Django Unchained

DJANGO UNCHAINED

I haven’t fully written my opinion on a film in awhile because I’ve
grown to feel that film criticism — or criticism in general — can be
like starting a fight; sometimes critics take their criticisms too
seriously (like me, previously unbeknownst to me) and deflate the films
they discuss or themselves feel deflated if their view and articulation
does not resonate with the world. These days I feel like writing about
anything related to cinema can only be viewed as an extension of my own
creative mind, so before you read this, know that this will be, maybe,
some unusual type of write-up on Quentin Tarantino’s latest film – of
which I’m sure you are anticipating or have seen and have probably
liked because it’s a likable film.

Prior to the 1PM advanced screening showing that my wife and I snuck
into this afternoon, I had seen the seven films by Quentin Tarantino,
most of them more than once (Death Proof being the only exclusion). If
you are unfamiliar with his work, the man’s style hearkens back to and
is a hodgepodge of cinema past and present. This means spaghetti
Westerns (Sergio Leone, Franco Nero and Sam Peckinpah), the Nouveau
Vague (until now, mostly Jean-Luc Godard, but this film reminisces
Francois Truffaut more), the Samurai films of Tomu Uchida and Hiroshi
Inagaki, and others – even Blaxploitation. That’s why when you enter a
film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, you should try to
remind yourself not to feel offended during the movie you’re about to
watch. Because his mind, his heart, his vision is all deeply founded in
cinema. He is rooted in it. So when you hear his overt use of the word
n-gger it isn’t that he is too cavalier about it – it’s because
filmmakers before him have decided that it was okay – because he
relates back to them for clarity – because he grew up watching and
loving those movies. That’s what I believe is the case, anyway, and if
so, it allows his films to be as sprawling and carefree as he is.

In Django Unchained’s case, it gets in the way of the film having a
real moral or emotional catharsis, but as was Inglourious Basterds this
is a sort-of wonky look at a rough patch in history with the intention
to send the audience home feeling like they’ve won, like mankind has
won. Here, I feel as if Jamie Foxx’s carnation of Django wasn’t raw
enough, wasn’t a slave enough, to get the hairs on the back of my neck
to stand up the moment he succeeds. He succeeds often – he is the
stallion, the hero climbing the mountain to slay the dragon and free
the princess, he is Quentin Tarantino’s chosen character for Quentin
Tarantino’s film, and that means you’ll have to like him, and that
he’ll do all the things Tarantino wants his good guy to do. He’ll do
everything you expect him to do, and in that, Jamie Foxx’s beautiful,
reflective eyes and nice charisma gets the film by with the tone I
think Quentin Tarantino intended this film to have, and that’s a kind
of tongue-in-cheek, but violently harsh tone with, of course,
victorious undertones.

However, there are moments where you’ll wonder where he’ll go with it.
An hour* into the film, Dr. King Schultz and Django enter Calvin
Candie’s house — on a cotton plantation, with a plan to get Django’s
wife Broomhilda from him — to see, before them, two Mandingos (they
are called) fighting each other to the death. For game. And it is
violent. And it is brutal. To see and feel – and what isn’t seen is
heard, and what isn’t heard is still thought and felt. This is how
we’re introduced to Leonardo DiCaprio’s villain.

The writing/justification for his character’s wild behaviour isn’t
quite understood. I mean, it is written to be understood – his
character hasn’t left the plantation all his life, it’s a time before
any sort of society or real civilization, at least to him. He is very
insecure, very insecure, and that is an issue too. Is this because the
times made him that way — that his situation was simply as ruinous for
his mind as the time was for his slaves’? If so, Quentin Tarantino
spares no expense allowing us to feel sorry for his antagonist – or
anyone like him. It’s very black and white and right here Tarantino is
going black, baby – even Dr. King Schultz’s charisma is almost
identical to that of Col. Hans Landa’s, but because the character sides
(even if incidentally) with the slaves (ie. Django) his actions, the
same ones he would take to the Jews in Inglourious Basterds, are
considered triumphant. It’s moralistically slippery because its only
stance is a superficial one, a judgmental one, and therein lies the
film’s only major problem – its lack of humanity.

