, Cannes to Venice, and London to New York, among other stops on the circuit. Thus many of the high-profile films in the AFI lineup amounted to a best-of collection this festival season. Among those movies at AFI were director John Lee Hancock's Saving Mr. Banks (which opened the AFI Fest after being unveiled at the London Film Festival), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty directed by Ben Stiller (which made its world premiere at the NY Film Fest), Inside Llewyn Davis from Joel and Ethan Coen (also debuted at the NY Film Fest), Her (the Spike Jonze-directed pic which too debuted at the NY Fest), director Alexander Payne's Nebraska (rolled out at Cannes), August: Osage County directed by John Wells (which made its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival), director Stephen Frears' Philomena (introduced at the Venice Film Festival), the Justin Chadwick-directed Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (which premiered at the Toronto Fest), and the Errol Morris documentary, The Unknown Known: The Life and Times of Donald Rumsfeld (rolled out at the Venice Festival).
Because of their fresh debut status at AFI, Out of the Furnace and Lone Survivor garnered considerable attention. Quite a departure from his acclaimed directorial debut Crazy Heart (which won two Oscars in 2010, including for Jeff Bridges as Best Lead Actor), director/writer Scott Cooper's second feature, Out of the Furnace, is a grim, gritty look at a beleaguered corner of the real world and several people trying to cope as best they can within it.
Still, Out of the Furnace and Crazy Heart have at the same time what Cooper described as a "distant cousin" common band as highly personal stories that explore the human condition while also shining a light on the locations and communities in which these people's lives unfold.
Out of the Furnace stems from Cooper's fascination with what Americans are going through at present. The film, for example, thrusts us into the Rust Belt's crumbling economy, high unemployment, and introduces us to a war veteran with PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) who returns home to find few options relative to assimilating back into the workplace. The only option he finds is to continue the violence he came to know in war as he brawls for "sport" before audiences of bloodthirsty bettors. These inhuman bouts introduce us to an underbelly of society but at the same time remind us that our world at large is violent as reflected in the tragedies at the Washington Naval Yard, Aurora and Newtown.
Cooper takes us into these issues by personalizing a story around a family tested at every turn. "You can take a much easier path as a filmmaker," acknowledged Cooper. "It's a risk to do a film as starkly realistic as this one. A lot of films that come out are much more digestible, palatable and more comforting."
Yet at the same time, there is an undercurrent of optimism and a testament to the power of human endurance in Out of the Furnace, translating paradoxically into a film that is in a unique way uplifting. The story centers on a character portrayed by Christian Bale, a steel worker in Braddock, Pennsylvania. He's making his living in a dying industrial town, has a dying father, is imprisoned for his part in a car accident that causes deaths, sees his relationship with the woman he loves disintegrate as a result and is trying to help his PTSD-stricken brother readjust to society. The latter battle is also lost, with Bales having to seek justice and retribution for his brother's murder.
"I'm moved by humanity and how we endure," said Cooper, praising Bale's performance. "Christian is easily one of the best actors of my generation and I don't think we've quite seen this level of humanity from him. He's quiet, almost Gary Cooper-esque, and is able to hold the screen without a lot of dialogue. He gives a non-showy performance that connects with us."
Cooper said he wrote Out of the Furnace with Bale in mind. This is akin to Crazy Heart which Cooper said he penned for Bridges. Stellar work in Out of the Furnace additionally comes from the rest of the cast which includes Casey Affleck, Zoe Saldana, Woody Harrelson, Willem Dafoe and Forest Whitaker.
The town of Braddock is also moving as a character. "Just as Santa Fe, parts of Texas and California were part of Crazy Heart, Braddock is a leading character [in Out of the Furnace]," related Cooper. "It's a dying steel town yet it's strong and persevering. There are lives of optimism and courage there."
Meanwhile Lone Survivor, based on the best-selling book of the same title, tells the story of four Navy SEALs on a covert mission to neutralize a high-level al-Qaeda operative. The SEALs, though, are ambushed in the mountains of Afghanistan and surrounded by a large Taliban force. As they confront going against unthinkable odds, the four SEALs find reserves of strength and resilience as they stay in the fight to the finish.
Mark Wahlberg stars as Marcus Luttrell, the author of the first-person memoir Lone Survivor, a book that's become a motivational force for its lessons on how the power of the human spirit is tested when pushed beyond mental and physical limits. Starring alongside Wahlberg as the other members of the SEAL team are Taylor Kitsch, Emile Hirsch and Ben Foster.
Berg directed and wrote the screenplay for Lone Survivor.
World Cinema
The AFI Festival's World Cinema section spotlighted a number of films eligible for the Foreign-Language Oscar, including:
• Bethlehem, which is Israel's entry directed by Yuval Adler. Storyline: A Palestinian teen is recruited by the Israeli secret service to inform on his militant brother in this tragic and tense thriller.
• Borgman, which is Netherlands' entry directed by Alex van Warmetdam. A man's unexpected arrival begins a series of unsettling events that unravel the facade of a wealthy couple, their three children and their money.
• Child's Pose from Romania, directed by Calin Peter Netzer. A dark tragicomedy which presents an overly protective and domineering mother who uses every means at her disposal to protect her son from the law.
• An Episode In The Life of An Iron Picker from Bosnia and Herzegovina, directed by Danis Tanovic. This reenactment of true events follows a family in Bosnia desperately seeking medical care from the state healthcare system.
• Gabrielle, which is Canada's entry, directed by Louise Archambault. A sweet, romantic drama about a young woman with Williams Syndrome, a rare neurodevelopmental disorder, fighting for acceptance, freedom and love.
• Gloria from Chile, directed by Sebastian Lelia. The title character is an independent 50-something woman who dominates Santiago's nightclub scene until she meets a naval officer and launches a challenging relationship.
• The Great Beauty from Italy, directed by Paolo Sorrentino. An exploration of a 65-year-old aristocrat's existential crisis that's sparked when his former lover dies.
• Heli, the entry from Mexico, directed by Amat Escalante. A Mexican factory worker and his family are plunged into a world of drugs, violence and corruption when a young army cadet makes a rash decision.
• Juvenile Defender from South Korea, directed by Kany Yi-kwan. A teenager in a Seoul detention center reunites with his mother who gave him up at birth. He seeks to rise above his circumstances.
• The Missing Picture from Cambodia, directed by Rithy Panh. Clay figures, archival footage and narration are combined to revisit the atrocities of Cambodia's Khmer Route, committed between 1975 and '79.
• Omar from Palestine, directed by Hany Abu-Assad. A young Palestinian and his friends become embroiled with the law and face conflicted loyalties in this psychological thriller set in the West Bank.
• The Rocket, Australia's entry directed by Kim Mordaunt. A 10-year-old Laotian boy leads his family on a difficult journey and competes in a community rocket festival.
