Tag Archives: Canadian content

A Canadian Duet, and no, I don’t mean Celine Dion and Ann Murray

I watched these two movies recently, and they’re only appearing in the same post because of their Canadian content.

Goon – I avoided this movie because it reminded me of Slap Shot, which came out before I was born and I’ve never seen but hate all the same because of my Mom’s ex-boyfriend. His name was Keith and he was a loser. He was a decade too young for her, two decades too immature, unemployed goon of course, lived with his parents, didn’t have friends but loved to hang out at the local hockey rink trying to get the kids to call him “Ogie”. No one ever did. He was probably borderline mentally challenged, now that I think about it. Anyway, he was a creep, and anything he touched, I’d be turned off of for years. So a lack of comedies about hockey didn’t strike me as a national tragedy, but it did to Jay Baruchel, so he and Evan Goldberg set about to adapting this book into a film treatment. I have mad love for Baruchel but it still wasn’t until a fellow blogger suggested that this movie wasn’t awful that I finally gave it a chance. Sean William Scott stars as a guy who isn’t good at anything except taking punches, and giving them. A scrap gets him noticed by a local hockey coach, who drafts him onto the team as an enforcer, and once he learns to skate, he joins Kim Coates’ (Tig, from Sons of Anarchy, if you’re bad with names like me) team in the minor hockey league where Liev Schreiber’s thug character has just been demoted from the NHL for remorselessly hitting one too many people. Baruchel also appears as a cable access TV personality and salty-tongued cheer leader, and Eugene Levy plays Scott’s disapproving father. The movie doesn’t exactly break new ground, but it’s a little smart and a little sweet, and it kind of works. A sequel is in the works, with Baruchel set to make his directorial debut.

Stories We Tell – This “documentary” is by Sarah Polley. Does her name mean anything outside of Canada? I grew up watching her as Ramona (we didn’t have proper cable, but my Aunt Joan would send me VHS cassettes in the mail, having taped the episodes diligently from TV. She also starred in Road to Avonlea, a Canadian classic though not exactly my style. And I was also lucky enough to catch her on the stage in Stratford, performing the lead role in Alice Through The Looking Glass. More recently she’s known for having directed Away From Her (which got her an Oscar nom for adapted screenplay) and Take This Waltz. Stories We Tell is her first full-length documentary, though I hesitate to call in that because she really experiments with the form, incorporating re-enactments meant to look like home video, and she cleverly pieces together narrative from several different sources, highlighting the discrepancies in our memories and perceptions. It basically investigates a family rumour that Sarah’s dad is not her biological father. Her mother, who could easily put this argument to rest, died when Sarah was 11. You’d have to see it for yourself, because I’m still not sure if she so carefully protects her family out of compassion or narcissism, but either way it’s compelling.

Sarah Polley apparently turned down the role of Penny Lane in Almost Famous, but you know who did appear in that movie? Jay Baruchel! There you go. Full ciricle. Have you seen either of these? Who is your favourite Canadian actor?

Where Talent Blooms

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I recently had the good fortune to come across an interesting Kickstarter campaign (Kickstarter is a site for crowd funding – where people can pitch their bright ideas, and their projected budget, and you can choose to back them with your own hard-earned dollars, or not). The campaign was launched by a local film maker who already has a couple of well-received short films under her belt, and, having toured the festival circuit and left with awards, is eager to do her next film up right. And did I mention she’s only 16?

