![]() “Before, during my time, there were no beggars,” she claims, happy to be filmed as she hands out crisp bank notes to street children and cancer patients. Of course, such candid details can give a false illusion of objectivity, though Greenfield doesn’t take her subject at face value, instead going the extra distance to interview her political detractors and supply the historical context the Marcos clan is actively trying to rewrite - the effects of which can be witnessed in elementary schools, where Ferdinand Marcos’ nearly decade-long period of martial law is now being recast as a rosier time than it was.įrom Imelda’s POV, the Philippines have gone downhill since her family was in charge. Kirkegaard include shots of Imelda getting her makeup done, or asking, “How’s my tummy? Does it look big?” before sitting for one of the interviews in which she strategically attempts to reshape and control her own narrative. ![]() Still, her vanity and ambition get the better of her, resulting in the juiciest insider look at a corrupt world leader since Barbet Schroeder’s “General Idi Amin Dada: A Self Portrait.”įrom the outset, Greenfield and editor Per K. Certainly, Marcos is image-conscious enough to recognize that granting Greenfield such access could backfire in a big way. What Greenfield’s subjects never seem to grasp is how her work manages to flatter them, captured in all their blinged-out excess, while striking outsiders as satirical and shocking. In light of the recurring themes of Greenfield’s oeuvre - decades spent documenting the lifestyles of the filthy rich and wannabe famous, à la “The Queen of Versailles” and “Generation Wealth” - it’s no wonder that Marcos would be amenable to being immortalized by such a high-profile photographer. Bizarrely, Marcos embodies both of those personae in a single public figure, and though the perception she’s creating is that of a magnanimous matriarch, Greenfield finds the truth (there’s that word) to be far more complicated. Even as far away as the Philippines, the photographer can’t escape glaring reminders of American absurdity - as when the recent Filipino elections seem to echo the United States’ surreal 2016 presidential ballot, which pitted a former first lady against a populist plutocrat. Marcos’ print-the-legend philosophy has particular resonance in a post-truth world, although such sinister undertones sneak up on audiences in a movie that begins, innocently enough, as the latest of Greenfield’s astonishing portraits of wealth run amok. Now, back from exile, the disgraced former first lady is fully invested in reclaiming her family’s position atop a country whose coffers they once pillaged, attempting to bend democracy and boost her son, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., to power. Once world-famous for her shoe collection, Imelda benefited enormously from husband Ferdinand’s two-decade dictatorship over the of the Philippines, until being forced to flee to Hawaii in 1986. Ian Pringle and members of the cast are festival guests.įor further information on The Legend Maker, read the Senses of Cinema dossier.“Perception is real, and the truth is not,” announces Imelda Marcos in “The Kingmaker,” a jaw-dropping documentary in which director Lauren Greenfield exposes just how effective the wounded peacock has been in reshaping her status. Supported by the MIFF Premiere Fund and inspired by a real-life Russian forger, director and screenwriter Ian Pringle ( Isabelle Eberhardt, MIFF 1991 Wrong World, MIFF 1985) has crafted a taut, engrossing story about the disposable, desperate underbelly of society. But with age beginning to take its toll on his craft, and a thug threatening his life, Figg's world is about to spin out of control. His clients range from embezzlers to murderers, from credit card scammers to Mafiosi as long as they can pay, Figg provides, no questions asked. He provides people with new identities and often the chance of a new life. Professional forger Alan Figg operates in a world of duplicity where little is what it seems. A piece of paper, a passport, an identity card or a new legend can give a person a second chance, a new life and – in some cases – the ability to commit all manner of crimes.
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