Storytelling and dialogue have always been Tarantino’s strong suit.
While his tale of vengeance is fully realized, narratively, I feel the
cleverness in Tarantino’s verbosity wavering – at least in these
historical pieces. I feel he’s trapping himself in the times, using
language that might be relevant, might be clever, might even be funny,
but it’s mostly flowery and possesses not an idea, but a point – a
point his character wants to make, and none of them really have
anything to say except to each other, and that just leads to more plot.
That’s okay – that makes a movie pass by really fast if it has panache,
and this does, Tarantino’s films always will – but it does lack that
soul quality. (Maybe if someone more deeply rooted themselves in the
lead role the film would have possessed more humanity – well it would
have – but it would have just skated over the underlying scriptural
issue.)The best actors in the film do bring a lot of themselves into
their roles and that helps bring to life the dark, yet colorful cast of
characters: Christoph Waltz is wonderfully composed and precise as the
sharp-shooting Dr. King Schultz, Leonardo DiCaprio (whose performance
is ever growing on me) is wild and triumphant, but also edgier than
I’ve ever seen as Calvin Candie, and Samuel L. Jackson is perhaps the
most interesting as Stephen, who appears to be – or at least I
interpreted him as – the sadistic male version of Hattie McDaniel’s
mammie from Gone With The Wind; when he cries at the end, you will
laugh and be mind-blown. These are three great performances.

As I said before, I think Quentin Tarantino is absolved from any
vilification, morally or otherwise. I think his intentions are as pure
as cinema, but this is a daunting film, and while you can play with any
subject matter to entertaining effect, it’s clear to me that with
stories like this one, ones where all of its characters are living some
sort of hell, you have to have humanity; you have to try and understand
people. Sometimes he’s rather play a Rick Ross song to convey his
protagonist’s charged blood-lust instead of his face – and that’s okay.
(Actually, the song that plays was produced by Jamie Foxx, so in a way
that is him. By some extension, it’s all him.) For the most part, the
violence of the film is gruesome – a hot topic for a lot of people to
talk about because it has effected them all. Unfortunately, very few
people seem to be raving how satisfying the film was. People can take
pain but not unless you give them the right pleasure, and sadly that
ending felt too much like artifice. He built up something real – the
violence, too, was real – but ended it so foolishly, like a cartoon.

So, it is my opinion that Django Unchained is entertaining and has a
lot of things to be enjoyed. There’s beauty (Robert Richardson’s
cinematography is picturesque), there’s excitement (the story unfolds
interestingly enough, it moves along) and is an undeniably finely tuned
and well put together motion picture. Ultimately though, there’s
nothing more to think about when those credits close, save a few of the
scenes and the acting throughout. Oh, and of course the technical
production – for the beautiful homage of a world they all created
through collaboration. All of them.

* The first hour is one in which Django and Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) get to know each other after the former is bought by the latter in the film’s opening scene. You will notice that the slave walking montage that plays with the opening credits features a lot of panoramic shots, far-zooms, cinematic playfulness and beauty. This will be featured a lot in the film to fine effect. Not quite how Robert Altman handled the lens, but still not bad.

Spring Breakers.

SPRING BREAKERS (2013), by Harmony Korine

I just came out of this one and I think I’m in love. Before I write about the film, let me say that I went into this film with no expectations. I didn’t know if it’d be funny or weird or mainstream or uncomfortable. As a fan of Harmony Korine, I know what he is and is capable of, I know he’s a joker, but I know he’s also a unique person who follows his vision to its end, whatever it may be, but you can never tell if you’re going to get something you’ll like. He gives you images and leaves you with thoughts. You don’t have to think too much during his movies — he doesn’t much either, so I doubt it having much subtext — but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something worth talking about when they’re over. You may feel it’s a little, or it may feel like a little, but if you can appreciate what he’s trying to depict, there will always be life to talk about once a film of his concludes.

When I said you don’t have to think much during the films of Harmony Korine, that is not to say you should not think about them afterward. If you’ve shown given him your time and patience and watch the film to its ultimate conclusion, I doubt anyone can say they didn’t like or take something away from it. James Franco’s performance seems pretty revered – I would call it amazing. Some sequences will stick with you — Korine himself says he doesn’t really remember the plots of all the movies he’s loved, instead sequences or scenes — like Britney Spears’ “Everytime”. Okay, I was in a theater of five — three of them left, one of them during that segment. But if you sit through it all you’re certainly not going to forget it! And if you leave, well, you’re certainly not going to forget it, but you will resent it for the time and money it took, but that’s silly, don’t resent that stuff. Just enjoy the movie you see.

The film could be divided into halves – the first being the prelude to Spring Break and Spring Break and the second with James Franco. During the film, and it’s awful to think like this during movies because it only distracts you from the movie, I thought to myself “The direction is kind of shapeless, the juxtapositions could be sharper, but it does have edge and the repetition is effective, it’s vivid and it’s making me sick,” in a good way. That could be how I could summarize the film for someone, if they wanted, but the direction finds itself in the end. Otherwise those words can be my basis of thought for this movie, which is an otherwise unique movie-going experience.

