Here's a fascinating interview of Francis Ford Coppola by Tavis Smiley:
part 1:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh....ab7qa0c
part 2:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh....ad7qa12
Tetro
Here's a clip of Francis Ford Coppola talking about Tetro on The View.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIZ1bmiSHbo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIZ1bmiSHbo
It was invited to the main slate as an out-of-competition gala, and Coppola didn't want to show it that way, as he considers is a low-budget, independent-style film. It was then invited to the Un Certain Regard competition sidebar, and Coppola accepted that slot.
He can't win Best Director from the main competition jury, but Un Certain Regard has its own prizes.
He can't win Best Director from the main competition jury, but Un Certain Regard has its own prizes.
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- Location: USA
Kirk Honeycutt raves.
Film Review: Tetro
By Kirk Honeycutt
Hollywood Reporter
CANNES -- "Tetro" looks like the work of a film school grad, his head swimming with the classic black-and-white European films of the '50s and '60s and his mind unable to shake his struggles with his family. And yet, its author is Francis Ford Coppola, making a mostly triumphant return to his earlier filmmaking days -- and to Cannes itself, where he has picked up a couple of Palme d'Ors.
After its debut as opening-night film in the Directors' Fortnight, "Tetro" should have no trouble winning future festival dates and securing distribution worldwide.
As a critic, it feels good to write positively about one of the American cinema's lost directors. Once so dazzling in his ambition and audacity, Coppola was forced by financial woes to make other people's movies for so many years that when he returned to indie filmmaking with 2007's "Youth Without Youth," the result was a confusing and pretentious work that found favor with very few.
"Tetro" erases that memory. It has style to burn, eye-catching acting by an international cast and a story that harkens back to many literary classic with its themes of a family torn apart, brothers in conflict and a son's rivalry with a towering father figure.
Yes, it does feel artificial with the Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca looking like a backlot confection and the drama pitched at somewhat precious levels, where an accident can never be just an accident, it has to mean something. The film is more than a little self-conscious. Coppola admits to -- no, he boasts of -- his influences here from Elia Kazan's "On the Waterfront" and "the mysterious work of Antonioni" to Tennessee Williams, Eugene O'Neill and, as a model for his angry young poet, Antonin Artaud.
Yet somehow the piece comes off as derivative but also original. While living and working in Argentina to make this film, he absorbed enough local color to imagine a fresh, authentic tale of stymied creativity -- a subject he would certainly be familiar with -- and familial conflict.
In his story, he dreams of a young lad coming to Buenos Aires to find his long-lost brother. Bennie, a few days shy of 18, is played by newcomer Alden Ehrenreich, reminding one of young Leonardo DiCaprio. Bennie's Italian family originally came from Argentina, but everyone emigrated to New York where father Carlo Tetrocini (Klaus Maria Brandauer) became a world famous conductor while his older conductor brother Alfie (also Brandauer) languished in obscurity.
There is room for only one genius in this family and Carlo claims that mantle. Bernie's elder brother fled years ago to Buenos Aires and changed his first name to Tetro -- a mere reworking of the family name. His live-in girlfriend Miranda (Maribel Verdu) declares him a "genius," only a genius without achievements.
Vincent Gallo trades on his own bad-boy image as a highly emotional actor and filmmaker to play the brooding, unstrung writer, who is not happy to see his baby brother. But, thanks perhaps to Miranda, he doesn't throw him out either.
Bennie, restless with his own artistic ambition, rummages through the couple's modest flat one afternoon and comes upon an unfinished play by Tetro that concerns their father. In the days to come, he finishes the play and a local celebrity literary critic (Carmen Maura) declares it a master work.
OK, so this is a plot contrivance that doesn't hold water for a minute, but the whole film takes place in a world infused with a Yankee version of magic realism.
Which brings us to the "accidents." When Bennie first sees Tetro, he is on crutches, newly released from a hospital after getting hit by a bus. It turns out Tetro was driving the car the night his own mother died in a crash back in New York. (Bernie and Tetro have different mothers.) Then, Bennie gets hit by a motorcycle, imposing on him a hospital convalescence during which he finishes the play.
The music by Osvaldo Golijov is wistful -- sometimes sad, sometimes happy. The wide-screen film is shot by Mihai Malaimare Jr. in a highly contrasted black-and-white with the camera mostly stationary. Yet flashbacks are in color, as are several ballet sequences that draw upon films by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger.