Matt, Sean and I are blown away by the obvious potential in her work. There’s a lot of insight and maturity that’s evident already, especially in a short entitled Gifts, and we’re so excited to see where she takes her work next. Kickstarter allows us to throw even just a couple of dollars her way and feel like we’re contributing to her vision. A long time ago, wealthy patrons would back artists with their support, encouragement, and financial aid, which allowed those artists to concentrate on their work without worrying about supporting themselves by other means. The Renaissance was famous for its patrons – the Medici family alone gave patronage to the Ninja Turtles among others (Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael – well, you get the picture). Today, we’re able to offer our support as a community (assuming none of you are from an elite political dynasty) and actually help foster the things we claim to support: young talent, creativity, and a strong female voice for the next generation that the movie industry so desperately needs. And isn’t it kind of cool to get in on the ground floor. I mean, we could be talking about the next Tarantino here, and wouldn’t you like to be able to say that you spotted her first? If you’re interested in contributing, every little bit helps, and her campaign can be found here. And without further ado, let’s hear from this talented film maker herself, Ms. Morgana McKenzie: director, editor, cinematographer, voice of tomorrow.

Ms. McKenzie took some time out of her busy schedule (she’s already in rehearsals for her upcoming film, Ellie) to answer some of our questions. In this particular interview we’ll be discussing a previous short film of hers called Gifts that you can watch by visiting this link. Ms. McKenzie made this film when she was 14 years old and garnered her tonnes of well-deserved awards, among them best thriller at CineYouth, best editing at ASK Film Festival, and best emerging female filmmaker at NFFTY (which also came with a scholarship to prodigy camp). You’ll be blown away by Gifts, and the rest of her catalogue is even more intriguing though they aren’t available for public viewing yet because they’re still making the festival rounds. You might want to use that link now to watch it before reading the interview because it does contain some spoilers.

Matt: Gifts is an engaging short film that features, among other things, a very well-executed murder scene that literally made me jump. Your POV approach kept the tension high as I was always a little afraid of what might be lurking just outside the character’s field of vision. What can you tell us about where the idea for this story came from? How do you go about building suspense with such a limited budget and non-professional actors?

Ms. McKenzie: I originally had the idea for two much more complicated shorts; one involving two worlds joined by water, and the other involving a POV sequence. These were too complex and not doable, so the idea came to mix the two shorts, making one. Writing and scrapping drafts ensued, and eventually I was left with GIFTS!

Suspense was important to me given that I didn’t have professional actors or equipment. I worked hard to do the best that I could with what I had for equipment, but I knew the suspense would be what would carry the story. I really tried to tackle that in the writing process, making sure that every bit of information being put out was for a reason and would ultimately move the story forward.

Matt: Most of us don’t take the time to commit to a two-hour movie without learning a little something about it first. Either they’ve seen a preview or they’ve read a review or at least looked at the poster. Short films are unique in that it’s quite common to go into it with no idea what we’re in for. For me, this made witnessing an ambush within the first few seconds of Gifts
even more disarming. Are you eager for the chance to make feature-length films or are you enjoying the unique storytelling opportunities offered by short films?

Ms. McKenzie: I am definitely interested to make feature-length films! I think it would be interesting to explore a longer form of storytelling and be able to experiment with expanding some of my current ideas. At the same time, I enjoy making short films, and am not in any sort of hurry to make my first feature. I see a lot of youth filmmakers in a rush to make their first feature, and while I understand the worry of getting it out there, I would rather take my time exploring short form storytelling while I can. I’m more interested in building a portfolio of work I’m proud of, while planning out my ideas for a feature.

Matt: Most of the short films I’ve seen fall into the category of either the Animated or the Arty. Is there a whole sub-genre of horror\thrill shorts that I’m not aware of?

Ms. McKenzie: Definitely! Some of the festivals I’ve attended like NFFTY and CineYouth have film screenings solely dedicated to the horror/thriller genre, and CineYouth even has a junior and senior award for “Best Thriller”. There’s a large network of filmmakers within that as well. Gigi Saul Guerrero for example has had a short in NFFTY’s “Edge of Your Seat” screening for years, and she’s now working on developing a feature based on her short “El Gigante”. It’s a cool genre to be a part of, and you definitely meet some cool people within it.

Jay: Is film something you want to pursue as a career, or more of a passion? How did this fascination with making your own movies start? What films\filmmakers have influenced you the most?

