Monthly Archives: September 2014

The Connection – Cedric Jimenez, Director

Uncategorized

This is a French take on the William Friedkin film The French Connection but should not be seen as a remake but rather the as the French take on the same story which is about the heroin drug trafficking through Marseilles in the 70’s and 80’s. The film is based on fact and real characters including the judge who was murdered and the drug lord who also was taken down. The story is thrilling without too much violence and more intellect than in your normal American thriller. It also lacks a Hollywood ending which is a relief. I really liked this film and I hope it shows up on Toronto screens despite it being in French with subtitles. For those of you who saw the Artist you can be happy that it stars Jean Dujardin who won an Oscar for that role. While The French Connection with Gene Hackman is a great film, this film is just as good although far more historically accurate and very French. Be sure to see it and why not have a look at The French Connection while you are visiting this time and story. Oh… the sound track is totally awesome for those of us born before 1970.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/galapresentations/the-connection

Charlie’s Country – Rolf de Heer, Director

Drama, Loved it, Oscar Stuff, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

This was my final film of the festival and a masterpiece in my opinion. It tells the story of an elderly aboriginal in Australia who is angry and sad and confused about what has happened to his country and his people and their traditions. The film is slow but deliberately so and the lead actor David Gulpilil does an amazing job portraying Charlie as he struggles with his demons. It is hard to describe the movie because it is so unusual but I can confirm it is a very good look at the struggle of first nations peoples and will help you understand our own first nations as well. Definitely worth the time and it will almost certainly be here in Toronto at some time in the near future.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/contemporary-world-cinema/charlies-country

Pasolini – Abel Ferrara, Director

Drama, Hated it, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

I was looking forward to this movie since I really like Willem Dafoe who plays Pasolini. In the end I was super grateful this movie is only 87 minutes long and that seemed long to me. It is very confusing, conducted in English, Italian with subtitles and Italian without subtitles and really gave very little insight to Pasolini or much else. I guess I should have been wary when the director was described as incendiary. I think if anyone uses a random word like this to describe a director then you should avoid the film at all costs. Other warning words are “challenging” “innovative” or “unique”. These generally mean ” really awful” in the opinion of this reviewer at least. Avoid this film.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/specialpresentations/pasolini

National Gallery – Frederick Wiseman, Director

Documentary, Loved it, Oscar Stuff, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

Today we decided to try the rush line and go for tickets to this 3 hour documentary about the National Gallery in London. The director is well known and has been doing docs since the 1960’s. His style is simply to film and let the images and dialogue speak for themselves. There is no narration but after 3 hours you feel like you have had a tour of one of the great art museums in the world. The film takes you through the galleries, offers you short lectures on individual pictures, visits management meetings, goes back to see the work done by restorers and gives you insight into how much thought goes into shows and how they are set up and lighted. Sounds long I know but it is fascinating and well worth your money and your time. Some of the images tied into earlier films including a significant look at a Turner exhibit that tied into Mr. Turner for me at least. The speakers in the film describing the art, the restoring process and the management of the gallery are all excellent. Hard to say too much more but it was really entertaining and I learned a ton. Go see this if you can.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/tiff-docs/national-gallery

Love and Mercy – Bill Pohlad, Director

Drama, Good, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

If you are a fan of the Beach Boys or Brian Wilson you should see this movie. Not the best film by far but interesting as a biopic. Wilson is played by two actors, John Cusack as the older Wilson and Paul Dano as the younger. Wilson suffered terribly from mental illness and yet managed to create a musical opus that will be enjoyed for years to come. I will not spoil this by telling too much of the story but Cusack wins the acting battle and Paul Giamatti has a great supporting role as the devious psychiatrist who tries to take advantage of Wilson. He does slime extremely well. Not enough of the music in my opinion and a bit of a confusing story line that jumps back and forth in time but worth a view.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/specialpresentations/love-mercy

Pawn Sacrifice – Edward Zwick, Director

Drama, Loved it, Oscar Stuff, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

Best film of the day. This is the story of the 1972 chess match between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer and the performance of Tobey Maguire in the lead role is superb given he likely is a foot shorter than Fischer was. The movie was focussed mostly on Fischer’s mental illness and how it affected the match so no major analysis of the games or the chess playing so if you are a chess geek this may disappoint. We follow Fischer from his youth as a child prodigy to the end of the 1972 match in which he crushes Spassky 12 ½ to 8 ½ in points and one of Spassky’s points is due to a forfeit when Fischer refused to show up for the second game. For the geeks however – look at Game 6 of the match which is arguably the greatest match ever played. When Spassky resigned he stood up and applauded Fischer’s brilliance in the game. The focus on the personalities however gives the film great dramatic energy and you will forget at the end that Maguire ever played Spiderman.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/galapresentations/pawn-sacrifice

