It's a Wrap!

Yesterday was the last day of TIFF 2012 and, as usual, there was a brunch to present the list of award-winning films for this year.

TIFF is not a competitive festival, so many of the awards are "people's choice" awards (i.e. there is no competition section as there is at Cannes and there is no jury which oversees the selection of awards). This approach has helped solidify TIFF's reputation as a good barometer of what will be successful in a commercial run and they constantly reference films like "Slumdog Millionaire", "The King's Speech", "The Big Chill" and others as proof of this. 

Also as per usual, my selection did not include any of the big winners (although I did see "Antiviral", which tied for Best Canadian First Feature. 

Interestingly enough, the overall winner was "Silver Linings Playbook", by David O Russell. I don't recall anyone saying anything, good or bad, about this film, but that's not that unusual. Given that at its heart it's about a family with a passionate interest in the Philadelphia Eagles football team, it seems particularly apt given our mayor and his adventures over the past week. 

The TIFF awards list is here. 

My unofficial, unscientific take on what generated the most positive response in lines are the following films:

- "The Deep", 4 or 5 mentions (I wrote about this earlier)

- "Storm Surfers 3D", 2 or 3 mentions (a film about surfers searching for the biggest, baddest wave off the coast of Australia)

- "The Sapphires", 2 or 3 mentions (a film about a girl group in Australia in the 60's)

I have a few more comments on some of the other films that I saw over the past week and a half, which I will add later this week. 

Cloud Atlas

As I mentioned earlier in the week, I approached this film with an equal mix of curiosity and apprehension. After seeing it Saturday morning, both feelings were turned out to be valid. 

David Mitchell's novel is a set of six stories that are presented in a ladder format (i.e. the first half of each story is presented in sequence until the final story, at which the second halves are unveiled in reverse order. The stories are not entirely self-contained and details start to cross over and get reinforced as you move through the book). 

Settings range from the South Pacific of the 1850's, to 1930's Belgium, 1970's California, present-day England, a futuristic Korea and a post-apocalyptic Hawaii. Each story is also handled in a  different literary style. 

The movie was directed by Tom Twyker ("Run Lola Run") and the Wachowski siblings (the "Matrix" trilogy). The Wachowskis handled the first story and the last two; Twyker directed the other three. The principal cast included Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent and others. 

In the transition from page to screen, they made some changes to the story lines and also abandoned the ladder approach, cutting between stories throughout the film. At times, the cross-cutting was useful in establishing the echoes between the stories. When it worked, it worked very well. 

To reinforce the idea of inter-connection between the stories, they used the same principal cast to play roles in each stories. For example, an actor might play the "lead" in one story, but a minor role in another.  The roles crossed racial and gender boundaries. 

I found this approach worked well in only a few cases and some of the combinations were appallingly bad. The English actors tended to handle the differing roles most effectively; the Americans less so. Hanks probably came off as the worst of the bunch, He was not only unable to create realistic characters in a couple of the stories but he was also saddled with make-up effects that accentuated the failure). 

The other problem with the film was that it tended to underline the themes of the novel in a very ham-handed fashion. Particularly in the Neo-Seoul section of the movie, it was a little too reminiscent of the worst excesses of the last Matrix movie. 

Overall, the movie was an interesting, if very flawed attempt at filming what some felt was  "unfilmable". I don't agree with that view and, if anything, the best approach might have been to approach the novel as a mini-series for television. It would have given each story the time it deserved and could have been handled in a way that allowed the different stories to be shot in a variety of styles as was done in the book. 

The Master

For someone with a relatively small back catalogue, Paul Thomas Anderson has maintained a very high standard of quality.

"The Master" is his take on the relationship between a charismatic preacher played by Philip Seymour Hoffman and an alcoholic veteran (Joaquin Phoenix). Hoffman's philosophy/creed is represented by a book called "The Cause" and it's easy to draw parallels between his character and L Ron Hubbard and his Dianetics work.

The relationship between the two men is the emotional core of the film and is fascinating to watch. Amy Adams plays Hoffman's wife and she also holds her own, displaying a quiet ruthlessness to anyone she perceives as a threat.

The film is full of treasures beyond the performances. The cinematography is luminous and benefited from the 70 mm presentation and there was a great use of period music combined with an orchestral score by Jonny Greenwood (Greenwood was also responsible for the soundtrack of Anderson's "There Will Be Blood").

