KILL LIST
KILL LIST is a strange, unsettling film. More character drama than straight out genre piece, the opening half owes more to Mike Leigh film than to Tobe Hooper. We’re introduced to Jay (Neil Maskell), a hitman that’s between jobs. After his last gig went awry (for reasons unclear at the beginning), he’s struggling to make […]
THE AWAKENING
Another in a line of films this year that start with great flourish, yet can’t sustain ’till the end, THE AWAKENING is 4/5ths of a great, moody little piece with a tacked on conclusion that washes much of it away. When it’s good, however, the film is a lot of fun. Set in 1921, the […]
TYRANNOSAUR
From about a minute into the film, Considine’s TYRANNOSAUR grabs you by the throat and never lets go. We follow Joseph, played by Scott thesp stalwart Peter Mullan, as he leaves a bar in a rage. Taking out his frustration on the first thing he can (the dog chained to his arm), we’re immediately disgusted […]
THE ORANGES
With all the dreary heaviness that you get during fest time (not that I’m complaining), sometimes you need a nice comedy to brighten your spirits. THE ORANGES was one of those refreshing turns – fun, maybe forgettable, but still a refreshing drink in the middle of more somber fare. Set in the upper middle class […]
SMUGGLER
SMUGGLER comes at a pretty challenging phase of any Midnight Madness slate – by the second last night, you’re completely exhausted, trying hard just to get through the next couple days of films with your sanity intact. It into the strange fugue state of mental and physical exhaustion that this crazy, almost madcap horror/comedy/adventure film […]
TAKE SHELTER
After turns in the likes of PEARL HARBOR and BAD BOYS II, followed by a couple strange and stranger Herzog films, the career of Michael Shannon has been anything but consistent or compartmentalized. Of late, his turn as the taciturn, smouldering Prohibition cop on HBO’s BOARDWALK EMPIRE has captivated viewers, showing the range of this […]
I’M CAROLYN PARKER: THE GOOD, THE MAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL
Another in a slew of Huricane Katrina-themed docs, what sets Demme’s film apart is both the scope (he filmed over many years) and the direct focus of the subject matter. Choosing one remarkable woman and using her story to the larger tale of the postdeluvian 9th ward is both inspired and extremely effective. Carolyn Parker […]
GENERATION P
GENERATION P is a psychedelic, kaleidoscopic explosion from Russia, relying upon oodles of post-Soviet pop-culture references that went way over my head, resulting in a film that that’s still a whole heap of fun. A twisted mix of MAD MEN and FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS, we find our protagonist poet Babylen (Vladimir Yepifantsev) […]
HIMIZU
After last year’s astonishing COLD FISH, Sion Sono with a disaster movie of a different sort. Shot and produced quickly, using the backdrop of last Spring’s Tsunami as both an explicit and metaphorical throughline of this tale of abuse, young love and the challenges of moving on after one has lost everything. Based on a […]
JEFF, WHO LIVES AT HOME
A sort of companion piece to Solondz’s DARK HORSE, the Duplass’ JEFF film is about quirky, dysfunctional family dynamics and the maturation of a man-child as he emerges decades late from under the wings of his mother (Susan Sarandon). As the title indicates, Jeff (Jason Segel) has never really made anything of himself, save for […]
THE DAY
THE DAY, another in a long, lonnnng line of post-Apocalyptic, us-vs-them films, does something worthy of celebration: It shows us that, indeed, the outskirts of Ottawa need very little manipulation to appear convincingly as an end-of-world locale. It’s always a good sign when a film demonstrates early on that infact anything is possible. Too often […]
DOPPELGÄNGER PAUL
I derive no pleasure from seeing mediocre Canadian films at TIFF. I have this strange, patriotic notion that some of these little indies will prove to have enough charm or wit to elevate them above the mundane, yet too often they’re so abysmally bad (a few come to mind) that their inclusion in the fest […]
FROM THE SKY DOWN
One comment off the top, I hate the title. Sure, it’s a cutesy, throwaway ACHTUNG-era lyric, but Bono’s work has always lacked real poetry. Nah, let’s call this thing what its – THE MAKING OF U2’s ACHTUNG BABY AND STUFF THAT HAPPENED DURING THAT TIME PERIOD. No, that might be worse. At any rate, FTSD […]
THE MOTH DIARIES
I admit upfront to not necessarily fitting the demographic that this film is intended for. I’m not an adolescent girl, riding this newest wave of Vampire works. I belong to no “team”, a la TWILIGHT, nor do I read books that are clearly as dreadful as the source that spawned THE MOTH DIARIES. That being […]
UNDEFEATED
A great sports documentary can capture everything ones loves about a given game – if done well, it doesn’t need fireworks or manipulation to craft something both special and memorable. Sure, the added tension of any competition (be it as diverse as a spelling bee or a Teen music competition) makes for added drama, but […]
