2008 TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2008 Toronto Film Festival Notes I’m the Director of Renew Theaters, which oversees the County Theater, the Ambler Theater, and Bryn Mawr Film Institute in the Philadelphia suburbs. I go to Toronto every year, because it’s the prime platform for fall & winter film releases. I was at the Fest for six days - from Thurs, Sept 4 through Tues, Sept 9. I saw 25 films – 5 of which I walked out of. That’s one of the luxuries of an “industry screening” at a festival: you can bail before a film’s over and that’s ok. Some industry types sample dozens and dozens of movies, rarely seeing anything from beginning to end. That’s no fun! On the other hand, there’s no need to be a masochist; if a movie is bad -walk. Sometimes the schedule makes walking out unavoidable in order to see a higher priority film. And seeing 4 or 5 films a day is not as hard as it sounds. Especially when you start at 9am and pace yourself. Most of the screenings are in the same complex, or just down the street. With plenty of coffee and good sandwiches to go, one begins to feel like a baby in a highchair, watching films and the world go by. What’s the difference, anyway? My comments are geared toward whether we are likely to show a film at our theaters. To that end, I can break them down into 4 categories (the thumbnails then follow): I discerned two major trends: melancholy and canines. If a film wasn’t sad, it had a dog. Sometimes it had both. Once a trend develops, you start looking for it. It wasn’t hard to find these. In no particular order: Waltz with Bashir. An animated documentary from Israel about the 1982 War in Lebanon. And ultimately about the Lebanese Phalangist massacres in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps. The filmmaking is amazing – astonishing animations made from images originally shot on film to create a surreal landscape of memory. The film becomes bleaker by the moment and is a subjective response to war. This is a cineaste’s delight. It will be interesting to see if it finds an audience. (Nightmare dogs and post traumatic melancholy.) Rachel Getting Married. Jonathan Demme returns to narrative film with a small “Dogma” style film shot quickly and on the fly – but very ably and well. About a dysfunctional family reassembling for Rachel’s wedding (duh!) and opening up all of the old wounds. There are plenty. Definitely on the dark side of the dysfunctional family get-togethers. With some great performances, especially a remarkable turn by Anne Hathaway as the sister fresh out of rehab. As well as some amazing music by the band and guests. Personal filmmaking, raw and direct. (Family melancholy.) Slumdog Millionaire. Everyone was looking for this year’s Juno – what a curse. But the consensus was that it’s this crowd pleaser indie from Fox Searchlight. (Surprise - the same distributor, by accident!) The film is from Danny Boyle and its about two slum kids from Mumbai, India who go from rags to rajah, as they say. It has a picaresque story line right out of Dickens. Too manipulative and sappy for my taste, this goes under the heading of “give the people what they want and they’ll always come back for more.” Aw, I didn’t mean to make that sound so snooty. Sorry. I’ll try to be nicer next time. (It has “dog” in the title.) Dean Spanley. This was a truly unexpected and pleasant surprise. Maybe my “best of fest”. A lot of applause and a lot of buzz afterwards. A charming and funny film set in Edwardian England, about a vicar who tells some very odd stories under the influence of a particular Hungarian Tokay wine. Peter O’Toole is off the charts funny as elderly curmudgeon Fisk Senior and Jeremy Northam is a perfect foil as Fisk Junior. Sam Neill and Bryan Brown round out a pitch perfect cast. (Dogs are central to the story.) Synecdoche, New York. The latest from super screenwriter Charlie Kaufman (BeingJohn Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine) and the first he has directed. Let me start by saying that I have really liked/loved his previous scripts. But right off the bat I was irritated with the title, which is tough to pronounce (sin eck’ doe key?). Then I was irritated by people who loudly announced that, of course they knew what the word meant (an article of speech that refers to the whole by a part – like referring to your car as “my wheels”). I was even further irritated when a pompous gentleman in line next to me said: “Oh, yes, people often get it confused with ‘metonymy’”. Grrrr (Which, by the way, means referring to an item by a related item – like referring to the Executive Branch as “the White House”. See the crucial, important difference?) All of which could be forgiven – EXCEPT that the film is even more irritating still. Kaufman is at his most morose and pathetic. Yes, yes, yes, thank you for sharing your unhappiness