Hangin' in the Hamptons

It's a dark drama in a foreign language with no familiar stars, but “Troubled Water” became the toast of the Hamptons International Film Festival this year, winning both the Audience Award and Golden Starfish Award for narrative feature. And on Sunday night, even as most festivalgoers were heading home or partying at the nearby Bamboo Restaurant, the film screened at the UA Cinema in East Hampton to a decent-size audience who came to see this “runaway hit,” as David Nugent called it in his introduction.

The Norwegian-Swedish production, which also won a critics' award at Cannes earlier this year, proved to be a gripping and emotionally harrowing film. It follows Thomas, a young man convicted of killing a four-year-old boy. Released from prison, where he's learned to play organ in the chapel, Thomas takes a job as a church organist in the same small town where his crime took place, hoping to start a new life.

And he does, almost. He meets a woman with a young boy of her own. He also encounters the mother of his own victim. And eventually he'll face a moment of truth.

Employing multiple vantage points and toggling cleverly between past and present, director Erik Poppe (who attended the festival and accepted his awards in halting English) weaves a complicated story that unfolds partly like a mystery and partly like a drama of redemption. Adding to the emotional power are the unusual, dramatic organ pieces played by Thomas – a rare case of truly effective movie music.

Poppe noted at the awards ceremony that the film has been playing for several weeks in Norway. “Troubled Water” certainly deserves a release here, especially now that at least one sample of American audiences has given it a vote of confidence.

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Frances McDormand took several shots at Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, comparing her to Marge Gunderson, the farcical small-town police chief the actress played in the movie "Fargo."

"Marge Gunderson is a fictional character," McDormand said to cheers and applause at the sold-out Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor, "and so is Sarah Palin."

In an hourlong conversation with film critic Elvis Mitchell -- one of the hottest tickets of this week's 16th annual Hamptons International Film Festival -- McDormand zinged the Republican party and laughed about a recent YouTube clip in which a goofily grinning Gunderson appears to interview a nervously babbling Palin. She also noted that the original script of "Fargo" had called for McDormand's character to attend an anti-abortion rally.

"We always found her scary," McDormand said. "Her world is so, so small. There's wonderful things about Marge, but they don't stand apart from her insular idea of the world."

But McDormand, a Yale-trained stage actress who's become best-known for daffy roles in comedies like "Raising Arizona" and "Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day," also spoke about her career and offered a few surprising revelations. Dressed casually in jeans and a rumpled blouse, McDormand frankly admitted that she disliked her latest role as the ditsy Linda Litzke in the Coen Brothers' latest, "Burn After Reading."

"I didn't enjoy it, I didn't enjoy playing the character, I didn't enjoy seeing the character," she said, partly because she's been trying for years to play more flamboyant, action-oriented, even villainous characters like the one she played in the poorly received sci-fi flick "AEon Flux."

"I want to do big, theatrical action movies," the actress said, drawing chuckles from the audience. "Why are you laughing?"

The event marked a day that served as the height of the festival. Amy Redford (daughter of Robert) spoke to reporters at the Hunting Inn in East Hampton about her directorial debut "The Guitar"; director Rian Johnson, in town to support his upcoming release "The Brothers Bloom," starring Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo and Rachel Weisz, visited the popular restaurant Nichol's; and a screening of the documentary "Dominick Dunne: After The Party" included an appearance by the author.

The festival ends Sunday night with an awards ceremony, a reception at the Bamboo Restaurant in East Hampton and an after-party at the Amagansett nightclub Stephen Talkhouse. -- Rafer Guzman

Photo: J. Conrad Williams Jr.

The final lap includes:

12:00 p.m. -- Festival award-winners announced. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

1:30 p.m. -- “The End of America.” In this documentary, author Naomi Wolf argues that the U.S. is devolving away from democracy while touring with her latest book. Southampton Regal Cinema.

3:00 p.m. -- “Dunya and Desie.” Two teen girls – one a reserved Muslim, the other a promiscuous Dutch native – take a road trip. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

5:00 p.m. -- “Werther.” A film adaptation of the dangerously influential Goethe classic. In German, of course. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

8:00 p.m. -- Screenings of the festival's narrative feature winner and documentary winner. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

9:00 p.m. -- Screening of the winner of the “Conflict & Resolution” program, which focuses on global affairs and crises. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Never one to miss an event, author Dominick Dunne showed up to the U.S. premiere of the documentary “Dominick Dunne: After the Party” at the UA Cinema in East Hampton, marking one of the few times during the festival that the theater remained packed for the post-screening Q&A.

No matter what you think of Dunne – who as he nears his 83rd birthday this month continues to draw fire and praise alike -- he lays forth a brutally honest and clear-eyed assessment of his life and times in the film. With few ellipses, Dunne describes his abusive childhood, the social climbing that wrecked his marriage and the devastating event that finally turned him into a crime author, his daughter's murder. Filmmakers Kristy de Garis and Timothy Jolley (an Australian pair who married earlier this month) secured interviews from Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, sister-in-law Joanne Didion and son Griffin Dunne, but in the end it's the subject himself who best describes how he came to be who he is.

