Let the Right One In: The Most intelligent Holocaust Film Ever?

Perhaps I'm looking into this film too deeply, digging through the frozen snow for the blood, if you will, but I think this is the most brilliant Holocaust film I've ever seen.

Squirming a bit? A wee bit surprised? Trust me, I feel you...but I mean what I said. To me, this film is using vampirism as a brilliant vehicle for the diabolic violence of the Second World War.

Let's start with the lead actors. On one hand, we have Oskar, blonder than blond, with translucent skin, a lonely lost boy in a country full of untouched and unbroken (pure white) snow. On the other side of the screen, we have Eli. Eli, people. Work with me here.... it's not like she's named Lina, Signe or Ikea, for that matter. Eli has dark, slightly curly hair, pronounced eyebrows and a troubling beauty far beyond her years. She can't stand the light and is portrayed as a blood-letter, a veritable vampire who sucks the life and energy from the white men and women around her.

If you're still with me, I'll continue. Enter the story of a forbidden love. Eli continually warns Oscar that "things can't continue like this". She can only travel by night and she spends her days hidden under five layers of blankets in a bathroom in a semi-deserted apartment. Certainly, we can see the comparison with the vampire lifestyle- the intolerance of light, safe passage in the evening, the endless need for blood...but what of the interesting addition to the vampire genre, the idea that vampires can only be accepted into someone's house if they are invited?

Here, I see a person seeking safe passage- an ostracized denizen looking for a haven. Eli's guardian warns her about seeing Oskar, and Oskar's absentee mother, when home, seems ill-at-ease with his newfound fasination in the morose next-door neighbor. Things are looking dangerous for the chosen son.

Theirs is one untimely and unlucky love. Eli is a pariah with a yellow star upon her adolescent chest, and Oskar steps one footprint closer to his grave ever time he meets up with her in the aluminum playground outside of their apartments. (Which are made out of brick, by the way- and you don't see brick buildings every day in Sweden unless we're dealing with chimneys). When it becomes too dangerous for the two to be seen together in public, they opt to communicate through a "wall"- tapping out simplistic messages using morse code.

This is impossible love, big time, but the ice is there to crack. Did I spend too many years with my nose against the uppity bridge of semiotics, or did the Aryan race just meet the "dark side" under the umbrella of the vampire genre?

Le Plaisir de....y aller

One of the best things about Paris is its many, many cinemas. Seeing a movie in the States still requires a little forward-thinking and planning- especially if one wants to see a film that requires the use of one's brain. In Paris, seeing a movie is as simple as popping into a café for an espresso. With few exceptions, every arrondissement has a handful of cinemas showing fabulous international films at any given time. One of my greatest pleasures in life is seeing a film "sur la pouce" and stopping into a little bar afterwards for a bubbly glass of something to mill things over in my head.

Last night we saw a great film, followed up by a great glass of Tariquet at the wine bar, Au Pere Louis. I would highly recommend both, especially the film, Le Plaisir de Chanter. Notice how much closer the French film their actors' faces and movements. Sensual and vivid, this is also a very funny film, unlike many contemporary French dramatic comedies that make you want to kill yourself.

BIFFMA Day 4- Don't drink the water

A sit-in that lasted two years and resulted in the triumphant relocation of a Coca Cola plant in India. Chemical waste dressed up as fertilizer given to a population displaced for the construction of a dam. Thirty-thousand deaths per day, 21 deaths per minute; the hearts of children stopping from a water-borne disease.

In FLOW: For Love of Water, Director Irena Salina investigates the state of water management across the world, with a focus on the aftermath of privatization in Bolivia, India and Africa. This film is currently awaiting a distribution deal, but it is a documentary to look out for. The statistics it reveals are horrifying and timely, and should not be ignored. Today our brows fret as we travel past the gas station, reading the numbers, evergoing upwards. But today is a time to worry about water. Listen for a moment. It is running out.

