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Toronto 2014 Review: Stylish And Well Performed, SCARLET INNOCENCE Surprises And Delights

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Toronto 2014 Review: Stylish And Well Performed, SCARLET INNOCENCE Surprises And Delights

Toronto 2014 Review: Stylish And Well Performed, SCARLET INNOCENCE Surprises And Delights

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 11:40 PM PDT

Adapted from a Korean folk tale and starting off as a softly lensed romantic melodrama, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Scarlet Innocence, the latest work from noted visual stylist Yim Pil-sung, must be primed for a local audience. Yet this surprising genre-bending effort, which is having its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, holds off from showing its true colors until it has lulled you into a comfortable reverie. A successful exercise in subverting expectations, Scarlet Innocence may also prove a watershed moment for Yim, an acclaimed director whose high profile and gorgeously designed works have so far failed to translate into box office returns. Following a scandal involving a younger student, Hak-kyu, a young and dashing literature professor, retreats to the...

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Toronto 2014 Review: Roskam's THE DROP Is A Top Notch Crimer And Fitting Goodbye For Gandolfini

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 11:10 PM PDT

Michael Roskam burst onto the scene three years ago with his Belgian bovine crime drama Bullhead. The film thrilled audiences from Berlin to Fantastic Fest and went on to score a nomination for the Best Foreign Language Oscar. We've been waiting patiently to see what Roskam would do next, and the film gods have smiled upon us as Roskam's sophomore outing is every bit the apt follow-up that Bullhead deserves. A taut crime drama in Roskam's signature slow burn style, The Drop announces Roskam to English language audiences in a big way. Set on the mean streets of Brooklyn, The Drop tells the story of taciturn bartender Bob Saginowski, played exquisitely by Tom Hardy. Bob pours drinks at his cousin Marv's place, Cousin Marv's. But...

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Toronto 2014 Review: NIGHTCRAWLER Out Networks NETWORK

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 10:01 PM PDT

Soon after seeing this film, I just kind of blurted out what this film meant to me when talking to fellow critics - it may be premature to declare it as such, but what the hell: Nightcrawler is my Network. Sidney Lumet's 1976 film is a scathing commentary on the News business, but it's also mildly preposterous. As a film it's magnificent, with some stunning performances, but there's a heightened theatricality to the work, an operatic quality about being mad as hell that's infectious while at the same time implausible. Nightcrawler, on the other hand, is both scathing and entirely plausible, all wrapped up in an entertaining film. An examination of the moral morass of the modern media landscape, as well as a dissertation...

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Exclusive: Your First Look At Canadian Horror BLACKBURN

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 09:01 PM PDT

Twitch has your first look at the Canadian horror flick Blackburn! We have the brand new teaser and a collection of stills from the production which just wrapped up in British Columbia and is heading into post.Directed by stunt veteran Lauro Chartrand (Born To Raise Hell) and written by Natasha Baron the flick follows five college friends who seek refuge in the ghost town of Blackburn, Alaska. Cut off by a forest fire and rock slide they hunker down in an abandoned mine. Yet all is not lost! The friends must band together against these angry and deformed inhabitants if they are to survive! Blackburn stars Calum Worthy (Disney's Austin & Ally), Lochlyn Munro (Freddy vs. Jason), Sarah Lind (WolfCop) and Emily Ullerup (Sanctuary). Also joining...

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Toronto 2014 Review: THE LITTLE DEATH, Kinky, Tragic, Hilarious

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 07:45 PM PDT

Josh Lawson is a charming and cheeky fellow. His goofiness on screen and well-mannered presence has permeated execrable dross from Australia and made it watchable. His painful turn as Doug, the loser partner in Showtime's black comedy series House of Lies, is probably the face he is most known for, but The Little Death is his directorial debut, and will be his defining success to date.The little death is slang for orgasm. It is by design, then, that this lustful urge and need fuels most of these tales of sex, relationships and philias from inner city suburbia in Australia. Each vignette interrupts one another, seemingly disconnected but each telling their wonderfully perverse, twisted and dark story. The pleasant interiors, calm lighting and general calm ambiance...

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Toronto 2014 Review: THE PRICE WE PAY, One Of The Most Compelling Docs Of The Year

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 05:00 PM PDT

It's not often that something as dry as tax theory can result in an engrossing night at the movies, but credit Harold Crooks and his team for providing an exceptional articulation about the vagaries of "off shoring" in an accessible, engaging way with The Price We Pay. Crooks builds upon the framework he set with his 2003 Sundance winning doc The Corporation, maintaining the same level of even hadndedness when required with a streak of advocacy running through but never overwhelming the storytelling. In many ways, The Price We Pay is even more balanced in its presentation, giving many voices from the world of finance a chance to dispassionately (but eloquently and engagingly) articulate the very real, very surreal world of virtual shell accounts,...

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Australia's 15th Lavazza Italian Film Festival Has An Effervescent Lineup

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 01:00 PM PDT

The Lavazza Italian Film Festival playing across Australia is now in its 15th year. The festival has brought the best mainstream and accessible Italian festival titles to Australian shores and this year is no exception. The festival is tighter than ever with some highly curated and impressive program segments that are as delectable as any top tier cucina menu.Check the gallery below for more on the festival, as well as my top five most anticipated films.The festival runs from 17th September to 22nd of October. Check the website for further details per state and city....

