2012 Cinequest (Part 1)

The 2012 Cinequest ran from February 28 to March 11 in San Jose. The primary venues were the Camera 12, San Jose Rep and California Theater.

I racked up over 1,000 miles on my car driving to San Jose on 11 of the 13 days of the festival.

I saw 36 programs. All were feature films; i.e. no short film programs. I saw 17 films at the Camera 12, 11 films at the California and eight at the SJ Rep.

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Old Goats; directed by Taylor Guterson; (2010)
Happy New Year, Grandma!; directed by Telmo Esnal; Basque with subtitles; (2011)
Play; directed by Ruben Östlund; Swedish with subtitles; (2011)
Heavy Girls; directed by Axel Ranisch; German with subtitles; (2011) - Official Website
Sons of Norway; directed by Jens Lien; Norwegian with subtitles; (2011)
L!fe Happens starring Krysten Ritter & Kate Bosworth; with Rachel Bilson; directed by Kat Coiro; (2011) - Official Website
Worth the Weight starring Robbie Kaller & Jillian Leigh; directed by Ryan Sage; (2012)
King Curling starring Atle Antonsen; directed by Ole Endresen; Norwegian with subtitles; (2011)
How I Was Stolen by the Germans; directed by Milos Radivojevic; Serbian and German with subtitles; (2011)
Cheap Fun; directed by Zach Sutherland; (2011)
Salt starring Fele Martínez; directed by Diego Rougier; Spanish with subtitles; (2011) - Official Website
Dave; directed by Eric A. Geadelmann; documentary; (2012)
Faust starring Johannes Zeiler & Anton Adasinsky; directed by Aleksandr Sokurov; German with subtitles; (2011)
Shuffle starring T.J. Thyne & Paula Rhodes; directed by Kurt Kuenne; (2011)
Dorfman starring Sara Rue & Haaz Sleiman; with Elliott Gould; (2011) - Official Website
Forgetting the Girl starring Christopher Denham & Lindsay Beamish & Lindsay Beamish; directed by Nate Taylor; (2012) - Official Website
Beat Down starring Marthe Bernard; directed by Deanne Foley; (2012)
How to Cheat starring Kent Osborne, Amber Sealey & Amanda Street; directed by Amber Sealey; (2011) - Official Website
Children of the Golden Dragon; directed by Bence Miklauzic; Hungarian and Mandarin with subtitles; (2010)
The Good Doctor starring Orlando Bloom; with Rob Morrow & Michael Peña; directed by Lance Daly; (2011) - Official Website
The King; directed by K.V. Anand; Tamil with subtitles; (2011)
The Bully Project aka Bully; directed by Lee Hirsch; documentary; (2011) - Official Website
Let the Bullets Fly starring Chow Yun Fat & Jiang Wen; directed by Jiang Wen; Mandarin & Cantonese with subtitles; (2010)
The Harsh Light of Day; directed by Oliver S. Milburn; (2012) - Official Website
Love, Wrinke Free starring Ash Chandler; directed by Sandeep Mohan; (2011) - Official Website
Touch starring Porter Lynn; directed by Minh Duc Nguyen; Vietnamese & English with subtitles; (2011) - Official Website
Delusions of Grandeur starring Rina Fernandez; directed by Iris Almaraz & Gustavo Ramos; (2012) - Official Website
Detachment starring Adrien Brody and Sami Gayle; with Marcia Gay Harden, James Caan, Christina Hendricks, Lucy Liu, Blythe Danner, William Petersen & Bryan Cranston; directed by Tony Kaye; (2011) - Official Website
The Hunting Season; directed by Yavuz Turgul; Turkish with subtitles; (2010) - Official Website
Five Hours South; directed by Mark Bacci; (2011)
Faust starring Gösta Ekman & Emil Jannings; directed by F.W. Murnau; silent with live accompaniment; (1926)
Mixed Kebab; directed by Guy Lee Thys; Dutch, Turkish & English with subtitles; (2012) - Official Website
Come As You Are; directed by Geoffrey Enthoven; Dutch, French & English with subtitles; (2011) - Official Website
Jason Becker: Not Dead Yet; directed Jesse Vile; documentary; (2012) - Official Website
Sunflower Hour; directed by Aaron Houston; (2011) - Official Website
Code 2600; directed by Jeremy Zerechak; documentary; (2011) - Official Website

Dennis James and Mark Goldstein accompanied Faust . James played the California Theater Wurlitzer and theremin; Goldstein played the Buchla Lightning Wands which are MIDIs (Musical Instrument Digital Interface).

Although I did not see any short film programs, the following short films preceded feature length films.

Heat Wave; directed by Joey Grossfield; 9 minutes; (2011)
Touch; directed by Jane Lanier; 30 minute; (2011)
Education; directed by various; 4 minutes

Heat Wave screened before Forgetting the Girl and Touch before Shuffle. Education was shown before Dave.

To be clear, there was a short film titled Touch and a feature length film titled Touch. The feature length film also screened at the 2012 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.

Also, there were two feature length films titled Faust - the 2011 version directed by Sokurov and the 1926 version by Murnau. I suspect the Faustian theme was tied in to Opera San Jose's production of Faust (April 26 to May 6) at the California Theater.

Speaking of film adaptations, Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage is being performed at the San Jose Rep through April 15. The play was adapted for the big screen last year in Carnage whose pedigree is eye popping. The four lead roles are performed by three Oscar winners (Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet & Christoph Waltz) and an Oscar nominee (John C. Reilly). The film is directed by Oscar winning director (and convicted statutory rapist) Roman Polanski.

I saw Code 2600 on the Encore Day. The program guide listed the short film Mutant preceding the regular screenings but it did not screen before the Encore Day screening.

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I'm exhausted just listing the films I saw. I'll write more about specific films in the next post.