TIFF08 - Day 7
I actually have a seat on the subway this morning. Not that I haven’t had one every other day so far, it’s just that I haven’t been on the thing so deeply in the heart of rush hour until today. Of course, the guy beside me is taking up 1 1/3 seats, but then I assume he put a little extra in the fare box this morning. Still, by leaning out into the aisle, I can type. Here’s a secret though, I’m actually finishing off yesterday’s write-up.
Okay; long day, five films, here goes:
Mike Leigh has made a number of the very best British films in recent times: most explore pinpricks of light in dark situations, like the ironically titled HIGH HOPES or LIFE IS SWEET , and 2004’s highly lauded VERA DRAKE, while some have looked into dark corners of light situations. TOPSY TURVY, about Gilbert and Sullivan, would be the best known of these. HAPPY GO LUCKY, Leigh’s latest, now joins the latter.
Poppy is a happy, go with the flow, brighten your day 30-year-old north Londoner, who seems so unaffected by life’s valleys that her friends actually worry for her. If that sounds vapid or ridiculous or an easy role to play, it ’s not. Even though we all know someone like Poppy, we just wouldn’t believe in this character if rising British star Sally Hawkins not knocked this one out-of-the-park with a relentless performance. Hawkins initially sets the tone as a high energy rather silly party girl, but gradually reveals a nuanced, thoughtful, fully-rounded character. Leigh has very deliberately chosen the name Poppy here - Hawkins’ chararacter’s real name is Pauline - to describe her type, and he ends up defining her type in fact. I believe we’ll find Poppy becomes to Hawkins as Holly Golightly became to Hepburn.
A little plot? Poppy is a primary school teacher who lives with another teacher, her best friend Zoe, and spends the weekend looking for kicks at the disco. A theft of Poppy’s bicycle one day is just taken as encouragement for her to take driving lessons, and Poppy only laments that she had not had a chance to say goodbye to her bike. Can Sally really take it when events really conspire to test her though? Poppy’s driving lessons turn out to more a test of her character when the instructor - in another memorable performance by Leigh regular Eddie Marsan - turns out to have strong opinions on more than just how to drive: a student in Poppy’s class has changed and is now dealing out beatings on other classmates: Poppy’s sister has let it be known she considers her to be immature and foolish. All the situations are mundane, but Leigh likes to explore the minutiae of relationships, and the gift to the audience is to do it right. An Hollywood oddsmaker has already pegged Hawkins for an Oscar nom, and Hawkins walked away with the Best Actress award at the Berlin Film Festival for this performance, so Leigh and Hawkins have in fact done this right.
ADORATION is easily Atom Egoyan’s most captivating film since THE SWEET HEREAFTER. Set in current day Toronto, we open in teenaged Simon’s French class, who have been asked by their teacher to translate a story about a terrorist attack on an airliner. Simon, played by Devon Bostick, presents his translation to the class, which links the story to his family’s difficult past. Soon everyone at school - the students, the teachers - are talking about the revelations on the story moves online to chat rooms. Devon’s world is turned upside down by it all, and the consequences for his family’s life, and that of his French teacher are beyond what anyone could have predicted.
Devon’s story pits Toronto’s WASP past against its multicultural present, and aspects of the city itself are represented by several of the characters. Egoyan’s wife Arsinée Khanjian anchors the cast as Simon’s enigmatic French teacher, Kenneth Welsh plays the bitter patriarch of Simon’s family, Scott Speedman is Simon’s struggling uncle and caretaker, Rachel Blanchard is his tragic late mother, and Noam Jenkins plays Simon’s late father, who is not lamented by all.
Egoyan explores his favourite territories in ADORATION - communication, alienation, the complexities of love and selfishness - through a fascinatingly structured film that gives up its secrets slowly and challenges the audience to make sense of complicated motives. I was thoroughly engrossed, and the Q&A made evident that the audience in general had been similarly spellbound. Purchased by Sony Pictures Classics, ADORATION is expected to be in theatres early in the new year.
Austrian director Nikolaus Geyrhalter’s 7915 KM documents the stories and concerns of the people who live along the route of the Paris-Dakar Rally. While we get a brief glimpse of the trappings of the rally itself in the opening scene, we are otherwise traveling from Morocco to Senegal in the rally’s wake, meeting those whom the rally has passed by. Most of those living along the route cannot believe the amount of money that rich Europeans and Americans waste driving through the land they own, they lament the lack of respect they are accorded by the racers while visiting their villages, and they despair the damage often caused to land their herds graze on. It’s not a love-in. In ending scenes we watch from a surveillance jet a kilometre above the Atlantic as they track over-full boatloads of Senegalese making a perilous dash for Europe. It’s all more than a little sad.
Ten years ago Brazilian director Walter Salles brought CENTRAL STATION to the festival, and I had a new favourite to add to my lists of great films and directors to keep an eye on. This year Salles is back along with his frequent collaborator Daniela Thomas and their film LINHA DE PASSE, or PASSING LANE, which is the story of single Saõ Paulo mother Cleuza and her four sons, all fathered by different men. The boys - between their early 20s and early teens, are soon to have another sibling as Cleuza is pregnant again. The eldest boy works as a bike courier on the city’s dangerous roads; the next dreams of life as a soccer star; the next has found his salvation in the church; the youngest, who is black, is obsessed with finding his father, a Saõ Paulo bus driver. As the film unfolds each has their own crisis of faith to deal with, and whether or not each character is able to overcome them is left up to us to decide. While I was looking for a film to move me to the extent that CENTRAL STATION had ten years ago, LINHA is not that film, but was an engrossing dip into many aspects of life in Brazil’s largest city nevertheless. Whereas STATION’s power comes from two riveting, intimate performances, LINHA sprawls, giving us glimpses at highlights of its characters lives. With LINHA, Salles has recast his star of STATION, Vinícius de Oliveira, then a 12 year-old shoe shine boy, in the role of Dario, the soccer star hopeful. It was good to see him onscreen again.
SHAKESPEARE AND VICTOR HUGO’S INTIMACIES is a documentary by first-time Mexican director Yulene Olaizola. The title refers to the corner in Mexico City at which Yulene’s Grandmother lives, and to some of the more interesting goings on in her home. Rosa Elena had boarders in her home after her husband died, and one came to change everyone’s lives. Jorge Riosse wrote and sang songs to Rosa and her granddaughters, then tore up all his music and began to paint. The rather fascinating paintings still cover the walls of Rosa’s home, but they end in 1993 when Jorge met an untimely end. Yulene’s documentary probes the time that Jorge spent at her Grandmother’s , and the mystery that surrounded his death, and the events that may have led up to it. It was all very well put together by a promising new filmmaker. With a luck this will end up on a documentary channel here.
Well, I am two days behind, so off this goes without further editing. Apologies for any typos, grammatical errors, nonsense, etc.
Cheers!
Craig James White
Toronto - see you in the dark!