TIFF

Wilby Wonderful Just Sappy Enough

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 11:29 am
Quirky dark comedies with ensemble casts are quickly becoming a Canadian cinema cliche, but Wilby Wonderful manages to feel like much more than the same old thing. Observing the trials and tribulations of a number of loosely connected islanders over the course of a day, it's sort of like a small town Magnolia with a local scandal looming, instead...
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Tarnation Is Awkward Therapy

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 11:27 am
There's one nice thing you can say about Jonathan Caouette: reportedly making Tarnation for just over $200, he's clearly resourceful. The rest, however, is up for debate. Tarnation is being heralded as an experimental film, but there's really nothing new about the collage of home movies, film clips, photos and narration or the way that they're...
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Movie Review

Siblings Is Acceptable Black Comedy

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 11:20 am
Although cool and somewhat funny, Siblings isn't quite as wickedly hilarious as its premise would suggest. A black comedy about a group of step-siblings that sort-of-accidentally kill their evil stepparents and have to cover it up to receive their inheritance (played with malevolent fun by Sonja Smits and Nicholas Campbell), the film pulls no...
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Movie Review

Saw's Gore Ain't A Masterpiece

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 11:08 am
Take Seven and add a dash of Cube. Now add lots of blood and gore. No, even more than that. Still more. The pitch for this film probably sounded a lot like that. Two men wake up in a dank and dirty cell to find themselves chained to opposite ends. There's a dead body in the middle holding a tape player and each man has a tape in his pocket. While...
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Movie Review

Primer Is Strictly For Nerds

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 11:01 am
When you have $7,000 to make a sci-fi thriller, you have to compensate for your lack of special effects with an intelligent and engaging story. Engineer-cum-Director/Writer/Star Shane Carruth gets it half right with Primer. With a plot that digs deeply into the ramifications of inventing a time-travel device, Primer is definitely an intelligent...
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Movie Review

Phil The Alien Is Silly Fun

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 10:58 am
Phil The Alien is definitely an absurd film, but it manages to play its subject matter just straight enough to keep from devolving into pure silliness. After his spaceship crashes on Earth, Phil shape shifts into human form. He soon develops a drinking problem and befriends a talking beaver. Eventually, he finds Jesus and joins a band to spread...
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Movie Review

Mondovino Has Spirit(s)

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By Joel McConvey (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 10:55 am
Despite its lengthy running time, Mondovino is one of the most agreeable films to come out of this year's fest. Filmmaker and sommelier Jonathan Nossiter takes his hand-held camera from Burgundy to the Napa Valley in California, profiling a variety of colourful characters from the wine world. The lovely scenery, light mood and plenitude of random...
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Movie Review

The Limb Salesman Too Bad To Be Good

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 10:50 am
Years from now, people might look back on The Limb Salesman as a classic so-bad-it's-good B movie in the grand tradition of Plan 9 and The Bad Seed. The concept of water as a rare delicacy will be seen as charmingly ridiculous instead of annoyingly stupid. Viewers might just chuckle at it, instead of wondering why no one's dead or the least bit...
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Movie Review

Kontroll Could Be Better

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) November 16, 2008 10:44 am
Big budget Hollywood films aren't the only ones that suffer from the problem of style over substance. While Kontroll has absolutely stunning cinematography (the architecture of Budapest's subway system is used to full effect here), likeable characters and a cool, throbbing techno soundtrack, the weak plot keeps it from becoming more than the sum...
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Movie Review

This Beautiful City

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) September 17, 2007 3:17 pm
Directed by: Ed Gass-Donnelly Starring: Kristin Booth, Caroline Cave, Aaron Poole While a story about the intersecting lives of a rich and troubled married couple, a depressed police officer searching for his lost daughter, a drug-addicted prostitute and her nearly clean lover and pimp may sound outlandish and gimmicky, it actually makes...
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Music Review
This Beautiful City

Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) September 17, 2007 11:00 am
Directed by: Paul Crowder, Murray Lerner Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who is every bit as flashy, modish, raucous and cool as the band it explores. An impressive mix of archival footage, celebrity commentary and new interviews, the film is a visual, substantial and musical treat. Chronicling everything from the members' loosely...
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Live Review
Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who

