Working Man's Death / Cinema Transmigration

The last film I got to see at the SFIFF was WorkingMan's Death, by Michael Glawogger, this year's winner of the Golden Gate Award for Documentary Feature. In a similar vein as Herzog, this filmmaker plumbs the depths of what the world offers for extraordinary images and contexts in its grimiest and most surreal corners. Though in a different approach, he does not so much extract or construct meanings or dig around into questions about human nature, but rather by pure immersion lets the scenes speak for themselves, and they speak volumes ! At the Q+A , there were comparisons with the work of Brazillian photographer Sebastiao Salgado, though Glawogger was quick to cut the similarities short, because the film medium goes elsewhere, is another experience. But similarities and differences here are of prime importance to extrapolate, not regarding medium but impact. When I asked him if he ever brainstorms on how he could acheive the "Next Level" with the power of film, i.e.: How might the work be utilized to improve the conditions of the regions he visits? He threw up his hands and laughed, " If I made a film with pamphlets, the audience would not be here."

Sitting in a full house at the SFIFF having just absorbed 5 bleak chapters of what might be considered hell on earth. Well, 6 chapters in all , but the last is an epilogue and a bit of a chuckle about how a factory in Duisburg has been transformed into an amusement park, as if hope would entail some banishment to boredom. From the slaughter yard of Port Harcourt, Nigeria to the coal mines of Donbass, Ukraine, why the audience Was here, IS an interesting and enigmatic question to ponder. In fact it was a precious clue to themes I wanted to investigate for my Indybay.org festival overview. Arts and Activism. Spectacle and Mission. Humanitarian Triumphs and Entertainment Overdose. Virtual Escape and Hardcore Praxis. And it was in fact a bizarre phenomemon that this film was so well attended. Glawogger himself seemed amazed. But what exactly are we doing here peering into these human crevices whilst ... eating popcorn ?! ( warning : Not Recommended for this film... and vegans beware ! )

Glawogger's reply rang both true and false. The artworld can be a kind of magic bullet, and cinema in particular has a kind of limitless cache, to enter lives, to scar and/or ornament our memories, to contemplate unkown paths and characters. And Salgado is one of an extra-terrestrial kind, who has become one of the world's most famous photographer's that went much much further than coffee table books by founding InstitutoTerra, which grapples with the rapid deforestation of the Amazon basin, by reversing the desertization of a small region of the Atlantic forest. And I just read about his most recent work to document and publicize a global campaign to eradicate poliomyelitis, a disease that has been practically eradicated from the industrialized countries but which keeps maiming and killing thousands of children and adults in developing nations. This has no adverse effect on his artworld popularity, except for the consequence of a kind of graduation/migration from the school and the arena of Art to a theater of ACTION. And a Salgado gallery may no longer be a gallery; It's an emergency room !

On his site, Salgado asks, "Are we condemned to be largely spectators? Can we affect the course of events? Can we claim 'compassion fatigue' when we show no sign of consumption fatigue?"

One audience member rather acidicly confronted the Austrian filmmaker, questioning whether he is merely aestheticizing misery. It was an awkward attack, but still a poignant topic, that has come up even in regard to Salgado. Glawogger amicably defused the antagonism and revealed his intentions pretty candidly and with a tilted sense of humor. He's a bit Guy Maddin in the doc department , straying beyond "national geographics" to expose the odd parts of humanity and travelling to the heart of precarity to befriend the very real people he visits, proof of which lies in the intimacy of his footage. And already, it is a humanitarian feat to reveal these lives in the shadows.

Still, looking at the big picture, this entire spectacle of 227 films (97 features and 130 shorts) from 41 countries, a festival now heading towards its 50th grand year like a space shuttle hurdling towards new frontiers, begs the question; What innovations and what payloads shall we return to the earth that harbours such dark and luminous realms for Real ?!! Our screens have been filled to the brim and next level Acts will be the new maps that the great pioneers will be bringing with them, not as an evolution of mere cinema, but artists who create and play superhuman roles and societies that respond with more than just a naked, transfixed eye.

Note: Workingman's Death is now playing the Roxie until May 11th ;
Support your local cinema's going the xtra mile all year round !!