As I write and think more about the film (I just got back) its nonstop audio/visual indulgence is so effective. Spring Breakers is a film that is very telling for this generation, if a little insane with its concept. “Just do it like a video game :: This is paradise :: Spring break forever ya’ll” things people today feel like. And of course, the repetition is done to unforgettable effect, but especially the line “You’re scared, aren’t ya? Scaredy cat” toward the end. Mmm… this is good cinema.

There’s a lot going on, a lot of ideologies passing and being shook up. The film doesn’t harp too much on these subjects, but they’re well realized. The writing and understanding of the characters are top notch – Alien and Faith in particular had touching storylines. Really towards the end of the film, as Alien talks more and we see more of him and Franco’s incarnation alone, it – his storyline – takes on an almost epic look at the contemporary gangland attitude. Why people do it, how hurt they are, what they seek, how lost they are – it’s touching. Unfortunately it’s hard to sell that way because it’s also very ugly in places and depressing and sickening.

The film begins with Skrillex’s Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites to a montage of people having fun on a beach, but mostly overselling the bodies of women, which later become naked. Harmony Korine understands the flow of life, it’s probably because he’s lived so much, but there’s something to how he structures films that is special. The opening alone juxtaposes that — the music starts off jumpy and nice, the people are more clothed and wholesome looking, but then the song gets distorted and people are naked, people are drinking too much and it’s nuts. The next scene is of four friends passed out together in the same room – they’re all lying around, uninspired and one of them gets high while one of them is asleep. It’s a sad sight and intended to show you how these naked, happy people are also unfulfilled, at the end of the day. Even though we later learn — through details, it’s very incidentally understood — that those four girls have yet to go to spring break and that they want to go there (the opening scene could even be interpreted as a collective fantasy of theirs), our brain has a different impression at first. And that’s why Harmony Korine’s movies have to be watched and not thought about too much until the end because he’s trying to do something during and for after. Most filmmakers are so ideally all movies would be watched without too much thinking.

But those characters, they want to escape.. Eventually they get to spring break — everything is even funny and fun, they’re dancing all openly (even trying too hard and being slutty) on the bus. We get a lot of shots of that – the last film Benoit Debie shot was Gaspar Noe’s Enter The Void. There is a lot of camera movement and a lot of attention to detail within the frame, but a lot of editing that keeps it delirious. A lot of bouncing and a lot of things to see, so the cinematography itself isn’t easy to note, however it effectively stimulates and desensitizes you and for that you know it’s done its job. You know it’s done its job because it has captured so many exciting images to such an excessive degree that it hardly registers after, I don’t know, the third scene of zealous promiscuity. It becomes no longer eye catching. An hour into the film when Harmony Korine has Alien use the term “double penetration” I felt sick. Then he shows us the primal looking twins that would do it. The second half really pushes you – it is his vision.

Most important, thematically, the film is about our ideals and the journeys we must take to find our own. For Grace, the quietest one of the group, without any blonde hair and a firm belief in God, she finds solace in spring break and escaping the regiment of school and family. Staying in touch with everyone, staying in the same city — all of the girls are sick of the city, but she’s struggling with her faith. On the Florida beaches, she has so much fun as there is so much openness – she believes it’s the most spiritual place she’s been. I might too, after years of sameness and cyclical piousness. Someone behind me laughed at the idea of a spring break beach being spiritual. I myself thought it was beautiful, but it is funny. The movie is many things.

Then in a pool, Faith says she wants to live there forever. “Buy a house and all of us live in it” Her friends laugh at her — it’s completely unrealistic — but then they wind up in a situation where they can remain ocean side, indefinitely, and she fears it the most. It would be the only way all four of them could live there, like she believes in, but it scares her. It’s as if he dream came true only to become a nightmare. At the same time, the friends of her that were skeptical of her idealism wind up on a path towards her vision; ultimately climaxing with an unforgettable ending.

The end sequence — with Alien and the girls and the same speech when Faith was talking to her grandma — possesses many ideas and will likely leave everyone with a distinct impression. It’s idealistic, lost and hopeful all at once, but the juxtaposition is funny and disturbing. If this film is meant to be “the wildest spring break you can imagine” put to film, Korine’s vision is unremittingly wild and captures it all.

