The Mourning Forest

While a lot of the international attention on Japanese filmmaking these days seems to be on its lucrative animation and horror exports, don't let that make you think that personal storytelling without chills, action, and creepy atmospherics are all Japan's filmmakers are interested in. Mourning Forest was last year's Grand Prix award winner at Cannes, a quiet and visually lush feature from director Naomi Kawase about a young retirement home worker who takes one of her elderly charges for a walk and then becomes hopelessly lost in the woods, becoming a mostly plotless character study of these two individuals as they wander, trying to find their way home. The setup reminds us of Gus Van Sant's Gerry, a film which can be tough going for some audiences with its long periods of quiet and inaction. Kawase's feature is described in similar terms by many critics, though consensus is that if you can move beyond the need for a film to be constantly steamrolling forward, Mourning Forest contains many rewards.

View the trailer.
Tomorrow at 7 p.m. at the Freer Gallery's Meyer Auditorium. Free.

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War Child

Of all the horrific stories that have emerged in recent years from the civil war in Sudan (and there are plenty to choose from), the kidnapping and indoctrination of young children into killers is perhaps at the top of the list of most heinous offenses to come to light. The subject of War Child, Emmanuel Jal, was one such child soldier, carrying and using an AK-47 in the war from the time he was seven until his ultimate escape from the military five years later. In the years since, he has become an international hip-hop star, playing music that calls for peace with an urgency that comes from his own harrowing experience. Local filmmaker C. Karim Chrobog has made a huge impression with his feature debut about Jal, racking up a truckful of awards with a film that tells a success story as unlikely as it is uplifting. The film premieres tomorrow at E Street, and Washington Film Institute is sponsoring a pre-movie happy hour at Bistro D'Oc with the film's producers in attendance.

View the trailer.

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Punch-Drunk Love

Punch-Drunk Love is easily Paul Thomas Anderson's most divisive film, and it's easy to see why. Coming on the heels of his epically-minded Boogie Nights and Magnolia, this quirky, and sometimes entirely dissonant and off-putting love story felt slight, nothing more than a throwaway to clear Anderson's head after the dense films that preceded it. The presence of Adam Sandler in the lead probably didn't help. Don't be fooled, though. Sandler delivers a performance of altogether shocking sensitivity, and underneath the quirkiness and odd plot directions lies a story about modern love and loneliness no less satisfying than the broader and more varied themes of his previous films. At the very least it's worth it to see a joyously over the top performance by Phillip Seymour Hoffman as the head of a small-time crime venture who goes after the hapless Sandler after the latter has ticked off one of the former's phone sex operators, and the dispute escalates to surreal levels. Not to mention seeing the song "He Needs Me", from Robert Altman's ill-advised Popeye movie, recontextualized into a dreamy montage; the 10-year-old in me who still harbors an unjustified love for that movie couldn't help but smile.

And if none of that convinces you, there's still a safe bet at the AFI this week, as the theater is screening a newly restored print of The Godfather.

View the trailer.
One screening daily, Sunday through Wednesday, at the AFI. And if you're looking for The Godfather, that opens tomorrow and runs for one week.

>> Long View Gallery is having a holiday cocktail party cum opening reception for a group show including Matt Sesow, Dana Ellyn, Billy Colbert and more. Tonight, 6 to 9 p.m.

>> Pyramid Atlantic opens two shows on Saturday. The first is The Sky is the Limit, curated by Felix Angel, the curator Inter-American Development Bank’s Cultural Center in Washington, D.C. The other is a site-specific paper installation by artist Leah Frankle that explores the Grades between innocence and experience. Saturday, 6 to 8 p.m., with an artist talk at 6:30 p.m.

>> Civilian Art Projects is hosting the Artistic AYA Fashion Installation, with work by Dana Ayanna Greaves, on Saturday night, which we're told will include art, music, models, shopping, dancing and drinks. $10 in advance, $12 at the door.

>> Well regarded Washington artist David Waters has a retrospective opening at the Govinda Gallery in Georgetown. The exhibition will feature his large scale work (watercolors, collages, drawings), as well as his bust of President John F. Kennedy, one of the many Presidential busts for which he was commisioned. Saturday, 2 to 5 p.m.

Holiday Fairs/Events

• The Fourth Annual Downtown Holiday Market starts this Friday on F Street between 7th and 9th Streets. Noon to 8 p.m. daily through December 23.
• The Craft Mutiny Holiday Booty Market is this Saturday at Hilda's Giftshop in the National City Christian Church. 12 to 6 p.m.
• Art Enables' Holiday Show & Sale is Saturday, 3 to 5 p.m., with gifts ranging from $2 holiday cards to $200 paintings.
• Gallery Plan B's "White Box = Gift Box" Holiday Gift Show will feature jewelry, scarves, small art, glassware and more through December 28. Reception with the artists is this Saturday, 6 to 8 p.m.
• The Art League's Holiday Ceramic Sale runs Friday through Sunday, see web site for hours.
• Touchstone has its second annual Artists for Charity Holiday Benefit on Friday. Tickets for the night of art and entertainment are $20 at the door, and support the AFC Children's Home, which houses children infected with HIV. 7:30 to 10:30 pm.
• Tranquil Space Yoga has a trunk show for local women artists on Saturday from 7 to 9 p.m.
• The International Art & Artists program (which runs Hillyer) introduced us to GoodShop.com, where you can shop many stores online and GoodShop donates 30% of your purchase price to an organization of your choice (like IA&A!).

