gilbert seah

Film Review: BEFORE THE STREETS (AVANT LES RUES) (Canada 2016)***1/2

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before_the_streets.jpgDirector: Chloé Leriche

Writer: Chloé Leriche

Stars: Rykko Bellemare, Kwena Bellemare-Boivin, Jacques Newashish

Review by Gilbert Seah

Things have not gone right, are still not going right and are going to get worse for a young adult Atikamekw man in the First Nations reserve of Manawan in Quebec. When the film opens, his girlfriend has left him, with him trying to win her back, unsuccessfully. Shawnouk (Rykko Bellemare) smokes up daily, is jobless and leaves a meaningless life with with his sister, mother and mother’s boyfriend, who happens to be an indigenous cop. Things get worse, when he accidentally kills his crime partner after a botched burglary.

When things have gone this badly, it can only get better. But this story of Shawnouk’s redemption shows that redemption does not come easy. It comes with humility, diligence and a self-discovery experience. All these issues make a heated subject for a super indigenous movie And writer/director Chloe Lerich does her subject justice. Lerich also produced, wrote and edited her film besides performing the directing duties.

BEFORE THE STREETS is an original and admirable first feature from director Chlore Leich. It is a moody piece that effectively capture the monotony of life with few opportunities on the reservation. The film also questions the rights deserved of these people – who have essentially got they land stolen from them. Now they have to suck up to the Whites. “Here come the shiflies”, says the indigenous cop, humorously about the Quebec police, at one point in the film.

There is a segment in the film where Shawnouk works in the canine department putting down stray dogs that are sick, or have bitten people. The metaphor is clear. Shawnouk finds it unbearable to work in such an environment.

One problem of the film has is Lerich’s fondness of closeups. As a result, only the closest object can be in focus and others in the frame appear blurred. The result is often many blurred images, especially at the very start of he film. There is also Atikamekw chanting at the start and end of the film – with the Atikamekw character screeching at a very irritating high pitch tone. It is a necessary piece, but hard on the eardrums.
Credit should be given to two excellent performances. The first is the actor Rykko Bellemare who plays the lead like an Atikamekw James Dean. He is able to capture both the audience’s sympathy and admiration for his downs and ups. The second is Jacques Newashish as the mother’s cop boyfriend, who is torn between the right and lawful thing to do.

For a debut feature Lerich’s film is an emotionally satisfying tale of redemption. The only question here is the credibility of the spiritual cleansing depicted. But it works through the personal change of Shwnouk, which is more important and effective than any jail term dished out by a Justice system. As in films like this, the ultimate question asked is: “Can there be any justice on stolen land?”

The film is shot mainly in he Cree language with a bit of French.

 

 

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Film Review: RINGS (2017)

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rings.jpgDirector: F. Javier Gutiérrez
Writers: David Loucka (screenplay), Jacob Estes (screenplay)
Stars: Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz, Alex Roe, Johnny Galecki

Review by Gilbert Seah

 Directed by F. Javier Gutiérrez (BEFORE THE FALLS) and written by David Loucka, Jacob Aaron Estes and Akiva Goldsman, RINGS, the third film in the RINGS horror franchise (after THE RING and THE RING 2) attempts to blend in American psychological horror to the Japanese ‘watch the video – then you die’ scenario. It does not work.

When one goes to see an American remake of a cheap Japanese horror franchise, one had better keeps ones hopes low. The question is how low to keep ones hopes at to still NOT be disappointed. The film’s first 10 minutes set up the audience for these low expectations. A cute guy is seated, and sweating on an economy flight. When the girl next to him asks what is wrong, he explains that he has seen a video and is to die within 7 days and that he has 5 more minutes to survive. So, stupidly enough, he has to leave for the washroom when the seat belt sign is on. Black stuff flows on the floor, he is pulled on the floor by an unseen force and the plane crashes. All this makes absolutely no sense at all. And neither do much of the rest of the film. The odd thing is that the film gets really boring within the next 10 minutes.