Ms. McKenzie: Film is something I will pursue as a career. It started as an interest after watching JJ Abrams’ film “Super 8”, but then as I explored making short films and became more experienced, I knew it was something I wanted to pursue long-term. Shows like Breaking Bad and True Detective that have an ongoing feeling of suspense and wonder have strongly influenced my work. I gravitate towards suspense and non linear storytelling. Individual people that have influenced me range from Ray Bradbury, Reed Morano, David Lynch, Vince Gilligan, Roger Deakins and the Coen Brothers.

Matt: You’ve had your films screened at several festivals around the world and have been fortunate enough to attend at least a few of them. What’s it been like to meet so many other young filmmakers and how do you think it’s influenced the way you make movies?

Ms. McKenzie: Meeting other youth filmmakers has been amazing. I’m able to network with other people my age that have the same interests as me, have someone to bounce ideas off of, and have a friendship at the same time. It allows you to have someone you can count on in filmmaking and in life.

Matt: What can you tell us about Ellie, which you begin shooting at the end of the month?

Ms. McKenzie: Ellie was originally meant to be done a year ago at Prodigy Camp, a camp based just outside of Seattle. I wrote it working with Emmy award-winning script mentor John Jacobsen, and had cast Nathan Gamble (The Mist, The Dark Knight) as the lead. Because the script was too long to shoot in the three-hour block given, complications with my DP, and almost everything else going wrong, I wasn’t able to finish shooting.

Now, I can start over with Ellie, here in Ottawa. It’s the first time I’ve hired union actors. ACTRA has been really supportive, and Ilona Smyth (Smyth Casting) made the casting process really enjoyable. I’ve also increased the quality of my equipment, and I’m ready to take a step forward with my filmmaking. This film can do that.

Matt: Earlier this year at the National Film Festival for Talented Youth (NFFTY), you got the
chance to speak about your experience as a female filmmaker. What’s it been like for you as a female filmmaker?

Ms. McKenzie: I get asked this question a lot and have a hard time answering it because it’s not
something I often think about. I’m aware it’s an issue and a big problem in the industry, but I haven’t felt the effect personally (probably because I haven’t worked professionally yet). I do get frustrated with the label of a female filmmaker. You don’t see females in other professions being labeled “female doctor” or “female fireman”, it seems ridiculous, doesn’t it?

I frequently see people surprised about the amount of dark material in my work. Maybe people expect to see themes from a teenage female filmmaker that involve romance, or butterflies and fairies. But those themes don’t interest me, unless of course the fairy is out to murder wolves, then we’re talking.

Jay: Last year you were able to attend prodigy camp thanks to a scholarship from NFFTY. What did you learn while at camp, and how do you see your education in film making continuing?

Ms. McKenzie: I learned so much at Prodigy Camp. I loved playing different crew roles on other campers films. You end up learning so much from the other kids and DP’s while on set. I as well learned the value of being able to connect with your crew. In this case, I was not able to connect with my DP, so decision-making was very difficult, especially under the tight three hour shooting window we were given. This was one of the reasons I wasn’t able to complete Ellie at Prodigy Camp, but it was a good learning experience for me on the importance of being able to connect with your crew.

I want to continue expanding my knowledge in film. For post high school, my current plan is to apply to the Canadian Film Centre (CFC) for their six month intensive directing or editing program. But, my plan for after high school changes often. My backup plan is to take a gap year to work and build more of my portfolio.

Jay: How do you perceive the film making culture here in Ottawa? Do you think Canadians have to be in Hollywood in order to be successful in the movie industry?

Ms. McKenzie: The filmmaking culture in Ottawa is good! Not as major as other places in Canada like Toronto, but we definitely have great local production companies like Zed Filmworks and Affinity, as well as resources like SAW Video for training and equipment rentals.

The youth indie film culture in Ottawa is what’s lacking. There are fewer opportunities for teenage or youth filmmakers to collaborate because it’s a smaller community, so you end up working alone on most things.

