TIFF 2010 reviews — available in bulk!

Alternate title: How I Spent the Last Weeks of My Summer Vacation. Here are all of the reviews I wrote for Eye Weekly for films about to play TIFF. My cover story feature on Denis Cote and his film Curling will also be out in the issue of Cinema Scope that’s about to hit stands. In the wise words of Jimmy Durante: am I done yet?

ANOTHER YEAR **

Dir. Mike Leigh w/ Jim Broadbent, Lesley Manville. Special Presentations. 129 min. Sept 13, 6pm, Elgin; Sept 14, 2:30pm, AMC 4.

Working in the domestic-and-dramedic mode of Life Is Sweet and Secrets & Lies, Mike Leigh’s latest was a consensus fave at Cannes but it’s excessively charitable to rank Another Year alongside his best (or second-best) work. The film covers 12 months in the life of Tom (Jim Broadbent) and Gerri (Ruth Sheen), a cheery couple who endure the sometimes trying company of family and friends. The most damaged of the lot is Mary (Lesley Manville), a workmate of Gerri’s who comes apart before our eyes. After treating Mary as an easy target of scorn for much of the movie, Leigh then decides she deserves better. But despite their incessant chatter, the characters are rarely more than ciphers and every emotional note is rendered in boldface type.

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF NICOLAE CEAUSESCU *****

Dir. Andrei Ucija. Visions. 180 min. Sept 16, 5:30pm, AMC 10. Sept 17, 5pm, AMC 9.

Filmmaker and video artist Andrei Ucija insists that the found-footage epic he built out of decades’ worth of propaganda and official films is not a documentary about the former dictator but a vision of Romania (and the world) as he saw it. Either way, this highlights-and-lowlights reel of party speeches, parades, state visits and, finally, an on-camera interrogation not long before his execution amounts to an absurd, disturbing and surprisingly compelling study of totalitarianism and its taste for theatre.

BIUTIFUL **

Dir. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu w/ Javier Bardem, Maricel Alvarez. 148 min. Special Presentations. Sept 10, 8pm, Winter Garden; Sept 11, 9:30am, AMC 6.

In the Amores Perros and Babel director’s first feature without screenwriter Guillermo Ariaga, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu stops futzing with timelines and shovels on the suffering and the symbolism until even Javier Bardem trembles under the weight. Cast as an ailing Barcelona shyster coping with the challenges of single-parenthood and sweatshop management, Bardem is typically charismatic. But the scattershot plotting, the grubby yet fussy visual aesthetic and Inarritu’s distaste for subtlety in every regard make Biutiful anything but pretty.

BLUE VALENTINE ***

Dir. Derek Cianfrance w/ Michelle Williams, Ryan Gosling. 113 min. Special Presentation. Sept 15, 6:15pm, Ryerson; Sept 16, 12pm, Varsity 8.

Two young-Hollywood MVPs go for broke in this Cassavetes-style drama about the beginning and the end of a working-class couple’s relationship. Dean (Gosling) and Cindy (Williams) are a volatile pair from the first moment they cross paths, though the sweet early stages obviously make for easier viewing than their doomed foray to what must be the world’s most depressing theme hotel. Both actors are so strong that their combined bravura nearly compensates for the sketchiness of many story elements and director Derek Cianfrance’s tendency to oversell the big moments when a lighter touch would’ve crushed viewers’ hearts just as effectively.

CARANCHO ***

Dir. Pablo Trapero w/ Ricardo Darin, Martina Gusman. CWC. 107 min. Sept 13, 8pm, AMC 6; Sept 14, 3:30pm, Varsity 8; Sept 19, 3:30pm, Bader.

The prolific Pablo Trapero (Rolling Family, Lion’s Den) returns with a noir-ish drama that increases in tension and texture before sacrificing some of both in a too-contrived third act. Last seen in The Secret in Their Eyes, Darin plays a dodgy lawyer who conspires with an ambulance medic (Gusman) on a bogus insurance claim. Both characters’ belated attempts to develop a conscience imperil their con, a reportedly popular one in Argentina. The late-night ambience also serves the film well, though Trapero seems less at ease with Carancho’s trappings as a thriller.

CASINO JACK ***

Dir. George Hickenlooper w/ Kevin Spacey, Barry Pepper. Gala. 108 min. Sept 16, 6:30pm, RTH; Sept 17, 2:30pm, Elgin.