These dances, choreographed by Ana Maria Stekelman, get inside the head of the blocked writer, although given the joint authorship of the play, perhaps it gets into the head of both Tetro and Bennie.
"Tetro" represents a collision of genres -- the coming-of-age tale (Bennie) and the Oedipal conflict in a son who wishes to kill his father (Tetro). In the end, it's about family, about the rivalries, conflicts and healing. It's also about Francis Coppola leaving the U.S. for a bohemian, Italian-influenced district of Buenos Aires to rediscover his art and his love for film.
Film Review: Tetro
By Kirk Honeycutt
Hollywood Reporter
CANNES -- "Tetro" looks like the work of a film school grad, his head swimming with the classic black-and-white European films of the '50s and '60s and his mind unable to shake his struggles with his family. And yet, its author is Francis Ford Coppola, making a mostly triumphant return to his earlier filmmaking days -- and to Cannes itself, where he has picked up a couple of Palme d'Ors.
After its debut as opening-night film in the Directors' Fortnight, "Tetro" should have no trouble winning future festival dates and securing distribution worldwide.
As a critic, it feels good to write positively about one of the American cinema's lost directors. Once so dazzling in his ambition and audacity, Coppola was forced by financial woes to make other people's movies for so many years that when he returned to indie filmmaking with 2007's "Youth Without Youth," the result was a confusing and pretentious work that found favor with very few.
"Tetro" erases that memory. It has style to burn, eye-catching acting by an international cast and a story that harkens back to many literary classic with its themes of a family torn apart, brothers in conflict and a son's rivalry with a towering father figure.
Yes, it does feel artificial with the Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca looking like a backlot confection and the drama pitched at somewhat precious levels, where an accident can never be just an accident, it has to mean something. The film is more than a little self-conscious. Coppola admits to -- no, he boasts of -- his influences here from Elia Kazan's "On the Waterfront" and "the mysterious work of Antonioni" to Tennessee Williams, Eugene O'Neill and, as a model for his angry young poet, Antonin Artaud.
Yet somehow the piece comes off as derivative but also original. While living and working in Argentina to make this film, he absorbed enough local color to imagine a fresh, authentic tale of stymied creativity -- a subject he would certainly be familiar with -- and familial conflict.
In his story, he dreams of a young lad coming to Buenos Aires to find his long-lost brother. Bennie, a few days shy of 18, is played by newcomer Alden Ehrenreich, reminding one of young Leonardo DiCaprio. Bennie's Italian family originally came from Argentina, but everyone emigrated to New York where father Carlo Tetrocini (Klaus Maria Brandauer) became a world famous conductor while his older conductor brother Alfie (also Brandauer) languished in obscurity.
There is room for only one genius in this family and Carlo claims that mantle. Bernie's elder brother fled years ago to Buenos Aires and changed his first name to Tetro -- a mere reworking of the family name. His live-in girlfriend Miranda (Maribel Verdu) declares him a "genius," only a genius without achievements.
Vincent Gallo trades on his own bad-boy image as a highly emotional actor and filmmaker to play the brooding, unstrung writer, who is not happy to see his baby brother. But, thanks perhaps to Miranda, he doesn't throw him out either.
Bennie, restless with his own artistic ambition, rummages through the couple's modest flat one afternoon and comes upon an unfinished play by Tetro that concerns their father. In the days to come, he finishes the play and a local celebrity literary critic (Carmen Maura) declares it a master work.
OK, so this is a plot contrivance that doesn't hold water for a minute, but the whole film takes place in a world infused with a Yankee version of magic realism.
Which brings us to the "accidents." When Bennie first sees Tetro, he is on crutches, newly released from a hospital after getting hit by a bus. It turns out Tetro was driving the car the night his own mother died in a crash back in New York. (Bernie and Tetro have different mothers.) Then, Bennie gets hit by a motorcycle, imposing on him a hospital convalescence during which he finishes the play.
The music by Osvaldo Golijov is wistful -- sometimes sad, sometimes happy. The wide-screen film is shot by Mihai Malaimare Jr. in a highly contrasted black-and-white with the camera mostly stationary. Yet flashbacks are in color, as are several ballet sequences that draw upon films by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger.
These dances, choreographed by Ana Maria Stekelman, get inside the head of the blocked writer, although given the joint authorship of the play, perhaps it gets into the head of both Tetro and Bennie.
