TIFF12 - The Anticipation Has Begun

The full lineup and schedule of this year's Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will be available on Tuesday, but many of the tiles have already been announced and they've already made it literally impossible to see everything I want to see. This includes many of my most anticipated films of 2012: Rian Johnson's Looper (which scored the Opening Night slot - a bit counter to their normal opening programming, but sounds like a great way to kick things off to me), P.T. Anderson's The Master, Terence Malick's To The Wonder, the Tom Tykwer/Wachowskis project Cloud Atlas (though that lengthy trailer has subdued my enthusiasm a bit) and David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook. Because of this deluge of titles, though, I don't expect I'll catch a single one of that list.

Don't get me wrong, I'm dying to see them (particularly those first three), but I've found that what makes the festival so much fun for me is finding the smaller, less likely to be distributed films from directors I like. That's not to say that I'm only looking for the rare nuggets - a lot of what I see gets a release (at least on DVD) at some point, but getting a chance to see it on the big screen with a film festival crowd that (typically) is looking for something a little different can make for an extraordinary week of discovery and even adventure. That's what has been my own preference, though, so I can't state its the only way to see a festival - I have several friends who prefer to catch big releases during the 11 day span simply because they want to make their festival as solid a filmgoing experience as they can. I can't argue with that.

And it's damn tempting (particularly with the recent over the moon praise for The Master in 70 mm), but since most of those films I've already rhymed off will hit local theatres soon after the festival ends (very soon in the case of Looper), I'll cool my heels a bit while I dig into the rest of the schedule. Probably.

Looking at the list of already announced titles, it's already packed with a plethora of big and small releases from across the planet. It would've been easy enough to fill an entire festival's schedule simply with the very first titles announced several weeks back (filled with some big names and a good chunk of world premieres), but I usually get a higher "hit ratio" with films from Scandinavia, Japan, the documentary lineup (which seems to get better every year) and the madness that is Midnight Madness.

The full schedule gets released on Tuesday Aug. 21st, but here's a quick shortlist of my 30 most anticipated titles from the currently announced films:

90 Minutes (Eva Sørhaug) - I seemed to be one of the few supporters of Sørhaug's previous feature Cold Lunch which, while certainly not a happy fun time at the cinema, offered surprises and an austere but strangely lovely look and feel. Her latest is apparently "bold and uncompromising" and appears to focus on domestic violence - likely to be a difficult watch, but just as likely to approach the subject from a new angle.

A Liar's Autobiography -- The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman (Ben Timlett, Bill Jones, Jeff Simpson) - I suppose this won't be hard to find on DVD once it gets released, but since Monty Python are one of the major touchstones along the path towards my sense of humour AND this mostly fictional account of Chapman's life (he was both ridiculously funny and terribly tragic) is in 3D animation, how can I pass this up?

The ABCs Of Death (26 different directors) - It's true, I'm a total sucker for anthology films. Sure there are clunkers (New York, I Love You was painful at times), but I love the variety on display. This is even more true when you get very short run times like 3-5 minutes per film (if you don't like something, it's not like you have to wait long). The Midnight Madness showing of the 26 shorts in The ABCs Of Death could prove to be a blast with a list of directors who will play in the restricted parameters of a short film (each with a horror theme based on a different letter of the alphabet) and a crowd who love to play along with what's on screen.

Berberian Sound Studio (Peter Strickland) - The great Toby Jones plays a reserved sound engineer who begins to crack up as he gets deeper involved in the production of an Italian horror film. It's just simply a fantastic premise.

Blondie (Jesper Ganslandt) - Ganslandt is another director I've only encountered at TIFF (a few years ago with The Ape), but who still left a mark. The premise of three at-odds sisters getting together to celebrate their mother's birthday doesn't sound overly intriguing, but I have to expect there's a whole lot more under that exterior.

Dreams For Sale (Nishikawa Miwa) - A couple decide to get through tough financial times by scamming lonely single women. I've occasionally thought that I should just default to always putting every Japanese entry onto my list considering my past successes.

