Week of September 25, 2008, Issue #675
FILM
22nd Edmonton International Film Festival
EIFF kicks off 22nd year with more film than we can handle
Vue Staff
Below are reviews of all of the films we could get our hands from the first week of the Edmonton International Film Fest. But there’s lots more: for starters, head over to page XX to read Eden Munro’s interview with the members of Anvil, the subject of the documentary Anvil! Besides that, not only are there plenty of features we couldn’t sneak a peak at, but there are short film galas, lunchtime flicks and, of course, a whole other weekend worth of films. So check out edmontonfilmfest.com for more details on the fest, and check here next week for more reviews and an interview with Sugar directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck.
Reviews by David Berry (DB), Paul Blinov (PB), Josef Braun (JBr), Jonathan Busch (JBu), Bryan Birtles (BB), Kristina de Guzman (KD), Brian Gibson (BG), Omar Mouallem (OM), Eden Munro (EM), Mary Christa O’Keefe (MCO). Also note that all features are showing at Empire City Centre 9.
45rpm
By David Schultz; Mon, Sep 29 (7:15 pm)
The title is misleading, because while 45rpm contains LPs and turntables, music only acts as a catalyst for what this film so subtly but perfectly portrays: the relationships that we often take for granted but which matter the most in our lives. Although the characters encounter situations that would usually have most actors chewing the scenery, the cast of 45rpm are able to evoke powerful emotions from the viewer without having to resort to such theatrics. Nearly all of the actors effortlessly demand your attention and have given what may be some of the most captivating performances I’ve seen in a film all year. KD
Adam’s Apples
Directed by Anders Thomas Jensen; Wed, Oct 1 (9:15 pm)
While your Amer-indie comedy director may go for the quirks, Danish director Jensen feels traumas make for laughter. So his follow-up to a cannibalism farce features a once-abused priest (Mads Mikkelsen) turning the other cheek whenever one of the parolees he’s taken in, a seething neo-Nazi (is there any other kind?), punches him. The funniest moments show how good intentions and cheerful forbearance underpin the worst sins. Otherwise, with its simpletons and other stereotypes, and lacking satire’s aim or any other pointedness, Adam’s Apples is rarely tart, sometimes tasteless, and then, with its stupidly sunny ending, just plain bland. BG
Audience of One
By Mike Jacobs; Wed, Oct 1 (5 pm)
Pastor Richard Gazowsky heads San Francisco-based Voice of Pentecost Church, which saw better days under his wizened but still-sharp mama. But Pastor Richard has a vision from God (the titular “audience of one” he reminds his hapless flock they’re labouring to please): after seeing his first film at the tender age of 40, he was ordered to make “Star Wars meets The Ten Commandments” to draw “millions of souls” to his master. He may be trying to create a sci-fi spectacle, but apparently God actually craves a tragicomedy—watching the descent of the mendicant director into a gross parody of Orson Welles is terribly sad and funny. MCO
Big Story in a Small City
By Gor Kirakosian; Sat, Sep 27 (2:15 pm)
Pretty much snatching its entire style from Amélie, but never successfully, Big Story in a Small City begins with the narrator getting crushed and killed by a falling piano. At the in-house wake his family holds for him, a family friend believes his body was mistakenly switched at the morgue, and a romp ensues. It’s quirky, but not that funny, irreverent, but very predictable. And the wacky overacting is more suitable for Telemundo than the silver screen. So although it’s certainly not the worst movie you can see at the festival, you can do much better. OM
The Cake Eaters
Directed by Mary Stuart Masterson; Sun, Sep 28 (12 pm)
Mary Stuart Masterson proves capable but uninspired in her feature film directorial debut, a story of a family of men dealing with their matriarch’s death: though she rarely misses the mark, most of her shots come across as pretty flat and uninspired, more suited to a movie of the week than the big screen. Still, she pulls some good performances out of her actors, especially young Kristen Stewart as a girl with a neuromuscular disease. Stewart manages to be both natural and vulnerable, and does a much better job of engaging the audience than Masterson’s often-lifeless images. DB
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son about His Father
By Kurt Kuenne; Sun, Sep 28 (7:15 pm), Thu, Oct 2 (4 pm); City Centre
Having never heard of the Shirley Turner case, I got chills watching this film. I also laughed—sometimes inappropriately—due to image choices and storytelling techniques which bordered on being downright tacky. Nevertheless, those same images managed to draw all sorts of emotions, ranging from anger at Canada’s failed justice system to hope watching individuals strive for change. But while Shirley Turner may have been the “devil,” she also clearly had serious psychological issues that should have been dealt with. That this was only mentioned in passing—both in this film and in the Canadian courts and mental health system—is rather unsettling. KD
