NOW_BUZZ_2012-08-30 by NOW Magazine

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012

ESSENTIAL TIFF REVIEWS

CRITICS PICK THE FILMS THEY

WHERE THE A-LISTERS EAT, DRINK & PARTY

CAN’T WAIT TO SEE

CLASSIC MOVIES’ CLASSIC COCKTAILS HOW TO DRESS LIKE A MOVIE STAR

BREAKOUT QUEEN CANADIAN ACTOR TATIANA MASLANY GROWS UP AND BLOWS UP

TICKETS ON SALE NOW Full season lineup at masseyhall.com I roythomson.com

CONTENTS 4 TIFF HITS AND MISSES

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l d r i n k s

HOW TO

TIFF

ESPERANZA SPALDING:

TABU

Looper, Rust And Bone, The Sessions and Laurence, Anyways are among the films to catch in our early review roundup

TICKET AND VENUE INFO Toronto International Film Festival September 6-16 416-599-FILM tiff.net FESTIVAL THEATRES

SATURDAY, SEPT 8 AMOUR

REVIEWS

RADIO MUSIC SOCIETY

5FILMS

FRIDAY, SEPT 7 ANNA KARENINA

▼ By GLENN SUMI

What to see. What to skip.

Great Expectations

The clock’s ticking down to TIFF 2011, but there’s still time to snag tix to the choicest flicks (and avoid the others). In addition to reviews, NOW’s critics choose five for their personal must-see lists. And check out tons more in next week’s issue, plus daily reviews at nowtoronto.com/tiff.

FRI, APR 5 8PM MH

Rust And Bone

I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE

HOW TO BUY TICKETS

PLUS Rapper Ice-T turns exec producer, and Ruba Nadda takes on a political thriller in Inescapable

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Cloud Atlas

THURSDAY, SEPT 6

WHIT EHORSE

THE END OF TIME

Passion

LOOPER

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AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 3

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l p r e v i e w Joseph Gordon-Levitt (left) and Paul Dano ooze cool in TIFF opener Looper.

HOW TO

TIFF TICKET AND VENUE INFO Toronto International Film Festival September 6-16 416-599-TIFF tiff.net FESTIVAL THEATRES BLOOR HOT DOCS CINEMA (506 Bloor West) CINEPLEX ODEON YONGE-DUNDAS CINEMAS (FORMERLY AMC) (10 Dundas East, fourth floor) ISABEL BADER (93 Charles West) JACKMAN HALL (AGO, 317 Dundas West) PRINCESS OF WALES THEATRE (300 King West) ROY THOMSON HALL (60 Simcoe) RYERSON THEATRE (43 Gerrard East) SCOTIABANK (259 Richmond West) TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX (Reitman Square, 350 King West) VISA SCREENING ROOM (ELGIN) (189 Yonge) WINTER GARDEN (189 Yonge)

REVIEWS

What to see. What to skip.

There’s still a week until TIFF 2012 begins, but here’s a sneak peek at some of the big-buzz flicks, awards- bound entries, quiet sleepers... and a few you should probably miss. Plus, NOW’s critics reveal what’s on their personal must- see lists. And check out tons more in next week’s issue along with news, reviews and tweets at nowtoronto.com/tiff. By NORMAN WILNER, SUSAN G. COLE, GLENN SUMI, RADHEYAN SIMONPILLAI and PAUL ENNIS

THURSDAY, SEPT 6 THE END OF TIME MAST D: Peter Mettler. Canada/ Switzerland. 114 min. Sep 6, 9:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 8, 12:15 pm Yonge & Dundas 2 Rating: NNN

A decade after exploring transcendence in Gambling, Gods & LSD, Mettler returns with another conceptual documentary, this one investigating the perception of time. It’s an intriguing notion, and for about 90 minutes it’s spellbinding. Mettler visits CERN to explore the concept of celestial time, a Hawaiian lava flow to consider geological time, Detroit to see the city’s recent financial

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collapse represented physically in abandoned buildings, and a Hindu funeral to show how humans mark time. And then he overstays his welcome with a very long (and narratively questionable) experimental sequence that feels like a CG version of 2001’s Star Gate sequence. Maybe he was trying to make me realize how slowly time passes when NW you’re bored.

LOOPER GALA D: Rian Johnson w/ Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis. U.S. 118 min. Sep 6, 6:30 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 6, 8 pm Roy Thomson Hall Rating: NNNN

Writer/director Johnson does for time travel movies what he did for film noir in Brick, taking the bones of a genre we know backwards and forwards – in

this case literally – and putting a fresh new skin around them. It’s 2044, and dead-eyed Joe (Gordon-Levitt) makes his living as a Looper, killing people sent back from 2074 so the future’s criminals won’t have bodies to hide. But when his future self (Willis) arrives and escapes assassination, Young Joe finds himself on the run from his employers, who are out to grab them both. It gets much more complicated than that when Young Joe meets a single mother (Emily Blunt) and her son (Pierce Gagnon), but Johnson keeps the pace fleet and the twists ingenious. This is first-rate head-fizzing entertainment, with exceptional performances by Gordon-Levitt, Blunt and Willis – and Jeff Daniels and Garret Dillahunt, too, come to think of it. NW

MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff. N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

HOW TO BUY TICKETS Packages sold out. Single tickets $19.69, premium tickets $38.27 (under 25 $15.04-$25, seniors $17.03-$32.08). Go online for details.

TICKETS

RUST AND BONE (DE ROUILLE ET D’OS) SP D: Jacques Audirad w/ Marion Cotillard, Matthias Schoenaerts. France/Belgium. 120 min. Sep 6, 9:30 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 7, noon Ryerson Rating: NNNNN

Audiard follows up A Prophet, his masterful prison drama, with another muscular film, this time a romance. A de-glammed Cotillard stars as Stéphanie, an orca trainer at a French Riviera amusement park who, after losing her legs in a workplace accident, begins a beautifully awkward relationship with Ali (Bullhead’s Schoenaerts), a blunt instrument of a man. Despite the Côte d’Azur setting and Katy Perry on the soundtrack, continued on page 12

Single tickets go on sale Saturday (September 2) online, by phone or at the festival box office (Reitman Square, 350 King West, and Metro Centre, concourse level, 225 King W). Limit of four tickets per screening per account.

SAME-DAY TICKETS If available, these can be purchased on the day of the screening online, by phone or at the festival box office (from 7 am). Theatre box offices open one hour before the first screening of the day.

RUSH TICKETS When available, they go on sale 10 minutes before the screening starts, for the first non-ticketholders in line.

CODE BREAKER • CTC City To City CWC Contemporary World Cinema DISC

Discovery DOC TIFF Docs GALA Gala Presentation KID TIFF Kids MAST Masters MAV Mavericks MM Midnight Madness SP Special Presentations VAN Vanguard

Ñ= Critic’s Pick

NNNNN = Best of the fest NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining NN = Snore N = Who programs this crap?

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AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 5

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l p r e v i e w Ben Affleck (right) steers his third feature, Argo, also starring Breaking Bad’s Bryan Cranston.

5FILMS

Much Ado About Nothing

I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE

▼ By NORMAN WILNER Everyday By the time you read this, I’ll have seen two dozen films in preparation for TIFF. If I’m really, really lucky, I might even have caught one of my five most highly anticipated titles from the list below. Though I’d settle for an early look at Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master, Baltasar Kormákur’s The Deep, Ben Wheatley’s Sightseers, Sion Sono’s The Land Of Hope or Peaches’s Peaches Does Herself. I’m pretty open is what I’m saying.

Michael Winterbottom and his actors, John Simm and Shirley Henderson, shot this drama – about a couple whose relationship is tested when he’s imprisoned on drug charges – piecemeal over the course of five years, the better to let the actors age in real time and develop their characters separately. I can’t wait to see what they’ve come up with. September 8, 6:45 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; September 10, 3 pm, Cineplex Yonge & Dundas 7; September 16, 12:30 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2

Joss Whedon was making The Avengers but he got bored during post-production. So he called a bunch of friends and shot a feature-length adaptation of William Shakespeare’s comedy. You know, just for a lark. Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof, who played out what may be Whedon’s greatest romance on Angel, reunite as Beatrice and Benedick, and Nathan Fillion plays Dogberry, which may be even better screen casting than Michael Keaton in Kenneth Branagh’s 1993 version. September 8, 2:30 pm, Elgin; September 9, 12:30 pm, Isabel Bader; September 14, 11 am, Elgin

Argo Ben Affleck’s third directorial effort – after Gone Baby Gone and The Town – dramatizes the 1979 efforts of the CIA to retrieve six Americans from the Canadian embassy in Tehran by sending in an agent (Affleck) posing as the producer of a quickie sci-fi movie. (He’s supposed to be in Iran to scout locations.) It’s Wag The Dog with a hair trigger, co-starring Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Bryan Cranston, Victor Garber, Kyle Chandler and Chris Messina. September 7, 6:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 8, 11 am, and September 15, 3 pm, Elgin

6 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

To The Wonder

Leviathan This experimental study of the American commercial fishing industry from directors Lucien CastaingTaylor (Sweetgrass) and Véréna Paravel (Foreign Parts) had critics raving at Locarno – or, more properly, tweeting constantly about its nightmarish intensity and thrilling camera work. Count me in. September 12, 7 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; September 14, 3:30 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 4

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After last year’s triumphant, transcendent The Tree Of Life, Terrence Malick returns (in record time!) with a new drama starring Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams, Olya Kurylenko and Javier Bardem. I don’t know anything about it other than the running time (112 minutes!), and given Malick’s tendency toward secrecy, I’m not sure we can even take that as gospel. September 10, 7 pm, and September 11, 3 pm, Princess of Wales; September 16, 9:45 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1

Q A AND

JORGE HINOJOSA AND ICE-T

DIRECTOR AND EXECUTIVE PRODUCER ICEBERG SLIM: PORTRAIT OF A PIMP Robert Beck, who called himself Iceberg Slim, has been a massive influence on the hip-hop world. His 1969 autobiography, Pimp: The Story Of My Life, codified an emerging underworld lifestyle, and his subsequent works explored and confronted African-American culture in a way few others did at the time. Two decades after Slim’s death, his life and legacy are explored in a new documentary, Iceberg Slim: Portrait Of A Pimp, making its world premiere at TIFF. It’s a labour of love for director Jorge Hinojosa and his executive producer, Ice-T, who joined our conference call from the New York set of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Jorge, you’ve been Ice-T’s manager for nearly three decades. How did you two end up making a documentary about Iceberg Slim? JORGE HINOJOSA When I first met Ice, I was still a teenager. I read those books and they just totally blew my mind. [They] exposed me to a world that I was totally unaware of. It was shocking, but at the same time it was really captivating. It puts you in this trance.

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MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff.

ICE-T At some point, Jorge just came up with, “I wanna do a story of the life of Iceberg Slim,” because a lot of people don’t know about it. So he started to dig and dig and dig, and he came up with this tremendous movie. I’m interviewed in it, but it’s pretty much Jorge’s directorial debut. I’m very proud of it. Jorge, what surprised you most while researching Slim? JH He really underplayed his criminal life. He talks about being arrested and stuff like that, but when I looked at his record, he was arrested 11 times before the age of 21. That was pretty shocking. And coming to grips with the time period he grew up in... I mean, he grew up in Chicago, the most corrupt city in America, during the worst race riots in American history. He really was kinda born in the fire, as it were. Ice, you’ve spoken of the connection you feel to Iceberg Slim… ICE-T When I started rapping, I named myself after Iceberg Slim. There’s a tremendous amount of similarities in our lives. He didn’t start to write books and I didn’t start to make records until we had gotten out of crime. He has this epiphany that lets him know that what he was doing was pretty much wrong, and he goes out and starts to speak to kids and try to explain to people that although these books might seem like they’re promoting the criminal lifestyle, really they’re a warning against it. Just like my music. It’s the same way anti-war films still make war exciting on some level, simply through dramatization. ICE-T Absolutely. As repulsive as some of the things you hear in the movie are, you want to hear more. NORMAN WILNER Robert Beck (aka Iceberg Slim) had a huge influence on hip-hop culture.

Iceberg Slim: Portrait Of A Pimp, directed by Jorge Hinojosa. September 8, 6 pm, Cineplex Yonge & Dundas 7; September 9, 9 am, Bloor; September 16, 4 pm, Scotiabank 1.

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AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 7

BUZZ F I L M F E S T I V A L P R E V I E W Joaquin Phoenix stars in much-anticipated The Master.

5FILMS

I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE ▼ By RADHEYAN SIMONPILLAI

As far as I’m concerned, TIFF offers two distinct pleasures: discovering films that may never appear on a Toronto screen again, and catching an early peak at titles earmarked for Oscar glory. When planning my calendar, I like to mix it up between the two.

Zaytoun Eran Riklis’s The Human Resources Manager was among my favourite titles at TIFF 2010, yet it never played here again. So no way am I going to miss his latest about an Israeli fighter pilot (Stephen Dorff) shot down over Lebanon who finds his way out with the help of a Palestinian boy. Riklis, who directed The Syrian Bride and Lemon Tree, tackles Middle Eastern problems with an absurdist and humanist touch. Dorff’s presence is a bit mystifying, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt after his resonant turn in Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere. September 9, 6 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; September 11, 9:30 pm, Scotiabank 2; September 16, 3:45 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2

INTERVIEW

RUBA NADDA WRITER/DIRECTOR INESCAPABLE

The Master True to the title of his latest enterprise, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson is a master of films about modern masculinity, where men define themselves through their careers. There was Mark Wahlberg’s porn star in Boogie Nights, Tom Cruise’s sex guru in Magnolia, and Daniel DayLewis’s oil tycoon in There Will Be Blood. In The Master, PTA regular Philip Seymour Hoffman stars as an L. Ron Hubbard-like cult leader, with Joaquin Phoenix as his emotionally unstable pupil. See it for the glorious 70mm presentation, its Oscar chances (a sure bet since Harvey Weinstein will engineer buzz) or Phoenix’s return to acting without irony (after the I’m Still Here shenanigans). Either way, I’m there. September 7, 9 pm, Princess of Wales; September 8, 3:15 pm, and September 16, 6 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1

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Spring Breakers

The Place Beyond The Pines Ryan Gosling plays a stunt rider who moonlights as a bank robber, which sounds like a repeat of Drive, a movie that was all superficial style posing as postmodernist art. But I have faith in director Derek Cianfrance, whose debut, Blue Valentine (also with Gosling), showed promise. Cianfrance’s sophomore outing, with Bradley Cooper and Eva Mendes, should provide a much more substantial drive through thriller territory. September 7, 6 pm, Princess of Wales; September 8, 11 am, Ryerson Theatre

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James Franco sports cornrows and a grill and Justin Bieber’s girlfriend is along for the ride in the latest from off-kilter director Harmony Korine. I could pretend I’m excited about Korine’s return, but really I just want to see Franco do some very bad things to Selena Gomez. September 7, 6 pm, Ryerson Theatre; September 9, 3 pm, and September 14, 9 pm, Bloor

Byzantium Interview With The Vampire director Neil Jordan takes another bite out of the genre in Byzantium. Playing Nosferatu’s minions are Saoirse Ronan, fresh from kicking ass in Hanna, and sexy former Bond girl Gemma Arterton, a talent in need of better movies. September 9, 9 pm, Ryerson Theatre; September 11, 11 am, Elgin; September 15, 9 pm, Bloor

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MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff.

Mixing action, identity and politics

Pick up

September TIFF issue, available now.

INESCAPABLE written and directed by Ruba Nadda, with Alexander Siddig, Marisa Tomei and Joshua Jackson. Screening September 11, 6:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 13, 5 pm, Scotiabank 1.

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MORE ONLINE

PMB 2012: Print Measurement Bureau – 2 Year Data

Ruba Nadda directs Alexander Siddig (below, left) and Joshua Jackson in ambitious flick Inescapable.

It’s taken six years, but Ruba Nadda is ready to sign off on Inescapable. “We just finished the [sound] mix,” she says when we meet a few weeks before her film’s scheduled TIFF world premiere. “I’ve held my breath with this one since 2006.” In contrast to her previous features Sabah and Cairo Time, which focused on the budding relationships be tween people from different cultures, Inescapable is a political thriller about a former Syrian intelligence of ficial long since relocated to Toronto who must return to Damascus when his daughter disappears there. “The big picture is not just the theft of his daughter, but the theft of this Arab man’s identity,” Nadda says. “I’m the product of immigrant parents, so I know when people come to Canada they leave so much behind. You come here and you’re forced to start over again, and this man, this is his past and he’s ashamed of it. He thinks he’s started over again, but his past catches up and he has to go back and reclaim it.” Nadda could only imagine one actor in the role – her Cairo Time star Alexander Siddig. She gave him the In escapable script while they were shooting in Egypt in 2008, and he immediately said yes. “He is the quintessential Arab man,” she says. “He’s very masculine and very hard, very contained and ex plosive. I don’t know how he does it.” Shooting in Syria was out of the question. Not only is moviemaking virtually impossible there, but Nadda – whose parents emigrated from Syria, and who lived there in her teens before the family moved back to Ca nada – is terrified of returning. “I know what it’s like to have lived in that totalitarian regime,” she says. “I still have nightmares of what it would be like were I still living there. When I go back to the Middle East, I’m scared to death that they’re gonna put me on a plane and send me back [to Syria].” The original plan was to substitute Cairo for Damas cus, but the political explosion there made any Middle East location risky. Producer Daniel Iron suggested Jo hannesburg, and after a scouting trip there, Nadda de cided she could make it work. “All I needed was history,” she says. “I needed decay. I took all my childhood photos of Syria and I just dupli cated it for the scenes. And it was safer for me.” While Nadda aimed for a snapshot of political real ities in today’s Syria – or, better, Syria before the start of the current conflict – she stresses that Inescapable isn’t a documentary. “I would love to just get all this information into the movie, but Syria’s very complicated,” she says. “I know that as a filmmaker I can shed light if I just [tell] a personal story that people can connect to. Then I can give a sense of what’s happening there now.” NORMAN WILNER

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AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 9

BUZZ f i l m f e s t i v a l c o v e r s t o r y

GROWN TATIANA MASLANY I S ALL

SHE WON SUNDANCE’S BREAKOUT PERFORMANCE AWARD FOR GROWN UP MOVIE STAR AND MESMERIZES AGAIN AS A TEEN IN PICTURE DAY, BUT TATIANA MASLANY IS DEFINITELY AN ADULT NOW By SUSAN G. COLE Rising star Tatiana Maslany has developed a true specialty: females caught between their teens and full-on womanhood. In 2009’s Grown Up Movie Star, her performance as Ruby, a young Newfoundland girl discovering her sexuality, scored her the breakout performance award at Sundance. In this year’s TIFF entry Picture Day, she’s Claire, who’s repeating grade 12 – her victory lap, Claire calls it. She’s sexually precocious in ways that scare her contemporaries, yet not entirely willing to take the leap into the world of adults. “I’m at the transition place myself,” she allows during a pre-TIFF interview, “still playing high school girls but moving to a stage when I’m playing older roles and going to the places of stillness and wisdom and knowledge and weight. It’s exciting and scary.” Sitting with her in a T.O. condo, I can almost see the transition taking place before my eyes. There’s the nervous energy of a teenager, fingernails painted all different colours that twinkle when she taps her hands together. But at 27, she’s also impressively articulate, demonstrating the profound intelligence that comes through in her work. She’s smart and sexy, a compelling combination that has her turning important heads in the business. She talks about sex frankly – she kinda has to, given the characters she’s been playing. “Sexuality is vibrating at an insane level when you’re a teenager,” she says intensely, leaning in. “The difference between Ruby and 10 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

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Claire is that Ruby’s just finding it. It’s like a weapon she doesn’t know how to use. Claire? I liken it to having a conversation, and Claire has a lot of conversations. Sex isn’t hard, but intimacy is terrifying.” Born in Regina, Maslany started out as a dancer. You can tell, director Kate Melville says later. Her movements are so precise; you can do five takes of a scene involving a glass of water and she’ll have that glass in exactly the same place every time. The kind of child who forced her parents to watch her and her brother’s homemade plays, she then got into community theatre as a kid. Until she moved to Toronto, acting was fun. But she did some TV in Winnipeg (Incredible Story Studio), a small film in Edmonton, got a break with a role in Ginger Snaps: Unleashed and broke out in Grown Up Movie Star. “I played a load of frumpsters,” she laughs as she recalls her early career. “There were a lot of dorks. Ruby changed that. She was so young and innocent. It was like discovering that sexual quality in myself onscreen.” The Sundance experience was exhilarating and completely unexpected. “We were out there for 11 days and so excited that this indie film shot in Newfoundland was being seen by more than 12 people. I didn’t even know there was a performance [award] possibility at awards night. I had a big cold – my nose was bright red – and I just sat there when they announced the prize. I vaguely remember somebody telling me I had to say something, so

REVIEW

PICTURE DAY DISC D: Kate Melville w/ Tatiana Maslany, Spencer Van Wyck. Canada. 93 min. Sep 7, 9:45 pm Isabel Bader; Sep 8, 3:30 pm Yonge & Dundas 6; Sep 16, 6:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4 Rating: NNN

As Claire, a troubled high schooler repeating Grade 12 and caught between the adult and teenage worlds, Maslany (Grown Up Movie Star) makes the rising-star label look like it’s for real. Neglected at home and tagged as the school slut by classmates, she enounters Henry (Van Wyck), someone she used to babysit, who’s grown up now. They establish a tentative friendship even as she’s dating a much older rock musician (Steven McCarthy, also excellent). This is writer/director Melville’s debut feature, and it often shows. She’s crammed way too much into the narrative, and plot points get dropped. (What happened to that homemade acid?) But you care about the characters in this engaging film, and it’s anchored by an actor to watch. SGC

Ñ= Critic’s Pick

I went up, burbled garbage and then vibrated offstage.” Melville, who’d met her while writing for Being Erica, in which Maslany had a semi-regular role, approached her with Picture Day right after that. Inevitably, though, Maslany made the trip to L.A., where she engaged in that soul-crushing experience of trying to get noticed. Problem is, she wasn’t being herself while selling herself. “I didn’t know what I was. I was very self-conscious, a fish out of water. I never felt like myself. If I’d had any calmness about me, I would have talked about films I love and actors I like and not the weather and driving. How do you make an impression in five minutes anyway?” Turns out she doesn’t necessarily need Hollywood. What keeps her growing as an artist is her ability to make the most of small situations. In the indie pic Defendor, she had all of three lines as a Russian prostitute. “It was just three lines, but I got to work with Elias Koteas, one of the most fascinating actors. It was a two-second scene, but I learned so much.” Now she’s shooting Cas & Dylan in Sudbury with Oscar winner Richard Dreyfuss – not bad for someone who had trouble getting noticed when she was making the rounds in Tinseltown. “Before I met Richard, I was terrified, but he’s open, warm and makes me feel completely safe. I can make a mistake and feel like an idiot and it’s all good because it’s all about finding the

NNNNN = Best of the fest NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining NN = Snore N = Who programs this crap?

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MORE ONLINE

Interview clips at nowtoronto.com

UP MERCEDES GRUNDY

characters. He’s humble, and loves the craft.” It’s a huge shift after working on Picture Day with relative unknown Spencer Van Wyck, who plays Harry, the boy Claire used to babysit and with whom she forges a tentative friendship. That evocation of the uneasy connection between a teen boy and girl is one of the movie’s main strengths. “Everything’s so tense,” Maslany agrees. “Friendship is a daring thing. That’s why it’s so terrifying for Claire. Being friends is more intimate than having sex.” In Cas & Dylan, she’s finally feeling like she may say goodbye to the kid roles. The film is Jason Priestley’s first directing feature, Canadian (Dreyfuss loves it up here) and a road movie in which Dreyfuss plays a doctor taking a long car journey with Maslany’s character, a writer and, yes, a mature one. No teen sensations here. “I feel like I’m at a new stage when I’m learning everything again. You can get comfortable and feel safe, but then you realize that you can go to a deeper level. “I just want to soak up every moment.” 3 susanc@nowtoronto.com twitter.com/nowfilm N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 11

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l p r e v i e w Rcontinued from page 4

PUSHER

Audiard’s elegant film has a rougharound-the-edges aesthetic and refuses to sensationalize its subject. Some will dismiss it because of its hoary contrivances, particularly during the gutwrenching climax, but they’re not giving the brilliant director his due. His genre clichés are part of his greater argument about deceptive appearances, moral redempton and RS false hopes.

VAN D: Luis Prieto w/ Richard Coyle, Bronson Webb. UK. 87 min. Sep 7, 9 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema; Sep 9, noon Yonge & Dundas 10 Rating: NNN

TABU WL D: Miguel Gomes w/ Teresa Madruga, Laura Soveral. Portugal/Germany/Brazil/ France. 110 min. Sep 6, 6:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 8, 1 pm Jackman Hall (AGO) Rating: NNN

5FILMS

I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE ▼ By GLENN SUMI

Yes, I’m looking forward to watching P.T. Anderson’s Master piece, making Much Ado over Joss Whedon and seeing local lights Deepa Mehta, Anita Majumdar and Zaib Shaikh bring Salman Rushdie’s brilliant Midnight’s Children to life. But my hopes are pretty high for these films, too.

Tom Hanks and Halle Berry help us navigate Cloud Atlas.

Rust And Bone Physical disabilities seems to be a major TIFF 2012 theme, an element in The Sessions, Amour and this film by Jacques Audiard. Matthias Schoenaerts (Bullhead) and Marion Cotillard play an unusual couple on the French Riviera whose relationship takes a turn after she suffers an accident. After The Prophet, a stunning, multi-layered look at power relations in a French prison, I’d see anything by Audiard. And it’ll be good to watch Cotillard, used more for her dewy eyes than for her acting in recent Hollywood films, act in her mother tongue and show why she won that Oscar. September 6, 9:30 pm, Elgin; September 7, noon, Ryerson Theatre

Cloud Atlas When I read David Mitchell’s genre-switching, era-hopping, bizarre page-turner of a novel several years ago, I never thought I’d one day see it made into a movie. While the six linked narratives were compelling, the book seemed like a nifty literary experiment – hardly the stuff of cinema. That the Wachowski siblings have adapted the book is even more intriguing; their post-Matrix material isn’t great. But then again, director Tom Tykwer did a decent job with another favourite novel, Patrick Susskind’s Perfume. And the cast – including Oscar winners Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Susan Sarandon and Jim Broadbent – is promising, right? September 8, 6 pm, Princess of Wales; September 9, 11:30 am, Winter Garden; September 15, 11 am, Elgin

Passion Brian De Palma is responsible for some of my favourite movie sequences of all time – mostly from his prolific period in the 70s and 80s. His output has tailed off recently, but this remake of Alain Corneau’s Crime D’Amour – about two women clawing at each other in a corporate environment – has all the ingredients of his best films: sex, vengeance, violence. That the leads are played by two sizzling screen presences – Rachel McAdams and Dragon Tattoo’s Noomi Rapace – should deliver on that title. September 11, 8 pm, Winter Garden; September 13, 8:30 pm, Scotiabank 1; September 14, 9:30 am, Scotiabank 3

Portuguese writer/director and occasional surrealist Gomes (Our Beloved Month Of August) shows considerable ambition in this bifurcated black-and-white drama, which spends its first half in present-day Lisbon, where a woman (Madruga) worries about her elderly neighbour (Soveral), then jumps back half a century to tell the story of that neighbour’s life in Africa as a silent film narrated by her former lover (Carloto Cotta). The problem is that the second half doesn’t really illuminate the first. Instead of finding a way to knit the two together, Gomes settles for a playful recreation of jungle-movie tropes and a couple of nods to F.W. Murnau’s 1931 Tabu: A Story Of The South Seas and calls it a day. NW Great soundtrack, though.

FRIDAY, SEPT 7 Great Expectations Mike Newell’s an uneven director; for every Four Weddings And A Funeral there’s a Love In The Time Of Cholera or Mona Lisa Smile: handsome but empty movies. So why am I looking forward to this adaptation of Charles Dickens’s much-filmed classic? The cast. Ralph Fiennes as Magwitch; Helena Bonham Carter as Miss Havisham; Sally Hawkins as Mrs. Joe. And Jeremy Irvine, who was believably in love with an animal in War Horse, sets his sights on a more human coupling in Holliday Grainger’s Estella. September 11, 9:30 pm, Roy Thomson; September 12, 11 am, Elgin; September 14, noon, Scotiabank 1

The Bay Who knew that Oscar-winner Barry Levinson (Rain Man, Good Morning, Vietnam) would one day screen something in the Midnight Madness series? His first feature since 1997’s Wag The Dog, The Bay is a found-footage horror film about an environmental catastrophe, starring unknowns. File this one under “morbid curiosity.” September 12, 11:59 pm, Ryerson Theatre; September 13, 2:45 pm, Cineplex Yonge & Dundas 6

ANNA KARENINA SP D: Joe Wright w/ Keira Knightley, Aaron Taylor-Johnson. UK. 130 min. Sep 7, 6 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 8, 12:15 pm Isabel Bader Rating: NNN

Wright tries to outdo Baz Luhrmann in this high-concept adaptation of Tolstoy’s novel that sets much of its sprawling action in an elegant theatre. This allows for swift scene changes (and must have kept costs down), and up to a point it makes sense thematically – stressing the artifice of 19th-century Russian society and the culture of watching and gossiping that ultimately dooms the affair between married mom Anna (Knightley) and her lover, Vronsky (Taylor-Johnson). But the strategy isn’t used consistently, mixing theatre interiors with actual exterior locations (it was filmed partly in Russia). And despite Tom Stoppard’s clear screenplay, the effect distances us from the characters. Still, it’s a bold approach, and the leads (along with Domhnall Gleeson’s sympathetic Levin) are fine, although Jude Law steals the picture with his pinched yet dignified and human portrayal of Anna’s cuckolded husband. GS

PICTURE DAY DISC D: Kate Melville w/ Tatiana Maslany, Spencer Van Wyck. Canada. 93 min. Sep 7, 9:45 pm Isabel Bader; Sep 8, 3:30 pm Yonge & Dundas 6; Sep 16, 6:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4 Rating: NNN

See Tatiana Maslany cover story and review of the film, page 10.

This is actually the second British remake of Nicolas Winding Refn’s 1996 breakout thriller about a mid-level coke dealer who finds himself on the hook to a vicious mobster; an earlier Hindi version was produced in 2010. Coyle (Coupling) takes on the role of the increasingly panicked anti-hero, but Zlatko Buric (who was in all three of the original Danish movies) reprises the role of the fatherly heavy. It’s all hand-held cameras, crisp editing and pounding music, and Coyle is fine – though he’s styled to play up his resemblance to Andy Serkis, making one wonder how much more effective Serkis would have been in the role. But as slick as director Prieto makes the production, he never quite pulls it out from under Winding Refn’s NW shadow.

SATURDAY, SEPT 8 AMOUR MAST D: Michael Haneke w/ Emmanuelle Riva, Jean-Louis Trintignant. Austria/France/Germany. 127 min. Sep 8, 6 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 16, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2 Rating: NNNNN

Austrian auteur Haneke (Caché, The White Ribbon) won his second Palme d’Or for this unforgiving tale of an aging husband and wife (French screen legends Trintignant and Riva) whose lives disintegrate into torment after she’s paralyzed by a stroke and he devotes himself to her care. Turns out there’s no one better to chronicle the tiny, cumulative miseries of old age than an emotional sadist, and Haneke can turn a simple sequence of a man moving his paralyzed wife from her bed to a chair into a nerve-shredding, heart-inmouth aria of suspense. The director’s approach is unapologetically manipulative, but Trintingnant and Riva invest every moment with life and history. I never want to see this movie again, but that’s testament to its NW power.

THE PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER SP D: Stephen Chbosky w/ Logan Lerman, Emma Watson. U.S. 103 min. Sep 8, 6:15 pm Ryerson; Sep 9, 3:30 pm Yonge & Dundas 7 Rating: NNNN

Chbosky makes his directorial debut with this adaptation of his 1999 young-adult novel about a teenager (Lerman) just starting to come out of his shell after a traumatic experience, thanks mostly to the prodding of new school friends (Watson, Ezra Miller). It’s set in Pittsburgh about 20 years ago, and Chbosky gets the period absolutely right. Not only are the clothes and fads rendered accurately, but the movie nails the sense of isolation and confusion that existed before the internet allowed us to answer any question in a heartbeat. Lerman’s withdrawn, inarticulate performance contrasts nicely with continued on page 14

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Ñ= Critic’s Pick

NNNNN = Best of the fest NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining NN = Snore N = Who programs this crap?

➼

MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff.

Oscar nominee Janet McTeer plays writer Mary McCarthy in big-buzz biopic Hannah Arendt.

5FILMS

I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE

▼ By SUSAN G. COLE When it comes to TIFF, I want the political films, for sure, but give me some pop culture and some good old-fashioned trash, too. All those elements are included in my wish list below.

Hannah Arendt

The Reluctant Fundamentalist In this adaptation of Mohsin Hamid’s exceptional Booker-shortlisted novel – he was a knockout at an IFOA panel that I moderated – a brilliant Pakistani Princeton graduate (Riz Ahmed) finds success in America’s business world. But when the Twin Towers fall, everything changes, including his own consciousness. Mira Nair directs, with Kiefer Sutherland, Liev Schreiber and Kate Hudson. September 8, 9:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 9, 11:45 am, Bloor; September 16, 2:30 pm, Ryerson Theatre

The Paperboy

Margarethe von Trotta has a gift for combining political acumen with astute observation of the lives of women. It should be in full play in her biopic about Hannah Arendt, focusing on the brilliant political thinker’s experience attending the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolph Eichmann. Long-time von Trotta collaborator Barbara Sukowa plays alongside Janet McTeer (Albert Knox). September 11, 6 pm, and September 13, 11 am, Elgin; September 15, 7:30 pm, Cineplex Yonge & Dundas 6

This Southern Gothic entry from Oscar nominee Lee Daniels (Precious) tells the story of a journalist (Matthew McConaughey) investigating the case of a prisoner (John Cusack) convicted of killing a racist sheriff. It’s got everything you want from grade-A trash: a great cast, including Nicole Kidman as the felon’s love interest, a ton of raunch, and, since it’s set in backwoods Florida, alligators doubtless will figure prominently. September 14, 6 pm, Elgin; September 15, 6 pm, Ryerson Theatre

Midnight’s Children

Bad 25

Oscar nominee Deepa Mehta collaborates with Booker winner Salman Rushdie on a film sure to make waves. Two children – one poor, one wealthy – are born in 1947 on the day India gains its independence, and are switched at birth. Soon they discover they’re both endowed with telepathic powers. With magic realism, over 60 locations and production design by Dilip Mehta (Water), which guarantees it’ll be gorgeous, this epic is generating big buzz. September 9, 6:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 10, 9 am, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2

Any movie by Spike Lee – one of the few American directors with a real voice – is an event. Can’t wait to see what he brings to this doc about the creation of Michael Jackson’s 1987 album, Bad. Lee has behind-the-scenes footage of the recording process and interviews with collaborators including Sheryl Crow (his duet partner in I Just Can’t Stop Loving You) and AfricanAmerican pop stars who were influenced by him, like Kanye West and Cee Lo Green. September 15, 9 pm, Ryerson Theatre; September 16, noon, Bloor

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BUZZ F I L M F E S T I V A L P R E V I E W Rcontinued from page 12 Watson and Miller’s ebullience, and his scenes with Paul Rudd (as a sympathetic English teacher) are wonderful. This could have been pap. It’s NW anything but.

