Toronto International Film Festival—A Thumbnail Sketch
By Larry Anklewicz
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
The party’s over and the stars have gone back home. The
Festival has ended and now it’s time to take a look back at what happened.
This wasn’t the best Festival I’ve attended. There seemed to be no
overwhelming hits and there seemed to be little agreement among festival goers
as to the best films. Personally, I didn’t see anything that really blew me
away. I saw a number of films that I liked, and I saw a few that I didn’t
like, but most of the films I watched were just OK. So let’s take a quick look
at what I did see. I wound up watching about 42 films, which is a few more
than last year. Many of these films will be in theatres within a short time.
In fact, a couple of them are already in the theatres. Here’s is a rundown of
what I saw and a very short statement of what I thought about them. I’ll try
to give a more definitive review when they arrive at the theatres.
Recent DVD Releases
Death Defying Actsis a love story involving Harry
Houdini and is set in Scotland. This is one film I really enjoyed, although it
was not a great film. Romantics will enjoy it and Catherine Zeta-Jones is
always easy on the eyes.
Surfwise is a documentary about Dorian Paskowitz, a medical doctor and surfing
enthusiast, and his wife and nine children. They spent their lives travelling
around the United States in a small camper looking for the best spots to surf.
It is absolutely fascinating.
Into The Wild
is Sean Penn’s latest directorial effort and tells the amazing
story of Christopher McCandless, who after graduating from college gives away
all his worldly possessions and hits the road to find out what life is really
all about.
Persepolis is an excellent animated film detailing Marjane Satrapis’ life as a
young Muslim woman growing up in revolutionary Iran and then being sent to a
school in Vienna in order to avoid the excesses of the revolution.
The Counterfeiters is an outstanding German/Austrian co-production about a
Jewish counterfeiter, who is shipped out to a concentration camp and is forced
to produce bogus British and American currency for the Nazis.
The Band’s Visit is a wonderful little film that explores the common elements
we have as people no matter where we come from. In this instance, a small
Egyptian band is invited to Israel to perform and gets stranded in a small
town in the desert.
Fugitive Pieces is an excellent Canadian film that explores the guilt
Holocaust survivors feel because they did not perish with their family and
friends.
Emotional Arithmetic is another Canadian film with echoes of survivor guilt
after the Holocaust and features a wonderful performance by Susan Sarandon.
The Secrets is a wonderful Israeli film that looks at discrimination against
women in the world of Orthodox Judaism.
Eastern Promises is a good thriller involving the Russian Mafia in London,
England and was directed by David Cronenberg.
When Did You Last See Your Father features excellent performances by Colin
Firth and Jim Broadbent and looks at the relationships between fathers and
sons.
Edge of Heaven travels between Turkey and Germany and tells the story of a
mother and daughter and a father and son. Each of their lives is
interconnected and each has his or her own story to tell.
Reservation Road also deals with fathers and sons. In this case, the son of
one of the fathers is killed in a hit and run car accident and the driver is
haunted by the memory of what he had done.
Across The Universe features over thirty songs by the Beatles in a rather
strange interpretation of the fab four’s music. Some parts work and some parts
don’t. The story line is kind of lame, but the featured performers have a lot
of charisma.
Breakfast With Scot is an interesting Canadian film about a gay couple who
wind up taking in a young boy until the boy’s father can return to the
country. Heartwarming comedy without the usual stereotypes.
In The Valley of Elah features Tommy Lee Jones as the father of a young
soldier who has just returned from a tour of duty in Iraq and has vanished.
Jones begins his own investigation into the unusual circumstances of his son’s
disappearance.
Captain Mike Across America is Michael Moore’s latest documentary. This one
deals with the 2004 presidential campaign in the United States and Moore’s
attempts to galvanize college students to vote for the Democratic Party.
Michael Clayton brings George Clooney back to the big screen as the fixer in a
big American law firm. Clooney is excellent in this thriller and will
certainly be nominated when awards season begins.
Rendition At one time this film may have been considered somewhat far
fetched, by after recent developments, we know that things like this can
happen. Reese Witherspoon plays the wife of an Egyptian engineer who is
suspected of having ties with a terrorist ring and is secretly detained by
U.S. officials and shipped to an Arab country for interrogation.
