San Diego International Film Festival 2019: Mobsters, Sex Trafficking & Bipolar Comedy

San Diego International Film Festival might not be acknowledged as one of the premier film festivals, but thus far I’ve been thoroughly impressed by the strength and variety of their program running through tomorrow evening. There have been numerous high-profile entries further bolstered by shorts and hidden gems from both the domestic market and abroad. Here’s my first set of capsule reviews to recap.

The Irishman (Martin Scorsese)

The opening moments of Martin Scorsese‘s latest picture caused an almost immediate smile of recognition to come over my face. There it is. An intricate tracking shot taking us down the hallway to the tune of The 5 Satins‘ “In The Still of The Night.” We know this world well. Scorsese does too. Because it’s an instant tie to Goodfellas. In some sense, we are being brought back into that world. Except you might say that The Irishman picks up where the other film left off, filling up its own space, coming to terms with different themes. This is no repeat.

A day ago, if badgered about the film, I would have said it’s about a hitman named Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro) who had ties with the Buffalino crime family (Joe Pesci) and worked in close proximity with teamster Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino). Still, it’s a meditation on so much more. True, I had to take a few moments to get used to a de-aged De Niro – I think it might have been the blue eyes – but I quickly accepted it and fell into the story.

The unsung surprise of the film is the pervasive levels of humor it manages end to end. Everyone is funny. The exchanges get outrageous to fit the larger-than-life characters and situations. It’s the kind of stuff you couldn’t make up if you tried. But the jokes also play as a fine counterpoint to the grim reality of these men and their lifestyles.

The Irishman feels like Martin Scorsese‘s Citizen Kane. I don’t mean it in the sense it’s his greatest film or the greatest film of all time. Rather, in a thematic sense, they are kindred. Yes, Scorsese‘s version is more profane, more violent, yet the end results are very much the same. You have a man with a life crammed full of acclaim, money, and power, whatever, but at the end of the day, what did it get him? He has no one to care about him. All his buddies are gone, and he’s the last of them holding onto secrets that do him no good. It’s all meaningless.

It’s a striking final image. All I could think was, “Oh how the mighty have fallen.” Whether or not any of this mythological story was true or not (as the film seems to validate), what’s leftover is a paltry life. It’s a testament to everything we’ve witnessed thus far that we feel sorry for Sheeran.

Some might be surprised to see how The Irishman also has ties to Scorsese‘s previous picture Silence because in his maturity, the director has been forced to grapple with the existential questions of life. I hope he, De Niro, and company make more films, but if this was it, I would be more than satiated.

Doing Money (Lynsey Miller)

Being based on a true story is almost trite now and yet it also happens to be one of the incisive daggers Doing Money can wield. Our heroine is Ana (Anca Dumitra), a Romanian woman literally kidnapped off the streets of London and subjugated into sex slavery. Her glasses are swiped and her mother threatened, instantly turning our story into a paranoia thriller. The fact the movie feels aesthetically blasé plays into the blurry helplessness of our lead.

The melodramatic beats feel relatively run-of-the-mill until you realize all of this was based on fact and then the ensuing narrative becomes terrifyingly real. Nothing is sanitized in this graphic portrait of the international sex trade as Ana is procured to operate in plain sight within a ring of pop-up brothels.

She and the other girls exist in invisible anonymity and their psychological torment gives way to Stockholm syndrome-induced tunnel vision. All they can see is the horrible situation they’ve been trapped in. There’s no escape. They begin to accept their fate as permanent.

Meanwhile, the police (Allen Leech and Karen Hassan) look to find a definitive way to crack the ring. All they need is one woman brave enough to blow the whistle. The only question is whether or not someone will…

Doing Money is a testament to grit and unwavering determination in the face of unimaginable trauma. It’s also a sobering call-to-arms to eradicate the peddling of millions of enslaved women and girls annually. These are certainly worthy causes to champion. Sadly, in the end, the movie loses its sense of urgency, though our heroine might do just enough to salvage the story. In real life, her actions spurred Parliament into action against modern-day slavery. That in itself is more significant than any dramatization. If anything, it signals change is possible.

Inside the Rain (Aaron Fisher)

Benjamin Glass (Aaron Fisher) is a transfer student to a new college. He’s also bipolar or, as he likes to call it, “recklessly extravagant.” It means he brings a past history, and it winds up getting him saddled with a hearing to consider his expulsion after two purported suicide attempts. It was all a big misunderstanding.

In the wake of these events, he meets the enigmatic beauty Emma (Ellen Toland) as he awkwardly try to drown his sorrows at a strip club. They meet outside when he gets in a fight with some jerks accosting her. From such auspicious beginnings, they enter the big leagues when the pledge of a film project ups the ante of a movie within a movie. She signs on to act in the pet project he plans to use to plead his innocence at the hearing. It’ll be great.

What sets in is relational ambiguity even as Ben continues to drive his parents up the wall and terrorizes his therapist. Inside the Rain is an indie with an acerbic edge, but it’s not totally derailed by these qualities. At its core is a big dorky heart not unlike its protagonist. Where the bark is worse than the bite and the affections run deeper than the volatile showings of animosity.

Likewise, Ben’s frenetic, filterless hurricane of bluntness overwhelm the sloppy character tropes around him including the therapist (a spunky Rosie Perez) who is a thinly-veiled sounding board, useful for continually comic confrontations. Everyone has their own set of charms. There’s the key. They have it in spades.

He fills the spaces in between with escapes out of a hospital with a newfound friend (Rita Raider); he highjacks a Lyft and runs off with his parents’ jar of spare change to fund his film while later dying a valorous death on a paintball field. Fisher does yeoman’s work as writer, director, and emotional center because without him the film would lose its unequivocal vitality. He’s commanding and lovable enough to carry the picture even as the object of his affections, Emma, remains coolly aloof.

The off-kilter but strangely agreeable surf-tinged soundtrack could have been plucked from The Ventures. I’m not sure if the ending is a betrayal so much as it is an indication of our hero, our Odysseus, settling himself down and starting to figure his life out. At any rate, it’s a starting point. I don’t know all the ins and outs, but this is a comedic labor of love offering reward to the viewer who can see through any personality flaws. That’s what life’s about anyways right?

Will you look to watch any of these films when they come out? Let us know in the comments below!