Impressions from TIFF: Wrap-up (part 2)

The Butcher, the Chef, and the Swordsman

Another Chinese martial arts fantasy, but was short on the martial arts. It used a nesting story-in-a-story-in-a-story structure, with each level of the story centering on each of the titular characters, and their involvement with a magical cleaver. Allow me to demonstrate by structuring my review in the same way:

The Butcher: Didn't enjoy this character because he was very cartoonish and annoying. At this point, I was not aware that there would be an embedded story, so I was quite relieved when we were introduced to...

The Chef: Probably my favorite part of the movie. It was told in the style of more traditional folklore and toned down the cartoonishness that in my opinion plagued the first part. Which brings us to...

The Swordsman: Took on an even more gritty tone, which kind of made it boring. Thankfully, it didn't last too long before we returned to...

The Chef: After having seen each of the three segments, I realized that the Chef portions struck the right balance between humor and seriousness. This storyline wrapped up nicely, but then we had to go back to...

The Butcher: Did I mention he was annoying?

2 out of 5

Janie Jones

A good example of how having the writer-director present at the screening and Q&A session can affect one's enjoyment of the movie. The movie itself was a pleasant, if clichéd, tale of a musician in a band who discovers that he has a teenage daughter who he has never met. Their relationship grows and he learns valuable lessons about life, blah blah blah. I might have liked it less if the director hadn't introduced it and mentioned that he met his daughter as a teenager, and based the movie on that. This gave it a more personal context which changed the way I viewed the film.

2.5 out of 5

There will be one more post.

Impressions from TIFF: Wrap-up (part 1)

I don't have the energy to write in-depth reviews of all the films I saw at TIFF, so I'll keep the rest short.

Black Ocean

A Belgian movie about a French naval ship and its crew. Very character-focussed and tried to depict the relationships, friendly and otherwise, between the sailors on the ship. It works up to a point, but after a while, you realize that nothing is happening in the movie except for a bunch of guys hanging out on a boat. It really went downhill for me when they tried to put in an antiwar message near the end by having one of the characters go through an arbitrary and dramatic emotional change. One positive note: the crew has a dog for a pet and he is cute.

1.5 out of 5

Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame

My friend told me that this Chinese martial arts fantasy was originally meant to be in 3D. It definitely showed up in many of the more spectacular special effects shots as they used camera angles and moves that you wouldn't normally see in conventional cinema. Beyond the visuals, however, this film didn't offer much else. The plot's central mystery started off interestingly enough in an Indiana Jones supernatural kind of way, but soon got way too convoluted for its own good. Spoiler: the real villain is the guy you least expect, which means it was actually the most obvious guy to begin with.

2 out of 5

ANPO

This documentary might have been interesting had I been able to keep up with the subtitles. Watching a documentary with subtitles is like reading a textbook, and it didn't help that I was watching my fifth consecutive subtitled film. The subject of the documentary--American military presence in Japan as visualized by various Japanese artists--still sounds fascinating to me, but honestly, guys, I was very tired. Nevertheless, there were some powerful images that have stuck with me, e.g. a photograph of an accident involving an American military truck hitting a Japanese girl. The expressions on the soldiers' faces spoke volumes.

(I don't know) out of 5

More to come...

Impressions from TIFF 2010: Confessions

Confessions kicks off with an extended monologue given by a schoolteacher whose daughter has drowned in a swimming pool. She gradually and coldly reveals that students in her class are responsible for her child’s death. The students act like typical apathetic teenagers, laughing and texting through the whole thing. As I was watching this, I wondered where the film was going to lead. Would it keep the structure of the opening sequence and have the teacher tell the story in flashback? Or would it switch to a more conventional route and show the consequences of the girl’s death? As it turns out, I could never have guessed where it was going to go.

If serialized TV series can be likened to novels, and movies are analogous to short stories, then Confessions is like poetry. It never adheres to a linear narrative, instead jumping between chapters that play like psychological profiles of the various characters in the film. At the same time, the plot reveals itself one fragments at a time, until a clear picture forms of the twisted schemes of the teacher and her students. There are no innocent characters in this film; everyone is motivated by some dark internal forces.