Revenge of the Green Dragons – Andrew Lau, Director

Adventure, Drama, Meh!, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

This is a Chinese film in the Hong Kong gangster tradition directed by the man who brought you Infernal Affairs later remade by Martin Scorsese as The Departed. This time around it is Andrew Lau’s film and Scorsese is the producer. Set in Queens New York City rather than Hong Kong this is brutal (and I mean brutal) film about Asian gangs, drug dealers and human trafficking. I found it very hard to take and would recommend it only to those who know what they are getting into. The action is non-stop and violent and the twist ending is really contrived and while surprising made no sense in my mind. I sense I was however not holding a universal opinion. One aspect of going to so many movies in such a short time is that your view of the film can be influenced by what you had for breakfast or an upsetting email or whatever. It follows that if a review is super negative – like this one – it is to be taken with a grain of salt. So…. If you know Lau and like Hong Kong gangster films this may very well be up your alley. I can attest to the fact that there were no empty seats.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/specialpresentations/revenge-of-the-green-dragons

Good Kill – Andrew Niccol, Director

Drama, Loved it, Oscar Stuff, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

Second film of the day and also excellent. Ethan Hawke is the star and he is superb. The story is about a former US fighter pilot who now guides drones in the fight against the Taliban and other terrorist groups. He sits in a metal bunker in the Nevada desert and guides drones over Yemin, Afghanistan and Pakistan to blow up and kill terrorist targets in what is essentially a first person shooter video game but which is for real. The film could have been as good as The Hurt Locker but it suffers from a Hollywood happy ending. Still even that does not take from the horror of what these drone pilots do in the course of a day’s work. While they do kill bad guys they also kill innocents as “collateral damage” and they suffer post traumatic stress despite being so distant from their victims. The director also introduced this one by saying that it was made with no help from the US military so we, the audience could be confident the film was telling the truth. It is very good despite my whine about the ending which is just fine as far as Hollywood endings go but just disappointed me a bit from what was otherwise a hard hitting film about the nature of war in the 21st Century. Definitely put this on your list of films to see this fall.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/specialpresentations/good-kill

Red Army – Gabe Polsky, Director

Documentary, Loved it, Oscar Stuff, TIFF 2014, Uncategorized

I was not sure what to expect from this movie but being a hockey fan and having grown up with Canada vs the Red Army I was intrigued. Luckily we had a chance to hear the director introduce the movie. He is a first generation American born in Chicago of Ukrainian parents who had grown up in the Soviet Union. He played hockey as a kid in Chicago and was also interested in his Ukrainian origins and this led him to consider making this movie focussed on the incredibly successful and skilled Red Army team of the 70’s and 80’s. The movie is less a hockey movie and much more an exploration of the soul of the Soviet society of the time. The protagonist of the film was Fetisov, likely the greatest hockey player of his time. A defenceman to challenge Bobby Orr as the greatest defensive player ever. Interestingly Fetisov refused to be interviewed for the film until the final day of filming when he agreed to give 15 minutes. This turned into 5 hours and two more subsequent sessions. This saved the movie because he is a tremendously charismatic figure who led the Red Army team as captain and… well there is much more that teaches you why Putin is so successful today and much much more about Russian society and thinking. There is much here to learn about hockey, why the Red Army team was so successful, how oppressive the regime was as well as the team leadership itself. There are some amazing lines from the interviews with players, former KGB agents, coaches and others. The one coach Tikhonov was particularly brutal and at one point one of the team members tells the interviewer that if he had to have a heart transplant he would want Tikhonov’s heart because he never used it. The film is full of lines like this and even if you don’t know or like hockey you will love this movie. It is simply a brilliant documentary and well worth your time. Highly recommended to all.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/tiff-docs/red-army

Rosewater – Jon Stewart, Director

Uncategorized

This is the first feature film directed by Jon Stewart who is better known as the host of The Daily Show and one of our more brilliant satirists. Rosewater is the dramatization of the recent imprisonment and torture of Iranian/Canadian journalist, Maziar Bahari. Bahari went to Iran as a journalist for Newsweek magazine and while there was arrested on the charge of being a spy. The connection to Jon Stewart was through the fact that The Daily Show did a segment on Iranian politics during the election of 2009. As part of that they did a comic interview with Bahari in which they asked him why he was spying in Iran. A clip of the interview was among the pieces of evidence the regime used to justify imprisoning Bahari. While farcical now it led to 6 months of torture for the journalist. The film is very powerful at portraying how isolation and fear can be used to torture and breakdown a victim. It is also however a story full of hope and ultimately a happy ending for Bahari. Stewart took several months off his TV show to direct this film in Jordan last summer and the result may result in an new career for Stewart who also wrote the script. The movie is highly recommended.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/specialpresentations/rosewater