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over 30 essential movie reviews the films WE Can’T wait to see plus getting ready for the red carpet
2014
N O W f i l m f e s t i va l p r e v i e w i s s u e
Devoted to the art & craft of filmmaking in Canada
BUZZ CONTENTS 4 TIFF HITS AND MISSES
Mr. Turner, Winter Sleep and Mommy are must-sees among our 30-plus reviews; plus critics choose their top 5 most anticipated flicks
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SCREAM QUEEN
Maika Monroe Hot actor scares up major buzz in two Midnight Madness films
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FILM FESTIVAL PREVIEW
REVIEWS Gong Li stars in Cultural Revolution weeper Coming Home (see review, page 6).
TIFF 2014 officially begins next week, but here’s our annual guide for your head start on this year’s star-studded flicks, awards-bound entries, quiet sleepers... and, yeah, a few bombs. Plus, NOW’s critics reveal what’s on their personal must-see lists. Check out dozens more in next week’s issue along with news, reviews, video and tweets at nowtoronto.com/tiff.
By NORMAN WILNER, SUSAN G. COLE, GLENN SUMI, RADHEYAN SIMONPILLAI , PAUL ENNIS, ANDREW PARKER, ANDREW DOWLER and JOSÉ TEODORO
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= Critic’s Pick
What to see. What to skip. FrI, SeP �
TRICK OR TREATY? MAST D: Alanis Obomsawin. Canada. 85 min. Sep ñ 5, 2:30 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 6, 9 am Jackman Hall (AGO). Rating: NNNN
Opening with an incendiary press conference and never flagging, this film by Obomsawin, Canada’s foremost First Nations documentarian (Hi-Ho Mistahey!), looks at the Idle No More movement and the deception of Treaty 9 and Omnibus Bill C-45. The doc balances equal amounts of justified skepticism with moments of true hope and grace. Letting people speak in the moment instead of relying too heavily on talking-head interviews, Obomsawin shows how Treaty 9 was a lie, a command to surrender rather than a helpful document.
NNNNN = Best of the fest
Her subjects, like hunger-striking Chief Theresa Spence (and First Nation women in general), are hopeful that their work will better the lives of future generations. Most importantly, we see how easily a government can deceive its people, regardless of race or other affiliation. AP And that’s terrifying.
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
Stay connected to TIFF all festival long MORE ONLINE For day-by-day TIFF coverage, with new reviews, interviews, photos, video and complete schedule, go to nowtoronto.com/tiff
FESTIVAL THEATRES
WINTER SLEEP (KIS UYKUSU) MAST D: Nuri Bilge Ceylan w/ Haluk Bilginer, ñ Melisa Sözen. Turkey/France/Germany. 196 min. Sep 5, 3 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 14, 9 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4. Rating: NNNNN
Ceylan’s recent Cannes’ Palme d’Or winner is a masterful and multi-layered film, as finely crafted and sophisticated as the Chekhov short stories that inspired it. Revolving around a retired stage actor (Bilginer) who operates a hotel in Cappadocia, it’s essentially a series of engaging conversations arising out of the hotelier’s personal relationships with his wife (Sözen) and sister. Right from the start the filmmaker establishes a seductive rhythm that draws us in and makes the three-and-a-quarter hours fly by. Even the exterior shots, when they do occur, act as a spectacular counterpoint to the rich dialogue. It’s a wonderful depiction of the full spectrum of the human condition, a film to be explored and enjoyed for years to come. PE
FORCE MAJEURE (TURIST) SP D: Ruben Östlund w/ Johannes Bah ñ Kuhnke, Lisa Loven Kongsli. Sweden/ Norway/Denmark/France. 118 min. Sep 5, 7 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 6, 9:30 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 1. Rating: NNNN
A Swedish family’s five-day Alpine vacation is the idyllic setting for a caustic moral tale that would have done Eric Rohmer proud. The photogenic, seemingly perfect uppermiddle-class unit is thrust into a psychodrama that’s as darkly comic as it is shocking, the effects heightened by the evolving emotional reactions illuminated by the
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Films I can’t wait to see NORMAN WILNER
It is, of course, almost impossible to narrow my list of hotly anticipated TIFF movies down to just five; there are at least two dozen movies I badly want to see. But these are the five for which I’ll clamber over my colleagues in the press line. (Guys, you’ve been warned.)
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repetition of each day’s banal events. Director Östlund is surgically precise and unfailingly perceptive in his detailing of the breakdown of family dynamics after an avalanche threatens an otherwise ordinary lunch at a restaurant’s outdoor terrace. The husband’s sudden run for safety and abandonment of his family appall his wife, who is equally troubled by his inability at first to admit his cowardice. This unexpected and primal act upsets their equilibrium and launches the delicious turmoil to come. PE
COMING HOME SP D: Zhang Yimou w/ Gong Li, Chen Daoming. China. 109 min. Sep 5, 8 pm Winter Garden; Sep 6, 8:45 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2. Rating: NNN
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Rosewater In 2009, Jon Stewart invited Iranian journalist and documentary filmmaker Maziar Bahari onto The Daily Show to discuss his country’s ongoing political convulsions. Shortly after returning home, Bahari was imprisoned, interrogated and tortured for five months on suspicion of collaborating with Western governments. Last year, Stewart went to Jordan for three months to shoot a fictional drama about Bahari’s ordeal, starring Gael García Bernal as the reporter. Stewart has spent a decade and a half telling people he’s a comedian, not a political commentator. We’re about to find out what happens when he embraces the other role. September 8, 6:30 pm, Princess of Wales; September 9, 12:30 pm, Winter Garden
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THE COBBLER For the first time in more than a decade, I’m excited about an Adam Sandler movie. That’s because this project puts the actor in the hands of writer/director Thomas McCarthy. After his note-perfect character studies The Station Agent, The Visitor and Win Win, I trust him absolutely. Yes, it’s about a New York City shoemaker who magically quantum-leaps into other people’s lives or something, but whatever. “Adam Sandler plays a salesman with rage issues” sounded pretty flimsy, too, and we got Punch-Drunk Love out of that one. September 11, 9 pm, Elgin; September 12, 9:45 am, Scotiabank 1
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Miss Julie Literally every time I have interviewed Jessica Chastain, the eponymous heroine of August Strindberg’s searing stage play somehow comes up in conversation. She’s been wanting to play this role for a very long time. And now she’s doing it – opposite Colin Farrell and Samantha Morton – in a screen version adapted and directed by Swedish legend Liv Ullmann. Chastain is the greatest female actor of her generation; I can’t wait to see what she does with a part she knows this well. September 7, 2 pm, Winter Garden; September 9, 5:30 pm, Scotiabank 12; September 12, 11:30 am, Scotiabank 2
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A Pigeon Sat On A Branch Reflecting On Existence Swedish filmmaker Roy Andersson makes movies that are instantly, identifiably his – films of elaborate tableaux, meticulously constructed and choreographed, which play out absurdist existential conflicts for our amusement. In 2000, Songs From The Second Floor followed a glum businessman as the world ended around him. His 2007 film You, The Living brought a tuba to the dark night of the human soul. I know nothing about his latest beyond TIFF’s assertion that “it muses on man’s perpetual inhumanity to man.” And really, that’s all I need. September 8, 7:15 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; September 10, 5:15 pm, Scotiabank 2; September 13, 3:15 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
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While We’re Young In Noah Baumbach’s latest, Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts play a long-married couple who meet a pair of younger lovers (Amanda Seyfried and Adam Driver) and start to hang out as a foursome, leading to blurred generational lines and at least a little emotional confusion. Stiller was pretty high on it when we spoke last Christmas. Having loved pretty much everything Baumbach’s done, I’m curious to see whether this will somehow merge the mid-life flailing of Greenberg (which starred Stiller) and the youthful ebullience of Frances Ha (which featured Driver in a small role). But whatever it is, it’ll be interesting. September 6, 7 pm, Princess of Wales; September 7, 12:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 11, 11:30 am, Elgin
Ñ
= Critic’s Pick
NNNNN = Best of the fest
Away From Her meets Doctor Zhivago in this melodramatic period piece set against China’s Cultural Revolution. Chen stars as a “rightist” political prisoner released after two decades to find his family torn apart and his wife (Gong) suffering from amnesia and unable to recognize him. Her condition makes an apt metaphor for a past that is willfully forgotten while the trauma still lingers. Unfortunately, the movie lingers, too. After a thrilling but unnecessary first act that caters to Zhang’s strengths with choreographing dance and suspense, the film settles into a repetitive tearjerker that looks great while hitting the piano chords too hard. The affecting performances rise above the unconvincing writing.
