Toronto Film Festival Reviews
Karen Allison
to wonder what
Cannes must be like. Toronto is busy, with something like four hundred films
shown in a ten day
period. One must program carefully to fit one's choices into a schedule since
each film is shown
only twice. In my case, I managed to see most, but not all of my initial first
choices; some simply
could not be fitted into my calendar.
As ever, I saw eight "Galas;" those films that the Festival organizers think
will be the big films of
the year and, as well, I took a pass for 25 "day" films. This means I could
not go to anything
starting at six p.m. or later. As you will see, I didn't actually see 25 day
films as schedules and
fatigue prevented my using the entire pass. I got my money's worth, however!!
Here are my
reviews: in my opinion, there were plenty of excellent films to be seen
although the galas were
somewhat wanting in quality compared to other years' choices.
Nowhere In Africa.
The story was of interest: a young German Jew foresees problems in the late
thirties and goes to
Kenya. He gets a sort of a job (not easy in those days in that country for a
foreigner) and sends
for his wife and young daughter. Naturally there is culture shock: these are
cultivated people
moving from sophisticated Berlin to a tiny settlement in the middle of a raw
and primitive country.
The husband urges the wife to forget fancy china and clothing and concentrate
on essentials, such
as a refrigerator. She yields to temptation, however, bringing totally useless
(in the milieu) fine
china and elegant clothes. The expected conflicts arise as well as the
expected good relationship
between the young child and the native populace. The film, however, moves far
too slowly, and
takes over two hours to achieve what could have been done in an hour and a half
or less.
Beautiful scenery and charming native rituals could not save this film for me.
Russian Ark
The world famous Hermitage Museum (formerly the Winter Palace) in St.
Petersburg is the
setting for this fantasy film, amazingly shot in one single sequence.
Literally thousands of extras
and actors all in period dress from the eras of Catherine the Great, Peter the
Great and Nicholas
and Alexandra (whose family, including the mysterious Anastasia, were
murdered), are seen and
somehow this tightly orchestrated film manages to succeed with only a few
obvious small
mistakes. You'll love the art (it is, after all, a museum), the dinner place
settings and the narrator,
who trails along behind a visitor (A nineteenth century French diplomat, who
discovers that,
although not Russian, he speaks and understands the language; part of the
fantasy). Altogether a
fascinating and amusing way to spend an hour and a half.
The Good Thief
In this film with echoes of "Man With A Golden Arm," Nick Nolte plays a six
time loser, a
gambler, heroin addict in Paris who hears about a heist and has to kick his
habit in order to play.
The job will take place in Monte Carlo; there is, naturally, a girl (at 18,
much too young for Nolte
and, in my opinion, a strange choice for the female lead). Nolte certainly
looks the dissipated part
of his character. There are other intrigues but you'll have to see the film to
find out what they are.
Some interesting camera work, with speed ups instead of slow motion for segues
kept me alert
and focused on the action.
White Oleander
This excellent film tracks the life, in and out of foster homes, of the
daughter of a woman who has
murdered her unfaithful lover. Taken from an Oprah club book, the story is
strong and moving,
the characters powerful and real and the issues compelling. I would call this
a must see film.
10
This documentary style film shows an upper class Iranian woman in ten
encounters as she drives
people (her young son, a friend, an old woman she offers a lift, etc.) around
Tehran in her car.
We get a glimpse into life in Iran through the interactions of this thirty
something divorcee as she
relates to other women, her ex husband and the rather annoying preteen son.
Don't look for a North American release soon, though public broadcasting may
give it some
distribution.
Autumn Spring
This is a charming Czech film about an old man whose practical jokes (such as
pretending to be a
wealthy foreigner contemplating the purchase of a multi million dollar estate)
backfire and get him
into trouble. He has spent a lifetime making jokes that are not well tolerated
by his rather gruff
wife. He and his best friend are found out in this case and the real estate
agent demands the
return of the cost of limousine services and restaurant meals.
The money (taken from his long suffering and frugal wife's funeral account) is
stolen, leading to a
search for funds.
Suffice it to say that everything ends in a happy way. The story is funny and
sad and the film is a
keeper.
Jet Lag
This marvelous French romantic comedy takes place at Charles de Gaulle airport
in Paris where,
coincidentally as on the date of its premier, France is suffering under a
general strike affecting air
traffic as well as most other aspects of life.
Our heroine loses her cell phone (I won't say how) and borrows one from another
traveler and
this begins the story. They continue to meet one another in various adventures
around the airport
and naturally eventually end up sharing a hotel room. The ending is
predictable but the path to
the ending is priceless.
