Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Creators:
Stars:
Júlio Andrade, Marjorie Estiano, Stepan Nercessian
UNDER PRESSURE is not really a film but two episodes of the series out of a total of 9. From the 2 episodes, UNDER PRESSURE looks like a soap opera happening in the hospital where the staff all interact with each other in one way or other, including romance and conflict.
The main character is the overworked Dr. Evandro who is the chief surgeon and goes above and beyond his means to save patients in the overcrowded hospital in Rio de Janeiro. He has an affair with Dr. Carolina (Marjorie Estiano) while stealing medication to satisfy his drug habit.
In the midst of all this, the ambulance would pull in at regular intervals with an assortment of emergencies that includes a girl who has popped in too many pills or a kid that choked on candy. As expected, there is more to it. The girl is being abused by the dad and the candy is in fact wrapped up blow.
While all the actors do their best to demonstrate chaos in the hospital, the film looks too set-up with the drama too sentimental. After watching Dr. Evandro tend to an assortment of emergencies, the drama wears down just like an anaesthetic.
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: UNDER THE TREE (Iceland/Denmark/Poland/Germany 2017) ***1/2
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writers:
Huldar Breiðfjörð (story and screenplay), Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson (screenplay)
Stars:
Steinþór Hróar Steinþórsson, Edda Björgvinsdóttir, Sigurður Sigurjónsson
This is dark comedy am its blackest. A simple story that unfolds in all its unpredictability and horror. It is trouble for two neighbours, something that many can relate to. The shade from a front yard tree brings tensions to a boil for two families in an Icelandic suburb.
The husbands have a small argument over trimming the big tree as one of the wives likes to lie in the sun and does not want the shade from the tree. But the wives argue. The tires of a car are slashed followed by rude gnomes ornaments placed in the front of the house. Then when the cat goes missing, all hell breaks lose.
Amidst the arguing, there is a subplot of the son losing custody of his daughter after cheating on his wife. Sigurdsson keeps his film engaging from start to end by making his characters real, reacting and doing things that normal people all over the world might end up doing, when pushed to the limit.
The ending comes with a good twist that leaves audiences satisfied that they have seen a really black comedy/drama.
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tU7KeDwJCAc
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: CANIBA (France 2017) ***
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Directors:
Directed by duo Véréna Paravel and Lucien Castaing-Taylor (LEVIATHON), who are also anthropologists, CANIBA is about Issei Sagawa, the notorious Japanese cannibal now living a reclusive life as a paralytic and seeking atonement for his gruesome crimes.
The film begins with his confession, his face in extreme closeup so, that one can also see all the defects in his face, with him talking about his crime and the reason for it. Issei was deported from Paris in 1981 after being held in prison for two years for murdering and cannibalizing Dutch student Renée Hartevelt (as told in voiceover).
The film is extremely slow and the action or non action is unveiled grainy, cinema-verite style. The brother now takes care of Issei and now semi-paralyzed, housebound on the outskirts of Tokyo, and seeking atonement.
The link between sexual fantasies and cannibalism is also examined in the film. Not for everyone! The film ends, appropriately, with a karaoke song about madness!
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: REVENGE (France 2017) ***1/2
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writer:
Stars:
Kevin Janssens, Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz, Avant Strangel
REVENGE borrows from many classic films like MAD MAX, THE HUNTING PARTY and female stalker movies to provide another gore fest in which victim becomes hunter with a few more tricks on display. This is Carolie Fargeat’s debut feature and an impressive one at that.
A rich businessman, Steve takes his mistress )Italian model Matilda Lutz) on a getaway in a gorgeous mansion by a desert. His two hunting friends show up and abuse her while he goes off for two hours. Instead of being on her side, Steve takes his friends side. When she threatens to tell his wife, Steve’s pushes her off a cliff. She survives. They hunt her down while she, turns the table on them.
The film is the real BATTLE OF THE SEXES, not the one with the same title centred on tennis, also at this year’s TIFF. A few gory set-ups include one where a man extracts chards of glass from the base of his foot and another with her tending to her wounds with the metal of a red hot beer can.
The climatic scene is full of inventive cat-and house chasing complete with Steve applying Saran wrap around his wounds. REVENGE is perfect Midnight Madness fare and had the theatre howling during the screening.
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: DARK RIVER (UK 2017) ***1/2
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writer:
Stars: Ruth Wilson, Mark Stanley, Sean Bean
Director of one of the best films five years ago, THE SELFISH GIANT, DARK RIVER is another drama set in the poor north of England. The setting here is a sheep farm in Yorkshire.
Slice (Ruth Wilson) returns to the farm after a 15 year absence. She left as she was abused by her father, as shown in flashback throughout the film. Her bother, as the neighbour says, is an idiot, and not only does he no listen to reason or Alice’s advice to improve the farm, which we assume does, he is abusive and at one point attacks her while drunk.
Things get worse when he wins tenancy of the land and orders Alice out. It is a tough life for anyone working a farm, made worse with rising working tensions. Barnard’s DARK RIVER shows the emotional anguish Alice goes through.
DARK RIVER is not as satisfying as THE SELFISH GIANT, as it has less story, but the film is no less dramatic. Ruth Wilson is really good as Alice and deserves the BFTA Award for Best Actress.
Clip from the sets: https://teaser-trailer.com/dark-river-movie/
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: ANGELS WEAR WHITE (China/France 2017) ***** Top 10
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writer:
Stars:
Le Geng, Mengnan Li, Weiwei Liu
A brilliantly told tale full of emotional angst that also reflects China’s unknown beach culture. The huge statue of Marilyn Monroe at the beach which is finally taken down for repair serves as a metaphor of the film’s broken characters in need for a better life.
