Image Now Films/Fantastic Films/Passion Pictures/Courtesy

If people were asked to name the most difficult mountain to climb on Earth, Everest would probably come up nine times out of 10. But if mountain climbers were asked the same question, they’d all respond with one answer: K2.

Nicknamed the “Savage Mountain,” K2 sits on the border of Pakistan and China. It is also the setting for “The Summit,” a new documentary from director Nick Ryan. But this film is no 3-D IMAX travelogue geared toward capturing the majesty of the world’s second-highest peak. “The Summit” chronicles the true-life events of a 2008 climbing expedition-turned-tragedy that resulted in the death of 11 people.

The main focus is placed on Irish climbing-fanatic Ger McDonnell, who would perish on the mountain, and the heroic efforts of his climbing partner Pemba Gyalje, who also served as a Sherpa guide. The trouble for Ger, Pemba and the climbing parties occurs at Camp 4, on the edge of an altitude known as the “death zone.” A series of mistakes and bad luck immediately kills off a couple  of climbers, leaving the rest stranded deep in the death zone with night quickly approaching.

Instead of relying solely on photos and interviews with loved ones and surviving climbers, the film incorporates footage of actors reenacting pivotal moments that occurred during the crisis. This mostly concerns the actions and interactions of the ill-fated climbers stuck passing the night near the mountain’s peak after an avalanche.

“I’ve long gone past the ‘reconstruction is a dirty word’ aspect of documentary filmmaking,” Ryan said. “As a filmmaker, you have to use whatever tools that you can to present
what I figured was a very complex story … As long as every tool you use maintains veracity and a truth.”

While the depiction of the harsh conditions facing the climbers is harrowing, the real tension comes from the conflicting stories of the survivors as to what caused it all. Each person has a different perspective from his or her location on the slope during the disaster, resulting in a malleable “Rashomon” style of the truth.

Further complicating matters were the Western media, which ran with the stories of the first couple of climbers who made it back safely. Completely written out of the story was the essential insight of Pemba, who had remained behind to help those still trapped and didn’t make it down until several days later.

“By the time he got there, the media had gone,” Ryan explained. “And we’re living in the world of 24/7 rolling news … Even if somebody was just sitting around there waiting for the truth to come out, who’s going to run it?”

That was largely the reason that drove Ryan to make the film. In many ways it comes from the earnest wish to finally tell the whole story, and more specifically, the story of Ger and Pemba, who were discovered to have risked their own lives to help those in desperate need of medical attention.

“There is a huge moral responsibility when you’re doing this,” Ryan said. “I can hold my head high and say that what we’re saying is exactly as we believe it to be, as the stories that we’ve been told.”

Crafted from daring cinematography, high production value and compelling interviews from climbers, the film pieces together the fateful climb in strong narrative form. But in trying to make up for a lack of facts as told by the media in 2008, the film overcompensates and presents too much information. Repeated temporal jumps to depict events in the past and their relation to the present can be hard to follow. Uneven pacing and tangential asides involving the history of climbing give the feeling that the filmmakers weren’t exactly sure how to tackle their own mountain of facts for the audience to digest.

In the end, the film succeeds in transporting the viewer to the tip of K2 and exploring the inherent danger of such an inhospitable climate but fumbles slightly in its delivery of the events. So if you’re up for the challenge of sifting through the volumes of testimony and taking the film’s final conclusion as conjecture rather than concrete truth, “The Summit” is a climb worth making.

Contact Ryan Koehn at rkoehn@dailycal.org.

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Sacred Land Film Project/Courtesy

Many massive private and public industrial projects threaten to destroy lands that are considered sacred by indigenous groups. With the world rapidly changing through globalization, industrialization and consumerism, there is a price to be paid from the increased commodification of our earth’s resources.

“Standing on Sacred Ground” is a four-part documentary project that focuses on the stories of eight unique indigenous cultures resisting external threats to their lands. Director Christopher (Toby) McLeod emphasized the direction of the narrative of the films. In an interview with The Daily Californian, he said, “We look for a nonlinear cultural story — something that is poetic and told in a different narrative voice that is more mythological or metaphorical.”

McLeod, who has been critical of other documentaries covering topics surrounding indigenous people, also avoids framing the film from a white male perspective. “There have been a lot of films about indigenous people where you have this National Geographic narrator talking right over the ritual and shaman,” he said.

The first episode, “Pilgrims and Tourists,” follows the indigenous people of the Republic of Altai and the Winnemem Wintu tribe of Northern California, which are both confronting government projects that attempt to build over their consecrated areas, such as ancient burial sites and natural springs. The film is beautifully shot with extreme long shots of the stunning and untouched mountains of Uch-Enmek nature park. Altaian activist Danil Mamyev embarks on a lone pilgrimage and explains in the film, “Sacred places are not dead places where humans are forbidden to tread. Instead, sacred places require human visitation — or pilgrimage.”

Although human visitation is integral to the Altaians’ sacred land, the increased tourism brings a lot of sightseers who disrespect the land and customs. The film shows stark close-ups of the ecosystem that has remained intact for thousands of years, which can be attributed to the safeguarding practices of the Altaians. However, the energy corporation Gazprom plans to run a pipeline through the Ukok Plateau. Along with socially irresponsible tourism, the Altaians are dealing with frequent hardships and trying to reach out to other indigenous communities for support.

