The day began with a screening of Chinatown, which I will shamefully confess that I had not seen. Why don't they make movies like this anymore? It trusts the audience to piece together what's going on, it builds tension without frenetic editing, the violence is shocking because it's not over the top, everything just works like a finely-tuned machine. Brilliant.
American Commune: Two women who grew up in a hippie commune go back and learn about it. Nothing sinister happened, which is good for them but doesn't make for a good documentary.
The Retrieval: This was a solid coming-of-age story. Set during the Civil War, it's about a young former slave conscripted by his uncle and a crew of bounty hunters to hunt capture other freed slaves. He is sent to bring back a former slave with a bounty on his head, but starts to develop a very moving father-son relationship with the target. I liked it very much.
Towheads: I don't know what to call this, but I liked it. A feminist slapstick movie? A whimsical motherhood odyssey? Shannon Plumb, the writer/director/star, is a very funny physical comedian and does a Chaplin riff, a Darth Vader burlesque routine, and everything in between. But there's an awful lot going on underneath about roles available for women, too; this was the best combination of funny and deep I've seen at the festival.
And then to top off the night, I went to see The Lumineers, the band with that song from all the commercials. They were pretty good. Dr. Dog opened and I guess were good but I can't really remember what they sounded like now.
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