Dash Shaw – Memphis Flyer

Steve Iwamoto and Constance Wu in I Was A Simple Man.

The two Sundance films screening at the Malco Summer Drive-In Friday night could not have been more different.

The first was I Was A Simple Man by director Christopher Makoto Yogi. This is a film with a very different vision of Hawaii than the glossy tourist shots of Waikiki mainlanders are used to seeing. Masao (Steve Iwamoto) lives by himself in the mountains of Oahu. When the old man gets a terminal cancer diagnosis, he is forced to ask his family for help for the first time in years. As he slips away, past and present loses meaning, and a vision of his dead wife Grace (Constance Wu) appears to comfort him. Masao tries to reconcile with his estranged children and grandchildren as we see the painful history of loss that turned him into an alcoholic recluse. The story intertwines with the history of Japanese immigrants to Hawaii before and after the war, and the statehood movement that left so much of the original population as seemingly permanent underclass. It’s no coincidence that Grace died on the same day the statehood celebration parade rolled through Honolulu.

Yogi’s vision is meditative and inclusive, but where in his first feature, August at Akkiko’s, he emphasized the beauty of the surroundings, here he often concentrates on the messy details of dying. It’s a beautiful and moving picture with an amazingly unmannered, stoic performance from Iwamoto, whose craggy face and shaggy gray ponytail are both charming and sad.

Cryptozoo

The second show was Cryptozoo by Virginia-based graphic novelist turned animator Dash Shaw. As the programmer’s introduction pointed out, this film is as rare as the unicorn whose murder sets the plot into motion. It’s a completely hand-drawn animated feature produced independent of any studio, with the total creative freedom that implies. The credits indicated that it took four years to create, and from the incredibly detailed creature designs and backgrounds, I’m shocked they got it done that fast. Basically Jurassic Park with Medusa and Mothman instead of dinosaurs, Cryptozoo retains a lot of the plot curlicues that would be excised in a more polished production. Often, total creative control can mean tedious self-indulgence, but Shaw and his collaborators effortlessly pull off every big chance they take because they are so totally committed to the bit. The overall experience is like watching a 6th grader’s notebook sketches come to life and have adventures, and I was totally there for it.

Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga in Passing.

Tonight at the drive-in, the Memphis end of Sundance 2021 continues with another double feature. Tessa Thompson stars in Passing by director Rebecca Hall. An adaptation of the 1929 novel by Harlem Renaissance author Nella Larsen, it’s a psychological thriller about a pair of Black women who can pass for white in the Jim Crow era, and the racial tensions exposed by the necessary deception.

Real-life sisters Alessandra and Ani Mesa play estranged twins in Superior.

The second films is Superior by Eris Vassilopoulos. Based around a pair of identical twin actresses, Alessandra and Ani Mesa, the director’s feature debut is a tense, visually lush thriller of family heartbreak and dysfunction.

Sundance satellite screenings at the Malco Summer Drive-In begin at 6 p.m. You can buy tickets at the Indie Memphis website.

Niamh Algar as Enid in Censor.

I’ll have to admit, I didn’t expect to have my first Sundance screening at the Malco Summer Drive-In. But the pandemic makes for strange situations, and from my point of view, this is one of the better ones. As a filmmaker, none of my works have ever been accepted to Sundance, and as a journalist, no outlet has ever offered to pay my way to Park City, so I’ve never been to the mecca of American indie film in person.

When Indie Memphis adopted the hybrid online and in-person model last November, an unexpected thing happened: It turned into an opportunity to expand the reach of the festival. In the case of screenwriting award winner Executive Order, the Bluff City’s homegrown regional festival was suddenly attracting audiences from Brazil.
In the opening press conference on Thursday, Sundance Institute CEO Keri Putnam recognized the upside of Sundance’s move into the virtual world. “We think this will be the largest audience that we have ever had,” Putnam said.

Festival Director Tabitha Jackson was on the job less than a month when the novel coronavirus essentially shut down the film industry. She explained that the festival’s unofficial theme was the Japanese art of knitsugi, the practice of repairing broken pottery in a way that make the cracks visible and beautiful. “You see all those little fragments and shards, and that came from the sense that what the pandemic had done was to kind of explode our present reality, and we were left with the pieces. The festival actually is coming from a place of needing to completely reimagine and take the pieces that we know are part of our essence and build them into something different to meet the moment.”

While juggling other work assignments, I tried to get a full taste of the pandemic Sundance paradigm on the first day. I made a point of seeing Kentucker Audley’s new film Strawberry Mansion at the drive-in, then scooting home to watch Censor online. I’ve become quite the drive-in habituate during the pandemic, so I knew what to expect, but this experience was truly something special. Just as the opening credits were rolling on a hometown filmmaker’s Sundance opening night debut, a shooting star whizzed above Summer Drive-In screen 3. Crowding into a theater in Park City for the premiere would have been great, but it couldn’t beat being in Memphis in that moment.

Back at home, I nestled into a cozy robe for the world premiere of Censor. Welsh director Prano Bailey-Bond’s feature debut was an amazing revelation. Set in the dreary London of the Thatcher ’80s, it stars Niamh Algar as Enid, a censor who watches VHS-era violence all day long. Enid has a secret: Her sister disappeared under mysterious circumstances when they were young, but while Enid was the last person to see her, she has no memory of what happened. When she sees an actress in a particularly violent film who kind of maybe looks like a grown-up version of her sister, she becomes obsessed with making contact. Enid’s reality starts to implode around her, mixing up the gonzo images of slasher flicks with her lonely London existence.

Bailey-Bond is clearly a student of ’80s horror, and judging from the Videodrome influences, something of a Cronenberg cultist. In at least one way, she exceeded her influences. Where Videodrome’s characters are Ballardian blank slates, Censor is focused intently on Enid’s inner life. Algar gives the kind of remarkably subtle and finely observed performance rarely seen in the genre. Bailey-Bond’s arthouse meets meta-horror vision pushed all the right buttons for me.

Cryptozoo

Tonight, Sundance screenings continue at the Malco Summer Drive-In with I Was A Simple Man. Christopher Makoto Yogi’s August at Akkiko’s was a highlight of Indie Memphis 2018, and last year he had an experimental video installation at the festival. In his new film, he returns to his favorite subject, his native Hawaii, and the experience of the ignored people who have made the islands their home for thousands of years. The second screening couldn’t be more different. Cryptozoo is an animated feature by Virginia director Dash Shaw about a couple who stumble into a fantasy world where unicorns and yeti rule.

Sundance in Memphis: A Memorable Night Under the Stars

The Sundance Film Festival in Memphis begins at 6 p.m. at the Malco Summer Drive-In. You can buy tickets at the Indie Memphis website.