Art by Saajanfernandes
Hand-painted poster for the film "The Village House" ("Gamak Ghar") from India.
Although this year’s virtual film fest won’t have the same camaraderie as the in-person screenings, there is one plus for the indecisive: every film is like a rush ticket as you can decide on the spur of the moment to buy a ticket and with all likelihood, have a virtual seat.
A Wisconsin’s Own short documentary about Harold Betthauser, an auctioneer in Milwaukee for more than 50 years. A must for lovers of local color and estate sales. It’s paired with The Passing On, a documentary about Black-owned funeral parlors. If you liked Six Feet Under, this one will be right up your alley.
cinematography by John Harrison and Tim Grant
A still from "The Passing On," directed by Nathan Clarke, a 2021 Wisconsin Film Festival Wisconsin's Own selection.
The Club of Ugly Children combines the look of that 1984-ish Apple Macintosh commercial with overtones of Hitler, Black Mirror episodes and The Handmaid’s Tale for a scary, stylish thriller from the Netherlands. Here, unattractive children are “rounded up and taken away,” but Paul, the hero, escapes to a band of dissidents — attractive children who’ve become politicized.
This drama may play more like a documentary. Here art and politics go hand-in-hand with the practicalities of everyday life. It’s an inventive look at communal living in a co-operative African American-centric house in Philadelphia, and it does build on the tragic history of Philly’s MOVE Black separatist movement.
American viewers might remember Riz Ahmed from The Night Of, a 2016 HBO miniseries that was gripping but even so didn’t quite do justice to Ahmed’s riveting screen presence. Here, he is co-writer, producer and actor in a drama that also draws on his skills as a rapper. His British-Pakistani character discovers he is afflicted with an autoimmune disorder and goes to visit his family in London, where he also grapples with racism and the legacy of British colonialism.
In the tradition of documentaries that open a door to worlds you never dreamed existed, My Darling Supermarket from Brazil looks to be the most fascinating grocery store film since Ready, Set, Bag! (also a Wisconsin Film Fest alum). This is a good one for enthusiasts of works that examine how ordinary people find meaning in what seem to be mundane tasks.
Fans of American Players Theatre in Spring Green will appreciate the appearance of APT star James DeVita and fellow player Marcus Truschinski, in this narrative that takes place at night in a graveyard (shades of Hamlet and Horatio). It’s paired with Ringolevio, a drama directed by Milwaukee-based artist/poet Kristin Peterson, in which a woman and her girlfriend head up north to meet her three brothers.
This is the fest’s urgent political documentary in the vein of prior years’ RBG and Knock Down the House. It focuses on a 1997 Wisconsin law, the “Unborn Child Protection Act” that protects a fetus in the instance of alcohol and drug abuse by the parent. This is the story of one pregnant woman who confessed her previous drug use to her doctor.
Anders Nienstaedt
"A Sad Story About a Tree" is a Wisconsin's Own short by recent UW-Madison MFA Anders Nienstaedt.
This short film from Isthmus contributor and UW-Madison MFA grad Anders Nienstaedt is a personal retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Fir Tree.” In style it may remind viewers of HBO’s quirky How To with John Wilson. It’s part of a screening of seven Wisconsin shorts called “Do Not Adjust Your Sets.”
Fans of the spelling bee documentary Spellbound from 2002 will probably be on board with this good-hearted documentary about so-called “model minority” Asian high schoolers trying to get into Ivy League and other top colleges; the students must deal with the stereotypes that affect their admission as well as the mercurial admission process itself.
A multi-generational drama that’s set in India, this film comes from a 23-year-old writer and director, Achal Mishra. It is a slow and thought-provoking look at a rural community that is losing ground to the 21st century. The cinematography will transport you.
A Wisconsin’s Own documentary focuses on the “underground” subset of Jehovah’s Witnesses who are also punk rockers, and the tension between artistic freedom and the constraints of the religion. Shown with the narrative short Scars.
We love a good journalism movie, from Page One to Obit on the documentary side and All the President’s Men to Spotlight on the drama side. This film documents a group of low-caste Dalit women in India who, smartphones in hand, head out to create a news site that speaks truth to power.