THE WANTED 18 DOC D: Amer Shomali, Paul Cowan. Canada/Palestine/France. 75 min. Sep 6, 8:15 pm Scotiabank 4; Sep 9, 2:30 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema; Sep 12, 5:30 pm Scotiabank 14. Rating: NNN
This is a hybrid documentary combining interviews, archival footage, drawings and stop-motion animation re-enactments – if you can call sequences involving talking cows “re-enactments.” Beginning with the dawn of the First Intifada in 1987, the film follows a herd of milk cows purchased by residents of the West Bank town of Beit Sahour so they can boycott an Israeli milk company. As the Intifada burgeons, the cows are hunted down by the Israeli army and must be secreted from one hiding place to another to survive. Co-directors Cowan and Shomali find an appropriate balance of gravity and comedy for this playful chronicle of one of recent history’s more pecuJT liar resistance narratives.
RS
SAT, SEP 6 NATIONAL GALLERY DOC D: Frederick Wiseman. France/U.S. 173 min. Sep 6, 12:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 7, 12:15 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 12, 11:30 am Jackman Hall (AGO). Rating: NNN
Art lovers will be chuffed that Wiseman puts his fly-on-the wall camera inside London’s National Gallery. Unfortunately, he wasn’t shooting during a particularly interesting period. The mammoth Leonardo exhibit has been up for a while, so there’s little curatorial discussion about it. Debates between gallery director Nicholas Penny and head of communications Jill Preston over whether the gallery should get involved in charity work have the most energy. For the most part, docents guide gallery-goers through the venerable institution’s impressive collection of Old Masters. When an eco-activist hangs a banner off the gallery’s facade, Wiseman doesn’t follow through with either the politico or gallery honchos to get a reaction. That shows the limitations of his I-shoot-only-whats’s-in-front-ofSGC me strategy.
WASTE LAND VAN D: Pieter Van Hees w/ Jérémie Renier, Natali Broods. Belgium. 97 min. Sep 6, 9:30 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema; Sep 8, 4:30 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; Sep 13, 6:30 pm Scotiabank 13. Rating: NNN
Waste Land is a moody psychological thriller about a homicide cop (Dardennes regular Renier) who gets in over his head trying to solve the murder of a young Congolese Belgian immigrant whose corpse has been found dumped in a Brussels river. Turns out the man was involved in selling African statues, and all clues lead to a mysterious art dealer who may dabble in the occult. Meanwhile, the cop’s wife (Broods) is pregnant but doesn’t know if she wants to keep the child, which triggers something in the slowly unravelling husband. Despite the unresolved plot threads, director Van Hees keeps you intrigued with effectively bleak mise en scène, a hypnotic score, strong performances and the disturbing underlying theme of the legacy of GS colonialism. continued on page 8
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
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HIGH SOCIETY (LE BEAU MONDE) CWC D: Julie Lopes Curval w/ Ana Girardot, Bastien Bouillon. France. 95 min. Sep 6, 9:45 pm Scotiabank 3; Sep 8, 6:30 pm Scotiabank 8; Sep 14, 3:30 pm Isabel Bader. Rating: NN
Everything’s done too delicately in this film about the romantic entanglement and subsequent tension between working-class Alice (Girardot) and rich kid Antoine (Bouillon). Alice dreams of working in haute couture, so her affection for Antoine is convenient career-wise, yet it seems genuine. It’s hard to say for sure since the emotionally restrained film rarely lets the couple show any passion or feeling, allowing social triggers to unravel the relationship at a languid pace. The ambiguity is both admirable and numbing, especially since the topic feels redundant. Last year’s Blue Is The Warmest Colour tackled the same class tensions with far more RS passion, fury and art.
SUN, SEP � IT FOLLOWS MM D: David Robert Mitchell w/ Maika ñ Monroe, Keir Gilchrist. U.S. 97 min. Sep 7, 11:59 pm Ryerson; Sep 9, 4 pm
Scotiabank 9. Rating: NNNN
See the Maika Monroe cover story and review of the film, page 12.
MON, SEP 8 WHIPLASH SP D: Damien Chazelle w/ Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons. U.S. 106 min. Sep 8, 3:15 pm Ryerson; Sep 9, 12:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1. Rating: NN
At an elite music college in Manhattan, a driven young drummer (Teller) squares off against a monstrous conductor (Simmons) for a potentially life-changing spot in the school’s jazz orchestra. With Simmons hurling abuse and Teller doing his best to roll with each new humiliation, it’s basically Full Metal Drum Kit. The only question is, will the kid crack or will the grown-up accept his talent? Teller and Simmons commit completely to the concept, and their performances are enough to power the drama through its
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first hour. But writer/director Chazelle’s plot twists grow increasingly ridiculous, prizing intensity over credibility, and the final act has the feel of a fever dream. Audiences loved it at Sundance and Cannes, but I wonder how many of them subsequently realized its ultimate message is “Bullying works.” NW
SONGS SHE WROTE ABOUT PEOPLE SHE KNOWS
Hey, I like big starry premieres as much as the next guy. Last year’s TIFF features Gravity and 12 Years A Slave both made my Top 10 Movies list. But there are other films that provide more intimate pleasures. Here are five that should fit the bill.