 The second part of the episode shows the first meeting between two different indigenous groups. Although the two communities have differing sets of cultural values and rituals, they share similar values in their connection to nature and land and face similar threats from industrial projects. The Winnemem tribe, erased from the federal list of recognized tribes, attempts to save its site from the government’s expansion of the Shasta Dam, which would submerge the land. Together, the Altaians and the Winnemem tribe establish a network of indigenous groups working to protect their land and culture.

Scientists have discovered a significantly higher percentage of biodiversity in sacred areas partially as a result of the indigenous groups’ efforts. McLeod notes that “if you can show scientifically that sacred places preserve biodiversity, you have a scientific argument on why sacred places have value to the modern world.” Indigenous practices and rituals are often dismissed as superstitious from a Western point of view, but the techniques they use for preserving their lands can be utilized to help protect other ecosystems around the world.

The second episode, “Profit and Loss,” depicts the Chinese nickel mine company causing environmental problems in Papua New Guinea as well as the tar sand mining in Canada. The decades of mining in Canada have caused deformities among fish, harsh contaminations in the water and cancer and birth defects among the inhabitants. Witnessing these tragic events is a reminder of the ethical quandary surrounding our nation’s dependence on petroleum oil.

The series incorporates powerful cinema verite, illustrated in the third episode, as the Ethiopian indigenous group and Christian evangelicalist group during the New Year’s ceremony have a dispute over land rights. The Christian group attempts to build a church on the indigenous group’s sacred land, much to the displeasure of the native community, culminating in a violent altercation. According to McLeod, attacks from Christian fundamentalist groups against traditional people are a common story that no one talks about in the media.

The second episode, also following the cinema verite tradition, has a long take of a New Guinea native fiercely arguing with a Chinese mining company representative over the harmful mining waste being dumped in the sea. Neither party comes to any sort of agreement as the dispute intensifies. The lack of communication and understanding between the groups in these dialectical shots illustrates the conflicting ideologies that are unable to be reconciled between the indigenous groups and the governments and corporations.

“Standing on Sacred Ground” is a series of documentaries that challenges preconceptions of primitivism and unflinchingly shows the devastation of lands that affect the livelihoods of the indigenous communities. The film, earnest in its ethnographic portrayals of the historically underrepresented and marginalized indigenous groups, presents an urgent message without being overly didactic.

The wondrous shots of the mountainous regions of Altai evoke the exotic and transcendent power of nature, while the shots of the tar sands in Canada show the deadly and pathological consequences of unregulated industrialization. The film is not easy to watch and may cause epistemological rifts but is crucial for understanding the value of indigenous communities in sustaining the future of our environment.

Contact Fan Huang at fhuang@dailycal.org.

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“The Dandelions”

As arthouse hits “Jules et Jim” and “Amelie” have shown in the past, French films have always had a talent for imbuing life with a whimsical charm, with a certain joie de vivre. Continuing in this tradition, “The Dandelions” freewheels through the vibrantly colorful yet psychologically troubled childhood of our schoolgirl protagonist, Rachel Gladstein. Prematurely obsessed with sex and death while bearing hostility toward her too-politically-correct mother, Rachel is a classic Woody Allen-esque case of neurosis. However, her walls begin to thaw when an unforeseen friendship blossoms between her and Valerie, an intrepid schoolmate who teaches Rachel to love life and helps resolve the tensions in her dysfunctional family.

With the look of a Parisian Wes Anderson flick, the fanciful world of “The Dandelions” is meticulously colorblocked. Everything from classrooms to kitchen cabinets pops with a rich palette of primaries and pastels. In one of the film’s most dreamily blissful moments, Rachel and Valerie frolic in the meadows while blowing on the movie’s namesake greenery. The film’s composition, which usually brims with clean, Ikea-chic design, is suddenly replaced with a shaky but remarkably organic home-recording style that truly captures the commonly longed-for joy of youth. Director Carine Tardieu knows how to channel nostalgia.

“The Dandelions” deftly handles serious emotional depth and humanistic drama without losing any of the fanciful charm that makes the film so engaging. Rachel’s family sphere is complicated when her dad is introduced to Valerie’s beautiful single mother, Catherine. When the Gladsteins’ stale family unit is shaken up by a temptress from where the grass is greener, Rachel’s parents begin to seriously tackle the woes of their relationship, and Rachel begins to realize that her parents are people too. That realization is one of Rachel’s many steps toward maturity and emotional closure, results of her new friendship. Valerie pushes her into unfamiliar territory, but it’s a delightful adventure in which Rachel swings to the rhythm of childhood until she finds her rightful ground where she can truly bloom — kind of like a dandelion.

— Jason Chen

“The Retrieval”

Filmed on the crisp desolation of the wintry Texan woodlands, “The Retrieval” marks filmmaker Chris Eska’s dramatic return to Mill Valley after his debut at the festival in 2007. The film unfolds in the American South around the time of the Civil War, as an adolescent black freedman is forced to come to terms with the conditions of his society and how they will affect the sort of man he will come to be.