"Tetro" represents a collision of genres -- the coming-of-age tale (Bennie) and the Oedipal conflict in a son who wishes to kill his father (Tetro). In the end, it's about family, about the rivalries, conflicts and healing. It's also about Francis Coppola leaving the U.S. for a bohemian, Italian-influenced district of Buenos Aires to rediscover his art and his love for film.
"What the hell?"
Win Butler
Win Butler
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Sonic Youth
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Vanity Project: Francis Ford Coppola’s “Tetro”
by Eric Kohn
indieWire
A scene from Francis Ford Coppola's "Tetro." Image courtesy of American Zoetrope.Neither complete misfire nor triumphant return to form, Francis Ford Coppola’s “Tetro” works as a competent family drama right up until the messy final act. If a first-time filmmaker had directed this stylish black-and-white-and-sometimes-color melodrama, it might gain some notice for suggesting great things to come. Instead, on its own terms, the movie is only a mildly interesting entry in Coppola’s thirty-plus years of work.
At the same time, the plot resonates in context. Based around the troubles of an Italian-American family living in Argentina, “Tetro” stars Vincent Gallo as the titular character, a wannabe writer estranged from his family and living aimlessly with his supportive wife (Maribel Verdu). In the first scene, Tetro—whose real name is Angelo Tetrocini—gets an unwanted visit from his eager young sibling, Bennie (Alden Ehrenreich), a navy reject interested in reconnecting with his black sheep brother. Bennie desperately probes Tetro to share details about their family. Tetro, however, feeling responsibility for the death of his mother in a car crash and resentment for the apathy of his famous composer father, refuses to open up.
When Bennie discovers that Tetro has privately written a play about their family history, he decides to try finishing it. Tetro protests, of course, based on his closeness to the material. As the brothers continue to battle over the future of the project (and their relationship), the plot arrives at a twist that’s both strained and completely unnecessary, considering the solid storytelling preceding it. The creative fire shared by brothers and father alike also provide an easy entry point for understanding the movie’s autobiographical traits. The Coppola family’s multi-generational big screen accomplishments, coupled with their Italian heritage, obviously parallel the set up on a rudimentary level. “Nothing in the story happened, but everything is true,” Coppola claimed during a Q&A following the first screening at Cannes’ Directors Fortnight sidebar.
But there’s more to it than that: The dialogue contains frequent insights into the way the filmmaker, now working on miniscule budgets and relying on self-distribution, feels about his sense of responsibility to his movies. “How do you walk away from your work?” Bennie asks Tetro. “Doesn’t it follow you?” Clearly, it does: Coppola hints at the dissatisfaction he felt over taking too many studio gigs when Tetro’s wife nimbly breaks down his ubiquitous rage. “He’s like a genius without that many accomplishments,” she says.
An autobiographical reading of “Tetro” certainly has merits, but won’t change the movie’s fairly average appeal. Gorgeous, high contrast imagery and exquisite mise-en-scene show that Coppola can still establish a distinctive mood (the contributions of his longtime editor, the legendary Walter Murch, also come in handy). Ironic for a feature about writing, the trouble lies with the trajectory of the screenplay (his first since “The Conversation,” a Palme d’Or winner in 1974), which uses basic contrivances shared by many family dramas. A few mildly appealing cinematic flourishes occasionally elevate the experience, but the central problem with “Tetro” comes from the assumption that the final play has real aesthetic merits. The result is that this story of a vanity project ultimately becomes one.
by Eric Kohn
indieWire
A scene from Francis Ford Coppola's "Tetro." Image courtesy of American Zoetrope.Neither complete misfire nor triumphant return to form, Francis Ford Coppola’s “Tetro” works as a competent family drama right up until the messy final act. If a first-time filmmaker had directed this stylish black-and-white-and-sometimes-color melodrama, it might gain some notice for suggesting great things to come. Instead, on its own terms, the movie is only a mildly interesting entry in Coppola’s thirty-plus years of work.
At the same time, the plot resonates in context. Based around the troubles of an Italian-American family living in Argentina, “Tetro” stars Vincent Gallo as the titular character, a wannabe writer estranged from his family and living aimlessly with his supportive wife (Maribel Verdu). In the first scene, Tetro—whose real name is Angelo Tetrocini—gets an unwanted visit from his eager young sibling, Bennie (Alden Ehrenreich), a navy reject interested in reconnecting with his black sheep brother. Bennie desperately probes Tetro to share details about their family. Tetro, however, feeling responsibility for the death of his mother in a car crash and resentment for the apathy of his famous composer father, refuses to open up.