Art Notes

• Jane Franklin Dance performs Incidence at Flashpoint's Mead Theater Lab the next two weekends, with a pay-what-you-can performance at 8 p.m. tomorrow.
• The Phillips Collection has a snazzy redesigned web site with a much easier to read event calendar; they'll also have Phillips After 5 tonight with museum tours, drinks, food and music for the price of admission.
• Art coopertive Caos on F has a First Friday opening between 5 and 8 p.m.
• Via Tyler Green at Modern Art Notes, Roger Ebert has an excellent article about the death of film (and art in general) critics, while gossip/celeb talk takes its place.
• Flickr user volcanojw, whose fascinating job we profiled in Photo of the Day awhile back, has an awesome set of images she took while watching the daguerreotype-making process, demonstrated by Mike Robinson of Century Darkroom.

Listeners at these shows can expect music that is not necessarily characteristic of current trends in jazz.

"Mainly, the element of melody is key in my compositions," Gulbrandsen explained. "Usually the form of my songs are short. These days, people are getting into a complex approach."

The two quartets will be performing material from Twelve, along with newer material written for Gulbrandsen's trio, but adapted to the new setting. Gulbrandsen's music also reflects his Nordic roots and the European style of jazz that was an early influence, notably the recordings on the legendary label, ECM.

"I’m trying to meld the European and American elements of jazz, so hopefully my music will have something fresh and appealing to the listener."

The Jostein Gulbrandsen Quartet will perform on Sunday at the Bossa Bistro & Lounge at 9 p.m, call 202-667-0088 for cover information. On Monday, the band will play 8 and 10 p.m. sets at Blues Alley. Tickets are $18 + $12.50 minimum/surcharge.

THE NUTCRACKER:
>> The Washington Ballet is again reprising Septime Webre's Washington-specific production of Tchaikovsky's Christmas ballet at the Warner Theater. With cherry blossoms and other local touches, Webre recasts the battle between the Nutcracker and the Mouse King as George Washington and King George III in the American Revolution. December 11 to 28, various times

>> If you must have the more traditional Nutcracker, with the Victorian sentimentalism, the Tchaikovsky, Joffrey Ballet returns to the Kennedy Center Opera House with its blockbuster production. December 11 to 14, various times

For the Chips N’ Dip Crowd (those of you there for the food, the beer, or because your boyfriend gave you no choice): Want to feel even more disgusted watching the game Sunday? Compare your starting salary to Baltimore's rookie quarterback Joe Flacco. This summer, Flacco signed a five-year, $30 million contract with $8.75 million guaranteed. But even Flacco could whine "unfair" compared to fellow rookie quarterback Matt Ryan's sweet deal of $72 million over six years (with $34.75 million guaranteed). We're surprised the auto industry hasn't tapped them for handouts already.

The arrangement keeps everybody happy, even the opening acts. Eugene Mirman gave the room a truncated, 20-minute set, only a little bit recycled from his May set at the Arlington Draft House. Mirman treated the crowd like a group of friends he wanted to impress with the cool stuff he’d just read. “Before the election,” Mirman said, “I read an article in The New York Times about people in Philadelphia—in Fishtown—who were racist, but were still going to vote for Barack.” He let the people from Philadelphia “woo!” for a moment, then reacted to the article that dozens (or hundreds) of people in the room had probably read, too. “’Well, I don’t want him to pass all those laws for the blacks, but at least he’ll save my pension.’ As if he’s going to pass a bunch of black laws. ‘From now on, Wednesday will be called basketball!’”

Almost half of Mirman’s set consisted of him reading out polls and forms he’d filled out on the Internet, a disturbing/hilarious number of them goofing on racism. A Classmates.com survey asked him what city he wanted to live in. “A candy city that floats on the back of an eagle,” he said. “And is heavily segregated!” Mirman ambled off the stage without looking like he’d tried too hard, confident that he and the crowd had connected anyway.

Stella’s act was more rigidly planned, but the goal was the same: Make the audience feel like pals. Wain, Showalter, and Black gave the crowd ground rules like “number eight—feelin’ great” and “number nine—doin’ fine.” Since they were in a synagogue they asked the crowd to put away their swastikas. “I drew four extra lines on mine,” said Wain, pointing to his stomach, “so it just looks like a window.”

“I drew action lines on mine,” said Black, pointing to the small of his back. “Now it looks like a windmill.”

“That’s very green.”

”I’m a green nazi!”

The skits, such as they were, ran together and stuck to the general theme of “three guys acting strange.” They weren’t afraid to milk a joke. In a skit about the group’s “favorite party jams,” the ostensible joke was that Wain got on his groove to depressing acoustic ballads like “Tears in Heaven.”

“It’s about Eric Clapton’s son falling off a building!” said Black.

“And into a party!”

But Black got the biggest laugh when he danced to “Who Let the Dogs Out?” by holding his legs still and waving his arms like a balloon mascot outside of a car dealership. It killed. When Black got two more chances to show off (one of them in a joke about sexual positions), he deployed the car dealership dance.

There were slow, jokeless patches, whenever the group got to into its schtick of confusing words and names. When in doubt, there were dick jokes (like an extended series of “poems” to audience members who wanted them to undo their zippers), and there was mockery of Showalter and Wain. It wasn’t the sort of show that built momentum or hit dizzying heights. The crowd wanted to be with its surreal pals for a while, and for $30, that’s what it got.

After the show, Stella walked downstairs to sign merchandise and introduce a screening of Wet Hot American Summer. The questions were ultra-specific: Was the movie specifically about a Jewish summer camp?

”By definition,” said Black, “summer camp is Jewish.”

”You went to a Jewish summer camp,” said Showalter. “My camp, it just so happened that everyone was Jewish. It wasn’t actually a Jewish summer camp.”

“When I went to visit it,” said Wain, “it had Hebrew names on all the bunks!”

”Yeah,” said Showalter, “everyone who ever went there was Jewish.”

”And only spoke Hebrew,” said Black.