Will is a member of a group of mostly white bounty hunters, whose forte is tracking down and returning runaway slaves to their masters. While his line of work directly reinforces the institution of slavery, which afflicted him personally for years and tore him away from his family, he depends on his gang for food, security and shoddy company.

However, his obedience is strained when he sets off on a mission with his uncle Marcus to track down a reputed runaway named Nate, and Will discovers that the “runaway” isn’t actually a slave at all but a fellow freedman. He must then make a choice between abandoning his stable life, awaiting his father’s unlikely return from the North, and betraying a man whom he can’t help but see as his kin.

Much of the movie is framed with a sullen sense of realism, with apt pacing marked by feelings of soft isolation that build to sudden bursts of franticness. Ashton Sanders makes a memorable debut as the young protagonist alongside the stern and wizened face of Tishuan Scott, whose portrayal of Nate rightfully won him the Grand Jury Prize for Acting at SXSW 2013. “The Retrieval” has drawn in accolades all across the national indie film scene.

— Erik Weiner

“One Man’s Show”

Newton Aduaka’s French drama “One Man’s Show” is a test in patience.

The story follows a few days in the life of aging actor Emil (Emile Abossolo M’bo in stunning, subtle form) after he is diagnosed with stomach cancer. We discover his life is the real charade as he sets out to make peace with the small wake of women whose lives he has impacted for the better and the far worse.

The film is divided into separate chapters with names like “Birth,” “Purgatory” and “Paradise,” just begging the audience to understand that this is a story about redemption. The narrative framework is interesting but does little to illuminate the confused and vague motivations of the main character. While Emil reflects on his life and mistakes, he gradually comes to grips with his own mortality, echoing the film’s repeated slogan, “You can’t outrun time.”

You can when it moves this slow — “One Man’s Show” has a glacial pace often drawn out with lingering scenes of characters wistfully roaming the streets of Paris at night or sharing silent car rides. While the tension of Emil’s potentially fatal diagnosis starts high, it quickly peters off once he begins making his rounds to the people from whom he seeks forgiveness.

The beauty of Paris is undeniable, but even it becomes played out once it’s clear some scenes exist solely as an excuse to frame the characters against its backdrop. While acted superbly and photographed with lush intimacy, there simply is not enough dialogue to go around for the film’s small cast. Aduaka’s “One Man Show” will undoubtedly not be requested for an encore.

— Ryan Koehn

“The Pretty One”

In “The Pretty One,” director and writer Jenee LaMarque tells a story of tragedy, imperfections and misguided identities. Identical twin sisters Laurel and Audrey (Zoe Kazan, “Ruby Sparks”) are complete opposites — the former lives at home painting copies of famous artworks and taking care of her widowed father, while the latter lives a stylish life working as a real estate agent selling storybook homes in the city. When a great tragedy befalls the family, Laurel is given the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to move away from home and pose as Audrey, who embodies confidence, independence and “prettiness” to Laurel.

Laurel gradually attempts to make the transformation from sweetly awkward to self-assuredly sophisticated, living in Audrey’s fashionably chic apartment and dating an older married man (Ron Livingston, “The Odd Life of Timothy Green,” “Sex and the City”). But Laurel is able to step back and rethink her pseudo identity when she befriends — and later, falls in love with — her next-door neighbor Basel (Jake Johnson, “New Girl”).

LaMarque’s directorial touch is stylized without being pretentious. The film’s pastel colors are whimsical and fanciful — very “The Virgin Suicides”-esque. Equally as artsy is Kazan’s dual performance, which is both beautifully opaque and emotional. Though at times her performance is a bit overdone, it doesn’t take away from the film’s quirkiness. Johnson reigns as the sensible albeit odd Basel, who swims, reads and sunbathes with the wide-eyed “Audrey,” who, unbeknownst to him, is not Audrey at all.

“The Pretty One” delves into themes of individuality and insecurity while painting a picture of imperfect sisterhood. Its dreamy soundtrack, which includes the music of Frank Fafara, Simone White and (fittingly) Twin Sister, is the perfect backdrop to the idiosyncratic film.

— Addy Bhasin

Contact Jason Chen at jchen@dailycal.org.

Contact Erik Weiner at eweiner@dailycal.org.

Contact Ryan Koehn at rkoehn@dailycal.org.

Addy Bhasin covers visual art. Contact her at abhasin@dailycal.org.

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Justin Timberlake must have a thing for Ivy League campuses. In 2010, he creeped on Stanford girls and buddied around with Harvard nerds as Sean Parker in “The Social Network.”

Timberlake rendered Parker’s overconfidence and general scumminess seamlessly. And he stood out like a sore thumb in the company of asocial computer coders who go to luau-themed fraternity socials hosted in campus multipurpose rooms. The dynamic worked perfectly in “The Social Network” because Parker was meant to be this somewhat creepy adult who could never quite fit in with Mark Zuckerberg and his buddies. Parker — and JT, too — were a little too cool.

