AIFF 2009 - Natalie Eleftheriadis and James Harkness Celebrate "Birthday"

Hipsters was stunning.  Then Bomber took us for a quietly brilliant road trip into family relationships.  And Monday night, Birthday seemed to eliminate the medium altogether absorbing us into the lives of a few Australian sex workers and their clients.

This was an intimate film.  We saw characters alone in their rooms physically and emotionally naked.  Their faces filled the screen.  Sometimes in duplicate as they examined themselves in the mirror.   Somehow, the camera took us right through their skin into their souls. There was no place to hide, for the characters or the audience.  We were right there in the middle of it as the characters exposed themselves.

We didn't just watch them.  We lived their lives with them for the 104 minutes of the film.  By the end of the film it felt like I had known each of the characters for years.  The actors simply disappeared into the characters.  Natalie Eleftheriadis was M.  Richard Wilson was Joey, an incredibly nuanced character.  There was no cast, the characters seemed to play themselves. 

This film plays again Saturday at 10:15pm at the Bear Tooth.  So, if you missed Hipsters too, you can see a double feature Saturday night starting with the giant cast and loud, busy backdrop of Moscow at 8pm then move to the intimacy of the almost completely interior brothel and church scenes of Birthday.  (Photo from the Birthday website.)

 

I'm guessing we got this world premiere of the film Birthday, in which two of the characters have birthdays, here in Anchorage partly because Monday was also director James Harkness' birthday.  I'll stop here and let you listen to  James Harkness and Natalie Eleftheriadis tell you about the film themselves.   (The silhouette is not some hot new film style, just the necessity in the dark Bear Tooth.  You see it more or less the way we saw it.  With the occasional flash.)

Here's your study question for the video.  Who said,  "I hate being a lawyer, I'd really like to go back to being a sex worker"?



I started, last night, to rant about why this wasn't listed among the films in competition.  But I decided to check with Tony Sheppard, the feature film programmer, first.  I got an email back this morning saying Birthday is, in fact, in competition.  I've updated my Features in Competition post and linked it to here. 

[No, I'm not paid by the Festival - except for a media pass.  We've just had some amazing films.  And maybe if I see the film a few more times I'll find some flaws, but I'll probably find more to praise as well.]

[Update,  2pm:  As someone concerned about intimate partner violence who has identified other films in the festival dealing with human trafficking, I probably needed to comment on the portrayal of sex workers in this film.  I'm not an expert in this area, maybe slightly more informed than the average person.  The film makers, in the video, say they visited many brothels and talked to many of the workers.  They would have a better sense than I about what the lives of these women are like.  My sense is that there are sex workers and then there are sex workers.  The brothel in the movie shows large, lushly furnished rooms, including nice, en suite bathrooms with full shower/bath.  The clients were charged something like Aus$300 for half an hour.  I'm willing to accept the filmmakers' word that the image portrayed in this film is accurate concerning this particular brothel.  But it is important to also note that many sex workers are in much different conditions, tricked into the trade, and virtual slaves against their will.  Probably going to see the documentary Playground (Wednesday, Dec. 9 - tomorrow as I write - at 5:45pm at Alaska Experience Theater)  would be an important contrast the way sex workers are portrayed in Birthday.]