TIFF 2K11: DAY 5

The Cardboard Village, dir. Ermanno Olmi. A real beaut of a picture; the auteur Olmi returns to cinema with a meditative and stirring piece concerning sacred spaces, questions of faith vs goodness, and illegal immigrants.

The film opens with a beautifully rendered depiction of the deconsecration of a church in smalltown Italy. We meet the pastor, a kindly old man (a familiar priest for those who watched Of Gods and Men) who has nothing without the institution.

A simply told tale, in which people behave deliberately and we are presented with all facets of human character. Moral disagreements are articulated clearly. There’s no exploitation in the refugees’ representation: they’re dressed plainly, they speak well, and they don’t brutalize each other. They’re humans, as well they should be, because this film finds interest in more than their situation.

I think I might be really into this “mode” of Italian cinema, echoed in other recent films like Le Quattro Volte. Deliberate and well-paced films that keep you immersed and questioning. I think I might like this movie a lot. Simple, quietly packaged, beautifully delivered.

Hysteria, dir. Tanya Wexler. I ended up here because Alps was full, and am glad I did. A solid, engaging Hollywood film. (The standard formula works!)

This fest, I’ve been increasingly discouraged at Hollywood films (namely The Ides of March and The Oranges, both of which frustrate and make me kinda angry), and also at myself for attending them. This movie was perfect, because it did all the classic Hollywood tropes right.

Ostensibly a film about the diagnosis of “hysteria” amongst women (as a catch-all for everything from insomnia to manic depression) and the inventor of the vibrator as a “cure” for such, the film really is, I dare to say, a good old-fashioned screwball comedy. A delightful one.

Hugh Dancy enters as a chronically out-of-work, highly-educated doctor with a wealthy benefactor/friend played by Rupert Everett (whose character is brilliant comedic relief). Dancy gets a job relieving women of hysteria by laying them on their back and applying sweet-smelling oils… on their nether regions, with his fingers.

I won’t get more specific, as it’s not about the basic plot (which has been told many times), but the delightful and engaging way it’s told. The cast is magnificent; Maggie Gyllenhaal is outstanding a strong Suffragette, a Shrew to be Tamed.

Good fun at the movies.

Monsieur Lazhar, dir. Philippe Falardeau. Maybe my favourite of the fest so far.

Falardeau, a Canadian filmmaker I know from It’s Not Me, I Swear!, returns with another film with smart children, acting well. It’s no secret that kids can be the hardest to direct, but Falardeau pulls it off so unfailingly that I can honestly say I think of Truffaut’s work in Small Change and The 400 Blows.

Lazhar is the name of an Algerian refugee in Montreal, seeking asylum after his wife and children were killed in an act of terrorism. He arrives at a school soon after a beloved teached has hanged herself in her classroom. He offers his services.

The classroom ripples. Two young friends, a boy and a girl, are particularly touched by the incident; their personal resolutions of grief and confusion are fascinating, mature.

It’s an entrancing tale: the characters are true, the ending is solid, and there is never a stretch to try for something more epic or shocking.

Highly recommended. Plus: Canadian content!

Crazy Horse, dir. Frederick Wiseman. I left this doc early. Not that I’m particularly averse to Wiseman’s fly-on-the-wall documentary style (at least not in viewership), but I felt like I was wasting time in the obviously constructed conversations in which subjects desperately strive for some kind of conflict, and the inane, nonstop dance sequences (mesmerizing, but not enough to make a movie).

This doc feels like it’s too astonished to discover the “best” nude dancing venue in the world also has a business side. It keeps propping up these discussions of budget and technical obstacles as if it’s a wonder the whole thing didn’t just spring into existence fully-formed.

This being said, I only stayed for an hour, so maybe it gets more involved later. Also, the dance sequences are truly a sight to see. I just wish we’d seen a bit more.

Machine Gun Preacher, dir. Marc Forster. Just popped my head in for 30 minutes of this. Man. Testosterone sure is a terrible thing sometimes.

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A talk with Guy Maddin and actor Udo Kier about Keyhole. Surprisingly normal Maddin and Kier talk about shooting digital and how to find the light on set.

A talk with Julia Loktev and actors Gael Garcia Bernal and Hani Furstenberg about The Loneliest Planet. Serious hiking to get to and from sets deep in the mountains. Furstenberg is big in Israel. Another instance of half-improvised acting, giving more creative control to actors.