In his latest endeavor, “Runner Runner,” Timberlake roams the brick pathways of another Ivy, this time Princeton and this time as a graduate student. The film, produced by Leonardo DiCaprio, is about Princeton student Richie Furst (Timberlake), who pays for school with an online poker gig because his previous stint on Wall Street makes him ineligible for financial aid. He gets caught by campus administration and is forced to call it quits. Attempting to make a few years’ tuition in one game, he logs on to the poker site, loses all of his money and bounces off to Costa Rica to confront the site’s head, online gambling titan Ivan Block (Ben Affleck).

That all happens within the first five or 10 minutes. The film’s fast and uneasy pacing immediately disqualified its believability. A movie about online gambling, an industry that circulates millions — even billions — of dollars could have provided an interesting plotline. After all, “21,” a similarly overdramatic gambling thriller about an MIT student who goes to Vegas to win big counting cards, was at the very least extremely entertaining and even seemed distantly feasible.

Jim Sturgess of “21” was a far more believable college student, confidence shaky and too brainy for his own good. Similarly, Richie was supposed to be this “gifted” mastermind who whips through algorithms but can’t quite figure out his place in life. It proved impossible for Timberlake to shed his douchey confidence. Timberlake never went to college in real life but instead self-actualized touring the world with ‘N Sync. In an interview with the Daily Cal, he said he prepared for his role as a college student by “drinking beer.” “Isn’t that what you college kids do?” he asked.

He even said, “I’ve never played a character quite like this, so it was a lot of fun for me to be the guy who’s in the eye of the storm that everything is kind of happening to. Versus playing the instigator …” In fact, Timberlake joked that he originally wanted Affleck’s role, the cocky, conniving and, in many cases, fairly brilliant bad guy. (Sean Parker, anyone?) “Villains are always fun to play,” Timberlake said.

The one point at which you did see Richie’s charisma waver was in his interaction with love interest, the charming, beautiful and British Rebecca Shafran (Gemma Arterton), who should look familiar from “Quantum of Solace,” in which she played Strawberry Fields. In a steamy and sexy outdoor bar in Costa Rica, their one makeout session — against all odds, considering it’s JT and a Bond girl — was neither steamy nor sexy but instead awkward and forced. It seemed that Block, with whom Rebecca used to be involved, had more chemistry with her.

Timberlake and Affleck would have been more successful had they switched roles. In the role of Block, Affleck was equally ill-suited. Overemphasizing every sharp word and heartless shrug, he seemed like Chuckie from “Good Will Hunting” walking into a room of executives and talking about a retainer agreement. The pretty boy would have done better as a wide-eyed college kid.

Despite the big-name cast and potentially provocative storyline, “Runner Runner” failed to gather enough momentum to muster any entertainment value.

Anna Carey is the arts editor. Contact her at acarey@dailycal.org.

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Warner Bros. Pictures/Courtesy

Alfonso Cuaron has an unmatched ability to transport audiences out of the cinema and to uncharted lands of make-believe. In 1995, he made the world of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s turn-of-the-century children’s story “A Little Princess” come alive in film. In 2004, he darkened the halls of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry with the lowest grossing but most critically acclaimed installment of the Harry Potter series, “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.” In his latest triumph, “Gravity,” Cuaron leaves behind Earth to explore the final frontier of cinematic escapism — outer space.

The film opens with a sweeping 13-minute shot. The camera catches, on one side, the gentle curve of the Earth from miles outside its atmosphere and, on the other side, the magnificent abyss of outer space. All is silent until the fuzzy crinkling of mission control communications (voiced by Ed Harris) pulls the focus toward the Hubble Space Telescope, where Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) is diligently working to install a piece of equipment. Mission Commander Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) flies around with his jetpack, recounting old stories to Houston and enjoying his last mission before retirement.

It’s a quotidian scene for the astronauts until word comes from Mission Control that debris from a demolished Russian satellite is traveling toward them faster than a bullet. The shrapnel hits, destroying their return shuttle and leaving them stranded in space.

With their oxygen supplies low, Stone and Kowalski race against time to reach a shuttle that will take them back to Earth. Beyond this point, the plot matters little. Bullock’s character grapples with the meaning of her past and, in a somewhat corny way, discovers the force that will bring her back home (hence the title). The film’s religious undertones, with Clooney playing an allegorical Christ figure, drive character development while drawing a compelling parallel between the physical and metaphysical realms of the outer-world as understood through Stone while she undergoes a spiritual rebirth.

Bullock stuns in her role as Stone. Although the part was originally offered to Angelina Jolie (and then about half of Hollywood), it’s hard to imagine anyone other than Bullock leading this film. She exudes earnestness and control while conquering the challenges of her imaginary environment. In one scene, she performs a type of zero-gravity ballet that adds a human beauty to the already visually stunning spectacle that is “Gravity.” It’s too soon to start making Oscar predictions, but so far, Bullock is the one to beat.

While the performances in the film are top-notch, the real centerpiece of “Gravity” is the visual effects. Nothing inspires more fear, more awe or more profound appreciation than Cuaron’s arrestingly beautiful galactic scenery. The experience of watching this movie, especially in 3D, is so immersive that it only occurs as an afterthought that it is all computer-generated. The set design reflects the reality of modern-day technologies, which lends the film a degree of authenticity and also distances it from more fantastical space films like those in the “Star Trek” series. Cuaron has created fantasy-free science fiction, and he’s done it unbelievably well.

