This year at the Tribeca Film Festival I have been overwhelmed by the quality of their slate. If you've been following my coverage, you'll note that I've been writing outright raves, feeling spoiled for choice and lucky bounding from one fantastic feature to the next. And since even films that were getting mixed reviews (Mr. Jones, Whitewash, G.B.F.) delighted me, I had incredibly high hopes for The Rocket and Hide Your Smiling Faces, which were roundly being dubbed the best of the fest in press lounge debates. Funny enough, I didn't totally agree.
The Rocket is a coming-of-age story set in rural Laos, and has been cleaning up at the festival winning The Founders Award for Best Narrative Feature, Best Actor in a Narrative Feature Film, and the Heineken Audience Award. It's easy to see why, as this captivating drama offers a bittersweet portrait of a jinxed young boy's hardscrabble quest for redemption.
Ahlo is a ten-year-old boy whose very existence is considered a bad omen. The valley where he and his family live is ruled by superstition, among them that twins are trouble. 'One is a blessing; the other a curse,' his grandmother gravely intones upon the birth of Ahlo's stillborn little brother. She insists Ahlo's mother murder him immediately, but instead she secretly buries the dead baby, and declares Ahlo is a twin no more. But when their village is uprooted ten years later to make way for a new hydroelectric dam, his grandmother outs his secret and declares him cursed.
From here Ahlo attempts to break his curse by finding his family a new home complete with fertile farmland. It's a journey that takes him through a landscape that is lush but deadly, seeded with slumbering bombs dropped by Americans long ago. The Rocket's charming fable involves a spunky little girl who befriends Ahlo, her James Brown worshipping uncle, and a make-your-own rocket festival that becomes Ahlo's proving grounds. It's tender and lyrical, involving moments of profound tragedy and scenes of inescapable joy. Gorgeously shot, beautifully performed by mostly nonprofessional actors, and topped off with a winsome and whip-smart protagonist, The Rocket is a total crowd-pleaser, deserving of its wild praise.
The feature film debut of writer-director Daniel Patrick Carbone, Hide Your Smiling Faces received more praise and buzz after every screening. So I went to see it with high hopes, but found myself wondering as the credits rolled what my colleagues found so outstanding. Set in summertime in rural America, this drama focuses on two brothers, Tommy and Eric, as they struggle to comprehend mortality after one of their friends unexpectedly dies. A determined character-driven drama, its narrative is slow as it tracks the boys from pick-up wrestling matches to wanderings through the woods, depicting the pensiveness and occasional out lashing of violence that constitutes their churning grief, anger, and confusion over the death. Carbone puts much of the emotional weight of this story on his young leads' somber countenances. For me, this approach fell flat.
Carbone chooses a subdued tone and performance style, which suits the lazy summer days vibe his pacing suggests and the film's landscape-loving cinematography reveals. In theory, this tone would make the outbursts of violence all the more impactful. But for me, the film felt devoid of emotion, as so much of it depends on the connection to two boys whose expressions are often purposefully blank. Without an emotional tie to its heroes, this movie crawled along, offering little in the way of events, and more meandering and melancholy. It felt aimless and lifeless to me. In the end, I got what Carbone was going for with Hide Your Smiling Faces. I just didn't feel it.
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