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We Need to Talk About Kevin - 8/10 – I thought the above trailer for this looked really good so I was really excited for this, Now, I haven't read the book myself but those I know who did were disappointed with this movie. And it definitely feels like something was lost in bringing the book to film. Lynne Ramsay's direction is terrific and Swinton is great, but I felt like the film missed its mark a little bit. Want to watch this one again though.
Wuthering Heights - 6/10 - Gritty and realistic adaptation of the Emily Bronte novel. An interesting experiment by Andrea Arnold, a director I quite like. First half was good, second half couldn’t keep my attention. I know the main character Heathcliff isn't supposed to be an overly sympathetic character or anything but I found him quite loathsome.
Dark Horse - 7/10 – New film from Todd Solondz about a fat 35 year old man-child who lives with his parents (Christopher Walken, Mia Farrow) and buys expensive action figures, he meets a depressed Selma Blair at a wedding and the two begin a weird relationship. Went in with low expectations because I’ve found Solondz post Happiness work to be spotty at best and the reviews coming out of Venice were not very good. I found it pretty funny and actually quite interesting. The third act turns into a surreal series of dreams that sympathetically examine how big fat fucking losers perceive themselves and those around them. This also had my favourite post movie Q&A. Solondz was super awkward and weird but really nice at the same time. Think the Q&A is on youtube actually.
Shame - 9/10 - My favourite film of the fest, probably my favourite film since The Wrestler. A poetic character study about a corporate Manhattanite that has “sex addiction”. Fassbender turns in the best performance of his career and Steve McQueen managed to surpass his brilliant Hunger with this one. Despite being about addiction it isn’t anything like Requiem for a Dream, which I found to be a sensationalized depiction of the destruction of addiction, and goes a somewhat more subtle route, and more effectively examines how addiction can be symptomatic of something larger. Also had the most depressing threesome scene ever and Fassbender has a magnificent penis.
I Wish - 8/10 – Hirozaku Kore-eda is one of my favourite living directors and one of the few Japanese directors continuing the humanistic tradition of the golden age of Japanese cinema and not making fucked up action/horror movies. Doing what he does best here, although a little more accessible.
Rebellion - 6/10 – La Haine is a masterpiece but everything Kassovitz has done since has been shit. This was okay. I don’t know, nothing really memorable.
Killer Joe - 7/10 Kinda like a trashy version of an early Coen brothers movie. Matthew McConaughey is refreshingly dark and makes Gina Gershon simulate giving him a blowjob, using a piece of KFC chicken.
Alps - 8/10 – New movie from Dogtooth director Giorgos Lanthimos, not as good or as visceral as Dogtooth but still enjoyable. It’s about a group of people who are paid to act as recently deceased people to make the grieving process easier for families. It’s a bit of a mess of a film but Lanthimos style and deadpan humour is so engaging that I feel like watching it again.
Jeff, Who Lives at Home - 7/10 – New Duplass brothers movie, I think I prefer the dark awkwardness of Cyrus, but this was still good. This was their most plotty and accessible movie, but they don’t abandon their unique style. I also liked that it was funny, but there wasn’t really any jokes.
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia - 9/10 - Loves this one as well. Ceylan's crime story leaves out the extraneous details to focus what is universal for all violent acts and the investigations that follow. There are people involved with the investigation, people who kill, and the family of the victims. The film isn't overly clinical either, lots of humour, emotion and of course Ceylan's unique and evolving cinematic rhetoric.
The Descendants - 7/10 – New Alexander Payne movie starring George Clooney. Clooney plays an out of touch father/husband who suddenly has to take the lead now that his wife is in a coma and her Will stipulates to have her life support removed. He later finds out his wife was cheating on him and wants to find the dude she was fucking. I like Payne’s adult approach to filmmaking, and he does a good job balancing the movies sadness with humour. This will probably get a lot of Oscar buzz.
Drive - 8/10 – Loved the quiet moodiness of the direction. Surprised by the movies ultra violence however. Kinda curious what the average person will think of this one, I wonder if most people are expecting something similar to the Fast and the Furious movies.
Into the Abyss - 7/10 - Werner Herzog documentary about a triple homicide in Texas. It lacks Herzog’s quirkiness and at times felt a little Datelineish but Herzog knows how to ask better questions than any TV journalist hack and he slowly peels back the interesting fabric of people’s lives. He even interviews one of the killers who is eight days away from being executed. The movie is unquestionably anti-capital punishment, but Herzog doesn’t lecture, he shows it how it is, and how this horrible practice damages the lives of all involved. Including, a correctional officer who was involved with hundreds of state killings, at one point was even doing two a week. Eventually the job broke him down, and he had to jeopardize his pension by quitting, he justifies the decision and poignantly asks us to question our own mortality by pointing out that on your tombstone there is a birth a death and in-between these things there is a hyphen, and asks “How are you going to live you dash?”
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