That’s not to say, however, that this film will get anyone excited about becoming an astronaut.  “Gravity” is unexpectedly terrifying. Whether it’s the thought of running out of oxygen while dodging shrapnel, the oppressive silence of space or being lost without any hope of rescue in an unforgiving void, viewers have their pick of chilling scenarios to squirm over. Tight shots from the inside of Stone’s helmet create a sense of claustrophobia despite the expansiveness of space. The film is, above all, a tale of survival — a lost-at-sea type of story with enough twists and setbacks to keep viewers holding their breath and gripping their seats until the very end.

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Last Wednesday night, the Pacific Film Archive screened the annual “Bay Area Student Film Festival,” a showcase dedicated to exploring the talent and creative perspectives of student filmmakers in the area. The festival accepted submissions of any short films less than 20 minutes — experimental or narrative — from students of Bay Area colleges. The result was a diverse and somewhat discontinuous lineup derived from colleges ranging from UC Berkeley to those across the bay, including San Francisco State and Stanford. Most of the student filmmakers were present themselves, elaborating on their experiences and influences for the audience afterward during a Q&A.

One film, “De((Tr)A(Il))Th Ca(Er(Kennt) Imo(Ni)A(S)” by California College of the Arts student Edward Setina, was even harder to follow than its title. Beautiful matte shots transport a mysterious black-clad protagonist to a bleak, forested dreamscape. He determinedly drags naked, lifeless bodies through the sinister atmosphere, turning the film into a weird, abstract sex dream akin to those of Edgar Allan Poe. What the film lacks in relatability, it more than makes up for in set and art design.

A strong standout was the bubbly “Ingrid,” in which a beautiful young woman incorporates dance moves into her wordless pining for a man to keep her company. Lo and behold, a man with Ken-doll-like vacancy appears on the couch beside her, ready to be posed and played with in every humorous position possible. Wonderfully paired with a bouncy, lighthearted rhythm and set entirely in a studio apartment, the whole thing could easily be adapted into a trendy music video. The film was the creation of Alise Anderson from the Berkeley Digital Film Institute.

From another planet came “St. Patrick’s Day,” from Dolan Chorng of San Francisco State University. It was a short piece of guerilla camera work done in San Francisco on the Irish-themed holiday, shakily capturing the exploits of a group of students as they encounter all of the awkward drunken debauchery nearby. Alongside an orchestral version of a Skrillex song, Chorng himself offers an esoteric narrative obviously mimicking the vocal stylings of “Alien,” James Franco’s character in “Spring Breakers.” This connection is not an assumption ­— at the Q&A afterward, Chorng listed the Harmony Korine film as his primary influence. However, “St. Patrick’s Day” feels less like a work inspired by “Spring Breakers” than a work completely derivative of it, and one wonders what unique aesthetic the festival curators thought the film satisfied when selecting it for the screening.

The strongest work and a definite audience favorite was “La Campeona,” directed by Jakob Asell and Anna X. Davies from UC Berkeley. The film is a short, gritty documentary  following the triumphs and trials of a 17-year-old girl named Martha who is obsessed with boxing and training at a local gym in Oakland. All established gender norms are abolished as Martha refuses to fight female opponents, preferring instead to take on her male counterparts. We meet Martha in the days before a big match that could potentially become her first recorded loss. Intimate scenes with her at the family dinner table with her proud father portray her as the son he always wanted. This father-daughter dynamic would border on controlling if Martha didn’t love boxing so much. But she does, spending all of her time training and shadowboxing in the gym, in every way the active, underdog champion that the film is titled after.

Overall, the 11 films were as varied as the group of students who made them. They ranged from the strikingly earnest and cinematic to the convoluted and pretentious. While the festival itself seemed scattered in its selection process, it succeeded in its one underlying goal: to celebrate the work of passionate student filmmakers in the Bay Area.

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Opening Band Films/Courtesy

To tell the tale of a generation of women, director Sini Anderson focuses on one life: Kathleen Hanna’s. The documentary “The Punk Singer” presents Hanna as the shrillest voice of the ’90s Riot Grrrl Movement. Clear and insightful, yet inflammatory in its simplicity, this singer’s timbre, bold attitude and controversiality have been igniting listeners since she first took the stage with punk band Bikini Kill.

The film opens with grainy footage shot in a living room in Washington. An audience stands grouped in a loose semicircle around Hanna as she performs spoken-word poetry, stomping and shrieking, “I’m your worst nightmare. I’m a girl you can’t shut up.”

Even in poor camcorder resolution, bewildered faces and backwards hats markedly contrast with the performer’s playfully chopped bangs, black combat boots and seething search for justice. This opening scene, even before Hanna becomes a singer, shows a tame version of the reaction she would be getting for most of her career.

