On Friday night, the AMC Palace was a vibrant hub of activity, as the Lone Star Film Festival entered its third day. Outside the ground-floor theater, dozens lined-up to see Rampart, the Woody Harrelson drama that’s been earning a great deal of buzz for the actor’s performance.
Later on in the lobby, 79-year-old Piper Laurie was signing copies of her new autobiography, prior to a screening of Carrie, the classic horror film that earned her a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination in 1977.
In its fifth year, the festival truly feels like a major cultural event – no easy feat in a city that can sometimes be finicky and move on when something loses the luster of the "new thing."
I was hoping to have nicer things to say about Rampart, which has generally received favorable notices since its world-premiere in September at the Toronto Film Festival. (It will have an Oscar qualifying commercial run in New York and Los Angeles in December and then open nationwide in January.) Harrelson plays a resolutely corrupt cop in Los Angeles in the early 1990s, dealing with a series of problems at work and at home.
It’s based on a story by crime novelist James Ellroy, and directed by the gifted newcomer Oren Moverman (The Messenger), but every moment struck me as false and unnecessarily flashy. The characters behave according to the screenwriters’ dictates, not how any person in the real world might; the visual style – jump cuts and swooping pans and rain artfully pouring in the night – is pretentious and endlessly distracting.
As for Harrelson’s performance, it’s certainly a committed, entertainingly foul piece of work – his character murders innocent people, bribes anyone he can, and occasionally sucks women’s toes – but after awhile I felt like I was watching a stunt: “Look at how nasty Mr. Nice Guy can be.”
Saturday's highlights are expected to include the French silent comedy, The Artist, the thriller We Need to Talk About Kevin, based on Lionel Shriver’s bestselling novel, and Butter, a politically-themed satire starring Jennifer Garner and set in the world of butter carving competitions.
The festival wraps up Sunday evening with a screening of Dee Rees’ affecting and intimate drama Pariah, about an African-American teenager in Brooklyn coming to terms with her sexuality. It premiered earlier this year at Sundance, where I thought it was one of the strongest titles in the line-up.
For schedule and ticket information, go to www.lsiff.com
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