TIFF ’05: Dear Wendy

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Crime, Denmark, Drama, Esoterica, Film Festivals, France, Germany, Romance, TIFF, UK
*½/****starring Jamie Bell, Bill Pullman, Michael Angarano, Danso Gordonscreenplay by Lars von Trierdirected by Thomas Vinterberg by Bill Chambers It's a classic catch-22: Dear Wendy reveals that Jamie Bell was born to play Billy the Kid, but it probably also squanders his chances of doing so. As Dick, the orphaned son of a miner, Bell dons Michael J. Fox's effeminate cowboy duds from Back to the Future Part III and transforms the town's social lepers into a gang of gun fetishists known collectively as the Dandies; director Thomas Vinterberg and screenwriter Lars von Trier give us the gay burlesque version…

TIFF ’05: Heading South

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Belgium, Canada, Drama, Film Festivals, France, TIFF
Vers le sud***½/****starring Charlotte Rampling, Karen Young, Louise Portal, Ménothy Cesarscreenplay by Laurent Cantet & Robin Campillo, based on short stories by Dany Laferrièredirected by Laurent Cantet by Bill Chambers Heading South (Vers le sud) represents such a departure from the milieu of Laurent Cantet's previous film (2001's brilliant psychological thriller Time Out (L'Emploi du temps)) that you can't really say it rounds out a trilogy he started with Human Resources. Nevertheless, it resumes his fascination with people in transience, people who've erected complex façades to avoid the repercussions of personal or professional failure; Cantet's pictures are screwball comedies played…

TIFF ’05: Wassup Rockers

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, Teen, TIFF
**½/****starring Jonathan Velasquez, Francisco Pedrasa, Milton Velasquez, Usvaldo Panamenowritten and directed by Larry Clark by Bill Chambers These days, when I think of Larry Clark, I think of Stephen Wiltshire, the outsider artist profiled in Oliver Sacks's An Anthropologist on Mars. Diagnosed with autism early in life, Wiltshire soon after began doing immaculately detailed sketches of animals before moving on to buses and eventually cityscapes. So advanced was Wiltshire's technique at such an early age that Sacks and co. were fascinated to learn that his talent came pre-evolved: as a child, he drew like a grown-up, but he drew like…

TIFF ’05: All the Invisible Children

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Directors: John Woo, Directors: Ridley Scott, Directors: Spike Lee, Drama, Film Festivals, France, Italy, TIFF

Fest2005children**½/****
directed by Mehdi Charef, Emir Kusturica, Spike Lee, Jordan Scott and Ridley Scott, Kátia Lund, Stefano Veruso, John Woo

by Bill Chambers Named after an initiative of the Italian Development Cooperation's Ministry of Foreign Affairs that supports Unicef and other global charities, this omnibus project assembles seven short subjects about children from a handful of world-class directors, all of whom were instructed to locate their contributions in their home and native land. Poverty seems to be the unifying theme until Jordan and Ridley Scott's vaguely autobiographical segment, which sticks out like a sore thumb but subversively suggests that if All the Invisible Children proper has any lessons to impart, they revolve around the auteur theory. Having never seen a film by Mehdi Charef or Stefano Veneruso, I don't know how closely their episodes hew to their previous work, but I can tell you that Emir Kusturica, Spike Lee, the Scotts, Kátia Lund, and John Woo tread familiar ground in a borderline egotistical fashion.

TIFF ’05: The Myth

Posted in2000s, Action, Adventure, Authors: Bill Chambers, China, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Film Festivals, Hong Kong, Jackie Chan, Martial Arts, TIFF
½*/****starring Jackie Chan, Tony Leung Ka-fai, Kim Hee-seon, Mallika Sherawatscreenplay by Stanley Tong, Wang Hui-ling, Li Hai-shudirected by Stanley Tong by Bill Chambers The Myth, or: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Turdbath. Sabotaging a potential comeback by trying to catch a wave (not unlike the myriad has-beens in the music industry who jumped on the disco bandwagon), Jackie Chan dips a toe in the unfriendly, nay, hostile waters of the wu xia genre recently revitalized by the likes of Ang Lee and Zhang Yimou. Although The Myth is cruddy-looking (HD's fine for George Lucas excretions and Robert Rodriguez fantasias, but it has…

TIFF ’05: Romance & Cigarettes

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, Musical, Romance, TIFF
*½/****starring James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslet, Steve Buscemiwritten and directed by John Turturro by Bill Chambers Dennis Potter was a genre unto himself, and when he died, he took his recipe for what Heinz Antor called "humanist postmodernism" with him. It's painful to watch writer-director John Turturro, one of the great character actors of our time, invoke the writer in Romance & Cigarettes, as he reduces Potter's notion of pop music as existential catharsis to exactly what it wasn't: a gimmick--an alibi for air band. In the spellbinding film version of Potter's Pennies from Heaven, Christopher Walken comically menaces…

