SA on Film

San Antonio Film Festival highlight reel includes must-see movies, Hollywood celebs, and more

Photo courtesy of San Antonio Film Festival

The 24th edition of the San Antonio Film Festival is set to liven up these dog days of summer. Running August 1-5 at the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts, the annual film festival will screen more than 30 features and dozens of short films and documentaries, in addition to panel discussions and other special activities.

Called SAFILM for short, the fest was founded by local resident and filmmaker Adam Rocha in 1994 as a video festival. The event became the San Antonio Underground Film Festival until 2006 when it rebranded under its current name.

Today, SAFILM is the largest film festival in South Texas, and is among several many homegrown cinematic celebrations held in San Antonio each year. Rocha remains the event’s executive director, and the film has held firm onto its roots, working with local artists such as Robert Tatum and Mig Kokinda in designing event posters and other merchandise.

In year's past, SAFILM has screened movies with actors and filmmakers of wide recognition, including the local premiere of Hell or High Water, an Oscar-nominated drama starring Jeff Bridges, Chris Pine, Ben Foster, and local actor Gil Birmingham.

Rocha said the strength of submissions from around the world has grown impressive each year, a reflection of the event’s reputation. “SAFILM just keeps getting bigger and bigger every year, bringing Hollywood films and insiders to San Antonio and highlighting the incredible talent found right here in our very state,” Rocha said.

“It’s catching on across the world, what we do. What’s especially getting us attention are our narratives. We’ve always had strong documentaries, but the narratives, specifically, are really, really strong.”

Prices for the 2018 SAFILM festival are $39 for a one-day pass, $75 for a two-day weekend pass, and $139 for a five-day VIP badge.

This year’s San Antonio Film Festival highlights include:

World premiere of Stella's Last Weekend — August 4 at 9 pm
From writer/director Polly Draper, an alum of the ABC drama Thirtysomething, Draper stars in the movie with her sons Max and Alex Wolff of The Naked Brothers Band fame. Draper and her sons all will be in attendance.

American Film Institute Seminar — August 4 from 9:30 am to 12:30 pm
AFI professor and film editor Michael Jablow will discuss the art of movie editing. Free.

Eastpoint: An Art Documentary — August 1 at 6 pm
Local filmmaker Sam Lerma created this documentary, which follows Lerma’s interaction with four artists-in-residence who share their love for art with students from San Antonio's East Side.

Benched — August 1 at 2 pm
This comedy/drama starring John C. McGinley and Garret Dillahunt as mismatched Little League baseball coaches.

Tia Chuck — August 1 at 7 pm
Filmmakers Angela and Mark Walley make their feature directorial debut with Tia Chuck, a tribute to the late Chuck Ramirez, one of San Antonio’s most beloved artists.

Frank and Ava — August 2 at 7 pm
This feature film delves into the romantic relationship and marriage between Frank Sinatra and Ava Gardner. This is also Harry Dean Stanton’s final performance. The beloved actor died in September 2017 following filming.

Closer to Bottom — August 5 at 6 pm
This drama, directed by San Antonio actor/filmmaker Jesse Borrego, is about two brothers who, deep in the throes of grief for their recently deceased father, fall for the same woman.

Flavor of Life — August 3 at 1 pm
Actor Pepe Serna of Scarface fame stars in this drama about a chef who works to establish a relationship with his estranged grandson to save their family’s restaurant.

Hometown Heroes — August 3 at 7 pm
Enjoy an evening of screenings of films from San Antonio-area filmmakers.

SAFILM Legacy Award — August 4 at 7 pm
The capstone of the festival, the SAFILM will present the Legacy Award to Jesse Borrego. Closer to Bottom is the directorial debut for Borrego, whose Hollywood credits include the television series Fame and 24, and such movies as Blood In, Blood Out, Lone Star, and Con Air. KONO radio DJ Dave Rios, the emcee for the festival awards ceremony, added: “The San Antonio Film Festival is a Tricentennial treat for film lovers.”

Coupled with events like the awards ceremony, the nonprofit festival also urges aspiring local filmmakers to pursue such careers. SAFILM, along with the 48-Hour Film Project and Cinefestival have brought a greater amount of publicity to San Antonio film industry in recent years. “Someone told me this [festival's an] unknown jewel,” Rocha said. “San Antonio people and others are realizing what we have here.”

For a full schedule of events, visit the SAFILM website.

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Movie Review

Lady Gaga brings an odd musical twist to Joker: Folie à Deux

Photo by Niko Tavernise

Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga in Joker: Folie à Deux.

For a movie that was more about one man’s mental health condition than anything related to comic books, 2019’s Joker was shockingly successful, making over $1 billion worldwide and nabbing a Best Actor Oscar for Joaquin Phoenix. Phoenix and writer/director Todd Phillips are back with Joker: Folie à Deux(literally meaning "a madness of two"), a film that has some of the same themes but a story that could not feel more different.

After his murder spree in the first film, Arthur Fleck (Phoenix) now calls Arkham Asylum home, where he is alternately tortured and favored by the guards, and revered by his fellow patients. Arthur plays nice for the most part, which leads one of the guards, Jackie Sullivan (Brendan Gleeson), to allow him to attend a music class in the minimum security ward of the facility, where he meets Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga).

The immediate connection between Arthur and Lee allows Arthur to indulge in more than a few fantasies, ones that manifest themselves in the film as musical sequences involving the two of them. As his fortunes change and he is forced to stand trial for his crimes, Arthur returns to the fantasies repeatedly, with Lee giving him a sense of hope and security that has been missing from his life.

The film, co-written by Scott Silver, features songs so often that the boundary between reality and fiction within the story is completely blurred. Some of the songs show Arthur, Lee, or both singing at Arkham, while others emulate old musicals by creating numbers on a set meant to look like the Murray Franklin talk show from the first film. It’s fair to wonder how much, if any, of it is real or just things that Arthur has conjured to comfort himself.

Most of the songs — “Good Morning,” “Get Happy,” and “That’s Entertainment,” among others — are cribbed from the classic movie musical era of the 1930s-1960s. Their titles and lyrics have surface-level relevance to the story being told, but it’s hard to say their meaning goes deeper than that. They are also so chopped up and delivered so often that it’s difficult to tell what kind of importance Phillips was trying to put on any one individual song.

While the music is the obvious big change, the more significant one is the film’s almost total lack of action. The focus on Arthur and Lee’s possible relationship and Arthur spending most of the film at Arkham leads to very few scenes of mayhem. In fact, hardly anything of substance happens until the film’s final act, and what does happen is less impactful than what fans of the first film may want.

Phoenix, just as he did in Joker, commits fully to the role, appearing to become gaunt once again and making sure the character is sufficiently disturbing. The arc makes him quieter and less annoying this time around, which may or may not disappoint some viewers. Lady Gaga is fine as the character otherwise known as Harley Quinn, although it’s interesting that she was likely hired for her singing ability and the film rarely lets her truly let loose.

If the nihilistic tones of Joker made it a surprise billion-dollar movie, it would be even more of a shocker if Joker: Folie à Deux made anywhere near that type of money. The Joker character has been approached in many different ways, but this is one of the oddest yet.

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Joker: Folie à Deux opens in theaters on October 4.

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