March 05--The words came from Edward Hopper, the most evocative storyboard artist who never actually worked in film: "When I don't feel in the mood for painting, I go to the movies for a week or more. I go on a regular movie binge." Reams have been written about Hopper's affinity for the urban landscapes of film noir and its precedent, German Expressionism. His paintings, however, are less about immediate threats to body and soul, or nakedly expressed nightmares, than they are about ordinary people lost in thoughts we're hypnotized into imagining.
Many films have paid homage to Hopper and his work, sometimes slavishly ("Pennies From Heaven"), sometimes indirectly ("Force of Evil" in the '40s, "The Lookout" in the early 21st century). None, though, is quite like "Shirley: Visions of Reality," a fascinating exercise in Hopper worship from Austrian experimental artist Gustav Deutsch. It's one of 61 features showcased in the Gene Siskel Film Center's annual European Union Film Festival, opening Friday.
"Shirley" won't play the EU fest until March 27-28, but in the meantime it'll be a full and varied month on State Street. The coming week brings Hungarian director Kornel Mundruczo's "White God" (7:45 p.m. Wednesday), a popular success at Cannes last year. Frankly allegorical, this weird mashup of "The Birds" and "Benji the Hunted" depicts Europe in the near future as immigration laws have tightened up on mixed-breed dogs, forcing a young girl's former canine friend, now fending for himself on the mean streets, to reckon with the consequences.
The less said about "La Sapienza" (3:30 p.m. March 14, 6 p.m. March 16), the better, though French-American Eugene Green's anti-realist style has its admirers. Visiting Stresa, Switzerland, a disaffected architect (Fabrizio Rongione) and his behavioral analyst wife (Christelle Prot Landman) encounter a frail young woman and her brother. Many first-rate films have been built upon the chance meeting, the accidental instigator; I found "La Sapienza" arid.
Livelier by far, "Eden" (3 p.m. March 29 and 7:30 p.m. April 1) made its North American premiere last year in Toronto and works well as pure, restless atmosphere in the support of characters steeped in music. French director Mia Hansen-Love tells a story of a Parisian student who falls in love with the "garage" subset of the rave DJ culture. We're not in the realm of epoch-making musical stars; rather, "Eden" concerns itself with those who find a medium level of success in their chosen field, then have a hard time maintaining it across the years, and the countries.
Last year at the Venice film festival, many thought the Golden Lion award would go to "Birdman," which made its pre-Oscar season premiere there. Instead the Venice jury went with "A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence," the latest series of wry, mordant living tableaux from Swedish auteur Roy Andersson (8 p.m. March 17).
For reasons with which I'm still wrestling, I found "Pigeon" no less meticulous in its deadpan comic mise-en-scene than Andersson's masterwork, "You, the Living." Yet a first encounter last year at Toronto left me hungry for more. This much is clear: The Hopper examination "Shirley" takes the tableaux conceit all the way in its chosen direction. Writer-director-production designer-editor Deutsch recreates 13 Hopper paintings, chronologically spanning "Hotel Room" (1931) to "Chair Car" (1965). The idea is clever; the women in each painting are imagined to be one woman, played by Stephanie Cumming, whose life runs parallel to the increasingly politicized times she witnesses. She is a Group Theatre actress who takes a menial office job ("Office at Night," 1940) for research purposes. This follows a stint as an usherette ("New York Movie," 1939), during which time she's required to watch the film version of "Dead End," based on the very play we're told she performed on stage.
It's a fanciful invention, though it doesn't always sit easily on the more mysterious qualities of Hopper's paintings. The artist's own life brought him back to familiar locales over and over; nonetheless he managed to see a good bit of the world as he became the artist he was meant to be. The EU festival is also a fine way to see a good bit of the world.
The 18th European Union Film Festival plays Friday-April 2 at the Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State St.; siskelfilmcenter.org.
mjphillips@tribpub.com