Chronicling her musical projects from Bikini Kill to the Julie Ruin, “The Punk Singer” also explores how Hanna persuaded an irritated boys’ club to admit that women are worthy of respect by convincing women they had a right to admission. Her friends, bandmates and peers gush throughout the film about her devotion to feminism in every endeavor, no matter the consequences.

When asked how she coped with the challenges of making her first full-length film, Anderson pronounced passionately: “This is Kathleen. This story has to be told.” Hanna has a messiah-like presence in Riot Grrrl, as though people find their voices in her art and become her disciples.

Hanna’s signature pronouncement during Bikini Kill shows, “Girls to the front!,” ordered men to literally get out of the way and accept women into their sacred places. More importantly, it became a rallying cry for women who wanted to assert themselves but feared the threat of aggressive moshing presented at shows.

While Hanna’s careers in music and activism were thoroughly documented in “The Punk Singer,” there was little explanation of relationship backgrounds or band in-fighting and almost no negative commentary.

That positive spirit is not only refreshing in documentary pursuits but also a tenet of the Riot Grrrl manifesto. Equality is a universal concern, and the Riot Grrrl movement wasn’t just created for feminists but for anyone who felt maligned by society. None of the people interviewed felt it necessary to belittle others’ successes or gossip about their failures.

The last part of the documentary unobtrusively examines why Hanna stopped touring in 2005. Mysterious illnesses plagued Kathleen throughout her career, but she was only officially diagnosed with late-stage Lyme disease in 2010.

The physically taxing and emotionally draining recovery from this disease has made her very private over the past few years. But Hanna refuses to let the odds get the best of her and, as always, refuses to shut up.

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XYZ Films/Courtesy

The fifth annual Oakland Underground Film Festival brought local and international films to Bay Area audiences. From documentaries to shorts to full-length features, OakUFF demonstrated what it means to be truly underground in an age when that title is so loosely applied. The festival provided local beer from Drake’s Brewing Company in San Leandro and a selection of free barbecued treats between showings to keep festival-goers happy and engaged, though the movies themselves were enough to do just that.

“The Dirties”

Written and directed by rising filmmaker Matt Johnson, who also stars, “The Dirties” is an endearing, striking and ultimately heartbreaking portrayal of bullying in a Toronto public high school. The movie traces the lives of “uncool” kids Matt and Owen who make a film in which they kill off the members of the ruling high school crew, The Dirties, for making their lives a living hell. This pipe dream slowly transforms into a looming horror as we watch Matt slip into the delusion of mistaking the fake for the real, finally becoming a character in his own tragic plot.

Backed by iconic indie filmmaker Kevin Smith, who claims, “You’ve never seen it done the way Matt Johnson has pulled it all together,” “The Dirties” moves quickly from being a film depicting the brutal effects of bullying to being one that asks questions about what it means to be normal and where to draw the line between fantasy and reality. Johnson essentially plays himself throughout the film — a charismatic and lovable jokester whose comic originality has the audience waiting to see what he comes up with next. But when his next idea is a Columbine-inspired mass killing, the audience comes to the tragic realization that their hero is en route to becoming the bad guy in the film. In a climactic moment of Matt’s loss of self-control, he stares into the camera and asks: “Do you think I’m crazy?” Either answer is too difficult to consider.

“The Dirties” seems to unintentionally shed light on everything controversial and interesting in the life of an adolescent high school kid trying to be cool, get girls and have friends. With this film, Johnson has made his mark not only as a pioneer in the world of DIY alternative filmmaking but also as a unique and brilliant voice in the lengthy discourse on bullying, mental illness and practically everything else that matters to youth growing up in this country.

“Le Bonheur: Terre Promise”

If you haven’t really suffered, you can’t be good at happiness.” This maxim speaks to the overarching significance of the humble documentary “Le Bonheur: Terre Promise.” The film chronicles the 82-day journey of the film’s director, Laurent Hasse, as he treks across France in search of an answer to the question, “What is happiness?”

Hasse interviews a range of French citizens, from suburban teens to elderly couples living in isolation, and portrays the lower classes and peasantry as struggling but surviving. Emmanuel, a young man who lives in solitude, sees happiness as “a quest for peace within you.” Elsewhere, a young housewife manages a smile as she clutches her child. “What keeps me happy? Being in love,” she says. Her husband, Stephane, seems to have a different idea. “Happiness is self-sufficiency,” he says. English subtitles flash across the screen.

The fleeting nature of happiness becomes apparent over the course of Hasse’s pilgrimage as he finds that, during an interview with a German expatriate, “(people) tend to go after happiness that pops like soap bubbles.”

The film’s dialogue of solemn, pensive conversations is broken up with instrumental music accompanying scenes of dreary winter roads, empty fields and scenic forests. Locals warn Hasse of the “French Bermuda Triangle,” a lifeless region through which he must travel. A melancholy tone throughout the film maintains a sense of grounded realism.

“Le Bonheur” presents a strong connection between the French people and their landscape. Some find that it nourishes them, while others find it depressing.

“(My land is) my little acre of happiness,” a farmer says.

“Living here is no longer worth living,” another inhabitant explains.

“Look at the landscape,” a baker says. “That’s what happiness is.”

The screen cuts to fog rolling through a silent meadow.

