Monkey Warfare

Dan (Don McKellar) and Linda (Tracy Wright) are self-obsessed roommates who scrounge and steal to make ends meet as well as buy weed to smoke. Susan (Nadia Litz) comes along and flirts with Dan as his protégé. Susan starts her own group of revolutionaries and tries to talk the couple into joining her wrecking crew.

I like the setup and the characters. They're oddly offbeat. I like all three actors in their roles. I wish the movie can take the next step. This being indie probably meant they blew the budget by trashing that one SUV. The movie needs to have the trio go out on a mission of destruction. That would have sent the movie to another level.

Yes, this is my favorite Canadian movie of all time, and no, I'm not now, nor have I ever been, associated with any of the people who made it.

I almost want to say, that it is my favorite movie period. But that might be stretching it.

What’s not to like about this movie? There is not a whole lot of action. There are no car chases, and there are no gun-battles. So if you are looking for that type of action, this is not the movie for you.

There are lots of beautiful shots of Toronto, parts of neighborhoods not normally shown. Lots of beautiful girls on bicycles, a bit of the history of modern resistance, a fair bit of pot smoking, and wonderfully appropriate music.

Join Dan and Linda, as they pick garbage for a living, and try to tame their new radical friend Susan. You won’t be disappointed.

Disregard comments from the disgruntled tiff attendee above (it's a shame a venue like IMDb sometimes acts as nothing more than a host for people with a tiny axe to grind).

This is a sharply written, well-acted little film. I say little, as it's obvious the budget was quite low. The director has a good sense of colour and of music. The performances are good all around. The humour is nicely laced into the situations presented in the script.

Some of his experimental cuts didn't work for me personally and the film as a whole may not be commercial enough for some, but the wryness of the writing and performances more than made up for that for me personally.

I recently saw this at the 2007 Palm Springs International Film Festival and I don't know how it's possible to take a $30,000 budget and a two week film shoot and come up with a picture that's 10 times better than many costing 100 times the budget and 10 times the shoot time but Monkey Warfare is evidence that it is. Director/writer Reginald Harkema is obviously a talented filmmaker but he must also be a hypnotist to get this accomplish cast and crew to work for next to nothing. The film's title comes from a chapter in counter-culture Icon Abbie Hoffman's 1971 autobiography Steal This Book but the story of the film is about a couple who are eking out a living by hitting garage sales and dumpster diving but using their skills of discovery and knowledge of antiques to turn a profit by selling their items on the internet. They live an underground existence with a fixed rent and have a past to run from. They're relationship as boyfriend-girlfriend has become Platonic over the years but a younger girl who deals in top grade marijuana comes into their lives and a chain of events unfolds that will alter the lives of all three. Actor/writer.director/producer Don McKellar is Dan, actress Tracy Wright is Linda and actress Nadia Litz is Susan. All three have multi-credited careers. Harkema, who has come to directing through being an editor does not edit this film as Kathy Weinkauf is editor here. Jonathan cliff is the film's cinematographer. This is an imaginative film with lot's of character development, a good script and story and lot's of smart comedy. I would give this an 8.0 out of 10 and recommend it.

This is a great movie, with lots to appeal to a lot of different kinds of people. There is a continuous thread of humor that is very engaging, and a very cleverly-built suspense around how far things might go. There is a creative tension around the bizarre love triangle between the three main actors. The clashes between current ways of thinking and living and the vestiges of those of a generation ago is presented with love and plain good fun. A lot of original material and situations - you just don't see that much these days.

Canadian cinema is often criticized as being slow, boring, and too introspective. This film is guilty of none of those and will likely find success in all markets.