At the same time, I don’t think we as Canadians need to be in Hollywood to be successful. Indie filmmaking is such a big thing nowadays, and there are so many other resources you can go to that aren’t related to Hollywood.

Jay: Who are your biggest champions and supports as you pursue your dream?

Ms. McKenzie: I’m extremely fortunate to be able to have some extremely supportive parents. They are definitely one of my biggest supporters in film, assisting me in any way possible. We joke that they only do it so I’m obligated to put them in a nice home later.

Aside from immediate family, I’ve met some really amazing people through film in places like Seattle and New Jersey. These are the people that I can go to for read over of my latest script, but I also consider them to be close friends and seek their advice on life in general. We are all trying to reach the same goal, and all support each other in any way possible to make sure we can get there. I like that a lot.

As you can see, Morgana McKenzie is not only a talented film maker, but a thoughtful and well-spoken young woman too. We’re really proud to have gotten to know her a bit and hope you’ve enjoyed it as well. Her Kickstarter campaign is still in high gear, and I urge you again to think about giving. I know we are a community of film lovers, and this is a great way to express it and contribute to it.

If you have any questions for Ms. McKenzie, leave them in the comments. Let us know what you thought of her work. Do you admire any other film makers in the short-film oeuvre? Do you know any other “prodigies”? We look forward to hearing from all of you, and we hope to bring you more news of Ms. McKenzie’s as her career continues.

Happy Canada Day!

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It’s rainy and gray in the Nation’s Capital (a perfect movie day, some might say – Magic Mike, anyone?) and what better way to celebrate our fine country’s 148th year than with a great source of national pride – Blame Canada, as it appeared in the glorious 1999 film South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.

This song was actually nominated for an Oscar that year, controversial because how on earth would they perform let alone televise a song that contained the gleeful use of the word FUCK? So they called in Mr. Squeaky Clean himself, Robin Williams, who turned his back to the audience at the crucial moment and allowed a backing chorus to gasp in its place. They left in all the best insults against former first lady Margaret Trudeau, Bryan Adams, Celine Dion, and of course that bitch Anne Murray too (who went on record as officially “not offended”).

Happy Canada Day, loves – may your barbecues and fireworks be unsoggy.

Miraculum and Other Crap I Watched Instead of Being a Productive Member of Society

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Miraculum is one of those movies that knits together different stories and hopes to make a beautiful afghan but sometimes ends up making a bit of a mess. Let’s face it, it’s hard to find, say, four different stories that are equally compelling, and in this case, Gabriel Sabourin does a better job with some stories (as screenwriter) than with the one he tells himself as an actor.The city of Montreal has just been home to a terrible plane crash where the lone survivor remains unidentified. Julie (Marilyn Castonguay) a nurse and also a Jehovah’s Witness, becomes quite taken with this unidentified stranger, maybe as a placeholder for her complicated feelings toward her boyfriend (Xavier Dolan), also a Witness, who is dying from leukemia and unwilling to get the treatment that would save his life, as per their religious doctrine.

The Burbs is not one of Tom Hanks’ best, but when he teams up with Bruce Dern as two suburbanites with maybe a little too much time on their hands, it’s still pretty awesome. A new family has moved into the neighbourhood and get this – they don’t mow their lawn! And their garbage cans are suspicious! And…do they look a little…foreign to you? Paranoia starts to creep in and suddenly the neighbourhood dads are crossing some pretty serious boundaries to accuse their little-known neighbourhoods of all kinds of mayhem, including murder. Coincidentally, this “neighbourhood” was shot on the Universal backlot, which we’ll be visiting in the next few weeks – it’s the same neighbourhood that was used for Desperate Housewives and Leave It To Beaver.

Words and Pictures has got both Juliette Binoche and Clive Owen, so already I’m sold. They’re both playing hig wordsandpictures h school teachers – she, art (being a talented artist herself, but recently plagued by arthritis) and he, English (being himself a writer, currently stifled by his alcoholism). They’re both a little isolated and angry at home, but shine in their respective classrooms and soon have their students engaged in a “war” – words vs pictures, or is a picture really worth a thousand words? It’s witty and interesting and while not their best work it was a surprising and gratifying Netflix find on a quiet night and I enjoyed it.

