"Klass" - the Estonian Academy Award candidate

The Warsaw Film Festival came to an end on Sunday. I didn't see many films by my usual standards (9 in 10 days), but I've got a lot going on at the moment.

Mostly I had enjoyable screenings, but few of the films evoked any strong feelings in me. Before I get to the one that hit me so hard that I decided I needed to write a whole post about it so that I could let all those feelings out ;), I just want to give a quick mention to Blackout (the trailer is here) which reminded me yet again of how pathetically underrepresented Filipino cinema is (here's my previous rant from the year before). It's one of the biggest film industries in the world and every time I see a Filipino film (er... this was the third time...) I realize how much I'm missing out on :-/

But lets finally get to the point, I've bottled up my feelings about Klass far too long, don't you think? ;)
Klass is about people getting bullied at school. It's a very violent and naturalistic film, but unlike km - one of the editors on filmweb (to whose review I will not link to because he spoils the ending - not that I think the ending was that unexpected, but I still think it's much better to see the film without knowing it) I didn't think the film was "cheap".
Sure, it's a topic where you can easily just use its sensationalism and concentrate on the victim's sufferings (you're bound to get sympathy from the audience if you're going down the naturalistic route), but I never felt this was the case with Klass.
On the contrary, I thought the way they avoided that happening to the film was very clever. Joosep (the boy who gets bullied by the whole class) may at first seem like the protagonist, but really he's not. First and foremost the film is the story of Kaspar.
Kaspar is a simple guy. He's from a small village and his parents have sent him to live with his grandma in the city, so that he can attend a better college. He has average grades, but is clearly very sporty. At the beginning of the film he bullies Joosep just as badly as the rest of the class (in one of the opening scenes they throw Joosep naked into the girls' locker room). But because of a string of events he ends up defending Joosep and getting bullied himself.
Kaspar is a great protagonist for a couple of reasons. He works well as a character - there's something very simple and straightforward about him, which makes him easy to like even if he's a bit of a jerk at the beginning. He's also a loyal friend which he proves to Joosep (and also a loyal boyfriend, but that's a storyline I don't particularly want to get into in this "review").
Perhaps even more importantly, it's hard to think of him as a victim - he's strong and he can fend for himself. On top of that there's a whole level of dynamics between Kaspar and Andreas (the biggest bully whose lead everyone in class takes). Kaspar admits later on in the film that he didn't like being bossed around by Andreas and already at the beginning of the film we see he's a bit cheekier with Andreas than most of Andreas's classmates would dare to be. I think to call it a rivalry would be simplifying what happens between them, but certainly the whole "bullying dynamics" play out the way they do largely because of the tension between them.
Joosep is a whole different deal. He's a true victim and when I say that I mean that he's easy to bully. It's not that there's anything particularly wrong with him (he's a bit geeky, but nothing that bad), but he gives in easily and he's used to the class treating him that way. Kaspar isn't easy to bully at all. He's not scared of getting into a fight. In fact about halfway through the film, Andreas decides it's not worth trying to crack Kaspar purely by using violence on him. Instead he has Kaspar locked behind some sort of gate in a shed and has the shit beaten out of Joosep and makes Kaspar watch ("See Kaspar - without you it would have been over now."). You can see part of the scene in question below with English subtitles, though it's preceded with a scene of the class playing basketball (this must be one of the most disjointed trailers ever):

Klass (The Class) - Trailer
Uploaded by splatterwelt

It's a bit odd showing scenes out of context like that because I don't think they give a particularly good feel of the film (or at least not why I liked it so much ;) ). Frankly, after watching the first 20min. or so I didn't think the film was that special. I mean yes, it was obvious that it was good, but I wouldn't have devoted a whole post to it ;) It looked just like a piece of well-made realistic cinema, which one can see quite a lot of at film festivals these days. But as it went on it got better and better. It was the level of detail in the characters, the group dynamics and the way the story itself developed. It was all a very careful construct with a beautiful build up to the culmination point. Of course the intensity of the abuse grew throughout the film as well and since it's staged and acted really well, that in itself makes the film more intense as it goes on.

Since I'm in danger of doing some serious gushing now, I better not continue writing ;-P I'll leave you with a teaser trailer for the film:


Lets hope this film gets a distributor in Poland!

It's official - Dumbledore is gay!

Yep, it's true! J.K. Rowling was asked about Dumbledore's love life in New York and now the news is out! :)

Second Sweeney Todd trailer

This is the second trailer and apparently there's still more to come (they're all supposed to emphasize different aspects of the film). This one emphasizes the gore and thriller aspects of the film.
There's a few new shots and lines in there:

I so wish we at least had a Polish date for the release :-/ Still no date is set and judging by the dates on which the film will be released in other countries, I'm expecting the film in Poland in spring 2008 at the earliest :-/

Can Johnny Depp sing?

Naturally, everyone's trying to figure out whether Johnny Depp can sing based on those few seconds in the Sweeney Todd trailer where he's shown doing so. Someone on the imdb forums actually compiled an audio clip of three of the most famous Broadway Sweeney Todds and Johnny Depp singing the exact same lines. It's interesting to hear I think - Johnny's interpretation is very different. He's definitely the weakest singer, but I think his version is the creepiest. Judge for yourself here.

Sweeney Todd trailer - yay!

Finally, the trailer for Sweeney Todd is out!! And it looks as good as I hoped it would :D Check it out: