Broken Embraces (2009) dir. Pedro Almodovar
Starring: Penelope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Blanca Portillo and Jose Luis Gomez

**1/2

By Blair Stewart

After taking a drubbing at Cannes I expected Pedro Almodovar's latest to be a weak offering when in fact "Broken Embraces" only suffers in part from coming after the acclaimed "Volver".

Featuring many of his regular players and hang-ups with illness, filmmaking and carnal desires, Almodovar spins the yarn of Harry Caine/Mateo Blanco (Lluis Homar), a blind writer-director in exile. Having found out the wealthy industrialist Ernesto Martel (Jose Luis Gomez) has died, Harry/Mateo and his godson Diego untangle Harry's past in flashback involving the deceased millionaire, the millionaire's mistress Lena (Penelope Cruz) and their flameout movie project together.

The movie within the movie "Girls and Suitcases" is a fun throwback to Almodovar's "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown" past in the foreground while Harry/Mateo and Lena (who's been cast in the lead role with Ernesto footing the bill) go off-script in the background. Adding another layer, Ernesto dispatches his creepily fey son Ernesto Jr. to make a documentary of the filming while he keeps tabs on the affair. Although the star-crossed lovers can find a brief respite from the world its tough to outlast a powerful man ruling it. The results are pitched into Almodovar's melancholic wringer of bawdy laughs and tears, but the slack payoff isn't on par with the likes of "Talk to Her" or "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!"

Penelope Cruz, as the star, is still very much Almodovar's ideal muse, he films her sexual vitality better than anyone else and she acquiesces in his fetishes for wigs and cinematic-mythology (Audrey Hepburn, Hitchcock's ice-queens, Almodovar's work). Lluis Homar as Harry/Mateo centres the film as it jumps between 1992 Madrid and 2008, and he has the right amount of dramatic weight to carry the plot while looking like an older Catalan matinee idol.

The film thankfully begins with an erotic seduction of a good Samaritan by Harry/Mateo, a Tarantino-like introduction with sex in place of violence. In supporting roles, Almodovar sometime-players Lola Duenas, Blanca Portillo and Angela Molina make good with the melodrama of the script. But because of the meandering it takes to reach its end even when the results are obvious "Broken Embraces" strikes me as minor Almodovar.

Regardless of the pace, minor Almodovar is still worth seeing if you're a fan.

Wake in Fright – also known as: Outback (1971) Dir. Ted Kotcheff
Starring: Donald Pleasance, Gary Bond, Chips Rafferty, Al Thomas, Jack Thompson, Peter Whittle and Sylvia Kay

****

Guest Review by Greg Klymkiw

It seems unthinkable in this day and age of film preservation and restoration that a motion picture classic made – not during the silent period of the early 20th century, but in 1971, a Cannes Palme D’Or nominee no less, and often cited (along with Nicholas Roeg’s “Walkabout” from the same year) as the beginning of Australia’s revitalization as a filmmaking force – was one week away from having all of its original negative elements destroyed. After a two-year search all over the world at his own expense, the film’s editor Anthony Buckley finally discovered the elements in the bowels of the CBS vaults in Pittsburgh (no less) in a pile of items marked to be “junked” (industry parlance for “destroyed”) and, I reiterate, ONE WEEK from the date he found them.

Because of his Herculean efforts as well as the frame-by-frame restoration by the National Film and Sound Archives of Australia and Deluxe Labs, Ted Kotcheff’s “Wake in Fright” (released outside of Australia as “Outback”) has a new lease on life – to shock and mesmerize audiences all over the world. Screened at Cannes in May of 2009 (only one of two features ever to be screened on two separate occasions at Cannes) and in a special presentation featuring Kotcheff in a personal dialogue on the film at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival, “Wake in Fright” stands as one of the most powerful explorations of male savagery in the context of a topography that seems as rugged and barren as the surface of the Moon. In a world of Samuel Fuller and Sam Peckinpah, Kotcheff’s brilliant film holds its own.

I first saw the movie when I was about 13 or 14 years old as “Outback” during a late night showing on the CBC (Canadian Broadcast Corporation) when, during this time, Canadian content guidelines allowed for the broadcast of ANY film that came from Britain’s Commonwealth to meet said guidelines. (Because of this, we saw some really fine movies and TV series during the 60s and 70s.) It was a movie that completely bewildered and obsessed me. Even a full frame standard telecine transfer did not detract from its strangeness, its terrible and terrifying beauty and its depiction of a world so foreign to my own, yet seeming to be imbued with a quality that suggested to me, even then, that what I was seeing was the stuff of life itself. For over thirty years I looked and waited, seemingly in vain, to see it again. To think I almost didn’t have that opportunity because of the aforementioned disappearance and death sentence is now, after seeing it again much older and (hopefully) wiser (on a big screen in a pristine, lovingly restored 35mm print), makes me feel like I have been witness to a miracle.

And what a miracle this movie is! Kotcheff, the Canadian born, raised and trained director (trained via and not unlike Norman Jewison, within the legendary CBC television drama department of the late 50s and early 60s), has made his fair share of good pictures – most notably the Berlin Golden Bear Award winner “The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz”, the droll “Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?” and the first and best Rambo picture “First Blood” – but nothing in his canon comes close to the mind boggling perfection of “Wake in Fright”.

Stunningly photographed by Brian West, the picture opens on one spot of the desolation that is the outback of Australia and the camera proceeds to do a slow 360 degree turn – shocking us with the reality that the land is the same whichever direction one looks and that it seems to go on forever. Into this environment we’re introduced to the impeccably groomed and fussily attired schoolteacher John Grant (Gary Bond) who is about to leave the two-building rail town for a much-needed vacation to Sydney. Grant describes his position as being enslaved to the Ministry of Education as they have required all new teachers to post a one-thousand-dollar bond to ensure they serve their entire first term in the most desolate postings imaginable. During a stopover in the bleak mining town of Bundanyabba, Grant meets Jock (played by legendary Aussie actor Chips Rafferty), an amiable policeman who plies him with beer and gets him into a card game where he loses all of his money. Stranded, perpetually drunk and eventually and brain-numbingly hung-over, Grant is hosted by a motley crew of locals (several hard drinking macho men and one extremely horny single female) who proceed to take him into the very heart of the Australian darkness. Grant is practically force-fed steady supplies of beer, seduced by the lonely woman (which is scuttled when he pukes while trying to penetrate her), taken on a mad, drunken and vicious kangaroo hunt and finally locked in a sweaty, smelly and almost violently homoerotic coupling with the mad alcoholic doctor Tydon (a malevolent Donald Pleasance).

At first, we are shown a passive observer, but as the film progresses, he regresses to the same savage state as the men he initially holds his nose up to and he decidedly and actively engages in acts so barbaric that he is forced to confront his inner demons to the point where he is sickened to the point of contemplating suicide.

Not unlike the world of playwrights Eugene O’Neill and Edward Albee, we find ourselves in the realm of alcohol-fueled depravity and game playing. Like any respectable Walpurgisnacht, booze is sloshed into empty cups with abandon and full cups are drained greedily, but these pagans who celebrate ARE the tortured spirits walking amongst the living and any bonfires they create seemed to be aimed squarely at themselves. Furthermore, the movie presents a “Paradise Lost” situation where depravity is merely presented and much like John Milton’s “hero”, Grant makes a conscious choice to immerse himself in the foul macho shenanigans like a pig in shit.

