Kylie Lewallen in Olivier Wever's piece for L'Edition Française
UPDATE: L’Edition Française is back at the Triple Door this weekend, Thursday May 26 through Saturday May 28. They say they’ve added some new things, so even if you caught the “old” show, you might want to pop in again. Honestly, if you saw the old show, you wanted to pop in again anyway. This burlesque show is eye-popping for its artistry and production value, besides the usual reasons.
Here’s my little thumbnail of the previous encounter:
It was a one-night-only show, so I brought my camera in case you didn’t make it. “L’Edition Française,” for Bastille Day at the Triple Door, presented new work by Lily Verlaine (The Burlesque Nutcracker), Kitten LaRue (The Atomic Bombshells), and Olivier Wevers (Whim W’Him).
The three choreographers dug into the catalogues of artists such as Serge Gainsbourg, Francoise Hardy, France Gall, Brigitte Bardot, and others, to create an evening of burlesque that ranged in tone from the campy music video, to something like “forgotten” orgy scenes from An American in Paris, to sweaty, oiled-up erotica. That, in conjunction with the Triple Door barman conjuring up a Fernet Branca Negroni (out with the Campari, in with the Fernet!) made for a satisfactorily full-figured evening.
SIFF 2011 offers an embarrassment (in more ways than one, ladies and gents) of cultish-schlocky riches. Looking for wild and woolly subversions of established exploitation genres? Or are you just seeking several industrial-strength shots of action, titillation, absurdity, violence, horror, and cheap thrills? Either way, this Dirty Half-Dozen represents what looks like the Fest’s most left-of-center and warped bag of cinema tricks.
Karate Robo-Zaborgar Japanese exploitation auteur Noboru Iguchi scored one of the most enthusiastically-received entries of SIFF 2010 with RoboGeisha (go to ye olde SunBreak archives for a concise assessment). Karate Robo-Zaborgar loosely re-jiggers a joyfully-ridiculous old Japanese Ultraman knock-off, so it’s likely not to be as violence-laden as the director’s other action titles. Still, it’s got the outrageous primary colors, hyperkinetic action, and demented twists on cliche that’ve earned Iguchi a fervent cult following.
Revenge: A Love Story South Korean action flick Yellow Sky’s generating the biggest action-film buzz of SIFF 2011, but this Hong Kong action/exploitation midnighter possesses a grittier, more brutal patina.
The Last Circus It’s a Spanish Civil War allegory; bathed in blood; populated by two hideously-scarred, homicidally-jealous circus clowns; and it’s the recipient of two very public Quentin Tarantino thumbs up in the form of Venice Film Festival jury prizes. No-brainer.
We Are the Night Ah, sexy female vampires doing sexy female vampire things; it’s a noble grindhouse tradition. The metaphoric torch gets passed from Ingrid Pitt to Daughters of Darkness to this Teutonic Lost Boys in drag.
Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame This lavishly-appointed, Tsui Hark-helmed martial arts costume drama is ostensibly a mystery about a forensics genius (Andy Lau), solving murders on the eve of the ascension of China’s first female Emperor. But any movie sporting kung fu, log fu, disembodied-limb fu, and spontaneous combustion definitely edges into cult territory.
The Intruder Like We Are the Night, The Intruder is descended from another beloved drive-in sub-genre: The Batshit-Crazy Killer Animal Movie. A band of disparate characters gets trapped in their apartment complex with a killer cobra or two; or four; or a thousand. Again, no-brainer.
Our Flickr pool's mangpages captured this dental hygiene horror story for us.
Washington Dental Service (part of the Delta Dental family) boasts 2.5 million customers and over $900 million in revenue annually, but the non-profit has also told its dentists to expect 15 percent cuts in reimbursements for procedures as of this June.
“We found that 94¢ of every dollar went to paying dentists, while 6¢ went to internal costs,” claims Ron Inge, DDS, dental director and vice president of professional services for WDS.
Top pay at WDS is reputed to be about $900,00 per year, making it one of the more generously paying non-profits to work for, at least for its executives.
The news had 4,000 Washington dentists grinding their teeth, and penciling out how much dropping WDS-insured clients would cost them.