At the end my feelings were reminiscent of seeing "Magnolia" for the first time, that there was much to be gained from another viewing.

As a sidebar, "The Master" was awarded the prize for best direction (Anderson) and acting (shared between Phoenix and Hoffman) at the Venice Film Festival.

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Thale

Two friends who work as cleaners at crime scenes unearth a deadly secret in a basement at a remote country house.

An assured debut horror film from Aleksander Nordaas, made all the more remarkable given the ultra-low budget ($10k for the shoot) and a prolonged shooting schedule (to reduce costs, they shot footage as time and people permitted). The director and producer also played multiple roles in the production and friends also contributed.
In terms of the results, it was very reminiscent of "Monsters" from a couple of years ago. Clearly a talent to watch.
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The Suicide Shop

"The Suicide Shop" is the first animated feature from director Patrice Leconte, whose previous work includes films like "Monsieur Hire" or "Man on a Train".

Shop is nowhere near as good, but it's a lighthearted trifle about a family that owns a store that specializes in the instruments of self-destruction. It's also a musical.

When the youngest son decides to embrace life, rather than help people end it, it sets in motion tensions that make the family question themselves and their occupation.

It was described in the post-film Q&A as a marriage of Tim Burton and Jacques Demy. There's also a lot of Charles Addams in it as well -- the father, Mishima, is essentially a Gomez Addams clone.

Unfortunately, it's also a film in 3D. The glasses used in the theatre were produced by Dolby and were the most uncomfortable specs I've had the misfortune to wear. I took them off several times during the screening and found that I could watch the images unaided with little interference, but the subtitles were very fuzzy. Although the French was, for the most part, easy to follow, I did need the subtitles from time to time and had to put the glasses back on. As the film did not particularly rely on a 3D presentation, I can only assume that the decision to show it in 3D is a commercial, rather than aesthetic, decision.

That said, it's a cute little film that's worth seeing (in 2D). Not really a cartoon for kids though -- teenagers would likely be the youngest age group that would enjoy it.
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Imagine

Every year, the schedule starts with a foundation of "known quantities" -- a director I've followed over the years, something I've read about in the months preceding TIFF or a story I know.

And then there are the wild cards. The films with no history beyond the description in the catalog but with a hint that there may be something there that I'd enjoy.

"Imagine" falls into the latter category, a story of a blind man who attempts to teach blind kids are to live without the need of a cane or other aids.

I was curious how a visual medium like film could be used to tell this story and put it in the schedule.

It turned out to be a very good choice. A strong ensemble cast (led by Edward Hogg as the teacher) and a quiet, graceful narrative made for a beautiful film.

Highly recommended.

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Sightseers

Last year, the closing night of TIFF was "Kill List", a film that revelled in creating an atmosphere of dread in its opening frames and carrying it through to its horrible conclusion.

The director, Ben Wheatley, has offered a release of sorts with "Sightseers", a blackly comic movie about a pair of frumpy British holidayers who embark on an increasingly bloody trip through the Midlands.

The script grew out of a creation of two English sketch comics and the film at times feels like an extended improv act. That said, it is nasty, gory and, at times, very, very funny.
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Byzantium

A mother and daughter, both immortal, settle in a decrepit hotel on the coast and are confronted with threats from their past and present.

Neil Jordan's latest film borrows many elements from vampire lore, although he has attempted to build a story that goes beyond the usual things.

It's a beautifully elegant film, driven by strong performances by Gemma Arterton as the wilful, sexually aggressive mother and Saiorse Ronan as her prim, introspective daughter.

I had written earlier about the two Spanish films that started with good ideas but couldn't follow through in any satisfying way. "Byzantium" shows what can result when you do follow through -- the mythology of the immortals has an internal consistent that supports the overall story.

A solid piece of work from Jordan.
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Spain x 2

I saw a couple of Spanish films on the weekend that fell into the category of suspense or horror. They shared some similarities, so I thought I'd deal with them together.

"The End" is a thriller about a group of friends who gather at a home in the country, just as "something" starts to happen. All electrical devices and clocks stop. As they struggle to determine what is going on, members of the group start to disappear.

"Painless" is a horror film about a group of children, confined to an orphanage / medical lab during the Spanish Civil war. Their isolation is due to their gift of being impervious to pain. Their history is revealed through the eyes of a doctor in the present day who has a connection to them.