TIFF 2K11: DAY 4

Take This Waltz, dir. Sarah Polley. In my last year of a film studies degree, my Studies in Canadian Cinema prof cited Away From Her as proof of a vital contemporary domestic film industry. Take This Waltz is equally important. A seriously great Canadian film (named after a song by another Canadian: Leonard Cohen), set in Toronto (playing itself), telling a kind and real story.

Unsurprisingly, Michelle Williams expertly plays Margot, an emotionally complex and relatable character; the wife of a man she loves dearly and has a close friendship with. Margot finds an instant connection with a man who lives across the road: an attractive artist / rickshaw driver.

There are no punches pulled when hard choices are made. And still, when the characters are happy, the audience feels that joy and partakes in it. (Doesn’t hurt that the jokes are on-point.) The characters are deep and relatable. I’m attracted to intelligent, holistic approaches to familial and romantic relationships, and Polley excels in this.

My only complaint about the film was its reticence to end (a complaint I have about many films in this fest), but this has been since tempered with alternative interpretations. There are a couple scenes when contrivances to push plot forward are made overly obvious and behave clunkily in the narrative, but they’re small bumps in a great feature. I’m no good at reviews, am I? I just hesitate to give away plot points and dance around subjects.

Anyways, watch this film! Support Canadian cinema! Support dick jokes from Sarah Silverman! Support Seth Rogan cooking chicken! Support hesitancy and frustration and love and all those things!

A Letter to Momo, dir. Hiroyuki Okiura. Oh, don’t watch this. I wanted to watch some Japanese anime, and this one has a very Ghibli-esque aesthetic (even more so than From Up On Poppy Hill, which is actually directed by Goro Miyazaki), but it is preachy and full of poor lessons.

The eponymous Momo is, unsurprisingly, our protagonist. She is, in a word, boring. Without understandable intentions, without any depth, she’s a protagonist foil for a plot that goes almost nowhere. She meets three “guardian” / “goblin” amigos, who look interesting but are also without depth.

Ostensibly a film about family and love (particularly obsessed with appreciating your mother) — the story devolves into nonsensical lessons on violence and theft. The mythology isn’t solidly constructed, so the groundwork actually changes over time. Every moral lesson is laid out so blatantly within dialogue that I actually started cringing. Our protagonist barely matures. The artifices are so blatantly constructed, it’s impossible to get into the film at all.

It’s always a pity when I feel like this about animation, especially hand-drawn animation, because the construction is so arduous you just want it to be good. But this isn’t. I squirmed in my seat. I looked at the faces next to me. I only stayed til the end to see if the demons do any crazy shit that would be super detailed and look awesome (nope).

Redeeming qualities! Gotta have em! It did look good. I did stay for the entire thing. New Japanese animations in the Ghibli tradition almost make me feel at home, or at least young again.

Barrymore, dir. Erik Canuel. Christopher Plummer shines in a surprisingly engaging theatre-on-screen adaptation.

My previous complaint about A Dangerous Method (which I like less, the more I think about it) was that the playwright seemed to run (and limit) the film. In embracing the theatrical aspect, and selecting an excellent lead player, Barrymore brings the theatre to the cinema.

Playing John Barrymore, a towering legend of the cinema, Plummer brings the audience through well-told and intricate stories. His character is engaging, so much so that I was not bored with just watching a sole character speak to himself (and to his stage manager in the wings, forever unseen).

Maybe I wouldn’t watch this in a cinema again (it was kind of a fest time-filler, to be honest), but I value its audacity and ability to make the tradition interesting.

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A talk with Morgan Spurlock, dir. of Comic-Con: Episode IV - A Fan’s Hope speaks. He says his private funders get no say in the finished product. He also says this is one of the only times Comic Con bigwigs have greenlit a documentary to be shot about the fest, mostly due to the support of Spike Lee and Joss Whedon. He’s fun and engaging and of course people asked obnoxious questions about Super Size Me.

A talk with Lynn Shelton, Emily Blunt and Mark Duplass about Your Sister’s Sister. The movement toward barely-scripted, half-improvised films is palpable, they say. Actors like it because it gives them something to work with and get into. Duplass directed a film in this fest: Jeff, Who Lives at Home. Another mumblecore flick from the guys who brought you Cyrus.

A talk with Bruce McDonald about documentary filmmaking. He’s still wearing that straw hat. Also: he likes sex and drugs, purportedly. Nothing more to report, a fairly banal interview (as far as my interests go). He does encourage indie filmmakers to think about marketing their film and to provide many marketing materials, to which I say: HALLELUJAH!