Sleuth

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) September 12, 2007 3:54 pm
Directed by: Kenneth Branagh Starring: Jude Law, Michael Caine Sleuth is the rare breed of remake that can sit comfortably alongside its predecessor. Neither is explicitly better than the other, but both offer their own unique and devilish take on the whipsmart Anthony Shaffer play. In this version, adapted by the legendary Harold Pinter, Jude...
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Sleuth

Just Buried

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By Hannah Guy (CHARTattack) September 12, 2007 3:48 pm
Directed by: Chaz Thorne Starring: Rose Byrne, Jay Baruchel, Graham Greene There's nothing more irritating than a good idea ineptly delivered. Director Chaz Thorne takes a charming and quirky little concept — neurotic doofus (Baruchel) inherits a funeral home and drums up business by gradually offing people who create problems — and flogs it to...
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Just Buried

I'm Not There

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By Jodi Goulart (CHARTattack) September 12, 2007 3:44 pm
Directed by: Todd Haynes Starring: Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Richard Gere, Julianne Moore, Ben Whishaw, Marcus Carl Franklin, Charlotte Gainsbourg Director Todd Haynes' I'm Not There can't entirely be labeled as a biopic of legendary singer-songwriter/poet Bob Dylan. Rather, it's an interpretation of the life of Dylan that...
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I'm Not There

Control

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By Hannah Guy (CHARTattack) September 12, 2007 3:32 pm
Directed by: Anton Corbijn Starring: Sam Riley, Samantha Morton, Harry Treadaway "It's black and white. It's not very fast. It's about the '70s." And thus director Anton Corbijn succinctly introduced the film festival audience to his debut full-length feature. And it's an accurate summation. Unless you've been living in a Nike shoebox...
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Control

Shake Hands With The Devil

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By Sarah Kurchak (CHARTattack) September 10, 2007 2:30 pm
Directed by: Roger Spottiswoode Starring: Roy Dupuis, Deborah Kara Unger Lieutenant General Romeo Dallaire's story has already been told so well in his award-winning book and in Peter Raymont's subsequent documentary that this feature film adaptation faces some high expectations. Unfortunately, more often than not, it fails to meet them....
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Shake Hands With The Devil

Joy Division: The Movie

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By Kevin Ritchie (CHARTattack) September 10, 2007 2:21 pm
JOY DIVISION (Real To Reel) Directed by: Grant Gee Although Joy Division delves into the back story of one of rock's most influential and beloved bands, British music video director/cinematographer Grant Gee largely focuses on the short, tormented life of the group's ghostly-pale lead singer, Ian Curtis. Mixing archival performance footage,...
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Movie Review
Joy Division - The Movie

The Jane Austen Book Club

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By Hannah Guy (CHARTattack) September 10, 2007 2:16 pm
Directed by: Robin Swicord Starring: Kathy Baker, Maria Bello, Emily Blunt, Hugh Dancy, Maggie Grace, Jimmy Smits, Kevin Zegers You can never judge a book by its cover, but there are times when you can gauge a target movie audience by its title. Book club? Jane Austen? A group of women? Chances are if these things turn your tummy, this sure as...
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The Jane Austen Book Club

Heavy Metal In Baghdad

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By Keith Carman (CHARTattack) September 10, 2007 2:11 pm
Directed by: Eddy Moretti, Suroosh Alvi Foregoing the argument of how dedicated a metal fan is to their music, Heavy Metal In Baghdad is a shocking documentary that proves just how disgustingly easy North America has it. While we whine about not getting enough sugar in our morning coffee, a group of young men are ducking SCUD missiles and...
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Heavy Metal In Baghdad

U2, Pearl Jam Films Coming To TIFF

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By CHARTattack Staff (CHARTattack) July 26, 2011 11:39 am
Rock fans will have plenty to get excited about at this year's Toronto International Film Festival, which will feature documentaries about U2 and Pearl Jam.From The Sky Down, a David Guggenheim-directed (An Inconvenient Truth, It Might Get Loud) film about U2, will open TIFF on Sept. 8, marking the first time a documentary has done so. Meanwhile,...
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