DISC D: Kris Elgstrand w/ Arabella Bushnell, Brad Dryborough. Canada. 80 min. Sep 8, 5 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4; Sep 10, 2:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4; Sep 13, 5:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3. Rating: NNN
This über-quirky Canadian pic about a woman who takes the advice of a music therapist too far is sometimes infuriating but often gobsmackingly good. In order to “express herself,” Carol (Bushnell) starts sending songs in phone messages to people who are pissing her off. A composition for her boss (Dryborough) inspires him to fire her, but for her own good – he thinks she has talent – which sends both of them on another kind of journey. Bushnell plays Carol as someone with almost no affect, a bad decision by writer/director Elstrand. But the smooth-jazz music is terrific, making the whole thing strangely beautiful. SGC
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Winter Sleep Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s slow, meditative films aren’t for everyone. As in his 2011 masterpiece Once Upon A Time In Anatolia, there’s often more mood and character than conventional narrative. His latest, which won the coveted Palme d’Or at Cannes, is loosely inspired by Chekhov stories and concerns a former actor who runs a mountaintop hotel. It’s 196 minutes. Sounds like bliss. September 5, 3 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; September 14, 9 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
MR. TURNER SP D: Mike Leigh w/ Timothy Spall, ñ Marion Bailey. UK. 149 min. Sep 8, 5:45 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 9, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2. Rating: NNNNN
Don’t call Mr. Turner a biopic. It opens in 1826, when JMW Turner is at the peak of his fame – none of that “Wow, look at the light!” from an eight-yearold with sketch book – and focuses on his daily life painting, arguing with artists and having (mostly) bad sex. Scenes in the Royal Academy where Turner’s paintings hang alongside his romantic contemporaries reveal how radical Turner was, laying the groundwork for the Impressionists. Dick Pope shoots those inspiring landscapes spectacularly, but writer/director Leigh also conveys the impact of reality – slave ships, the rise of the steam engine – on Turner’s otherworldly masterpieces. Spall, winner of the Cannes best actor prize, inhabits the role with
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A Midsummer Night’s Dream Visionary director Julie Taymor obviously has a thing for Shakespeare. She’s directed bold film adaptations of Titus Andronicus and The Tempest, and even her best-known work – the revolutionary stage production of The Lion King – is essentially a retelling of Hamlet. And now comes this film version of her acclaimed production (from Brooklyn’s Polonsky Center) of the Bard’s most popular comedy. Expect lots of imaginative visual effects and a deep humanity. After the screening, part of the Mavericks series, Taymor stays for an extended talk. Will anyone dare mention the Spider-Man musical debacle? September 8, 5 pm, Isabel Bader
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Timothy Spall in Mr. Turner
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Films I can’t wait to see GLENN SUMI
BUZZ FILM FESTIVAL PREVIEW 2014 NOW
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= Critic’s Pick
NNNNN = Best of the fest
I Am Here There have been many documentaries about the new China, but few as powerful as Lixin Fan’s Last Train Home, which captured the painful generational split within one family during the New Year’s holiday. His new film looks at the finalists of one of China’s most popular TV shows, a singing competition called Super Boy. It looks a little lighter than Last Train, but I’m sure there’ll be just as many insights, not to mention some rousing music. September 9, 6:30 pm, Scotiabank 1; September 11, 12:30 pm, Bloor Hot Docs; September 14, 9 pm, Scotiabank 11
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Guidance The irresponsible high school teacher is a familiar figure in films (think: Election, Bad Teacher), and now that sub-genre gets a Canadian twist in Guidance, about an alcoholic former child star (writer/director Pat Mills) who happens to luck into a job as a guidance counsellor for troubled kids. Mills is known for his award-winning shorts, including the queer charmer Pat’s First Kiss (which played at TIFF), and he should get the child actor details right since he was part of the YTV series You Can’t Do That On Television. His feature debut is part of the Discovery series. Sounds about right. September 5, 6:30 pm, Scotiabank 3; September 6, 4:30 pm, Scotiabank 8
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
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Do I Sound Gay? Is there such a thing as a “gay voice”? Documentarian David Thorpe takes a look at this politically incorrect but potentially hilarious concept, talking to acting coaches, linguists and celebrities like comic Margaret Cho, actor George Takei, fashionista Tim Gunn and writer David Sedaris. Thorpe and NOW’s Savage Love columnist, Dan Savage, who’s also in the film, discuss it afterwards. See ya there, girlfriend! September 7, noon, Ryerson
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
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Films I can’t wait to see SUSAN G. COLE
When I check my TIFF list, I’m looking for works by smart women, films with strong performers and entries that challenge political norms. Here’s what I found in 2014.
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A Little Chaos I love it when artists fight about aesthetics – and sex, for that matter – which is why this Alan Rickman-helmed pic about a landscape designer rattling the cage of King Louis XIV’s chief architect is high on my list. Kate Winslet plays the designer – it’s always promising when an Oscar winner’s around – but it’s her pairing with Matthias Schoenaerts (superb in Rust And Bone) that makes this an intriguing entry. A period piece set at Versailles, it’s an art director’s wet dream, too. September 13, 6:30 pm, Princess of Wales, and 8 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 14, 9:45 am, Scotiabank 1
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The New Girlfriend François Ozon’s follow-up to Young And Beautiful again steps into taboo terrain with this story of a woman (Anaïs Demoustier) who finds out that the husband (Romain Duris) of her recently deceased best friend is a cross-dresser, which leads to a surprising friendship. Y&B – about a middle-class teenager turning tricks – wasn’t exactly a laugh riot, but Ozon is known for exploring gender and sexual identities with humour and subtlety. This one should be a lot more sly. September 6, 6:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 7, 1 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; September 13, 9 pm, Elgin
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A Second Chance It’s a relief to see that Denmark’s Susanne Bier, foreign-language Oscar winner for In A Better World, is returning to drama after her much less assured English-language comedy Love Is All You Need. This time out, she tells the story of a police officer who reconnects with his junkie parents and is forced to make a difficult decision. Few filmmakers explore moral complexity as skilfully as Bier. September 9, 6 pm, Elgin; September 10, 11:30 am, Elgin; September 14, 9:45 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
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This Is My Land As the world watches Gaza go up in flames, observers are wondering what artists are doing to develop new strategies for peace. Riffing off a quote from Nelson Mandela – “Education is the only power to change the world” – Tamara Erde does her part in a revealing documentary about how three Palestinian and three Israeli schools are teaching the history of this painfully persistent conflict. September 7, 7 pm, Scotiabank 13; September 9, 10 pm, Scotiabank 9; September 13, 9:15 am, Scotiabank 3
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October Gale Patricia Clarkson was a revelation in Ruba Nadda’s 2009 Cairo Time. The two collaborate again in this film in which Clarkson plays a doctor who takes in a man (Scott Speedman) washed ashore at her cottage who’s been wounded by gunfire. Nadda’s last pic, the political nail-biter Inescapable, was a departure for the Canadian director and not as successful as the small, tender stories she had become known for. She’s stayed with the taut thriller genre here, but Clarkson’s been a gift for her before and could make magic again. September 11, 8 pm, Winter Garden; September 12, 9:15 am, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
= Critic’s Pick
NNNNN = Best of the fest
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brute force, speaking in grunts, spitting on his canvases to get the right effect and yet showing an achingly human side in a brothel sequence or when tragedy strikes. Mr. Turner is about art and what ignites it and it’s perfectly happy to take its time. Art film in every sense of SGC the word.
A GIRL AT MY DOOR (DOHEE-YA)
FOXCATCHER
CTC D: Jung July w/ Bae Doona, Kim Saeron. South Korea. 119 min. Sep 8, 9:30 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 11, 4 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4; Sep 14, 6:45 pm Scotiabank 8. Rating: NNN
GALA D: Bennett Miller w/ Channing Tatum, Steve Carell. U.S. 133 min. Sep 8, 6 pm Roy Thomson Hall; Sep 9, noon Princess of Wales. Rating: NNN
After 2011’s Moneyball, director Miller returns to the chilly tone of his Capote for another tale of interpersonal tensions and murder, though this time the result isn’t quite as impressive. In 1987, Olympic gold medalist Mark Schultz (Tatum) was recruited by John du Pont (Carell) to build a wrestling team that could win gold in the 1988 Seoul Games. It ended badly. The script divides itself awkwardly among three principals – in addition to du Pont and Schultz, there’s Mark’s older brother David (Mark Ruffalo), who gets caught up in du Pont’s ambitions – and Miller drenches every scene in heavy portent. All three leads wear distracting prosthetics, which works against Tatum and Ruffalo’s naturalistic performances and makes Carell’s precise, creepy turn as the self-absorbed, deluded du Pont far too obviously unhinged. It’s unnecessary, especially since Vanessa Redgrave is right there, looking exactly like herself as du Pont’s imperious mother, to show us how powerful an unadorned performance can be. NW
In this tightly woven melodrama that turns on sexual manipulation, an alcoholic female cop (Bae) with a checkered big-city past assumes a new post as chief in a small seaside town and almost immediately takes an abused and bullied 14-year-old girl (Kim) under her protection. Bae convincingly walks a fine line, balancing her character’s demons with a compassionate heart and a sense of duty, giving a nuanced performance with emotional heft. Kim brings believable vulnerability and freshness to her role, but the rest of the cast is too one-note to elevate the movie to something really special. PE
RUN DISC D: Philippe Lacôte w/ Abdoul Karim Konaté, Isaach De Bankolé. France/Ivory Coast. 100 min. Sep 8, 9:30 pm Scotiabank 3; Sep 10, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 4; Sep 13, 6:15 pm Scotiabank 14. Rating: NNN
This ambitious attempt to encapsulate the last 20 years of Ivory Coast history ultimately fails to fulfill its lofty aim, but not before providing insights into a part of the world we rarely see. The film begins with its eponymous protagonist (Konaté) announcing that he has just assassinated the prime minister. Flashbacks return him to his well-travelled life (which Lacôte uses to personify a generation) and provide an explanation for his radical political act. But in trying to account for the violence that has shaped Ivory Coast’s recent past, the filmmaker slips. Run’s own picaresque life, though, whether as a child aspiring to be a rainmaker or as a young man zealously supporting the corrupt regime, is both PE entertaining and informative.
TUE, SEP � TIMBUKTU MAST D: Abderrahmane Sissako w/ ñ Ibrahim Ahmed (aka Pino), Toulou Kiki. France/Mauritania/Mali. 97 min. Sep 9, 6:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 12, 2 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 1. Rating: NNNN
Channing Tatum in Foxcatcher
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
Sissako’s humanism in the face of jihadi repression resonates powerfully. It’s a clear-eyed, moving examination of the lives of ordinary people in northern Mali who want nothing more than to make music, play soccer and, for the women, to feel the breeze on their hands without being forced
NN = Snore
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N = Who programs this crap?
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NOW BUZZ FILM FESTIVAL PREVIEW 2014
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SCREAM
QUEEN kathryn gaitens
By NORMAN WILNER
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NEWCOMER MAIKA MONROE FEARLESSLY BURNS UP THE SCREEN IN TWO SMART AND SUSPENSEFUL MIDNIGHT MADNESS FLICKS
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The
Midnight Madness crowd is going to love Maika Monroe. The 21-year-old actor is bringing two films to TIFF this year – It Follows and The Guest – and both are screening in the notoriously raucous late-night genre program. Not only are the movies themselves solid (see accompanying reviews), but she’s terrific in both of them. By the time the festival wraps, Monroe could find herself edging dangerously close to horror-idol status. It promises to be a radically different experience from Monroe’s first trip to Toronto, when she accompanied Ramin Bahrani’s drama At Any Price to the festival in 2012. “That was my second film festival ever,” she says. “I went to the Venice Film Festival and then Toronto, so I’m so, so excited to go back and have two films that I’m so proud of. It’s gonna be really fun.” It’s also going to be a workout. TIFF can be a meat grinder at the best of times, and staying up for midnight red carpets and 2 am Q&A sessions is a marathon in itself. Fortunately, Monroe is an actual athlete – her other job is competitive kiteboarding – so she’ll be up for the challenge. Of course, acting in horror movies is its own kind of cardio. In David Robert Mitchell’s It Follows, she plays Jay, a young woman who picks up a sexually transmitted demon that will stalk and kill her unless she passes it along to someone else. And in The Guest, the new thriller from You’re Next creators Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett, she goes head-to-head with Downton Abbey’s Dan Stevens as the one person in her recently bereaved household who suspects Stevens’s pathologically helpful visitor is not the gentleman he seems to be. Both movies let Monroe play variations on the horror trope of the Final Girl, the plucky and resourceful young woman who might just keep herself from the clutches of malevolent forces. Rather than condescend to the genre or play a self-aware version of a horror hero, Monroe finds her role’s emotional reality and bears down on it. We believe these impossible things are happening because she believes it – and where The Guest knowingly has fun with its situation, It Follows is deadly serious. And Monroe is the key. “I saw her audition, and it was intense and wonderful,” says It Follows writer/director Mitchell. “There was a deep vulnerability, I just immediately cared for her, felt worried for her, believed her,” he says. “A lot of the film is lowkey and gentle – there’s a softness to the dialogue and the performances. But there are also moments where it becomes incredibly intense, and she’s an actress who is able to do both those things, and you believe it.” Monroe says she’d never read anything like it before and didn’t know how the script was going to come across on film. Talking with Mitchell and screening his indie drama The Myth Of The American Sleepover gave her a better sense of the project, especially when Mitchell revealed that the concept of the implacable monster came from his own nightmares. “I was like, ‘Okay, I want to do this,’” she says. “David is such a huge part of these characters – [they] kinda come from kids he knew continued on page 14 NOW BUZZ FILM FESTIVAL PREVIEW 2014
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exactly what we were looking for.” “We saw a ton of actors for that part,” director Wingard says, “and Maika was always the top choice. What it boiled down to was ‘Who can really make this [character’s] sarcastic wit funny, and not just seem lame or annoying?’ A lot of actors, if the character’s written as sarcastic, they take that and go over the top with it. She made it funny and likeable.” I ask Monroe whether she got her spin on Anna from the page or from the energy in the room, and she laughs. “I don’t know what my process is. It’s so different for every project, and sometimes you just have to wait till you get on set, see how everyone works together and kind of figure it out there.” She does want to warn Midnight Madness audiences that the whole scream queen thing isn’t something she’s actively pursuing. “I try and do very different projects,” she says. “I’m probably gonna stay away from horror now. I like challenging myself and pushing myself, because I feel like that’s the only way you can grow.” She recently wrapped the thriller Bokeh, which casts her and Matt O’Leary as a couple on an Iceland vacation who wake up to find they may be the last people on Earth. “We’d shoot in the middle of the night so it could feel like no one was there – and in Iceland there’s three hours of darkness, so we were shooting at 2 in the morning and it was
THE GUEST MM D: Adam Wingard w/ Dan Stevens, Maika Monroe. U.S. 99 min. Sep 13, 11:59 pm Ryerson; Sep 14, 6:45 pm Scotiabank 3. Rating: NNNN
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A stranger (Downton Abbey’s Stevens, sporting a perfect Middle American accent) comes to a small town to visit a fallen soldier’s family, is invited to stay… and then things get nasty. After the wickedly clever You’re Next – a Midnight Madness hit in 2011 – Wingard and screenwriter Simon Barrett’s new feature is a self-aware homage to the early films of John Carpenter, and one in particular. But even if you’ve never seen a Carpenter film, you can enjoy The Guest as an energetic, inventive thriller that takes a premise and runs with it, pitting Stevens’s charming time bomb against the dead soldier’s sister (a terrific Monroe), who sees through him almost immediately and tries to figure out what’s really going on. The action is inventive, the characters well drawn and the climax is… well, not NW original, exactly, but in a movie like this that’s kind of the point.
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in high school, and his own self. Working with him and bringing this girl to life, making her as real as possible, was so much fun because he has every little detail figured out in his head. So it was really fun creating it together.” Wingard and Barrett’s The Guest, Monroe explains, was another case of signing on to a movie just to see how it would turn out. “I watched You’re Next, and that’s an amazing movie,” she laughs. “So meeting them, I was super-excited – it’s just such an awesome group. And I
watched Dan Stevens’s work and I was like, ‘Hmm. Okay.’ I couldn’t picture it. I felt I had to do the project, just with their history. It was something different, something I’d never done.” Screenwriter Barrett says the timing couldn’t have been better for Monroe, though he isn’t sure she was aware of that when she auditioned. “She was at this weird point because she did professional kiteboarding,” he says. “She wasn’t sure if she wanted to pursue that as a career, or acting. And I think that led her to just being totally relaxed and not really caring if she got the part, which was
Horror breakouts Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween (1978)
Kevin Bacon in Friday The 13th (1980)
The daughter of Hollywood royalty Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, Curtis quickly established her own identity as the steely Final Girl of John Carpenter’s seminal slasher film. She’d reprise the role in 1981’s Halloween II, 1998’s Halloween H20: 20 Years Later and 2002’s Halloween: Resurrection, but the first movie is the only one anybody needs to see.
I’ve always wanted to believe producer/director Sean S. Cunningham cast Bacon as a dickish camp counsellor because he’d seen the actor as the obnoxious Chip Diller in National Lampoon’s Animal House and couldn’t wait to kill him.
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REVIEW IT FOLLOWS MM D: David Robert Mitchell w/ ñ Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist. U.S. 97 min. Sep 7, 11:59 pm Ryerson; Sep 9, 4 pm Scotiabank 9. Rating:
NNNN Midnight Madness often favours flash and excess, so it’s nice to see proper slow-burn horror get a chance to freak out a crowd. Mitchell, director of the thoughtful teen drama The Myth Of The American Sleepover, ups his game in this high-concept nail-biter about 19-year-old Jay (Monroe), whose new boyfriend infects her with a sexually transmitted demon that will stalk and kill her – unless she passes the curse along to someone else. It’s a metaphor worthy of early Cronenberg, and the movie runs with it, building unnerving tension with long takes of mundane activity that aren’t interrupted so much as invaded by something walking into the frame. Monroe is fantastic in the lead, letting us see Jay’s evolution from skeptic to believer to calculating survivor, and Mitchell’s script has thought its monster through to the last detail, teaching us the rules as we go and letting his characNW ters be as smart as the menace they face.
still daylight out.” Monroe is currently making The 5th Wave, an alien-invasion thriller based on Rick Yancey’s bestselling novel. “I have this really awesome role,” she says. “I play this badass, kick-ass girl. And there again, I’ve never done anything like that.” The only downside of so much work is that Monroe is likely to go a full year without getting back in the water. “Usually, when I know I have time off, I take [kiteboarding] trips,” she says.
“So over Thanksgiving and Christmas I went to Brazil with my family and we spent about a month kiteboarding, which was amazing. So probably this Christmas, that’ll be the next time I’m really able to kite, just because it’s been such a crazy year. We’re starting to look at different places we want to go explore.” Once she’s caught her breath, that is. 3 normw@nowtoronto.com | @normwilner
MORE ONLINE
Interview clips at nowtoronto.com
Maika Monroe’s double whammy in It Follows and The Guest puts her in some pretty terrific company. Here are a few other actors who made memorable appearances in horror movies – even if the movies themselves didn’t always deserve them. By NORMAN WILNER
Johnny Depp in A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984) Depp’s teensy but charming role as doomed boyfriend Glen was his first bigscreen part. He remained admirably loyal to the franchise, even contributing a very goofy cameo to Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare.
Jennifer Aniston in Leprechaun (1993) Yup, that’s her. Fortunately, Friends came along a year later and prevented her from making any of the sequels.
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= Critic’s Pick
Paul Rudd in Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers (1995) Playing the troubled Tommy Doyle, last seen as a four-yearold in the original Halloween, Rudd’s supposed to be sinister and menacing. He can’t sell it, but it’s kind of adorable to watch him try.
NNNNN = Best of the fest
Naomi Watts in Children Of The Corn: The Gathering (1996)
Amber Heard in All The Boys Love Mandy Lane (2006)
Michael Fassbender in Eden Lake (2008)
That’s future Oscar nominee Watts as a medical student who comes home to her Nebraskan hamlet just in time for all the children to go crazy and start killing the grown-ups. Just think of this as her audition for The Ring, which let her star in a real horror movie.
About half an hour after its TIFF Midnight Madness premiere, Jonathan Levine’s savvy slasher movie had been picked up by the Weinstein Company and unknown lead Heard – whose biggest previous credit was playing the young Charlize Theron in North Country – was a force to be reckoned with. If Mandy Lane hadn’t spent the next seven years stuck in distribution hell, people might even have understood why.
The future Magneto plays the unlucky boyfriend of Kelly Reilly in James Watkins’s gruesome thriller about a couple whose vacation in the country goes terribly wrong. And dammit, he’s charming even when he’s been beaten to a bloody pulp.
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
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Films I can’t wait to see RADHEYAN SIMONPILLAI
Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice is skipping Toronto so it can premiere weeks later at the New York Film Festival. I’m hoping at least one of the following films makes up for that massive disappointment.
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Nightcrawler Fresh off his stints for Canada’s Denis Villeneuve in Enemy and Prisoners, Jake Gyllenhaal goes gaunt in his latest thriller. The actor/producer lost about 20 pounds to play Louis Bloom, a petty thief turned driven freelance crime journalist who chases scenes of mutilation like the paparazzi chase celebrities. There isn’t a lot of info around this title, directed by Dan Gilroy. But the marketing has been particularly appetizing, kicking off with a Craigslist ad posted by Gyllenhaal’s character selling his mantra in a video resumé. If the movie is as impressive as the viral campaign, this could be our generation’s Network. September 5, 9 pm, Elgin; September 6, noon, Ryerson; September 12, 9 pm, Ryerson
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Two Days, One Night The last film from the Dardenne brothers, The Kid With A Bike, played TIFF 2011 and never returned to a Toronto theatre. So I’m going to make a point of catching their latest. This one stars Marion Cotillard, whose recent string of glamour-free, down-and-out characters (Rust And Bone, The Immigrant) makes her a natural fit for the Belgian filmmakers. In their latest workingclass, neo-realist tale, Cotillard’s Sandra tries to rally her peers in a factory to help save her job. Word from Cannes is that Two Days, One Night is more of the same from the Dardennes, which is exactly what I’m hoping for. September 9, 8 pm, Winter Garden; September 10, 12:30 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
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Phoenix For the past decade, writer/director Christian Petzold (Jerichow, Barbara) has been a talent to watch, tinkering with Hitchcockian influences in national allegories about today’s Germany. His latest is a post-WWII drama starring regular muse Nina Hoss as a concentration camp survivor whose face has been disfigured to the point that her husband, who may have betrayed her to the Nazis, doesn’t recognize her. September 5, 6 pm, Elgin; September 6, 11:30 am, Elgin
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Top Five Chris Rock writes, directs and stars in this dramedy about a comic/movie star who wants to be taken seriously. So essentially, he’s playing himself. This insider look at the industry is produced by Scott Rudin, an award magnet whose stellar track record includes The Truman Show, There Will Be Blood, The Social Network and so much more. Makes me think this one could be a surprise hit. If not, at least we get to see Kevin Hart, Jerry Seinfeld, Adam Sandler and Whoopi Goldberg join forces in the supporting cast. September 6, 10 pm, Princess of Wales; September 7, noon, Princess of Wales; September 13, 9 pm, Ryerson
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to wear gloves at all times. All of these simple acts have been declared violations of sharia law by thuggish Arab invaders. Gorgeously photographed by Sofiane El Fani, the cinematographer of Blue Is The Warmest Color, the film focuses on a loving family whose pastoral life outside of town is riven by a tragic accident that puts them in the foreigners’ merciless grip. In telling their story and those of the other innocent victims, Sissako stands PE up for freedom everywhere.
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The Good Lie I approach this film with cautious optimism. The trailer makes it look like shameless Oscar bait: Reese Witherspoon plays a saintly but sassy white woman out to help those poor, funny Sudanese refugees. This could be The Blind Side all over again. But it’s directed by Philippe Falardeau, one of Canada’s finest exports, whose last two films, It’s Not Me, I Swear! and Monsieur Lazhar, gave us plenty of reasons to be proud. Here’s hoping Hollywood hasn’t spoiled one of our most treasured talents. September 7, 3 pm, Elgin; September 8, 12:30 pm, Roy Thomson Hall; September 12, noon, Princess of Wales
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= Critic’s Pick
TU DORS NICOLE CWC D: Stéphane Lafleur w/ Julianne ñ Côté, Catherine St-Laurent. Canada. 93 min. Sep 9, 6:30 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; Sep 11, 4:45 pm Scotiabank 4. Rating:
NNNN There’s not a lot going on in this weird, beguiling coming-of-ager, and that’s perfectly fine, because director Lafleur and his cast know how to make the most of it. A wonderfully restrained Côté stars as insomniac 22-year-old Nicole, who’s spending her hot summer days while her parents are away looking for something to do with her similarly aimless best friend (St-Laurent). Characters both idiosyncratic and absurd pass through, but whether they’ll have any effect on Nicole’s arrested development is left in the air.
NNNNN = Best of the fest
Lafleur counters the lackadaisical narrative with direction, editing and sound cues that are both precise and mysterious, making every note in this exceptionally well-made film someRS thing to savour.
BIG MUDDY DISC D: Jefferson Moneo w/ Nadia Litz, Justin Kelly. Canada. 104 min. Sep 9, 7 pm Scotiabank 13; Sep 11, 8 pm Scotiabank 9. Rating: NNNN
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Pursued by an old associate, a Saskatchewan grifter (Litz) flees with her teenage son (Kelly) to her childhood home to hunker down for a final confrontation with her enemies. It’s set in the present day, but it doesn’t have to be. Except for the presence of the occasional cellphone, Big Muddy plays out like a pulp novel, with a goodsized cast of characters on collision courses due to decisions they made years or decades earlier. It works surprisingly well within Julianne Moore in its modMaps To The Stars est parameters.
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
NN = Snore
Litz anchors a strong cast (including Stephen McHattie, Rossif Sutherland, David La Haye and a nicely chilly James Le Gros), and Moneo creates moments of strange grace that contrast sharply with all the bloody venNW geance.
GIRLHOOD (BANDE DE FILLES) CWC D: Céline Sciamma w/ Karidja ñ Touré, Assa Sylla. France. 112 min. Sep 9, 8:45 pm Scotiabank 2; Sep 11, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 14, 9:30 pm Scotiabank 3. Rating: NNNN
N = Who programs this crap?
This classical coming-of-age story set in the Parisian suburbs vibrates like a street opera. Sixteen-year-old Marieme (Touré) drops out of school, falls in with a gang of three girls led by Lady (Sylla), changes her name and adopts their glam look. Always together, always brash and lively in public, they exude an energy and camaraderie that are completely natural and infectious. Sciamma has directed films involving young women before, but
here she deals exclusively and nonjudgmentally with black teenage girls, and masterfully so. Watching Marieme mature into a confident young woman PE in control of her life is a joy.
MAPS TO THE STARS GALA D: David Cronenberg w/ Mia Wasikowska, Julianne Moore. Canada/ Germany. 112 min. Sep 9, 9:30 pm Roy Thomson Hall; Sep 10, 2:30 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin). Rating: NN
Cronenberg has turned Bruce Wagner’s satirical Hollywood novel into a flat, psychologically trite tale of absent parents and ruined children. Moore plays a neurotic actor trying to land a part originally played by her famous, and famously dead, mother (Sarah Gadon, glimpsed in clips and hallucinations), while Wasikowska is a troubled young woman who arrives in Los Angeles on a collision course with an even more troubled child star (Evan Bird) whose parents have at least one terrible secret of their own. There are some interesting ideas knocking around, and the idea of parents’ mistakes literally haunting their children is a perfect metaphor for Cronenberg. But there’s no centre to the script, which wanders back and forth between the various characters with no real point or logic. Nothing has any impact, and the biggest revelations are just sort of left hanging. NW continued on page 18
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Mommy
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MOMMY
THE TRIBE (PLEMYA)
SP D: Xavier Dolan w/ Anne Dorval, AntoineOlivier Pilon. Canada. 134 min. Sep 9, 9:30 pm Princess of Wales; Sep 10, noon TIFF Bell Lightbox 1. Rating: NNNN
DISC D: Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy w/ Grigoriy ñ Fesenko, Yana Novikova. Ukraine. 132 min. Sep 9, 9:30 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 10, 9:45 pm Jackman
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SILVERED WATER, SYRIA SELF-PORTRAIT (MA’A AL FIDDA) DOC D: Ossama Mohammed, Wiam Simav ñ Bedirxan. Syria/France. 92 min. Sep 9, 9:30 pm Scotiabank 4; Sep 10, 9 am Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 13,
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Precocious auteur Dolan (J’ai Tué Ma Mère) again mines his rocky relationship with his mother in this exceptional film about a single mother (Dorval) coping, barely, with the troubled, often violent, son (Pilon) she loves. Things start looking up when she befriends a neighbour (Suzanne Clément) with speech problems. Pilon is an endearing sweetheart when under control, but terrifying when he loses it. As the tough mom who dresses like a teenager, Doral is equally incendiary, and it’s a tribute to Clément’s gift that she can match her in a much quieter role. Operatic, beautiful and explosive, Mommy is wholly unpredictable. This guy has turned into SGC one of Canada’s best filmmakers.
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= Critic’s Pick
In this extraordinary lament for a nation, Parisbased Syrian expat Mohammed compiles videos shot by Bedirxan over a period of 1,001 days during the siege of the Kurdish city of Homs. Mohammed also incorporates reams of YouTube footage, narrating the whole as one loosely structured chronicle. It’s an artfully composed poem about the tangible horrors of civil war. Bedirxan, a Kurd who was a teacher before one of the anti-Assad rebels objected to her lack of head covering, is fascinated by a streetwise little boy who has a remarkable ability to play amidst the detritus of the hostilities. Those scenes stand in chilling contrast to the battles recorded on cellphones, footage that’s often outlasted the lives of the citizens who photoPE graphed it.