I bet nobody like the movie Blackhat, ever. Am I right? The “action” was silly. The “romance” was even sillier. The “thriller” aspect was completely inert. I can’t write anything about this movie without using ironic quotations, for goat cheese’s sake! They bust hacker-Thor from prison to help stop an even evil-er hacker and it’s all cyber-crimey and pretty dull, with really loose writing and lazy directing, and you just want it to be over, but why spend TWO HOURS AND FIFTEEN MINUTES anticipating credits when you could just not watch it at all?

Montreal in Film and Why Mommy is Better Than The Score

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Well, I did it, Andrew from Fistful of Films. I watched Mommy. Andrew’s made no secret of his appreciation of this Cannes sensation- now I get the picture on his masthead- and after the film resurfaced during Thursday Movie Picks a couple of weeks ago, I vowed to finally give this a watch.

First, I’ll say that I liked Mommy better than The Score, the Robert De Niro-Edward Norton heist movie from 2001 that I watched the night before. Like Mommy, The Score is filmed and set in Montreal, where I spent the first twenty-four years of my life. I know the city well, well enough to know that Quebecers don’t sound like that. The accents and dialects (more French than Quebecois) aren’t a big deal and most non-Canadians may not even notice but they’re distracting for me. Mommy’s already off to a good start just by being a Canadian film with actual Canadians.

The actors in Mommy get more than just the Franglais right. As mother and son, Anne Dorval and Antoine-Olivier Pilon always manage to make their increasingly complicated feelings and relationship believable, if not always likeable. Both Die (Dorval) and Steve (Pilon) are immediately off-putting. We are warned from the beginning that Steve can be a lot to take but I was unprepared for foul-mouthed and deliberately provocative style. Even Die, Steve’s long-suffering mother, is tough to take at first, presenting herself immediately as arrogant and confrontational through some pretty cocky gum-chewing.

I warmed to these characters quickly though. Die first. We quickly see how out of control- even dangerous- Steve is and I couldn’t help seeing her as a mother doing the best she can with an impossible situation. Steve has his charming- even sweet- side too. His feelings of guilt over ths burden he thinks he must be to his mother rise to a scene in a karaoke bar where he deliberately causes a scene in order to derail Die’s flirtation with a lawyer who she thinks can help with her son’s situation. The relationship between mother and son is unpredictable and at times a little strange but makes sense as we realize that they can’t help feeling that all they have is each other.

This relationship is written and acted to perfection even if Mommy isn’t. Dolan devotes way too much time to a stuttering former teacher who lives across the street without any real justification for doing so. I also could have done without the unusual 1.1 Aspect Ratio that is distracting at best and counter-productive during the more cinematic sequences that Dolan seems to love.

Have you seen Mommy? If you have, I would love to hear what you thought of the final scene.

Laurence Anyways

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I don’t have much to say about the whole Caitlyn Jenner-break the internet thing. I hope she’s happy and getting happier with her transition. I’m not a fan of the Jenner-Kardashian machine, and it feels weird to me to take something so intimate and personal and seek to profit from it, but I guess she’s only following the family business model. I just hope it doesn’t cheapen the real struggle that less privileged people go through with their own transitions every day, out here in the real world.

Laurence Anyways is a 2012 movie by talented Canadian director Xavier Dolan. It’s about a man, Laurence (Melvil Poupaud) who, in the late 80s and his early 30s, decides he must live as the woman he’s always known himself to be. Hurdle number one: breaking the news to his girlfriend Fred (Suzanne Clement), who goes through the predictable knee-jerk reactions – are you gay, have you ever worn my panties, I’m leaving you. But she can’t really leave him. Leave her, I should say, and soon becomes his biggest supporter.