A lot can be said about Alien, too. Alien is an interesting character with a past surrounded by people struggling in the ghettos. Apparently he was the only white boy growing up – and now his best friend is his enemy on the block. Suddenly, there are two women he feels compelled to call soulmates (and it feels real, Franco makes you feel its authenticity for this character) and later on, during one of the scenes before the finale, it feels like a sad romance – at least to Alien. All for that money, all for that fame — everything to do with him is fascinating. His bashful smile when he says people recognize him on the street for one of his songs’ hooks. If James Franco were a less concerned actor, he would have portrayed this character as a more extreme Saul (from Pineapple Express) but he goes way beyond that in terms of thought, consideration and approach. There’s so much humor, but it’s also quite disturbing and sad – and in the end, there is poetic justice and for that, for me, the film is poignant in its approach to humanity.

Alternating between humor and despair – Harmony Korine captures the rawness of life with young characters with respect to their struggles and ideals and desires, but also showing the folly in them, as well as the righteousness. The good and the bad. Find yourself and find your path.

If you think about it, if the film were to have a sequel, how would their paths look like, once the credits have rolled? I think it’s beautifully in alignment with the nature of the world and the film’s characters. All of their paths, everything we see them go through all makes sense, doesn’t it? Cotty’s path, Brit’s path, Candy’s path, Faith’s path, Alien’s path, Archie’s path – it was more than satisfyingly realistic; it’s also cinematically satisfying. It doesn’t have a form and it is shapeless, but it does end and when it does, that gives its shape – both artistically, in its poetry, and literally as final bits of film, ending the reel. It happens that way because that’s how it is – I imagine it’s partly because Harmony Korine doesn’t believe in the end of films. “It never made sense to me. There is always more to life,” so I believe, then, that he sees life as it is – the past, the present and the future, whatever it holds, which is natural, rather than within of within the context of cinema, or artifice. The thing is, people are probably going into this movie expecting The Hangover rather than Trash Humpers – it’s super realistic and weirdly cinematic, not the other way around. It’s something else. Like Mister Lonely and his films before that, it is something else. Hypnotic or poetic. A slice of life you’ve never seen or understood before. At least I hadn’t – not with compassion, which Spring Breakers is steeped in; mostly for Harmony Korine’s observational approach, which could be voyeuristic, but there is a warmth in what he wants to communicate and does so effectively with tone. If the film has greater ambitions than being solely about spring break, it certainly feels it.

Good, measured acting from Selena Gomez, a wild, unhinged approach from Vanessa Hudgens and a solemn undercurrent of a score by Cliff Martinez and Skrillex complete the film. Rachel Korine’s chameleonic work should not go ignored – she really disappears into that most lost role – nor should Ashley Benson who was finely unsettling. Ya’ll did good.

Review: Kinyarwanda

Directed by Alrick Brown and performed by a blend of amateur actors and witnesses to the Rwandian genocide, Kinyarwanda can be called wildly eclectic. Written by Ishmael Ntihabose, the script possesses a dignity that the film doesn’t always realize. Where he is surefooted in what he wants to say in each vigniette, Alrick Brown is sometimes confused by how and sometimes (and most worryingly of all) what exactly should be emphasized to get the point across. While Alrick Brown as director show promise as he observes lost souls reaching out for repentance, there are times where his technique can be criticized for being too cinematic; his use of slow-motion to capture relief or suffering accentuate his lack of concern for cadence, for the misc en scene. It is a melange of faith and strength, but also of unwarranted suffering and confusion. It is welcomed that Brown never goes for the throat and his direction certainly more optimistic than you would expect given the film’s setting, but at times it is fair to feel that the film would have been more effective had he insulated his entire film with the uneasiness that permeates the aforementioned scene of penitence. At times, the film doesn’t feel like the film we’ve been watching – the attitude toward the material changes drastically from vignette to vignette. The patient cinematography utilized to make the segment Re-Edukation Camp 2004 as affecting as it was vanishes when it comes to scenes with larger production value; more people and something cinematic like a death or a revelation. The idiosyncratic script that brings together all these storylines is quite ingenious, at times feeling like the writer was granted Shakespeare’s perfect sense of irony and tragedy, all while speaking articulately about Rwanda’s 1994 genocide and many of the circumstances that caused it and resolved it, going so far as to show a scene depicting the high acting Muslims of Rwanda discussing what led to the inevitable harmony of Rwanda, or at least momentarily dispelling the conflict and reviving a lot of the faith that was lost during.