Frida
A simply fabulous film, this is a biography of Frida Kahlo, the artist who
married the Mexican
muralist Diego Rivera and was hostess (and briefly mistress) to Leon Trotsky
during his exile in
Mexico.
She is a larger than life woman and she is brought vividly to life in this
truly excellent film, which
traces her life from childhood and an accident that leaves her in pain for the
rest of her life, to her
decision to become an artist, to its realization, including her first meetings
with Rivera (who was
an established artist when she was just a youngster), their travels together,
their politics, their
lusty and fascinating lives together and apart. Artists make wonderful
subjects for film and Frida
Kahlo is no exception.
Tycoon
With a leading man very reminiscent of Humphrey Bogart, the director has
examined the past
fifteen years in Russia with an eye to commerce. Moving from barter (brooms
for automobiles in
this case) through "protection" schemes into a fully Mafia=like rubbing out of
the various
members of an automobile cartel developed by the protagonist, we see what a
frightening place
Russia has become.
Far From Heaven
Starting with the cliche of a happy home in the 50's, clean huge station wagons
and other beautiful
finned vehicles, wasp=waisted women wearing long, wide skirts, the story
revolves around a
"banker's family" of four, very well=placed in their Connecticut community.
Pillars of the
community, the parents are written up in the local newspaper; the children are
obedient, polite, a
perfect picture.
As the underpinnings of their happy lives come undone because of his sexual
proclivities and her
choice of confidant, the aspects of their "perfect" 50's life breaks down.
The film takes an interesting idea, a tough story and plays it straight against
the too=familiar
background of life in the era. If it only moved faster, if it only had more
energy, it would be a
great film. As it is, it has the makings of a cult film but perhaps not a
winning commercial one.
Respiro
This beautifully realized film tracks the eventual acceptance by a tiny fishing
community in
Sardinia of the startlingly different wife of a fisherman. The metaphor for
this notion of
embracing what is different is a woman who is clearly suffering some mental
dysfunction and who
acts quite unlike the other wives in the community who work in the fishery and
live normal family
lives. The husband deals with his jealousy and passion for the wife and
eventually, when her son
helps her run away, the entire community gathers around the family and when she
is found, they
embrace her in a touching and beautiful ending.
The actors, other than the two leads, are all amateurs and shine in their
roles, including the
children who are, simply, amazing. The cinematography is wonderful and this is
truly a gem of a
motion picture.
Spider
Ralph Fiennes gives a tour de force performance as a schizophrenic man in this
dark drama. He
has just progressed to a halfway house from an asylum and his thought process,
while still murky,
is clear enough for him to examine his early life in which he believed certain
events had certain
meanings.
Fans of director David Cronenberg may be the only audience for this difficult
and frankly
depressing work, although the word from those fans, heard around the Festival,
was that this was
not nearly a dark enough film given his preferred genre.
Rabbit Proof Fence
This Australian film, directed by Phillip Noyce is a gem. It traces the cruel
way that Australians,
in the fifties, treated the "half=breed" offspring of aboriginal women who had
children by
Caucasian workers. These children were literally kidnaped from their mothers
and taken to
schools where they were taught to be servants. This is a period, of which,
naturally, Australians
are not proud, and, indeed, are scarcely aware.
Three such girls are taken from their mothers who live in a settlement near the
eponymous fence,
which was an Australian failure of an attempt to contain the rabbit population
and keep it from the
agrarian economy it threatened to destroy. This fence stretched for many, many
miles across the
country and was the guidepost for the girls to find their mother again. When
they arrive at the
school, they are, naturally, desperately unhappy and they escape, heading along
the fence to find
home.
Chased by a tracker (just as escaped slaves in the U.S. were) and by police,
the girls must survive
in terribly difficult circumstances. The book by a daughter of one of those
girls was the
inspiration for the film, which I highly recommend.
Blind Spot: Hitler's Secretary
The subject of this documentary died within days of its release. She was one
of Hitler's young
secretaries during the War and would have you believe that, a young and naive
girl, she had no
idea until after the War what had gone on. I remain unconvinced.
There is no evidence of a questioner, just the questions and her face and her
answers. Before
long, the format of the film, the obvious comfort of this old woman talking
about these matters,
her elegant surroundings, convinced me that I did not want or need to see the
entire film. Others
told me that her story became more and more disjointed as the film wore on. It
may be of interest
as a closing chapter on some aspects of Hitler's office arrangements but to me
it was superfluous.
Chihwaseon
This is a Korean film about an artist who was also something of a rake. He is
shown carousing,
drinking, whoring, apparently as he was described in the literature. The art
is wonderful, the story
repetitive. In all, a curiosity but not a film of high art as I had hoped.