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Kyoto 2014: Lineup Highlights Ancient Capital's Filmmaking Past

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 12:00 PM PDT

The newly re-branded Kyoto International Film and Art Festival has introduced a lineup that focuses on older works, particularly from the city's film-making past, as much as it does on newer titles. With the introduction of the Mifune Toshiro Award, and his son Shiro in attendance and sitting on the jury, a couple of the great actor's classics will be shown, along with works from Clint Eastwood and Irene Jacobs, recipients of the clunkily titled new 'Most Respect' Award. Sections are dedicated to Buster Keaton, Fatty Arbuckle, and Japanese classic comedy director Torajiro Saito, along with a rare screening of Kyoto based b-movie Daimaijin. Really, the old stuff threatens to outshine the new. Of the later works the excellent Fuku-chan of Fukufuku Flats (read the review here),...

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Toronto 2014 Review: CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA Will Age Gracefully

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 11:00 AM PDT

The eponymous image of Clouds of Sils Maria features a heavenly mist snaking its way through mountain peaks like a river, the rocks frozen in time, immutable, the clouds in perpetual motion.It is shown as shot for Olivier Assayas in 2014, and the characters in the film at one point watch the 1924 Arnold Fank silent, black and white documentary The Cloud Phenomena of Majola. The technology and aesthetics have changed, but filmmaking keeps on rumbling chaotically along as the images themselves become fixed and un-aging. No matter how many films Assayas makes, he cannot help himself from being a film critic-historian. As with many of the auteur directors of the French New Wave a generation or more before him, he wrote for Cahiers Du Cinema before...

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Toronto 2014 Review: HECTOR AND THE SEARCH FOR HAPPINESS, Cluelessly Earnest

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 10:30 AM PDT

The patron saint of smashing entitlement into smithereens, Louis C.K., has a great bit about being Caucasian. The gist of it is that he can hop in a time machine and go back in history, and there will be a waiter attentively greeting him, "Your table is right over her, sir."  With all the think pieces being written about white privilege in the wake of Ferguson, Missouri, the timing is exquisitely poor for Peter Chelsom's Hector and the Search for Happiness (hereafter Hector) the story of a wealthy white working professional who gets to travel the world, often seated first class, to find out why he should stay with his girlfriend and procreate -- if this were a sharper, more satirical affair, the words Consume and...

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Full Trailer For Donnie Yen's KUNG FU JUNGLE Combines Intense Drama With Hard-hitting Action

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 10:00 AM PDT

Donnie Yen's latest film Kung Fu Jungle reteams the action star with director Teddy Chen (Bodyguards And Assassins) and co-star Wang Baoqiang (Iceman). The film's full trailer is now available and it looks intense and exciting. With any luck, this might just be Yen's best film in quite a while. Official Synopsis (via Film Combat Syndicate): A vicious killer (Wang Baoqiang) is going round Hong Kong killing top martial arts exponents. When convicted killer and kung fu expert, Xia (Donnie Yen) hears of this, he offers to help the police catch the killer, in return for his freedom. However, the canny and lethal killer eludes them again and again. Although the latter has made it quite clear that Xia would be his ultimate challenge, Xia refuses...

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Watch An Exclusive Clip From The Ford Brothers' THE DEAD 2

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 09:00 AM PDT

They unleashed hordes of the undead on continental Africa with The Dead and now brother act Jon and Howard Ford are doing the same in India with the sequel to their indie hit, The Dead 2. A ship docks fresh from Somalia which contains one infected worker that passes unnoticed into the very heart of India's overpopulated bustling streets, setting off an unstoppable chain of events. Meanwhile, American turbine engineer Nicholas Burton (Joseph Millson, Casino Royale) is working in the stark yet tranquil Indian countryside when he receives a call from his love Ishani (Meenu), a local girl who lives on the outskirts of the slums of Mumbai and who has hidden their relationship from her tradition-minded father. She reveals she is now pregnant and...

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Beyond Fest Is Back!

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 08:30 AM PDT

Oh, how they grow up so fast. Just last year Beyond Fest was merely a new born suckling at the crusty teet of its six-headed mother from Mars (they need moms). And now, it's walking and talking and throwing shrunken voodoo heads around in the zero-g room (we never should have built that godforsaken place!)Yes, folks, Los Angeles' Beyond Fest, our fractal city's new champ when it comes to top notch genre fare from around the globe, is happening at the American Cinematheque at The Egyptian, September 25 - October 4. Basically what I am saying is, even though I am going to Fantastic Fest, you might as well stay put and just go to Beyond, because it too, is fantastic (I'm gonna get in...

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BITTER HONEY: Exclusive Clip Highlights Sour Results Of Polygamous Marriage In Indonesia

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 07:30 AM PDT

In an new, exclusive clip from the upcoming Bitter Honey, opening in Los Angeles on October 3 and in New York and several other cities on October 31, we get a taste of life in a polygamous relationship. And, as you might have guessed from the title of the movie, it's not a very rosy look. Robert Lemelson, who directed, combines his experience as an anthropologist and documentary filmmaker to tell the story of three polygamous families in Bali, Indonesia. The story is told over a period of seven years. As the official synopsis states in part: The film portrays the plight of Balinese co-wives, for whom marriage is frequently characterized by psychological manipulation, infidelity, domestic violence, and economic hardship. Much more information is available...

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Review: It's Baudrillard Revisited In Czech Anti-Rom DELIGHT

Posted: 05 Sep 2014 06:00 AM PDT

Czech director Jitka Rudolfová rejoins the ranks of emerging filmmakers worth following. Her feature debut, a sort of generational observation piece called Dreamers, focuses on a group of friends in their 30's who decide to change their aimless lives. Delight is cut from the same cloth, however Rudolfová pushes the idea into a captivating, complex and bleak dimension, effectively epitomizing complicated existence in a hyperreal world. Milena, a film editor in her 30s, catches herself entangled in a relationship where her sole meaningful communication occurs via text message. Her professional life seems to be battlefield as she tries to maintain the integrity of a project while its director, focused only on being able to finish and sell a documentary on transvestites, is willing to submit to...

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