Beyond the Multiplex

There have been so many noteworthy releases over the last couple of weeks (as well as so many noteworthy deaths), that this week's column requires radical measures: A Blurbathon! I've always maintained that writing those little 150-word movie reviews for weekly papers is harder work than blathering on and on in cyberspace, but at least it takes less time. Herewith, in highly subjective descending order, a guide to the best indie films creeping onto the cultural fringes of this overcrowded summer.

"This Is England" I've already raved about Shane Meadows' extraordinary autobiographical film about his misspent skinhead youth after seeing it at the Tribeca Film Festival, and on repeat viewing I think that in its sneaky, subtle way it's one of the year's best movies. (Based on its boffo weekend opening at New York's IFC Center, viewers so far agree.) Young Thomas Turgoose stars as the pudgy, socially inept Shaun, an unhappy kid of 10 or 11 who's adopted first by Woody (Joseph Gilgun), the surprisingly kind leader of a teen skinhead gang, and then by Combo (Stephen Graham), a violent racist just out of prison who supplants Woody as alpha male. Even Combo is never a caricature, though he's clearly dangerous and unbalanced; the affection he feels for the fatherless Shaun is genuine, even if Combo expresses it by taking Shaun to neo-fascist political meetings and encouraging him to terrorize Pakistani shopkeepers. "This Is England" is marvelously acted and depicts its troubled young characters without judging or sugarcoating them. It's one of the simplest and best re-creations of downscale urban England during the gritty post-punk years ever put on screen, and it's both upsetting and very funny. Shaun's scenes with the disastrously made-up proto-Goth girl who becomes his girlfriend (she's several years older and a full foot taller) may make you laugh and cry in the same moment. (Now playing at the IFC Center in New York. Opens Aug. 3 in Los Angeles; Aug. 10 in Boston, Chicago, San Francisco and St. Louis; Aug. 17 in Atlanta, New Orleans and Philadelphia; Aug. 24 in Nashville, Pittsburgh and Portland, Ore.; Aug. 31 in Dallas, Detroit and Indianapolis; and Sept. 7 in Seattle. Also available on many cable TV systems, via IFC In Theaters.)

"Blame It on Fidel" Another remarkable performance from a child actor, this time by Nina Kervel as a precocious 9-year-old Parisian girl whose parents are caught up in the heady left-wing fervor of potential worldwide revolution, circa 1970. Anna's Spanish refugee father (Stefano Accorsi) makes frequent journeys to Chile to work for Salvador Allende's socialist revolution, while her mother (Julie Depardieu, daughter of Gérard) becomes an ardent feminist, collecting case histories of illegal abortion and organizing against France's then-repressive laws on reproduction and contraception. Anna sails through all this ideology with sublime, princess-scale disdain, attending her upper-crust Catholic school, learning to cut fruit with a knife and fork, and viewing the bearded revolutionaries assembled in her parents' kitchen as untrustworthy madmen. This delightful, improbable tale of a family riven (and then reunited) by the tides of global politics is directed by Julie Gavras, daughter of the Greek-born filmmaker Costa-Gavras (of "Z," "State of Siege," etc.), and it's safe to assume she knows something about growing up as the child of distracted leftists (although this film is adapted from a novel by Italian writer Domitilla Calamai). A wrenching, funny and wise little picture, with a diva-like junior star at its center. (Opens Aug. 3 at Cinema Village in New York, with more cities to follow.)

"Summer '04" German director Stefan Krohmer's tale of sun, sand and sex starts off as a witty, Eric Rohmer-esque comedy about a European family suddenly thrown into erotic disorder on their summer vacation, and then halfway through takes a sharp left turn into thriller-ish darkness. There may be something formulaic or deterministic about the film's ultimate direction, but along the way it's quite a ride. Martina Gedeck is tremendous as Mirjam, the unself-consciously sexy, 40ish wife and mom who doesn't even realize she wants more than she's getting from family life. (For about the 755th time, I will observe that American films pretty much never offer middle-aged women these kinds of roles.) At first, Mirjam's problem is Livia (Svea Lohde), the way-way-precocious 12-year-old vixen who is officially her teenage son's girlfriend but starts to go sailing every day with a beefy, cheerful guy named Bill (Robert Seeliger), who happens to be much closer to Mirjam's age than Livia's. Like everybody else in this movie, Bill has depths he doesn't reveal at first, but Mirjam can't figure him out: Is he a dangerous predator, an innocent man-child or a trustworthy father-surrogate? Soon enough, Mirjam finds herself competing for Bill's affections against a 12-year-old, while her husband and son look on, and then a shocking, unexpected event throws the summer further askew. A well-crafted and deceptively leisurely film, with a heart of ice. (Now playing at Film Forum in New York, with wider release to follow.)

Next page: Telling glimpses of Iran, Portugal and New Jersey