More Two-Second TIFF Reviews

Posted inAuthors: Bill Chambers, Blog, Film Festivals, TIFF
Wassup Rockers (d. Larry Clark) Somehow the most humanistic film of Clark's career is also his most nihilistic. Nice to see him acknowledge the "Other," but they're still skater punks. *** (out of four) Romance & Cigarettes (d. John Turturro) A fugue. In the words of David Lynch, "Fugues make me crazy!" Actually eager to rant about this one. *½ (out of four) All the Invisible Children (ds. Various) As with any omnibus film, hit-or-miss. I think I liked Kátia Lund's segment best, but John Woo does his best work since heading West. Your mileage will vary. **½ (out of four)

TIFF ’05: Mary

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Drama, Esoterica, Thriller, TIFF
**/****starring Juliette Binoche, Forest Whitaker, Matthew Modine, Marion Cotillardscreenplay by Simone Lageoles, Abel Ferrara, Mario Isabelladirected by Abel Ferrara by Bill Chambers There are really three-tiers to Abel Ferrara's output, as indicated by his choice of avatar. Arguably the most commercial, at least until New Rose Hotel, his Christopher Walken movies have also been the director's most meticulously crafted, while his Harvey Keitel movies resonate as Ferrara's most personal, with Dangerous Game probably the closest he's ever come to a roman à clef. Then there is Matthew Modine, star of The Blackout and now Mary--relatively minor films seemingly motivated by…

TIFF ’05: Where the Truth Lies

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Canada, Crime, Directors: Atom Egoyan, Drama, Film Festivals, Mystery, Thriller, TIFF, UK
*½/**** starring Kevin Bacon, Colin Firth, Alison Lohman, Rachel Blanchard screenplay by Atom Egoyan, based on the novel by Rupert Holmes directed by Atom Egoyan by Bill Chambers Canadian filmmakers tend to expose their limitations when they mimic American pop (see: the oeuvres of Jerry Ciccoritti and Mary Harron), and Atom Egoyan, who adapts his signature post-modernism to the Boogie Nights/Goodfellas paradigm in Where the Truth Lies, is no exception. Part of the problem is that it's almost impossible to empathize with journo Karen O'Connor's (Alison Lohman) attraction to the world of Lanny (Kevin Bacon, in what I'm tempted to…

Two-Second TIFF Reviews

Posted inAuthors: Bill Chambers, Blog, Film Festivals, TIFF
Mary (d. Abel Ferrara) Third-tier Ferrara, as evidenced by his choice of star (Matthew Modine). ** (out of four) Heading South (Vers le sud) (d. Laurent Cantet) Cantet works in dread the way some work in oils. A much-needed antidote to the twee likes of Ladies in Lavender. *** (out of four) Takeshis' (d. Takeshi Kitano) A kind of career summary for Beat by way of Buñuel; heard outside the screening: "Was that a comedy?" Short answer: yes. ***½ (out of four)

TIFF ’05: Capote

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Biopic, Canada, Crime, Drama, Film Festivals, TIFF
**/****starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Clifton Collins, Jr., Chris Cooperscreenplay by Dan Futterman, based on the novel by Gerald Clarkedirected by Bennett Miller Editor's note: I was so wrong about this film it's almost funny. It probably should've won Best Picture that year. by Bill Chambers Richard Brooks's masterful screen translation of Truman Capote's true-crime (Tru-crime?) novel In Cold Blood is full of indelible imagery that at first seems to seep into the fabric of Capote beyond director Bennett Miller's control. But as the homages--most notably, both pictures postpone the pivotal slaying of the ominously-named Clutter family until showing…

In Es-Crowe: On “Elizabethtown”

Posted inAuthors: Bill Chambers, Blog, Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, Romance, TIFF

Because Cameron Crowe considers it a work-in-progress, critics at last night’s TIFF screening of the interminable Elizabethtown were asked, in not so many words, to handle the film with kid gloves. (Apparently the folks at Venice saw a completely different cut.) So to avoid a flap, I won’t be posting a capsule review at the mothersite, but let me just say that the version I saw–which looked polished but by no means finished–makes one long for the subtlety and finesse of Garden State. (And really, how much more warning do you need?) Its epiphanies are so processed and its characters are so inorganically whimsical that the movie verges on self-parody (and it’s possible that a performance of “Free Bird” by the Stillwater-esque Ruckus pushes it over the edge, albeit consciously)–the suicidal hero (Orlando Bloom, channelling Crowe surrogate Tom Cruise (Elizabethtown‘s producer)), for instance, plans to do the deed by rigging up his exercycle with a butcher knife to simulate a stabbing motion!

