September 23, 2008
During the last three days of the festival this year I must have had a friend at nearly every screening. That’s great fun of course, but it means that I didn’t get a lot of writing done then. If I wasn’t with a friend between screenings I was normally able to find a few minutes to write away, but mostly it came down to typing away on the laptop on the way downtown on the subway in the mornings, or homeward-bound again in the evenings. Some of what you’ll read below was typed up on the subway at about 1:40 AM on the Sunday morning after it all ended. After the festival was over I have to admit to having not been less motivated to finish it all, but I’ll give it a shot now. Here’s day 8 at the festival:
THE BROTHERS BLOOM had the highest wattage star power of any festival film that I got tickets for: Adrien Brody, Rachel Weisz, Mark Ruffalo. So yeah, high, but not that high. Because of that, I was concerned that I might be in for something too Hollywood (dreaded H-word)… but in the end, BLOOM went swimmingly. From its opening scene where a handicapped cat moves across the screen with a crutch and in a roller skate, you know you are in for a rather crazy ride. BLOOM’s first hour is propelled by the whimsy and craftiness of AMELIE with a good dollop of DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS thrown in, with exotic locales and quirky characters aplenty. Brody and Ruffalo play the eponymous brothers, orphans since - well, since the beginning of the film - who have perfected the art of the con since childhood foster-home experiences compelled them to act rather independently.
After our introduction to the brothers’ world, the plot kicks into gear with the classic con cliché - the sworn last grift - only one more poor little heiress to bilk and it’ll be time for the pair to retire. We forgive this tired old saw though as the scheme is deftly hilarious, with another surprise around every corner, and our heiress, the glowing Ms. Weisz, turns out to be more than they bargained for naturally. Could she be a con artist herself? BLOOM couldn’t be that DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELSy could it? In what direction will this elaborate plot twist?
Well, it twists all right, and the film that begins with the genial mischief of AMELIE’s Montmartre, ends in somewhat murkier terrain along the Gulf of Finland. Director-writer Rian Johnston (of the Generation-Y film noir BRICK) ends an hour and a half of fun with a quarter hour of darker stuff. Maybe that’s the trick of the con though; maybe the audience should share the sucker punch. I still remember the film fondly despite my misgivings about its ending, so I say “see this film” like the critics do on tv.
Not had your fill of self-serving double-speak from faceless corporations lately? Well, UNDER RICH EARTH, which details the lengths to which Canadian mining firm Copper Mesa (formerly Ascendant Copper) will go to strip mine an Ecuadorian village, will certainly get your back up as high as you could ever want. EARTH was assembled by Winnipeg-born documentary filmmaker and lawyer Malcolm Rogge from videos and stills shot by the villagers of Junin in Ecudor’s remote Intag valley. Rogge adds interviews he filmed in the aftermath of armed incursions by paramilitary units hired by Copper Mesa into the farming village. EARTH also thoroughly exposes Copper Mesa’s propaganda campaign in regard to its planned Intag mine as so many lies.
It’s great to know that there’s a Canadian mining company romping around Ecuador threatening and traumatizing the local farmers to establish a strip mine on their land. Thank goodness a Canadian documentary filmmaker is taking them on. You’ll never have been so disgusted to be a Canuck if you get to see this, and you’ll be checking your mutual finds afterwards to make sure that Copper Mesa has none of your money.
On Thursday afternoon I scheduled the one programme of Canadian shot films I see each year.