In both cases, the films started with an interesting premise, but failed to achieve the potential of the opening. It didn't seem to me that they thought enough about the implications of the premise and the stories suffered as a result.

"The End" tried to introduce a supernatural element through the character of "The Prophet", a friend of the group who seems to have brought the group together for some unexplained purpose and whose apocalyptic visions are captured in a sketchbook that the protagonist finds at a car crash site. It doesn't seem to perform any specific purpose in the story.

"Painless" tries to try the monstrous aspects of one of the kids to the larger horrors of the civil war, but the reality is that it's been done much better by other films.

By comparison, I saw a film this morning called "Byzantium" that did its homework and largely succeeded. More on that film shortly.
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The Act of Killing

Another day, another documentary. Monday morning began with "The Act of Killing", by Joshua Oppenheimer.

A military coup in Indonesia in the 60's led to mass assassinations of accused communists and other "enemies of the state". Many of the killings (estimated at about 2.5 million) were committed by local gangsters and paramilitary organizations, with the support of the State.

In the film, the director meets with a gangster named Anwar Congga and his associates. They recreate scenes from their killings as a film, becoming enthusiastic participants in the production.

The film is surreal and horrifying in equal measure. it also brings into question how much of their remembrances are genuine and how much is glorification inspired by the attention of the film crew and raises questions about the extent to which the director is complicit in their representation (a question which he acknowledged during the Q&A).

Even though the events took place nearly 40 years ago, it's clear that their impacts are still very much active today. The relationship between the government and the paramilitary is very much alive.

As a coda, when I left the Bloor Cinema this morning, I immediately saw two limos with diplomatic plates and a collection of very stern Asian gentlemen. Apparently there were representatives of the Indonesian Embassy at the screening.
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Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God

I've been doing well with docs this year. The trend continued Sunday afternoon with Alex Gibney's "Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the house of God".

The film's primary focus in on St. John's School for the Deaf in Wisconsin and a long history of sexual abuse of numerous boys at the school by a priest named Father Lawrence Murphy.

When three of the boys attempt to have Murphy removed from working with young children, it starts a chain of events that leads into the highest reaches of the Vatican. What starts as a story about the abuse of children becomes an expose of the lengths to which a monolithic organization like the Catholic Church will go to protect itself. And, in the end, it goes back to the men who suffered at the hands of Murphy and are still dealing with it today (Murphy died in '98, so his voice is truly silent).

Their testimony in the film is delivered using both signing and through voice-overs using people like Ethan Hawke and Chris Cooper. Even without the voice-overs, their emotional pain and anger comes through loud and clear.

The film is a devastating portrayal of personal and institutional abuse. After the screening, the three men participated in the Q&A, a moving experience on its own.

Every year at TIFF, there are one or two films that demand space for quiet reflection after the screening. "Mea Maxima Culpa" was one of those films.

Although this is an HBO production, I suspect that this will be a doc that will receive a big promotional push in order to get it on the Oscar list for next year.
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Connections

Walking along Queen Street yesterday evening, I spotted the Wachowksi siblings about to cross the street just as a streetcar passed by with an ad for "Cloud Atlas", their latest film.

We're seeing it on Saturday. I read the book earlier this year and loved it. I must admit I'm both curious and somewhat apprehensive about the adaptation -- much of the beauty of the book is due to the subtle interplay of its multiple story lines and it will be a huge challenge to translate this to a three-hour film.

More on this later this week.

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Going North

A bit of a catch-up day. My BB's battery died just after lunch time (ironically, I think it might have been the TIFF app that killed it).

I saw back-to-back Nordic films on Sunday morning.

Baltazar Kormakur's "The Deep" was based on a true story of a seaman who survived several hours in the water of the North Atlantic in the winter of 1984, after his ship capsized just off the Westman Islands of Iceland. It was (and is) considered a medical miracle.

Mika Kaurismaki has been a fixture at TIFF for some time (I remember discovering him and his brother Aki at a spotlight many years ago). They have a blackly comic sense of humour but manage to do this while still respecting the basic humanity of their characters.

"Road North" concerns a concert pianist who is confronted by the father who abandoned him when he was three. Together they embark on a road trip to northern Finland and he discovers much about his family and himself.

I'm a fan of both directors but my reaction to the films was quite different.
"The Deep" was suspenseful, engaging and, in the end, quite cathartic. The location shooting on the boat and in the water (particularly during the capsizing) were very impressive.