When Bennie discovers that Tetro has privately written a play about their family history, he decides to try finishing it. Tetro protests, of course, based on his closeness to the material. As the brothers continue to battle over the future of the project (and their relationship), the plot arrives at a twist that’s both strained and completely unnecessary, considering the solid storytelling preceding it. The creative fire shared by brothers and father alike also provide an easy entry point for understanding the movie’s autobiographical traits. The Coppola family’s multi-generational big screen accomplishments, coupled with their Italian heritage, obviously parallel the set up on a rudimentary level. “Nothing in the story happened, but everything is true,” Coppola claimed during a Q&A following the first screening at Cannes’ Directors Fortnight sidebar.
But there’s more to it than that: The dialogue contains frequent insights into the way the filmmaker, now working on miniscule budgets and relying on self-distribution, feels about his sense of responsibility to his movies. “How do you walk away from your work?” Bennie asks Tetro. “Doesn’t it follow you?” Clearly, it does: Coppola hints at the dissatisfaction he felt over taking too many studio gigs when Tetro’s wife nimbly breaks down his ubiquitous rage. “He’s like a genius without that many accomplishments,” she says.
An autobiographical reading of “Tetro” certainly has merits, but won’t change the movie’s fairly average appeal. Gorgeous, high contrast imagery and exquisite mise-en-scene show that Coppola can still establish a distinctive mood (the contributions of his longtime editor, the legendary Walter Murch, also come in handy). Ironic for a feature about writing, the trouble lies with the trajectory of the screenplay (his first since “The Conversation,” a Palme d’Or winner in 1974), which uses basic contrivances shared by many family dramas. A few mildly appealing cinematic flourishes occasionally elevate the experience, but the central problem with “Tetro” comes from the assumption that the final play has real aesthetic merits. The result is that this story of a vanity project ultimately becomes one.
"What the hell?"
Win Butler
Win Butler
-
Sonic Youth
- Tenured Laureate
- Posts: 8005
- Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 8:35 pm
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Reviews from Variety and Screendaily:
Tetro
By TODD MCCARTHY
Variety
Although markedly better than his previous small-scaled, self-financed film, "Youth Without Youth," Francis Ford Coppola's "Tetro" is still a work of modest ambition and appeal. Gloriously shot in mostly black-and-white widescreen in Buenos Aires, Coppola's first original screenplay since 1974's "The Conversation" hinges on the tension between two long-separated brothers dominated by an artistic genius father. The angst-ridden treatment of Oedipal issues makes the picture play out like a passably talented imitation of O'Neill, Williams, Miller and Inge, and thus it feels like the pale product of an over-tilled field. Coppola will release the film himself Stateside, doubtless to marginal returns, and in the long run, "Tetro" likely will be most remembered for introducing a highly promising young actor, Alden Ehrenreich.
Allegedly first noticed by Steven Spielberg in a homevideo played at a bat mitzvah and subsequently discovered by longtime casting ace and producer Fred Roos, the 18-year-old Ehrenreich manages the remarkable feat of resembling by turns three of the leading actors from "The Departed": When he first appears, he looks like the younger brother of Leonardo DiCaprio; then, at certain moments, his smile and the look in his eye recall Jack Nicholson, while his head and facial shape are reminiscent of Matt Damon. Not only that, he has a winning screen presence and proves entirely up to the role's dramatic requirements.
Ehrenreich plays Bennie, who, clad in the spiffy whites of a cruise ship attendant, uses a Buenos Aires layover to track down his brother Tetro (Vincent Gallo). Arriving unannounced at the apartment his brother shares with g.f. Miranda (Maribel Verdu) in the artsy La Boca district, Bennie wants to know why Tetro never followed up on his promise to come back for him when the older boy left home a decade earlier.
Bennie has always idealized Tetro as a successful bohemian artist, but the scruffy malcontent destroys that image quickly, rebuffing Bennie's familial overtures and refusing to answer his many questions. Tetro seems so overwhelmed by resentment, regret and anger, mostly concerning his illustrious orchestra-conductor father Carlo (Klaus Maria Brandauer), that the most he can do is scribble notes on scraps of paper he shows to no one.
