Hey folks, Harry here with another set of reviews from Toronto, this time from our old buddy Rolo Tomasi. He gives us another look at THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE and the new Juliette Lewis Indie... So let's hop to it shall we? Here ya go....
Hey Harry,
RoloTomasi here...every night I go to the Uptown Theatre here in Beautiful T.O., without a ticket to my name, and yet somehow, I find my way into the hot ticket screenings. Sunday night it was THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE, and Monday, NINE QUEENS. What can I say? I'm the guy who gets away with it....
THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE (Mexico)
Everyone here has been making a big deal about Guillermo Del Toro. I've only seen MIMIC, and I wasn't blown away by it...in fact I don't think I remember anything about it four years after the fact. So I entered this screening a blank slate,knowing nothing, ready to be blown away. Hell, I wouldn't have even expected a ghost story if Del Toro hadn't given it away in his introduction! The film begins with a pile of images - a mysterious doorway, the bomb bay of an airplane, a wounded child, heavy images that dare you not to respond to them. What are we seeing? Is it the end of the film? Is it the beginning? I rarely walk into a movie without some kind of context for what I'm about to see, and love the way Del Toro sets these images up. We know they'll be explained by the end, and we just settle back to enjoy the ride.
You can get the synopsis from any other review here, so I'll just give my opinion (Whatever that's worth). Del Toro lets the story flow slowly, building up suspense over the first hour. Atmosphere is established - the setting is isolated, emotions run high, the Spanish Civil War is right outside the gates - the film is quiet and eerie - in some ways reminiscent of THE SHINING. Del Toro has cited the ghost stories of Henry James as an influence, and I've only read Turn of The Screw, but I remember that foreboding feel I got from that book. Del Toro's slow, steady buildup of the mystery is especially effective once he unleashes absolute carnage of the desert orphanage where the film takes place. After an hour in Del Toro's grip, he lets loose with a violence that feels like nothing less than the apocalypse. The acting is uniformly excellent (Marisa Paredes and Federico Luppi are particularly touching as the principal and science teacher, whose romance is a nice touch of melodrama). The adults however are a distraction - this film belongs to the children of the orphanage. This film is about how they survive the extraordinary situation of war, affected by it, even in the isolation of the desert.
Sony Pictures Classics has picked up the film, so chances are it'll play major cities.
NINE QUEENS (Argentina)
Another SPC pickup - May not be for everyone. Towards the end of the film, the woman sitting next to me was putting on makeup! Still, if I noticed, I obviously wasn't giving it my full attention either.
The movie plays out similarly to David Mamet's HOUSE OF GAMES. This isn't a better film, but I think it benefits from a director with a better visual flair than Mamet (Or at least Mamet Circa 1987). Marcos (Ricardo Darin, looking a little bit like Joe Mantegna did in House of Games) is a veteran con man who picks up a young prospect about to be arrested for a swindle involving switched change at a convenience store. Juan (Gaston Pauls, looking nothing like Lindsay Crouse), the younger shark, is a good short con operator, but he's brash, impatient, and needs discipline. Marcos is in desparate need of a partner, and convinces Juan to stick with him, just for one day. The first 25 minutes of this movie is spent literally following these two men around the streets of Buenos Aires (I'm guessing here), as they move from one con to another. A call from an old partner of Marcos' pulls the pair into a scam involving the titular stamp collection, which could be the big score both small-timers are looking for. As Marcos leads them through the scam, more and more people get involved, and the pair find themselves in bed with half the population of Argentina just to pull off this one scam. Marcos, the veteran, appears to be losing ground with each new deal he makes and each new share he cuts, while he tries to maintain the role of tutor to Juan.
The two things that make the film work are the sharp dialogue and the great chemistry between the two leads. We have to follow them for the entire film, and the fact is that writer/director Fabian Bielinsky has managed to make them likeable, even while they con an old lady out of her precious heirloom ring. And the film feels realistic, unfolding over a 24 hour period. Some scenes don't work, like a short chase sequence where two people chase a motorcycle on foot, or a confused bathroom scene where Marcos initiates the big deal. This is not a big deal - this is one of those movies you'll walk out of liking it, but comparing it to other, better films you've seen before. Bielinsky shows promise - he just needs his own voice.
PICTURE CLAIRE
It's playing the festival, but I actually saw it in a test screening 4 months ago, so I'm sketchy on the details, some of which may have changed...
Juliette Lewis takes her top off. I put that first so you Americans won't tune out the second I mention that this is a Canadian movie(Like you give a rat's ass about Canada). She also doesn't speak much during the film. In fact, she plays a French Quebecer who shows up in Toronto ("No speak Hanglish"). She informed on some biker gangs, and let me tell you that biker gangs can be nasty customers, they leave her quite literally without a bed to sleep in. She rushes to Toronto, because she knows someone there, a photographer she had a one night stand with. Once she gets there, she finds herself in the middle of a caper involving a dead thug (Mickey Rourke), a mystery woman (Gina Gershon), and a couple of crooked cops. This is fun stuff if you live in Toronto, because you can spot all your favorite landmarks.
The problem with this movie is that it's overly stylized - I love Bruce McDonald's raw grimy humor. His Canadian sitcom, TWITCH CITY is the only one I've ever seen that seems to revel in Urban squalor. I haven't seen HARD CORE LOGO, but I loved HIGHWAY 61, which he made with Don McKellar 10 years ago. There's very little of that sense of humour here. This film randomly uses colors, lunar imagery, and splitscreens (Like 15 screens at once) to tell its story. There doesn't seem to be reason or rhyme to the design, it's just like paint thrown at canvas. And the story itself never managed, for me anyway, to justify the style.
An interesting effort, but ultimately unsatisfying.
Rolo out...