Phone Booth
It's hard to imagine that an afternoon's activity inside of a phone booth on a
street in New York
City's West Side would occupy our attention for the length of a film. However,
it happens and
this thriller is gripping from start to finish. The sleazy publicist who
answers the phone in the
booth is taken for a wild ride, threatened with death (and indeed, death is all
around him) and
pushed to make a confession of his sins by a psychotic killer on the other end
of the phone call.
An excellent performance by Forrest Whitaker as a policeman and the masterful
portrayal of the
killer by Keefer Sutherland added to the fine portrait of the publicist by
Colin Farrell add up to a
first=rate film.
The Trials of Henry Kissinger
Interestingly, Henry Kissinger's activities occupied two films this year, no
doubt in some way
related to the fact that 9/11/73 was the date of the coup in Chile, fostered by
Kissinger, that
removed the democratically elected Salvador Allende.
This documentary was inspired by a book by Christopher Hitchens which accuses
Kissinger of
war crimes including literally millions of deaths not only in Chile but also in
the manufactured war
in Cambodia. The film makers investigate these accusations and come to much
the same
conclusions as Hitchens. The film makes very interesting watching and its
release in the US
should bring some new inspection of Mr. Kissinger into the forefront.
11'09"01
Eleven different film makers from eleven different countries were each invited
to produce an
eleven minute film about the titular date. I found some to be horrific, some
very anti American,
some magical. I don't know if this will be released but if it is, for the
segments by the British film
maker (about Kissinger/Allende), by Sean Penn (a marvelous, sad piece about
mourning) and one
by an Afghani film maker living in Iran about explaining to school children
what had happened in
New York it is worth viewing.
Standing in the Shadows of Motown
This was one of my great favorites of the Festival (and the subject of a lot of
hype, so much so
that the theater was standing room only when I saw it). It is a documentary
about the Funk
Brothers, the studio band that backed Motown's artists during its Detroit era
(1959 to 1972).
They are reunited (save the few who are deceased) to talk about the band, about
the Motown
performers, about life, and to play in the style they created, backing modern
singers, performing
Motown classics. There were current interviews along with some rare vintage
footage and
photos.
The house was rocking, and I was singing right along, as were, I noticed, many
of the middle
aged audience. Loved it!! Loved it!! Loved it!!
L'Homme Du Train
This film tells a story of an aging thief (second story about such a man) who
lands in a small town
with the assignment of hitting a bank. He must first arrange this crime and
needs to spend some
weeks setting it up. He discovers that there is no hotel in the town at about
the same time as he
meets another aging gentleman who invites him to stay at his home. With no
choice, the two
become house mates for a time and eventually become friends.
The stories of the two men are dissimilar but the ending for each is the same.
I won't spoil the
story by telling it to you; the film is worth seeing.
Antwone Fisher
This is an autobiographical film; the producer and script writer are the same,
the title character.
Born to a prison inmate whom he had never met once he was removed from her arms
after birth,
he had an early life that did not improve up to his enlisting in the Navy. He
was a foster child in a
terribly abusive home and developed a rage that kept getting him in trouble
with his fellow
seamen and his superiors.
Eventually, he got into enough trouble that he was referred to a Navy
psychiatrist who suggested
very strongly that seeking his "real" family would be the best, perhaps the
only way he could
move past this fury with the world and its inhabitants.
There is nothing gentle about this story, or the film. It is compelling and
true and may be one of
the best films of the year.
Assassination Tango
Robert Duvall creates a wonderful character in this crime thriller. He is a
hit man who has found
in himself a warm place for his young adoptive daughter. He is a tough guy,
experienced in the
crime of assassination who lands in Buenos Aires and is delayed by circumstance
in executing his
prey. He finds his way to Tango parlors, to a luscious tango artist who
teaches him the dance and
who adds to the very human side he is discovering himself to have. The
portrait is masterful and
the story engrossing. I promise you will not nap during this one!!
Too Young To Die
This short Korean film explores the subject of emotional and physical love by a
couple in their
seventies. They meet, fall in love at first sight and enter into a
relationship that leads to marriage.
All aspects of this relationship are explored in the film, including several
very tender love scenes
(yes, in the nude), after each of which, the man makes a happy note on his
calendar. One day
when the woman doesn't come home as expected, he becomes concerned, afraid
something has
happened to her. He races around the marketplace asking after her and when she
does come
home, there is a fight between them.
According to a Korean film buyer I met, this film is most unlikely to be shown
in that country,
where love among the aged is denied and despised. I hope it finds an outlet in
the west, where we
have much to learn from this couple.
The Other Side Of the Bed
This is an Italian romantic comedy which was much less successful than the
French "Jet Lag."