Miranda mediates a kind of truce that at least keeps Tetro from kicking Bennie out and, at length, revelations leak out in conversation and color flashbacks about deep, disturbing family secrets centering on Carlo, his unbridled egomania and sense of droit du seigneur.
Fraught with Greek and Freudian weight, these crucial disclosures constitute the thematic meat of the piece and explicitly explain the reasons for Tetro's dreadful psychological condition and his desire to escape the family. But while what went on years ago might more than justify the unsteady course of Tetro's subsequent life, Coppola's gradual lifting of the dramatic lid over the course of more than two hours frankly feels old-fashioned and labored; the sort of transgressions summoned up have, of late, become the stuff of comedy and instantly disposable daytime TV talk -- no longer the exclusive property of deep-dish dramatists bent on exploring how the warped behavior of above-the-law patriarchs leads to tragedy.
What would, then, have been weighty material for the stage, bigscreen or television back in the '50s now has the feel of a small, particular story that's been inflated to immodest proportions. At the same time, Coppola lacks the writerly flair to make the big scenes soar or resonate with multiple meanings and dimensions; rather, they more often than not seem abruptly curtailed and somewhat unsatisfying.
In his search for the story's full impact, the writer-director is not overly assisted by Gallo, who has no trouble catching the bohemian physical aspects and sullen antisocial attitude of a self-styled artist, but doesn't reach down deep to where he might uncover nuggets of true character revelation; he never finds Tetro's bottom. By contrast, Ehrenreich's Bennie, hitherto unexposed to the family skeletons, is a veritable beacon of optimism and endeavor, and the teenage thesp makes the picture his own.
Other thesps, including the lively Verdu ("Y tu mama tambien") and the imposing Brandauer, register as required, albeit with no surprises. Spanish diva Carmen Maura swans through as an influential art-world maven amusingly named "Alone," who bestows and withdraws her favor at a whim.
The film's physical specifications are impeccable. Retaining much of the same crew from "Youth Without Youth," including lenser Mihai Malaimare Jr., composer Osvaldo Golijov and indispensable longtime editor and sound wizard Walter Murch, Coppola gets good value from his Argentine locations and provides abundant sensory pleasure. Use of black-and-white here creates a link with the director's 1983 "Rumble Fish," his only previous monochrome outing, which also dealt with two brothers with a significant age difference.
Coppola has spent much of his career, as well as a great deal of his own money, seeking the ideal state of truly independent filmmaking. The trouble, as always, is in being careful what you wish for, since when he finds creative nirvana, he frequently has trouble delivering the full goods. "Tetro" represents something of a middle ground in that respect.
-----------------------------------------------
Tetro
14 May, 2009 | By Lee Marshall
Screendaily
Dir/scr. Francis Ford Coppola. US-Arg-Sp-It. 2009. 127mins.
A melodramatic family drama set in a Buenos Aires where even innocent passers-by seem consumed by jealousy and passion, Tetro offers glimpses of a golden-age Francis Ford Coppola in his first original script since The Conversation (1974). Although it feels at times like a vanity project, some strong performances – most notably by Spanish actress Maribel Verdu (Y tu mama tambien), but also Vincent Gallo in the title role and newcomer Alden Ehrenreich – save all but Tetro’s most cringeworthy lines.
Tetro goes out domestically on June 11 through Coppola’s American Zoetrope releasing, where its more linear storyline should attract more viewers than Youth Without Youth. Ultimately, Tetro looks likely to become what the French call a succes d’estime in the international marketplace (although audiences in Argentina may react poorly to the film’s tourist trip through their complex social and cultural drives).
Mihai Malaimare’s moody black and white photography, an atmospheric score by Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov and long time Coppola collaborator Walter Murch’s editing and sound work help to lift a story that seems at times almost a parody of the dark male family dramas that Coppola’s creativity has always fed on. Indeed, the plot has something of the melodramatic sweep and overwrought tone of an opera libretto.
Ehrenreich plays Bennie, a fresh-faced 17-year-old cruise ship waiter who turns up in Buenos Aires one day in search of his estranged brother Angelo (Gallo). Angelo is a gloomy, broodingly dark poet and playwright who now goes by the name of Tetro (an abbreviation of the family surname Tetrocini, but also an adjective meaning ‘gloomy’ and ‘broodingly dark’ in Italian).
Bennie and Tetro’s father Carlo (Brandauer) is a musician from an Italian émigré family in Argentina, who moved to the States where he is now a famous conductor. He’s also a domineering tyrant whom Tetro despise because of past events which are revealed in a series of flashbacks filmed in colour which rank among the film’s absurder moments.
