Friday, May 7, 8:00 PM, Charles Theatre 1

Director: Ulrich Seidl

Cast: Maria Hofstatter, Christine Jirku, Victor Hennemann, Georg Friedrich, Alfred Mrva, Erich Finsches, Gerti Lehner, Franziska Weiss, Rene Wanko, Claudia Martini, Victor Rathbone

Country: Austria
Year: 2001
Running Time: 120 minutes
Format: 35mm

Remember Irreversible, Gaspar Noe's brutal story, told backward, of rape and revenge that screened at last year's MFF ? That was number one on a list of favorite movies John Waters' created for the magazine Artforum. Dog Days was number two. John has called DOG DAYS "the most humiliating experience for both actors and audience..."

Directed and co-written by Austrian Ulrich Seidl, who has mostly worked in documentaries, Dog Days is as raw a depiction of the banality of modern suburban life as you are likely to see. Shot over several summers, to insure the hottest possible weather, in a dreary suburb of Vienna, Seidl uses interweaving stories, documentary technique and explicitness of all kinds- sex and violence are only part of it- to describe a world of petty but profound sadness. As many viewers inevitably wonder how the director got the cast of professional and (mostly) amateur actors to volunteer for this work, you should remember this was made just as the numerous inanities of reality television started dominating American prime time television.

Part of the New Directors series in 2002, Dog Days won the Grand Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival 2002, and has been nominated for and/or won numerous awards at other film festivals in 2001 and 2002. There is an R Rated version, but we are screening the Unrated version.

-- Jed Dietz

John Waters has unique positions in the worlds of film and art. John has become the regular host of the annual Independent Spirit Awards. His one-man show, "Change of Life," ran this spring at the New Museum for Contemporary Art, and his newest movie A Dirty Shame, is scheduled to open this summer. He has just returned from Romania where he acted in The Seed of Chucky.