This film is all about heart and the heart of all film’s come from the actors. A person can write and a person can direct, but if there isn’t an honest soul in the character on-screen, we are not going to feel a connection. We can feel a true emotion – if they’re vacant we can feel disdain, if they’re calculated we can feel reverence for their skill – but we’re not, or at least I’m not, going to feel love – and that’s the most important thing. For this reason, I must first talk about Edouard Bamporiki’s performance as the reticent Emmanuel, a character we first see in a Re-Education Camp* ten years after the genocide. From the first moment he appears on-screen, we know his performance is going to be special; that he is going to evoke an honesty we see more in these amateur settings than in more professional productions. He does not identify himself with anyone or anything; his energy is off, he looks trapped inside his body; he composes himself like onyx. We are drawn to him. With every expression tacit – with reservation identical to our own reserved reflections and quietly palpable inner turmoil – his acting is not acting but self-examination caught on film. Then, it is also true that his acting lacks tact and when he speak his cathartic piece at the end, more dialogue composure can be desired and his potential seen, but yet fully realized. Still, from the moment he emerges in the film and we feel his bitter, self-contained suffering, we want it to end. Immediately. And that isn’t for lack of backstory – when it comes, we still feel badly for him, for his pain. Acting like this revitalizes my appreciation of watching the performer perform because it reminds me that sometimes there is no discretion in the action – that the person performing has opened themselves up to the world and that honesty, that strength is what fills my heart with love.

Other performers range from honest to misjudged and that’s where the film’s greatest weakness is. If Bamporiki’s style of acting is true, so then is Cleophas Kabasita’s and Kena Onyenjekwe’s in their limited roles, and Cassandra Freeman honest in her strong, nobel way despite how she is shot in slow-motion to a detrimental degree. However, the focus of the film is a young Tutsi woman named Jean (Hadidja Zaninka) who is in a burgeoning relationship with a sweet, caring Hutu man named Ishmael (Hassan Kabera), has a tragic trouble freshly seated in her heart and a big moment at the end where her storyline and Bamporiki’s come together in a disheartening way, yet it all seems to have escaped her. Her effort is clear – her intention is good, so she can not be blamed for anything but being miscast. She is not an actress and was clearly uncomfortable succumbing and fluctuating between states of complete emotional devastation and losing herself in fleeting illusions of love for the screen. Most of the film’s players are not actors by trade so to say she is not an actress is not a slight, but those actors, for the most part, did expose their pains and open up on screen. If Zaninka has suffered, she is sadly in a state of circumvention. So to is Mazimpaka Kennedy (in the role of a priest at odds with his faith and seeing the goodness in himself), but he has more skill. He is probably the most skilled performer of the bunch as it’s easy to notice how he nails comic and dramatic cues where no other actors in the film do. Their cadences are natural and his are not – his emotional scenes don’t exactly render true and are actually jarring as you notice how much more comfortable he is being superficial. Though his emotional moments do lack what he offers to the film is a mainstream style that is welcomed in film drenched in too honest suffering. His segment is the only inconsistent one – the others are either good or bad and to varying degrees.

It’s an well-meaning, but inconsistent film with an ambitious scope to respect and a beautiful message. Without spoiling the film – think to yourself how many deaths are seen or implied? For a film that resolutely illustrates the fear and tension in Rwanda during its three month genocide in 1994, it is something, in the end, that almost completely avoids brutality to spread its hopeful message. If Kinyarwanda is not completely satisfying, it is ultimately beautiful.

* A Re-Education Camp is designed to relieve the minds of those Hutu’s who committed violent and mostly murderous acts during the 1994 genocide. They are told to forgive themselves for what they have done and ask for forgiveness to those they have hurt. None of them wield hatred or commit acts of violence – their minds do not need adjusting, they know what they have done is wrong.

2011 SAG Predictions

I don’t write on my blog much very more, but these are announced tomorrow (9am ET / 6am PT).

Best Ensemble Cast:

The Artist
The Descendants
Midnight In Paris
Moneyball
The Help

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role:

George Clooney, The Descendants
Jean Dujardin, The Artist
Michael Fassbender, Shame
Brad Pitt, Moneyball
Michael Shannon, Take Shelter

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role:

Viola Davis, The Help
Elizabeth Olsen, Martha Marcy May Marlene
Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady
Tilda Swinton, We Need To Talk About Kevin
Michelle Williams, My Week With Marilyn

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role:

Kenneth Branagh, My Week With Marilyn
Albert Brooks, Drive
Nick Nolte, Warrior
Patton Oswalt, Young Adult
Christopher Plummer, Beginners

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role:

Jessica Chastain, The Help
Melissa McCarthy, Bridesmaids
Carey Mulligan, Shame
Octavia Spencer, The Help
Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

My 2011 TIFF Schedule

This is the schedule I want and am confident I will wind up with. I wish I was able to do more probing into the title releases beforehand – and blog about it – but that’s okay.

