TIFF, Day Eight
Sep. 11th, 2008 10:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
przedAnother day and three more solid films. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that my picks don't all go south in the final two days.
Title: Fifty Dead Men Walking
Director: Kari Skogland
Country: UK/Canada
P's Rating: Recommended
The second film this fest that deals with the Irish Troubles, this time from the point of view of a young bloke who's recruited by Irish Special Branch to infiltrate the IRA. Martin is a street smart young hustler who comes to the attention of both the IRA and an intelligence handler in Special Branch. He's recruited into Special Branch as he begins to rise through the ranks of the IRA, with the danger cranking up every time he makes it through to the next level. Jim Sturgess is very good as Martin, and the always dependable Ben Kingsley is lovely as his Special Branch handler, Fergus.
Title: The Brothers Bloom
Director: Rian Johnson
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Recommended
Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brodie play con men brothers making a play for one last mark. Ruffalo's Stephen constructs elaborate plots that use the longing of Brodie's Bloom for a normal, unwritten life. When Bloom decides he's had enough of the con, Stephen comes up with one last job. Rachel Weisz plays their final mark, a rich and eccentric young woman who falls for Bloom. And Rinko Kikuchi is too much fun as Bang Bang, the brothers' silent assistant who can get anything done. Though the plot sinks a bit into its own convolutions about half way through, it's still a fun, and occasionally touching, ride, and a worthy follow-up to director Johnson's first film, the high school noir, Brick.
Title: The Burrowers
Director: JT Perry
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Recommended
I picked this one because a) it was touted as being like John Ford's The Searchers (a personal favourite of mine), but with monsters and b) Clancy Brown was in it. And I wasn't disappointed. Karl Geary plays an Irish ranch hand whose sweetheart is abducted along with her family. He joins the hunt for the Indians who abducted her, but the true culprits turn out to be something much more implacable than mere human beings. Clancy Brown is solid in a too brief turn as the leader of the party hunting for the abducted family, and Geary is quite fab as Irish immigrant Coffey. Films like this live and die on their monsters and how they're shot, and in this case the director was canny enough to both create a truly disturbing creature and to limit the amount of time you see the things on screen.
Title: Fifty Dead Men Walking
Director: Kari Skogland
Country: UK/Canada
P's Rating: Recommended
The second film this fest that deals with the Irish Troubles, this time from the point of view of a young bloke who's recruited by Irish Special Branch to infiltrate the IRA. Martin is a street smart young hustler who comes to the attention of both the IRA and an intelligence handler in Special Branch. He's recruited into Special Branch as he begins to rise through the ranks of the IRA, with the danger cranking up every time he makes it through to the next level. Jim Sturgess is very good as Martin, and the always dependable Ben Kingsley is lovely as his Special Branch handler, Fergus.
Title: The Brothers Bloom
Director: Rian Johnson
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Recommended
Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brodie play con men brothers making a play for one last mark. Ruffalo's Stephen constructs elaborate plots that use the longing of Brodie's Bloom for a normal, unwritten life. When Bloom decides he's had enough of the con, Stephen comes up with one last job. Rachel Weisz plays their final mark, a rich and eccentric young woman who falls for Bloom. And Rinko Kikuchi is too much fun as Bang Bang, the brothers' silent assistant who can get anything done. Though the plot sinks a bit into its own convolutions about half way through, it's still a fun, and occasionally touching, ride, and a worthy follow-up to director Johnson's first film, the high school noir, Brick.
Title: The Burrowers
Director: JT Perry
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Recommended
I picked this one because a) it was touted as being like John Ford's The Searchers (a personal favourite of mine), but with monsters and b) Clancy Brown was in it. And I wasn't disappointed. Karl Geary plays an Irish ranch hand whose sweetheart is abducted along with her family. He joins the hunt for the Indians who abducted her, but the true culprits turn out to be something much more implacable than mere human beings. Clancy Brown is solid in a too brief turn as the leader of the party hunting for the abducted family, and Geary is quite fab as Irish immigrant Coffey. Films like this live and die on their monsters and how they're shot, and in this case the director was canny enough to both create a truly disturbing creature and to limit the amount of time you see the things on screen.
