Ballast

[Boner M]

The striking trailer reminded me of just how much I liked this film. Criticisms of how derivative it is of the Dardennes & Killer of Sheep are admittedly warranted, but I eat up that shit, so who cares. It's being self-distributed by Lance Hammer himself, so keep an eye out.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/independent/ballast/

[NickGlass]

Criticisms of how derivative it is of the Dardennes & Killer of Sheep are admittedly warranted, but I eat up that shit, so who cares.

Gimme, gimme. I'm seeing this next week.

[Boner M]

Quantum of Poor Rural Black Folk

[Raiders]

Lance Hammer's Ballast is elegantly made, and I certainly admire the way Hammer evokes this delta and region through his formal compositions. But I don't like the film, because it seems to almost pat itself on the back for its "ambiguity" as if through non-answers it gives some insight into these characters. In a film like, say, Gus Van Sant's Elephant, ambiguity lends itself to the unnatural, inexplicable horror and the way we messily try to sum up something that is undefinable. But, Hammer's characters are almost window dressing; sullen, archetypal non-entities roaming a well-shot landscape. Trading in the style of the Dardennes, and perhaps more importantly Charles Burnett's Killer of Sheep, Hammer pretends that his respect, or rather his lack on an attempt to really define these characters, is admirable. But, it isn't, and his film suffers from a lack of any focus. For all of Burnett's roaming, unfocused individual moments, he was building a tapestry of a town, each character and setting a piece to the puzzle. Here, the opening images of an empty field and a strange, sudden flock of birds, the film defines its ethereal, temporally uninterested vibe. Where Burnett gave each scene a life of its own and where the fiction felt wholly informed by the non-fiction, here Hammer creates a narrative where individual moments are dropped and left unfulfilled and where for all the naturalistic posturing, the film feels void of almost any interest in the drama of real life.

It presents the standard po-town, indie situations and lets its non-descript characters wallow in an aimless plot, placing the burden on the faces and grace of its non-actors. And, for all its beauty and elegant austerity, I was left with a mood of confusion and irritation as opposed to any sense of emotional depth.

[Boner M]

Ed Gonzraiders. :)

I can't really argue with you on the film's vagueness and lack of definiton since I saw it during a busy festival season which means my recollection of its narrative is sketchy, but the things that have stuck with me - a sense of shattered lives trying to find some sort of equilibrium together, the strong sense of mood and place, the reliance on the faces of its actors to carry the drama - are the kind of essential things that would've stuck with me had the film contained more of the (IMO superfluous) things that you say it needs. I think the motivations behind the film's mere existence are somewhat dubious, and the film seems somewhat opportunistic given Killer of Sheep's recent surprise success and the Dardennes being the cool influence for virtually every indie filmmaker today, but I think those things are irrelevant when the resulting film is so compassionate. Plus, the film has possibly the best sets of bookending shots, and the best non-pro performance (Tara Riggs) I've seen in years. And the cinematographer is named 'Lol'.

Steven Boone wrote a great 'backlashing the backlash' post here that you should read:

http://blog.spout.com/2008/10/24/ballast-backlash-defense/

EDIT: Actually, Boone seems to be more responding to Armond and his criticisms of the film's attitudes to race, which haven't much to do with your review. Still worth reading.