A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman. Dorfman was an
advisor to Chilean President Salvador Allende when the CIA organized a coup
and Dorfman wound up in exile. In this outstanding documentary, Dorfman
returns to Chile to visit the places and people who lived the Socialist dream
with him.
Dans La Vie is an interesting French film about the friendship between an old
Jewish woman and the Arab woman who comes to care for her.
Then She Found Me is Helen Hunt’s first attempt at directing a film and she
does very well with this story of a woman attempting to find love and have a
child before her biological clock runs out.
The Jane Austen Book Club is sure to find lots of fans amongst lovers of Jane
Austen’s novels and those looking for a good chick flick.
Run Fat Boy Run is a British comedy directed by American David Schwimmer,
about a man who panics and leaves his pregnant wife at the alter. A few years
later he tries to win his way back into the life of the woman he jilted.
Shake Hands With The Devil is a good drama about the genocide in Rwanda as
seen through the eyes of Canadian General Romeo Dallaire, the head of the
United Nations forces stationed in Rwanda at the time. This is a film that
will stay with you for a long time after you’ve seen it.
Caramel tells the story of several women who work in a hair salon in Beirut,
Lebanon. The setting makes this an interesting film to watch and tends to
overcome some of its shortcomings.
The Stone Angel is based on the Margaret Laurence novel and is a good
adaptation of the book. It tells the story of a strong willed woman who in her
declining days reminisces about her youth and the decisions she made as a
young woman.
The Tracey Fragments is the latest offering by Canadian director, Bruce
McDonald. The film is composed of a series of split screens and visual devices
that can be a distraction. In this case, it seems to work most of the time,
but not always. You have to see it and make up your own mind about this one.
And Along Came Tourists tells about a German young man who chooses to do
alternative civilian work rather than do compulsory military service. He is
sent to work at the Auschwitz concentration camp and is deeply affected by the
camp and the town adjoining it.
Honeydripper is set in the deep South of the 1950s and tells the story of a
club owner who is facing bankruptcy unless he can come up with a performer who
will draw a substantial crowd. The owner hires a legendary soul guitarist but
things don’t work out exactly like he plans.
Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who is an interesting description of the
rise of the rock group, The Who, and will interest the millions of their fans,
but proves to be an unexceptional documentary.
Young People Fuc-ing. The title is more titillating than the story, as we
watch four or five couples getting it on and learn about the sexual hang ups
they all have.
American Venus was one film I really disliked. It tells about an American
woman who gets her kicks from owning and handling guns.
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days received a lot of hype from the Cannes festival,
but I found it to be somewhat of a yawn. It gives us the full details about
the day in the life of a young woman who decides to have an abortion.
Closing The Ring is a love story between three men and one woman. The woman
marries one of them just before he ships out to Britain during World War II.
When her husband is killed, she marries his friend, while the third man keeps
the fires burning in his heart for her for the rest of his life.
The Man From Plains is the deification of former United States President Jimmy
Carter. This documentary follows Carter on his latest book tour and
concentrates almost entirely on Carter’s controversial opinions about the
Middle East.
Disengagement is a terrible film by festival favourite Amos Gitai. I will
never understand why festival programmers have fallen in love with Gitai. He
hasn’t made a good film in a long time.
Jellyfish is an Israeli film about a young girl who comes out of the sea and
is taken home by a woman who finds her on the beach. The woman attempts to
determine who the child belongs to. This one was a little too artsy for me.
Children of the Sun is a documentary about the decline of the Israeli kibbutz.
It has some great archival film, but I was disappointed because it is too
vague and disorganized. I would have liked to know who the narrators were and
the time period some of the film was dealing with.
Love Comes Lately is based on three short stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer.
With a pedigree like that I was probably expecting too much and I found this
film under whelming.
In Bloom tells the story of a high school girl who survived an incident
similar to Columbine. The story goes back and forth in time and it is
difficult to get a real grasp on what is actually happening.
The Babysitters is the fantasy of men going through a midlife crisis. One man
begins an affair with his children’s babysitter and then gets her to provide
his friends with other babysitters. In the end, a whole group of teenage girls
run their own little prostitution ring in order to earn money for clothes,
jewelry and college.
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