Tribeca preview: 'In the Loop' and 'Still Walking'

By Kevin Lally

The eighth annual Tribeca Film Festival, founded by Robert De Niro and his producing partner Jane Rosenthal to help reinvigorate Lower Manhattan after the Sept. 11, 2001attack, opens tomorrow night with the world premiere of Woody Allen's Whatever Works. Allen's return to his native cityaftera movie retreat to London and Barcelona is an appropriate kickoff for this very New York-oriented event, even if L.A. transplant Larry David is the ultra-curmudgeonly mouthpiece for Allen this time out. The comedy, which has the bald, aging David marrying 21-year-old Evan Rachel Wood, may offer some queasy parallels to Allen's personal life, but itsgeneral attitude is that when it comes to romantic relationships...hey, whatever works.

The Tribeca Festival itself has been taking a hard look at what works (and doesn't) and has slimmed down considerably from its past excess of screening choices. The Fest has been criticized for not being selective enough (especially in its programming of low-budget indies), and for being rather too eager to host Hollywood fluff (the Olsen Twins' New York Minute in 2004 being an especially regrettable choice). The jury's still out on whether something like Nia Vardalos' My Life in Ruins, this year's closing night attraction, is festival-worthy, but this edition's trimmer schedule of 85 features (including 45 world premieres) and 46 shorts, seemsto have a healthy ratio of strong and intriguing contenders.

I've already seen two exceptional Tribeca selections, both from IFC Films and both slated for release this summer: In the Loop and Still Walking.

The BBC production In the Loop is one of the most consistently funny films I've seen in years. The feature debut of director and co-writer Armando Iannucci, this droll political satire is an offshoot of an award-winning BBC TV series, "The Thick of It," which centered on a British government minister and his team of wily spin doctors. For the big-screen incarnation, the scope widens to explore the relationship between Britain and the U.S. in the leadup to an unnamed war (think Iraq).

In a radio interview, the incompetent Minister for International Development, Simon Foster (Tom Hollander), declares that war is "unforeseeble," then muddies the waters to a murky shade when he tries to revise his comment in a subsequent encounter with the press, proclaimingthatBritain "must be ready toclimb the mountain of conflict."Before long, Simon becomes a pawn in the campaign of State Department honcho LintonBarwick (David Rasche) to fire up support for an invasion in the Middle East.

The film is a true transatlantic ensemble effort, with great comic opportunities for its entire Brit and U.S. cast. Peter Capaldi (Local Hero) is hilarious as the volatile, profane Director of Communications for the Prime Minister, who takes the seething insult to a new level of artistry. Mimi Kennedy, best known from TV's "Dharma and Greg," shines as a high-powered, liberal-leaning diplomat with major dental problems, and James Gandolfini, Tony Soprano himself, gets to show his comic side as a general skeptical of the push toward war. (Well-read, he calls himself "the Gore Vidal of the Pentagon" until someone notes that Vidal is gay.)

Iannucci's film is partly improvised, which is hard to fathom since the witticisms here seem to flow endlessly. The performances straddle that fine line between the absurd and the utterly credible, giving the impression that this outrageous satire isn't really that far from the awful truth. In the Loop debuts at Tribeca on April 27 and opens in theatres on July 24.

IFC was also smart to acquire Still Walking, the latest film from accomplished Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-Eda (Nobody Knows, After Life). This subtle, poignant and charming drama all takes place in one day, as a 40-year-old art restorer returns for a visit to his elderly parents' home with his new wife, a widow, and her ten-year-old son. The occasion is the 15-year anniversary of the accidental drowning death of his older brother.

Nothing much happens plotwise apart from the tensions revealed within this family of complex and often ornery individuals. Over the course of the film they bicker, make tentative connections, and ultimately reveal the sad distance that will be regretted once the elders are gone forever. Kore-Eda wrote the film in response to the death of his own parents, and there's a refreshing, clear-eyed lack of sentimentality to this portrait that is yet a moving reflection on mortality."We're not normal," one character observes of the family's dysfunction. "These days we're not abnormal," another replies.

Still Walking debuts at Tribeca on April 28 and opens in theatres on August 21.