The second best film at this year’s festival, Darren Aronofsky’s stunning film about a Hulk Hogan/Randy Savage like wrestler named Randy “The Ram” Robinson, who was once huge in the 80s and has now been reduced to a has-been playing small, local venues, and appearing at pathetically attended fan events, all in the name of struggling to survive on what little fame he can scratch together. Stuck in the past (old Nintendo video games, and hair bands from the 80s), Randy has never left his wrestling identity, insistent on maintaining his phony name, his long blonde dyed hair, his tan, and buying steroids to maintain the body he needs for his profession which simultaneously destroys it. That’s exactly what happens when he suffers a heart attack, and is confronted with forced retirement.
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There are times when while watching a movie in my room, my roommate passes my door, stops, looks at me for a few moments, then with a sigh says “You’re watching something cute and romantic, aren’t you?” You see, as a big romantic sap, I have an obvious tell: I have a big goofy grin plastered all over my face. If anyone had turned to look at me during the screening of LOVELY, STILL, they would have seen a lot of that grin.
It was hard not too, given how wonderful twenty-three year old writer-director Nicholas Fackler’s confidently made debut film was. There is something so sweet in this story of a lonely old man named Robert (greatly performed by Martin Landau) who unexpectedly and joyfully finds love again with his new neighbor, Mary (Ellen Burstyn) – and is completely overwhelmed by it (in the nervous and emotionally consuming way). And even though it seems a story about love the second time around (to borrow from Sinatra), it really proves to be a lovely ode to the joys of dating at any age, and the intoxicating effects of all consuming – and nearly instant – true love. If you recognize a teenage romance or two of your own in the film, it’s probably not by mistake.
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Before the film began director Philippe Claudel introduced his film as one about the “strength, thrill, hope of life,” a somewhat surprising description given that I knew I was about to watch a film about a woman named Juliette (Kristin Scott Thomas) being released from prison after serving a fifteen year sentence for murder, and struggling to reintegrate herself into the word and living with her estranged younger sister, Lea, and her family.
It turns out though I’VE LOVED YOU SO LONG is just that, a measured, quiet, emotionally stirring tale of hope and rebirth (a word Claudel used frequently in the post-screening Q&A). Watching Juliette slowly and surely – but not without much difficulty – transform from an emotionally dead human being at the beginning of the film, to one glowing with the possibility of a new life at the end of the film, makes the movie a rewarding pleasure. After all, who of us isn’t comforted by the notion that someone this damaged, this seemingly lost to life and herself, can’t find the means to live again?
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By Julia Gutowski
One week is certainly how long the film felt. The constant snoring of a lady behind me at the Gala premiere of ONE WEEK at Roy Thompson Hall on Monday September 8th, although disturbing, was quite understandable. Although only 90 minutes in length, the movie felt unevenly paced, and much like other self-discovery films, there was a lot of silence, pondering, and not much talking or coming to new conclusions. Scenery shots and awkward, uneccessary phone calls don’t make up a great film, especially one with underplayed character development.
ONE WEEK is a classic coming of age road movie of sorts. Ben Tyler, (Joshua Jackson) is recently diagnosed with Stage 4 Cancer, so he realizes he is not happy with his current job as a teacher or with his fiancé, who he never really loved and decides to go on a road trip. The problem is he already knew he was unhappy with life. He didn’t need cancer or a road trip to tell him that. I suppose cancer gave him the courage to do what he knew he should have done all along but there should have been more of a struggle to come to terms with his illness or the decisions he makes in the film- for example, to sleep with another woman. Instead his character arc is minimal.
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The fact that Danny Boyle’s SLUMDOG MILLONAIRE proved to be the winner of the People’s Choice Award here at the Toronto International Film Festival should be hardly a surprise to anyone who had the pleasure of being in the crowd at its first screening here where it was met with fully justified thunderous applause, and even exuberant clap-along to its Bollywood style musical number during the end credits. Guided by a warm heart, a cleverly original conceit, and a brilliantly structured screenplay, SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is a vibrant, kinetic film, pulsing and bursting with life, energy, and a wicked soundtrack. Even if at first it doesn’t seem that way.
At the onset of the film we are introduced to Jamal being tortured by police officers, determined to find out what form of cheating he used to manage to arrive at the final question of the Hindi version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”, poised to win millions. After all, in a society (and a show) that values institutional education, how could an orphaned slumdog from Mumbai possibly have gotten past the first few questions? As the lead detective grills him on how he knew each answer, Simon Beaufoy’s fantastically structured screenplay kicks in, sending us back in time to the moments when Jamal stumbled across the answers while living his life. Woven together, we get a chronological tale in the Dickensian tradition of Jamal and his brother Salim growing up in the slums as resourceful and vagabond orphans set on destined paths that increasingly draw them apart.
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Awarded with the Grand Prix at the 2008 Festival de Cannes, while I was watching GOMORRAH here at the Toronto International Film Festival I found myself puzzled why it did. Admittedly, Cannes has always had a leaning towards awarding slow and ponderous films with various distinctions – sometimes justified (4 MONTHS, 3 WEEKS AND 2 DAYS), sometimes not (BROKEN FLOWERS) – but for most of GOMORRAH it seemed to be missing that emotional and/or socially significant oomph the festival seems to love celebrating. Then I got to the post-script at the end of the film which reveals the greater context of what the film has just shown us.
