Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.09.2015, Blaðsíða 52

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We take the goo
d old tradition
al
recipes and the
best icelandic

ingredients to
create fun and
tasty food.
Let tradition s
urprise you!
Moooh..!
Baaah..!
...!
Catherine Breillat's recent dreamy ver-
sions of 'Bluebeard' and 'Sleeping Beauty'
are a comp, but Garrone goes far more
baroque. In Salma's tale, she's the barren
queen whose husband (John C. Reilly)
hunts the food that will enable her to bear
an albino prince (whose twin is a pauper);
Vincent Cassel stars as the sexually vora-
cious nobleman who becomes enraptured,
sight unseen, by the voice of a crone who
lives with her equally wrinkly sister; Toby
Jones is the king who seems more inter-
ested in his pet flea than his marriage-
minded daughter (the flea certainly has a
healthier appetite).
These are not fables, in the sense of be-
ing morally instructive (unless “sea mon-
ster hearts are not finger food” counts as
a moral), but the stories all limn mythic
desires (for youth or a child, for love or
sated lust), with an intensity capable of en-
gendering tunnel vision, and considerable
collateral damage. The actors give strong
performances, finding a credible individu-
ality in frankly impossible roles: not Salma
Hayek, so much—her job is to look regal,
act maternal, be fierce; not too much of a
stretch, then—but certainly the strange
doddering whimsicality of Toby Jones
as the sweet-natured but introverted and
flea-obsessed king, and the withered baby
talk of Shirley Henderson as one of the
old peasant sisters. Nor, as evidenced by
the litany of names in the credits, does
Garrone shy away from playing diverse
regional and second-language English ac-
cents off one another. You don't cast John
C. Reilly—with his mashed-potato face
and American accent as flat and cheery
as Iowa—as a medieval king in an adap-
tation of a 17th century Italian fairy tale,
unless incongruity is a goal. 'Tale Of Tales'
thus has the same sort of slightly timeless,
placeless air as some Italian-shot co-pro-
duction from the 60s or 70s, with its cast
of invariably dubbed international stars—
appropriate for versions of fairy tales sub-
sequently adapted by Charles Perrault and
then the Brothers Grimm.
The international flavour is also no-
table in the context of RIFF. In recent
years, the fest's Opening Night film has
had an Icelandic connection: a Sigur Rós
documentary in 2011 (and 2007!); 'Queen
of Montreuil', by the late, sorely missed
Westman Islands-born French filmmaker
Sólveig Anspach (1960-2015), in 2012;
'This Is Sanlitun', by the Beijing-based
Icelander Róbert I. Douglas in 2013; the
Iceland-shot American indie 'Land Ho!'
last year.
There is no such connection for 'Tale
Of Tales'—this year, RIFF’s organizers
have simply gone with a film that played in
the main competition at this year's Cannes
Film Festival, from a filmmaker whose
breakout feature, 2008's 'Gomorrah', has
received the de facto canonization of a
Criterion Collection DVD. Opening with
'Tale Of Tales' probably doesn't mark a sea
change in RIFF’s mission—it's surely just
a matter of what's out there at any given
time (there *is* a notable film with Icelan-
dic ties making the rounds on the fall festi-
val circuit at time of writing, but Universal
has long had Baltasar Kormákur's 'Everest'
locked into a September 18th theatrical re-
lease).
However, it does underscore the festi-
val's greatest ambition: to assemble a line-
up that brings local audiences up to speed,
and Reykjavík up to par, with the best of
international art cinema.
Almost exactly fifteen minutes into the 2015 Reykjavík International Film Festival, Salma
Hayek will eat a sea monster's heart. The 12th annual RIFF opens on September 24 with 'Tale
Of Tales', from the Italian director Matteo Garrone, a loose adaptation of three 17th-century
fairy tales from 'Pentamerone' of Giambattista Basile. This is the oldest surviving written
source for versions of Rapunzel and Cinderella; in Basile's telling of the latter, the fairy god-
mother emerges from a date tree which Cinderella has tended to with a hoe, a golden bucket
and a silken napkin gifted to her by another, different fairy, just to give an idea of the defiantly
retro vibe of the narrative here. Though Garrone makes considerable modifications to three
of Basile's lesser-known tales, and links them loosely by setting them in adjacent, occasionally
overlapping kingdoms, all three maintain a distinctly pre-Disney feel, rendering archetypes
strange with asymmetrical, arbitrary structures and talismanic objects as odd as in the mod-
ern versions, but less familiar; and lining up grotesque beasts and frank sexuality alongside
miraculous shapeshifting and cloistered princesses.
Photo Still provided by RIFF
Words Mark Asch
Bringing Reykjavík Up To Speed, Par
RIFF’s opening fairy tale marks no sea change
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