NUDITY HAS BEEN called “the most inexpensive F/X,” and Gabi on the Roof in July (March 3, 5pm, Camera 12) uses it thoroughly. But after a while you get used to the jaybirdocity of Gabi (Sophia Takal, who co-directed) and become more interested in the film’s discourse about ways of conducting oneself. Two figures face each other over the gulf of being twentysomething: 20-year-old Gabi, an Oberlin student just about to launch into her wildest decade. Her brother, Sam (Lawrence Levine, who co-directed), is almost 30; he’s a serious painter on the cusp of either making it or breaking it. Gabi wants into the art racket herself. She calls loafing, playing nude Twister and getting her body covered with whipped cream her own form of art. What Gabi really is, despite her genuine charm, is selfish. But is Sam much better?
The movie has a great ear for art gabble. At the gallery where she works, a character named Chelsea comments, “When the visitors come in, we want them to feel that they’re immersed in New York art culture, so they don’t have to feel that they have to search it out.” And the incident of an older art gallery manager’s meltdown at Sam’s studio has the air of a true story. Gabi on the Roof in July is hipster Rohmer, a celebration and critique of that stage of life when one travels in packs and sleeps in piles, like hamsters.
Speaking of the torments of the art world: the last word on this subject is director Terry Zwigoff, whose Daniel Clowes–scripted Art School Confidential was a harrowing and comically lurid account of what goes on in those academies. Zwigoff, a genuine maverick (countering name-only mavs like Deepak “God wants you to fly first class” Chopra), shows up for March 5’s Day of the Writer event at SJSU Theatre.
A great way to cap that Friday would be with Ernst Lubitsch’s The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg, showing at 7pm at the California Theatre with the legendary Dennis James at the theater’s organ. Much talk has flowed about the future of film distribution, which seems (when all’s said) to mean smaller and smaller screens for more and more movies. Nothing suffers more from shrinkage than silent film, and if you’ve never had a chance to see how big silents get, this is your chance, in a genuine picture palace.
However, Shorts Program 4 (March 5, 7pm, Camera 3) makes a nice fallback position. Among the animated work included is The Spine, a shocker by Chris Landreth. Landreth won an Oscar in 2005 for Ryan, a story about his fellow Oscar nominee, the animator Ryan Larkin, whose life was ruined by substance abuse. The new one was a little too tough for the Academy, apparently.
On Thursday (March 4, 7pm, California Theatre), Benjamin Bratt, star of the San Francisco–filmed La Mission, turns up for a Maverick Spirit event. Closing night (March 7, 8pm, California Theatre) features the Korean film Mother, which hasn’t been screened for the press. As a warm-up, try a revisit with Outsourced, (March 6, 4pm, California Theatre), a genial crowd pleaser back for seconds at the festival. Sunday will be full of to-be-announced encore screenings for those who missed a spot or two during the week; with luck, Gabi on the Roof in July will be one of them.
CINEQUEST runs through March 7 in San Jose. See Cinequest for schedule details and Metroactive for reviews.