Dolan is a young director who’s still finding his way with this film. There are some crazy set pieces that don’t always work, but are still admirable and some quite memorable. He’s clearly got a visual talent beyond your average director. But he brings this movie in at nearly three hours, and it just doesn’t need to be that long. In fact, the film’s first 20 minutes are probably the most editable. And the interview framework feels forced and unnecessary.

Poupaud and particularly Clement are masterful here. I really enjoyed scenes between Laurence and his ice-bitch mother, played wonderfully by Nathalie Baye. There’s a lot this film is telling us in sideways glances and throwaway remarks. Poupaud’s quiet moments work like magic. The first day Laurence wears a dress to his job (as a college professor) is a minute in film that needs to be studied. The silence is crafted beautifully. Clement, meanwhile, gets to be the explosive one, her red hair accenting her passionate missives like fireworks.

There are some mis-steps here but Dolan presents his flamboyant film with confidence, if a little too much music, a little too stylized. But it’s something to behold, and this kid just keeps getting better and better.

Weekend Round-Up

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Project Almanac – I have mixed feelings about this one. I wasn’t bored by it, but the story is thin. I like the championing of the inventor, but I disliked the very trite time-travel routine, where the same costs and benefits are explored here as have been elsewhere a thousand times before. The kids are likeable enough but you know what? Enough with the “found footage” thing. It’s done. Let’s drop it.

Gambit – A movie with Colin Firth and Alan Rickman AND Stanley Tucci you want to like. But can you? It’s a remake, written by the Coen brothers, about an art thief who recruits ditzy Cameron Diaz to pull a fast one on his boss – and then dares to be surprised when it doesn’t quite get pulled off as planned. Firth is solid and has great comic timing but Diaz exists on a level so far beneath him it’s not fair to either. I have the feeling Firth was hoping for The Big Lebowski but ended up in The Ladykillers. Better luck next time, y’all.

San Andreas – The three Assholes who went to see this together are also the same three Assholes planning a trip to shitty, shaky San Francisco next month. Oh sure it seemed like a good idea at the time. Lots of wine, we heard, those weird, slopy streets, and just a beautiful coastal drive away from LA. San Andreas is not exactly a boon to tourism. Made it seem a little reckless to travel there (let alone live there), in fact. But we survived the movie and as of this time have not cancelled our plane tickets, mostly because Sean couldn’t find the number. I watched this movie totally stressed out, from start to finish. Is there a plot to this thing? I have no idea. WATCH OUT FOR THAT FIRE! Is there good acting in this thing? I don’t know, does dodging debris count? WATCH OUT FOR THAT FLYING CRUISE SHIP! It was a disaster movie so jam-packed with disaster that some leaked out the sides. It keeps you so busy racing from one near-death experience to another that you never have time to question the holes in the movie, because every hole is filled with exploding glass – in 3D!

Dear Zachary: A Letter to his Son About his Father – In 2001, Andrew Bagby was brutally murdered. Soon after, his girlfriend, the prime suspect, announces she’s pregnant and Bagby’s bereaved parents have to interact with their son’s killer in order to gain any visitation with the grandson who looks just like him. This is a documentary Kurt Kuenne who isn’t a particularly talented documentarian, but who was Bagby’s best friend. This is a tribute to his friend, and also to the parents who went to great lengths to make a life for a grandchild born out of tragedy. I was prepared for this one to hurt my heart, but I wasn’t quite as prepared as I needed to be. Check it out on Netflix.