“I had to admit, I cried a lot,” Dunne said after the screening, referring to the first time he saw the film. “It really shows my life completely, the fakery of the early me,” he added. “And I'm not embarrassed a bit.”

Answering questions from the audience, Dunne addressed the recent O.J. Simpson case, calling it “a cheesy, cheap crime,” and noting that he followed the recent trial in Las Vegas.

“I got to talk to O.J. this time,” Dunne said. “I always got to court early, and so did he. I found him to be a very lonely man. He would talk to me about his children. He'd say, 'Dominick! Sidney is at Boston College, and she's number one in her class!' I saw a whole different part of him. And then I thought to myself, 'Don't get conned. Remember the picture of Nicole's head.'”

Dunne, who's become a celebrity by writing about celebrities, also professed bafflement over another meta-celebrity of the day: “I am utterly confused by Paris Hilton,” he said. “I don't know how she got this fame. That's real fame she has.”

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Saturday's highlights:

11:30 a.m. -- “A President to Remember.” Documentarian Robert Drew continues his series of films on JFK with help from cinematographers D.A. Pennebaker and Albert Maysles. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

2:00 p.m. -- Frances McDormand holds a Q&A session moderated by film critic Elvis Mitchell. Bay Street Theatre, Sag Harbor.

4:30 p.m. -- “Sugar.” The new drama from “Half Nelson” co-directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck focuses on a Dominican baseball player who comes to America's minor leagues. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

6:30 p.m. -- “The Guitar.” Directed by Amy Redford (yes, that Redford), this indie feature follows a young woman diagnosed with a terminal illness who decides to make the most of her time. Southampton Regal Cinema.

9:30 p.m. -- “Sleep Dealer.” This film, about a futuristic Mexico filled with virtual day-laborers, sounds intriguing if nothing else. Southampton Regal Cinema.

One day, five films:

First up was “Four Seasons Lodge,” a poignant look at one of the last Catskill “colonies” -- resorts purchased by holocaust survivors who vacation with each other in lieu of the families they lost during the reign of the Third Reich. Directed by New York Times staffer Andrew Jacobs, the film avoids the usual somber testimonials: These aged men and women (some from Long Island) sit and play cards while chatting absently about Auschwitz, Mengele and cannibalism.

Comparatively, the subject of Kevin Rafferty's documentary “Harvard Beats Yale 29-29” -- which held its U.S. premiere at the festival -- might seem a little trivial: How much can we care about a 1968 football game between two elitist private colleges? But Rafferty, who said after the screening that he interviewed all but 3 of the 64 players involved (the legendary Calvin Hill declined), ends up telling a nail-biting sports story highlighted by personal stories, famous faces (Tommy Lee Jones, a Harvard player, pontificates on the game as if delivering one of his doleful performances) and the backdrop of the tumultuous '60s.

“Herb and Dorothy” had its New York premiere at the festival, and it proved to be an utterly charming documentary about the Vogels, a husband-and-wife duo who used their modest salaries – he was a postal clerk, she a librarian – to amass a priceless collection of conceptual and minimalist art in their rent-controlled apartment in Manhattan. Chuck Close, Robert Mangold and Christo and Jeanne-Claude all explain how this eccentric couple came to join the ranks of the kabillionaires who typically dominate the art-collecting world; the film ends with their names engraved at the top of a list of donors to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The couple appeared afterward to answer only a few questions (Herb's health appears to have worsened since the film's completion) and received one of the warmest rounds of applause at the festival so far.

The “big” movies of the evening included “The Brothers Bloom,” an almost unclassifiable con-man comedy-drama from Rian Johnson, the director of the cult indie hit “Brick.” Starring Adrien Brody and Mark Ruffalo as a pair of con-artist brothers, and Rachel Weisz as their final mark, the film is full of delightful flourishes: fanciful lighting, broad comedy, heightened symbolism, dialogue that rhymes. Though the film can't quite keep up with itself all the way to the end, Johnson seems to be turning into a great stylist and a distinctive director.

The night's main event was “The Wrestler,” the much buzzed-about film from Darren Aronofsky starring Mickey Rourke as a has-been pro wrestler and Marisa Tomei as a stripper who's also past her prime. The Oscar talk around Rourke isn't undeserved: As Randy “The Ram” Robinson, he looks like a rotten carcass of beef but radiates an irresistible warmth and a sense of vulnerability.

But Tomei's performance is equally brave: For once, an actress plays a stripper who actually strips, baring everything and striking the obscene poses that the job requires. Like Rourke, she's depending on a body that's letting her down, and you can see the knowledge creeping into her still-beautiful face. It's a terrific film, but not a feel-good one, and it will be interesting to see how audiences react when it's released in December.

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Some ambitious plans for Friday:

12:00 p.m. -- "Four Seasons Lodge." New York Times writer Andrew Jacobs directs this documentary about a group of holocaust survivors (some of them Long Islanders) who have been vacationing together in the Catskills for decades. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

1:30 p.m. -- "Harvard Beats Yale, 29-29." Former Harvard footballer Tommy Lee Jones stars in this documentary about a momentous game between the two Ivy League schools.