I admit that during the more abstract sections of Confessions, I tuned out slightly; being accustomed to more structured narratives, I found it hard to pay attention when it didn’t feel like the plot was being advanced in some way. However, I realized afterwards that those scenes would pop back into my memory, and it was because the visuals that they present would draw parallels to more significant scenes in other parts of the movie. For example, there is an image that sticks in my head of the students splashing through rain puddles in slow-motion. On its own, you might call it pointless, but later on, the schoolteacher character experiences a cathartic moment in a scene that has a similar visual palette.

Generally, I subscribe to the idea that the more you remember and contemplate a movie after watching it, the better it is. In that sense, Confessions was the best movie I saw at TIFF this year, because it was with me for days, and I’m really looking forward to seeing it again.

4.5 out of 5

N.B. I don’t automatically like a movie just because it has a Radiohead song in it. To avoid accusations of same, I hereby relegate to a footnote the brilliant use of the song “Last Flowers” in a couple of key scenes of this movie. That is all.

Impressions from TIFF 2010: Even the Rain

In Even the Rain, a Spanish film crew, lead by the director Sebastian (Gael Garcia Bernal), travels to Bolivia to shoot a movie about Christopher Columbus' discovery of the New World. Structurally, it brings to mind some of Larry David’s more self-referential moments, but in a dramatic, instead of comedic, context. (Think the fourth season of Seinfeld, where Jerry and George create a show within a show, or the seventh season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, where at one point, Larry David plays himself playing himself.) There are extended scenes of Even the Rain that essentially show the finished product of what the Columbus film would look like. It's a credit to the filmmaking that these scenes carry an emotional impact even though that we know that, as a movie within a movie, it’s two levels removed from reality and requires double suspension of disbelief.

Of course, if the movie relied on an interesting structure alone, it would devolve into gimmick. Thankfully, Even the Rain effectively uses the layered structure to reflect the different attitudes of the characters and the ethical issues of the situation they find themselves in. It's clear that Sebastian's goal for his Columbus film is to denounce the mistreatment and exploitation of the Native Americans while lionizing the Spanish priests who defended the Natives' rights. At the same time, the film crew hires local Bolivians of Native descent as extras, and brag to their producers about having cheap labour. In other words, the themes of the film they're making reflect and contrast against the themes of the film that we, the audience, are watching.

In particular, the character of the actor who plays Christopher Columbus in the inner film is very complex and multidimensional. As Columbus, he is completely inconsiderate towards the Natives, which is what the role requires. In his interactions with the other actors who play the heroic priests, he is callously skeptical of their idealism and doubts if they truly believe the same things that their characters believe. However, as the conflict with the Natives escalates, he shows yet another side to himself that was previously unexpected.

All in all, Even the Rain was entertaining and thought-provoking. It becomes a bit generic towards the climax, but I enjoyed the first act so much that it earns its melodramatic ending.

4 out of 5

Impressions from TIFF 2010: The Hunter

The promotional materials for The Hunter emphasize the events that occur in the latter half of the film. Without going into spoilers, I can say that this is a reasonable decision from the marketers because the second half does sound pretty exciting. However, I think to focus on the thriller-esque plot points is slightly misleading and sets up some undue expectations. After reading the official synopsis, and especially after the hard guitar rock accompaniment of the opening credit sequence, I was ready for an energetic crime film, and that’s not what The Hunter delivers.

I know it’s unfair to judge a movie by its promotional materials, and I don’t intend to do so. In fact, after I had settled into the slower-than-expected pacing, I found a lot to like about the film. The cinematography stands out the most; there were many well-composed shots that you could take a still frame and hang on a wall. The camera effectively captures both the grays of the urban environment of Tehran and the greens of the forest that is the setting for the latter parts of the film.

The director and writer, Rafi Pitts, also stars in the lead role. His performance, on the surface, is very stoic; you might even say stone-faced or boring. But I think he does a good job of conveying a quiet rage and sadness beneath the surface, especially in the scene where he is first notified of his wife’s death. He plays it as if he’s almost about to break down in an emotional outburst, and sustains it throughout the lengthy scene.

The main flaw I found with The Hunter was with the plotting in the second half. For long stretches, we lose sight of the main character and the story shifts to the police officers who are pursuing him. Many political themes are brought up at this point, but I didn’t think the moralizing fit in with the mood of the first half so I found it more distracting than thought-provoking. In the end, style won over substance, but in a good way.

3 out of 5

Impressions from TIFF 2010

Coming soon...