Hey folks, Harry here and... well looks like "you heard it at AICN first" on this title. Art Snob has been a Toronto correspondent for AICN for the last 5-6 years, and he's always called em well, and this review has definitely struck my interest. This seems like a really great movie, which is nice, because... frankly, all the successes we've heard from Toronto this year were anticipated titles. Titles that anyone with a credits list and a bit of luck could pick from the crowd. Here's one, nobody really saw coming. Here ya go...
Harry:
Here's an exclusive on the best TIFF movie that nobody seems to have mentioned yet. Believe me, you want to be able to say "you heard it at AICN first" about this movie.
Art Snob here. I just finished the first leg of my annual journey around Lake Ontario to the Toronto Film Festival. I was bummed-to-the-max that the Rochester-Toronto ferry service was halted indefinitely just two days before I was ready to set sail, but the city and the movies lifted my spirits in short order. Incest … pedophilia … nymphomania … homicide … patricide … genocide … torture … annihilation … ah, this is a festival after my own heart!
I saw some very good stuff, including HOTEL RWANDA, KINSEY, UNDERTOW, SILVER CITY, HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS, CREEP, A DIRTY SHAME and THE WOODSMAN, but I’m most compelled to give a heads-up for the decidedly BEST movie that I saw, a New Zealand gem that seems to have slipped under everyone else’s radar so far: IN MY FATHER’S DEN.
Most Americans have only seen three movies from New Zealand in their lives – all of them fantasies from the same director – but discriminating cinephiles such as yours truly are also aware of powerful dramas such as WHALE RIDER, HEAVENLY CREATURES, ONCE WERE WARRIORS and THE PIANO. IMFD is in the same league with all of these, and I would rate it as clearly superior to TIFF 2002 audience award winner WHALE RIDER. (Ditto for its young newcomer star Emily Barclay being a bigger talent than RIDER’s Oscar-nominated star, Keisha Castle-Hughes.)
The film is one of the rarest of cinematic treats … an INTELLIGENT mystery. There are no red herrings or odd information clues in this movie, and there’s no hit-you-over-the-head exposition, either. The story unfolds at a deliberate pace that may seem just a bit slow in the beginning, but things kick into high gear following a major plot development a little past midway. There’s much playing around with timelines and flashbacks, but it’s all done in a smooth, rhythmic way that doesn’t seem forced or gimmicky in the slightest. It’s like seeing the pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle steadily coalesce until a masterpiece is revealed.
The barebones outline of the story is as follows: A successful but world-weary war photographer named Paul Prior returns home to a small New Zealand community for the funeral of his father. He’d left as a young man seventeen years earlier, and his younger brother Andrew who stayed behind doesn’t seem particularly welcoming … even less so when it turns out that Paul is going to share the inheritance equally, when Andrew was the one who took care of the father in his later years. The father had been an atheist who kept a hidden den on the family grounds where he could indulge in free-thinking literature and other delights. He’d taken Paul into his confidence and shown it to him prior to his departure, and in the process of examining the run-down grounds, Paul discovers a young 16-year-old girl trespasser named Celia using the now-dilapidated den as a hideaway to pursue her love of writing. He sends her away, but later discovers that she’s the illegitimate daughter of an old flame of his … and that he may very well be her father.
With the final settlement of the estate taking longer than expected, Paul decides to stay and take up a position teaching journalism at the badly understaffed local school, with Celia being one of his students. She can’t stand the cloistered environment of the remote community and is attracted to the well-traveled Paul, possibly feeling a paternal pull as well. They become close friends and see each other with increasing frequency until raised eyebrows in the community force them to start meeting in secret. During this time, Celia’s writing talent keeps growing, until she finally wins second prize in a major creative writing contest. (The framing device of the movie is her reciting haunting lines from this short story.)
Then one day, Celia turns up missing. A packed suitcase hidden in her bedroom indicates that she was planning on running away, but didn’t for some reason. Everything points to Paul, but he knows that he hasn’t been set up. The resentment over the relationship that had been simmering amongst the townsfolk and his family turns nasty, and Paul decides to try and find out by himself exactly what happened.
You may think you can guess what the deal is, but believe me, you’re wrong. With Hollywood mystery movies, I can almost always see what’s coming a mile ahead, but this was one time when I didn’t know what the answer was until the movie showed me … and the denouement was completely consistent with everything that had come before.
Kudos time: This film is a major breakthrough for director Brad McGann, who had only directed a few inconsequential minor works before this. Ditto for British actor Matthew MacFadyen, who seems to have definitely made the major jump from TV to movies. Supporting players Colin Moy as Andrew and Miranda Otto (A.K.A. Eowyn) as his wife are first-rate, also. And cinematographer Stuart Dryburgh, who earned an Oscar nomination for his work in THE PIANO, deserves another one for this movie. The film makes wonderful use of the stunning New Zealand scenery without ever overdoing it in travelogue fashion. (Note: the cinematography was fantastic, and the film’s producer apologized prior to the screening that this was a SUBSTANDARD print.)
The real revelation though, is the aforementioned Emily Barclay as Celia. She received a major ovation from the audience at the post-screening Q & A. I’ll bet that she’ll soon be awarded the HIGHEST honor that Hollywood bestows upon talented young actresses with cute-but-not-cover-girl looks: a “best friend/confidante” supporting role in a Hillary Duff/Lindsay Lohan/Anne Hathaway/Keira Knightley movie.
I really want to see the movie again, so I’m afraid this means that it won’t be available in the States anytime soon. (Two years later, and I’m STILL waiting for a repeat viewing of the last TIFF movie I saw with a talented young actress – LILJA 4-EVER.) Sad to say, but IMFD just might be too thoughtful, too artistic to have any chance of box office success over here. It’s a fine wine for an audience that only wants Jolt Cola.
After only a four-day stint at the fest, I’m elated at how much better this one is than last year’s. Still to come for me on my second leg: GOING UPRIVER, PRIMER, THE LIBERTINE, OLD BOY and SAW. If one of these can surpass IN THE DEN OF MY FATHER and get my audience choice vote, this will have been the best TIFF of the seven I’ve attended.
Art Snob