Tetro, who first appears with his leg in a cast, has given up writing plays and resents the intrusion of his fresh-faced young brother. But, with the help of Tetro’s fiery but kind girlfriend Miranda (Verdu), Bennie decides to help his brother by secretly completing one of his unfinished plays and sending it off to a famous critic called Alone (Maura), a media superstar (Maura plays her as a cross between Oprah Winfrey and Barry Humphries).
A series of expressionistic touches - ballet inserts, clips from Powell and Pressburger’s The Tales of Hoffmann – build towards a cathartic third-act sequence (set among the glaciers of Patagonia) which does, finally, possess a sort of weird power. But it’s a long stretch to get there.
Edited By Sonic Youth on 1242310998
Tetro
By TODD MCCARTHY
Variety
Although markedly better than his previous small-scaled, self-financed film, "Youth Without Youth," Francis Ford Coppola's "Tetro" is still a work of modest ambition and appeal. Gloriously shot in mostly black-and-white widescreen in Buenos Aires, Coppola's first original screenplay since 1974's "The Conversation" hinges on the tension between two long-separated brothers dominated by an artistic genius father. The angst-ridden treatment of Oedipal issues makes the picture play out like a passably talented imitation of O'Neill, Williams, Miller and Inge, and thus it feels like the pale product of an over-tilled field. Coppola will release the film himself Stateside, doubtless to marginal returns, and in the long run, "Tetro" likely will be most remembered for introducing a highly promising young actor, Alden Ehrenreich.
Allegedly first noticed by Steven Spielberg in a homevideo played at a bat mitzvah and subsequently discovered by longtime casting ace and producer Fred Roos, the 18-year-old Ehrenreich manages the remarkable feat of resembling by turns three of the leading actors from "The Departed": When he first appears, he looks like the younger brother of Leonardo DiCaprio; then, at certain moments, his smile and the look in his eye recall Jack Nicholson, while his head and facial shape are reminiscent of Matt Damon. Not only that, he has a winning screen presence and proves entirely up to the role's dramatic requirements.
Ehrenreich plays Bennie, who, clad in the spiffy whites of a cruise ship attendant, uses a Buenos Aires layover to track down his brother Tetro (Vincent Gallo). Arriving unannounced at the apartment his brother shares with g.f. Miranda (Maribel Verdu) in the artsy La Boca district, Bennie wants to know why Tetro never followed up on his promise to come back for him when the older boy left home a decade earlier.
Bennie has always idealized Tetro as a successful bohemian artist, but the scruffy malcontent destroys that image quickly, rebuffing Bennie's familial overtures and refusing to answer his many questions. Tetro seems so overwhelmed by resentment, regret and anger, mostly concerning his illustrious orchestra-conductor father Carlo (Klaus Maria Brandauer), that the most he can do is scribble notes on scraps of paper he shows to no one.
Miranda mediates a kind of truce that at least keeps Tetro from kicking Bennie out and, at length, revelations leak out in conversation and color flashbacks about deep, disturbing family secrets centering on Carlo, his unbridled egomania and sense of droit du seigneur.
Fraught with Greek and Freudian weight, these crucial disclosures constitute the thematic meat of the piece and explicitly explain the reasons for Tetro's dreadful psychological condition and his desire to escape the family. But while what went on years ago might more than justify the unsteady course of Tetro's subsequent life, Coppola's gradual lifting of the dramatic lid over the course of more than two hours frankly feels old-fashioned and labored; the sort of transgressions summoned up have, of late, become the stuff of comedy and instantly disposable daytime TV talk -- no longer the exclusive property of deep-dish dramatists bent on exploring how the warped behavior of above-the-law patriarchs leads to tragedy.
What would, then, have been weighty material for the stage, bigscreen or television back in the '50s now has the feel of a small, particular story that's been inflated to immodest proportions. At the same time, Coppola lacks the writerly flair to make the big scenes soar or resonate with multiple meanings and dimensions; rather, they more often than not seem abruptly curtailed and somewhat unsatisfying.
In his search for the story's full impact, the writer-director is not overly assisted by Gallo, who has no trouble catching the bohemian physical aspects and sullen antisocial attitude of a self-styled artist, but doesn't reach down deep to where he might uncover nuggets of true character revelation; he never finds Tetro's bottom. By contrast, Ehrenreich's Bennie, hitherto unexposed to the family skeletons, is a veritable beacon of optimism and endeavor, and the teenage thesp makes the picture his own.