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9th
1pm – 2:33pm: Le havre (AGO)
4pm – 5:35pm: Restless (Bell Lightbox 2)
7pm – 9:08pm: Wuthering Heights (Bell Lightbox 2)
9:30pm – 11:07pm: Oslo, August 31st (Scotiabank 1)

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 10th
11am – 12:38pm: The Ides of March (Visa Screening Room)
4pm – 5:35pm: Hick (Winter Garden)

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 11th
9:15am – 11:08am: We Need To Talk About Kevin (Bell Lightbox 2)
12:30pm – 2:16pm: Keyhole (AMC 3)
3pm – 4:30pm: Mavericks: Sony Pictures Classics (Bell Lightbox 3)

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13th
10am – 12:14pm: Faust (Bell Lightbox 2)
12:15pm – 1:46pm: Your Sister’s Sister (Bell Lightbox 1)
3:15pm – 4:54pm: Shame (Bell Lightbox 1)
6:15pm – 8:52pm: Once Upon A Time In Anatolia (Bell Lightbox 1)

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14th
9:15am – 11:15am: Damsel in Distress (Scotiabank 4)
12pm – 1:45pm: Like Crazy (Ryerson)
3pm – 4:33pm: ALPS (Bell Lightbox 2)
7:30pm – 9:07pm: Michael (Bell Lightbox 2)

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15th
11am – 12:25pm: Jeff, Who Lives At Home (Visa Screening Room)
2:45pm – 4:16pm: Breathing (AMC 3)
7:45pm – 9:13pm: The Kid With The Bike (Isabel Bader)

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16th
9:30am – 11:20pm: Hors Satan (Bell Lightbox 2)
12pm – 2:03pm: Machine Gun Preacher (Scotiabank 1)
2:15pm – 4:15pm: Take Shelter (Scotiabank 3)

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 17th
9:30am – 11:28am: The Skin I Live In (Bell Lightbox 2)
12:00pm – 1:35pm: Peace, Love and Misunderstanding (Ryerson)
2:45pm – 5:01pm: Melancholia (Ryerson)
6:15pm – 7:53pm: The Deep Blue Sea (Bell Lightbox 1)

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 18th
3:00pm – 4:45pm: Rampart (Ryerson)
6:00pm – whenever: Cadillac People’s Choice winner (Ryerson)

TIFF 2011: Anticipation Meter

I would have liked to have kept up with the TIFF title announcements as they came, but my internet was down for a few weeks, so I’m dealing with the titles collectively in my blog as I have in reality. I’m excited, and if you’re reading this, odds are you are too.

Since I will be seeing less films this year – maybe as low as ten, but I’m doing my best to get to thirty – I’m only going to include those which I really want to see because I will eventually end up with a lineup consisting of those titles. And since I have little time, I will simply copy and paste the synopses.

TEN.

SHAME — starring Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan.  Brandon is a thirty-something man living in New York who is unable to manage his sex life. After his wayward younger sister moves into his apartment, Brandon’s world spirals out of control. From director Steve McQueen (Hunger), Shame is a compelling and timely examination of the nature of need, how we live our lives and the experiences that shape us.

RAMPART — starring Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster. A genre-bending, 1990s Los Angeles police family drama, Rampart explores the dark soul and romantic misadventures of a never-changing LAPD cop (Woody Harrelson) whose past is finally catching up with him in the wake of a department-wide corruption scandal. Along the way, he is forced to confront his disgruntled daughters (Brie Larson, Sammy Boyarsky), his two ex-wives (Anne Heche, Cynthia Nixon), a tenacious Deputy DA (Sigourney Weaver), an investigator on his trail (Ice Cube), a homeless witness to his crimes (Ben Foster), his aging mentor (Ned Beatty) and a mysterious new lover who may or may not be on his side (Robin Wright), as he fights for his own sanity and survival.

OSLO, AUGUST 31ST — starring Anders Danielsen Lie and Ingrid Olava. Anders wanders the city, meeting people he hasn’t seen in a while. Long into the night, the ghosts of past mistakes will wrestle with the chance of love, of a new life, with the hope to see some future by morning. An adaptation from The Fire Within (Le feu follet).

WUTHERING HEIGHTS — starring James Howson and Kaya Scodelario. A Yorkshire hill farmer on a visit to Liverpool finds a homeless boy on the streets. He takes him home to live as part of his family on the isolated Yorkshire moors where the boy forges an obsessive relationship with the farmer’s daughter. Starring James Howson and Kaya Scodelario.

NINE.

360 — starring Jude Law and Rachel Weisz. In 360, director Fernando Meirelles and screenwriter Peter Morgan combine a modern and dynamic roundelay of original stories into one, linking characters: from different cities and countries in a vivid, suspenseful and deeply moving tale of love in the 21st century. Starting in Vienna, the film beautifully weaves through Paris, London, Bratislava, Rio, Denver and Phoenix into a single, mesmerizing narrative.