Down to the Dirt
By Justin Simms; Wed, Oct 1 (6:45 pm)
As a film, Down to the Dirt is as unfocused as its protagonist, the whiny bad boy Keith Kavanagh (Joel Hynes) who leaves small town Newfoundland for St John, love interest in tow, in an attempt to escape their troubles. Outside of the initial hometown scenes, where a few intriguing plotlines get sown (and quickly set aside, without any kind of expansion or satisfying follow-up), director Justin Simms seems content to skip through the plot with a strange lack of attention to any details during its bloated, nearly two hour run time. We don’t want to see Kavanah’s redemption; we just want the movie to end. PB
Flame and Citron
by Ole Christian Madsen; Mon, Sep 29 (9:15 pm)
Although sometimes burdened by distractingly fancy-pants camerawork and edits interrupting stellar acting and mostly stately, static and gorgeously composed frames, this factually rooted story brings two Danish folk heroes and their intrigue-stuffed Second World War-era vividly to life. Flame and Citron are members of the Danish Resistance, anti-Nazi operatives who assassinate collaborators in Copenhagen. It’s late in the war, and even the “good guys” are collapsing into paranoia and confusion. As with all excellent war dramas, this one’s instructive today, dealing with the nature of terror and terrorism and the question of whether heroism exists in conflict or only in memory. Although the ending is disappointingly executed—no pun intended—there’s much rewarding in this rich cinematic experience. MCO
Heavy Load: A Film About Happiness
By Jerry Rothwell; Sun, Sep 28 (2:30 pm)
There’s something charming about Heavy Load, the punk band that’s in the spotlight for this film of the same name. Formed out of a combination of learning-disabled musicians and support workers, the film turns on the honest healing that music provides for those in the band. Director Rothwell captures many a poignant moment—like those involving the soul-searching of drummer Michael White and guitarist Mick Williams as each wrestles with his respective place in the band and the wider world—but too often the approach is too unfocused, and Rothwell’s narration, insisting that the film is an investigation into happiness, forces the film down a particular narrative path that is perhaps not the most interesting one available. The effect is that his voice-over becomes intrusive and heavy-handed, and when the lights go up there’s a sense that the real story has been barely touched upon. EM
I Served the King of England
By Jirí Menzel; Sat, Sep 27 (9:15 pm)
I can’t decide if it’s the product of another era—Menzel’s claim at greatness goes 40 years back with the lovely Closely Watched Trains—or simply that of a persistently idiosyncratic Czech sensibility. I Served the King of England, based on Bohumil Hrabal’s famed novel, exhibits this very particular sense of mischief, farce, silent era antics, gentlemanly sexism and deeply bleak satire, following its diminutive protagonist’s quest for riches and sex during the rise of the Third Reich. He’s a Nazi collaborator—but he didn’t mean it! It sounds crass, but it’s actually highly nuanced, genuinely troubling stuff, and well worth your while. JBr
Let the Right One In
Directed by Tomas Alfredson
Tue, Sep 30 (9:15 pm), Wed, Oct 1 (4 pm)
Tomas Alfredson’s Let the Right One In is shockingly brutal almost as often as it’s achingly sweet, though that dichotomy is maybe the least of the film’s tricks. Following a bullied, withdrawn boy who befriends a young vampire, Right One manages to be a fairly tender coming-of-age story, a psychologically creepy horror flick and a meditation on the necessity of violence, with a powerful grasp of both visual metaphor and visceral thrill to boot. A melange of genres that rises above all of them, few films manage to be both this rich and this enjoyable, and fewer still are realized so beautifully. DB
Man on Wire
By James Marsh; Tue, Sep 30 (6:45 pm)
There weren’t any handicams or mobiles at the ready when Philippe Petit made his legendary walk between the Twin Towers back in 1974, but fortunately his collaborators took care to film the never-to-be-repeated spectacle for posterity. Marsh’s superb documentary utilizes the archival footage as well as Errol Morris-like recreations and new interviews with all involved, including the mischievous, wildly charismatic Petit himself, who can tell a story with the same brio he brings to his thrilling feats of trespassing-as-performance. All of that leaves us all that much more breathlessly attuned to what it really means to traverse life’s high wire. JBr
Nurse.Fighter.Boy.