The film’s main characters are two teens, who are very much in love. Holt (Alex Roe) leaves for University while Julia (Matilda Lutz) stays home pining for him. When Holt does the ‘watch the video and then die in 7 days’ gig, Julia drives up to save him. All these problems are caused by Holt’s Professor Gabriel (The Big Bang Theory’s Johnny Galecki). Somehow, the smart one seems to be Julia who has all the answers. Julia figures out that she has to free some girl in order to remove the curse which she is now caught with – which proves that she is not that smart after all. The villain of the piece turns out to be a blind fat priest called Burke (Vincent D’Onofrio – he played the recruit that shot himself in Stanley Kubrick’s FULL METAL JACKET) who might end up unforgettable in this role for all the wrong reasons.

The story turns into the horror story of a town that had a missing talented girl. The talented girl was kidnapped for almost a year, and put in chains in a basement by the priest, Burke. The attempt to Americanize RINGS with the video horror and this kidnapping story is a weak excuse of a plot that is just too flimsy to work. The tactic is not fooling anyone either.
The only thing going for the film are the scary images – most duplicated from the Japanese franchise.

For a horror flick, RINGS cost a massive $25 million to make. This will add to the estimated $500 million loss Paramount is is writing down from its film division this year. Watch the film, then sell your stock within 7 days.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFB4eZSVgBE

 

 

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THE SALESMAN (Iran/France 2016) ****

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the_salesman_poster.jpgDirector: Asghar Farhadi
Writer: Asghar Farhadi
Stars: Taraneh Alidoosti, Shahab Hosseini, Babak Karimi

Review by Gilbert Seah

Winner of the Best Script and Best Actor (Shahab Hosseini) prizes at 2016 Cannes,THE SALESMAN, the third film from the Iranian director of UNE SEPARATION and LE PASSE once again deals with domestic problems of a husband and wife in a suspense whodunit Hitchcockian setting.
Rana (Tararne Alidoosti) and her high-school teacher husband Emad (Hosseini) have moved quickly into their new apartment after an earthquake deemed their last place too dangerous to live. At the new place, just before going into the shower, Rana buzzes someone up thinking the person to be her husband. A stranger turns up in the bedroom. Rana ends up in hospital with bruises. The husband seeks revenge. In whodunit style, he traces keys and cellphone to the person responsible. The last 20 minutes has Emad confronting the perpetuator with unexpected results.

THE SALESMAN of the film title refers to the Pulitzer Wining 1949 Arthur Miller play, DEATH OF A SALESMAN. Emad is in a current production of the play with him playing the main character of the salesman, Willy with Rana playing the wife. There are of course parallels between the play and Emad’s real life. Both Willy and Emad seek the perfect life (as Willy in Miller’s play searches the American Dream), but fate hands out a different deck of cards. When Emad faces the man who committed the crime, a hidden crisis in his marriage relationship resurfaces – and he has to deal with it.

Unlike Farhadi’s other two films, THE SALESMAN moves at a slower pace and has more hidden agenda. Things are not what they seem. For one, the wife is a bundle of contradictions. She wants her husband to spend more time at home, but she wants personal solitude. When the husband finds the culprit, she wants the husband to let him go.

Farhadi also deals out slices of Iranian life in his film. The audience gets to see how the people live in Tehran where the story is set. The evacuation at the film’s start show how Iranians live. They take care of their disabled family members. The perpetuator’s family that show up at the end of the film depict the strong bond of Iranian family culture. One segment in Emad’s classroom reflects what the school system is like – and humorously. In one funny scene, a fat student quizzes Emad how possible it is in a literature text for a man to turn into a cow, only to be commented by a fellow pupil if he had recently looked into the mirror.

What is also immediately noticeable about Farhadi’s filming is his camera placement. At the film’s start, the stationary camera captures effectively the mayhem of the building evacuation. From the camera behind a window, a bulldozer can be seen. The climax of the film has the camera placed so that the characters move into the frame where the entire action then takes place.

At the end of the film,when the audience sits back to consider the consequences of the incidents that have unfolded on screen, one realizes that the impact is on the individual. The culprit is not sent to jail and the husband has not punished the wife’s attacker. The film leaves an open ending on how the revelation of events affect each character in the story. And his is what makes Farhadi’s film stand out.

THE SALESMAN has been nominated for the Academy award for Best Foreign Language Film. Director Farhadi has announced that he will not attend the ceremonies because of President’s Trump controversial travel ban.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VcfinMasfw

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Film Review: SHEPHERDS AND BUTCHERS (South Africa 2016) ***

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shepherds_and_butches.jpgDirected by Oliver Schmitz

Writers: Chris Marnewick (novel), Brian Cox (adaptation)
Stars: Andrea Riseborough, Steve Coogan, Garion Dowds

Review by Gilbert Seah

Director Olive Schmitz has made quite a name for himself with his first feature MAPANTSULA (1988) debuting at Cannes in Un Certain regard and again with his LIFE, ABOVE ALL (2010) being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. His latest is again a film which deals with a controversial topic, inspired by true events, the trial of a prison guard who shot seven black men dead.

The film is set during the height of apartheid in South Africa. The racial prejudice is obviously expected to be an effect on the story. A young white prison guard, Leon Labuschagne (Garion Dowds) embarks on a seemingly motiveless shooting spree that leaves seven black men dead., one night during a traffic incident. But this is obviously something deeper than road rage. A British-born lawyer, Johan Webber (Steve Coogan), assigned to his case sets out to prove his actions were a direct result of psychological trauma from his volatile work environment.

It is an odd choice to cast Steve Coogan in the role of a concerned lawyer. His best roles have been in comedy as in THE TRIP and THE TRIP TO ITALY as well as in ALAN PARTRIDGE. Even in his serious roles like PHILOMENA, he injects a sarcastic, biting humour that makes him an actor a joy to watch. In this film, Coogan is total serious. He is seen smoking a cigarette during the planning of his case, but never gain in any other seen. Actor Garion Dowds was probably chosen for his role as the accused because of his innocent and small stature, showing his character a vulnerable and easily influenced one.

One expects to be disturbed when watching a film like SHEPHERDS AND BUTCHERS that deals with the death penalty. There is plenty in the film to shock the audience. These are mainly in the flashbacks and recalling of events by guard Leon Labuschagne. The description of a hanging with the rope not of correct length (the dying man suffering the pain of strangulation with a broken neck in consciousness for a full 15 minutes) and the actual enactment during a flashback are clearly not for the faint-hearted. The scenes showing the sights of the faeces and urine surrounding the dead hung bodies are also plain nasty. Director Schmitz also creates the uneasiness of the period of apartheid throughout the film.

Leon Labuschagne was a prefect at school and attended church regularly. He was a father with a wife and daughter but now he stands trial for the murder of 7 people. The most intriguing question the film is to answer is what brought the change to this man, Leon. Director Schmitz brings his film to a satisfying conclusion with the verdict of the court case.
The film’s most absorbing parts still lie during the courtroom drama. Andrea Riseborough is marvellous as the prosecutor Kathleen Murray questioning Leon to breakdown.

The film was shot entirely in Cape Town, South Africa in English and Afrikaans. Why the film is called SHEPHERDS AND BUTCHERS is clear during a crucial scene at the end of the film.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGdGrwd27Yk
 

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Film Review: PATERSON (USA 2016) Top 10 *****

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paterson.jpgDirector: Jim Jarmusch
Writer: Jim Jarmusch
Stars: Adam Driver, Golshifteh Farahani, Nellie

Review by Gilbert Seah

PATERSON is the brilliant but quiet new film from Jim Jarmusch that focuses on a working-class poet (Adam Driver) in a small New Jersey town who practices his craft amidst the quiet magic of everyday life.

Those familiar with Jarmusch will be glad to notice the director’s traits from his early films present in PATERSON The wide camera panning of STRANGER THAN PARADISE and the dead pan humour of DOWN BY LAW are a few examples. But PATERSON is clearly his best film. Jarmusch captures the simplicity of an American small town and both the complexity and beauty of life amidst the daily routine of bus driver wannabe poet called Paterson in the town ale called Paterson.