This is one daring, nasty piece of work and without question, the movie Kotcheff will ultimately be best remembered for. He not only elicits fine performances from a stellar cast, but his mise-en-scene is pretty much perfect. It’s also no coincidence that he is Canadian and perhaps the perfect director outside of Australia to have tackled this story so rooted in that nation’s pathology. Given that the vast majority of Canada’s population resides within 100 kms along the Canadian and U.S. border, the rest of this vast country north of the 49th parallel is not unlike the world of the Australian outback. (To all non-Canadians: just think of a land populated by SCTV’s hosers Bob and Doug McKenzie – seemingly benign, but below the simpleton surface, a roiling, frustrated, angry, bitter nation of moose-hunting psychopaths.)

As well, it is no surprise that it was Anthony Buckley, the editor of the film, who searched high and low for the lost negative elements, since the cutting in this picture has few equals. For the most part, things are delivered at a steady, unobtrusive pace, but when we’re in the territory of dreams or overtly physical action, the editing veers from measured to positively Eisensteinian. At times, the action borders on the hypnotic, while at other points, it’s as jarring and disturbing as the images and action engaged in by the characters.

This action, as designed by director Kotcheff, is expertly blocked. His shot choices are impeccable and most importantly, he seems perfectly at home in capturing the claustrophobic nature of both barren exteriors and interiors – where the only way to break free is to rage against the dying of the light that has, for the characters who populate this world, become life itself.

This picture rages, alright! It’s one hell of a ride and we’re all the better for it.

∫

Lebanon (2009) dir. Samuel Maoz
Starring: Itay Tiran, Yoav Donat, Michael Moshonov, Zohar Shtrauss

***

The presence of the Venice Film Festival purposely scheduled a week before TIFF has meant it often gets a jump on the discoveries normally attributed to this festival. While at TIFF most of us bloggers, critics, cinephiles wait for what film emerges with the Golden Lion - an award not as coveted as say, the Palme D’Or but as shown by history, an award as influential. Before garnering acclaim at TIFF films like Brokeback Mountain, and The Wrestler won awards there.

And so when Samuel Maoz’s “Lebanon” was announced as the Golden Lion winner I immediately looked it up to see when it was playing. So did every other writer/agent/distributor last Sunday at it’s first P&I screening where an enormous crowd showed up with only about half the number of seats as the demand. The second screening was equally packed but I did manage to get in.

It’s an intense adventure using the same subject matter as “Waltz With Bashir” - another Israeli take on the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. This time we’re put into a tank with four Israeli soldiers. There’s Assi the commander, Shmulik the gunner, Yigal the driver and Hertzel the loquatious loader. Being friends as well as comrades means that Assi often has difficult asserting his orders to the group - specifically with Hertzel who questions the logic of the chain of command and the hierarchy of duties. It makes for light humorous banter, dulling us to the horror going on outside the tank.

But when Major Jamil enters the tank orders get thrown down with authority. With clarity Jamil makes it simple, proceed through the recently demolished village, look for surviving enemy soldiers and contain any lingering threats. We’re told it’s a walk in the park until they get to their next destination, an impending battle in San Tropez.

The tank has two points of view, a wide angle pigeonhole target sight of the gun, and a closer zoomed in view from the same angle. From these two shots we watch as Shmulik slowly go stir crazy from the brutality he’s forced to watch happening on the outside - a family being shot to death in a vacant building, an innocent muslim blown apart in his car, even a cow clinging to life with his stomach torn open are indelible images to both Shmulik and us, the audience.

For the others, the intensity increases from earth quaking of the explosions and devastating sounds of war echoing through the steel machine. Like the metallic claustrophobia of the German sub in ‘Das Boot”, the confines of the metal tank serves as the film’s only location. The space is tight and perhaps Maoz’s used Alfred Hitchcock's 'Lifeboat' as inspiration to maintain a dynamic and non-repetitive visual experience from such a small place.

The few sources of light create enough creative light schemes to play with and the occasional time the hatch is opened up sends a blinding beam of light into the tank is enough to remind us that there is another world outside.

Admirable as it is in creating a intense war film without really seeing anything, the film suffers from our uncertainty as to whether the filmmakers are actually taking a stand on something. War is bad, we know. Perhaps it’s the singular point of view of the tank as a metaphor for the unwavering partyline of the Israeli military. Maybe. It’s an implied theme which we have to stretch to find, but it lacks the passionate confessionary tone of “Bashir”. And so it fails to raise itself to the cinematic level of brilliance the concept and the era in history demands.

Soul Kitchen (2009) dir. Fatih Akin
Starring: Adam Bousdoukos, Moritz Bleibtreu, Birol Ünel, Pheline Roggan

***1/2

What a 180 shift for Fatih Akin, the (deserved) winner of the Best Screenplay Award at Cannes 3 years ago for his so very serious contemplative Alejandro González Iñárritu-like international drama, “Edge of Heaven”. “Heaven” was a great film, but so formal, so clever and earnest in its message about forgiveness and empathy, it was on the exhausting side of cinema. Thus, Akin’s new film, a brilliant comical farce set in a down and out German restaurant feels like a film made after sniffing some potent smelling salts.

Zinos Kazantsakis (also co-writer Adam Bousdoukos) is a hapless restauranteur introduced to us serving frozen vegetables, Captain Highliner fish sticks and other uncreative truck-stop foods to his satisfied but uninspired working class clientele. When the public health inspector gives him a bad report card, his beautiful girlfriend decides to move to Shanghai for a journalistic assignment, and he slips a disc in his back, Zinos' world teeters on the edge of collapse. But when he hires a fired primadonna haute cuisine chef Shayne (Birol Ünel) to run the kitchen things start to look up. Shayne’s creativity making chicken fingers look like Fois Gras appears to turn his business around. Suddenly Soul Kitchen becomes a hopping joint with full on DJs, rock bands, and nightclub dancing.

Enter Zinos’s brother, Illias (Moritz Bleibtreu), fresh out of prison on dayleave, who has been given co-power of attorney authority on the property. Illias gambles away the building in a poker game to a bullish real estate investor. Add to the fact that Zinos’ girlfriend has left him for another man in China puts Zinos on near suicide watch. But a number of events, and unplanned coincidences result in a miraculous turnaround of luck throwing Zino back in contention in the restaurant business and with a new girl on the horizon.

Fatih Akin mixes the pace of screwball classics, with a “Raising Arizona’ zaniness, anchored by a real world everyman hero in Zinos. Akin has his running shoes on at all times, never letting us rest in between clever character introductions, brilliantly choreographed food preparation set pieces, and a number of wild energetic musical numbers.

Akin and Bousdoukos's tight screenplay is of the American romantic comedy template variety. But with the fresh German faces, frenetic reckless pace and a willingness to go for every gag it barrels over any Apatow, Sandler, or Ephron comedy over the last few years.

If any film this year were to come close to ‘Slumdog Millionaire’-feeling of exuberance and warm fuzzies upon leaving the theatre it would be “Soul Kitchen”. The final credit sequence doesn’t feature a choreographed Bollywood dance sequence, but the flashy graphic credits set to it ‘It’s Your Thing” by The Isley Brothers comes pretty close.

'Trash Humpers' (2009) dir. Harmony Korine
Starring Harmony Korine, Rachel Korine

*

Guest Review by Reece Crothers

When David Cronenberg's "Crash" (shame on you Paul Haggis) was released late in the last century, it received a rating of "N or NNNNN" in our local NOW Magazine. That was confusing. Was it great or terrible? Most people said it was a "love it or hate it" kind of picture, but usually one or the other. How was that possible? How could the reviewer have such extreme ambivalent feelings about the picture? After thirteen years and one screening of Harmony Korine's new movie, I finally understand. I cannot say whether 'Trash humpers' is a good film or a terrible one, only that there has never been anything like it, which was the director's intention, and in that respect it is a stunning achievement.