Hall (AGO); Sep 13, 9 pm Scotiabank 14. Rating: NNNN A wholly original take on the crime thriller genre in the mould of Gomorrah or A Prophet, Slaboshpytskiy’s film follows an innocent outsider (Fesenko) as he learns the ropes, rises up in the organization, falls in love with an unattainable woman (Novikova) and tries to get out. But it’s not the Mafia or a prison he’s navigating; it’s a boarding school for the deaf where a violent criminal clique operates a prostitution ring and engages in stealing and mugging on the side. There are no subtitles or dialogue in this brutal love story, but the soundtrack is not silent. While some small details may be murky, the big picture is clear enough. The plot is propelled by sign language and body movements (including much graphic sex) – think pantomime or even ballet. And nothing is sugarcoated, including the PE ending.
WE WERE WOLVES DISC D: Jordan Canning w/ Peter Mooney, Steve Cochrane. Canada. 94 min. Sep 9, 9:45 pm Scotiabank 13; Sep 10, 8 pm Scotiabank 9; Sep 13, 5 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 4. Rating: NNN
After their father’s death, a 30-ish husband and father (Mooney) and his estranged brother (Cochrane) go on a trip to clean out the dead man’s cottage. There’s a really solid relationship at the core of Canning’s modest two-hander, and Cochrane (who co-wrote the script with Canning) and Mooney are wholly believable as siblings who fall instantly back into their decades-old rivalry. But there just isn’t enough going on to sustain a feature, and once Republic Of Doyle’s Lynda Boyd turns up as an old friend of the father’s, We Are Wolves just drifts into a holding pattern until the time comes to release painful revelations. It’s not bad, exactly, it’s just not enough. NW continued on page 20
NNNNN = Best of the fest
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
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THE GATE (LE TEMPS DES AVEUX) SP D: Régis Wargnier w/ Raphaël Personnaz, Kompheak Phoeung. France. 95 min. Sep 10, 8 pm Winter Garden; Sep 11, 10 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; Sep 13, 6:15 pm Isabel Bader. Rating: NNN
MAST D: Jean-Luc Godard w/ Héloise Godet, Kamel Abdelli. France. 70 min. Sep 10, 6 pm Ryerson; Sep 12, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Sep 14, 9:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2. Rating: NNNNN
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WED, SEP �� LI’L QUINQUIN (P’TIT QUINQUIN) CWC D: Bruno Dumont w/ Alane ñ Delhaye, Bernard Pruvost. France. 200 min. Sep 10, 2 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 11, 11:30 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 4; Sep 14, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 4. Rating: NNNN
Who would believe that the director of such intense dramas as L’Humanité and Hadewijch could have concocted this hilarious screwball police procedural? The chief investigator (Pruvost) is a human tic machine and a delight-
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Godard, the legendary enfant terrible of cinema, uses 3D in an ultra-modern, eye-popping way. Placing his camera in the foreground, he skews our perspective by focusing on objects upfront. This enhances and changes the way we view the characters in this exploration of an illicit love affair, and Godard adds literary, political and cinematic references to amuse and stimulate. Despite the lack of conventional narrative, it’s his most accessible and fun film in years. Palpably energizing, it flies by on wings of puns and song. The director’s dog proves a most genial guide to his owner’s ruminations on nature and metaphor in a film that is as densely packed as most movies twice PE its length.
ful combination of Hercule Poirot and Inspector Clouseau. He’s looking into a series of macabre murders (body parts stuffed inside dead cows) in a rural community in northern France. Observing from the periphery is the titular character (Delhaye), a preteen prankster passing his summer holidays with his sweetheart and likeminded pals. Dumont has mined this oddball territory before, but the difference here is that he’s using comedy to unleash his unique view of human nature, and doing so inside a crackerjack plot of weird twists and PE bizarre turns.
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Ñ
= Critic’s Pick
NNNNN = Best of the fest
AMOUR FOU CWC D: Jessica Hausner w/ Christian Friedel, Birte Schnöink. Austria/Luxembourg/Germany. 96 min. Sep 10, 7:15 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 12, 9:30 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 3. Rating: NNN
Drawing inspiration from the life and death of the German Romantic poet and playwright Heinrich von Kleist (Friedel), who killed himself in his early 30s, writer/director Hausner debunks the romantic myth of dying for love by deconstructing his double suicide. Ironically, Kleist’s suicide partner (Schnöink) was not even a love interest, just an acquaintance, who may or may not have been terminally ill. Not without irony, Hausner makes the most of the distancing effect of the stilted 1811 dialogue. She’s also well aware of the absurdly comic formality of her characters and their desires – the film’s title is no accident. Still, despite its great attention to period detail, beautifully composed cinematography and unerring artfulness, PE it left me cold.
NNNN = Excellent NNN = Entertaining
The Gate de-emphasizes both the scope and intensity of the insane horrors perpetrated by the Khmer Rouge in 1970s Cambodia and the suffering of its victims. Instead, it uses its simple story to pose an interesting moral question about forgiveness and what you owe to the man who saved your life but killed thousands of others. A French ethnologist working on ancient manuscripts and monuments in backwoods Cambodia is captured by the Khmer Rouge. They’re convinced he’s a spy, but his captor seems genuinely interested in establishing his guilt or innocence. The fact-based drama plays out with perfect naturalism against the Cambodian forest, whose beauty AD only adds to the tension.
NN = Snore
N = Who programs this crap?
THU, SEP �� AN EYE FOR BEAUTY (LE RÈGNE DE LA BEAUTÉ) SP D: Denys Arcand w/ Éric Bruneau, Mélanie Merkosky. Canada. 102 min. Sep 11, 6 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 12, noon Scotiabank 3. Rating: NNN
MAIDAN (MAÏDAN) WL D: Sergei Loznitsa. Ukraine/ ñ Netherlands. 133 min. Sep 10, 9:45 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 11, 3:15 pm Jackman Hall (AGO); Sep 13, 7:30 pm Scotiabank 10. Rating: NNNN
Loznitsa turns his static camera on the titular Kiev square in all its glory and randomness as he chronicles the final three months of the massive demonstrations that led to the ouster of President Yanukovych in February 2014. It’s the essence of documentary filmmaking, unconventional as it may appear. There is no narration, only the found sounds of bullhorns, occasional media blasts and the hubbub of the masses. Early on it’s like we’re in a minimalist travelogue centred on the square complete with a wide variety of passersby. Interestingly, it’s the film’s form that makes it so compelling. The unmoving camera serves to draw the audience in, transforming the viewer into a participant, much more than a PE passive voyeur.
FRI, SEP ��
A DREAM OF IRON (CHEOL-AE-KUM) CTC D: Kelvin Kyung Kun Park. South Korea/U.S. 100 min. Sep 11, 7 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sep 12, 2:15 pm Scotiabank 13; Sep 14, 3 pm Scotiabank 9. Rating: NN
Tracking South Korea’s transition from traditional values to the worship of industry during its age of modernArcand’s latest is another micro/ ization, Park’s abstract doc lacks a macro dramedy along the lines of human element to keep us going The Decline Of The American Empire through its protracted run time. and The Barbarian Invasions. The People pass through, mainly writer/director hangs political and sometal workers and engincial commentary on a very simple eers, but none leaves an premise: married Charlevoix archiimpression. tect Luc Sauvageau (Bruneau) That of course is the finds himself drawn to a Toronto point in a film that is all administrator (Merkosky). about how the maMuch of the first hour conchine has consists of little vignettes and conquered. It’s not a versations that don’t amount new lesson, but to much. A subplot about it’s told with exLuc’s mentor falling ill plays ceptional like a reprise of Barbarian camera Invasions, with Marie-Josée work. Croze once again appearing Park’s aras a sympathetic medical resting professional. compositions But when Arcand finally make the congets around to moving struction of a Maika Monroe Luc’s wife, Stéphanie (Méin The Guest massive tanker lanie Thierry), to the foreboth awe-inspiring front of his narrative, things and hellish, their come into dramatic focus. It power muted by just takes a long time for the filmmaker’s lack NW that to happen. RS of restraint.