TIFF 2K11: DAY 3

The Island President, dir. Jon Shenk. It’s hard to objectively talk about documentaries; the subject matter can be engaging and important, but the presentation can still be misshapen or awkward. This docu (from the maker of Lost Boys of Sudan) has a prolonged ending, but the subject and protagonist are so engaging and astonishing — you’ll never stop caring. You might even feel energized by the final credits.

President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldives has been through some shit. For twenty years, Nasheed fought Maumoon Gayoom’s 30-year autocratic reign (with a thoroughly unsurprising 99% approval rating), to responses of jail, torture, exile. The most stunning example of this man’s ability to rise again comes from a description: for 18 months (or around such length), Nasheed was locked in a 3’ x 6’  corrugated steel jail. After the overthrowing of Gayoom’s rule (via democratic election, in which Nasheed won peoples’ hearts by visiting almost every household in the country), a new foe arose: the rising sea, the imminent destruction of the Maldives, the threat of a nation of environmental refugees.

The Maldives showcases famed resorts (think screensaver-calibre beaches) and 1200 islands — all of which would be submerged with a rise of three metres in sea level, many of which have already been abandoned due to erosion and/or destruction post-tsunami.

Nasheed is smart. He’s kind. He’s the leader George Clooney wished he had conjured in The Ides of March. Nasheed takes to the UN, to India, to the UK legislature, and finally, to Copenhagen in 2009, where he is instrumental in brokering a deal.

It’s pretty indicative of the film that I can’t stop reciting the story. Let me speak of the experience: you’re stunned by beautiful vistas, you’re chilled by the Radiohead soundtrack, you’re discouraged in any government that doesn’t have President Nasheed at its helm. (He walked by me in the industry lounge! Starstruck! Photo above [to come]!) Truly, a film to consider.

Pearl Jam Twenty, dir. Cameron Crowe. I dunno, don’t do this unless you’re invested in the scene. I left this one early.

Keyhole, dir. Guy Maddin. By far Maddin’s worst.

I love and follow Maddin; from my first experience with The Saddest Music in the World, I watched everything from Tales from the Gimli Hospital to Brand Upon the Brain!  (It’s funny, now that The Artist is gaining critical/popular acclaim for being a contemporary silent film — Maddin’s been playing at that game for a while.)

This film carries all of Maddin’s trademarks: crossing boundaries (and an obsession) with the mother, an examination of the home, a leering sexuality. It portrays them all in a Maddin Gone Wild way — nothing tempered or confused, like in his best films. Nothing particularly new about the presentation (still obsessed with the silent film, but less fidelity to the ideal he originally cherished).

I wouldn’t watch this again, unfortunately. I feel like Maddin’s success may have driven him to, you know, the excess and failure he so desires. Don’t see this. Sorry.

Twenty Cigarettes, dir. James Benning. I don’t know how to feel about this, probably because I’m new to experimental cinema. It’s 99 minutes of twenty people, one at a time, smoking an entire cigarette.

Interesting in that you wonder what they’re doing or thinking about. Who they are. You look at their faces and think about their expressions and features. You can observe them in a very Gaze-like way. You scrutinize them.

I guess it’s safe to say: it’s not about them, it’s about you. Watch this, only in a theatre. I doubt one’s ability to stay through it anywhere else.

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A talk with Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, creators of Paradise Lost (1, 2, and now 3), the stories of the West Memphis 3. (Point of note: Joe Berlinger made Crude, one of my favourite docus of recent years.) They were great. One of the best lines was uttered by Bruce, who said he’d had three children and one good marriage, and he’s never been so happy to see the West Memphis Three released.

A talk with documentary subject Paul Williams and director Stephen Kessler, from the premiering film Paul Williams: Still Alive. This was pretty okay.

TIFF 2K11: DAY 2 (rewritten a day late due to Tumblr mishap)

Le Havre, dir. Aki Kaurismäki. A quick glance at the opening credits tells you a full story: Laika the dog gets a full credit by herself, Jean-Pierre Léaud, of Antoine Doinel French New Wave fame, is also listed.

I think I cried through this entire movie. Not out of sadness or pity or any aggrandizing emotions (on behalf of the film), but out of pure feeling. This is a rare gem — without artifice, it behaves how one feels. In a small town in Normandy, a young refugee boy lands without hope. He is taken under the wing of a kind older gentleman, whose eternally giving wife has recently taken ill with a terminal condition. “Urgently benign,” lies the doctor, at the wife’s behest.