On the other hand, "Road North" was superficial. The emotional payoff didn't really come off at the end.

Looking back at the two, the impression I was left with was of one film that tapped into some universal themes by being aggressively local ("The Deep") while the other was rootless. I sat in the screening imagining an American remake and how it could be done with almost no changes beyond the language and place names. I found that very disappointing as Kaurismaki's films have been so much better than this, by being true to their roots.

"The Deep" is the one to see.



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Dredd 3D

Some may remember a terrible science-fiction film with Sylvester Stallone as Judge Dredd, a cop with high-tech lethal weaponry who acts as police, jury and executioner in a dystopian world of the future. The story was based on a British comic book.

Dredd 3D is an attempt to pay homage to the original source and erase the bad memories of the Stallone mess. Starring Karl Urban (whose face is almost completely obscured by his helmet and opaque visor), the film worked in its own limited way.

A drug lord based in a 200-storey high rise is distributing a new, lethal narcotic called slo-mo. Dredd and a new partner with telepathic abilities are sent into the building to arrest her. The drug lord retaliates by locking the building down and unleashing her minions on the two "judges". Mayhem ensues.

While there is a little black humour, the film is mostly just an exercise in pyrotechnics and design. The 3D added a hyper-real feel to the film that accentuated its comic-book origins and the overall look-and-feel was good, but in the end it was fairly forgettable.
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Sharing is good!

The first screening on the Sunday of TIFF has always been a bit of a challenge to get to, given that the subway only starts at 9. There are buses, but they are usually stuffed to the rafters and move at a snail's pace along Bloor.

Car2Go is a new car-sharing service in Toronto which is designed for short one-way trips. I added it to the arsenal this year. Home to Yonge & Bloor in 30 minutes, leaving enough time for some damn good coffee before the first film.

The view is also a lot nicer than it was 24 hours ago.

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Far Out is Not Far Enough

Saturday morning started with a great documentary on the life of children's author and illustrator, Tomi Ungerer.

I didn't read much kidlit when I was young, but his images of robbers, pigs and other animals were instantly recognizable.

What I wasn't familiar with was his career as a magazine illustrator in the 50's and 60's, political postering in the 60's and erotica from the 70's onward. It was the connection with the last that resulted in him being effectively blacklisted for nearly three decades.

Ungerer is the primary voice of the film, both through his art, through extensive interviews and animated sequences of his work. His joy in making any and all kinds of art is palpable.

Also included are interviews with Maurice Sendak and Jules Feiffer.

A captivating documentary... The best of the docs so far this year.
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From "Ship of Theseus"

What's the best email to reach cyber enlightenment?

One with no attachments.
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No Bixi today

Woke up to pouring rain this morning. Lots of memories of queuing in front of the Uptown or Cumberland (RIP), the many assorted umbrellas providing a crude canopy for those unlikely enough to be without.

It's possible now, using buildings and the PATH system to spend almost the entire day indoors. Today is one of those days in my schedule.
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The Pervert's Guide to Ideology

The "pervert" is Slavoj Zizek, a philosopher with a fan base of rock star proportions and who, with director Sophie Fiennes, had previously made "The Pervert's Guide to Cinema" (it was also at TIFF, seven years ago).

Both films feature him as the sole voice, interpreting the messages of classic films in his own fashion. The hook is that through clever editing and set design, Zizek is inserted into the scenes.

In "Ideology", he expounds on the implicit ideology of film, using scenes from "Full Metal Jacket", "They Live", "A Clockwork Orange" and "The Sound of Music", among others.

Although he can be quite witty and incisive, the overall effect is of being trapped on a trans-Atlantic flight with a seatmate that has way to much to offer and no inclination to provide time for reflection.

As it turned out, the most interesting thing he said was in the first words of the Q&A after nearly two-and-a-half hours of the film (he used a couple of anecdotes to illustrate the changes in how people treat public space as private space).

A film best experienced in small doses.

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Ship of Theseus

A set of three stories written and directed by Anand Gandhi, the film reflects on the story of the ship of Theseus and the question of whether a ship that has had its entire structure replaced by other parts can still be termed his ship.

In the three stories, the protagonists (a photographer requiring a cornea transplant, a monk in need of a new liver and a man who may have received a stolen kidney) are faced with the question of whether a necessary organ transplant changes something fundamental about them.

