Red Riding: 1974 (Julian Jarrold, 2009): UK
Reviewed by Lava Farmer. Viewed at the Santa Barbara Film Festival.
Red Riding: 1974 is the first chapter of the shockingly dark Red Riding trilogy. The story begins when a little girl goes missing and an eager journalist named Eddie Dunford (Andrew Garfield) starts to find a link between this and a series of murders from not long before. Through his efforts to unlock the truth he discovers how crooked the Police really are, and how far the spread of their influence had really spread. Every time he starts to piece together the clues and find out who’s connected to whom, he finds that everyone is connected to the police, leaving him to be continually brutalized with nobody to turn to because it’s the Police that are doing the beating. However, Eddie is relentless and pushes forward with his investigations, perhaps to prove there is some hope for humanity.
Director Julian Jarrold uses mis-en-scene in the beginning to create a feeling of enclosure. Most of the scenes are shot very extremely close up the point that you almost feel
Fathers and Guns (Emile Gaudreault, 2009): Canada
Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy. Viewed at Metro 4, Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
De Pere En Flic or Fathers and Guns, is a refreshingly funny film about a father/son undercover team in the middle of a sting operation. When one of their own is taken hostage, dad Jacques Laroche (Michel Cote) accuses his son Marc (Louis-Jose Houde), a sharpshooter at the range, of being spineless and too slow on the draw. After having his best friend taken before his eyes, Marc is bumped down to a desk job for his bumbling ways, thanks to his dad’s request.
Meanwhile Charles Berube (Remy Girard), a high-profile defense attorney is having problems of his own. Charles successfully defends a group of motorcycle thugs (who hold the cop hostage), and thanks to his neglect, his son is suicidal, while Charles himself is having problems with his conscience – he talks in his sleep, revealing privileged information.
In a last ditch effort to salvage his relationship with his son, Charles and his son (Patrick Drolet) sign up for a father/son wilderness retreat, complete with therapist as nature guide. Since Charles’ home is tapped, it seems the obvious next step is to send an undercover father/son team to
