TIFF 2010, Day Six
Sep. 15th, 2010 09:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
przedSaw two films yesterday, both decent, but neither outstanding. The casts made both of them, though.
Title: Beautiful Boy
Director: Shawn Ku
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Okay
Michael Sheen and Maria Bello play the parents of a teenager who's gone on a shooting spree at his college before killing himself. It's basically a two-hander, with Sheen and Bello as a couple who's marriage was already at the breaking point before the shootings. The two actors are very good, but occasionally it all gets a bit shouty for my tastes. And as a parent, it's occasionally excruciating to watch.
Title: Tracker
Director: Ian Sharp
Country: New Zealand/U.K.
P's Rating: Pretty Good
Ray Winstone plays Arjan Van Dieman, a Boer farmer who ends up in New Zealand after the end of the Boer War with the British Empire. Temeura Morrison plays Kereama, a Maori whaler who returns to his homeland many years after his people have lost their own war with the British, only to be falsely accused of killing a British soldier. Van Dieman is an expert tracker, and sets out to capture the escaped Kereama for the bounty, only to find he has more in common with his Maori prey than with his British employers. Though it's not a brilliant film, it's raised to a higher level by the performances of Winstone and, especially Morrison. Once their characters hook up, it becomes a highly enjoyable if dysfunctional buddy flick. The New Zealand locations don't hurt either; the landscape it gorgeous. My only quibble is the director's continual decision to film characters backlit so you can't see their faces. I'm not sure if it was incompetent lighting or a dodgy aesthetic choice, but it did the film no favours.
Title: Beautiful Boy
Director: Shawn Ku
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Okay
Michael Sheen and Maria Bello play the parents of a teenager who's gone on a shooting spree at his college before killing himself. It's basically a two-hander, with Sheen and Bello as a couple who's marriage was already at the breaking point before the shootings. The two actors are very good, but occasionally it all gets a bit shouty for my tastes. And as a parent, it's occasionally excruciating to watch.
Title: Tracker
Director: Ian Sharp
Country: New Zealand/U.K.
P's Rating: Pretty Good
Ray Winstone plays Arjan Van Dieman, a Boer farmer who ends up in New Zealand after the end of the Boer War with the British Empire. Temeura Morrison plays Kereama, a Maori whaler who returns to his homeland many years after his people have lost their own war with the British, only to be falsely accused of killing a British soldier. Van Dieman is an expert tracker, and sets out to capture the escaped Kereama for the bounty, only to find he has more in common with his Maori prey than with his British employers. Though it's not a brilliant film, it's raised to a higher level by the performances of Winstone and, especially Morrison. Once their characters hook up, it becomes a highly enjoyable if dysfunctional buddy flick. The New Zealand locations don't hurt either; the landscape it gorgeous. My only quibble is the director's continual decision to film characters backlit so you can't see their faces. I'm not sure if it was incompetent lighting or a dodgy aesthetic choice, but it did the film no favours.