with us. We get it that you obsess about illness and death and are endlessly self conscious. But do you have to repeat it over and over and over and over and over? Do you? People will want to see this film, because his other scripts are so fine. So we’ll play it. It does have a few special moments. But it is so morose and it is SO obsessive-compulsive! That is not cool. That is very tiresome, in fact. And very disappointing. Very. Oh, it’s still a movie that you have to see (look, now he’s even got me repeating myself). And maybe you’re just twisted enough to think it’s the greatest masterpiece since Kafka! How do I know? (Melancholy as life, love, art and everything.) O’Horten. I must have some Scandinavian blood in my veins, because I’m a sucker for this type of film. Deadpan, slow, absurd. Both funny and melancholic. Horten is a retiring train engineer and we follow his routine days as they grow increasingly surreal. Amiable and sympathetic, as well as elegant and vital. Directed by Norwegian Bent Hamer. A gentler version of Aki Kaurismaki. I loved this little film! (Dogs and bemused melancholy.) Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist. Hoping to be this year’s Juno. Stars Michael Cera, the teen daddy in that film. Here he also plays a super nerd, but retooled as a hipster geek musician in an indie band. It works at times – when Nick and Nora are bantering – in capturing a Juno feel. But at other times in drifts into easy teen comedy choices. Nice try. It’s harder than it looks. The Burning Plain. A masterful first film directed by Guillermo Arriaga, the screenwriter of Babel and 21 Grams. Arriaga has created a distinct storytelling in which time and place are scrambled into of maze of interconnecting parts. The truth slowly reveals itself it all its tragic and human glory. I didn’t sob buckets of tears like for 21Grams, but this is still very good stuff. With great acting from Charlize Theron and Kim Basinger. (Melancholy pushed to full blown tragedy.) The Duchess. This is a wonderful 18 th century story of the Duchess of Devonshire, played by Keira Knightley. And an indulgence, since we already have the film booked. Be-u-ti-fully shot in amazing period dress and in glorious palaces and stately mansions. Ralph Fiennes is perfect as the tightly held Duke and the supporting actors are great. Knightley is a bit of a question mark – as to the character, which is quite feminist in design. Does she feel a bit anachronistic in the performance or in the conception? Or not? Not sure, still thinking about that one. A minor quibble, in any event. (Many upper class dogs and some pre-feminist melancholy.) The Secret Life of Bees. This is a definite for us. Based on the best selling novel, it’s set in 1964 rural South Carolina. Starring Dakota Fanning as a young white girl whose mother has died and she is fleeing home with a black girl friend. They take refuge with a family of sisters, who manage a honey farm, run by Queen Latifa. Our film buyer said he cried through the whole movie. That’s a very, very good sign. The Brothers Bloom. I really was looking forward to this – the second film from Rian Johnson, who debuted with the excellent BRICK. With Adrien Brody and Mark Ruffalo as brothers who are con men. The film’s intro of them as children – showing how they discover their gift of grift - is deliriously wonderful. It’s the new Rushmore! Alas, Johnson didn’t take just one Wes Anderson pill, he downed the whole bottle. Soon whimsy tumbles onto eccentric asides, which crashes over self conscious allusion – and I was begging for mercy. And then I was begging to be put out of my misery. What a monumental disappointment. Brody and Ruffalo chew the scenery. No mannered acting choice is too much. Where is the director? And then Rachel Weisz out hams them both! Is that even humanly possible? If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes… But if you liked A Life Aquatic or Danny Boyle’s A Life Less Ordinary - maybe you’ll like this. Not me, baby. The Other Man. I liked this more than most people I talked to – who just derided it. Starring Liam Neeson as a jealous husband who tracks down “the other man” involved with his wife. Also with Laura Linney and Antonio Banderas. Directed by Richard Eyre, who just did the infidelity potboiler, Notes on a Scandal. This moves in a similar direction, with some interesting twists and surprises. Not great, but pretty good. But, then, I may be alone on this one. (Unfaithfulness as melancholy.) Easy Virtue. Based on the Noel Coward play, this should be a crackling good time. And it does have a great British country estate and a fine cast, including Kristin Scott Thomas and Colin Firth. But it falls terribly flat and I didn’t laugh once. Instead of sharp, the wit is delivered in a nasty way and the timing is completely off. It’s too dopey at other times