Of the three, the middle story of the monk was the most powerful. It raised some interesting moral questions and had the strongest cast of the film.

The ending found a way to link the stories in a way that felt a little too "neat" to me, but overall it was a strong film.

"Ship of Theseus" is part of this year's spotlight on the city of Mumbai.
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Who needs a limo...?

Over the past few years, the heart of the festival has moved south from the Bloor-Yorkville area to a line from the Lightbox over to Yonge and Dundas.

The new geography presents its own challenges for the dash from a theatre in the west to one in the east (or north to the two remaining holdouts along Bloor). Street traffic is too congested and the subway has its limitations, despite what our mayor believes.

The answer to the above comes on two wheels. There are Bixi stations near to most of the theatres. Even though they drive like tanks, they're still faster than the rest of the transportation options. Eaton Centre to Bay and Bloor took 10 minutes in rush hour. Perfect for the Premiere Rush.


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The End of Time

Peter Mettler is a Canadian director and cinematographer whose entire catalog has been shown at TIFF over the years. He's made several documentaries (most recently "Petropolis", about the Alberta oil sands) and his latest, "The End of Time", is a continuation of the approach he's taken in previous work.

"The End of Time" is an exploration of time from astronomic and geological time scales down to the fleeting life span of sub-atomic particles (the first section includes a tour of the Large Hadron Collider at the CERN research facility in Switzerland). One of the most striking scenes is of lava flowing on one of the Hawaiian islands; geology operating at human time scales.

The photography and sound-design was exquisite. In some respects it was a good companion to "Sans Soleil" earlier in the day.

"The End of Time" will be shown again at the Lightbox in December.

All in all, a good start to TIFF 2012.

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Kinshasa Kids

From the elegance and control of "Sans Soleil" to the chaos of "Kinshasa Kids", a film about a gang of street kids who dream of hitting the big time as a band.
The film is an interesting hybrid of fiction and documentary; at times, the action stops dead or changes direction abruptly due to an event somewhere near the scene. The squalor of the place is devastating and it seems the kids are the economic engine of the place, although mostly a result of petty theft.

The music is the high point of the film, bringing joy to the lives of the kids and to the audience.


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Study in Contrasts

As I stand in the line in front of the Lightbox, Christopher Cross (Sailing, of course) is playing at one of the bistros across the street.

In front of me passes a man in his 60's (perhaps, 70's) in a KMFDM T-shirt.

I'm on his side.
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The Fallability of Memory

Kind of apt that in remembering two films by Chris Marker about time and the fallability of memory, that I misremembered that Sans Soleil was being shown solo, not with La Jetee.

That said, Sans Soleil was a terrific start to the year, a very poetic ode to time, focusing on Japanese and African culture and drawing parallels between the two. The film is bookended by scenes of Iceland, which re-awakened memories of my own from last fall.

Aside from the visuals, the editing and sound design of the film was magnificent, with a great electro-acoustic score by Michel Krasna.

Spending the time before the next film (back to Africa for "Kinshasa Kids") enjoying a beautiful early fall day in Toronto in David Pecaut Square.

The square is a maze of sponsor structures (there's a huge tent/mansion at one end of the square and people walking around dispensing bags of junk food from garbage bags. Hmmm...

At the periphery are a platoon of workers protesting a lockout by one of the major sponsors. This is the second labour dispute to hit the festival this year; the other is related to TIFF's use of a third-party to handle their print processing.
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View from the first line

The first screening this year is a pair of classic films by Chris Marker -- La Jetee and Sans Soleil.

The screening is at Jackman Hall at the AGO, nicely appropriate as the venue was the home of the Cinematheque for many years. Lots of great memories of seeing many other classics here.

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They're at the post...

It's less than 48 hours to the first film of TIFF 2012. Time to re-awaken the blog for another year of sensory overload.

As it turns out, the New York Times had a piece on the just-completed Telluride Film Festival. There is definitely a "circuit" for films and festivals; all of the films listed in the article are also part of this year's schedule and, as it turned out, almost all of them were on my "long list" of possible films to see. My final list of 40-odd films includes "No" and "The Act of Killing". More on those films in the days to come.

Initial impressions? This year's list includes a number of longer films than last year, with a few films stretching three hours or more. It's probably one of the more expansive schedules I've put together, with contributions from all but a couple of the festival's programs.

The fun starts Thursday at 12:00 with a double bill of Chris Marker films.