Combine that pressure with the fact that some 60 percent of Washington residents don’t have dental insurance, and Dr. Dan Marut’s Quality Dental Plan starts looking like a very interesting proposition indeed. Marut–honored as the “Best Dentist in Ashland”–established his Quality Dental Plan in October 2009, and it has two objectives: to get uninsured people to visit the dentist, and to put payments back in the hands of dentists. It’s not a third-party system–each dentist’s office runs their billing, using QDP’s proprietary “back office” set-up.
Patients pay a simple annual membership fee, and in return they get a preventive dental care package. I spoke with Poulsbo’s Jeromy Peterson, DDS, about the details. Peterson says he charges $325 per year (QDP is customizable, so the price varies dentist office by office), and then members receive two teeth cleanings, an annual dental exam and x-ray, and a teeth whitening (that last an in-demand cosmetic procedure not usually covered by insurance). There’s a discounted rate for additional family members.
Members also save 15 percent on any other treatments (cosmetics, implants, orthodontics), with no limit, and no deductible. Contrast that $325 yearly with Washington Dental Services basic individual plan (around $544, with maximum coverage of $1,000), and it’s easy to see the benefits.
Peterson, a 1997 graduate of the University of Washington School of Dentistry, attended the UW on a Navy scholarship, and afterwards put three years in the service, before setting up shop in Poulsbo, where he has 1,200 patients. “They’re typically people who don’t have insurance right now,” he says of his QDP members. “Every single one of my patients who wasn’t insured has signed up for it.”
Peterson is a fan of QDP because it keeps the patient relationship with the dentist–no insurance company steps in between to negotiate what’s covered, at what rate, and at their own speed of reimbursement. He sees big changes coming in Washington’s dental coverage landscape, as other major carriers cut their reimbursements as well.
Premiums, he notes, have yet to reflect all this cost-cutting. “We do have patients who have been moving away to HSAs, or who have dropped their insurance because they don’t use it enough to justify the costs,” he says, and predicts it won’t be long before businesses start to adopt QDP, lured by the fixed cost of the membership. (This is the same reason medical provider Qliance has drawn its business customers.)
If you’re curious, but not near Poulsbo, Dr. Wendy Crisafulli in Bothell and Dr. Lindsay Barry in Kirkland also offer the Quality Dental Plan. Here’s a list of other dentists offering QDP around Washington:
Benson Hill Smiles
Thomas A. Caspers, DDS
Renton, WA www.bensonhillsmiles.com
Randy McLeary, DDS
Bonney Lake, WA
www.bonneylakedentist.com
CE Family Dentistry
Olivia Collier, DDS
Bellingham, WA
www.cefamilydental.com
Banner Family Dental
Drs Lael and Brant Banner
Tumwater, WA
www.bannerfamilydental.com
Aesthetic Dental Center
Van H. Vuong, DDS
Federal Way, WA
www.AestheticDentalCenters.com
While this predictably means lots of chocolate and cheese, as well as waffles, fries, and beer, this food writer has also been feasting on a lot of offal. Most memorable was my first meal of the trip, following a quick train ride from Brussels Airport to Viva M’Boma.
After considerable contemplation of the menu, my partner and I settled on two delicious entrees: a mix of veal kidneys and sweetbreads, as well as pot-au-feu with veal cheeks, oxtail, and marrow. Even better, though, was an appetizer of calf’s brain “meuniere,” served warm with butter and onions.
The seafood’s been great here, though the simplistic preparations make me miss the bold flavors I find in Seattle. So the smart move has been to search menus for dishes like brains, which are sadly lacking in my beloved Seattle.
We’re just under a week into SIFF, with almost three weeks of film festival to go! Be sure to check the SIFF updates page to see which films are already sold out or are selling fast. Individual tickets for most films cost $11 for the public and $9 for SIFF members. Matinees are a bit cheaper ($8/$7) and those who are more willing to commit can consider all sorts of passes still for sale as well as slightly discounted packs of tickets in bundles of 6 or 20.
Young Goethe comes to Everett for a party Thursday night at the Performing Arts Center.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at what SIFF films those of us at The SunBreak saw so far this week as well as the films that we’re most looking forward to seeing over the next couple days. Note that this week marks SIFF’s residency in Everett with a gala presentation of Young Goethe in Love on Thursday night ($25, includes party and film).