A Canadian-made movie about the downfall of Washington’s most notorious lobbyist, Casino Jack presents the story of Jack Abramoff as a caustic, frantic farce. But given the wilder-than-fiction quality of so many aspects of his tale – from Abramoff’s movie-producer past to the outrageously shady scheme involving cruise-ship casinos – the treatment actually suits the subject. Likewise, Spacey hasn’t put his loquacious-SOB routine to such memorable use in quite a while. Playing Abramoff’s partner Michael Scanlon, Pepper is even more fun.

DAYDREAM NATION ***

Dir. Mike Goldbach w/ Kat Dennings, Josh Lucas. Canada First. 98 min. Sept 10, 6pm, Ryerson; Sept 11, noon, AMC 3.

This Canada First opener by Mike Goldbach (Don McKellar’s co-writer on Child Star) is a gorgeously shot portrait of small-town desperation that’s plenty beguiling until it becomes too clear how much Goldbach has borrowed from Tom Perotta and Alan Ball’s forays into similar thematic and geographic terrain. Luckily, the movie’s best scenes are as whip-smart as Kat Dennings – she carries the day as Caroline, a high schooler who clinches her aspiring bad-girl status by seducing her English teacher (Lucas). Traces of Donnie Darko can also be discerned in Daydream Nation’s many portents of imminent teen apocalypse and it’s all effectively (if somewhat excessively) scored to songs by Stars, Emily Haines and Sonic Youth.

FILM SOCIALISM ***

Dir. Jean-Luc Godard w/ Alain Badiou, Patti Smith. Sept 9, 6pm, Ryerson; Sept 11, 3:45pm, AMC 5; Sept 19, 9:30pm, Lightbox 2.

The hilariously cryptic English-subtitling job adds another layer of obfuscation to the curdmudgeonly New Waver’s latest, a “symphony in three movements” that resituates elements of recent works (especially JLG par JLG and Notre Musique) into a wide-ranging commentary on late-capitalist fatigue, the impotence of images and le fin du tout. The first section is the most coherent and engaging as performers including Patti Smith wander through a particularly garish cruise ship. Set largely at a gas station that becomes the site of a domestic revolt, the rest will be more trying to non-French speakers but still has enough moments of humour and insight to ensure that Godard retains his godhead status among old-school cinephiles.

FIRE OF CONSCIENCE ****

Dir. Dante Lam w/ Leon Lai, Richie Ren. 106 min. Midnight Madness. Sept 18, 11:59pm, Ryerson. Sept 19, 3pm, Scotiabank 11.

Hong Kong director Dante Lam proves his mettle as a choreographer of mayhem in this tautly rendered action flick. I for one didn’t realize just how much a few grenades can add to a gun battle before – the very noisy results stand with the very best of John Woo and Johnnie To. Too bad the plot – in which edgy damaged-cop Manfred (Lai) tangles with suave crooked-cop Kee (Ren) – is an often clumsy smattering of HK crime-story tropes. But hey, did I already mention the grenades?

THE FOUR TIMES *****

Dir. Michelangelo Frammartino w/ Giuseppe Fuda, Bruno Timpano. 88 min. Visions. Sept 10, 7:45pm, AMC 5; Sept 11, 12:15pm, AMC 4; Sept 12, 2:15pm, AMC 4.

The standout selection of the Directors Fortnight at Cannes, this metaphysically inclined yet wryly funny feature by Italy’s Michelangelo Frammartino is a marvel. An elderly goat-herder serves as the nominal protagonist in The Four Times, which depicts the cycle of life in a remote Calabrian village in a manner that’s unconventional yet formally elegant. While a keen understanding of Pythagoras’ theory of the soul’s four-fold migration may be helpful to viewers, it’s not essential in order to enjoy the movie’s wonders, the best of which may be some inspired sight gags involving its many four-legged thespians.

FUBAR II ****

Dir. Michael Dowse w/ Paul J. Spence, Dave Lawrence. MM. 85 min. Sept 9, 11:59pm, Ryerson; Sept 11, noon, Varsity 8.