When Hasse reaches the icy waters of the Atlantic Ocean, he completes his journey and heals a part of his aching soul. The film proves itself to be incredibly relevant, touching and artfully composed. We learn not only about the meaning of nationality but also about the meaning of life.

Filmmaker mingle

Midway down San Pablo Avenue, my cab driver glanced back at me in his rearview mirror.

“Let me tell you something about Oakland. There are druggies on these corners. And a lot of hookers.” He stopped at a light. “This is real life, honey.”

Unexpectedly — albeit pleasantly — the films shown at the Oakland Underground Film Festival’s filmmaker barbecue resonated with a similar frankness. Somewhere between grimy and sexy, Thursday’s audience gathered for a screening of five local shorts in the only illuminated building on the block. The event was followed by a post-show schmooze with producers. As an organization with growing notoriety for “keeping it real,” the Oakland Underground Film Festival strives to unite local filmmakers who highlight issues pertaining to the Bay Area. When programmer Shawn Taylor spoke about the event’s selection process, he emphasized that he sought material that rang true to a meaningful objective.

“So nothing overly artsy?” I asked.

Taylor grinned. “Not even if Jesus made it.”

Generally, the films were true to their intent and accented the je ne sais quoi that makes the Bay Area so unique. Most remarkable was Melinda James’ “16 Seeds.” A short, the documentary comments on contemporary food inequality by following three black farmers in Oakland’s inner city.

“Where there’s more alcohol than fresh fruit, there’s a … need for intervention,” said Gail Myers of Farms to Grow, who was featured in the film.

Myers’ identification of societal disconnect as a leading obstacle to food justice resonated with the objective of the festival; each film explored the penetrating issue of how to instill change in any community, demonstrating the central idea that collaboration is integral to a revolution’s success.

Indeed, the entire event seemed like a sort of meeting of mutineers — angst-ridden yuppies seeking company in their efforts to rebuild the decaying world. Although the festival was well intentioned, it might benefit from narrowing the scope of its zeal. Taylor said it best: The Oakland Underground Film Festival doesn’t pose.

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Belladonna Productions/ Memento Films International/Uncorked Productions /Courtesy

When making a scary film, there are only so many directions you can take. Characters, formulas and monsters are recycled again and again through the narrow, dimly lit echo-chamber that has become the horror genre. So it’s refreshing when one surfaces that differs and lets the audience in on a world they haven’t seen before.

Striving for this status is “We Are What We Are,” which revitalizes a horror genre staple usually reserved for stories of dystopian civilizations or ill-fated detours through the Amazon: cannibalism. It was in part because of this semiforgotten subgenre that director Jim Mickle signed onto the project in the first place.

“I think that was something fun,” Mickle said. “I’m a horror movie fan, so it was nice to have something new that wasn’t a vampire, werewolf, zombie, ghost or whatever is the typical thing. To have something that’s ‘Oh wow, I haven’t seen this in a while, this is great.’ ”

It was with this breath of originality that Mickle set out to catch audiences off guard and tell a story of deep-rooted religious cannibalism in North America’s Bible Belt. The result is a half-fleshed midnight B movie as envisioned by William Faulkner.

Mentioning that the film deals with cannibalism isn’t exactly a spoiler. “We Are What We Are” is a remake of a Mexican film of the same name that received quite a bit of acclaim when it debuted in 2010. Also, the remake’s movie poster features two sullen girls and their grizzly father standing ominously over three empty dinner plates. The fact that they eat people is all but written in barbecue sauce beneath the title.

The story follows the Parker family, who is steeped in centuries of backwoods man-eating tradition. After the Parker matriarch dies, the widowed Frank (a stoically convincing Bill Sage) tightens his strict rule on their three children and forces the oldest daughter Iris (Ambyr Childers, who very well could have been a cousin of Jennifer Lawrence’s Ree in “Winter’s Bone”) to assume the duties of preparing people to be eaten during the family’s yearly ritual.

Complicating everything is a torrential rainstorm that has been washing long-buried remains into the lap of curious town mortician Doc Barrow (a scene-stealing Michael Parks). While Iris and her sister Rose begin to question the morality of their annual feast, Frank becomes more fanatical, fearful of losing what’s left of his family. This setup captures much of the creepiness and foreboding of the original Mexican version, which compelled Mickle the most.

“It wasn’t a horror movie about cannibalism — it’s a horror movie about tradition,” he said. “I think that was what was really fascinating about the first one.”
Mickle was careful not to treat the film as a remake but rather a reimagining. Charged with the task of creating an American version for a larger audience, he distinguishes his version by creating a heavy atmosphere and tone that is uniquely Mickle. This involved changing the setting from a dense urban city to the rural deep South.

“I think it would have been the American thing to do to run around and try to come up with an American concept and try to fit (this) story into it,” he said. “I think it was more about ‘Hey, I know what it’s like to grow up in this environment, and I know all the creepy things about it,’ and then I think that’s what’s going to make this work.”

The setting becomes a character unto itself. Long, ponderous shots of crooked woods and gushing water lend nicely to the mood of gothic horror. But where the film succeeds most is not in its horror but in its drama. All that remains once one removes the element of cannibalism is a somewhat slow, disturbing portrait of two young girls trying to break free from the tyrannical rule of their religious father.