ROAD NORTH (TIE POHJOISEEN) CWC D: Mika Kaurismäki w/ Vesa-Matti Loiri, Samuli Edelmann. Finland. 110 min. Sep 8, 6 pm Yonge & Dundas 9; Sep 9, 12:30 pm Yonge & Dundas 9; Sep 16, 9 am Yonge & Dundas 10 Rating: NNNN

An estranged, wastrel of a dad (Loiri) shows up drunk on the doorstep of his son (Edelmann), an uptight, 40-something concert pianist. The two embark on an on-the-fly road trip with life-changing stops along the way. You’ve been down this sort of road many times before, but Kaurismäki surprises with a sly journey full of warmth, humour and whimsy. Loiri’s jovial performance as the cunning father anchors the film. He’s difficult to trust, but like his son, you want to ride RS with him anyway.

THE SECRET DISCO REVOLUTION DOC D: Jamie Kastner w/ Gloria Gaynor, the Village People. Canada. 84 min. Sep 8, 9:45 pm Scotiabank 3; Sep 13, 3 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema Rating: NN

If there was something revolutionary about disco, it’s certainly been kept secret from this filmmaker. Kastner offers a history of the maligned musical genre while taking Hot Stuff author Alice Echols’s position that the disco movement was politically liberating for the marginalized. Stuffed with incoherent arguments, a whole lot of speculation and sweeping statements that anger even the Village People, the film is only redeemed when Kastner finally shares the audience’s frustration. Like disco, the doc has little to offer, but Kastner RS dances around the subject well.

WEST OF MEMPHIS MAV D: Amy Berg. 146 min. Sep 8, 2:30 pm Ryerson Rating: NNNN

Just a year after Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky brought Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory to TIFF, another feature documentary about Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jesse Misskelley Jr., wrongfully convicted of the 1993 murders of three eight-year-old children in West Memphis, Arkansas, might seem unnecessary – but the story of the West Memphis Three can never be examined closely enough. Berg’s narrative doc is much more emotionally accessible than the meditative Paradise Lost films, with appearances by celebrity supporters like Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh (who produced this film), Eddie Vedder, Johnny Depp and Natalie Maines. The film organizes two decades of investigation and activism into a comprehensive two-and-half-hour narrative, re-interviewing key figures from new angles and bolstering Berlinger and Sinofsky’s thesis that the ®/TM Toronto Film Festival a registered ®/TMInternational Toronto International Film is Festival is a registeredcase epitomizes the horribly flawed trade-mark of TorontoofInternational Film Festival trade-mark Toronto International Film Inc. Festival Inc. nature of the Arkansas justice system, used under license PMA Canada. used underbylicense by PMA Canada. 14 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

which would much rather abandon an innocent man on death row than NW reopen a closed case.

SUNDAY, SEPT 9 A FEW HOURS OF SPRING (QUELQUES HEURES DE PRINTEMPS) SP D: Stéphane Brizé w/ Vincent Lindon, Hélène Vincent. France. 109 min. Sep 9, 9:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; Sep 11, 5 pm Yonge & Dundas 6 Rating: NNN

This finely modulated examination of a working-class mother-son relationship takes a satisfying turn once the son (Lindon) discovers that his independent-minded mother (Vincent) has opted for assisted suicide to deal with her terminal cancer. Tenderness blossoms amidst the gravitas as the ex-con truck driver’s concentrated gaze at his dying mother melts away years of non-communication between two stubborn solitudes. The mother’s dedication to fulfilling her desire to die with dignity makes a persuasive case for a humane way out, even if it means going to Switzerland to do it legally. Brize’s sensitive direction and compassion for his characters enable us to empathize with the plight of these two inarticuPE late people.

THE SESSIONS SP D: Ben Lewin w/ John Hawkes, Helen Hunt. U.S. 95 min. Sep 9, 2:30 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 11, 2:30 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 15, noon Ryerson Rating: NNNN

In a challenging role that’s sure to get awards attention, Hawkes (Winter’s Bone, Martha Marcy May Marlene) plays Mark O’Brien, a real-life poet and journalist who, because of childhood polio, spends most of his life in an iron lung or on a gurney. The film recounts his attempts in his late 30s to lose his virginity with a sex surrogate named Cheryl (Hunt). The fact that he’s Catholic, and recounts his experiences to his priest (William H. Macy), adds another fascinating element. Director Lewin sometimes struggles to find the right tone, but the story unfolds elegantly, and he’s helped by a magnificent cast. Acting entirely with his head, Hawkes, his voice breathy and pitched high, finds a huge range of subtle emotion, and Hunt invests her character with depth and compassion even as she’s struggling with her own conflicted emotions. GS

MONDAY, SEPT 10 ANTIVIRAL SP D: Brandon Cronenberg w/ Caleb Landry Jones, Sarah Gadon. Canada. 108 min. Sep 10, 9 pm Ryerson; Sep 12, 2:45 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema Rating: NN

In a world so fame-crazed that people pay to be infected with celebrities’ diseases, a black marketeer (Jones) injects himself with the blood of an ailing superstar (Gadon) and becomes a pawn in a very deadly game. Writer/director Cronenberg has said he’s never seen any of his father, David’s, movies, so apparently they’re in his DNA. Antiviral is basically

Ñ= Critic’s Pick

Videodrome with viruses instead of tumours, right down to the biomechanical hallucinations and the corporate war subtext. But this version’s told so clinically that it might as well be hermetically sealed, and Jones’s character is never anything more than a scowling, bug-eyed cipher. Gadon’s great as a sheltered (and possibly genuinely innocent) superstar, but she’s only in the film long enough to make us wish she’d stuck around NW longer.

BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO VAN D: Peter Strickland w/ Toby Jones, Cosimo Fusco. UK. 92 min. Sep 10, 6 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema; Sep 11, 2:45 pm Yonge & Dundas 3 Rating: NNN

Berberian Sound Studio takes place almost entirely within the confines of the eponymous Italian recording facility where a repressed British engineer (Jones) has arrived to mix a bloody giallo called The Equestrian Vortex. Writer/director Strickland sets the story in the mid-70s, right around the time Dario Argento was finishing up Suspiria, and that film’s suffocating, oppressive sensibility is replicated here with lots of heavy breathing and shrieking (as looped by actors in sound booths) and flesh-squelching (as recreated by foley artists stabbing watermelons and smashing fruit). As our twitchy hero begins to come apart under the stress of the job, the movie echoes his crumbling state of mind by coming unstuck in chronology and language – sort of. It evaporates like a bad dream as soon as the lights come up, but the experience is still worth having. NW

HYDE PARK ON HUDSON GALA D: Roger Michell w/ Bill Murray, Laura Linney. United Kingdom. 95 min. Sep 10, 6:30 pm Roy Thomson Hall; Sep 11, 12:30 pm Winter Garden Rating: NN

In 1939, George VI and Elizabeth spent a weekend at Franklin D. Roosevelt’s estate in hopes of getting the president to pledge U.S. support in the coming war. Also present was FDR’s cousin (and occasional lover) Daisy, whose diaries provide the factual basis for this shameless King’s Speech wannabe. Hyde Park On Hudson is more concerned with historical pageantry than with actual drama, forever imagining the conversations of its famous characters behind closed doors. Linney’s Daisy serves as narrator and audience surrogate, but the movie has no time for her, being much more interested in the scenes between Murray’s paternal FDR and Samuel West’s insecure George, which are clearly meant to echo the interplay between Geoffrey Rush and Colin Firth. Olivia Colman gets to have a little fun as George’s wife, Elizabeth; Murray’s Rushmore co-star Olivia Williams, as Eleanor Roosevelt, does not. Every moment seems calculated to appeal to the mainstream NNNNN = Best of the fest NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining NN = Snore N = Who programs this crap?

MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff.

American audience that embraced The King’s Speech. Why else would the English characters use the term “stutter” instead of “stammer” in reference to George’s speech NW impediment?

discovery, and his exceptionally nuanced performance keeps Tower standing despite its iffy foundation. RS

A LATE QUARTET

SP D: Matteo Garrone w/ Aniello Arena, Loredana Simioli. Italy/France. 115 min. Sep 12, 6:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 13, 9:30 pm Scotiabank 3 Rating: NN

SP D: Yaron Zilberman w/ Christopher Walken, Philip Seymour Hoffman. U.S. 105 min. Sep 10, 6 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 12, 5 pm Scotiabank 4 Rating: NNN

When Peter (Walken), leader of a famous string quartet, sees signs in himself of a degenerative disease and contemplates retirement, jealousy, ambition and life crises start rocking his collaborators (Hoffman, Mark Ivanir and Catherine Keener). There’s some great writing in director Zilberman and Seth Grossman’s script on the topic of music – a speech about Peter’s encounter with Pablo Casals is amazing – and good performances by a great cast. But until the last scene, the film is emotionally slack, and no one except Walken is credible as a string player, a major problem with the editing and coaching. SGC

TUESDAY, SEPT 11 BURN IT UP DJASSA (LE DJASSA A PRIS FEU) DISC D: Lonesome Solo w/ Abdoul Karim Konaté, Mohamed Bamba. Ivory Coast/France. 70 min. Sep 11, 7 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 13, 10 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 14, 12:45 pm Scotiabank 4 Rating: NNNN

Solo’s remarkable debut is a gritty crime drama that holds a whole lot of promise for raw Ivory Coast filmmaking. Konaté turns in a fiery performance as Tony, a street dweller with undeniable charisma and an itch for something more than his legitimate job selling cigarettes can offer. Solo directs with a realist’s pulse while frequently cutting to a young narrator (Bamba) who tells a slightly skewed version of Tony’s story. Solo’s like a ghetto mythmaker, turning street life into art and taking Africa’s oral storytelling traditions in RS a fresh direction.

TOWER DISC D: Kazik Radwanski w/ Derek Bogart, Nicole Fairbairn. Canada. 78 min. Sep 11, 10 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 12, 6:15 pm Yonge & Dundas 9 Rating: NNN

An admirable feature debut by former Ryerson student Radwanski, Tower is a tightly focused but somewhat hollow character study that makes the most of a microbudget. Holding the film’s claustrophobic close-ups throughout is Derek (Bogart), a 34-year-old Toronto loner who shrugs off relationships just as he does goals and responsibilities. He’s a repellant personality not because we see him do anything bad, but because his expression and speech make you long for better company. Still, the actor is a true

WEDNESDAY, SEPT 12 REALITY

Having explored the insidious reach of organized crime in Gomorrah, director Garrone examines the effects of another corrosive social disease on Italian society: the allure of reality television. An extroverted Neapolitan fishmonger (Arena) auditions for a spot on the Italian version of Big Brother and slowly becomes obsessed with appearing on the show. It’s a promising idea, but Garrone exhausts his comic and satirical potential after about an hour, leaving Reality wheezing toothlessly in a feedback loop of obnoxious behaviour and increasingly obtuse plotting. Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín – who’s at TIFF this year with his political drama No – told exactly the same story in 2008’s Tony Manero with far more wit and bite. Seek that out instead. NW

SMASHED CWC D: James Ponsoldt w/ Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Aaron Paul. U.S. 85 min. Sep 12, 6 pm Ryerson; Sep 13, 5 pm Yonge & Dundas 7 Rating: NNN

The marriage of two young drunks (Winstead, Paul) is tested when she decides to get sober and he doesn’t. Still working the functioning-alcoholic angle he played in Off The Black, director Ponsoldt has made a movie that feels as unstable as its protagonists; it wobbles between uncomfortable comedy and shattering drama, sometimes in the same scene. Winstead’s virtually unrecognizable from her more composed turns in Scott Pilgrim and that Thing prequel, and Paul does a more solicitous version of Breaking Bad’s ruined Jesse Pinkman. But the pieces don’t quite snap together the way they should. Ponsoldt can’t help underlining every Big Emotional Turning Point, and while Nick Offerman, Megan Mullally and Octavia Spencer do their best to lend humanity to their supporting roles, the movie never sees them as anything NW more than plot devices.

THE SUICIDE SHOP (LE MAGASIN DES SUICIDES) SP D: Patrice Leconte w/ Bernard Alane, Isabelle Spade. France/Belgium/Canada. 79 min. Sep 12, 9 pm Ryerson; Sep 16, 12:30 pm Scotiabank 2 Rating: NNN

When suicide seems like the only way to go, the Tuvache family business makes sure you go out with options: poisons packaged like perfumes, a handmade sword for hara-kiri or a plastic bag and tape for the hobos who cant pay for more. That’s the morbidly amusing premise in The Suicide Shop, an animated comedy that squeezes as much life out of its central gag as it can. The flat musical numbers seem a

dull ploy to pad out the running time, but Leconte compensates with old-school animation that boasts RS visual wit and dry humour.

THURSDAY, SEPT 13 LAURENCE ANYWAYS SP D: Xavier Dolan w/ Melvil Poupaud, Suzanne Clément. Canada. 161 min. Sep 13, 9 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 15, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2 Rating: NNNN

A love relationship goes through wild ups and downs when Laurence (Poupaud) transitions from male to female and his girlfriend (Clément) tries to support her. Saturating his colour palette and adding magical touches so that nature mirrors the story’s powerful emotions, Dolan (J’ai Tué Ma Mere) creates a gorgeous, epic romance that never loses its energy despite the film’s length. The performances are spectacular, especially Clément’s as a woman who desperately wants to believe she can be part of the gender revolution, and Nathalie Baye’s as Laurence’s deeply SGC conflicted mother.

FRIDAY, SEPT 14 BESTIAIRE WL D: Denis Côté. Canada/France. 72 min. Sep 14, 6:30 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 16, 10 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 4 Rating: NNNN

We look at animals. They may or may not look back. Côté’s extraordinary meditation on the relationship between man and beast (and even the camera) is simply a series of static shots that leave you thinking. Bestiaire is not for everyone, since it demands a patient audience willing to fill in the gaps between Côté’s striking compositions and telling montage. Those who are game will be richly rewarded, while the rest will have a RS better time at Marineland.

REBELLE (WAR WITCH) SP D: Kim Nguyen w/ Rachel Mwanza, Serge Kanyinda. Canada. 90 min. Sep 14, 9 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 15, 3 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2 Rating: NNN

For a film about child soldiers in an unnamed African country, Rebelle shows surprising restraint. Director Nguyen’s decision to look away from carnage and avoid melodrama may limit our engagement, but it’s the admirable choice, making room for sensitive and imaginative filmmaking. Non-actor Mwanza (a revelation) stars as 12-year-old Komona, a village girl abducted by rebels, forced to kill her own parents and baptized the War Witch for her ability to sense impending danger. Komona’s attempt to escape along with an infatuated albino boy (Kanyinda) provides a sweet, even whimsical interlude from the horrors of war that seems too RS 3 good to be true.

FOLLOW NOW WRITERS DURING THE FEST @wilnervision, @glennsumi, @freshandfrowsy, ®/TM Toronto International is a registered ®/TM Toronto International Film FestivalFilm is aFestival registered @susangcole, @NOWFilm, @NOWLifeStyle trade-marktrade-mark of Toronto International of Toronto International Film FestivalFilm Inc. Festival Inc. under license by PMA Canada. used underused license by PMA Canada.

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BUZZ F I L M F E S T I V A L F A S H I O N

That’s how you make an entrance Forget sneaking in through the kitchen. Real stars get spotted with their PR teams in the lobby of the Drake Hotel, this celeb’s home base for her barely-24-hour-long festival visit. Smythe Almost Famous coat ($695, Holt Renfrew, 50 Bloor West, 416-9222333, smythelesvestes.com), H&M crystal-covered sweater ($179, 1 Dundas West, 416-623-2090, and others, hm.com), VAWK copper leather skirt ($975, vawk.ca), Lilliput wide-brim hat ($225, 462 College, 416-536-5933, lilliputhats.com), Thierry Lasry sunglasses ($485, Spectacle, 752 Queen West, 416-603-0123, and others, spectaclelovesyou.com), Swarovski earrings ($180, 2 Bloor West, 416-850-6072, and others, swarovski.com), Nortamy ring ($350, Rue Pigalle, 927 Queen West, 647-3528115, ruepigalle.ca), Jessica Jensen woven carryall ($898, shopjessicajensen.com) and Abel Munoz Alessia heels ($650, George C, 21 Hazelton, 416-962-1991, abelmunozaccessories.com). 16 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

CAMERA READY Glittering fall fashion guaranteed to get the TIFF paparazzi flashing. By Andrew Sardone

Photos by Michael Watier

Shot on Location at the Drake Hotel Hair and makeup by Jordana Maxwell, TRESemmé Hair Care/judyinc.com Fashion assistant: Stefania Yarhi • Model: Taylor McKay/Ford Models N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 17

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l F a s h i o n

CAMERA READY

She skipped the red carpet? If you were a tree… She’s comfy in a suite for an afternoon of interviews as our star’s junket talk turns to favourite Toronto haunts and her transition from model to actress. Jessica Mary Clayton crystal print blouse ($225, jessicamaryclayton.com), H&M gold trousers ($59.95), Swarovski necklace ($700), Fine and Good bangles ($215 to $235 each, Made You Look, 1273 Queen West, 416-516-9595, and other, madeyoulook.ca) and Fluevog Begin Cha Cha loafers ($229, 242 Queen West, 416-581-1420, fluevog.com).