Ever watch Bravo? Sometimes these things show up on that channel when a feature ends before the hour is up. You never know when a short is going to play though, so there’s just about no way to get to see these. So, what can I tell you anyway? Well, any shorts programme is a mixed bag of funny, clever, touching, and disappointing. You don’t remember the disappointing ones too long, like A SMALL THING - something about a girl trying to remember a birthday that scarred her for life: luckily her birthday hasn’t scarred me for life. Then there was the line drawn animated piece called PIERCE, CRUSH, ESCAPE; NOTES ON THE BOREAL, that displayed squiggly lines dancing across the screen for 10 minutes depicting forest-like scenes. It could have been 7 minutes shorter. UNIFORM MATERIAL looks at the fine line that divides those with means and those without by following the methodical actions of a man preparing for a new job. 15 minutes was a bit long for this, but the short’s point is well made. In MON NOM EST VICTOR GAZON a young boy tallies the pros and cons of life after he is told that a relative committed suicide because more things made him sad than made him happy. Sounds depressing, but it was actually funny and charming. WHITMORE PARK, named after the Regina suburb where the filmmaker grew up, recalls with nostalgic humour the school teacher who changed his life. That was an excellent use of 9 minutes. MACHINE WITH WISHBONE documents the workings of a number of Rube Goldberg type inventions. Beautifully shot, and very engrossing: 8 delightful minutes. 106 tells the story of Edna Berry, the oldest woman in Canada, and the attempts to off her by the second oldest woman in Canada: a sprightly 6 minutes. Finally, to close it off was the inexplicably programmed LA BATTUE: 20 minutes of misery detailing a daughter who wants to get away from her mother, set during a hunting party in a Quebec forest in winter time, with plenty of shotguns, none of which were used soon enough.
Didja see SON OF RAMBOW earlier this year? The kid from that - Bill Milner* - our hero - stars in IS THERE ANYBODY THERE? along with Michael Caine, who is reason enough to go to a film. Bill stars as Edward, who lives in a home his parents run as a seniors’ lodge. Ten-year-old Edward is fascinated by what comes after death, and has recently turned to leaving a cassette recorder running under the beds of elderly residents who aren’t expected to make it through the night: Edward is hoping to catch evidence of paranormal activity on tape. Caine plays Clarence, a rather reluctant new resident in the home, and a bitter ex-magician for whom the magic in life has been revealed as mere trickery. This pair get off to a bad start (natch), but then predictably learn to get along famously, with a few unpredictable turns as the story unfolds: both have a lot to learn about life.
ANYBODY THERE, it turns out, is quite a fun pic. With a supporting menagerie of schoolyard bullies, preoccupied parents, and batty house guests the film glides from one amusing setup to the next, reminding the audience of what a trip it was to grow up, and how you can mess with kids heads when you get older. Very charming.
Craig James White
Toronto - see you in the dark!
*Who would name a kid Bill Milner these days? At least, why would a 10 year old be using that as a stage name? Why not Billy? Why not Will? Both are cooler for a kid. I hear Bill Milner and I think ’silent film star’? Rethink Bill Milner.
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September 12, 2008
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!
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September 10, 2008
Day 6? Already?
It’s 9:21 AM - the earliest I have been in a cinema for a film this year, but I’m just practicing for a 9 AM film I have tomorrow, and I’ll have to get there earlier than that. Some films - not many - are starting as early as 8:45 AM at this fest. I mean, Breakfast Television hasn’t even ended by then. I’ve heard tell that some folk in the hinterlands start their days as early as 6 AM, so they would be able to make it down for 8:45 I suppose, but that just seems like crazy talk to me.
So, I am seated in the Paramount 2, and I’m waiting for the start of a Jennifer Anniston film? What? Am not! I’m at a Steve Zahn film. Steve’s this underused, under-appreciated comic actor (funny is enough in his case: if he has range, I don’t want to know about it) and I am just happy he’s in a film here called MANAGEMENT.
***
Okay, the flick’s over now. Ehhhhhh: nice try, but too contrived.
I should be fairer to Jennifer Anniston though. Several years ago in an attempt to distance herself from her ‘it girl’ image, she starred in a little independent film called The Good Girl, which was a very good film in which Anniston showed serious ability, and it earned her some real cred. For a while. Now she’s trying to recoup that, or build on it, with MANAGEMENT, another little independent, a small romantic comedy that is out to charm its audience with winning, understated performances by Anniston and the aforementioned Steve Zahn, along with a splashy nutbar cameo by Woody Harrelson. Too bad it just seems like they filmed some guy’s bedtime fantasy.
Zahn plays Mike, the nighttime manager at his parents’ motel in Kingman, Arizona. One day Sue (Anniston) drops in, and Mike decides to make a pass at her. She’s from the East Coast (= far more sophisticated) and isn’t falling for Mike’s lines. Or is she? It goes back and forth and then an hour and a half later the movie ends as do all thoughts about it.