Beautiful colours, incredible steady shots, a sincere belief in humans, and a real look at who we are and the beautiful things we can do. A real French New Wave throwback (the casting of Léaud says as much, as does the reading of a Kafka novel), and a perfect movie to spend an evening on. True and honest, but sweet and new at the same time.

Gazing into the Abyss: A Tale of Death, a Tale of Life, dir. Werner Herzog. Opens with a quintessential great Herzog interview. He speaks to the priest who holds the ankle (with permission) of those being executed with capital punishment — he stands in front of the state cemetery, where there are no names, only numbers listed on stone crosses. This is the best part of Herzog, other than certain monologues in which he brings new, almost otherworldly, almost unconnected storylines in (like the albino crocodiles in Cave of Forgotten Dreams).

I only saw the first hour of this, but if you love Herzog it is definitely right up your alley. I am not the biggest fan of his (sorry, world). This film was already distinguished in certain ways, however. For instance, Herzog’s intrusion was more minimal than is generally expected. The subject matter is more sad. The poor men he interviews (one on death row, the other spared but facing life) are not “innocent” (and Herzog makes no case for such), but… stupid. Wrong. Hormonal. Young. I’ll watch the rest later in the fest.

A Dangerous Method, dir. David Cronenberg. Not that great. And I hate saying that, because I love everybody involved. My advice would be: don’t pay to see this in a cinema.

Keira Knightley, whom I actually love in most things, is unconvincing as a strong and struggling Russian Jew. Her conviction is lacking, perhaps, or maybe it’s the screenplay. A wordy and convoluted film, with intense reliance on dialogue which is both frequently uninteresting, and untrue. (I’m a person who frequently cites Jung in interrogations of film and, yes, real life, so this is startling obvious to me in several instances.)

The film is adapted from a play, which I suppose elucidates the staid shots, the stilted and plot-driving dialogue. If I were you, I’d watch Cronenberg’s 1996 Crash. If you want psychoanalysis, you have it there, to a far truer extent.

The Skin I Live In, dir. Pedro Almodóvar. Oh. Watch this.

Of course, the first and easiest cinematic comparison drawn is between this and Franju’s 1960 horror, Eyes Without a Face (from an aware filmmaker, Skin pays tribute to Franju’s work in several ways: the best of which being the scream and window-jump suicides). But, hey, it’s Almodóvar. This narrative goes in and out; it follows-through with a twist you’ll spend hours on; it brings you closer to the deeper parts of your mind.

Antonio Banderas, in another solid Antonio Banderas role, plays a scientist who has crafted a beautiful woman in his basement. She adores him. He has made a breakthrough in skin-grafting and -creation. All is weird and uncomfortable, nothing more so than the touted fact that the woman in his basement bears a canny resemblance to his deceased wife.

The ending does lack some punch, there were opportunities for even a more insidious closing — but you can’t have it all. A solid two hours of engrossing entertainment. Entrapment, identity, love, hostages; it’s all fair game, and it’s all explored in startling ways.

I can’t give away too much, and I’ve rewritten this blurb like four times thanks to Tumblr, so I can only urge you to watch this. You’ll be surprised.

TIFF 2K11: DAY 1

Melancholia, dir. Lars von Trier. Just checked out the first hour of this one, as it’ll be in theatres soon enough. The part I did see was great: well-acted, believable characters, subtly frightening. I’ve been a von Trier convert since Dogville, so I am perhaps not the best suited to go to for an objective opinion, BUT: this is probably his most accessible film, based on the hour I saw. Some old Hollywood style snappy dialogue, beautiful bourgeois parties, and a good ol’-fashioned planet crashing into the earth. Can’t wait to see the whole thing.

The Turin Horse, dir. Béla Tarr. Oh man. The highlight of the day. Sure, ostensibly it’s a black-and-white Eastern European 2h45m dark ages epic. But if you sit down for this movie, you won’t get up again. The pacing is incredible in its hook.

The film opens with a myth: Nietzsche’s madness is conceived by a mistreated horse in Turin. And then we see a horse. A majestic, domineering creature fighting against winds we grow to know as the end of the world. I don’t believe this to be the horse that drove Nietzsche to utter, “Mutter, ich bin dumm”; the myth exists more as a guiding concept. It’s a beautiful scene, bringing brutal, straightforward physicality (and holy christ, incredible cinematography) to a story of imaginary figures.

