Harry here... DAMN - I really need to and want to see PUNCHDRUNK LOVE and BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE... I mean, it is just absolutely necessary. But it sounds like this was a really strong year up in the North Country. I completely miss being there for it. So here ya go....
Hey Harry,
Well, the Toronto Festival wraps up today. I saw something like 25 or 30 movies, but these are my favourites...
1. Punchdrunk Love (P.T. Anderson)
I can't really say how much I liked this movie. I liked it so much I saw it twice. And I'll see it again. Adam Sandler plays Barry Egan, a guy who sells toilet plungers and other novelties to hotels or resttaurants. One night he dials a phone sex line, and the girl starts threatening him, asking for money. In the meantime, he falls head over heels in love with Lena (Emily Watson). Sandler is perfect. Emily Watson is charming. The plot has three layers which all come together to make the best film I've seen all year. I heard a lot of people complain about the length of the film. I guess when you make two movies at two-and-a-half hours or more, you set a precendent, but every minute of this film has something in it. Simply amazing.
2. Bowling For Columbine (Michael Moore)
Moore's film will not be very well receieved by the American public. It makes the right wing and the media look very bad, and these people make up a noticable percentage of the population. Still, it's brilliant. Funny and tragic at the same time. The interview with Charleton Heston is brutal. Heston will never be looked at the same way again. The comparisons to Canadian society are drop-dead funny. This is Moore's best work since the first few episodes of TV Nation. The director said at the press conference that the largest theatre chain in American will not distribute the film, so it looks like United Artists is going to have a tough time getting people to see it.
3. 8 Femmes/8 Women (Francois Ouzon)
This movie starts off normally enough. Suzon (Virginie Leydoyen) comes home for the holidays. The family (which includes Catherine Deneuve, Fanny Ardent, and Isabelle Huppart) chat for a while, and then they all break out in song. Yep. French musical. Anyway, turns out Daddy is dead and one of the women did it. They spend the film revealing secret pasts and, well, singing. It sounds strange, and it is, but it's a lot of fun. It comes to theatres in the next couple of weeks.
4. Auto Focus (Paul Schraeder)
The story of Bob Crane (star of Hogan's Heroes) is hilarious, sad, and sometimes just weird. "I'm a likeable guy," Greg Kinnear says, as Crane, at the beginning of the film. It's true. Everyone seemed to like Bob Crane. But Crane got involved with a video specialist named John Carpenter (Willem Dafoe), who led him to a life of alcohol and sex addiction. Kinnear and Dafoe are outstanding. The film does a fine job of showing just how naive Crane was about his problem, and the threat of his best friend, "Carpy." If I have one issue with the film, it is that they mention some things about Crane's behaviour that should have been explored on film (showing amateur porn to Donna Reed), but overall, Aut Focus is a great biopic, which will likely put Kinnear's career back on track.
5. Dirty Pretty Things (Stephen Frears)
Is it just me, or does Stephen Frears make five movies a year? Every time I turn around, there's a new Frears movie in the theatre. The director is hit or miss, but this is a hit. The story follows illegal immigrants living in Europe, and the lengths they will go to for freedom. Sergi Lopez (With a Friend Like Harry) is fantastically scary as the boss of a hotel, and Audrey Tautou (Amelie) pulls of her first english-speaking role as a young Turkish woman (although they go to great lengths in the movie to cover up how frighteningly skinny the actress is in real life). The thriller has a great story and a perfect visual look for the subject matter.
Worst of the Festival
1. Frida (Julie Taymor)
Nope. Just not doing it. Hayek and Molina are fine, but the story jumps forward too quickly, and let's be honest -- Hayek is too pretty to portray elderly Frida. This is one of those movies that tries so hard to be everything at once, but fails on so many levels. Oh, and Ed Norton is in it for 30 seconds.
2. Spun (Jonus Akerlund)
I think someone forgot to tell Jonus Akerlund he wasn't making music videos anymore. This is a terrible case of style over substance. Nothing happens, and all the tricks are ripped off from Requiem for a Dream. I have no idea how this film landed a distribution deal at the festival. What ridiculous excess.
3. Assassination Tango (Robert Duvall)
Robert Duvall: So I have this idea for a movie. I'm going to go to Guatemala and learn how to Tango. What do you think?
Studio Exec: How about, you do that, but can you also throw in some ridiculous story about you being a hitman, and in the last 20 minutes, a lot of people will get shot.
Robert Duvall: Okay, I want Sandra Bullock and Julia Roberts.
Studio Exec: We'll give you Kathy Baker and a box of macaroni.
Duvall: Macaroni! I love the smell of synthetic chees in the morning!
That's all from Toronto!
Love Peppermint.
