Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Film

Indie Flicks: In the grip of suspense

By PHILIP BOOTH
Published August 4, 2005

	[ThinkFilm
	Kontroll

Kontroll (R) (108 min.) Why does Kontroll, a combination of dark comedy and foreboding thriller, make a filmgoer feel a little uncomfortable, as if the walls are closing in?

It's because the entire movie, directed by rookie Hungarian filmmaker Nimrod Antal, is set underground, in the Budapest subway system, desperately crowded during the day but spooky after-hours. Antal proceeds to drag viewers ever deeper into the bowels of the grimy, dirty place.

Kontroll focuses on a quirky group of ticket inspectors, work-numbed, generally unkempt and socially disadvantaged slobs whose job is to make sure riders pay their fares.

Bulscu (Sandor Csanyi), a strong, silent type with a mysterious past, eventually emerges as the protagonist, a man who has come to prefer his dark, underground existence to a different kind of life in ground-level sunshine. Bulscu, initially little more than a wandering rebel, is a sympathetic character, if not entirely likable. He soon finds a cause: his personal mission to track down a serial killer who slays his victims by pushing them in front of oncoming trains.

His strange, sometimes creepy journey includes a homey midnight dinner aboard a train with a conductor who once captained above-ground trains, and several encounters with a cute if eccentric woman (Eszter Balla) who travels around in a bear costume. The long night's journey into day concludes with a thrilling life-or-death chase scene that resembles a race across a Dante-esque hell with a villain whose hooded getup is meant to suggest the Grim Reaper.

Kontroll opens with the sort of antic that Alfred Hitchcock liked to pull on audiences: A man allegedly representing the Budapest Public Transport Company looks into the camera and delivers a statement that suggests the story we're about to see is "obviously symbolic" and not meant to reflect poorly on the real-life transit system, one of the world's oldest.

Antal, although an entirely different kind of director, displays a seemingly intuitive feel for the kind of smarts, offbeat humor and nerve-jangling suspense that Hitchcock would have appreciated. B+

- PHILIP BOOTH, Times correspondent

Saint Ralph (PG-13) (98 min.) What's a girl-crazy (if inexperienced) red-blooded Canadian teenager to do when his sexual obsession leads to an embarrassing incident in the swimming pool at his Catholic school, circa 1954? Why, become a surprisingly competitive runner, and land a shot at winning the Boston Marathon.

That's the fate of the title character (Adam Butcher) in Saint Ralph, an offbeat period piece that handily fulfills its modest ambitions as a diverting blend of comedy and drama. Alternately poignant and quite funny, it's an impressive second feature from Canadian filmmaker Michael McGowan.

Ralph, brought to life in a winning performance by big-screen newcomer Butcher, is the sort of overconfident fellow who slyly compliments a school secretary on her clothing (shades of Eddie Haskell) but demonstrates a genuine devotion to his mother (Shauna McDonald), a bedridden cancer patient who slips into a coma.

As punishment for the incident at the pool, Ralph is forced to join the cross-country team, and somehow concludes that an athletic miracle - first place in the Boston Marathon - will translate into a medical miracle for his mom. His teacher, Father Hibbert (Campbell Scott), conveniently is a former world-class runner.

McGowan inventively tracks the progress of an unusual pilgrim - sections are divided into months, named for saints - and elicits likable performances from Butcher, Scott (The Secret Lives of Dentists), Jennifer Tilly as a sympathetic nurse, and Gordon Pinsent as the school's crusty but warmhearted administrator. B

- P.B.

[Last modified August 3, 2005, 10:08:03]