THE IDES OF MARCH — starring Ryan Gosling and Philip Seymour Hoffman. An idealistic staffer for a newbie presidential candidate gets a crash course on dirty politics during his stint on the campaign trail. Based on the play by Beau Willimon. Directed by George Clooney.

TAKE THIS WALTZ — starring Michelle Williams and Seth Rogen. A funny, bittersweet and heart-wrenching story about a woman struggling to choose between two different types of love. Sarah Polley’s latest.

A FUNNY MAN — starring Nikolaj Lie Haas and Julie Zangenberg. Opening in the seductive style of the 1960s, A Funny Man uncovers the perennial loneliness that comedian Dirch Passer (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) has found himself in after a fast-track rise to fame, despite being surrounded by a mélange of wealth, women, alcohol and infamy.

ALPS — starring Aggeliki Papoulia and Aris Servetalis. A nurse, a paramedic, a gymnast, and her coach have formed a secret, illegal company. The service they provide is to act as stand-ins for the recently deceased, for the benefit of grieving relatives and friends. The company is called “ALPS” and the ALPS members, taking inspiration from the life of the deceased, adopt their behaviours and habits, memorizing favourite songs, actors, foods, familiar expressions. Although the members of ALPS operate under a disciplined regime demanded by the paramedic, their leader, the nurse doesn’t.

MICHAEL — starring Michael Fuith and David Rauchenberger. A mousy insurance salesman keeps an under-aged boy locked in his basement, while doing his best to appear ordinary to the outside world.

VOLCANO — starring Theodór Júlíusson. This coming of age story follows a 67-year-old man who proves that it is never too late to change. Hannes is a bitter old man who finds renewed purpose in life in the wake of a family tragedy. For years, Hannes isolated himself from his wife and his now grown children. Determined to care for his wife for the first time, Hannes slowly discovers sentiments long buried within him.

EIGHT.

DAMSELS IN DISTRESS — the latest by Whit Stillman. Damsels in Distress is a comedy about a trio of beautiful girls as they set out to revolutionize life at a grungy American university – the dynamic leader Violet Wister (Greta Gerwig), principled Rose (Megalyn Echikunwoke) and sexy Heather (Carrie MacLemore).  They welcome transfer student Lily (Analeigh Tipton) into their group, which seeks to help severely depressed students with a program of good hygiene and musical dance numbers. The girls become romantically entangled with a series of men – including smooth Charlie (Adam Brody), dreamboat Xavier (Hugo Becker), the mad frat-pack of Frank (Ryan Metcalf) and Thor (Billy Magnussen) – who threaten the girls’ friendship and sanity.

JEFF, WHO LIVES AT HOME — starring Jason Segel and Susan Sarandon. Penned by the writer/director team of brothers Jay and Mark Duplass (Cyrus), this is the story of one man searching for the meaning of life while running to the store to buy wood glue.  Using the universe as his guide, Jeff looks for signs to help determine his path. However, a series of comedic and unexpected events leads him to cross paths with his family in the strangest of locations and circumstances. Jeff just may find the meaning of his life… and if he’s lucky, pick up the wood glue as well.

YOUR SISTER’S SISTER — starring Emily Blunt and Rosemarie DeWitt. Still mourning the recent death of his brother, a bereft and confused man finds love and direction in a most unexpected place. It also stars comedian Mike Birbiglia and Mark Duplass, and is directed by Lynn Shelton (Humpday).

PLAY — starring Kevin Vaz and Yannick Diakite. Play is an astute observation based on real cases of bullying. In central Gothenburg, Sweden, a group of boys, aged 12-14, robbed other children on about 40 occasions between 2006 and 2008. The thieves used an elaborate manipulation scheme called the ‘brother trick,’ involving advanced role-play and gang rhetoric rather than physical violence.

MELANCHOLIA — starring Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg. In this beautiful movie about the end of the world, Justine (Kirsten Dunst) and Michael (Alexander Skarsgård) are celebrating their marriage at a sumptuous party in the home of her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), and brother-in-law John (Kiefer Sutherland). Despite Claire’s best efforts the wedding is a fiasco, with family tensions mounting and relationships fraying. Meanwhile, a planet called Melancholia is heading directly towards Earth… Melancholia is a psychological disaster film from director Lars von Trier.