Perhaps this would make for a better movie. The characters and story have to constantly tie into the somewhat campy tropes of a family who literally believes in eating people, diffusing some of the emotional and realistic thrust, and the motivations of characters tend to come across as a tad forced.

The ending does offer somewhat of a surprise, though it confuses more than illuminates. It also capitalizes fully on the aforementioned camp, acting more as a punch line than a twist. But at the end of the day, “We Are What We Are” truly is what it is, another horror story with a fresh idea that falls flat once it gets to its bloody, senseless climax.

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Blackened Recordings/Courtesy

The silent roadie, Trip (Dane DeHaan), casually skates toward the Metallica concert and sees James Hetfield in a flaming hot rod. Afterward, he walks past Robert Trujillo prepping his bass in his studio, which shakes the entire room. Metallica’s legacy precedes itself; they have sold more than 180 million albums and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009. The film’s exaggerated representations of the band members aren’t entirely gratuitous, as they have already become deified as rock’s gods.

Now, 30 years into their career, they have released their first IMAX 3D concert movie, “Metallica: Through the Never.” Paralleling an apocalyptic narrative with an immense Metallica concert, this film marks the continuation of a band that has reached heights no other modern rock band has achieved.

The movie starts and ends not with Metallica but with the fictional narrative of Trip’s journey to retrieve an unknown package for the band. After a John Woo-styled car crash, Trip is stuck between a faction of protesters and a group of riot police tapping their batons in unison to the song. The theme of injustice and protest has been covered in the band’s past music, especially in their seminal album, …And Justice For All. When asked about this common motif, Metallica co-founder James Hetfield noted, “It is a struggle of mankind wanting to be heard. Whatever it is, there’s conflict, and (the film’s) just highlighting that. It’s a metaphor for the human struggle.”

All hell breaks loose as the protests quickly descend into full-fledged anarchy. Trip’s clash with a violent group of dissidents coincides with the band’s hits, such as “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “One” and “Master of Puppets.” The connection between the narrative and the music delineates the distinction between the imaginary exterior world of Trip’s odyssey and the interior world of the Metallica concert.

While these two worlds seem like separate entities, they slowly start to converge. Hetfield described the process of juggling these two parts saying, “(It) took a little finessing … Having to get those together, some songs had to go and some had to get moved around to fit with the scenes.” The music complements the narrative well, with “Fuel” playing as Trip is speeding alone down the road.

The narrative, however, provides little context for the characters and scenarios, becoming increasingly surreal and jarring with the escalation of violence and destruction. Trip walks past several lynched bodies in the street as he continues his journey, unaware of the danger that may lie ahead. There is no explanation of the events as we witness Trip’s near-suicide mission. But the film isn’t concerned with answering these plot points — it’s focused on establishing a bleak tone and desperate atmosphere of survivalism to correspond with the music.

In the concert, the band starts with “The Ecstasy of Gold” from Sergio Leone’s “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,” a staple of all their performances since 1983. Tradition has always been part of Metallica’s modus operandi and will continue to be. It’s a rarity that a band as prominent as Metallica stick together after all these years, and the chemistry from their decades of unity shows onstage.

James Hetfield can shout with both aggression and zeal in “Battery” and transition to a more subdued and expressive tone in “Nothing Else Matters.” Kirk Hammett still shreds like no one else can, and his virtuosic guitar solos will definitely arouse some head-banging in the theater. Lars Ulrich’s drumming — frenetic and fast-paced — never fails to keep up with the dynamic, shifting tempos and rhythms of the songs. From their underground thrash metal years of “Kill ‘Em All” to their breakout mainstream appeal in their self-titled album, the movie’s song list will appeal to the most hardcore fans and presents the band’s expansive range.

The stage for Metallica’s performance has never been bigger, thanks to an elaborate array of lights, screens and pyrotechnics. The camera shots range from close-up shots of James Hetfield and other band members to views of the audience and fly-on-the-wall shots, providing a holistic perspective for the audience. The visuals on the stage accompany the music with soldiers crossing for “One” and coffins and gravestones ominously flashing for “Master of Puppets.” The 3-D technology and the cinematic qualities of the film bring the viewer much closer to the stimulating and immersive experience of a concert.

“Let’s see if we can take this to another level,” James says to the crowd as he tries to get them involved with the music. Metallica has gone far and beyond the level of what a rock band can be. But they haven’t forgotten their roots in San Francisco. Lars Ulrich said, “We fly the flag of San Francisco proudly all over the world and always have. This is our home — family, friends, peers. San Francisco is a big part of what Metallica is.”

The merging of Trip’s narrative and Metallica’s concert, although anachronistic at times, provides a unique and mesmerizing experience for Metallica fans and a compelling introduction for those who aren’t fans. Metallica has not only combined critical and commercial success with their albums but also has expanded across all different media spectrums, from their documentary “Some Kind of Monster” to a “Guitar Hero” video game and now a concert movie in IMAX 3D. “Metallica: Through the Never” is an extension of the band’s larger-than-life ethos.

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