WHAT WE SAW:
Josh: My week included a trio of imperfect but interesting films that made use of science fiction premises as an excuse to play out thought experiments, with varying degrees of success. All three ditched (or couldn’t afford) flashy special effects, instead striking contemplatively moody tones, employing muted color palettes, and focusing tightly on a couple of characters.
I think that my favorite of the three was Womb, in which Eva Green’s rekindled romance with a childhood crush is cut tragically short. In whatever future they’re inhabiting on the stormy German shores, though, she has the option of gestating his clone and raising him as a son. The results are predictably creepy, but Hungarian director Benedek Fliegauf doesn’t lose sight of the dark humor potential in his exploration of the taboos at play. Reckless driving is also the catalyst for a moral quandary in Another Earth, in which the surprising appearance of our planet’s twin in the night sky both indirectly induces a tragic accident and serves as a long-shot for redemption. The ever-looming planet increasingly becomes a distraction from would have been an interesting and strongly-acted character study on how (not) to deal with post-prison life by inserting yourself into the survivor of the people you killed. While the main character is working through her issues with ever-questionable behavior, the absence of global terror about the clone Earth wreaking havoc with the tides, the potential for planetary destruction upon their collision, the challenges of interplanetary travel, and the motivations of our only recently desynchronized neighbor loomed. For those determined to see everything at this year’s SIFF with Ewan McGregor and Eva Green, there’s Perfect Sense (final screening today, 4:30 pm at the Egyptian). Set in approximately modern-day Glasgow but infused with dispassionate outside-of-time Galadrielesque narration, it charts the rocky romance between a chef and an epidemiologist who have the misfortune of finally finding each other just as the world’s population is losing its senses one violent episode at a time. That the population would greet the global loss of smell with a “life goes on” attitude was plausible, but as the other senses line up to make their exit without much intervention from the medical establishment it begins increasingly difficult to invest in the syrupy romance in a world where cyanide tablets would be a hot commodity.
Audrey: I liked all three sci-fi lite films (Another Earth, Perfect Sense, and Womb) more than Josh, but that’s due more to lowered expectations than anything else. All three have a strong premise, and sometimes, that’s all it takes–based on a good starting idea alone, these films were granted a little more leeway with their use of allegory and/or “poetics.” Womb in particular imparted several important life lessons: don’t sleep with a dumb mousy girl if you’ve got a Eva Green as your MILF; teach your child/lover early on to love you and only you, but have some simple explanations/lies at the ready; and look both ways before stepping out into the street.
Josh: In less apocalyptic news, there’s the struggle of print newspapers to survive in bad economic conditions and increasing competition. In particular, with Page One: Inside the New York Times Andrew Rossi chose a particularly interesting year to profile the nation’s paper of record. Viewed mostly through the lens of the paper’s Media Desk, this loosely structured documentary begins at the approximate time that several newspapers across the country (including our own Seattle Post-Intelligencer) were closing down or ceasing print operations. From there, we watch as the Times contends with massive layoffs in its own newsroom, WikiLeaks bombshells, and the photo-op end of combat operations in Iraq. Although many staffers are profiled and plenty of talking heads pontificate, the primary narrative follows the cantankerous and charismatic David Carr as he contextualizes the paper’s relevance in the face of emerging trends in social media and investigates the collapse of another old media empire. (today, 7:00 pm @ Neptune; May 28, 11:00 am @ Egyptian; May 30, 3:30 pm @ Everett).
MvB:Honey(all showings past) immerses you in the sights and sounds of a young Turkish boy whose father is a wild beekeeper. It’s part of Semih Kaplanoglu’s “Yusuf” trilogy, and it’s amazing for its recreation of youth’s fascinations and half-understandings, but also a touching portrait of a father-son bond deepened by the father’s epilepsy and the Yusuf’s ferocious stutter. Its leisurely pace derives from the rural lives it chronicles.
Win/Win(May 30, 6:30 p.m. @ the Egyptian; June 1, 4:30 p.m. @ the Neptune; June 10, 7 p.m. @ Kirkland Perf. Ctr.) is filed under Black Comedy and Make Me Laugh, but I can’t say I smiled all that much. It’s mostly an affecting drama from the Netherlands about a young stock analyst with more than a hint of Asperger’s about him, who has a knack for picking winners on the fly. His rise within his firm, contrasted with the the financial sector meltdown and the cut-throat practices of his trade, eventually precipitates a nervous breakdown.