Jarmusch shows that magic is where one finds it. The pleasures from the film derive from the audience’s observations of the film. For one, the film is a film about Paterson’s routine. It is a week in the life of Paterson beginning on a Monday and ending on the morning of the Monday of the following week. Paterson carries on his daily routine that includes getting up in the morning at the same time at 6:10 (though he wakes up late one of the days). He kisses his wife, eats the same breakfast of fruit loops and milk and goes to work at the bus garage where he drives the the bus of the same route everyday. When he gets home, he walks his dog, Marvin, and stops for a beer at the neighbourhood bar, chatting with the locals.

Amidst the driving and walking, he writes poems – beautiful and simple ones that the audience can relate to. All these might sound mundane, but Jarmsuch has created a really beautiful film, aided by his muse, actor Adam Driver, whose every facial expression registers his mood and emotion. The Toronto Film Critics Association awarded Driver the Best Actor Prize this year.

PATERSON is also a love story. The two lead a simple life of the same daily routines, but it is clear that they care for each other – deeply. It is tolerance and sensitivity that are the ingredients that make their love so strong. In one of his poems. Paterson says, I see other girls but if his wife were to leave him, he would tear his heart out.

It is also noticeable that Paterson is the happiest character in the film. The bartender Doc envies Paterson’s relationship with his wife. Everett, a local is heartbroken from unrequited love while his fellow bus driver, Donny is always full of personal and family problems. Everything seems to turn out right for Paterson, even his wife’s cupcake sale at the farmer’s market.

A key character in the story is surprisingly Paterson’s dog, Marvin. While Paterson straightens the post of his letter box very day after work, it is Marvin that topples it slanting every day when Paterson is at work. Marvin also chews up Paterson’s book of poems one day, an act that brings the film to its climax.
PATERSON turns out to be the perfect poetic film – visually as well as in the character’s writings. Effective, moving and thoroughly captivating, PATERSON is a a genuine feel-good movie without artificial sweeteners!

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8pGJBgiiDU

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Film Review: A DOG’S PURPOSE (USA 2017) ***

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a_dogs_purpose.jpgDirector: Lasse Hallström
Writers: W. Bruce Cameron (screenplay), Cathryn Michon (screenplay)
Stars: Josh Gad, Dennis Quaid, Peggy Lipton

Review by Gilbert Seah

A DOG’S PURPOSE begins with the birth of a puppy. The question: “What is the purpose of life?” is asked in the voiceover. But the answer comes front he canine point of view. The puppy lives its life and dies. (The first life is really short.) It is reincarnated several times starting as a puppy leading different lives as different breeds with different owners. But the main important one is the one as Bailey (all the dogs voiced by Josh Gad) who has a loving relationship with Ethan (K.J. Apa). But the dog remembers all its past lives.

With so many reincarnations come many stories. Director Hallstrom moves his film fast, so that there is hardly a dull moment. There are 4 separate stories with 4 different owners and reincarnations. The stories are all told from the dog’s point of view. The script tries to be funny, but the result is only polite laughter judging from the promo screening audience.

The ultimate question arises from the film’s title is what a dog’s purpose is. The obvious answer is to be man best friend. But the answer (not to be released in this review) provided by the film is even more specific.

The cast has only one well known name, that of star Dennis Quaid who appears towards the end of the film, though he has an important role. The best performances are from the canine actors, credit going to the trainers of course. It is always a wonder to see how these dog players perform so well – for example running where they are supposed to go, under fences into water, jumping through loops and saving helpless human beings and licking them constantly.

The film, typical from Swede director Hallstrom (MY LIFE AS A DOG, CHOCOLAT, WHAT’S EATING GILBERT GRAPE? THE CIDER HOUSE RULES) is undeniably mawkish, milking sentiment whenever possible. It is advisable to bring plenty of Kleenex. My guest who loves dogs who I brought to the promo screening, bawled his eye out.

A few words obviously need be said about the film’s controversy. On January 18, 2017, a video surfaced on TMZ showing footage taken from the set of the film, which shows a German Shepherd named Hercules being dragged and dipped into rushing water while visibly resisting. Worst, the following clip shows the dog being submerged in the water at the other end of the tank. As a result, many is expected to boycott the film. So far, Universal Pictures has cancelled the film’s scheduled January 19 Los Angeles premiere and the representative from the Humane Association watching for the cruelty and harm to animals has been suspended. One will see during the weekend at the box-office (expected gross is $20 million) if the adage ‘all publicity is good publicity’ is still valid.