The team behind the 2002 mock-doc cult classic just gives ‘er once again with highly satisfying results. Upping the stakes from its predecessor, FUBAR II sends Calgary headbangers Dean (Spence) and Terry (Lawrence) up to the oil boomtown of Fort McMurray, where their friendship is imperiled by everything from credit-card abuse to Terry’s new lady (a terrific Terra Hazelton). Director Michael Dowse pours on the pathos in a middle stretch that’s dark and raw enough to feel more like a Cassavetes movie than the umpteenth homage to Christopher Guest. But don’t worry: the ending is pure Frank Capra, albeit by way of Ronnie James Dio.

HEARTBEATS ***

Dir. Xavier Dolan w/ Dolan, Carole Mondello. 120 min. Special Presentation. Sept 14, 6:45pm, Varsity 8; Sept 15, 3:15pm, AMC 5.

More brashly stylized yet less adventurous than I Killed My Mother, the Montreal upstart’s sophomore effort presents the nation’s favourite new auteur as one point in a hipster love triangle. Francis (Dolan) and Marie (Mondello) are fierce competitors for the affections of Nico (Niels Schneider), a sexually ambiguous Adonis who clearly revels in the attention. The borrowings from Jean-Luc Godard, Wong Kar-wai and even Francois Ozon are egregious and many – as a result, Heartbeats is not nearly as distinctive as its predecessor. Yet Francis and Marie’s constant oscillations between desire and despair yield some witty dialogue and many sharp observations about contemporary courtship among our restless youth.

THE HOUSEMAID ***

Dir. Im Sang-soo w/ Jeon Do-youn, Lee Jung-jae. 107 min. Gala. Sept 12, 9:30pm, RTH; Sept 14, 4:30pm, Winter Garden; Sept 19, 6pm, Scotiabank 2.

A remake of a then-scandalous 1960 thriller by Kim Ki-young, The Housemaid is the salacious tale of a good God-fearing woman (Secret Sunshine’s Jeon Do-youn) who enters the employ of a wealthy family so decadent, they would’ve been evicted from Falcon Crest. Much sexiness and cruelty ensues as the new staffer falls prey to the hunky, philandering man of the house (Lee Jung-jae). Though director Im Sang-soo prefers to keep matters at a simmer, his mix of melodrama and Bunuelian black comedy does eventually reach the promised crescendo of queasiness.

I WISH I KNEW ****

Dir. Jia Zhang-ke w/ Zhao Tao, Lim Giong. Masters. 138 min. Sept 15, 9:45pm, Scotiabank 4; Sept 17, 5pm, Jackman Hall.

China’s preeminent young director presents another in his ongoing series of psycho-geographically inclined works. This time the location of choice is Shanghai, which is described by various residents as well as many who had to leave the city behind during the revolution. It’s only fitting that Jia’s film also reflects on the place’s cinematic history, the director’s own vivid images of Shanghai becoming interwoven with its earlier appearances on celluloid. Pensive shots of Jia’s regular leading lady Zhao Tao bracket the nostalgic reveries of his many fascinating subjects.

THE ILLUSIONIST ****

Dir. Sylvain Chomet. 80 min. Special Presentation. Sept 12, 2:30pm, Elgin; Sept 19, 6:30pm, Lightbox 2.

The creator of The Triplets of Belleville makes a very welcome return with an animated feature that’s just as painstaking in its creation and delightfully peculiar in its sensibility. An adaptation of an unmade screenplay by Jacques Tati, The Illusionist is the story of an elderly magician who’s part of a decaying class of showmen and vaudevillians soon to be made obsolete by TV, rock ‘n’ roll and other emblems of mid-20^th-century modernity. Our illusionist ponders a change of vocation when he begins a (mostly) paternal relationship with a Scottish lass in Edinburgh. While he’s better off than most of his ilk (including one very, very sad clown), it remains to be seen whether this gent can really find a new place in the rapidly changing and gorgeously rendered world of Chomet’s film.

INCENDIES ****

Dir. Denis Villeneuve w/ Lubna Azabal, Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin. SP. 130 min. Sept 13, 6pm, Lightbox 1; Sept 14, 2pm, AMC 3.