The End Of Time (Peter Mettler) - The film promises to "explore (and explode) our conceptions of time". Count me curious.

First Comes Love (Nina Davenport) - I really adored Davenport's Parallel Lines, a documentary that traces her trip back to NY for the first time right after 9/11 and the cast of people she meets along the way. She garnered more attention for her next doc Operation Filmmaker (deservedly so) and returns with a look at her own attempt to have baby as a single mother over 40. She typically puts herself at the centre of her films, but I'm perfectly fine with that as I can't help but genuinely like her.

Foxfire (Laurent Cantet) - Cantet's latest promises more of that uncomfortable dynamic between generations that filled The Class as he relates the tale of a 1950s girl gang (from the novel by Joyce Carol Oates)

Ghost Graduation (Javier Ruiz Caldera) - I'm a bit concerned that the comedy in this Spanish mash-up of The Breakfast Club and Ghostbusters might be too broad, but on the other hand it's a Spanish mash-up of The Breakfast Club and Ghostbusters.

The Impossible (JA Bayona) - I was one of the few that didn't go completely ga-ga over Bayona's The Orphanage. I liked it a good deal and it was definitely right in my wheelhouse, but I felt it never quite deserved the jump scares it threw out and quite disliked the ending. However, there's obviously some talent there so I'm curious as to how he handles a story of a couple searching for their children in the aftermath of the massive tsunami of 2004.

Key Of Life (Kenji Uchida) - The plot is irresistible: a failed actor switches identities with a man he meets at a bath house only to realize that the man was an assassin.

The Land Of Hope (Sion Sono) - Sono is currently one of the most interesting and daring filmmakers on the planet, so I'll watch anything he makes. He returns to the aftermath of Japan's devastating earthquake with a another story of survival. Though it is apparently a step in a different direction for him, I'm onboard all the way.

Lunarcy! (Simon Ennis) - It's really the perfect title for a doc about people's obsession with the moon isn't it?

Miss Lovely (Ashim Ahluwalia) - "A delightfully lurid ride through the lower depths of the Bombay film industry, Miss Lovely follows two brothers who hit it big producing sex-horror films in the mid-1980s.". Yes please.

Motorway (Soi Cheang) - Cheang's Accident sounded brilliant as it focused on a team of assassins who made their killings look like, well, accidents. But it wasn't - apart from botching the excitement of most of the over-convoluted impossible-to-suspend-belief accidents, the film didn't handle its melodramatic character moments in any interesting fashion (somewhat like most of Johnnie To's - a producer here - films). And yet, I'm still drawn to the promise of non-stop car chases and action in his latest (rookie cop learns the tricks of the high-speed pursuit trade from a veteran as he prepares to go after a skilled getaway driver).

Mumbai's King (Manjeet Singh) - I daresay that this neo-realist style view of one young boy's life in Mumbai's slums is a different take on the city than Miss Lovely, but since this year's City To City program focuses on Mumbai, it's highly appropriate we see numerous viewpoints.

No (Pablo Larrain) - I was amongst those that were wowed by Larrain's Tony Manero, so I'm going on his name alone. Casting Gael Garcia Bernal doesn't hurt either.

Painless (Juan Carlos Medina) - The horror genre certainly seems to be an attractive place to start your feature filmmaking career in Spain and here's another example of a first time helmer dives headlong into the genre. The plotline of secret experiments conducted during the Spanish Civil War that come to the fore in the modern day sounds well-worn by now, but you can't deny that it'll bring some creepiness to a packed theatre - and that's always a treat.

Penance (Kiyoshi Kurosawa) - A new Kiyoshi Kurosawa film. Let the world rejoice.

Post Tenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas) - I'm terribly conflicted here...I absolutely head-over-heels loved every frame of Silent Light, but the reviews from Cannes indicated a very different and possibly self-indulgent work this time. Why must I wrestle with these decisions?