A DOG’S PURPOSE is not the best of Hallstrom’s films, but he manages a successful job. The film is an entertaining family film that caters to all dog lovers. It is pitiful that bad press arose from the TMZ videos, but the filmmakers, I am sure had the best intentions in mind for man’s best friend.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jLOOCADTGs

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Film Review: The Comedian. Starring Robert DeNiro

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the_comedian.jpgDirector: Taylor Hackford
Writers: Art Linson (screenplay), Jeffrey Ross (screenplay)
Stars: Robert De Niro, Leslie Mann, Danny DeVito

Review by Gilbert Seah

THE COMEDIAN is, as the title implies about the story of insult comedian Jackie (Robert De Niro) who once found fame as Eddie in the TV sitcom Eddie’s Home. Jackie is now surviving on low-paying gigs in New York City but his audience wants to remember the Eddie routines that Jackie hates to be remembered for.

The trouble starts when Jackie assaults a heckler at one of his performances resulting in him being sentenced to community service at a homeless food shelter. But Jackie meets a fellow community service server, Harmony (Leslie Mann) who he has a relationship with.

Director Taylor Hackord (AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN, RAY, THE DEVIL’S ADVOCATE) treats his star and the material with respect. It shows. THE COMEDIAN turns out to be a likeable, respectable film despite some very lewd humour.

As in movies about stand-up comedians that pays homage to stand-up comedians go, the film contains worthy cameos provided by the likes of Charles Grodin, Jimmie Walker and Oscar Winner Cloris Leachman. Danny DeVito and harvey Kietel also deliver memorable performances. The comic routines on film are also well written and funny – garnishing laugh-out loud laughs. The best of these is the banter carrying on between the Jewish lesbian comic on hand and De Niro.

De Niro, no stranger to comedy being in comedies like MEET THE PARENTS and THE FAMILY, proves in this film that he can also do stand-up and insult stand-up at that. He is winning in his performance and though unlikely to win him another Academy Award, it is a performance that invokes both sympathy and laughter. De Niro looks good (with his hair probably dyed) and fit, and believable as the late 60 year old that can still become a father.

Where the film (both script and direction) succeeds is the difficult yet successful blending of vulgarity and sincerity. This is witnessed for example, in the one wedding scene when Jackie’s performance both delights his niece and infuriates her mother, Flo (Patti LuPone).

The film is a drama comedy with more laughs than anything else. As one late critic said, a funny film will allow a multitude of faults to be overlooked. The script is smart enough not to include any messages or uncomfortable sex scenes, to include the effects of modern technology (like viral youTube videos) and hilarious stand-up routines in the film.
The best film about a comedian remains Martin Scorsese’s satirical THE KING OF COMEDY that happens also to star a younger Robert De Niro as a stalker of a famous comedian played by Jerry Lewis. THE COMEDIAN is a light drama, played for laughs rather than insight or satire. The film succeeds in its lesser aimed goal.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALlj3RRF9h8

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Film Review: WHERE THE UNIVERSE SINGS – THE SPIRITUAL JOURNEY OF LAWREN HARRIS

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 This is the story of Canadian painter and artist, Lawren Stewart Harris, CC (October 23, 1885 – January 29, 1970). After a brief introduction to the paintings, Harris background is outlined. One of his most famous works, “Mountain Forms” recently sold for over $11.2 million. Harris was born in Brantford, Ontario, and is best known as a member of the Group of Seven who pioneered a distinctly Canadian painting style in the early twentieth century. A. Y. Jackson has been quoted as saying that Harris provided the stimulus for the Group of Seven.