The French-Canadian director of Maelstrom and Polytechnique mounts his most ambitious film, an adaptation of Wajdi Mouawad’s wrenching play about twin siblings Jeanne (Désormeaux-Poulin) and Simon (Maxim Gaudette) who travel to Lebanon to discover the history of their mother (Azabal). Blessed with the help of a strong cast, the country’s best cinematographer (Andre Turpin) and his own leaned-out screenplay, Villeneuve has crafted a work of searing intensity, terrible beauty and great emotional power.

IT’S KIND OF A FUNNY STORY **

Dir. Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck w/ Keir Gilchrist, Zach Galifanakis. 101 min. Special Presentations. Sept 11, 9pm, Ryerson; Sept 17, 9am, Varsity 8.

A disappointing third outing by the duo behind Half Nelson and Sugar, this adaptation of a young-adult novel by Ned Vizzini plays out like a timid, youth-centric variation on One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Toronto-based teen actor Keir Gilchrist stars as a stressed-out and only slightly suicidal New York youngster. After checking himself into a mental ward, he meets various non-threatening types (including Zach Galifanakis as a sarcastic depressive) and receives life lessons that even adolescent viewers may find to a wee bit pat. Several animated and fantasy sequences (including a flamboyant musical number set to Bowie and Queen’s “Under Pressure”) give the movie some vitality but never for long enough to stave off its overall sense of lethargy.

KABOOM ***

Dir. Gregg Araki w/ Thomas Dekker, Haley Bennett. 86 min. Vanguard.

Vanguard. Sept 15, 9:15pm, Ryerson; Sept 18, 12:15pm, AMC 3.

Any aging hipster harboring feelings of nostalgia for the scrappy movies Gregg Araki made before the relative maturity of Mysterious Skin and, er, Smiley Face will pop a chub for Kaboom. Crossing the unbridled horniness of Totally Fucked Up with the SoCal apocalypse fantasy that was Nowhere, the American director’s latest tells the enjoyably nutzoid tale of a bisexual college student (Dekker) who gets involved with various mystery men and women, some of them in creepy animal masks, many of ‘em naked. It all points toward a freaky cult and, of course, the end of the world. Araki may be shilling another acid-addled variation on Beverly Hills 90210 to a viewership now more attuned to Jersey Shore but there’s still fun to be had.

LIFE, ABOVE ALL ****

Dir. Oliver Schmitz w/ Khomotso Manyaka, Lerato Mvelase. CWC. 106 min. Sept 12, 3pm, Varsity 8; Sept 14, 6:15pm, AMC 5.

Adapted from a young-adult novel by Canadian writer Allan Stratton, this South African township tale tackles a painful subject in terms that are sincere, humane and affecting. A 12-year-old with several ailing family members and the world on her shoulders, Chanda (Manyaka) struggles to overcome the shame associated with AIDS in her small-minded community. Director Oliver Schmitz largely avoids the easy route to viewers’ tear ducts, a restraint that allows the final scenes to be genuinely moving.

THE LIGHT THIEF ***

Dir. Aktan Arym Kubat w/ Aktan Arym Kubat, Taalaikan Abazova. CWC. 80 min. Sept 10, 6pm, AMC 4; Sept 11, 9:30am, AMC 3.

From Kyrgyzstan comes a modest but engaging fable about a shock-prone electrician who is caught up in cultural changes and more sinister machinations that threaten the future of his already poor village. Besides giving a charming lead performance as the somewhat addled but well-intentioned “Mr. Light,” writer-director Kubat succeeds at generating considerable thematic complexity and wider resonance from his seemingly simple and eminently local story.

MADE IN DAGENHAM ***

Dir. Nigel Cole w/ Sally Hawkins, Bob Hoskins. Special Presentation. 113 min. Sept 11, 6pm, Elgin; Sept 12, 9:30am, Varsity 8.

Working-class grrl power carries the day in this conventionally packaged but sufficiently lively comedy-drama about the 1968 strike by female machinists at a British auto plant that became a pivotal event in the national campaign for equal pay for women. Playing Rita O’Grady, a fictional composite of several leaders, Hawkins enlivens the film with her mixture of pluck and canniness. Though director Nigel Cole (Calendar Girls) relies on the standard Brit-pic recipe of cutesy humour, inspirational speeches and montages set to vintage pop tunes, Hawkins and the cast do justice to the efforts of their real-life counterparts.

MIRAL **

Dir. Julian Schnabel w/ Frieda Pinto, Hiam Abbass. SP. 113 min. Sept 13, 6pm, Ryerson; Sept 14, 9am, Varsity 8.