Room 237 (Rodney Ascher) - I have no interest in personally deconstructing Stanley Kubrick's The Shining, but apparently there are legions of obsessive fans who have found hidden meanings throughout the film. However, I do have interest in Ascher's documentary that focuses on these people.

The Secret Disco Revolution (Jamie Kastner) - As I've grown and matured over the years, I've come to realize that any genre - be it film, music, literature, etc. - is not completely bad in and of itself. Even the dreaded Disco genre that I couldn't stand while growing up has revealed itself to me in later years to be filled with some great songs. Kastner's doc promises to cover not only the musical part of the movement, but the changes it brought to society as well.

Seven Psychopaths (Martin McDonagh) - OK, I know this is coming out soon after TIFF as well, but I don't think I can resist seeing this at Midnight Madness, lapping it up with the crowd and likely seeing many of the cast/filmmakers on stage.

Storm Surfers 3D (Christopher Nelius, Justin McMillan) - I'm picturing those incredible big wave surfing shots at the end of Stacy Peralta's Riding Giants splashing out of the screen in 3D and drenching me with awe...

The Suicide Shop (Patrice Leconte) - I'm not sure if an animated musical about a family concerned about passing along their business (of ending people's lives) to their cheerful, live-loving son is the place to start with Leconte's films, but it hardly matters. The screencaps look great.

Tai Chi 0 (Stephen Fung) - A "slick, stylish pop-art take" on the life of the founder of a school of Tai Chi. It's the only trailer I've watched from this list so far and it looks like it could be gobs of fun. I'm considering taking The Boy to see it if it doesn't seem overly gory.

Thermae Romae (Hideki Takeuchi) - Yet another Japanese comedy - this time time-travelling an ancient Roman architect to a Tokyo bath house in present day. Ripe with possibility.

The Thieves (Choi Dong-hoon) - One can only hope that this Korean action picture set in Hong Kong will combine the best of both worlds of filmmaking. If it does, look out.

The We And The I (Michel Gondry) - I'm not sure if Gondry is the first director I would have thought to helm this single day look at teenagers from the Bronx on their last day of school, but he continues to surprise me with his choices.



I'd be ecstatic just with that lineup, but new titles still to come and scheduling challenges will certainly mix things up. Who knows, maybe I'll still find some time for Joseph Gordon-Levitt...

Sunrises & Sunsets #7

Obsession (1976 - Brian De Palma)

Blind Spot #7 - "Our Hospitality" and "The Family Jewels"

If you're wondering what Jerry Lewis' decidedly non-classic The Family Jewels is doing on my Blind Spot list this month, well, you can easily be forgiven. I blame the NetFlix gods for unceremoniously turfing The Nutty Professor from the ranks of their streaming library, so I took a flier with his 1965 effort that (just like The Nutty Professor) was also written and directed by him (and additionally produced in this case). The intent was to watch and compare two of the top comedies from a pair of brilliant physical comedians who also worked behind the camera. One of them (Buster Keaton) is a personal favourite while the other (Jerry Lewis) is someone whose filmography has barely been scratched by me. Keaton, of course, is the great Stone Face: a gifted and slightly bonkers physical comedian who did insanely dangerous stunts, but whose characters on screen rarely showed any emotion. Lewis, on the other hand, drew strongly on his elastic facial expressions to double down on the physical gags of his films. My preference has always been with Keaton (knowing Lewis just from clips off TV, etc.), but a viewing of one of Lewis' earliest films The Bellboy made me reconsider digging into his film career.