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STILL THE WATER (FUTATSUME NO MADO) CWC D: Naomi Kawase w/ Nijiro Murakami, Jun Yoshinaga. Japan/France/ Spain. 119 min. Sep 11, 8:30 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema; Sep 12, 6:15 pm TIFF Bell Lightbox 2; Sep 14, 12:30 pm Scotiabank 3. Rating: NN
After splendid opening visuals of stormy surf rolling into a cove on the sub-tropical Japanese island of Amami-Oshima, a dead man’s body is deposited on shore. Unfortunately, Still The Water rarely reaches such heights again. Kawase’s dual focus on the primacy of nature and the renewal of life is seen from the perspective of two teenage lovers (Murakami and Yoshinaga) in this contemplative exploration of the way the cycles of life, death and love are interwoven. Despite the breathtaking cinematography, the plot plays out more melodramatically than spiritually. One striking exception is Miyuki Matsuda as Yoshinaga’s mother, a shaman, whose exuberant confrontation with mortality is an exemplary lesson in the islanders’ belief in death as a momentary interruption of life.
Audio Engineering & Music Production
PE
Hazanavicius’s serious follow-up to his crowd-pleasing Oscar darling The Artist is one-dimensional, selfsatisfied, self-important and way too long. This well-meaning exploration of the effects of the 1999 Chechen war on innocent children founders due to a busy, credulitystraining plot that only occasionally rises above its cloying coincidences. Striking cinematography and a believable nine-year-old (AbdulKhalim Mamatsuiev) can’t save this misfired homage to Hollywood (in this case Fred Zinnemann’s 1948 The Search) by a talented director PE with technique to burn.
SAT, SEP �� THE GUEST MM D: Adam Wingard w/ Dan ñ Stevens, Maika Monroe. U.S. 99 min. Sep 13, 11:59 pm Ryerson; Sep 14, 6:45 pm Scotiabank 3. Rating: NNNN
See the Maika Monroe cover story and review of the film, page 12. 3
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SP D: Michel Hazanavicius w/ Bérénice Bejo, Annette Bening. France. 134 min. Sep 12, 9 pm Visa Screening Room (Elgin); Sep 13, 2:45 pm Bloor Hot Docs Cinema. Rating: N
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FASHION
BEST DRESSED If you’re lucky enough to secure an invite to a starstudded gala or ultraglam after party, try one of these luxe looks on for size
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By SABRINA MADDEAUX
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FASHION
SOMETHING BORROWED
We go behind-the-scenes at Stylist Box, the local showroom where stars go to get dressed for free By SABRINA MADDEAUX Photos by RYAN EMBERLEY
“I feel bad for actors,” sighed a good friend as we watched some Hollywood awards show. “Having to buy all these designer dresses – imagine, a different one for every occasion!” I almost choked on whatever cheese-laden snack item I was shoving down my throat. It never occurred to me that people actually think starlets pay for the designer fashions they so dutifully don for red carpets and parties. Let’s clear this up right now: those dresses are on loan. For free – in exchange for the publicity that comes with being photographed and having “big-name star wears house of Hoity-Toity” printed in blogs and publications around the world. For many designers, having their clothes worn by a star is more important than receiving good runway reviews. They say a picture is worth a thousand words and, in the world of celebrity dressing, that’s truer than ever. “Customers don’t care any more about reviews; they care what picture Rihanna just Instagrammed while she’s naked in bed,” confirmed Tom Ford in a Style.com interview earlier this year. Enter Stylist Box, the go-to local showroom for designers looking to get their wares on celeb bodies and in magazine editorials, founded by fashion industry veterans Gail McInnes and Christian Dare. Their slick Dundas West showroom plays host to some of Canada’s best labels, including Lucian Matis, Andrew Majtenyi, Hilary MacMillan and Mäsha Apparel. “The concept is to help Canadian designers who can’t afford their own press showrooms or PR retainers every month. We want to help foster Canadian designers by getting them space in editorials and on the red carpet” says Dare. Mäsha is a perfect example of what Stylist Box can do for a brand. It often takes homegrown labels years to reach the sort of name recognition Mäsha has achieved in just one. Her first collection launched in time for last year’s TIFF and, thanks to Stylist Box, her designs landed on the likes of Amanda Grace Cooper (All Cheerleaders Die), Lauren Lee Smith (If I Stay) and Gabrielle Miller (Corner Gas). Stylists, talent managers and fashion editors appreciate McInnes and Dare’s solid track record and professionalism, two things that can’t be taken for granted in an industry where B should stand for business sense, but more often stands for batshit crazy. Designers have to trust Stylist Box to loan their precious samples to the right people. Potential borrowers continued on page 26
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Clara Pasieka (Maps To The Stars) wears a Zarucci gown.
what’s yours? Bianca Venerayan & Dani Roche, Designers & Bloggers - kastorandpollux.com
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Stylist Box’s Gail McInnes (left) consults with Pasieka.
Another Zarucci dress gets tried on for size.
Pasieka wears a top and skirt by Andrew Majtenyi.
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have to trust that the service understands their needs and is organized enough to come through on last-minute or special requests. The duo has outfitted some of Canada’s biggest names, including Kim Cattrall, Nelly Furtado, Sarah Gadon, Fefe Dobson and the reigning queen of fashion herself, Jeanne Beker. And, yes, being seen on the rich and famous really does translate into sales. “You can mention those celeb names in your bio, your media kit, your buyers’ kit,” explains McInnes. “It’s essentially all about the customer: if they see that Kim Cattrall or Rachel McAdams has worn something, it gives that label familiarity. It’s almost like an endorsement.” “You’d be surprised how much buyers actually pay attention to the red carpets,” adds Dare, an important point in a country whose major fashion weeks are criticized for being at odds with buyers’ schedules. I stop by Stylist Box on a day when Canadian actor Clara Pasieka, who appears in the much-anticipated David Cronenberg film Maps To The Stars (see review, page 17), drops in to try on dresses for various TIFF events. McInnes leads her around the showroom, stopping at each rack to tell her a little bit about the designers and provide some suggestions. She then steps back and lets Pasieka pull whatever catches her eye. Multiple dresses are tried on. There’s a stunning backless wonder from Matis, an edgy architectural offering from Majtenyi and a floral gown by Mäsha that, according to Pasieka, “feels a bit like a swimsuit to wear… in a good way.” In the end, Matis is the winner of this round, and McInnes offers that he may be able to tailor the dress to Pasieka’s exact measurements. The tailoring of a garment that already fits pretty well is a detail others might overlook. But Mcinnes and Dare understand that when a dress has the potential to be seen by millions, you can’t afford to sweep anything under the red carpet. 3
A Lucian Matis dress.
A floral gown by Masha Apparel.
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T:9.83”
© 2014 Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company. All Rights Reserved. 5, Ascent, Stimulate Your Senses and all affiliated designs are trademarks of the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company or its affiliates.
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