TIFF ’05: Shopgirl

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Drama, Film Festivals, Romance, TIFF
**/****starring Steve Martin, Claire Danes, Jason Schwartzman, Bridgette Wilson-Samprasscreenplay by Steve Martin, based on his novelladirected by Anand Tucker by Bill Chambers Believe it or not, it takes more out of you to watch Anand Tucker's Shopgirl than to read the Steve Martin novella on which it's based. As in his Hilary and Jackie, Tucker seems to be striving for something lyrical but winds up with something purple, submerging as he does nearly every scene in Barrington Pheloung's syrupy score whilst failing to consolidate redundant emotional gestures. Consequently, Shopgirl is like Lost in Translation on steroids, bloated where the other…

TIFF ’04: Saw

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Film Festivals, Horror, Mystery, TIFF
**/****starring Leigh Whannell, Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potterscreenplay by Leigh Whannelldirected by James Wan by Bill Chambers Saw is ready and rarin' to be analyzed, opening as it does with the scholar-baiting tableau of a man (Leigh Whannell, also the film's screenwriter) waking in a bathtub, baptized or reborn. (It just so happens that his name is Adam.) And I swear to God the bad guy lives on "Stygian Street." Everything about Saw points to Whannell putting the cart before the horse: symbolism before context; set-pieces before bridges; revelations before mysteries... The movie's logic is at once unassailable and…

TIFF ’04: Palindromes

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Drama, Esoterica, Film Festivals, TIFF
*½/****starring Ellen Barkin, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Richard Masurwritten and directed by Todd Solondz by Bill Chambers Preceded by the snarkiest, if also funniest, on-screen dedication since The War Zone's "For my father" ("In loving memory of Dawn Wiener"--Dawn being the pre-teen heroine of Todd Solondz's breakthrough feature Welcome to the Dollhouse), Solondz's fifth film, Palindromes, is a virtual sprinkler head oscillating back and forth to spritz everything in the director's purview with venom. (It's his idea of moral ambivalence.) A "palindrome" is something that reads the same forwards and backwards, and by casting several different actresses to…

TIFF ’04: Keane

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Drama, Film Festivals, Mystery, Thriller, TIFF
***½/****starring Damian Lewis, Abigail Breslin, Amy Ryanwritten and directed by Lodge Kerrigan by Bill Chambers It may seem as though Lodge Kerrigan is spinning his wheels by revisiting the territory of his directorial debut two pictures later, but this actually provides a means by which to judge Kerrigan's maturation as an auteur. Only slightly more prolific than Terrence Malick, Kerrigan quietly penetrated the indie scene with 1994's Clean, Shaven, which cast Peter Greene--in a role that brilliantly exploited the actor's own mercurial nature--as Peter Winter, a paranoid schizophrenic scoping out his only child and her new parents; the film furnishes…

TIFF ’04: p.s.

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, Romance, TIFF
P.S.**½/****starring Laura Linney, Topher Grace, Gabriel Byrne, Marcia Gay Hardenscreenplay by Helen Schulman and Dylan Kidd, based on the novel by Helen Schulmandirected by Dylan Kidd by Bill Chambers Curious that Dylan Kidd, the mind behind the revelatory Roger Dodger, felt compelled to include a "director's statement" in the pressbook for his sophomore feature, p.s., but it's nonetheless an essential read in that it gives the lie to artist intentionality. "From Aristotle to Joseph Campbell to Robert McKee," Kidd writes, "everyone's in agreement: you can't have drama without obstacles...The idea behind p.s. was to tell a story where nothing stands…

TIFF ’04: Sideways

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, TIFF
***/****starring Paul Giamatti, Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen, Sandra Ohscreenplay by Alexander Payne & Jim Taylor, based on the novel by Rex Pickettdirected by Alexander Payne by Bill Chambers Alexander Payne has a gift for wry humour, of course, and in Sideways, there's a nice, sardonic hold on a bathroom door's sign--"MEN"--after Jack (Thomas Haden Church), having learned nothing from a sour indiscretion that netted him a broken nose, starts hitting on a waitress. By the same token, the curlicue noted above is typical of the level of organization, for lack of a better word, in Payne's work, which always…

TIFF ’04: I ♥ Huckabees

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Esoterica, Film Festivals, Germany, TIFF, UK
i ♥ huckabeesI Heart Huckabees**/****starring Dustin Hoffman, Isabelle Huppert, Jude Law, Jason Schwartzmanscreenplay by David O. Russell & Jeff Baenadirected by David O. Russell by Bill Chambers David O. Russell's debut feature Spanking the Monkey now bears the mark of Kane. (Citizen, that is.) A funny, caustic mood-piece that heralded the Second Coming of Hal Ashby, it was also an impossible thing to live up to--or down, for that matter, Spanking the Monkey's mother-son incest plot in some ways a modern correlative to Citizen Kane's taboo-shattering demystification of William Randolph Hearst. Russell's work since (Flirting with Disaster, Three Kings) has…

TIFF ’04: White Skin

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Canada, Drama, Film Festivals, Horror, Mystery, Thriller, TIFF
La Peau blanche**/****starring Marc Paquet, Marianne Farley, Frédéric Pierre, Jessica Malkascreenplay by Joël Champetier, Daniel Roby, based on the novel by Joël Champetierdirected by Daniel Roby by Bill Chambers I had a pretty good idea of where White Skin (La Peau blanche) was headed, and although I was more tickled that it had the French-word-for-chutzpah to go to those ludicrous extremes than disappointed that the outcome was vaguely predictable (if movies never failed to surprise me, it would only mean that I watch as many as I do in vain (besides which, no film uses a clip from Rabid indiscriminately)),…