Therefore The Nutty Professor was the obvious next step for investigating Lewis - it's typically his highest rated film (among those he directed and starred in), is rife with potential for slapstick and is essentially part of general pop culture at this point. The Bellboy was an excuse to squeeze numerous skits and ideas together into a non-plot film, but it succeeded in impressing me along several lines. Lewis showed he could actually be subtle and very inventive while being a complete goofball. The Nutty Professor will have to wait, but I had some high hopes going into The Family Jewels that I'd get at least more of the same and build further anticipation to his other films. How did that pan out? Well, let's review my first sentence of this post again...Barring several moments of reasonably inspired absurdity and several deftly timed bits by Lewis, the film flops and flounders as it haphazardly wanders through its plot mechanism: a 9-year-old heiress (first time actress - and boy does it show - Donna Butterworth) gets to spend 2 weeks with each of her five different uncles to see who she prefers to be her guardian. The family chauffeur Willard (also played by Lewis) is her best friend and escorts her to each new candidate. He also happened to accidentally stop an armoured car holdup at the start of the movie which is not forgotten by the gangsters he thwarted.

Keaton's 1923 film also deals with the concept of family and what it really means (he even sneaks his own father Joe Keaton into the film as a train engineer), but it begins in a more overtly melodramatic fashion. It opens with title cards informing us of a generations long feud between the McKay and Canfield families that has little purpose anymore - the adult males just know that they want to kill the other family's adult males. And so, on a dark and stormy night, a visiting Canfield decides to do what he feels is his duty and remove the local McKay from the face of the earth. He succeeds, but also manages to get himself bumped off too. The elder McKay's widow decides to take their 1 year-old son and move to New York city to get away from the feud and promises never to tell the boy about any of it. After this opening (which, though not funny, is very well constructed with little need for intertitles), we cut 20 years into the future and meet 21-year-old Willie McKay. The moment Buster Keaton's face comes on screen, the film shifts easily into its comedic space. Almost as easily as Keaton effortlessly and economically creates humour with subtle movements and body positioning (he sometimes seems quite frozen in mid movement). Of course, there are also the stunts that build to bigger and bigger payoffs as the movie goes on, but some of my favourite moments are the small things he does. Just the way he tosses a piece of luggage on top of a carriage is something to behold. And, possibly my favourite part of the film, a 10 second throwaway of him not knowing what to do with his hands when he realizes a set of people are watching him. His timing, movements and variety of ideas are all simply magnificent.

Lewis also leaves no doubt what kind of film you are watching the second he comes on screen, though his comedic intent is far more in your face. That's not necessarily bad, of course, just that his rubbery mugging for the camera is a different approach. Some of it works here, but a lot of it feels forced and continues past any possible initial point of humour. One reason is that he simply has no one to play off - the young Butterworth has zero skills in this area - and so some of his bits aren't overly welcome shortly after they've begun. This particularly applies to several of the uncle characters like Captain Eddie and the gangster Bugs Peyton who are all schtick and very little else. As soon as Lewis is finished with the permutations of the "crazy" characters, he's ready to move on to a new scene. Though there is the overall plot that holds the movie together, it still feels like a set of sketches - even more so than The Bellboy. Through the strained moments, though, there's still several good bits - Lewis can occasionally get more of a laugh by reining in his need for the BIG reactions such as when an entire row of books spills to the floor due to his touching a single one of them or during a full 2-minute long single take shot of him trying to get two people properly lit and positioned in a camera frame (in this case he actually has someone to play off). This inconsistency leads to the film feeling half-baked and cobbled together which is certainly not something you could say about Our Hospitality. Things kick into gear when Willie takes a steam train home after getting a notice that he can now claim his family's property (the film is set in the mid-1800s). Keaton seems to get inspired by train gags and he packs numerous ones in early on. Fortunately he follows these up with a variety of other environments and set pieces. He meets a girl on the train and she just happens to be a Canfield, so when she brings him home for dinner the rest of the menfolk in her family are none too pleased. This leads to a variety of missed opportunities for Willie to die via gunshot and slides right into some hair raising chase sequences on cliffs and rapids. The film's most famous bit is Willie's rope swing timed perfectly to save the girl as she plummets over a waterfall. Sure that's a dummy going over the edge of the water, but that's still Keaton tied to the rope and flying headlong into the gushing water. It's not just impressive, but the absurdity of Willie being able to pull this off adds laughs to the excitement.

