Our Picks of 2017

Dragonfly Eyes ~ Leo's Pick

Choosing films from a festival catalogue is mostly lucky dip, and can really just come down to the stills, timetable and the skill of writing a synopsis. But all three elements aligned making Dragonfly Eyes the fourth film of my first day at the Busan Film Festival which, unfortunately for the rest, made the festival peak early for me.

The main attraction of Dragonfly Eyes is its abitious play with form--blurring the usually clear(er) boundary between documentary and fiction. Don't get me wrong, the film is a pure work of fiction. A narrative has been devised by Xu which acts as the driving force in the film. However the images complicate this 'fiction' as Xu scoured thousands of hours of CCTV footage (and the like) available online, meaning that these images are documents of real-life. This means that the two lead characters who occupy the fiction are always changing appearance in the image, while simulaneously the film shock us with the fact that the footage is 'real' and exists independent of the film. That man getting beaten up ended bruised, the people in that car crash ended in hospital and....I'll leave the most shocking ones for you to witness yourself. And thus the interplay between document and fiction runs the length of the film, but only in the viewers mind. The film's fictional narrative disregards the idea of CCTV or 'documented' footage, but as we understand that the fiction is a lie while the images are real we uncover a whole new level to the film.

I so enjoyed Dragonfly Eyes as it is unlike anything I have seen before, Xu attempted something truly ambitious but pulled it off astonishingly. It's a film that draws intense emotions and thought out of you purely though starkly real images and formal consideration, which I think is a true achievement. Meanwhile the film still rattles around in my head whenever I see a CCTV camera, or hear the words 'documentary footage'... It's really a film that will make you think, keep you thinking, and challenge your conceptions of the 'real' and the 'fake' on a screen. I hope the film becomes widely available soon for you to see (and for me to see again)!

4/4/3

11/13

~Leo

RAT FILM ~ Iman's Pick

Leo has so eloquently worded his review of Dragonfly Eyes as his pick of 2017, I can only confess that my reasons for choosing RAT FILM after 6 months are still yet to become clear to me! The documentary, directed by Theo Anthony, explores the human obsession with rats in order to suggest something of Baltimore's history.

There is an array of different styles implemented in the documentary which would deem it as being 'experimental', such as a (badly) computer-generated city and this strange, computerised POV of a rat in a cage. Through such means, one cannot help but question why such methods were used to merely tell a story, or rather a bunch of short accounts, about the rat infestation of Baltimore. It is because RAT FILM is not just wanting to be labelled as the documentary on the rats of Baltimore, it is a documentary that is ultimately on people and just how weird and wacky we are. This is addressed in the film itself with the man who works for rat control stating "There's never been a rat problem in Baltimore, it's always been a people problem". Through using the rat infestation of Baltimore, it seems - albeit incredibly suggestively and not explicitly - that Anthony is wanting to comment on topics of race and political agendas in America, drawing a parallel between how the treatment and behaviour of rats fundamentally serve as a clear example of criminal behaviour in Baltimore and to a wider degree America in itself. Systematic segregation between races is not only a corrupt mode of thinking, it is also doomed to create situations that become harder to manage - much like a rat infestation.

This is done in such a way in RAT FILM that for me is unlike any film I have watched, and is done in a way that treats the viewer with enough respect and decency that it trusts they will reach its true aims. I am yet to watch RAT FILM again, but wonder if the magic will still upheld a second time. Regardless of the stories, accounts, fantastic score by Deacon, progression of 'narrative' or even the wacky styles it delves in, what stood out most to me were just the images it created.

It will take me quite some time to forget about the poetic image of these two men who late at night create bait with ham dipped into peanut butter and go fishing for rats down an alley way. It is a level of absurd that seems to only be able to exist in reality, in a space that has been as mistreated as Baltimore has been. I can only remember fragments of the film, but those said fragments are enough to envelope me into infatuation of the ideas RAT FILM explores. It is a documentary like no other, that seems to be constantly going on a tangent and alas makes you reach conclusions you question whether were intended or not. Much like the rats of Baltimore, the film manages to weasel into the smallest nooks and crannies of your mind and creates a plague where you cannot help but become invested in what is happening... despite never truly understand what is happening.

4/4/2

10/13

~Iman