LOVE AND BRUISES — starring Tahar Rahim and Corinne Yam. Hua, a young teacher from Beijing, is a recent arrival in Paris. Exiled in an unknown city, she wanders between her tiny apartment and the university, drifting between former lovers and recent French acquaintances. She meets Matthieu, a young worker who falls madly in love with her. Possessed by an insatiable desire for her body, he treats Hua like a dog. An intense affair begins, marked by Matthieu’s passionate embraces and harsh verbal abuse. When Hua decides to leave her lover, she discovers the strength of her addiction, and the vital role he has come to play in her life as a woman.

CENTURY OF BIRTHING — the latest by Lav Diaz. A grand meditation on the roles of the artist, Filipino director Lav Diaz’s Century of Birthing tells two seemingly unrelated tales: one focusing on a filmmaker who has spent years working on his latest opus; the other about a Christian cult leader in a rural region. (Six hours in length.)

MONSTER CLUB — starring Eita and Yôsuke Kubozuka. Having abandoned modern civilization, Ryoichi lives an isolated, self-sufficient life on a snow-covered mountain and sends mail bombs to the CEOs of corporations and TV networks. One day, he encounters a mysterious creature in the forest. That night, his older brother, who had committed suicide, appears before him at his cabin. The apparition takes Ryoichi beyond a door, where Ryoichi learns the truth about his family.

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN — starring Tilda Swinton and John C. Reilly. A suspenseful and psychologically gripping exploration into a parent dealing with her child doing the unthinkable.

KEYHOLE — starring Jason Patric and Isabella Rossellini. Idiosyncratic, cheeky and uncategorizable, the films of Guy Maddin are testaments to the singular vision of a great contemporary cinema artist, and Keyhole may be his boldest film yet. A surreal indoor odyssey of one man, Ulysses Pick  struggling to reach his wife in her bedroom upstairs, this hypnotic dreamlike journey bewilders and captivates.

CUT — starring Hidetoshi Nishijima and co-written by Shinji Aoyama. An obsessive young filmmaker becomes a human punching bag to pay off the yakuza loans that financed his films. A love poem to cinema classics from the acclaimed director of The Runner, Vegas: Based on a True Story, and A,B,C…Manhattan.

CHICKEN WITH PLUMS — starring Mathieu Amalric and Isabella Rossellini. Tehran, 1958: Nasser Ali Khan, the most celebrated violin player, has his beloved instrument broken. Unable to find another to replace it, life without music seems intolerable. He stays in bed and slips further and further into his reveries from his youth to his own children’s futures. Over the course of the week that follows, and as the pieces of this captivating story fall into place, we understand his poignant secret and the profundity of his decision to give up life for music and love.

HIMIZU — starring Megumi Kagurazaka and Denden. The story is about a teenager who aspires to be ‘ordinary’ within a world of chaos. Following an incident that can never be erased from his life, his wish becomes something impossible to achieve, turning him into a person obsessed to sanction evil people in society.

FOOTNOTE — starring Lior Ashkenazi and Shlomo Bar-Aba. This story chronicles the outcome of a great rivalry between a father and son, both professors in the Talmud department of Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Halfway Awards: 2011

I’ve not been reviewing much, and I don’t think I really will be for the next little while (though perhaps when I rewatch The Tree Of Life I’ll do one up), but here’s some superfluity. Going by US release to make this a far more interesting affair than it would be if I were to exclude, say, HaHaHa.

BEST PICTURE
Aurora
HaHaHa
Bal (Honey)
Meek’s Cutoff
Midnight In Paris

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
Mitsuru Fukikoshi – Cold Fish
Benoit Magimal – Little White Lies
Hunter McCracken – The Tree Of Life
Cristi Puiu – Aurora
Jun-Sang Yu – HaHaHa

BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
Marion Cotillard – Little White Lies
Liana Liberto – Trust
Takako Matsu – Confessions
Michelle Williams – Meek’s Cutoff
Jeong-hie Yun – Poetry

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Michael Fassbender – Jane Eyre
Ryu Kohata – City of Life and Death
Brad Pitt – The Tree Of Life
Corey Stoll – Midnight In Paris
Christoph Waltz – Water For Elephants

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Jessica Chastain – The Tree Of Life
Zoe Kazan – Meek’s Cutoff
Melanie Lynskey – Win Win
Maria Popistasu – Tuesday, After Christmas
Moon So-ri – HaHaHa

BEST DIRECTOR
Woody Allen – Midnight In Paris
Benjamin Heisenberg – The Robber
Semih Kaplanoglu – Bal (Honey)
Cristi Puiu – Aurora
Kelly Reichardt – Meek’s Cutoff

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Bal (Semih Kaplanoglu)
Cold Fish (Shion Sono)
HaHaHa (Sang-soo Hong)
Meek’s Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt + Jonathan Raymond)
Midnight In Paris (Woody Allen)

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Not good enough to even try.