Toronto Film Fest, Day Seven
Sep. 15th, 2005 10:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
przedA long day today, ending with a midnight screening. I'll be all three of the next midnights, so I'm just hoping I manage to get enough sleep until the end of the fest.
Title: The Proposition
Director: John Hillcoat
Country: Australia/U.K.
P's Rating: Highly Recommended
Set on the Australian frontier, John Hillcoat's new film shows both the beauty and the brutality that the human animal is capable of. The always incredible Ray Winstone plays a police captain in the deep Outback, charged with capturing a gang of Irish bush rangers who massacred a local family. He catches two of the brothers of the gang, and sets one of them, Guy Pearce, to kill the last two of his brothers remaining free, with the promise that he'll arrange pardons for him and his younger brother if he manages it. There is no one in the film who isn't implicated in horrendous acts of violence: the local official, effetely played by David Wenham, advocates genocide of the aboriginals, while even Winstone's wife, the ever lovely Emily Watson, pushes for the flogging of the brother remaining in custody. But at the same time, there is no character without redeeming features. Danny Huston, playing the oldest brother, is a raging psychopath, but also clearly well-educated and eloquent. And the middle brother is unthinkingly vicious but can sing with the voice of an angel. Nothing in this film allows you to take comfort in easy answers, and that's as it should be.
Title: Stranded in Canton
Director: William Eggleston
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Crap
Sometimes when you pick a film just because it fits a gap in your schedule you find a gem. And sometimes, not so much. This film, part of the Dialogues series, is by well-respected photographer Eggleston and was made in the early '70s when he bought one of the first portable video cameras. Basically, it's a series of vignettes of his friends of the time, but since his friends are a bunch of drunken, drugged out lunatics, and not in a good way, the whole experience pales after a while.
Title: Fallen
Director: Fred Kelemen
Country: Germany/Latvia
P's Rating: Okay
A low key, slow-paced film, but one which rewards patient viewing. While walking home from work one night, Matiss fails to stop a young woman from jumping off the bridge. Haunted by his failure, he begins to look into who the woman was and what might have prompted her to suicide. The film takes places on the streets of Riga, capital of Latvia and the main reason I picked the film. (I'm half Latvian.) My one frustration with it is that it was shot on video, which means the careful compositions don't look nearly as good as they would have on film. Still, an interesting film.
Title: Metal: A Headbanger's Journey
Director: Sam Dunn, Scott MacFadyen, Jessica Joy Wise
Country: Canada
P's Rating: Highly Recommended
Who knew a documentary about heavy metal music could be so engaging. Co-director Sam Dunn, a self-confessed fan of metal since the age of 12 and also a trained anthropologist, acts as our tour guide through the history of metal music. Not only is Dunn an engaging, intelligent and funny screen presence, but he get some fascinating interviews from some surprisingly eloquent subjects. Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi turns out to be a well-turned out English gentleman, if one from the working class, while Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson is an enthusiatic advocate of his chosen art form. And one of the guys from Slip Knot, in full mask and makeup, turns out to be incredibly well-spoken. Dunn and his co-directors don't shy from the darker side of metal--they take a trip to Norway to interview the country's practitioners of black metal, several of whom were convicted of burning down historic churches in the early '90s--but their enthusiasm and passion for the music make you understand the appeal of the culture.
Title: The Proposition
Director: John Hillcoat
Country: Australia/U.K.
P's Rating: Highly Recommended
Set on the Australian frontier, John Hillcoat's new film shows both the beauty and the brutality that the human animal is capable of. The always incredible Ray Winstone plays a police captain in the deep Outback, charged with capturing a gang of Irish bush rangers who massacred a local family. He catches two of the brothers of the gang, and sets one of them, Guy Pearce, to kill the last two of his brothers remaining free, with the promise that he'll arrange pardons for him and his younger brother if he manages it. There is no one in the film who isn't implicated in horrendous acts of violence: the local official, effetely played by David Wenham, advocates genocide of the aboriginals, while even Winstone's wife, the ever lovely Emily Watson, pushes for the flogging of the brother remaining in custody. But at the same time, there is no character without redeeming features. Danny Huston, playing the oldest brother, is a raging psychopath, but also clearly well-educated and eloquent. And the middle brother is unthinkingly vicious but can sing with the voice of an angel. Nothing in this film allows you to take comfort in easy answers, and that's as it should be.
Title: Stranded in Canton
Director: William Eggleston
Country: U.S.
P's Rating: Crap
Sometimes when you pick a film just because it fits a gap in your schedule you find a gem. And sometimes, not so much. This film, part of the Dialogues series, is by well-respected photographer Eggleston and was made in the early '70s when he bought one of the first portable video cameras. Basically, it's a series of vignettes of his friends of the time, but since his friends are a bunch of drunken, drugged out lunatics, and not in a good way, the whole experience pales after a while.
Title: Fallen
Director: Fred Kelemen
Country: Germany/Latvia
P's Rating: Okay
A low key, slow-paced film, but one which rewards patient viewing. While walking home from work one night, Matiss fails to stop a young woman from jumping off the bridge. Haunted by his failure, he begins to look into who the woman was and what might have prompted her to suicide. The film takes places on the streets of Riga, capital of Latvia and the main reason I picked the film. (I'm half Latvian.) My one frustration with it is that it was shot on video, which means the careful compositions don't look nearly as good as they would have on film. Still, an interesting film.
Title: Metal: A Headbanger's Journey
Director: Sam Dunn, Scott MacFadyen, Jessica Joy Wise
Country: Canada
P's Rating: Highly Recommended
Who knew a documentary about heavy metal music could be so engaging. Co-director Sam Dunn, a self-confessed fan of metal since the age of 12 and also a trained anthropologist, acts as our tour guide through the history of metal music. Not only is Dunn an engaging, intelligent and funny screen presence, but he get some fascinating interviews from some surprisingly eloquent subjects. Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi turns out to be a well-turned out English gentleman, if one from the working class, while Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson is an enthusiatic advocate of his chosen art form. And one of the guys from Slip Knot, in full mask and makeup, turns out to be incredibly well-spoken. Dunn and his co-directors don't shy from the darker side of metal--they take a trip to Norway to interview the country's practitioners of black metal, several of whom were convicted of burning down historic churches in the early '90s--but their enthusiasm and passion for the music make you understand the appeal of the culture.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 08:10 am (UTC)Oh, good call on River Queen by the way (or was it Don). It was crap. I still can't bring myself to review it. 2 Hrs of my life I will never get back.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 11:49 pm (UTC)Thanks for taking the bullet on River Queen. Glad to know my instincts didn't fail me on that one.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 11:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 11:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 07:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-15 11:51 pm (UTC)