Weekly round-up

A mining injustice, sexy singing
lessons and a really big rock

COPPER CLASH: Under Rich Earth

by MALCOLM FRASER,
MATTHEW HAYS
and CHRISTOPHER SYKES

Under Rich Earth
From the early moments of Malcolm Rogge’s intense documentary Under Rich Earth, we know a grave injustice is being done. The trouble dates back to the mid-’90s, when a Japanese mining firm moved into Ecuador and secured the rights to copper in one region of the country. The local population protested, knowing full well that extensive mining of the land would lead to environmental disaster.

But the government officials stand firm, insisting that the company will do no wrong and that the financial kickbacks will be good for everyone. More protests follow, and then, there’s a local angle for Canadians that is bound to leave you feeling queasy (it sure did it for me). The mining rights ultimately landed with a Canadian company, Ascendant Copper. They in turn hired private security firms to allow for the continued mining of the region and to keep the protesters at a distance.

Rogge managed to get footage that shows clear malfeasance and violence on the part of the private police force, and also gets both sides to deliver their versions of what actually went down in those hills near the mines. Given the ongoing collapse of the international financial systems, the stalwart capitalist system we were sold turned out to be built on quicksand, Rogge’s film—which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September—turns out to be a remarkably prescient cautionary tale about the vicious downside of globalization. (MH)

UNDER RICH EARTH SCREENS AS PART OF
THE CINEMA POLITICA SERIES ON MONDAY,
FEB. 23, 7:30 P.M. IN CONCORDIA’S
HALL BUILDING (H-110).

HALF-FLUBBED HEIST: Stone of Destiny

THE DIRECTOR WILL BE PRESENT
Le Plaisir de chanter The latest from French director Ilan Duran Cohen is a strange hybrid of thriller, dark comedy and oh-so-French romantic farce. Muriel (Marina Foïs) is an uptight, maternity-obsessed agent for an unnamed shadowy organization; Philippe (Lorànt Deutsch) is her much younger partner, who reluctantly gives in to her sexual advances in the midst of an investigation.

They’re keeping watch on Constance (Jeanne Balibar), the widow of a recently murdered scientist who the agents suspect may have been trafficking in nuclear secrets. Foïs and Deutsch enrol in a singing class where Balibar is also a student. It soon transpires that most of the students are actually spies or criminals tailing Balibar for her secrets, including a male prostitute (Julien Baumgartner), who becomes romantically involved with a surprising number of the characters.

Foïs is compelling as the emotionally stilted agent, and Balibar is charming and funny as the widow whose perpetual cluelessness frustrates her pursuers. The combination of cloak-and-dagger intrigue with a sex farce in which everyone is sleeping with each other sometimes has the feel of early Tarantino minus the geek machismo, other times recalling the outright farce of a film like A Fish Called Wanda.

The film is unlikely to be anyone’s idea of a masterpiece—the shifts of tone can be a bit off-putting and the flighty dialogue occasionally gets annoying—but with a solid cast, an unpredictable, twistladen plot, and lots of sex and equal-opportunity full frontal nudity, you could do a lot worse for your entertainment dollar. (MF)

Stone of Destiny
Who’d have thought a 150-kilo slab of sandstone could bring about so much mischief?

Ask any Scot about the Stone of Scone, used for centuries during the coronations of Scottish monarchs, and you can expect a fevered spiel of nationalist rhetoric involving words like “symbolic” and “independence” and, often, “bloody English wankers.” Nationalist Ian Hamilton saw the stone—housed since 1296 in London’s Westminster Abbey as a spoil of war—as validation not only of England’s rule over his native Scotland, but also as a means to make a political statement.

Director Charles Martin Smith (The Snow Walker), an American who calls Vancouver home, rewrote Hamilton’s testimonial “The Taking of the Stone of Destiny” for the screen, recounting the true story of the 1950 Christmas Day heist. Hamilton (passably portrayed by Stardust’s Charlie Cox) and three compatriots break into the Abbey, load the rock into a car, and promptly whisk it away, but not before accidentally breaking the stone in two.

While the film disappoints with its super-conventional structuring— Cox gets angry, plans heist, faces setbacks, re-plans heist, steals rock, wins respect of hardnosed father, gets the girl—it still receives a passing grade based upon its compulsive watchability. It’s impossible not to grin as the mischievous ploy is half-flubbed by the not-so-motley crew, yet still they (temporarily) return the booty to its rightful owner. Destiny is a prankish crowd pleaser that will sweep you up and leave you with a coy smirk on your face. (CS)

LE PLAISIR DE CHANTER AND
STONE OF DESTINY OPEN THIS FRIDAY,
FEB. 20