HELENO
A moody, lugubrious rumination on Brazilian football player, HELENO traces the life and career of Heleno de Freitas (Rodrigo Santoro) as he captures the spirit of his nation, the last great Brazilian superstar before a young upstart named Pele would capture world acclaim. Easy comparisons could be made to RAGING BULL – like the Scorsese […]
LOVELY MOLLY
There’s not a heck of a lot worth saying about LOVELY MOLLY, save that it certainly didn’t live up to the title. Helmed by Eduardo Sánchez, one half of the duo that brought the BLAIR WITCH onslaught to the masses, this film owes more to the much derided sequel. Promising to “reinvent” the found footage […]
SNOWTOWN
SNOWTOWN is remarkable for a number of reasons. First, it is an astonishingly fresh debut from Kurzel, a steady and sure directorial effort. The ensemble cast is also excellent, a mix of amateurs and local talent that bring a depth and richness to the film. Finally, there’s the story itself – harrowing, horrific, made all […]
DAMSELS IN DISTRESS
Stillman’s back after a dozen years in the wilderness, this time with a strange, film-out-of-time look at College, cliques and the goings on of young neurotics. DAMSELS sinks or swims if you buy into its world, and for me the film worked its charms from early on. Greta Gerwig is pitch perfect as Violet, the […]
NEIL YOUNG JOURNEYS
The third Demme doc involving Neil Young in as many years, NEIL YOUNG JOURNEYS is perhaps the most slight in terms of actually “documentary” form. We see Neil (and his brother, leading the way in a vintage Cadillac) traipsing through his home town of Omemee, Ontario, languidly trolling the places where he spent his early […]
SLEEPNESS NIGHT
I can’t think of a film that’s made me more physically uneasy than SLEEPLESS NIGHT, a testament both to its unique setting and the skills of its filmmakers. The film starts with a bang, literally. Gunshots ring out as a car is hijacked for its lucrative shipment. In the mélee, one of the attackers has […]
THE INCIDENT
THE INCIDENT opens with three stoner buddies gathered together to craft some tunes to churn out a record. There’s bickering and gnashing of teeth, then they disband in order to prepare for work the next day. Following this patently useless prologue, we see the same crew don their gear for another day at work – […]
ELLES
The ever lovely Juliette Binoche stars in this strange twist on the usual midlife crisis film. Writing for ELLE magazine in Paris, Binoche’s character is writing an article about young prostitutes. Drawn to two of her subjects – one a striking Polish girl, the other from one of Paris’ outlying housing estates, she quickly finds […]
GOD BLESS AMERICA
Bobcat Goldthwait – the name conjures up Muppet-voiced standup comedy and manic turns in a slew of POLICE ACADEMY films. Of late he’s dropped the shtick in favour of directing a bunch of edgy TV shows and the Robin Williams starrer and cheekily named WORLDS GREATEST DAD. Obviously this was his first visit to Midnight […]
DARK HORSE
Seems that Solondz is almost getting mellow as he matures – DARK HORSE could be confused by some as a middle-of-the-road ensemble comedy. There remain certain flourishes and idiosyncrasies that have separated his films from the mainstream, but in this, his most accessible film in years, it’s a story that unfolds in almost a straight […]
PARADISE LOST 3: PURGATORY
Back in the early 90s, a group of three teenagers were arrested and convicted after a brutal crime of child murder was uncovered in a small Arkansas town. Throughout the trial, the “West Memphis Three” plead their innocence. In the mid-90s, an HBO documentary brought the story of the victims, their families, and the accused […]
ANONYMOUS
There will be lots working against a positive reception of ANOYMOUS. The first is the filmmaker, a name that’s been stricken from almost all promotional material leading up to the films late-fall wide release. Sure, Emmerich has made some of the most bombastic, most egregious films ever made, but who’s to say a shlock meister […]
HYSTERIA
Hysteria is one of those delightful, ribald-yet-accessible Brit comedies like The Full Monty. It’s salacious enough to be interesting, yet accessible enough that only the most prudish will be offended. Not bad, then, that the film takes as its subject matter the development of the electric genital massager, or vibrator. We start in London in […]
SAMSARA
Ron Fricke is back with more of his nature porn, along the lines of his BARAKA and films his shot like KOYAANISQATSI. The title derives from the Tibetan (“the ever turning wheel of life”), and Fricke’s wheel is as epic as the globe itself. Shot over four years, visiting almost two dozen countries and capturing […]
LIVID
Few films have confounded me this fest as LIVID – by all measure I should absolutely loathe this film. To call it “deliberate” would do it injustice, this film is slooowww, a single factor that’s usually death for any film at Midnight mid-fest (my seventh film of the day, this was). The film involves witch […]