18 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

From a rack of sequined cocktail dresses and jewelled gowns, this star selects a strapless bronze stunner by VAWK to introduce her flick to the TIFF audience. VAWK sequined dress ($1,620, vawk.ca), Philippe Ferrandis earrings ($180) and cuff ($575), Stefano Poletti Venetian mirror necklace ($795) and glass ring ($110, all Rue Pigalle).

CONDOS

MAGIC HAPPENS HERE Legendary living at Dundas & Spadina from the mid $200’s

N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 19

BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l F a s h i o n

CAMERA READY

I don’t (usually) do after-parties Fending off nosy gossip writers and pretending she doesn’t see the too-many-to-count smartphone cameras pointed in her direction, our A-lister goes for gold lamé at the official postpremiere shindig. Smythe blouse ($395, Holt Renfrew), H&M gold skirt ($49.95), Swarovski earrings ($190) and cuff ($250), Moonrox necklace ($185, Made You Look), Nortamy ring ($350, Rue Pigalle) and Nine West sparkle and animal-print heels ($130, Heel Boy).

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Experience Toronto transformed by artists

September 29, 2012 Sunset to sunrise

One night only. All night long. All free.

“

Morning-after private time. Not. She can’t even catch a quiet moment picking out Toronto souvenirs at the Drake General Store before jetting back to the set of her next blockbuster. H&M sweater ($59.95), Pillar by Allison Wonderland Down To You skirt, ($154, Charlie Boutique 809 Queen West, 647-436-8452, allisonwonderland.ca), Linda Farrow for The Row sunglasses ($428, Spectacle), Fine and Good earrings ($60), silver bangle ($215) and brass ball bracelet ($65, all Made You Look), Swarovski cuff ($180), Nortamy ring ($350, Rue Pigalle), Aldo Brotzman boots ($140, 50 Bloor West, 416-921-9763, and others, aldoshoes.com) and Juma tote bag ($325, A2Zane, 753 Queen West, 416-803-7754, jumastudio.com).

One night, one million people and 130-odd art installations... the result is the most genuinely popular cultural event in Toronto.

”

-Toronto Star scotiabanknuitblanche.ca

sbnuitblancheTO

TIFF at the Drake

The city’s “hot bed for culture” hotel isn’t just for stars during the festival (though a long list of boldfaced names including Woody Harrelson, Jennifer Aniston and Colin Farrell have camped out here during TIFFs past). On September 6, the Drake rolls out the black carpet for its Overdrive Launch Party, an everyone’s-invited TIFF bash starting at 9 pm featuring an airstream trailer tattoo parlour, on-site barbershop and live performances in the Underground ($10). 1150 Queen West, 416-531-5042, thedrakehotel.ca.

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AUGUST 2012 • BUZZ 21

BUZZ F I L M F E S T I V A L F O O D

KATHRYN GAITENS

PARTY CENTRAL

Where the A-listers hang out

verybody loves a TIFF party, especially if it involves the chance of casually bumping into Kristen Stewart at the buffet or doing the shing-a-ling next to Johnny Depp on the dance floor. Problem is, none of us is ever invited. But TIFF schmoozes aren’t that hard to find. Just look for a gaggle of fat guys carrying cameras with overly long telephoto lenses standing in front of a restaurant or a nightclub and it’s guaranteed there’s more than one person inside who’s recently been on the cover of the National Enquirer. The spectacular rooftop lounge and terrace on the 16th floor of the chi-chi Thompson (550 Wellington West, at 22 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

Bathurst, 416-640-7778, thompsonhotels.com) is difficult enough to enter at the best of times (it’s only for guests and residents of the condo-hotel), and never more so than during the 10 days of TIFF. If you do manage to weasel your way in – helicopter, perhaps? – remember to dress the part, as there’s a strict dress code: no flip-flops, no bachelorette sashes and no wife-beaters. That includes you, Bruce Willis. Over on the west side, the Drake (1150 Queen West, at Beaconsfield, 416-531-5042, thedrakehotel.ca) doesn’t do the red carpet. It does a black one instead. And while your odds of gaining entrance to its private Room 222 dining most nights are as

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good as scoring a walk-in at the Sky Yard, you won’t have any problem at the lounge, where cocktails named for Dennis Hopper (American rye whiskey, cognac, Punt e Mes vermouth, Cherry Heering and bitters) and Brigitte Bardot (Hennessy Black cognac, Drambuie, Green Chartreuse, lemon juice and grated ginger) go for 14 bucks. Since it’s located in the same condo tower that’s home to Hogtown’s flick fest, Luma (350 King West, at John, 647-288-4715, oliverbonacini.com) is sure to be packed with wall-to-wall Alisters. You’ll probably find them out on the second-floor deck grabbing a quick smoke. continued on page 24 œ

KATHRYN GAITENS

DAVID LAURENCE

Now that the fest’s epicentre has moved south, the Thompson Hotel patio gets a lot of action.

Staff at Templar keep all their star info super-secret.

STAR GRAZING By STEVEN DAVEY

Luma, inside the TIFF building, is a natural attraction for the stars.

Contrary to what you’ve read on the TMZ website, most movie stars are just like the rest of us – they don’t like flashbulbs going off while they’re eating dinner. That’s why Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling, when they were attached at the hip, chose to canoodle over cannoli at off-theradar trats like Grace (503 College, at Palmerston, 416-944-8884, gracerestaurant.ca), the prime real estate its 12-seat inner courtyard. Playa Cabana (111 Dupont, at Davenport, 416-929-3911, playacabana.ca) – a not particularly note-worthy tacoteria in that no-go zone that’s not quite Yorkville or Forest Hill – is the last place in town you’d expect to spot someone like Jake Gyllenhaal. Maybe that’s why he goes there, because it ain’t the guacamole. Hunger Games star and off-Broadway playwright Woody Harrelson is such a fan of the raw vegan carte at Jennifer Italiano’s Live Organic Food Bar (264 Dupont, at Spadina, 416-515-2002, livefoodbar.com), he goes for her raw vegan pizza whenever he’s in town. Too bad Brad and Angelina won’t be back this year, since the Prime Steakhouse (18 St. Thomas, at Bloor West, 416-971-9666, windsorarmshotel.com/prime) in their favourite hotel has introduced an all-vegan menu. We imagine room service comes in handy with an entourage of 18 kids. Whenever celebs want to get away from it all, they come to old-school Italian trat La Bruschetta (1317 St. Clair West, at St. Clarens, 416-656-8622, labru.ca) – in droves if the autographed plates hanging on the walls signed by Whoopi Goldberg, Bette Midler and Matt Damon are any indication. There’s even a shrine to Sophia Loren! 3

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BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l F o o d Give the party some Asian flavour at Spice Route.

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Parts & Labour manager Rob Turenne sits with his special cocktail of Mount Gay XO, honey, cloves, star anise and lots of other goodies.

© 2012 smart Canada, a Division of Mercedes-Benz Canada Inc. Model shown is a 2013 smart fortwo passion. 1Total price of $12,684.30 is based on the 2013 smart fortwo pure, is available for cash purchase only and includes MSRP of $14,400, Freight & PDI of $1,295, Dealer Admin fee of $395, air-conditioning levy of $100, EHF tires, filters, batteries of $23.86, PPSA of $35.15, OMVIC fee of $5 and applicable dealer discount. License, insurance, registration and taxes are extra. *Total due on delivery of $1,953 includes first month’s payment of $99 and total dealer fees of $1,854.01. Lease offer based on a new 2013 smart fortwo pure available only through Mercedes-Benz Financial Services on approved credit for a limited time. Lease example based on $99 per month for 24 months. A.P.R. of 0.9% applies. Total obligation is $4,219. Security deposit of $0. 12,000 km/year allowance ($0.20/km for excess kilometres applies). License, insurance, registration and taxes are extra. Offers may change without notice and cannot be combined with any other offers. See your local Toronto Area smart Centre today. Offers end September 30th, 2012.