4:30 p.m. -- "Herb and Dorothy." In their rent-controlled Manhattan apartment, depending only on their salaries as a librarian and postal worker, the Vogels have amassed perhaps the world's largest private collection of minimalist and conceptual art. Japanese documentarian Megumi Sasaki directs. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

7:00 p.m. -- "The Brothers Bloom." Show up around 6:45 to see director Rian Johnson make his arrival to a screening of his new film about two con-men (Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo) and their target (Rachel Weisz). UA Cinema, East Hampton.

9:30 p.m. -- "The Wrestler." The first festival showing of the movie that already has some picking Mickey Rourke for an Oscar. UA Cinema, East Hampton.

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Actor-director Giancarlo Esposito didn't stick to the script when he spoke after Thursday night's showing of his race-themed film “Gospel Hill” at the UA Cinema in East Hampton. The film's impressive ensemble cast includes Julia Stiles, Danny Glover, Angela Bassett, Taylor Kitsch (of “Friday Night Lights”), Nia Long, rapper The RZA and Esposito himself as residents of a small southern town still reeling from the murder of a civil rights leader (Samuel L. Jackson) during the chaotic 1960s.

Instead of simply touting the film and thanking everyone involved, Eposito – who has been pushing the indie film at festivals around the country -- revealed Samuel L. Jackson's asking price, teased Julia Stiles about her reluctance to star in another movie with “a black storyline” and casually called Spike Lee “a racist.”

Esposito said he had considered Jackson for a larger part, but the film's $3 million budget couldn't accommodate Jackson's $5 million asking price. What's more, when Jackson works on a movie, “he likes to play golf a lot and fly around to different locations and make a lot of money,” Esposito said, laughing. Instead, Jackson's scenes were filmed in two days on a Los Angeles backlot.

Stiles, who plays a new arrival to the town, was originally concerned that the film might typecast her as doing “only black movies,” Esposito said. “She told me she'd already done a movie with a black storyline. I said, 'This isn't the dancing movie, Julia. This is a serious film.'”

Esposito described “Gospel Hill” as a film that encourages people to cross racial divides and “start treating each other like human beings again.” He also related a conversation he had with Spike Lee, a filmmaker who often takes a more confrontational approach to race.

“I said, 'Spike, you're a racist. That doesn't mean I don't love you,'” Esposito said. “'You're taking all the anger and hatred that's in you and taking it out on white people. That's racist. That's wrong.”

PHOTO: HamptonsFilmFest.org

Among the highlights for Thursday:

3:00 p.m. -- Q&A with Jacqueline Bisset, moderated by Alec Baldwin. Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor.

5:30 p.m. -- "Troubled Water." A Northern European drama about an ex-con who served time for the murder of a young boy and has put his past behind him -- until another young boy goes missing. UA Theater, East Hampton.

6:00 p.m. -- "Slumdog Millionaire." British director Danny Boyle goes to India for this story of a call-center worker who wins a television game show. Ross School, East Hampton.

7:00 p.m. -- "Haze." Director Pete Schuermann, of Syosset, explores college binge-drinking in this documentary. UA Theater, East Hampton.

8:30 p.m. -- "Two Lovers." Dry-cleaning heir Joaquin Phoenix steps outside the box when he starts dating a beautiful but troubled Gwyneth Paltrow. Southampton Regal Cinema.

10:00 p.m. -- "Black Ice." An online affair leads to a double-identity revenge plot in this Finnish/German thriller. UA Theater, East Hampton.

Last night's opening film, "Valentino: The Last Emperor," a look into the creative process and fabulous lifestyle of haute couture designer Valentino Garavani, only delicately touched on the man's decades-long relationship with his business partner, Giancarlo Giammetti. There were moments of emotional tenderness and quasi-marital bickering, but the romance seems implicit rather than explicit.

So at the after-party at Gurney's Inn in Montauk, where festival-goers noshed on meatballs and ordered four drinks at a time from the open bar, I caught up with "Valentino" director Matt Tyrnauer. A Special Correspondent for Vanity Fair, Tyrnauer has encountered semi-closeted cases before: He once wrote about Siegfried and Roy. After his piece on Valentino ran in Vanity Fair, Tyrnauer said, "there were like 15 Italian papers with the headline: 'Valentino is Gay.' It's like a state secret over there."

Tyrnauer used that piece to develop a relationship with the two men, especially Giammetti, the lesser known figure who has lived in Valentino's shadow since they met in the early 1960s. Often, Tyrnauer said, Giammetti was the one pushing for the film's completion, while Valentino occasionally bristled at the cameras: "'You know who the star of this film is, don't you?'"

For the Hamptons festival, the film marked the first time the organizers opened with a documentary. It showed a commitment to serious filmmaking rather than just studio entertainment -- something that seems important to the fest's new director of programming, David Nugent -- but it also resulted in a fairly empty red carpet: Stars typically only come out when they have a film to promote. With Valentino himself declining to attend the festival, that left only a few semi-famous faces (Judith Giuliani, for instance) for photographers to snap. Next year may be a different story.

(Photo courtesy of Acolyte Films)