Aloha – Cameron Crowe’s greatest offense is being too successful too early in his career. Does this stand up to Almost Famous? No, it doesn’t. And not many movies would. But would people be giving Aloha as hard a time if it were written and directed by anyone else? This film is imperfect. It drags in places (but has flashes of brilliance to prop things up) and it tries to involve too many, which takes away from the central story, which is the one we’ve put our butts in the seats to see. Emma Stone plays Jennifer Lawrence opposite Bradley Cooper (what is it about Bradley Cooper, by the way, that his characters are constantly romancing women he could have fathered?). Anyway, he plays this deeply flawed individual and she plays so pert and perfect you want to punch her right in the googly eyes. But you’re supposed to root for them I think, even though Rachel McAdams makes a tantalizing (and age appropriate, while still being younger) alternative. They exchange some witty banter, some banal banter, look at an atrocious toe, and induce Billy Murray into a dance scene. It’s not a cohesive movie by a long shot, but nor is it as bad as the critics will tell you. The story wants to be more than it is. The movie is beautiful but straight-forward. There’s very little art here. What we have in abundance is white people, puzzlingly, since it’s set in Hawaii, where the census tells us they’re relatively rare and Hollywood tells if you squint hard enough, George Clooney passes for Hawaiian.

Going Clear – The more I learn, the less I understand. I didn’t learn anything new (in fact, nothing that’s not on the Wikipedia page), and I think they went a little soft on the former members they interviewed. Has anyone else seen this?

Polytechnique

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I cringed my way through this movie – impossible not to if you know what’s coming, and what Canadian doesn’t?

This movie revisits one of the saddest days in our country’s recent history. On December 6, 1989, a man armed himself with a riffle and showed up to Ecole Polytechnique to hunt women – feminists, he called them. He shot 28 people and killed 14 women, targeting them specifically and even excusing the men from classrooms.

In order to preserve the dignity of the victims of this tragedy, director Denis Villeneuve makes them into fictitious composites, but their truths still ring out. They are students. Their only crime is pursuing education in a field (engineering, mostly) that their shooter deemed “for men.”

Villeneuve shoots his movie in black and white. I discussed this choice before: Villeneuve seemed to want to minimize the impact of the blood, allowing the audience to think about the killing spree in perhaps a slightly more transcendental way. The film rises above the tragedy and is quite cool in its presentation, some might even call it dispassionate.

But is it right to be dispassionate about so sore a subject? Rewatching it, I’m feeling the director’s passivity in the first half, the deaths seeming abstract as they happen off-screen. Later, a pile of bodies is shown out of focus Most of the horror is kept from us, the worst of it coming from the startle of gunfire as it rips through particularly quiet moments in the film. Perhaps we are meant to take it in without tears or judgement, and simply ruminate on what happened, and why. It certainly feels as though Villeneuve has gone to great lengths to give us plenty of room to do just that.

Mommy

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This movie is as challenging as it is rewarding. Undoubtedly difficult to sit through, I found myself really turned off by the characters and I had to coach myself a little in order to keep going. Just last week I was defending a movie to Sean and I found myself saying that a movie doesn’t have to have likeable characters or a happy ending in order for it to be ‘good.’ I believe this to be true, but I’d forgotten how tedious a film can be if you have no one to root for.

And I don’t mean to call this movie tedious by any means (although I’d say it’s overlong) because once I forgave the characters for being nasty human beings, I could relax into the theme of the movie, which never for a moment claimed otherwise.

First off, director Xavier Dolan wants you to know that the film’s set in an alternate Canada where a new law has just been passed enabling people to wave their parental rights and surrender “problem children” to the government at any time, no questions asked. So keep that in mind. Diane is a single (widowed) mother with a teenaged son named Steve who’s prone to hyperactivity and violent outbursts. He’s been institutionalized since his father died but having recently maimed a kid in a fire he set, he’s being kicked out and mommy dearest must bring him home. This kid’s behaviour is immediately repulsive, but our introduction to his mother isn’t much better and right off the bat it’s clear there’s a strong case of apple-doesn’t-fall-far-from-the-treeism at work. Home school him? That’s a joke. Try just not getting choked out by him. His mother, despite her faults, is trying hard to keep him away from the system, and it’s clear that she does love him. The surprise of this movie is that she doesn’t just chuck him at the nearest hospital. She tries. And the trying is painful to watch because we see how futile and unending it will be. And then a mysterious neighbour named Kyla lends a hand, but there aren’t enough hands in the world to save this kid from his attachment disorder.

