Powerful film humanizes migrants
By Thomas Adamson
CANNES, France (AP) --It may be the most topical film at Cannes — but "Mediterranea" — a searing account of a desperate African migrant who travels by boat from Burkina Faso to Italy — is not just pulled from the headlines.
It's been years in the making and is based on a true story.
First time director Jonas Carpignano — who's half African-American, half-Italian — evoked the real-life experiences of his roommate and lead actor in the film, Koudous Seihon.
Seihon witnessed shootings, race riots, violence and faced near-constant discrimination after he took the perilous trip by foot, car, bus and boat to southern Italy as a 20-year-old father seeking to support his family.
Despite its small 1 million-euro ($1.1 million) budget, Carpignano's film, which was screened at the Critics Week, has already garnered great attention for its highly personal portrayal of Europe's great migrant crisis.
"We're constantly bombarded and desensitized (about migrants). That's why I wanted to make a film about this, to give people something to latch on to," Carpignano said. "It doesn't help to constantly group immigrants as just migrants coming over. There has to be more of a personal angle."
The film's power comes from its documentary-style shooting and from the charismatic Seihon, who plays the enigmatic character of Ayiva with understated grace.
"The idea of the film was to let people in through one specific character, through Ayiva," the director explained. "He's never pathetic and (he's) strong, despite having nothing. I hope the audience finds him charismatic and charming — which I of course do, as he's my friend."
Ayiva manages to keep our sympathies as an essentially innocent man fighting to survive in a racist, hostile community. The character puts a human face on stories like last month's tragedy, where a boat off the Italian island of Lampedusa capsized, drowning an estimated 800 migrants.
Carpignano said he hopes the film moves the conversation from tragedies on the sea to the equally important issue of what happens to migrants once they have reached Europe.
"There needs to be a lot more attention to what happens afterward. … This is not a fleeting thing. It's changing communities," said Carpignano. "This is not going away."
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
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