Of the 14 films I saw in the 2012 Windsor International Film Festival, 12 of them qualify as Canadian. How Canadian some of these films are is a discussion in the next week or two. For right now, here are reviews of the Canadian films in the festival. Tomorrow, we'll discuss the odds of those films somehow getting to people south of the border.
Laurence Anyways has Xavier Dolan stepping up his game in this release about a man who decides to identify as a woman. Even if the plot throws you off, Dolan makes a film about love no matter what, gender identity, acceptance, open and closed societies.
Suzanne Clement plays one of the strongest female characters you've seen on the screen in ages. Fredrique goes by Fred, and you can read something into that as well. Nathalie Baye excels as Laurence's mother. While the ladies add a French touch to the French-Canadian film (the film was a Canada-France production), the setting is pure Quebec.
Dolan is a Montréal-based filmmaker and showcases the city well in his previous films. Laurence Anyways shows off Montreal as well as Three Rivers and the Isle of Black.
The film runs a bit long and the time travel can be a little much. But you will find two characters who you root for to be together in a way that typical American romantic movies can't muster.
Stories We Tell is a documentary from Sarah Polley, but she turns the cameras on others to tell her story about discovering her real biological father. The true subject of the film, besides Sarah, is her mother, who died when Sarah was 11. The fact that Polley looks so much like her is a bit haunting. Even though Sarah is the subject, she hides behind others' stories about what happened. As the layers get peeled off the onion of this family, you discover that the pain from this family can be any family's pain.
Watching real people in a documentary is intense in itself, but they are telling their stories to the person who is most affected by this story. If you like Sarah Polley or documentaries, you will definitely enjoy this film. But there is more to learn even if neither of them are your cup of tea.
The two men in the picture, the long-time husband and the man who had the affair with Sarah's mother, Diane, react in ways you might not expect. Their take is a plot on its own. But that is what you learn from this film: in families, there are multiple stories about the same story.
We see lots of Super 8 footage of Diane, and recreations shot through Super 8, which dispel the cinema verite documentary concept. This can be unsettling, but Sarah needs the visuals to help illustrate the overall story.
The missing voice is Diane, who, except for talking/singing her way through Ain't Misbehavin', we can only see but never hear. Her story is the best story that we only learn about through other people's stories.
Still was the closing night film. If you are looking for recognizable stars, James Cromwell, Genevieve Bujold, and Campbell Scott are big names; Cromwell is American. The story is based on a true story about a couple in New Brunswick who have struggles with building permits and codes in building a home for his ailing wife. The film was shot in both New Brunswick and northern Ontario, in part because some of the money came from Ontario.
Michael McGowan, who directed One Week and Saint Ralph (both featuring Scott), is also Canadian. McGowan wrote and directed the movie. The film follows the story straight through, the acting stays true, and the landscape is gorgeous.
Rebelle is Canada's foreign language Oscar entry. Kim Nguyen is the film's director, the major Canadian connection to this film. Like Water and Incendies (mostly), the film has no Canadian content onscreen otherwise. The film tells a very hard story about a female child soldier in Africa. The young woman in the lead came from the streets of Africa and does a wonderful job, The film has triumph and a lot of tragedy. Speculation is that the film will make the cut for the Top 5 for the Oscars.
Please Kill Mr. Know It All is a really long title. On paper, this film could be mistaken for a slight twist on a hokey romantic comedy. The script makes all the difference. Sally is a young, but nerdish woman is a hit with a Mr. Know It All column. Sally's editor, who doesn't act like much of an editor, leads her on this path of finding a guy to be the visual of Mr. Know It All (somehow this has to be a guy). Sally sees Albert in a theater and draws his picture, making him inevitably famous.
The problem for Albert is that he is a hitman and can't do his job if people know who he is. Worse yet, he gets a contract to kill Mr. Know It All. Of course, Albert falls in love with Sally and hilarity ensues.
The film exudes a Canadian, Ontario, and Toronto spirit of people working together, often for little money, because they really like a script. You'll recognize Colin Mochrie at the beginning of the film, otherwise most of the cast are not known outside the Great White North.
The title and basic plot might throw you off, but this is a romantic comedy with a smart script that doesn't insult your intelligence. Even if you don't like romantic comedies, you can like this movie — and score brownie points with someone who does like this genre.
Picture Day was a first-time film from Kate Miles Melville, a long-time Canadian TV writer. Tatiana Maslany is Clare, in "Grade 13" and still needing to complete a few courses before graduating. Her nickname is Twist-Off; she's a woman for whom sex comes easy, but intimacy is harder. She gravitates between a much older man in a rock and roll band and the kid she used to babysit. Maslany has strength and incredible vulnerability, a well-drawn character. This film has that Canadian, Ontario, Toronto sensibility is a similar fashion to Please Kill Mr. Know It All. A smart script and very likable characters.
Nuit #1 offers two movies for the price of one. This French-Canadian production offers up a man and woman who meet at a rave and they go back to his place for sex. And they have sex. This is the first movie, about 20 minutes long. As Clare tries to leave, and Nikolai wants her to stay, we enter the second movie. In this movie, Clare and Nikolai trade soliloquies about loneliness and what they want from sex and life.
Intimacy is what gets lost. Both people seem to be looking for it, but the idea is ignored in the dialogue, non-verbal behavior of the actors, and overall general theme to the movie. The French sensibility of the long soliloquies reminds you a bit like My Dinner with Andre, except that was supposed to be a conversation between two people. Clare and Nikolai talk but not to each other.
The sex isn't as hot as they want you to think it is. Clare puts herself up as a free spirit who just had sex with two women and a man yet hides herself with Nikolai around after they've had sex.
Inescapable spends little time in Canada as the protagonist has to chase down his daughter in Syria. Not Without My Daughter is the phrase you want to shout as the film progresses; yes, the same title on a TV movie with Sally Field. The film is pretty two-dimensional except for a twist involving a Canadian diplomat (Joshua Jackson, a Canadian). We get occasional cracks and references to Canada throughout the film. At one point, someone asks where the passport is from. "Canadian." "American, Canadian, same difference."
Riot was a local film, a debut film, that was professionally done, using Windsor to its fullest potential. The actors and characters were good, especially for the kind of budget involved. The major problem was that the film has a plot that didn't even follow its flimsy premise and a script that needed a team of surgeons. The main plot twist, which should have been the actual plot of the film, was in a scene buried under an avalanche of music. The director said that was not on purpose. Good.
Blackbird was a film that offered a potentially intriguing subplot about kids and bullying and revenge. Unfortunately, Brandon is trapped in a film with a laughably false premise and is railroaded in directions that defy logic and is forced into an artificial box. The movie spends a bunch of time where Brandon gets harassed and assaulted in juvenile jail. The jail scenes were too much in a movie that was going nowhere. In the States, MSNBC shows episodes of Lockup instead of news coverage. That may be "reality" television, but it doesn't pass for entertainment.
Full disclosure: I walked out on this film. Jail scene after jail scene with no purpose was more about exhibition of violence than actual plot points. From what I understand, Brandon eventually gets out of jail and has to live in a world where he is seen as a psychopath. Maybe that part of the film was better, but you have to sit through a disturbing pointless ride along the way.
While the film was definitely Canadian, the plot and script felt more like unrealistic American (yes, that is an insult).
Camion was a film I had hoped to review. Unfortunately, the version at the festival did not have English subtitles. I hope to find a way to review the film. If I am successful, I'll have a full review.
Full disclosure: While I paid for the opening night film and party, I was given a press pass for the duration of the festival. Then again, I paid my way for the previous 5 years.
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