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Sundance Review: Here

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  • Sundance Review: Here

    Hollywood Reporter
    Jan 22 2011


    SUNDANCE REVIEW: HERE
    11:44 AM 1/22/2011 by David Rooney

    The Bottom Line
    If a road trip through the rugged Armenian hinterlands sounds like it
    might generate only intermittent pleasures, it does.

    Venue:
    Sundance Film Festival, U.S. Dramatic Competition

    Cast:
    Ben Foster, Lubna Azabal, Narek Nersisyan, Yuri Kostanyan, Sophik Sarkisyan

    Director:
    Braden King

    PARK CITY - (U.S. Dramatic Competition) The subtle calibrations of Ben
    Foster's performance give "HERE" an intriguing center. But Braden
    King's meandering semi-experimental road movie about two travelers
    whose paths briefly converge is too enraptured by its own dusty
    exoticism.
    Hatched out of a non-narrative multimedia piece that screened in
    Sundance's 2008 New Frontier section and was subsequently developed
    through the festival's feature lab, the film bumps into some
    interesting ideas. It explores the process by which experience becomes
    memory, how the physical becomes intangible, how land - be it home or
    terra incognita - can yield both truth and deception. Ultimately,
    however, these reflections never acquire the weight to be much more
    than artsy embellishment on a two-dimensional story of fleeting
    romance between underwritten characters.

    Those protagonists are Will (Foster), an American satellite-mapping
    engineer under contract in Armenia, and Gadarine (Lubna Azabal), an
    expatriate photographer back in her homeland on an arts grant and
    faced with her family's ambivalence toward her fledgling success
    abroad.

    After parallel glimpses of these solitary outsiders, they meet in a
    restaurant. A second chance encounter cements the bond, and Gadarine
    suggests she accompany Will to the remote borders and to a disputed
    territory within Azerbaijan where she has always wanted to shoot.

    King and his co-writer Dani Valent appear to be aiming for a dreamy
    Lost in Translation vibe, but they neglect to anchor the mood piece by
    giving substance or depth to their central characters.

    Despite the humor and heart Foster breathes into the role, Will's
    function is too heavyhandedly symbolic - a mapmaking wanderer in
    search of definition. Azabal has a nice naturalistic ease in front of
    the camera, and some lovely interludes with Gadarine's parents. But
    the character is more or less Will's schematic opposite - a woman who
    has distanced herself from her roots and is now rediscovering them.

    The film captures some impressive landscapes and layers an eclectic
    mix of original and traditional Armenian music over its unhurried
    travel time. But unless you count doing a lot of vodka shots, this is
    a dramatically uneventful two hours. No significant conflict surfaces
    until roughly 90 minutes in, when an unpleasant brush with border
    military officials, a nasty hangover and a minor road accident sour
    the romance.

    The chief carryovers from the project's trans-media evolution are
    experimental interludes by various filmmakers, accompanied by
    ponderous voiceovers from Foster on the poetics of scientists and
    explorers. Some of these are quite beautiful, notably a fast-moving
    collage of film frames that suggests Gadarine dreaming back through
    the generations. Elsewhere they feel inorganic to the film.

    Like the all-upper case title (which is almost as irritating as
    all-lower case), the abstract imagery adds little and smacks of
    affectation.

    Screenwriters: Braden King, Dani Valent
    Producers: Braden King, Lars Knudsen, Jay Van Hoy
    Executive producer: Julia King
    Director of photography: Lol Crawley
    Production designer: Richard A. Wright
    Music: Michael Krassner, Boxhead Ensemble
    Editors: David Barker, Andrew Hafitz, Paul Zucker
    Interlude filmmakers: Daichi Saito, Garine Torossian, Paul Clipson, Julie Murray
    Sales: Preferred Content, K5 International
    No rating, 121 minutes

    http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/sundance-review-74627




    From: A. Papazian
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