In the Q&A that followed the TIFF screening, Korine explained some of his motivations behind making this movie as a sort of archival, or "found object", and it is a huge departure from the sweet and dreamy, and super-slick 'Mr. Lonely', Korine's previous picture. I thought Korine had really matured with that movie. It was playful and surreal and poignant and clever and it showed the young auteur in a slightly more vulnerable mode, actually revealing something romantic and even sentimental. The new film is a return to the nihilism of "Gummo" without the innocence of "Julien Donkey Boy" or the melancholy heart of "Mr. Lonely".

Korine in person was much more lucid and candid than his reputation would suggest. Though he playfully sparred verbally with an obnoxious audience member who felt he was owed a personal explanation for the exploits he had just been subjected to on the big screen: "Is that supposed to be artistic?" Obnoxious Audience Member demanded. "I don't know..." Korine jabbed, "Is your hat artistic?"

The emphasis was on "artistic" as a dirty word and it actually suits the picture just fine. I refer you back to the title: 'Trash Humpers'. This is not a title like "Magnolia" or "Reservoir Dogs" that serves as a tonal indication without any reference to the subject or content of the film. This is a film all about humping trash. It's dirty, but it's also beautiful. The VHS photography (blown up to 35mm) is a nostalgic requiem for our analog past. Anyone who ever edited their movies from one VCR to another will get a warm fuzzy feeling.

When asked if "Trash Humpers" was part of the Dogme95 films (the style made famous in 1998 by Thomas Vinterberg with "Festen" and by Lars Von Trier with "The Idiots", and a school to which Korine's JDB is a certified member) Korine responded that "it probably would be if I thought about it". It's hard to tell how much thought was actually put into the film or even should be put into analyzing it. To describe "the plot" would be misleading. The picture works best as a primal sensory experience.

Korine explained to the crowd at the TIFF screening that the origins in the project began when he was handed a VHS tape by a fan who simply asked "Watch this" before walking away. Korine played the tape at home with his wife and a friend. After twenty minutes of bizarre, juvenile, violent stunts, Korine's wife and friend wanted to turn it off, afraid the tape may veer into snuff territory at any minute. But Korine was captivated and couldn't bring himself to shut the video off prematurely. "Someone's gonna get killed on this tape" they warned. That scenario, a famous artist and friends are handed a snuff tape, would probably make for a better plot than the one actually strung together for this movie. After all, what is at stake for the average trash humper? But that is obviously not the point. We are meant to observe the antics of the TH's in the same way that Korine et al screened that original VHS fan tape. It is an alternately hilarious and terrifying and almost always baffling horror story of three degenerates in latex "old people" masks who just can't get no satisfaction. If a stranger gave you this tape, my advice would be to stay the hell away from them. They are probably insane. Coming from Korine, it's harder to dismiss.

"Kids" (1995) still ranks as the most sobering morality tale of my personal film watching life, ranking with "Trainspotting" (1996) as the ultimate cinematic warnings about the consequences to the sex, drugs and rock'n'roll ethos that defined those pictures on the vanguard of decades previous. And Korine was only 19 when he wrote "Kids". There is no doubt that he is one of the most brilliant and individualistic filmmakers working in American movies today. I really couldn't say whether I liked this film or not, and personally probably would have enjoyed seeing Trash Humpers in a gallery setting rather than in a cinema, but I am glad I saw it. Korine's vision is truly his own. He follows his own voice. He knows his audience is not a blockbuster one, yet he has a strong cult following. Time will tell whether or not he will be able to exist as a filmmaker in both worlds like Gus Van Sant has been able to (Van Sant executive produced "Kids" and Korine made a cameo in "Good Will Hunting", arguably Van Sant's most commercial film).

"If you are the kind of person who walks out of movies.... if that is something you do... and that's cool... but like, you should probably just go now. You aren't going to like this movie. But if you are into seeing something called "Trash Humpers", and that's what it's about really, then I hope you like it". Those were Korine's words to the crowd at the screening just before the lights went down and we all had our minds blown. Consider yourself warned, or initiated, depending on your appetite.

Solomon Kane (2009) dir. Michael Bassett
Starring: James Purefoy, Meredith Crowhorn, Jayson Fleming, Pete Postlethwaite, Max von Sydow

**

In 'Solomon Kane', writer/director Michael Bassett is intent on creating an iconic and serialized character the likes of Indiana Jones, Ash, Jack Sparrow. While it’s clear Bassett has put a lot of passion, energy, and money on the screen to create a loud, rain-soaked muddy, sword-swinging medieval cult classic, unfortunately it's not cult film in the making, just a decent one-off.

Bassett sets the film in 1600 in puritan England, a well-chosen era for action purposes as it has both guns and swords as well as violent religious conflict between pagans, puritans, Protestants, and Catholics. Soloman Kane (James Purefoy) is a badass pirate introduced busting into a North African palace intent on stealing some treasure. He’s stopped by the devil himself who tells him his soul is owed to him for all his bad deeds in his life. Kane escapes back to England and retreats to his church and swears to be a man of peace.

Peace and redemption comes in the form of a humble god-fearing family of four (inc. Pete Postlethwaite) who take Kane along in their travels to the New World. But before they get anywhere they’re ambushed and killed by a horde of devil slaves. With their innocent virginal daughter kidnapped Kane must betray his oath of peace and kick some major ass to save the girl. His journey takes him back to his birthplace where he’s confronted by a long lost family rival hell bent on personal vengeance.

Solomon Kane seems to be carefully crafted for Halloween costume and merchandized action figure possibilities. He has a distinct hat and cape and Bassett often has him brandishing two swords in numerous hero worship poses. His hair which barely covers his face is a mix of Van Helsing meets The Undertaker and James Purefoy as Kane comes off as a doppelganger of Hugh Jackman with less chest, but more tattoos.

There’s nothing we haven’t seen in any film before this. Though adequately directed with full production value, each swordfight is choreographed with the same rhythm of editing, and all the same dramatic beats are hit, including the flashbacks to Kane’s tragic past and dishonour as a child. Bassett is heavy on the religious motivations and so at times it feels like being one Kirk Cameron away from being a laughable evangelical Christian film - Kane's allegories to Christ even includes a crucifixion scene with Kane escaping by ripping his hands out of the nails. Even Kane’s name is a combination of Old Testamenters, Solomon son of David, and Cain of the ‘Cain/Abel’ story.

When adding in Klaus Badelt’s Batman-like score, it becomes one giant melodramatic opera requiring us to take it all so very very seriously. There’s not an ounce of humour not even when Kane rips the mask off the deformed henchman of the devil or Kane rips his through the nails which have stuck him to the cross. Both are over-the-top moments ripe for comedic exploitation. But, no.

It’s all part of Bassett’s inability to elevate the material beyond mere overly-archetypal characters, familiar situations, and all-around recycling of all other swashbuckling/medieval actioners. ‘Soloman Kane” therefore sits somewhere above ‘In the Name of the King’, equal to Stephen Somers’ ‘The Mummy’ and below ‘Wolfhound’ in the genre of fantasy.

Kirot (2009) Dir. Danny Lerman
Starring: Olga Kurylenko, Ninet Tayeb and Vladimir Friedman

***1/2

Guest Review by Greg Klymkiw

When Galia, a ravishing, raven-haired, almond-eyed, high-cheek-boned Ukrainian prostitute firmly and proudly demands the restitution of her passport and monies owed, a grotesquely evil and dripping-with-rancid-gooey-oil-of-slime Israeli pimp snarls at her with contempt, “Nothing is yours.”