And there lies the big difference in these two films - Keaton give us a full story with subtle humour that ramps its way up to bigger more absurd laughs through character and action. Lewis sticks pretty tight to one main style and keeps pushing it without any fine tuning and regardless of situation. There's still plenty for me to explore in Jerry Lewis' "oeuvre" and I certainly plan to do so - both The Family Jewels and The Bellboy provide enough elements to show the creative comedic mind behind Lewis' goofiness. However, Keaton remains one of my movie heroes and Our Hospitality is yet another of his perfectly formed comedic creations. I'll track down The Nutty Professor at some point, but it's probably best I didn't see it as a comparison point to Keaton. That's just not a fair fight.

Sunrises & Sunsets #6

The World Of Apu (1959 - Satyajit Ray)

Scribblings Of A Random Nature #24

The Black Dahlia (2006 - Brian De Palma) - Many times better than my previous De Palma film - the stylish but highly disappointing and awkward "Femme Fatale", but still just a shade underwhelming. I can't help but feel De Palma is somewhat tone deaf when it comes to his actors' line readings, though I grant that he's obviously much more interested in the visuals. I can't help but feel that many of his films could absolutely benefit from more natural or even consistent approaches to how the characters come across when they speak. There's a school of thought that says he intentionally has stilted dialog and acting, but it makes it no less frustrating at times. Still, a pretty strong film overall.

Carlito's Way (1993 - Brian De Palma) - Even more interesting and entertaining than Dahlia, "Carlito's Way" has more of that consistency I was looking for from De Palma. For example, Sean Penn is playing a scumbag, drug-fueled lawyer at a high pitch, but he does it at that same level throughout the whole film. Pacino manages to avoid his completely over the top performances of the last few decades and reins himself in just enough so that he's believable as a former gangster trying to go straight but finding no easy way to do it. And yet, the film overall still manages to feel somewhat undercooked - every scene feels like it's been edited into the picture a bit too soon, like the director has just called "Action!" a mere split second before we join it.

My Summer Of Love (2004 - Pawel Pawlikowski) - Two young ladies meet in a small village and begin an intense friendship/affair over one languorous summer. As their relationship blossoms, the brother of one of them embraces his born-again philosophy and converts his pub into a place of worship. The two leads are excellent (Emily Blunt in one of her very first film roles), there's some strong tension that builds up within the triangle of the brother and two girls, and Pawlikowski manages to capture what feels to be some very spontaneous moments, but it never fully brought across the characters nor a purpose for the story. It's probably more a factor of what felt like a let down of a final third after so much possibility had been brought to the screen in the early going. By its end, it simply didn't feel like it had achieved anything except for some really fantastic camera shots - in other words, it felt like an exercise in filmmaking instead of an actual story that needed to be told.

Sound Of Noise (2010 - Ola Simonsson, Johannes Stjärne Nilsson) - I guess you could say this is another case of potential squandered, though in this case the let down is slower and much more prolonged. A group of musical "terrorists" perform their compositions on a variety of different pieces of their city - a hospital operating room, a bank, a city square and a set of transmission lines - while a policeman who just wants quiet starts to track them. There's certainly some moments of invention in the "musical" numbers (which are really percussion pieces since the group are all drummers), but each successive one seems to be less impressive and the group's purpose becomes less and less engaging, relevant and meaningful as the film goes along. It's well made, well acted and well paced for sure, but feels like it stalls after the first full group performance. I couldn't help feeling that the filmmakers either lost their way or never really knew where to go with their team of anarchists and their tone-deaf pursuer. Still, there are certainly moments of cleverness (like the animated walkthrough of the "score" of the four percussion pieces from which all the screencaps come). Check out their short (same cast) Music for an apartment and six drummers that apparently led to the film.

Sunrises & Sunsets #5

Summer Interlude (1951 - Ingmar Bergman)