In case you couldn’t catch absolutely every movie during SIFF, which ended last weekend, the fest is reprising 12 of its favorites this weekend. At 5:30 p.m. Friday, Gandu self-consciously strives to avoid every Bollywood trope and trace of Satyajit Ray. In Kolkata, Bengal, former video and commercials director Q frames his story in stark black-and-white. Gandu is about 20, fatherless and resentful of his mothers lover. When the latter two have sex, Gandu crawls across their bedroom floor like an insect to steal some cash. Out on the street, he throws down Bengali hip-hop rhymes and posts his graffiti tag in dilapidated alleyways. At a certain point, embarking on a road trip with a Bruce Lee-obsessed rickshaw driver (simply named Rickshaw), Gandu is introduced to heroin smoking and undergoes a kind of cognitive break. Suddenly hes a famous rapper or rocker; suddenly he can have sex, in color, with a red-wigged girl straight out of a Wong Kar-wai movie. Is it just another screen fantasy? Gandu isnt sayingits all provocation, attitude, longing, and self-disgust. We also recommend On the Ice (5:30 p.m. Sat.) See SIFF website for full schedule. (NR) BRIAN MILLER
June 17-19, 2011