In a cold, mantra-like timbre he adds: “I own you. I own your pussy. I own your soul.”

In reality, this prostitute would be beaten and forced to keep turning tricks until she was so used up and strung out that she’d receive a bullet to the head and her body would be burned to ash and scattered to the winds of Israel.

But this is a movie.

And the talented, criminally, insanely and mind-numbingly gorgeous Ukrainian model and actress (and Bond girl from “Quantum of Solace”) Olga Kurylenko plays the role of Galia the prostitute and Galia (with pouty lips, leather jacket and an itchy trigger finger on a smoking second generation Glock 17 semi-automatic pistol) is not going to take this lightly. She’s suffered too much and there’s more than just her life and dignity at stake. She has a new friend, Elinor (played by the talented, criminally, insanely and mind-numbingly gorgeous Sephardic Israeli pop star Ninet Tayeb), a pregnant neighbour who needs to be saved by her brutal abusive husband.

Rest assured, things will blow up real good.

The movie is “Kirot” (the Hebrew word for “walls”) and as written and directed by the talented Israeli filmmaker Danny Lerner, it’s a picture that does for Ukrainian prostitutes enslaved in the sex trade what Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Bastards” does for the Jews in Nazi Germany. It’s a brutal, fast-paced and stylish thriller that delivers all the goods any action fan would want, but also manages to do it with evocative characters and having something to say – not in any dull didactic manner, but with all the sizzle and steak one would ever want from a genre picture.

The sexual slavery imposed upon Eastern European women is a subject that’s finally getting its big screen due this year. Other than a TV movie or two and Lukas Moodysson’s powerful 2002 feature drama “Lilja 4-Ever”, this is subject matter that the movies have been reluctant to tackle. But this year we’ve seen Liam Neeson decimating Albanian pimps in the surprise hit “Taken” and the Slovenian drama “Slovenian Girl”. “Kirot” joined this smattering of pictures devoted to the subject of women who are kidnapped and forced into sexual slavery as the opening film of a new City to City series focusing on Tel-Aviv at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. It’s a fresh and welcome take on the subject – just the sort of thing that movies seem to be made for.

It’s been several years since hard-hitting investigative journalist Victor Malarek shocked the world with his powerful non-fiction book “The Natashas” – a book that brought the issue of contemporary sexual slavery to the forefront of the world’s consciousness. In his book, Malarek focused on the real Israeli pimp “Tarzan” and how women from Eastern Europe were being duped and/or outright kidnapped and forced to work as sex slaves. Malarek reported on every disgusting detail – from the “breaking-in” period wherein women are raped into submission, forced to serve hundreds, if not thousands of clients, have their passports stolen and receive threats of violence towards their family if they don’t submit and in Israel, are forced to engage in un-protected sex with “devout” Orthodox johns who refuse, for cultural/religious reasons to waste their seed (as it might offend God).

“Kirot” is not only a rip-roaringly entertaining movie, it’s an important one since it might well be the first mainstream picture to reach a wide audience and bring this issue to light.

Make no mistake, though. It’s brutal. The treatment of women at the hands of the Israeli pimps is sickening. While the movie does not go into the same graphic detail as Malarek’s book (thank the God of Abraham!), the opening few minutes contain some of the nastiest depictions of violence against women I’ve seen in quite some time. But, take heart, gentle souls, when Miss Kurylenko starts brandishing her gun, the satisfaction level will skyrocket amongst even the most liberal sensibilities.

Lerner paints a grimly realistic underworld portrait – a world of cheap rooms, dark, wet streets and gold-chained scumbags. There are no police, no law enforcement – why should there be? Most countries turn their back on this issue by paying mere lip service to it. In fact, the Israeli government is one of the biggest offenders here – in some cases, actually charging the sex slaves with prostitution and deporting them back to their home countries, further stigmatizing and torturing them. Luckily, governments are not the people and it’s taken the brave effort of Jewish women’s groups to fight this scourge head-on. (One more reason why we should NEVER confuse government with individuals and/or groups.)

The movie opens with an extreme close-up of Galia’s fiery eyes as she sits sullenly in a tacky whorehouse. Her “employer”, Mishka (Vladimir Friedman), orders her to smile. She forces one and escapes at the first opportunity. Upon recapture, she is beaten, and then promised a choice – make a “hit” or two and all will be forgiven. If she refuses, her infant daughter in Ukraine will be kidnapped and forced to work as a child prostitute.

What’s a girl to do? She dolls up, girds her loins and dives in headfirst. She’s set-up in an apartment, given cash, new duds and a chance at freedom. Alas, with pimps, and the underworld in general, there’s never such a thing as freedom and after she makes her first kill, she’s strung along. She knows she’s never going to escape, now.

Action must be taken. And believe me, it is.

That said, the picture is not all brutal pyrotechnics. Lerner allows numerous scenes of contemplation, builds complex characters and delivers a movie that’s one part Jean-Pierre Melville, one part Walter Hill, one part Scorsese and some deliciously delectable dashes of Michael Winner’s “Death Wish”. The action scenes, especially during the picture’s final third are brilliantly, heart-poundingly suspenseful and the violence is directed with the skill and precision of a true master (though this is only Lerner’s second feature). These sequences of relentless bloodshed are offset by gentle, evocative dream sequences involving Galia and her daughter and the true bond of friendship that develops between Galia and Elinor. In one of a few profoundly moving scenes, Elinor takes Galia to a Mikveh where she can purify herself and become immersed in the Holy glow of Judaism in the Eyes of God. This is exactly what the Doctor ordered. Cleansed and rejuvenated, our heathen Cossack warrior princess is now able to shed all her guilt and filth and proceed with her redemption by extracting revenge on her slavers and also save the life of a Jewish mother and her child.

This is the stuff great movies are made of – journeys where the stakes are high and the results of extreme actions in extraordinary situations are rewarded with the holiest ascensions into purity.

“Kirot” kicks ass!

Major ass!

The Disappearance of Alice Creed (2009) dir. J. Blakeson
Starring: Eddie Marsan, Gemma Arterton, Martin Compston

****

With only his first feature film we can immediately sense special things to come from J. Blakeson - an ingenious three-hand kidnapper noir conceived and executed with the same kind of cinematic confidence as a young Christopher Nolan or David Fincher.

There should be very little said about the plot of this picture other than 2 kidnappers grab and hold for ransom the daughter of a wealthy man. That’s it. That’s all you should know before diving into Blakeson’s razor sharp, twisty and utterly beguiling chamber drama.

Blakeson takes one of the most basic of Hollywood genre-premises, the kidnap-ransom plot, distills everything extraneous to the three main characters, and boils the picture down to its essential emotions. We don’t meet any of the characters before the kidnapping, never see a money exchange or any conversations outside of the room, and never ever do we see a policeman.

There’s only three people in the film: Vic (Eddie Marsan) the alpha-criminal who goes about the business of crime with steely-eyed efficiency; Danny (Martin Compston), the apprentice, who follows orders from Vic and the only one who appears to have a conscience in the affair; and of course, Alice Creed (Gemma Anderton), the poor victim who spends most of the film gagged and bound to four corners of a bed.

The opening sequence is marvel of thriller montage scenes. Blakeson cuts together a stunning preparation sequence as we see Vic and Danny go to the hardware store, buy all the necessary tools and supplies for the job and construct their kidnappers' layer inside some kind of vacant apartment flat.