Concerned? Visit http://www.flowthefilm.com/ or http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/ for ways that you can help.

BIFFMA Day 2- An Ordinary Life

Garrison Keillor: The Man on the Radio in the Red Tennis Shoes. In this labyrinth of a documentary, director Peter Rosen follows Garrison Keillor through the hobbit holes of his many-faceted life. One walks away with the impression that Keillor achieves things without ever really working, that he walks, talks and breathes the act of writing through his very existence. Beside a brief appearance by his daughter and an off-camera comment by the director about Keillor's third wife, there is no evidence to contest the impression that Keillor is an alien, shuttled to Earth from a planet of geniuses who function and invent in a time system of their own.

Towards the end of the film, Keillor admits that he once feared living an ordinary life. And then he realized that "that's what we all get; an ordinary life. And it's good enough. It's good enough." This sentiment echoed with our matted Beaver, whose new life in the country has turned out to be extraordinary in its simplicity. A cabin on a small plot, a voice on the radio, a companion in the darkness, stirring us on.

BIFFMA Day 1- Man on Wire

James Marsh's Man on Wire depicts the early days of the high-rope walker, Philippe Petit. Dubbed as the "artistic crime of the century", Petit rigged a tightrope between the two towers of the World Trade Center in 1974, and walked back and forth between them 8 times while police looked on, unable to seize him. This feat took years of planning, cross-Atlantic trips, and the sacrifice of friendships. More interesting, maybe, than the stunning images of Petit and his delirious passions, is the portrayal of the men and women he used to get to the towers. His estranged best friend who still bursts into tears when asked, 30 years later, "what happened after", the girlfriend who stood beneath him as he scaled the heights of his heart. Petit was in attendance, and spoke to the audience after. Having exchanged the high rope for the high life of motivational speaking, it would appear that Petit has finally tumbled down from above. By all appearances, the fall was long and lonely.

BIFFMA Day 1- Valerie

Valerie, directed by Birgit Möller, portrays two weeks in the life of a Polish model unraveling into financial despair in Berlin. It is Christmas, and Valerie has come to Berlin to search for an apartment and spend the holiday with her furry, sequined friends. With no money in the bank, she attends casting calls with confidence- things have always worked out before- but when too many days pass, ripples of worry trouble her face; she is passed up for younger, fresher models. Habituated to a world where paychecks are picked up by invisible hands and taxis don't run meters, it gradually dawns on Valerie that she doesn't have a penny saved nor any future prospect. Unwilling to alter the illusion of the easy life that she and her friends entertain by asking for a loan, she finds herself unable to pay her parking ticket in the subterranean garage underneath her hotel. Cast out from the Grand Hyatt after her credit card proves faulty, she begins to live in her car, changing behind doorways to emerge each night a cashmere-covered butterfly, looking for solutions in the beautiful rooms of the city. This is a film about the ramifications of people losing interest and the volatile currency of beauty.

BIFFMA comes to town

The third annual Berkshire International Film Festival has landed upon Great Barrington, bringing with it hairdos, beemers, little and not-so-little black dresses, passed hors d'oeuvres, short films, long films, good films and sketchless attempts at artistry. The opening night party, hosted by Pearls www.pearlsrestaurant.com, was a fancy pants event complete with unagi and Viggo Mortensen's doppelganger slamming out the drinks. Run, little beavies, run- the man makes a naughty margarita.

Beaver and Domo met some nice people and some lassy sailors, several of whose sea-worthy legs proved less so in stilettos. Here's a tip for sunny summer fashion: if you've gone to the effort of having your hair done, remaining coherent is almost as flattering as a square neckline.

Nevertheless, despite the crowds, the traffic, and the invasion of handbags, Domo and Beaver are looking forward to the films. After tag sales and cabbage rolls with pork belly and raw oysters, there's nothing Beaver loves more than three days of flics. Except her little Domo!