It all begins when a seedy hotel worker witnesses on closed circuit camera a man trying to force himself into the room rented by schoolgirls. An assault occurs and the cops are trying to pin the crime on Commissioner Lu. Lu is rich and has connections with money and the local mob. Writer/director Qu weaves an engrossing tale involves multiple layers, all of whom have something to hide.
The truth of Chinese culture where what appears on the surface is always unclear is clearly reflected by the goings-on. Broken marriages, hotel fronts, the under-aged sex trade and illegal employment are just a few issues on display here.
The actress playing the attorney, the super-efficient, caring and brilliant mind steals the show. Top marks credited to all departments in this excellent and powerful debut by Vivian Qu, a film force now to be reckoned with.
Trailer: (unavailable)
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: THE OTHER SIDE OF HOPE (Finland 2017) ****
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writer:
Stars:
Dome Karukoski, Ville Virtanen, Tommi Korpela
The latest film by Master of deadpan comedy Aki Kuarismaki tackles the issue of the refugee crisis in Europe. As the film opens, the audience sees a Syrian refugee, Haji pull himself out of a coal dumpster in ship docked at a port in Finland. Khaled (Sherwan Haji) seeks refugee status but is ironically refused on the basis of peace in his region, just as news on the TV report multiple bombings in his town with dozens of casualties.
At the same time, a Finnish middle-aged man is seeking a new life for himself as he leaves his wife, wins money at poker and buys a restaurant business. The two meet after a fight and Haji is aided by the restaurant owner.
This is Kaurismaki’s most serious film to date and it sends an urgent message of the refugee status. Kaurismaki has still not lost his sense of humour as illustrated in an important scene in the film when Khaled says: “I love Finland like nothing you can imagine, but please get me out of here!”
For those familiar with Kaurismaki, there are familiar segments in this film that are found in his other films like the gambling, starting up a new restaurant business, the cute pet dog and the folk music.
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtiFG6utst8
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: DISAPPEARANCE (Norway 2017) ***
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writer:
Stars: Jakob Oftebro, Rifka Lodeizen, Elsie de Brauw
A silent reconciliation or attempt at that anyway, between daughter and concert pianist mother will immediately draw comparison with Ingmar Bergman’s classic AUTUMN SONATA.
In DISAPPEARANCE, Norwegian photojournalist Roos (Rifka Lodeizen) makes her annual visit home. In the film, she stops her car in the middle of a snow field to smoke a fag.
While reaching the home, loud barking dogs greet her. These are signs that things are going to be rough with mother. Such is the enjoyment of DISAPPEARANCE, a slow moving but pensive tale where the mother, Louise (Elsie de Brauw), a celebrated former concert pianist, remains as cold and remote as the wintry alpine landscape she inhabits, while Roos’ precocious 13-year-old half-brother, Bengt (Marcus Hanssen), continues to conduct his experiments with sound recording and mixing.
The audience witnesses a dramatic transformation has transpired in Roos as she reconciles with Louise, in this stunningly photographed film.
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToARBtyKts4
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: ALIAS GRACE (Canada 2017) ***
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Sarah Gadon, Edward Holcroft, Zachary Levi
ALIAS ALICE is a layered historical drama based on of Margaret Atwood’s Giller Prize–winning novel about a poor Irish servant accused and convicted of murder, from Canadians screenwriter Sarah Polley and director Mary Harron (AMERICAN PSYCHO).
This is a woman’s film all the way, and the female presence is felt – and in a good way. The story concerns the incident of Marks allegedly killing her wealthy employer, Thomas Kinnear, and his stern housekeeper, Nancy Montgomery, in Upper Canada in 1843.
Years later, as the adult Grace relates her story (as the film begins) to an increasingly appalled and distracted doctor brought in to assess her sanity, it becomes clear there’s far more at work here than widely assumed. The ALIAS PROJECT is filmed as a TV miniseries.
The film shown at TIFF, well shot, well acted, written and directed and even more impressive being for TV, is comprised of the first two episodes.
The film ends with the audience wanting for more.
TIFF 2017 Movie Review: DOWNSIZING (USA 2017) ****
Movie Reviews of films that will be playing at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival) in 2017. Go to TIFF 2017 Movie Reviews and read reviews of films showing at the festival.
Director:
Writers:
Stars:
Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau
DOWNSIZING, a film combining several genres offers the solution to the world’s problem of overpopulation.
If people can be reduced in size to a thousandth of their original, many of the world problems could be solved. People will only eat, use and dispose much, much less product. When science finally achieved the success of downsizing, many colonies were begun.
So, Matt Damon and wife opt to be reduced and live in their new reduced size colony for monetary benefit. Things never go as expected, as in a similar film long time back in Michael Crichton’s sci-fi WESTWORLD.
DOWNSIZING contains a script written by Payne and Jim Taylor that is occasionally brilliant with lots of attention to details. The film does not go into thriller territory but into more ambitious aims. Payne’s social satire does not fully work and ends up too ambitious for its own good.
Still, the film is engaging from start to finish to a large part to Damon’s performance with help from a host of impressive stars (Kristen Wiig, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau, Laura Dern, Jason Sudeikis, Alec Baldwin, and Neil Patrick Harris). Better a film that with high aims that falters that a minimalist film with no faults.
The special effects and cinematography are also amazing. Shot in Toronto and around the fiords of Norway.
Festival Reviews 