It’s a tough call as to what’s the worst thing about this woeful misfire by Julian Schnabel, which has all of the bombastic tendencies of the artist’s features to date but little of the intelligence or panache. Is it the miscasting of a variously accented Freida Pinto as a Palestinian schoolgirl turned activist? Is it the use of so much wobbly handheld camerawork and image tweaking in an attempt to bring dramatic intensity to scenes that have none? Or is it the tin-eared, politically simplistic script that purports to be a decades-spanning epic about people tied to a Jerusalem orphanage but feels like a 13-year-old’s class report on Israel and the intifada? That’s a decision for Miral’s bewildered viewers to make.

MY JOY ****

Dir. Sergei Loznitsa w/ Viktor Nemets, Vlad Ivanov. CWC. 127 min. Sept 11, 6:15pm, Varsity 7; Sept 13, 2:15pm, AMC 4; Sept 19, 8pm, Jackman Hall.

Given the often harrowing contents of this Russian entry, the title must be deemed an ironic gesture. That said, this debut feature by documentarian Loznitsa is one of the year’s most distinctive discoveries. A vicious parable about the evils that lurk in the darkest corners of the Russian soul, My Joy begins as the story of a good-hearted truck driver before heading off in many directions and then retracing its own steps. If David Lynch and Nikolai Gogol had been able to make a movie together, it probably wouldn’t have been half as weird or caustic as this.

OCTOBER ***

Dir. Diego and Daniel Vega w/ Bruno Odar, Gabriela Velasquez. Sept 15, 5:45pm, AMC 3; Sept 17, 8:45pm, Scotiabank 11; Sept 18, 9:30am, Varsity 7.

In this modestly scaled but distinctive debut feature from Peru, a loan shark in Lima is forced to change his habits when he reluctantly takes charge of a baby he squired with a prostitute. The sibling director team displays a forte for deader-than-deadpan humour in the vein of Aki Kaurismaki and end up doing quite a lot with very little.

OF GODS AND MEN ****

Dir. Xavier Beauvois w/ Lambert Wilson, Michael Lonsdale. CWC. 120 min. Sept 13, 9:30pm, Lighbox 3; Sept 17, 3pm, Scotiabank 11.

French monks debate whether to stay or go when Algeria’s civil war engulfs the community they serve. Basing his film on the true story of seven monks who were kidnapped and killed in 1996, director Xavier Beauvois takes a somber and respectful approach to serious questions about faith, responsibility and religious division. The performances from the cast are suitably weighty, too, though the efforts by French star Lambert Wilson and the great Michael Lonsdale help ensure that these men remain painfully human as they wrestle with matters of the divine.

POETRY ****

Dir. Lee Chang-dong w/ Yun Junghee, Lee David. Masters. 139 min. Sept 10, 6pm, Scotiabank 2; Sept 11, 9am, Bader; Sept 17, 9pm, Lightbox 1.

With its muted register and elderly protagonist, Poetry doesn’t deliver the same wallop as Secret Sunshine or Oasis, the last two powerhouses by Korean director Lee Chang-dong. But his latest – which won for best screenplay at Cannes – is still a keenly intelligent and precisely rendered work, with Yun Junghee giving a quietly wrenching performance as a woman who struggles to deal with the ramifications of her grandson’s participation in a crime.

ROUTE 132 ***

Dir. Louis Belanger w/ Francois Papineau, Alexis Martin. CWC. 113 min. Sept 10, 9:15pm, Scotiabank 3; Sept 12, 9am, Varsity 7.

Skipping out on his young son’s funeral, a grief-stricken prof and his old pal head north of Montreal with plans to enjoy the countryside by robbing a bank or two. But since criminality is not their strong suit, it’s soon clear that Gilles (Papineau) has other challenges to face in this richly engaging drama by Quebecois director Louis Belanger (Post-Mortem). Though Route 132 is heavy-handed about some of the emotional matters, Belanger’s film is subtler and wiser about many others. The rapport between Gilles and the amiable Bob (Martin) also makes this road movie well-worth travelling.

ROUTE IRISH ***

Dir. Ken Loach w/ Mark Womack, John Bishop. Masters. 110 min. Sept 15, 9pm, Elgin; Sept 18, 3pm, Ryerson.