The story seemed to me very hoked up, the humor not really hitting the marks.
The additional
feature of its being a musical, with the principals bursting into song at
various moments did not
improve matters for me. The recent release of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
convinced me that
this genre simply hasn't aged well.
Between Strangers
This is a first effort from director Eduardo Ponti, Sophia Loren's son. It
combines three stories
(think Love Boat, the stories are separate but run in short segments,
interleaved) of women
searching for freedom from their situations. One is the wife of an overbearing
and difficult man
who is confined in a wheelchair. One is the daughter of a murderer who has
just been released
from prison and one is a photographer, trying to escape her father's (he is a
renowned
photographer) attempts to advance her career. The plots advance predictably
and the end result is
a mishmosh of a film with no real direction.
The Quiet American
Phillip Noyce's second entry in the Festival, this is a contender for the best
film of the week.
Perhaps of the year; check the Academy Awards and see. The story comes from
the novel by
Graham Greene. It is set in Viet Nam in the sixties (another excellent novel,
"Up Country" by
Nelson de Mille is also set at that time and today, and this was, for me, an
opportunity to put
some pieces together from the two books), and is a murder story. The acting
was marvelous, the
story well put together and well paced and the film a winner.
I hope these capsule reviews are helpful to you and I certainly hope that you
will get to see some
of the very fine films that were presented at this year's Toronto International
Film Festival.
Copyright 2002
Karen Allison
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,___ ||__l |Vegas Or Bust!!! l
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.=( o )=====------------( o )-( o )!
lougerst1043
opcorn and drink
--
ANSalberg
>opcorn and drink
>
>--
CHEAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
lougerst1043
CHEAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
and when was the last time you paid your dues???????
--
ANSalberg
>
Who.......................me?
Karen Allison
>opcorn and drink
>
It's not the $7, it's the opcorn that's expensive. That Robert Indiana makes
very pricy paintings.
HWill4jazz
Harriet
Linda
>Great reviews, Karen.
Yes, thanks for your hard work. I intend to see Frida, White Oleander and
Antwone Fisher. (AF to be released nationwide early Dec. I'm hearing we may
have a premier here next month.)
Linda
Linda
Did you hear any buzz about "Bowling for Columbine"? Such an odd title.
I know, I know...call Parq's agent.
Linda
EMLipp
Thanx for posting them, Karen. Your reviews are very concise, perceptive, and
articulate. I don't go to the movies very often, but will keep an eye out for
some of them. I especially hope to see Frida. We attended an Elderhostel in
Mexico several years ago in which we learned quite a bit about the lives and
works of Frida and Diego.
I forwarded your reviews to my son-in-law, who is a very active film buff. His
response was that there appears to be an emphasis on international art film,
similar to the DC Filmfest. He says that many of these international art films
make a circuit to festivals around the world, timed not to overlap with one
other. And he compliments Karen on her reviews.
ANSalberg
>some of them
> His
>response was that there appears to be an emphasis on international art film,
>similar to the DC Filmfest.
Along with some other film-festivals [ Sundance etc] This seems to be the only
way the lower-budgeted films get top priority reviews. In our Newspapers [ I
read 3 every day] High budget/"star" films- even the ones that are AWFUL [ 1-*
] are front page of the Entertainment section -while the "art" films with 4-*
may be buried two or three pages in and shown in only a few theaters [ It seems
you can't get AWAY from the other kind!] Is it any wonder that "Austin Powers"
makes BooCoo bucks while the good films languish............Anne
Karen Allison
have a premier here next month.)<<
I heard that Antwone Fisher was very articulate and interesting at the opening
night. If you can get tickets to the premiere, I'd go for it.
Karen Allison
>make a circuit to festivals around the world, timed not to overlap with one
>other. And he compliments Karen on her reviews.
That's quite true. I've been hearing from people involved with other film
festivals, including one in Hawaii.
Thank him for his kind words, Ed :-)
Karen Allison
I know, I know...call Parq's agent.<<
That was one I just couldn't schedule - it conflicted with something else I
really wanted to see. I don't know if it'll play in the U.S..
I heard it was really excellent and that he gave a fabulous Q&A after the film
was shown.
Linda
>night. If you can get tickets
He's sure to be here. For others in this Group who may not know......
Antwone Fisher spent his not-very-nice childhood in Cleveland. After a stint in
the Navy he went to CA, and became a security guard on the Sony Motion Picture
lot. He became friendly with a screenwriter and began relating his life story.
The screenwriter encouraged AF to write, and helped him along the way. Tom
Hanks read the script and made it his directorial debut film, much of it filmed
here in Cleveland.
Linda
WaterDragon852
Excellent as usual, Karen.
Ains.