and never hits the right tone. The woman next to me was laughing like a loon and I felt like saying “This is not the Three Stooges, my good woman.” With an overbearing score that amuses itself by playing recent tunes in period style - clumsiness that sums the film up. Sorry. It looked good on paper. (Dog as central character – briefly.) I’ve Loved You So Long. A quiet, well-done French film, starring Kristin Scott Thomas, again, as a woman who gets out of jail after 15 years. This slowly builds to an emotional peak in a very controlled and artful way. With masterful acting by Thomas. Superb. Melancholy? You betcha. The theme of the fest! (Hard core melancholy.) Blindness. The latest from Fernando Meirelles (The Constant Gardener). An allegory about an epidemic in which everyone goes blind. Except Julianne Moore. Oh, very realistic? But it’s an allegory, you say. Well, then, the preposterous setup and the awkward writing and stiff acting are all forgiven, right? A Lord of the Flies for adults? No, no, no. Fifty Dead Men Walking. A well done Irish film about a police informant during “the Troubles” in the north in the eighties. Ben Kingsley is superb, as is Jim Sturges in the lead. Sturges was the Brit standout (Lennon standing) in Across the Universe. It’s a thriller and a character study. Decent all around. But not really memorable. (Come on, the Irish are always melancholic.) Everlasting Moments. A period Swedish film, set before WWI, about a working class family that struggles to get by. A very old fashioned type film. The dad is a brawny, good-natured guy who occasionally falls off the wagon and indulges in drunken merriment. And Socialist sympathies. Mom is the glue of the family, and occasionally exercises her artistic side with a still camera that they won in a raffle. A kind and affectionate and rosy tribute to the good old days, that was not really that good. (Northern melancholy.) Nothing But the Truth. A disappointing film, which starts out with promise and then crashes and burns by the end. About a newspaper reporter who goes to jail rather than reveal the primary source who revealed an undercover CIA agent. Its sort of a bastard version of Judith Miller meets Valerie Plame and it gets a bunch of details laughably wrong in my jaundiced opinion. And the end revelation made me fall out of my chair laughing. You’ve got to be kidding! (This is a dog.) A Film With Me In It. An Irish comedy about a loser actor and a loser (and drinker) screenwriter. They’re about to be thrown out of their apartments when all of a sudden a series of horrible accidents start happening around them. The film is sort of a cross between Withnail and Shallow Grave and it pushes ironic farce to its surreal limits. A quirky little film that has its moments. (Dead dog and Irish artists’ melancholy.) Il Divo. A stylish Italian film about Italian prime minister Giulio Andreotti. Set in the eighties. With a propulsive soundtrack and a very distinctive portrayal of Andreotti. But the film is way too inside the details. We would really have to know the characters to make such sense of the film. It’s sort of like watching a foreign language film without the subtitles. Interesting, maybe. But impenetrable. The Good, The Bad, The Weird. A super-technicolor, kinetic, eye-popping Korean update of the spaghetti Western, set in the desert of Manchuria during the thirties. Great trains, and horses and guns and cartoon caricatures. Candy. Hard, violent candy. If it the sort of thing you like – it’s the best. I don’t, so I was bored after 30 minutes. But then I think Kill Bill isn’t worth the film it’s printed on, either. Disgrace. John Malkovich stars in an Australian film set in South Africa about a disgraced college professor who returns to live with his daughter on a rural farm. Tragedy strikes, but the daughter seems to want to accept it as her punishment. Hey, South African films always do badly at the box office. And confused, muddled ones do even worse. Even if they’re based on an E M Coetzee novel. (South African guilt ridden melancholy and many, many dogs at home and at a shelter.) Ghost Town. A broad comedy, starring Ricky Gervais, as a misanthropic dentist who can communicate with the dead. Funny, in a very unsubtle way, this has its moments. But it’s Hollywood broad and not for us. Worth a rent down the road. A perfect airplane movie. (Ouch!) The Burrowers. A horror film set in the 1870s in the Dakotas. The only reason I saw this was it was the only thing to see at its time. And, yes, I watched the whole thing. Because I got shut out on the hottest ticket in town – Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler, which had just won the top prize at Venice. Got great buzz. By Darren Aronofsky. The Wrestler, that is, which I didn’t see. Thanks. John Toner |
County Theater, Ambler Theater and Bryn Mawr Film Institute |