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NOW Magazine Fringe Review

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Party central œcontinued from page 22

A 905 meat market most weekends, club king Charles Khabouth’s tiki-tastic Spice Route (499 King West, at Brant, 416-849-1808, spiceroute.ca) looks straight out of a Dorothy Lamour movie, complete with koi pond and palm trees. Best place to meet ’n’ greet: the unisex bathrooms. The klieg lights out front point the way to C5 (100 Queen’s Park, at Bloor, 416-586-7928, rom. on.ca), the swanky boîte on top of the ROM’s crystal, where it’s non-stop cocktail parties and private dinners. Stalking obscure Icelandic documentarians? Find them in their element knocking back pints on the rooftop of the decidedly unglamorous Pilot (22 Cumberland, at Yonge, 416-923-5716, thepilot.ca). Want to get even punkier? Head to Parkdale’s Parts & Labour (1566 Queen West, at Fuller, 416-588-7750, partsandlabour.ca), where chef Matty Matheson promises a “shitload” of TIFF shindigs. That you won’t be able to get in unless you’re on the list goes without saying. Don’t bother showing up at the front door of 24 BUZZ • AUGUST 2012

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the super-exclusive Fifth (225 Richmond West, at Duncan, 416-979-3005, thefifthgrill.com), because the entrance is in the alleyway round the back. Once past the bouncers (password: swordfish) and up a rickety freight elevator, find the loveliest rooftop resto this side of the south of France. Or so Google maps tells me. Show up early – 7 am, say – if you expect to get a seat on TV chef Mark McEwan’s patio at One (116 Yorkville, at Hazelton, 416-961-9600, onehazelton.com) in the Hazelton. A favourite of everyone from Britney to Whitney, the hotel hot spot rocks nightly till dawn. Named for the character Roger Moore played on The Saint, the exceptionally low-key Templar (348 Adelaide West, at Peter, 647-933-5546, designhotels.com/templar_hotel) is so off-theradar that most cab drivers can’t find it, let alone the paparazzi. Not that you’ll share face time with anyone remotely famous at its Del Terrelongedesigned Monk Bar just off the lobby. “We would never offer any information about celebrity sightings,” says the boutique hotel’s general manager, Andrew van Buskirk. “Having said that, whatever rumours you’ve heard are most likely true.” stevend@nowtoronto.com

DISH

Momofuku Noodle Bar opens at the Shangri-la Hotel just in time for the Film Fest.

PHOTOS BY STEVEN DAVEY

By STEVEN DAVEY

Fuku, Too Big TIFF-related food story this year is news that New York-based superstar chef David Chang is about to open an outpost of his Momofuku Noodle Bar in the Shangri-la Hotel in time for the festival. The Hogtown operation (190 University, at Adelaide West, momofuku.com) is located in a three-storey pavilion adjacent to the luxury hotel and features an impressive water feature out front, Zhang Huan’s Rising, which looks like a giant silver dragon being attacked by a swarm of killer locusts. It’s still not clear whether or not the new ’Fuku – which is actually four separate restos – is strictly walk-in or will only take reservations lottery-style through its website like the ones in Manhattan. We wouldn’t be surprised if hardcore foodies start camping out days ahead, like folks used to do for the opening of the Ex. Might we suggest a wristband policy?

Susur gets Bent After a lengthy gestation period, Toronto’s most celebrated chef, Susur Lee, has finally unveiled his latest resto-lounge, Bent (777 Dundas West, at Markham, susur.com). The newly minted boîte marks Lee’s first partnership with his sons Kai and Levi Bent-Lee. Expect a lot ceviche and sake cocktails.

Susur Lee has finally unveiled Bent, the resto he’s operating with sons Kai and Levi Bent-Lee.

Maybe next year Though he’d hoped to be up and running, Top Chef Canada winner Carl Heinrich won’t be opening his Richmond Station (1 Richmond West, at Yonge, 647-748-1444, richmondstation.ca) in time for TIFF. The ex-Marben toque says renovation delays have pushed the launch back a couple of weeks. Its former incarnation was the fest’s ground zero, and the soon-to-open new Four Seasons Hotel (60 Yorkville, at Bay, 416-964-0411, fourseasons.com/toronto) will feature not one, but two restaurants helmed by the Michelin-starred Daniel Boulud. Watch for Café Boulud and dBar’s official launch October 6. And, yes, there will be brunch. 3 stevend@nowtoronto.com

www.anchorbayent.com

www.amctv.com/shows/the-walking-dead

Walking Dead S2 now magazine.indd 1

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BUZZ F i l m F e s t i v a l d r i n k s

TIFF COCKTAILS? MAKE MINE A Tampopo: The Simple Sake

Casino Royale: Vesper martini

Truck driver shows up, has a fight, teaches woman how to make noodles. So goes one of the greatest food comedies of all time. If this movie doesn’t make you hungry, you have no stomach. Prior to a home ramen feast, whet your appetite with this refreshing sake and gin cocktail created by Julien Salomone of Boutique on Church Street. 1 oz London dry gin ¾ oz junmai sake ¾ oz lemon juice ½ oz ginger syrup Shake with ice and pour into a rocks glass.

It’s no secret that 007 likes his gin or vodka martinis shaken, not stirred, but this variation is Bond’s own creation, dating back to Ian Fleming’s 1953 Bond debut, Casino Royale. Daniel Craig orders one – named after the character Vesper Lynd – very precisely, in the 2006 film version. 1½ oz London dry gin ½ oz vodka ½ oz Lillet Blanc Shake over ice, strain into a martini glass and add a lemon twist.

My Dinner With Andre: Amaretto sour

The Big Lebowski: White Russian

In what might be called an inaction movie, playwright and actor Wallace Shawn and theatre director Andre Gregory, playing themselves, sit, talk and eat dinner. You have to be there. Anyway, there’s lots of drinking, all of which is concluded nicely by Wally’s ordering an amaretto. Keep the conversation going with this classic. 1½ oz amaretto ¾ oz lemon juice Shake with ice and strain into a small stemmed glass. Garnish with an orange slice.

It’s possible that certain non-alcoholic substances are more suitable for regular viewings of the Coen brothers masterpiece, but don’t forget about the Dude’s preferred cocktail. Also very good for people who like to get drunk but aren’t partial to the flavour of hard liquor. 1 oz Kahlua 2 oz vodka Cream to taste Pour over ice.

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DOUBLE... FEATURE .

Hold the Tom Cruise. These boozie movie combos will put the hot-buttered back in your rum and popcorn. By GRAHAM DUNCAN

The Rum Diary: Cuba Libra

The Solid Gold Cadillac: Golden Cadillac

This occasionally gorgeous but ham-fisted retelling of Hunter S. Thompson’s novel, set in 1960 Puerto Rico, is awash with rum. Let us pay tribute to espadrilles, Wayfarers and the rise and fall of the American empire with the oft-maligned rum and coke, aka Cuba Libra. Without the lime and the ice, it’s just prom night poison. Juice of ½ lime 2 oz light rum Combine in a highball glass, fill with ice cubes, top with cola, garnish with a slice of lime.

Born in 1952 (happy 60th birthday!), the drink predates the film by four years, but they share a mid- century stylistic exuberance. The cocktail can be made in either a blender or a shaker. The movie is notable for its main ingredient, the brilliant Judy Holliday. Both can leave you sweetly intoxicated. 1 oz Galliano 1 oz crème de cacao 1 oz cream Shake or blend with ice and serve in a coupe glass.

Blue Velvet: Michelada

Mid-August Lunch (Pranzo Di Ferragosto): The Sunset Limited*

Blue Velvet contains the ultimate cinematic beer reference: “What kind of beer do you like?” “Heineken.” “Fuck that shit. Pabst! Blue! Ribbon!” You may feel the same way about beer cocktails, but you haven’t tried this Mexican hangover cure. The recipe below approximates one consumed in Guadalajara. It didn’t cure the hangover. Nothing short of death would have. Blend together, in diminishing quantities, so as to fill a quarter of a glass: Tomato juice Lime juice Worcestershire sauce Hot sauce

Salt Chili powder Top with light-flavoured North American lager beer. Stir.

In an affront to the Italian wine industry, this film’s main character drinks a lot of Chablis, the steely French Chardonnay that shouldn’t be mixed with anything. In the past, North Americans referred to any dryish white wine as Chablis. Here’s a modern take on a “Chablis” cocktail from that age of oenological innocence. 3 oz white port Juice of half a lemon 2 dashes Angostura bitters 2 oz soda water Californian Chardonnay Combine first four ingredients in a highball glass. Top with ice cubes and wine. Garnish with a mint sprig. *Take two: the original recipe calls for domestic Muscatel, now unobtainable N OW FI LM FE STIVAL PREVI EW

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