Blakeson’s formal and precise compositions, pacing and ultra-sharp lighting scheme resembles a David Fincher-like attention to detail, a style which compliments and subliminally establishes the precision of Vic and Danny’s plan.

The duo seems to have everything covered including a bed pan for Alice to pee in when required. What they don’t plan for is the emotional attachment to the job. As much as possible Vic commands Danny NOT to think, to remain focused on the work, Danny just can’t do that and when his motivations for the job are revealed, it becomes the first wrench in the works. Just when we think we know where the film is headed we learn about Vic’s motivations for the job. Even Alice’s needs and presence complicates things. Soon it becomes a complex Mexican stand-off, each one trying to hold their poker faces as best they can to get out alive. And by focusing on character as much as the procedural details as the scheme starts to unravel we’re never quite sure who, if anyone, will come out on top in the end – Vic, Danny, or Alice.

Many great directors have begun their careers with this type of noir. Blakeson’s work stands tall beside neo-noir classics such as “Bound”, “Shallow Grave”, “Memento”, “Blood Simple”. Watch for great things in the future from this guy.

P.S. On the IMDB it appears Blakeson is the writer for the 'Descent' sequel, which instantly puts that film in a whole new light.

The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (2009) dir. Judith Ehrlich, Rick Goldsmith
Documentary

***1/2

The spectre of Richard Nixon continues to produce more compelling stories and interesting characters than ever before. With this documentary the microscope zooms in on the story of Daniel Ellsberg's leak of the Pentagon Papers and its influence into activisim in the 60’s, the Vietnam War and the fall of Richard Nixon- a film which successful links itself to the other great Nixon/Vietnam era political films such as ’Frost/Nixon’, ’All The President’s Men”, ’Nixon’, and ’The Fog of War’.

In many ways Daniel Ellsberg symbolizes the best qualities of the zeitgeist of political activism in the 60's - a man who risked family, career and public reputaion for the sake of the fundamental constitutional values which in his mind appeared to be forsaken by the country's elected powers. Ehlich and Goldsmith's film serves as a cinematic memoir for Ellsberg who reveals his motivations, regrets and the moment-by-moment emotions of the two year period between the leaking of the Papers and his ultimate exoneration.

To refresh.. the Pentagon Papers was the notorious term for a top secret study prepared by the Department of Defence on U.S./Vietnam relations from 1947-1968 - a study which revealed a scathing lies from four Presidents about the motivations, execution and escalation of the Vietnam War.

In 1971 Daniel Ellsberg, a former political advisor to Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara and researcher with the Rand Corporation leaked these to the New York Times, the effect of which saw him arrested for espionage, as well as causing the snowball effect of Watergate and Richard Nixon's eventual resignation.

Ellsberg is still alive and provides the narration and key interviews recounting this complex story. We learn about his Harvard education and recruitment into the exclusive political think tank, The Rand Corporation, where he made a name for himself with his ability to think outside the box. During this time his work drafting military risk strategies and decision-making theories helped influence Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara escalate the war in Vietnam. It wasn’t until he met his wife, an activist and protestor, did he awaken to the real world effects of his work. And so Ellsberg recounts the difficult moral conflict he found himself faced with. With this knowledge in his possession, does he have moral obligation to disclose it for the greater good of the nation?

We learn about the connections he makes with colleague Anthony Russo to steal the papers and covertly send them to the papers. When the news hits the streets we get to hear the first hand reactions of Nixon, John Ehlichman, and Henry Kissinger via Nixon's own White House wiretap tapes sounding off on the shit storm fallout caused by the leak.

The uncomplicated tried and true documentary techniques are not flashy but effective visualize the story. Talking heads are formally composed, artistic recreations borrowed from the Errol Morris, or ‘Man on Wire’ school of oblique close-ups do the job visualizing what could not be shown by news footage or stock photos. Ultimately the emotional power is in the voices and faces of the participants.

At 75 Ellsberg emerges as a hero and a champion for political activism and perhaps the original and most important whistle blower ever. Ellsberg’s moral conflict is articulated best by one of the interviewees who discusses the need to have young people on the jury of his trial. Anyone of middle age would likely find disdain for what Ellsberg did, not because of ethical differences, but the fact that Ellberg's actions would have revealed the cowardice of those ordinary men and women who wouldn't have had the guts to do the right thing - the decicion to risk family and career for one’s morals is something few of us have face, and for those that do, even fewer would go through with it.

Harry Brown (2009) Dir. Daniel Barber
Starring: Michael Caine, Emily Mortimer and David Bradley

*1/2

Guest Review by Greg Klymkiw

A new vigilante picture starring Sir Michael Caine as the title character, a senior citizen who cleans up the scum in his neighborhood whilst avenging the murder of an old pal should be music to the ears of most movie-goers. It certainly was to mine. But as this turgid, poorly paced, humourless, somewhat pretentious and far too precious picture un-spooled, all I kept thinking was: “Oh no, say it isn’t so!” As hard as I tried to like the picture, it was pretty much impossible to muster any enthusiasm.

The screenplay by Gary Young (“Shooters”) is serviceable enough. It opens with some brutal violence, lays the groundwork for Harry’s seemingly mild mannered character (an ex-Marine as it turns out, who served Britain in Ireland during the “troubles”), efficiently stacks the deck for the audience to enjoy watching our title hero take out all the filth and paints several vivid portraits of youth run amuck that are guaranteed to convert even the most liberal sensibilities to the noble cause of vigilantism (or send them running for the door in disgust at how lower class kids are portrayed as vicious irredeemable psychopaths who deserve only death).

The problem lies mostly with first-time feature director Daniel Barber, whose previous work includes television commercials (always a bad sign) and an Academy Award nominated short film (no real guarantee of talent). The clichéd bleach-bypass-ish lighting that contrasts with the deep, semi-noir-ish deep blacks is not without mood, but there’s no real imagination to the compositions – no urgency, no real edge. The cutting is even more by the numbers and lacks the same kind of drive and build-up that made a lot of the 70s crime pictures so intense.

The picture that comes immediately to mind is Mike Hodges’s stunning 1971 crime and retribution thriller “Get Carter” (which also starred Caine), but even the mere thought of that picture’s relentless nastiness serves to constantly remind us of how little oomph “Harry Brown” has.

“Get Carter” is a rollercoaster. “Harry Brown” is the kiddies’ car ride.

All that said, Sir Michael handles himself magnificently and his restrained, intelligent performance comes close to saving the movie. His depiction of seeming stoicism that is ultimately unable to hide the sadness in his eyes when he gazes upon a photograph of his long-dead daughter or his Alzheimer’s-afflicted wife or his best friend who expresses fear and anger at being harassed by neighborhood thugs is powerful and moving. As the indignities are heaped upon Harry, we can see the anger dancing and flickering in his irises – a guarantee that much carnage will follow.

In spite of Caine’s performance, though, the movie is pretty much a slog. Barber metes everything out at a snail’s pace and appears to do so in order to give the movie the sort of weight he clearly hopes will raise it above a simple vigilante picture. It’s this precious, holier-than-thou attitude towards the material that destroys all potential for entertainment value. Clearly, the director wants us to question our reactions to the proceedings, but all we end up questioning is why in hell the movie is so boring? Why is their no nastiness to Caine’s actions? Where’s the relish the director should be taking in all the displays of carnage. And while I am thankful to Barber that he does not resort to the fashionable, but annoying and lazy herky-jerky style of shooting and cutting the action – he often hangs back and lets things play out naturally – it’s the overall pace of the picture and attitude of “I’m above exploitation” that affects the picture’s ability to involve us.