Other thesps, including the lively Verdu ("Y tu mama tambien") and the imposing Brandauer, register as required, albeit with no surprises. Spanish diva Carmen Maura swans through as an influential art-world maven amusingly named "Alone," who bestows and withdraws her favor at a whim.
The film's physical specifications are impeccable. Retaining much of the same crew from "Youth Without Youth," including lenser Mihai Malaimare Jr., composer Osvaldo Golijov and indispensable longtime editor and sound wizard Walter Murch, Coppola gets good value from his Argentine locations and provides abundant sensory pleasure. Use of black-and-white here creates a link with the director's 1983 "Rumble Fish," his only previous monochrome outing, which also dealt with two brothers with a significant age difference.
Coppola has spent much of his career, as well as a great deal of his own money, seeking the ideal state of truly independent filmmaking. The trouble, as always, is in being careful what you wish for, since when he finds creative nirvana, he frequently has trouble delivering the full goods. "Tetro" represents something of a middle ground in that respect.
-----------------------------------------------
Tetro
14 May, 2009 | By Lee Marshall
Screendaily
Dir/scr. Francis Ford Coppola. US-Arg-Sp-It. 2009. 127mins.
A melodramatic family drama set in a Buenos Aires where even innocent passers-by seem consumed by jealousy and passion, Tetro offers glimpses of a golden-age Francis Ford Coppola in his first original script since The Conversation (1974). Although it feels at times like a vanity project, some strong performances – most notably by Spanish actress Maribel Verdu (Y tu mama tambien), but also Vincent Gallo in the title role and newcomer Alden Ehrenreich – save all but Tetro’s most cringeworthy lines.
Tetro goes out domestically on June 11 through Coppola’s American Zoetrope releasing, where its more linear storyline should attract more viewers than Youth Without Youth. Ultimately, Tetro looks likely to become what the French call a succes d’estime in the international marketplace (although audiences in Argentina may react poorly to the film’s tourist trip through their complex social and cultural drives).
Mihai Malaimare’s moody black and white photography, an atmospheric score by Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov and long time Coppola collaborator Walter Murch’s editing and sound work help to lift a story that seems at times almost a parody of the dark male family dramas that Coppola’s creativity has always fed on. Indeed, the plot has something of the melodramatic sweep and overwrought tone of an opera libretto.
Ehrenreich plays Bennie, a fresh-faced 17-year-old cruise ship waiter who turns up in Buenos Aires one day in search of his estranged brother Angelo (Gallo). Angelo is a gloomy, broodingly dark poet and playwright who now goes by the name of Tetro (an abbreviation of the family surname Tetrocini, but also an adjective meaning ‘gloomy’ and ‘broodingly dark’ in Italian).
Bennie and Tetro’s father Carlo (Brandauer) is a musician from an Italian émigré family in Argentina, who moved to the States where he is now a famous conductor. He’s also a domineering tyrant whom Tetro despise because of past events which are revealed in a series of flashbacks filmed in colour which rank among the film’s absurder moments.
Tetro, who first appears with his leg in a cast, has given up writing plays and resents the intrusion of his fresh-faced young brother. But, with the help of Tetro’s fiery but kind girlfriend Miranda (Verdu), Bennie decides to help his brother by secretly completing one of his unfinished plays and sending it off to a famous critic called Alone (Maura), a media superstar (Maura plays her as a cross between Oprah Winfrey and Barry Humphries).
A series of expressionistic touches - ballet inserts, clips from Powell and Pressburger’s The Tales of Hoffmann – build towards a cathartic third-act sequence (set among the glaciers of Patagonia) which does, finally, possess a sort of weird power. But it’s a long stretch to get there.
Edited By Sonic Youth on 1242310998
"What the hell?"
Win Butler
Win Butler
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HarryGoldfarb
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Francis Ford Coppola's new film Tetro is set to start its release on June 11. It will be Coppola's first original screenplay since The Conversation, stars Vincent Gallo, was shot in Argentina, and apparently will be in black and white. You can go to the website here:
http://tetro.com
I sure hope the music on the site is in the score.
Edited By Greg on 1238968845
http://tetro.com
I sure hope the music on the site is in the score.
Edited By Greg on 1238968845