By Charles Officer; Tue, Sep 30 (9:30 pm)
Charles Officer’s stunningly visual portrait of three lower-class black Torontonians—a boxer, a nurse and her young son—and their unbeknownst reliance on magic is an independent treasure. With a reggae and spoken word soundtrack to burn or fuel the energy, a gritty lens perspective and characters who thrive in the night, it always has an unusual feeling of suspense, even at the most innocuous of moments. It is also one of the least Canadian Canadian films I’ve seen, which is a good thing; the story is more universal than national. As far as directorial feature-debuts go, Nurse.Fighter.Boy. is as good as it gets. OM
Pontypool
by Bruce McDonald; Thu, Sep 25 (7 pm)
Opening Night Gala
EIFF organizers did right to screen Canuck vanguard Bruce McDonald’s weird and scary Pontypool for the opening night, particularly as it delivers both gripping entertainment and socio-political oddity that an underdog festival like ours should be known for. Semi-iconic radio personality Grant Mazzy (Stephen McHattie) kicks off a cold morning on the air of a small Ontario town, only to have his throaty rants interrupted by reports of eerie events occurring as a result of the fast spread of a zombie-like virus. Eventually quarantined in the building with his calculating producer Sydney (Lisa Houle) and young assistant Laurel (Georgina Reilly), Grant tries to keep his cool despite having hardly a clue of what the hell is going on outside. It’s 28 Days Later meets CBC Radio One meets an introductory linguistics course, and should go marvelously with a cheese platter and a room full of schmoozing industry types. JBu
The Project
Directed by Ryan Piotrowicz; Sat, Sep 27 (2:30 pm)
Shot with handicams, The Project follows a trio of filmmakers who turn the cameras on themselves as much as they do the subjects of their documentary: a pair of cops (one young, one old and jaded) and a group of underprivileged kids from the projects. The faux-doc-drama reaches some believably gritty lows, and feels particularly compelling when dealing with the troubled youth. The project only falters as the on-screen filmmakers begin to deteriorate: as they start to tear into each other with cameras still rolling, the script starts to seem a little obvious and, well, a little fake. PB
Sex Positive
by Daryl Wein ; Tue, Sep 30 (9:30 pm)
Both a historical retelling of the rise of AIDS and an investigation into the contributing social factors responsible for spread of the HIV virus, documentarian Daryl Wein shares the life of Richard Berkowitz, a sex activist in part responsible for the advocacy of safe gay sex in North America. While the subject is heavy and often complicated by site-specific rhetoric (such as the addressing of promiscuity amongst gay men), Sex Positive is also informative and engaging in exploring an underground era of sexuality that was frightening in the dramatic loss of individuals to the disease but also liberating in its quick demand for respect and unity. JBu
Under the Snow
By Candela Figueira, Maitena Muruzabal
Sun, Sep 28 (2:30 pm)
Under the Snow is a sweet and simple movie with modest ambitions. It simply presents slices of routine life, and portraits of four decent, hard-working people. They’re all from different backgrounds and in different periods of their lives, and they develop an unusual friendship in a factory for winter tire-chains. But because the youngest lady, Angela (Laura De Pedro), is so lovely, we tend to get much more of her story than the rest, even though her story isn’t all that interesting. You can’t blame the filmmakers because, like this critic’s, hearts were melted upon her first appearance. OM
Wherever You Are
By Rob Margolies; Tue, Sept 30 (5 pm)
My own family has come nowhere near creating the intense battlefields that the Bernsteins have daily, but we’ve had our moments and the vein-popping, headache-inducing feelings I got when those moments happened are felt once again just by watching as the conflicts within this dysfunctional family spiral out of control onscreen. Some of the continuity is questionable, and the personal secrets that each family member unveils as they talk one-on-one with a Freudian shrink at times feel tacked on for shock effect, but one scene where father Ira (Josh Pais) gives a heart-warming speech to his kids sums it up nicely: you need all the crap to know when those nuggets of gold that life has to offer are unexpectedly thrown at you. KD
War Eagle, Arkansas
By Robert Milazzo; Sun, Sep 28 (4:45 pm)
Coming of age stories often feature outsiders, but none like the pair that make up the focus of Robert Milazzo’s War Eagle, Arkansas. Enoch Cass (Luke Grimes) is an introverted high school baseball star who can barely get out three words in a row due to his stuttering, and his best friend Wheels (Dan McCabe) is an extroverted quadriplegic. While Cass helps Wheels get around and cuts his food for him, Wheels does most of the talking for his best friend, and together they seem to form one person. When baseball scholarships and girlfriends come into the picture for Cass, he has to decide whether to escape his dreary hometown or stay and support the people he loves. Apparently based on a true story, this is an intimate and poignant look at what it means to be a community. BB
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