Great vigilante movies get under our skin by forcing us to cheer the actions of the person who seeks retribution so that maybe, just maybe, we WILL genuinely question our own reactions to the violence as it is being perpetrated. They do this by bringing a pulp sensibility to the material much like Hodges did in “Get Carter”.

The only straw of entertainment value to grasp at is Caine’s terrific performance, but it’s simply and finally not enough.

One especially annoying speed bump in the movie is the performance of Emily Mortimer as a homicide detective who is investigating the murder of Harry’s old pal and begins to suspect that our hero is the person committing a series of killings amongst the neighbourhood’s underworld. Not only is she miscast, but her dour demeanour is singularly unattractive and we long for one of the thugs to erase her completely from the proceedings.

“Harry Brown” commits a cardinal sin – it tries to gussy itself up as something it isn’t. This has produced a picture that MIGHT appeal to a politically correct minority who can pretend they’re NOT watching the movie for the carnage and would normally not be caught dead in a theatre showing a kick-ass vigilante picture, but all the rest of us – who like our action straight-up (morality be damned!) get supremely short-changed. That said, however, Sir Michael is great, and that, I suppose, is not to be sneezed at.

“Harry Brown” is playing at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and will be theatrically released by E1 Films.

Chloe (2009) dir. Atom Egoyan
Starring: Julianne Moore, Amanda Seyfried, Liam Neeson, Max Theriot

**1/2

It’s a shame ‘Chloe’ turned out to be what it is. For two thirds, it’s an entrancing Hitchcockian thriller under the filter of Atom Egoyan sophistication. Unfortunately a concerted effort to stay in the mainstream sees the film play out on the straight and narrow path toward cliché and familiar genre storytelling - thus revealing itself as nothing more than a recycled sexual genre thriller from the 1990’s.

Catherine (Julianne Moore) is a sexually frustrated doctor married to David (Liam Neeson), a university professor, both lead busy lives and barely have any romantic time for each other. Their teenaged son, Michael (Max Theriot), is just discovering the joys of sex and spends plenty of time locked in his bedroom with his girlfriend. When Catherine suspects David of cheating, she’s not so much upset as jealous of him. Enter Chloe, a sexy high priced call girl who plies her trade in the same posh upper class Toronto restaurants as Catherine. After a brief meeting Catherine tracks her down offers her a proposition to flirt with her husband as a test of his fidelity.

Chloe turns the trick, and gets paid and reports back on the results. Not satisfied with just one encounter Catherine pays her again and again to increase the affair, the effect of which actually turns Catherine on. Catherine and Chloe's relationship deepens creating a situation even more dangerous than a naughty affair.

It's Julianne Moore’s picture here, our hero really, carrying the burden of the action and with all the emotional conflict on her shoulders. It’s a demanding role to manage the direction in which her character sways - from sexually frustrated alpha-female to emotionally naked sex slave - but Moore pulls it off. Seyfried is alluring when her character needs to tease us with her mantrap flirtations. Egoyan even opens up eying her stunning nude body being clothed, shot discreetly of course with carefully placed camera angles. Her big blue eyes and lusciously full lips are nothing short of perfect. When her dangerous side is revealed so does Seyfried's inadequacies, failing to convince us her psychotic obsessions don’t rely on the “Single White Female‘ or ‘Fatal Attraction‘ precedent.

Egoyan’s biggest strength has always been his ability to hide and reveal information for maximum emotional impact. Maybe it’s the linear narrative or the genre requirements which hold him back here but it’s a predictable and unmemorable course charted. As the chess pieces are setup brilliantly I was hoping the film wouldn’t go where it appeared to be headed. And as the running time clipped along the realization slowly set in that it was the only place it could possibly go. And so, by the third act we find ourselves in a full fledged 1990’s sexual thriller, no more intelligent, original or sophisticated than anything we’ve seen before.

Going through the credits it’s easy to see how this picture went off the rails - or stayed on the rails, depending on your perspective. Ivan and Jason Reitman are credited as producers (instead of the arthouse-leaning Robert Lantos) and the ones who found the property and recruited Egoyan. Its the first picture where Egoyan hasn't written his own script, and the mainstream direction the film goes has someone else's fingerprints all over it.

It’s Egoyan’s most mainstream film which perhaps might satisfy audiences put off by his usual psychology ruminations but it will likely only tease naughty boys looking to catch sight of Amanda Seyfried's lovely breasts.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009) dir, Werner Herzog
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Val Kilmer, Eva Mendes, Vondie Curtis-Hall

***1/2

The new 'Bad Lieutenant' feels like one big cinematic joke leaving those who don’t get it alienated and dumbfounded and those who do laughing in hysterics. When this movie was first announced - idiosyncratic director Werner Herzog remaking or refashioning Abel Ferrara’s great character study of hedonism, depravity and redemption - none of us knew what to expect, but if anyone could possibly rework this material for the best it would Werner Herzog. The result indeed its an oddball film of monumental proportions, the work of a complete madman with total freedom with his cinematic canvas.

Nicolas Cage is Terence McDonough, the film’s title character. Like Harvey Keitel he’s addicted to drugs - explained to us this time in a flashback - and has the confidence that he can get away with anything. He and his partner Stevie (Val Kilmer) get assigned to a case of a family murdered as part of a Senegalese drug vendetta. As the investigation progress the events of his personal life interweave and interfere with the work.

Along the way Terry crosses paths with a number of oddballs. There’s Frankie (Eva Mendes) a prostitute who’s also his girlfriend and #1 drug partner who will develop the urge to kick the habit. Terry's also a gambler taking bets on college football with his weirdo bookie played by Brad Dourif. There’s his father and alcoholic stepmother who, and there’s his father’s dog which he has to take care of. There’s the child of the murdered family whom he brings along with him to his many sordid escapades, there’s the drug kingpin, ‘Big Fate’ (Xzibit) who proposes to Terry a partnership in organized crime, and there’s his police chief (Vondie Curtis-Hall) who tells him he’s close to having his badge revoked.

I can honestly say this is the only film to ever pull me back from ‘one of the worst pictures I’ve ever seen’ to become a headshaking instant cult classic in the same sitting.

It takes over half way through to figure this picture out. On one hand some scenes serve to recreate the hedoism and train wreck journey of Harvey Keitel’s character, others serve the tone of an investigative noir and other times we're watching Lynchian black comedy.

The opening scenes which appear to be played straight are executed with strange amateurish and uneven quality. Val Kilmer is unintentionally hilarious as Terry’s loose cannon partner, and the scenes meant to rival Keitel’s more audacious notorious scenes end up painfully overplayed and rotten.

Slowly we get accustomed to the general theme of wackiness, anchored by Nicolas Cage's wonderful performance. His acting style is perfectly suited to this material. Herzog appears to allow Cage to let loose like never before resulting in a number instant classic set pieces. Terry’s visit to the pharmacy to refill his vicodin prescription is priceless, and arguably the film's eye popping climax is the surreal drug deal shoot out - a scene which will likely be talked about for some time to come.

At some point it all clicked. Like I was out of sync throughout the picture. Once I got engaged the film dissolves away all its chaff revealing an utterly fascinating and entertaining surreal fantasy worthy of David Lynch.

The presence of Herzog’s other film, 'My Son My Son, What Have Ye Done' is important to understanding this picture. Though I haven't seen that film yet I defer by colleague Reece Crothers' assessment of Lynch's collaboration in that picture and assume a similar influence creeped into this one. So audience must come in with an awareness of both filmmakers’ previous films, as well as the original 'Bad Lieutenant' in order to fully appreciate the mad genius of this picture.