The voiceover is often in the first person (voiced by Canadian actor Colm Feore) of Harris as he describes his views and his paintings. Shot in chronological order, which helps the audience understand the shift in his work, the audience sees Harris’s works become more abstract and simplified, especially his stark landscapes of the Canadian north and Arctic. His initial paintings showed the city, the poor parts of Toronto where he moved and lived for a while. Harris is also a humble man, not signing nor dating his work, so that his paintings can be judged for what they are – without prejudice.

While the painting are on display, directors Raymont and Lang constantly remind the audience (sometimes too often) of the Harris’ purpose he envisioned for his paintings. Harris wants his admirers to embark on a spiritual journey to settle on a different plain of consciousness that hopefully is inspired by the paintings.

The film also includes interviews by experts the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Andrew Hunter,
the Vancouver Art Gallery’s Ian Thom, curator and former Globe art critic Sarah Milroy, biographer Peter Larisey, author Dennis Reid, curator Roald Nasgaard, collector Ash Prakash, author Lisa Christensen of Heffel’s and Harris’s grandchildren Stew Sheppard and Toni Chowne. Actor/comedian Steve Martin (in serious mode) also has a surprise appearance here having his say.

It is odd that two thirds through the film. Raymont decides to insert the segment on Harris’s life. He goes on to tell of his unsatisfactory marriage to Trixie as well as his romance with another painter, Beth supposedly his soulmate. Raymont uses the segment to explain Harris’ transition to abstract art.

An additional bonus of the documentary is the archive film footage shot by Harris himself. As he travelled through the Arctic and across Canada, his shots on film are magnificent. Even Toronto with its streetcars and old automobiles look stunning. It is odd that his painting hardly contained people. But people are plentiful in his footage.

The film also features over 130 paintings, dozens of previously un-seen photos and 8mm family films, plus works by those who influenced him, including Van Gogh, Cezanne, Gaugin, Kandinsky, Emily Carr and Georgia OKeeffe.

Director Raymont (Emmy winner Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Roméo Dallaire) does his subject justice. He is fortunately to be able to show Harris archive films which really helps the audience understand the artist.

Like Harris’s paintings, Raymont’s documentary is occasionally therapeutic and inspiring.

Please note that this is the 1 hour 30 minute version, not the 60 minute version previously shown on TV.

Trailer: https://vimeo.com/192636801

where_the_universe_sings.jpg

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Film Review: AKRON (USA 2016) ***

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akron.jpgDirectors: Sasha King, Brian O’Donnell
Writers: Brian O’Donnell, Brian O’Donnell
Stars: Matthew Frias, Joseph Melendez, Edmund Donovan

Review by Gilbert Seah

After the gay lifestyle gained acceptance around the world, gay films appear to have exhausted all possible subjects. Issues such as coming out, sex change, gay marriage, teen love, transgender identity, gay bashing, prejudice, gay rights have all been covered in one gay film after another. Filmmakers with gay themed films have to resort to used subjects with a new twist or a new look to succeed. AKRON, a teen mid-western gay love story does just that.

“You don’t choose who you fall in love with?” Benny challenges his father during a confrontation in one of the film’s key scenes. It is a valid question and one that does not have a single answer. The film poses one big magic question: “Can love conquer all?” And the film, as in many love stories, has an obstacle to the romance. In this case it is a very huge obstacle.

This obstacle is observed in the film’s first scene, which appears at first to have no connection to the rest of the movie. When the connection is made, it generates a powerhouse effect.

A young boy, Christopher is at the supermarket with his mother. In the parking lot, the mother accidentally runs over and kills a boy. It turns out that the boy’s younger brother is Benny, who meets and falls in love with Christopher later on, the coincidence first unknown to both. When the truth emerges, the romance is challenged, first by Christopher and Benny individually, and then by Benny’s well-meaning parents. Sometimes, a secret might best be kept, but this is the movies.
The film is undoubtedly a tear-jerker. There are no scenes that are milked for sentiment, but the effect of the story is a powerful one.

The film clearly reminds one of first love, teen love and innocent love at that – whether gay or straight. The film could very well be a straight love story between a boy and girl, with not much difference in effect.