Mommy has a very distinct style, the director choosing to go with an almost unheard of 1:1 aspect ratio, which means we actually view the movie as a perfect square. Dolan chose this deliberately to highlight the emotions of each scene, and he reinforces this again with his tight shots, up close and personal, intimate certainly, sometimes claustrophobic. When Steve is at his most inappropriate, your skin crawls because you, like the characters, cannot escape. There is little breathing room – literally, figuratively – what a thing to be able to communicate through film! Steve is a trial, and even at 2 hours, the burden feels almost unbearable at times, and you begin to walk in his mother’s shoes. Mommy isn’t much for the bigger picture, but it’s an immersive experience that pushes your limits, makes you wish for bad things, and then leaves you feeling slightly ashamed for having wished them: quite a feat for a little Canadian film.

If you can’t cope with a movie with unlikeable leads, then this one’s not for you. It’s tough even if you think you can. Steve pushes against boundaries and is continually in a state of having gone too far. He’s alive on screen, visceral and so real he’s scary, scary because you know he exists, and that he’s somebody’s son. The kid who plays him must be really well-cast because I loathed him, loathed his face, loathed every grimace he would make. Do you see how it got to me? This movie demands a lot of its viewers, not just in terms of bearing witness, but also in looking away when the rest of the story isn’t really fleshed out. Kyla, for example, appears on scene with a disabling stutter that’s a fresh result from some unnamed trauma, but we never get to know what it is. She exists to help mother and son and her back story is just a tantalizing black hole. But Diane, on the other hand, is given such a shockingly non-judgemental treatment that you won’t believe it can originate from a 25-year-old director. It’s a compassionate and stark look at caretaking, and the breaking point of the maternal bond.

I’m not sure if you can really enjoy a movie like this, at least not int he way you might enjoy a popcorn movie with a talking racoon. This is a movie that requires digestion, possibly even mastication, but I do believe it will leave you satisfied.

Operation Christmas List

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Barney thinks he’s beat the system. After some fool proof research, he’s pin-pointed the hot toy of the Christmas season (a Crabby Mousie) and plans to stockpile them, sell them at a profit, and buy himself a bike with the proceeds (Barney is approximately 12 years old). He recruits his geeky best friend Walt, reluctantly allows his devoted fan Iris in on the deal, and gets saddled with little brother Penn, making for the motliest crew of criminals you’ve ever seen.

At least until they come across an actual gang of thieves, adult ones, led by Forte, in the department store with the very same goal.

Kid robbers vs. grown up robbers means the kids go all Home Alone at the grown-up asses, albeit in an uninspired and low-budget way. This movie is truly not very good, and I can’t imagine that even the director ever thought it would be. The kids are MV5BYTc1ODM0Y2ItMzE1My00OTU5LWEyZGMtMDMyODM2NmJhMmRlL2ltYWdlL2ltYWdlXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNjI4Mzg5OTg@._V1_SY1000_CR0,0,1497,1000_AL_ annoying (have I mentioned lately how much I hate fake lisps? Is there anything on earth I hate more? I’d rather eradicate fake lisps than war, I think, such is my revulsion), and the grown-ups are ludicrous. The security guard, an adult, for the record, spends 10% of his time kareokeing and 90% being stuck in his own office, outwitted by kids, of course. And don’t get me started on Forte, the villain. Oh okay, go ahead and get me started! The man sounds like the Swedish Chef but he dresses like he’s ready for a Gotye video. I mean, floral on floral is pretty bold, but who wears that to break in somewhere? And the villain above him (what a hierarchy!), Daphne, is described as a “socialite shut-in” with zero apparent irony. You know, just one of those shut-ins who really loves to get out there and party.

I don’t even know if there’s a hot toy for 2018, but if there is, and if you’re morally obligated to find and buy one for a kid on your list, then whatever hoops and hell you have to go through to get it will be a breeze compared to watching all 80 minutes of this film. So, you know, don’t.