Max Manus (2009) dir. Joachim Rønning, Espen Sandberg
Starring: Aksel Hennie, Agnes Kittelsen, Ken Duken, Nicolai Cleve Broch

**

The Norwegian resistance movement is the subject of this big budgeted sprawling co-production treatment. Clearly this an important story to Norwegians - the true tale of a group of youngsters, turned commando terrorists who, over the course of 5 years, manage to help turn the tide of war. It’s a noble effort featuring some fine young actors playing their roles with honour and dignity, but there’s too much story in a too short a time resulting in a cinematic dilution of emotion and suspense.

Max Manus (Aksel Hennie) is introduced fighting for Norway against the German invasion in a raucous battle scene in the snow. Max tells us in voiceover the embarrassment of his country’s quick surrender fueled his desire to fight even harder against the Nazis. We watch Max form a résistance group of likeminded young people, who produce propaganda papers with as much zeal as a group of frat kids. But when their carelessness finds Max caught by the Gestapo, the reality of their actions becomes quickly apparent.

Max manages to escape and regroup in Scotland where he’s trained as a commando to work in the large Allied-coordinated resistance movement. His missions involve planting bombs on boats and buildings under the noses of the Nazis. Max becomes so good at what he does he becomes a legend within the Nazi SS, who are determined to find him. One by one his fellow warriors and good friends are hunted down and killed leaving only Max to put the final nail in the coffin for the Nazis.

There’s nothing false in “Max Manus” yet the film remains at a distance too far for the audience to be intimately invested in the emotions of these events. It’s the ‘hopscotching’ effect of skipping through the highlights of the five years over which the film takes place. In the first 15mins we meet Max, see him as a soldier on the front, get injured, start up a resistance, develop a propaganda newspaper, get caught, escape and join up with the Allies in Scotland. Scenes are just too short to enjoy and the filmmakers even resort to annoying narration to fill in the details of what the montage scenes can’t. Thankfully they discard the device when it’s not longer necessary.

In skipping too fast between locations, we never feel the threat against Max and his fighters. One moment they’re planting a bomb underneath a battleship and the next moment they’re in Sweden or Scotland sipping whisky. Perhaps some dramatic licence was needed to keep the characters under the pressure cooker of undercover terrorism - the set pieces in ‘Valkyre’ or ‘Munich’ serving as the best cinematic examples.

Other opportunities are missed all over the place as well, chiefly the parallel stories of Max Manus and his foil Siegfried, the chief Nazi SS man. By the nature of the editing pattern there would appear to be some sort of ‘Catch Me If You Can’ cat and mouse chase going on, but never does one influence the other. Looking carefully Siegfried actually has no tangible narrative purpose and could have been cut out altogether without harm to the story. And even if Siegfried were weaved in appropriately there’s much screen time devoted to some romance between he and his secretary, which inexplicably disappears before the third act.

The only respite comes, unfortunately, in the final credits when we see photographs of the real life characters next to the actors' faces - not an original device, but one which finally anchors down the reality of the story. It’s too little too late, because the filmmakers have missed this potentially thrilling story with uninspired and only adequate storytelling.

L’affaire Farewell (2009) Dir. Christian Carion
Starring: Emir Kusturica, Guillaume Canet, Ingeborga Dapkunaite, Dina Korzun, Maria Lara, Fred Ward, Philippe Magnan, David Soul and Willem Dafoe

***1/2

Guest Review By Greg Klymkiw

While the 1980s will always feel to me like one of the most culturally empty periods I ever experienced in my life, one thing I will never forget was just how close-to-home and strange the Cold War between the former Soviet Union and the rest of the Western world – particularly the United States – actually was. It was a time of paranoia, macho posturing between the USA and USSR and always the fear of nuclear warfare. Having been born on the cusp of the Baby Boom and Gen-X, I was certainly made aware of the early days of the Cold War during the 50s, but it really wasn’t until the 80s that I felt I got a real taste of feeling like I was living – if not culturally – politically in a climate that felt very much like a living history and that events were transpiring that would change the world forever.

Christian Carion, who directed the lovely, sentimental World War I drama “Joyeaux Noel” (not only an award winning and critically acclaimed film, but a huge boxoffice hit in its domestic territory France and eventually all over the world) has, with his latest picture “L’affaire Farewell”, crafted a work that is imbued with considerable nostalgia appeal in terms of how expertly it captures the espionage and flavour of the Cold War during the 80s, but is also, one of the best political thrillers in years.

Based on the true story of the high ranking KGB official who secretly fed the biggest state secrets to the West and was responsible for the downfall of communism in Eastern Europe, “L’affaire Farewell” is an utterly compelling, straight ahead picture that thrills with both subject matter and impeccable craft.

Colonel Grigoriev (the brilliant master director Emir Kusturica in his formal debut as a leading man) feels completely disillusioned with Communism under Leonid Brezhnev and with the assistance of Pierre (actor and director Guillaume Canet) a non-professional French civilian working in Moscow leaks information designed to bring down the entire Soviet regime. This famous historical mission, dubbed “farewell” and led by French president Mitterand (Phillipe Magnan) and US president Ronald Reagan (Fred Ward) was, without question, the most daring operation in the history of 20th Century espionage.

Carion parcels out this fascinating story with precision and class. Most importantly, he does so in a manner that keeps us enthralled and in a heightened state of suspense – thanks to a first-rate script by Eric Raynaud and a mastery that recalls both Costa-Gavras and Fred Zinneman, most notably and respectively conjuring memories of “Z” and “The Day of the Jackal” and reminding us of just how good an old-fashioned political thriller can be. There’s nothing overtly flashy about Carion’s approach and the picture feels closer to the measured pace of Zinneman than that of the rapid-fire Costa-Gavras, but his film clearly shares the Gavras blend of personal and political and nowhere is this more apparent in how the plot balances the private lives of his characters against the sweep of historical events.

The cast is outstanding. Emir Kusturica as Grigoriev is a revelation. With his tough, tender, brave and cynical performance, Kusturica mines his sexy-ugly Bogart qualities and creates a character who is, in many ways, as haunting as that of Rick in “Casablanca”. The camera loves Kusturica and one hopes he’ll get more chances to deliver the goods on-camera as well as off. Guillaume Canet is a far more traditional leading man type – handsome AND sensitive, he might even have the more difficult role as he needs to transition from a civilian bureaucrat into a spy who thinks he’s getting better, but is, in fact swimming deeper in the shit than he could even begin to comprehend. The array of beautiful leading ladies as the strong, supportive women in the lives of these two men are a perfect compliment to their male counterparts.

The real fun can be found in the fabulous casting of Fred Ward and Phillipe Magnan as Reagan and Mitterand. Ward is especially stunning. A handsome, grizzled veteran of tough guy roles, Ward is perfect as the former matinee-idol-turned-president. While he bears only a passing resemblance, his verbal intonations and even a few physical ones are eerily reminiscent of a President who might have often felt like a joke at the time, but in retrospect seems like just what America and the world needed in the 80s.

One of the script’s great touches includes Reagan constantly screening the final scenes of John Ford’s “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” to his aides – reminding both himself, them and the audience of how there is always more than one side to every story and that history itself has a way of swapping truth and fiction in order to tell a ripping yarn.

And have no doubt, “L’affaire Farewell” is one hell of a ripping yarn. While the movie spends perhaps a bit too much time on the romantic relationships of both Grigoriev and Pierre, they add a personal touch to the proceedings that suggests how life often throws the curveballs of normalcy into pretty much anything – no matter how extraordinary one’s situation might be. This contrasts quite beautifully with the espionage and ultimately lends even more weight to the moments of suspense which range from creeping, mounting anticipation to all-out esde-of-the-seat stuff.