The closest thing to a thriller that Ken Loach has made since Hidden Agenda, Route Irish takes a somewhat roundabout route to revealing its own mission, which is to expose the liberties taken by private military contractors in Iraq. Fergus (Womack) is devastated by the death of Frankie (Bishop), a fellow soldier he encouraged to sign on with a security firm after they’d finished their army stints. But a fragment of cellphone video contradicts the official details of Frankie’s death and Fergus sets off to find the truth, largely with the help of an inordinate number of Skype chats. The impassioned performances and Loach’s typical fervor allow Route Irish to transcend some ropey TV-movie plotting.

SCORE: A HOCKEY MUSICAL **

Dir. Michael McGowan w/ Noah Reid, Allie McDonald. Gala. 92 min. Sept 9, 6:30pm, Elgin; Sept 9, 8pm, RTH; Sept 12, 12:30pm, Varsity 8.

For once, it’d be nice to have a homegrown TIFF opener that wasn’t so divisive. But despite the efforts of cast members like Noah Reid – who stars as a home-schooled hockey prodigy whose meteoric rise is scuppered by his on-ice pacifism — Michael McGowan’s songs-and-shinny extravaganza is not the ultra-Canadian crowdpleaser it purports to be. The biggest issue is the unmemorable music – you can tell something has gone awry when a jokey usage of Dan Hill’s “Sometimes When We Touch” provides the movie’s sole decent melody. It ain’t pretty to hear the singers continually struggle with the wonky meter caused by McGowan’s relentless quest for semi-clever rhymes (“Zamboni” and “baloney” comprise one example). Nor does the staging or choreography indicate that Score’s creators have much affinity for the genre – the result too often looks and sounds like an under-written fringe-fest production that’s grown too big for its Cooperalls. Next to those problems, the cutesy stunt casting (Olivia Newton-John! Walter Gretzky! Strombo!) and shameless efforts to exploit patriotic sentiments seem like minor infractions.

A SCREAMING MAN ****

Dir. Mahamet-Saleh Haroun w/ Youssouf Djaoro, Diouc Koma. Special Presentation. 92 min. Sept 15, 6:15pm, Lightbox 2; Sept 16, 4:45pm, Bader; Sept 19, 6pm, AMC 6.

A moving and masterful film by one of Africa’s best directors, A Screaming Man won the jury prize at Cannes and deserves a wider audience than the continent’s great films often achieve. Haroun portrays the impact of war on ordinary families through the story of a proud pool attendant (Djaoro) who is forced to make an unenviable decision when an impending conflict bears down on his professional and personal life. The austere visual compositions and well-controlled performances are hallmarks of Haroun’s disciplined yet humanistic approach.

SOUL OF SAND **

Dir. Sidharth Srinivasan w/ Dibyendu Bhattacharya, Saba Joshi. 98 min. Discovery. Sept 12, 9pm, Lightbox 2; Sept 14, 3pm, Varsity 7; Sept 19, 3:30pm.

This Indian indie drama’s taboo-busting scenes sex and violence mark Soul of sand as anything but a Bollywood venture. Yet its many scenes of hammy, tawdry melodrama also make it seem like a TV soap that’s been tarted up to attract international festival play. To be fair, director Sidharth Srinivasan has a good eye for compositions but that’s the only virtue of his increasingly ludicrous morality play about a dim-witted, good-hearted watchman who is imperiled by his master’s scheming.

SPECIAL TREATMENT **

Dir. Jeanne Lebrune w/ Isabelle Huppert, Bouli Landers. Special Presentations. 95 min. Sept 14, 6pm, Elgin; Sept 18, 9am, Lightbox 1; Sept 19, 6:45pm, Scotiabank 4.

Cast as a genteel prostitute who wants out of the biz, the ever-watchable Isabelle Huppert gamely tries to rescue this French drama from its own pseudo-intellectual excesses. The notion that Huppert’s character and the fatuous psychoanalyst played by Landers are both charging people for essentially the same services is what passes for profound here. Director Jeanne Lebrune may aim for a contemporary spin on Belle de Jour with her satirical take on sex and therapy but the result owes less to Bunuel than Bertrand Blier at his most tediously self-indulgent.