For the Cannes jury it must have been a reassuring confirmation that what they had seen was of “real” social relevance and impact and worth commending. For me it was the greater narrative structure I’d been waiting the entire film for so that it would have some dramatic relevance and impact. Too bad it was way too late in coming.
GOMORRAH certainly is not without its accomplishments. Most notably, with almost all gangster films taking either the operatic (THE GODFATHER) or titillating/pulpy/glorifying (SCARFACE) approach to their subject matter, Matteo Garrone’s film is refreshing in its nearly neo-realistic “a day in the life” navigation of several storylines involving characters at varying levels of the Gomorrah cartel infrastructure. Two character arcs in particular are engrossing and hint at the film that could have been. One involves two best friends – equally full of youthful cockiness and stupidity – who seek (like their idol Tony Montana) to make the world their own by going against the established organization. The other storyline follows a young grocery delivery boy who succumbs to the allures the Gommorah promises, and initiates himself into the cartel.
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The director of the Danish film, FLAME & CITRON, Ole Christian Madsen’s, as well as his producers, were quick to defend their film against any similarities with Paul Verhoeven’s BLACK BOOK, a film featured at TIFF last year. Their quickness to disassociate themselves with Verhoeven’s project becomes understandable when seeing the film, because even though both films dramatize European resistance against Nazi occupation in World War II, BLACK BOOK sought out to be (and was) highly entertaining melodrama, whereas FLAME & CITRON – though equally pulpy – has something slightly more ambitious in mind.
Flame and Citron of the film’s title are actually the codenames of Bent (Thure Lindhart) and Jorgen (Mads Mikkelsen), the Danish Resistance’s chief assassins whose chief task is to eradicate Danish collaborators, and eventually also Nazis. In Denmark, the two men are considered national heroes, even if they have purportedly become somewhat forgotten. The temptation for a filmmaker then to resurrect lost heroes – especially Resistance fighters – on screen as martyrs, near mythical defenders of black and white morality, is one that is often indulged. Madsen refreshingly resists that temptation.
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When most people hear a film described as a character study, serious movie buffs usually know to read that as a heads-up that the film (especially one directed by the somber Mike Leigh) is going to be depressing, following some emotionally unsatisfied character who just can’t seem to find happiness in life, love, or work. In an interesting flip, HAPPY-GO-LUCKY is a character study of a person you won’t find depressing at all.
Poppy is the kind of character you almost certainly have bumped into at one point in real life. Little more than a child in a woman’s body, she’s always bubbly and happy, excessively friendly to any and everyone, and seemingly deflates all seriousness around with humor. Her demeanor seems so excessive chipper that we – like we would in real life – not only might find it horribly annoying, but might accuse Poppy of suffering from a crippling bout of delusion or naiveté. After all anyone who finds her bicycle stolen and simply bemoans that she didn’t have a chance to say goodbye, and turns right around to see it as a chance to finally learn how to drive, is at once someone who us members of a generally cynical and unhappy society (though we would disguise that as “realistic” or “pragmatic” society) would question as someone who isn’t living entirely healthy.
Initially, watching Poppy maker her way through the unstructured, slice-of-life narrative structure of the film, you’ll most likely feel her grate on your nerves. You’ll even be tempted to think she’s little more than a superficial caricature, as shallow as her appreciation for the seriousness of life. The delight of watching HAPPY-GO-LUCKY is being proven wrong.
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Late in THREE MONKEYS there is a tensely dramatic scene between Eyüp and his wife, Hacer, where he demands “What’s wrong with you?” It’s an existential question that proves to be perhaps at the root of the film’s heavy thematic fixations, as it meditatively explores the devastation wrought by a family unable to understand and communicate (see, hear, or speak, as the title alludes to) with each other, and perhaps most of all with themselves.
That often emotionally violent theme is unleashed by an act of physical violence. Servet, a politician up for election, gets involved in a hit-and-run accident late at night, he convinces his loyal driver, Eyüp, to take the fall for him in exchange for a considerable sum when he gets out of jail, and a promise to maintain his monthly salary for the nine months so his wife and son are provided for. As Eyüp accepts the guilt of another man as his own, it catalyzes a domino effect of choices as characters make decisions they and others have to account for. Like all great and tragic family dramas, it proves to be the inciting incident that unravels the family, exposing their individual and joint dysfunction, and leaving them with little more but rubble to rebuild with. It’s a powerful subject, complimented by some great performances, and gorgeous camera work that emulates through mise-en-scene and brown/gray shading the physical, emotional, and situational confinements of its characters.
Yet for all the film’s greatness and gasps of profoundness, it only seems that way with the benefit of the passing of time since you saw it. While actually watching the film, it’s an often frustrating experience, because it too often indulges its dramatic aspirations with excessive artistry, which is a nice way of saying its at times pretentious and artistically self-indulgent.
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