AKRON works as a film (ignore the 4.2 rating on imdb) for various reasons. For one, it is a sincere story of first love. One can always remember the first time one has fallen in love and thus, one can relate to the characters. The chemistry of the two leads are almost perfect. The two teens playing the leads are also excellent, particularly Matthew Frias, who looks like a younger version of Andrew Garfield.
The two actors portraying the teens are almost too perfect in terms of muscled bodies. The love makng is very erotic aided by the fact that they have almost perfect chiseled bodies and handsome faces. As the film is a teen romance, it is appropriate that no hardcore sex scene is presented – only ones with kissing and foreplay, thought these are erotic enough.

Though this well-made, sincere film should get a theatrical release, it goes straight to video. AKRON will be released February 7, 2016 on DVD and VOD via Wolfe Video. But AKRON is well worth a viewing. Warning, make sure you have lots of Kleenex. But it is good to have a good cry once in a while. At last these will be happy tears.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9p831bjy74

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Film Review: THE APPRENTICESHIP OF DUDDY KRAVITZ (Canada 1974) ****

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duddy_kravitz.jpgDirector: Ted Kotcheff

Writers: Mordecai Richler (screenplay), Mordecai Richler (novel)

Stars: Richard Dreyfuss, Micheline Lanctôt, Jack Warden

Review by Gilbert Seah

 It has been a long spell (thanks to its recent restoration) since the Canadian classic THE APPRENTICESHIP OF DUDDY KRAVITZ got a release again on the big screen. The film is the autobiography of the author, Mordecai Richler based on his best selling novel of the same name.

The film is the story of Duddy (pronounced doo-dee) Kravitz (Richard Dreyfuss), a brash, restless young Jewish man growing up poor in Montreal, Canada. His taxi driver father Max (Jack Warden) and his rich uncle Benjy (Joseph Wiseman) are very proud of Duddy’s older brother Lenny, whom Benjy is putting through medical school. Only his grandfather (Zvee shows the motherless Duddy any attention. But Duddy rises the ranks.

There is a scene in which an old Jewish bearded man says that a man without land is a nobody. (This scene is seen in both this film and the Woody Allen comedy LOVE AND DEATH). In this film, it is Duddy’s grandfather who tells his grandson the maxim.

Duddy starts a serious relationship with a hotel employee, French-Canadian Yvette (Micheline Lanctôt). One day, she takes him on a picnic beside a lake. Duddy is stunned by the beauty of the setting, and his ambition crystallizes: taking to heart his grandfather Zeyta’s maxim “a man without land is nobody” to heart. The film traces Duddy’s accomplishment, but not without dire consequences. It is a film of both coming-of-age and growing up – and a very effective one at that.

This is director Ted Kotcheff’s best film. His attention to detail, which is evident throughout the film is what makes the movie tick. The best example can be seen in the opening sequence where Duddy in military garb marches in a band while goofing around. The military tune “O When the Saints” bookmarks the ilm, while the lyrics also have some meaning in the story.

It is reported that Richard Dreyfuss hated his performance so much in this film that after seeing the film’s final cut, he decided to take the role in JAWS, that he initially turned down. But in my opinion, Dreyfuss delivers an almost flawless performance as Duddy in the film . He captures the juvenility and ambition of the growing Jewish boy. Dreyfuss has proven himself as an actor in the the later AMERICAN GRAFFITI and also in THE GOODBYE GIRL winning an Oscar for Best Actor in the process.

I have a few complaints of the film despite it being a classic. Being a film set in Montreal, I would prefer it being shot in France or at least have more French spoken in the film. The other is the list of Americans playing Canadians and an Englishman playing the American Hollywood director.

The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz screens as part of Canada on Screen on Sunday, February 5 at 6:30 p.m. Beginning in January and running throughout the year, this free programme will present moving-image installations, special events and guests, an extensive online catalogue, and screenings across the country, all based on a list of 150 essential moving-image works from Canada’s history, and compiled through a national poll of industry professionals. Canada on Screen is a co-production between TIFF and three core project partners — Library and Archives Canada, the Cinémathèque québécoise, and The Cinematheque in Vancouver — for Canada’s sesquicentennial in 2017. The Government of Canada and RBC are Presenting Partners of Canada on Screen.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYkgUm-ImHw

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