KISSES tells the story of two Dublin 12 or 13 year-olds, next-door neighbours Dylan and Kylie, who run away from home when Kylie rescues Dylan from his raging father. The two have grown up in unenviable situations - poverty, alcohol, abuse - and this latest incident is the last straw: off they go, never to return.
Director Lance Daly begins his film in black and white, but adds colour as the kids make good their escape, bringing it up to full saturation as they arrive in the hustle and bustle of downtown Dublin where everything seems supercharged to the kids. If they weren’t smart enough when left to their own devices you’d say that it all goes like a dream for Dylan and Kylie initially, a while pair are resourceful, it isn’t long before gritty reality comes crashing in on the two after the setting of the sun. What’s their long term solution? What are they going to learn?
Wonderfully authentic with natural performances and smart writing, KISSES moves past the average coming of age film into something really special. With thick Irish accents throughout, the sometimes tough-to-catch dialogue will leave film distributors on this side of the pond second guessing KISSES’s commercial potential, but let’s hope somebody sees a little gold in it. During the Q&A, director Daly asked the audience whether or not to release the film subtitled. While the result was an overwhelming show of hands against that prospect, I will admit to turning on the subtitling on DVDs occasionally - I mean, well, take BILLY ELLIOT for example; who knew that Tyke for ‘nothing’ is ‘nowt’? Now I can spell it too. (Tyke, by the way, is the Yorkshire dialect.) Still, DVDs are the only proper place for subtitles for British or Irish films.
The Q&A also featured the most fidgety kid I had ever seen. Kelly O’Neill, the girl who played Kylie, would not stand still, or even stay on stage, and could barely answer a question. If you’re 12 years old and great on camera, it is no guarantee that you know how to act in public yet, or that you even want to. You could see rebellion was hardwired into these kids. Very interesting.
The EU declared Liverpool the European Capital of Culture for 2008. They do it every year to one city or another. Amongst Liverpool’s subsequent commissions was a film to commemorate it and tell its history, and it went to hometown iconoclast Terence Davies to do the deed. OF TIME AND THE CITY is Davies’ reminiscence of growing up in a tough city, one beset by poverty and since repudiated urban renewal policies that left hollow housing estates in place of tumbledown slums. Davies rails at all that is English, but finds some humanity to love amidst the institutions he despises. Were the complaints merely hurled epithets the film would be a drag, but Davies’ caustic wit charms and turns viewers into colluders.
Might you ever see this film? I can’t think where, other than in an art gallery in Liverpool, or maybe on very late at night on Bravo.
It’s the really dark ages. War and the plague are sweeping across the German lands, and one night 14 year-old orphan Krabat is told in a dream to follow the ravens that are waiting to lead him out of a life of misery. So begins direktor Marco Kreuzpaintner’s sorcery fantasy KRABAT, an engrossing story of boys enslaved in a medieval mill in exchange for being taught about the dark arts.
The festival has for a few years now included a select handful of family films that they allow children to go to. The darkest of these this year was KRABAT, and as Harry Potter fans I knew my nephew and niece would be swept up by the mystery and magic of this tale, so along with more family friends, seven of us, including 4 kids, invaded the Varsity for the evening. Turns out my hunch was right, and on Wednesday those 4 kids get to go to school and tell their friends how cool a film was that they actually had to be read subtitles for.
Kreuzpaintner gathered a number of young German stars for his movie including Daniel Brühl and Robert Stadlober, an excellent art director, great special effects artists, and created a really compelling world from Otfried Preußler’s novel of enslavement and freedom… and sold it to 20th Century Fox. Will 20CF release a subtitled German language film for kids here though? I dunno. It’s really good, but how do you sell a foreign film to teens? How will Lucas and Leah’s friends react when they tell them they saw a really great film they had to read?! It’s curtains for KRABAT on this side of the Atlantic I fear, but maybe a DVD release will find a “cult” fan base.
Craig James White
Toronto - see you in the dark!
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