While much of the threat of Communism was manufactured by the US propaganda machine, the movie (and Grigoriev’s character) display how even the noblest of intentions (Grigoriev sadly recalls the need for revolution during the early part of the 20th century) can slip into an abyss of evil and how only by destroying what transforms into all-out totalitarianism is a goal that must always be countered head-on. In “L’affaire Farewell”, we not only get a sense of how evil Communism had become, but that finally it was individuals and not governments who brought the whole deck of cards down.

“L’affaire Farewell” is playing at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and will be theatrically released by E1 Films.

Waking Sleeping Beauty (2009) dir., Don Hahn
Documentary

***

It may seem odd that even though I despise those ‘Little Mermaid-Lion King Era’ Disney pictures of the early 90’s I was still attracted to the story behind the making of these films. The corporate story of Disney from its fall from grace in feature animation to its triumphant rise under Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg is given feature documentary treatment in ‘Waking Sleeping Beauty’.

The title refers to a quote from Katzenberg upon being hired by the company, the need to recapture the magic touch of Uncle Walt, who died in 1966, just as the company was moving in the direction away from animation and into theme parks, TV and other ancillary ventures.

The start date is 1984 with the hiring Michael Eisner from Paramount and Frank Wells of Warner Bros to run the company. Along with Roy Disney, the sole mainstay from the Uncle Walt era and Jeffrey Katzenberg who would become the celebrated ‘saviour‘ of the animation, they form the trinity of characters for the film. There’s enough TV coverage for Hahn to use to visualize the hoopla around this event, much of it from a 60 Minutes segment conducted by Diane Sawyer.

We all know the persona of Michael Eisner, not an actor, but a man with a persuasive enough voice to make him the public figurehead of the new Disney. Jeffrey Katzenberg is characterized as a money-maker who is quoted as saying, he doesn’t to win the Academy Award but the Bank of America Award.

Early on we get to see early footage of a young Tim Burton, John Lasseter and other future star filmmakers working as animators under the old regime. Hahn depicts the youthful animation division as a ragtag bunch of kids holding together the legacy of Disney with duck tape and chewing gum. The lowest point for everyone was the overly budgeted failure ‘The Black Cauldron’ and the usurping of the throne by Steven Spielberg and Don Bluth with their new animation collaboration, "An American Tale". But slowly, by the hand of Katzenberg, the hits start rolling in, ‘Oliver & Company’, ‘Little Mermaid’, “Beauty and the Beast’, and ‘Aladdin.’ But by the time their biggest hit, “The Lion King’ rolls around the money making machine starts showing signs of wear and tear behind the curtain. Hahn cleverly demonstrates the ego clashes between Roy Disney, Eisner and Katzenberg by intercutting their own filmed introductions to their movies, a childish competition to be bigger than the other. With Katzenberg increasing his public persona higher than Eisner’s we’re told this is the impetus for the breakup of the once mighty trio. Knowing a second wave of Disney resurgence with the merger with Pixar, post Katzenberg, his departure doesn’t have much gravitas, but it’s the death of the unassuming peacemaker Frank Wells which provides the emotional cap.

Unfortunately, since Eisner is still with the company we don’t get to hear from him outside of the canned interviews, soundbites from news stories and other publicity-policed segments. In fact, none of the non-stock interviews are shown on camera. We only hear their voices, identified by pop-up graphics. This decision was most likely made to avoid any potential stodginess which might result from documentary formalities, but it comes at the expense of being able to see the facial expressions and mannerisms of the film’s central characters. At one point one of the animators tells us the soul of an animated film is in the eyes of its character - a severe bit of ironic failure which Hahn unfortunately fails to see.

And overriding everything is the silent hand of Disney guiding this film. Don Hahn, producer of ‘The Lion King’, and longtime Disney employee narrates the story. His voice is not that compelling and he’s not even much of a storyteller, but his rise from lowly coffee fetcher for the Disney’s cherished animators of old in the 60’s to the producer of the most successful classical animated film ever made certainly gives him the authority. But with this, inevitably, a celebratory back-patting feeling arises. Hurray for us. The film never goes beyond the information it’s meant to convey. The lack of personality from their subjects means the film never rises to the artistic heights and pathos of say, ‘The Kid Who Stayed in the Picture’ or 'An Inconvenient Truth.' And so I couldn't help but think how Davis Guggenheim or Brett Morgen would have served this material.

Valhalla Rising (2009) dir. Nicolas Winding Refn
Starring: Mads Mikkelson, Gary Lewis, Ewan Stewart

*1/2

There wasn’t a film I anticipated more at TIFF than “Vahalla Rising”. If anyone was going to do a mythological Viking story, I would have chosen Refn – a bold and muscular filmmaker largely unknown in North America but revered internationally for his magnificent Pusher trilogy. He also shocked me to bits this year at Sundance with his raucous ode to British prison lifer Charles Bronson, in “Bronson”.

And so with ‘Vahalla Rising’, a Danish filmmaker doing a Scandinavian story with Mads Mikkelson in the lead?? Pass me the popcorn please.

What Refn births onto the screen is the most alienating displeasing mind-numbing cinematic garbage I’ve seen in a long time.

Somewhere in Northern Scotland, or Scandinavia (which, at the time, was not all that dissimilar), it’s the Middle Ages – a time and place when Christian zealots warred with the old pagan/heathen way of life. A group of sadistic Christians are touring the countryside showcasing their pagan prisoners in a gruesome gladiatorial gambling game. Their star gladiator is ‘One Eye’ (Mads Mikkelson), who is tattooed to the max and with his left eye pulled out and grown over with skin. The match involves ‘One Eye’ forced to fight off two free opponents while tied with rope to a wooden stake. No matter what the challenge One Eye pummels and beats his opponents like rag dolls. Eventually One Eye escapes killing all his captors and seeks to return home.

Along with a young boy One Eye hook up with a group of Scottish crusaders looking to free the Holy Land. With nowhere to go One Eye and the kid tag along. The journey is long, slow, dreamy and violent. The faction eventually turn against each other when they realize their path has led them to some other land, instead of Jerusalem – a place where One Eye confronts his biggest challenge.

Sounds exciting, full of violent bloody fights, killing, and swordplay? Refn restricts his ability to entertain by handicapping himself severely. Chiefly, our hero ‘One Eye’ is rendered as a silent contemplative killer, a man of decision and action, like Mad Max or the harmonica man in ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’, but unfortunately without any dialogue whatsoever. Secondly Refn sets a pace not unlike ‘Once Upon A Time in the West’, but the absolute slowest moments in that film without Leone’s writing skills to pay off the silences.

What we get is a slothlike metaphysical journey through rain and fog, with characters talking and moving in slow motion. There’s so little going on that Refn in a couple scenes ramps up the volume of the ambient atmospheric soundtrack to build up to absolutely nothing. Refn also inexplicably divides the film into six chapters with bold titles like ‘Hell’, ‘Warrior’ or ‘The Saviour’ falsely implying some kind of narrative shift or change in tone. Nope, it’s a just continuation of slow panning shots of mountains and fog.

The film builds to a reveal which, considering the terrain they were traversing makes no logical sense whatsoever, yet I still guessed it. Even with a third act twist Refn dulls any dramatic effect by slowing things down and refusing to throw us any kind of bone.

‘Vahalla Rising’ is a complete and utter waste of time and money.