The film starts on Day One, although of what, we are not told. Presented with two characters, an aging father and his adult daughter, the film is immersed in a near-silent domestic world of harsh winds outdoors and daily basic rituals: heat up two potatoes and eat them with your hands, take the horse and cart out (if the horse so allows), gather water from the well. The most outstanding ritual is the meticulous dressing and undressing (to long underwear only) of the father by the daughter. Over the course of five days, we’re given new realities and practices. We see the same activities performed from different perspectives. It’s fascinating.

The similarity to Frantesik Vlacil’s famed Czech film Marketa Lazarova struck me: not just in aesthetics (although most certainly that — long hair! layers upon layers of clothing! horses!), but in its non-facetious, non-ironic stance. It presents itself as cinema, born fully-formed. This isn’t to say it exists in a vacuum, the very relation to Marketa Lazarova (and even Ozu films in its low-angle shots of eating), points to its contemporary status as influenced.

Wetlands, dir. Guy Édoin. The only Canadian film on my docket and I only saw a bit of it. Opens in just a… I can only say ludicrously Quebecois way. A naked woman walking through the wetlands. Cut! A teenage boy jerking off in a tree. Cut! Cum dripping down a tree leaf in an artsy way. Then I saw a cow giving birth to a stillborn, via a woman’s actual arms reaching in and pulling it out. I was very :O about it, but still super cool to see. I would have liked to see it all, but…

This is Not a Film, dir(???) Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahasebi. Watch this Not A Film!! Just when you thought cinema wasn’t dangerous. Jafar Panahi, famed director of movies you’ve heard of like Offside and Crimson Gold and The White Balloon, has been sentenced to a 20-year ban on filmmaking and six years in prison. He smuggled out This is Not a Film on a USB stick inside a cake, from Tehran to Paris. This is just backstory.

One day, Panahi and his documentary-filmmaking friend Mirtahasebi spend a day filming at the former’s pad. They drink tea, talk about Panahi’s appeal, interact with the enormous, crazy-for-climbing pet iguana Igi, and film partial retellings of Panahi’s latest feature idea. (Panahi soon becomes disillusioned with the retellings, bemoaning how much is lost in words and how much is gained in film: “Why would you make a film if you could just talk through it?”)

If nothing else, the documentary is a delightful look into the days of a bright and interesting man. Constantly surprising, at times downright hilarious, and still the background remains: all Panahi did was try to make a film, and as a result he is faced with incarceration. This is not a film — that’s important — but it’s something to consider.

The Ides of March, dir. George Clooney. Oh, just don’t.

The easiest way to talk about this film is to call it a stupid Primary Colours: YOUNG, IDEALISTIC LIBERAL GUY BECOMES DISILLUSIONED WITH POLITICS AFTER HIS IDOL IS REVEALED TO BE A PHILANDERER. All caps because SERIOUSLY. This can be done well. It has been done well. I think movies like Primary Colours and Election are tops. This was not done well.

The film features brilliant political minds and a charismatic, well-loved leader. Well, according to them. The audience is certainly never given evidence of this. In fact, if anything, we’re presented with children. The “funny” bits are contrived and juvenile (an example: Ryan Gosling’s character tells the Democratic nominee [his boss] to make his platform have MANDATORY TWO-YEAR SERVICE for all high school graduates, joking that, “everyone over 18 will vote for it, and people under 18 can’t vote!” This is the entire movie. Ugh.)

What kills me most is that Clooney has proven himself to be someone who can play a charismatic figure, but he has just neglected to do so in this. Everyone’s lauding his charisma and smarts and general popularity (as a to-be despotic President who self-identifies as non-religious and can’t even properly answer a question on defense and oh my God is so obsessed with oil from the Middle East like that’s the biggest problem facing anyone). The screenplay also neglects to ever mention the GLARINGLY OBVIOUS fact that Clooney is a fox and his opponent is, you know, Not George Clooney.

Anyways, not worth a go to the theatre. Not even Gosling in a suit can save it. Awful.

But I did get to exit the cinema with Roger Ebert and his amazing, beautiful wife. So I’m still glad I stayed for the whole thing.

SO INTO THIS.

FREDDIE MERCURY
BONNIE TYLER
PAT BENATAR
LOVERBOY

FRITZ LANG