Josh: I also caught the last screening of Microphone, a jumbled hybrid between narrative and documentary that follows a guy who returns to New York to find his long-ago love leaving town. In his ships-in-the-night depression, he floats into the lives of underground bands, street artists, and skaters. Like his attempts to pull together a showcase for their unrecognized talents, the plot doesn’t really go far, but it’s still an interesting glimpse at the streets and attitudes of pre-revolution Egypt and its youth.
FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION:
Wednesday:
You Are Here If director Daniel Cockburn’s debut is as playful and wonderfully strange as his acclaimed video art and short film work, this surrealist feature film should make for a fun journey (9:30 p.m. @ Harvard Exit; tomorrow, 4:30 p.m. @ Harvard Exit)
Steam of Life Spend an hour and a half with men who use the sacred Finnish space of the sauna to spill their emotions. (4:30 p.m. @ SIFF Cinema; also May 26, 7 p.m. @ Egyptian, June 7, 6:30 p.m. @ Admiral)
Page One: Inside the New York Times As mentioned above, highly recommended for news junkies; media reporter and online wunderkind Brian Stelter is scheduled to attend tonight’s screening. (today, 7 p.m. @ Neptune; May 28, 11 a.m. @ Egyptian; May 30, 3:30 p.m. @ Everett)
If A Tree Falls uses archival footage and interviews to re-visit the Earth Liberation Front, their extreme actions (including against the University of Washington), and the government’s prosecution of them under domestic terrorism statues. (7 p.m. @ Harvard Exit; May 29, 6 p.m. @ Kirkland)
Natural Selection arrives in Seattle theaters with Rachel Harris as a Christian housewife hitting the road to track down her sperm-donating husband’s drug-addled ex-convict son. (7 p.m. @ the Egyptian; May 27, 4 p.m. @ the Egyptian)
Silent Souls MvB recommended this melancholic Russian road trip meditation on love, culture, and identity surrounding the funeral rituals of the Merjan for those who want to travel without leaving home. (7:00 p.m. @ Pacific Place; June 12, 6:15 p.m. @ Kirkland)
Outside the Law sounds like Once Upon a Time in America done Algerian–a really exciting prospect from this end. (9 p.m. @ the Admiral)
Apart Together in this family drama, lovers separated in 1947 by China’s civil war reunite and an invitation to relocate from Shanghai to Taiwan proves complicated. (9:30 p.m. @ SIFF Cinema)
Treatment, Sean Nelson's debut as co-director & writer, screens on Thursday.
Thursday:
Backyard a concert documentary set in, you guessed it, a Reykjavik backyard where pizza, pancakes, and a few flyers lead some of Iceland’s brightest talents. No Sigur Rós, but at least Mùm turns up. (4 p.m. @ Neptune; May 29, 8:30 p.m. @ Admiral)
Pinoy Sunday factory workers try to smuggle a shiny red couch from the street to their rooftop. (4:30 p.m. @ Pacific Place)
The Thief of Baghdad The 1924 Thief of Bagdad is an antiquated but pretty terrific 1924 adventure, and if the Re-Imagined graft of ELO songs to the film takes, this could be a kick and three-quarters. (7 p.m. @ Neptune)
Treatment Local superhero Sean Nelson (actor, musician, former flagpole sitter) makes his debut as a feature film screenwriter and co-director with this story or a clueless filmmaker, his long-suffering best friend, and their scheme to cast an A-list celebrity in their movie by following him into a posh rehab facility under false pretenses. (9:30 pm @ Egyptian; May 28, 11 a.m. @ Neptune)
Nuummioq Another shot at Greenland’s first narrative feature film. (9 p.m. @ the Admiral)
John Carpenter’s The Ward Tony deemed this locally-filmed horror “not half bad.” (9:30 p.m. @ the Neptune)
Patients pay a simple annual membership fee, and in return they get a preventive dental care package. I spoke with Poulsbo’s Jeromy Peterson, DDS, about the details. Peterson says he charges $325 per year (QDP is customizable, so the price varies dentist office by office), and then members receive two teeth cleanings, an annual dental exam and x-ray, and a teeth whitening (that last an in-demand cosmetic procedure not usually covered by insurance). There’s a discounted rate for additional family members.