THE STRANGE CASE OF ANGELICA ****

Dir. Manoel de Oliveira w/ Ricardo Trepa, Pilar Lopez de Ayala. 95 min. Masters. Sept 11, 6pm, AMC 4; Sept 18, 6:45pm, Scotiabank 3; Sept 19, 12:15pm, Scotiabank 11.

While the latest by the 101-year-old Portuguese master may involve some CGI, The Strange Case of Angelica otherwise has nothing in common with Avatar. It doesn’t have much to do with any other contemporary cinema either, but then De Olivera’s loyalists already consider him a class of one. Made in the same region where he shot his first short, the new film is a strange and stately fable about a photographer (Trepa) who grows obsessed with the image of a dead beauty (De Ayala). Ideas about art, philosophy and mortality come to the fore and it’s all rendered with the formal elegance and intellectual playfulness that have been hallmarks of De Oliveira’s work since before you were born.

TAMARA DREWE ***

Dir. Stephen Frears w/ Gemma Atherton, Roger Allam. 111 min. Special Presentation. Sept 12, 9pm, Ryerson; Sept 13, 3:30pm, AMC 7.

A picturesque English village is upended by the return of a prodigal daughter in Stephen Frears’ breezy adaptation of Posy Simmonds’ comic turned graphic novel. Gemma Atherton stars as the title character, a former wallflower who’s now a celeb newspaper columnist and the new paramour of a tantrum-prone rock drummer (Dominic Cooper). Roger Allam steals the show as a pompous writer who’d like to get to know the new Tamara. Despite the material’s tony DNA – Simmonds’ strip was a contemporary spin on Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd – the result is an unstuffy blend of provincial farce and chick-flick flightiness. Though the early stretch is sometimes broad to a fault, the finale surprises with its bite.

UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES *****

Dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul w/ Thanapat Saisaymar, Jenjira Pongpas. Masters. 113 min. Sept 16, 10:30pm, Bader; Sept 19, 9:15am, AMC 5.

What with its Palme d’Or triumph, the latest marvel by Apichatpong Weerasethakul will hopefully expand the director’s rep beyond the rarefied-cinephile types who already worship at his altar (myself included). An exploration of animist myths and reincarnation beliefs in the countryside in Thailand’s northeast, it is (more or less) the story of a dying man who is visited by two living relatives, the ghost of his long-dead wife and his long-missing son, who now takes the non-human form of a red-eyed Monkey Ghost. It’s immediately clear that Weerasethakul has disregarded any possible division between our world and any others that may exist. Yet the story is also enriched by deeply felt notes of love, grief and joy, as well as a delicious sense of humour and — even more surprising — an awareness of the grim political realities for rural Thais. Most importantly, it’s gobsmackingly beautiful.

! WOMEN ART REVOLUTION: A SECRET HISTORY **

Dir. Lynn Hershman. RTR. 83 min. Sept 12, 12:15pm, AMC 2; Sept 14, 7:45pm, AMC 10; Sept 19, 3:45pm, AMC 7.

An important and interesting topic gets a disappointingly chaotic treatment in Lynn Hershman’s overstuffed doc on America’s feminist art movement of the late ‘60s and beyond. That a work as crucial to this history as Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party gets about two minutes of screentime is just one indication that something has gone seriously awry in Hershman’s haphazardly arranged survey of the events, figures and artworks that constituted an assault on patriarchal art institutions. The repetitious series of platitude-heavy soundbites also crowds out more valuable opportunities for providing context and analysis about these artists’ ideas and achievements.

YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER ***

Dir. Woody Allen w/ Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin. 98 min. Special Presentations. Sept 12, 6pm, Elgin; Sept 19, AMC 6.

Though nowhere near as sprightly as Vicki Cristina Barcelona, Woody Allen’s latest ensemble comedy still has more flickers of wit and vitality than any of us have any right to expect as we enter the third decade of his career slide. Once again, the cruel vagaries of fate are uppermost in Allen’s mind as he introduces us to an interconnected array of Londoners who can’t be happy with what (and who) they got. While Sir Anthony Hopkins is saddled with a one-note role as an older gent who’s fleeced by a floozy (Lucy Punch), Josh Brolin is winning as a frustrated writer whose fixation on a pretty neighbour (Freida Pinto) leads to romantic complications and an especially memorable comeuppance.