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impressions of films at TIFF08

post #1 of 9
9/14/08 at 5:34pm
Thread Starter 
the 33rd Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) finished over the weekend. across the ten days, i attended 18 screenings. here are the film titles accompanied by a single line summary.

$5 A Day: Christopher Walken plays a charming but flawed con artist in this indie film
Achilles and the Tortoise: Takeshi (Beat) Kitano directs the life story of an untalented painter
Ashes of Time Redux: Wong Kar-Wai's only wuxia film recut and remastered for 2008

At the Edge of the World: the waters off Antarctica is the battleground in this documentary
Burn After Reading: a comedy from the Coen Brothers starring Clooney, McDormand, Malkovich, Swinton, Jenkins and Pitt
Chocolate: Ong Bak director Prachya Pinkeaw proves that 24 year-old Jija Yanin Vismitananda can tremendously kick ass

JCVD: the best film starring Jean-Claude Van (Damme) Varenberg
Martyrs: an example of gory, horrific, depressing goodness. my review is up on IMDb
Not Quite Hollywood: a documentary that details exploitation films from Australia

Paris, Not France: because it's hot
The Real Shaolin: we follow four people, in this documentary, who aspire to learn marital arts the old school way
Religulous: Bill Maher and Larry Charles challenge the three Abrahamic religions

RocknRolla: Guy Ritchie returns to form with gangsters, street-smart thieves, a gorgeous femme fatale, expats and drugged out rockstars
Slumdog Millionaire: my favourite at TIFF08. a truly exceptional film directed by Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan.
Tokyo Sonata: Kiyoshi Kurosawa surprises us with a tale of a disfunctional modern Japanese family

Witch Hunt: a documentary that highlights gross injustices in Bakersfield, California
The Wrestler: among Darren Aronofsky's best films ever made. seriously.
Zack and Miri Make a Porno: Kevin Smith directs this hilarious and raunchy comedy featuring Seth Rogan and the hot Elizabeth Banks

all the films that are part of the Midnight Madness (MM) programme were, of course, viewed at Ryerson Theatre along with 1200+ other people. attending MM screenings at the AMC24 or Varsity venues doesn't have the same vibe.
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post #2 of 9
9/14/08 at 5:45pm
Right on.
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post #3 of 9
9/14/08 at 6:06pm
There's been surprisingly little talk of the festival on CHUD, main page or boards. This thread and this thread is all I've seen. Well, I was there; only had time to see ten this year. In my general order of preference, they were:

Chocolate
Religulous
JCVD
The Wrestler
Martyrs
Not Quite Hollywood
Tale 52
Burrowers
Vinyan

And I'm not going to rank The Sky Crawlers because I slept through most of the first hour. Not because it was boring, but because I'd just eaten a big mess of eggs and salmon and pancake that knocked me out. Though I do suspect it may have been pretty boring.

But I'll say that even the lowest on that list are still pretty decent. A solid year for me; not my best ever, but better than last year.
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post #4 of 9
9/14/08 at 7:02pm
Not Quite Hollywood is a gem. The most exciting title sequence since...I don't when.

Vinyan was great too. Fucking creepy. Like a cross between the Brood and the Blair Witch Project. Goddamn.

Sky Crawlers was unexpectedly good. For an anime. AKA lot's of meandering conversations about nothing. But quits that shit near the end.
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post #5 of 9
9/14/08 at 7:23pm
I thought Vinyan was really good in its first half, but then went with lame cliched horror scares at the end. Though that was a hell of a final shot. Lucky, lucky boys.

Ali, in Sky Crawlers, did you find the design of the characters, as well as the voice actors' tone of delivery, to be just about the dullest shit ever? A lot of the aerial visuals were beautiful, and what I got of the story seems good, but those humans were so dry that I wasn't really fighting it as I started to drift off.

The biggest surprise for me this year was how JCVD and The Wrestler covered such similar territory, and how JCVD turned out, in my opinion, to be better. And I think Aronofsky's great -- at the Toronto fest back in 2000, I came out of Requiem for a Dream shaking, and I love, love The Fountain. But JCVD covers the same idea as The Wrestler in more varied, interesting ways.
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post #6 of 9
9/14/08 at 8:03pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Beageal View Post
In my general order of preference, they were

Chocolate

...

[ snip ]
i hope you saw Chocolate with the Midnight Madness crowd at Ryerson Theatre. there's absolutely no better place at TIFF to watch a martial arts film than Ryerson with MM folks.
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post #7 of 9
9/14/08 at 8:09pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by emacs View Post
i hope you saw Chocolate with the Midnight Madness crowd at Ryerson Theatre. there's absolutely no better place at TIFF to watch a martial arts film than Ryerson with MM folks.
I did indeed. And you're right, though there used to be a better place: The Uptown, back when it was still standing. Saw Ong Bak there during TIFF, and several others. It was such a great theatre, best in Toronto. I don't really like the Ryerson; it's dingy, there's barely a slant to the seats. I'm a tall guy and there've been multiple Midnight Madness shows over the year where I've had problems seeing the subtitles, from the floor and the balcony.

But the MM audiences, no matter where you put them, are the best. Absolutely the best crowd to see a film with.
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post #8 of 9
9/14/08 at 9:55pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Beageal View Post
I thought Vinyan was really good in its first half, but then went with lame cliched horror scares at the end. Though that was a hell of a final shot. Lucky, lucky boys.

Ali, in Sky Crawlers, did you find the design of the characters, as well as the voice actors' tone of delivery, to be just about the dullest shit ever? A lot of the aerial visuals were beautiful, and what I got of the story seems good, but those humans were so dry that I wasn't really fighting it as I started to drift off.
Yeah, it's one of the reasons I found the first half of Crawlers boring. But you can also see it as a valid choice for the actors, you know, since their characters are supposed to be burnt-out and nihilistic. I still think the story elements introduced later in the movie gave it an interesting enough spin to make it worth a watch, even if it might drag a bit.

And about Vinyan, I think the movie is at its worst when violence finally occurs. But I love the directing in this movie. I haven't been wowed by someone's cinematography like that since Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Or felt that claustrophobic.
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post #9 of 9
9/14/08 at 9:59pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Beageal View Post
there used to be a better place: The Uptown, back when it was still standing. Saw Ong Bak there during TIFF
yes. in fact, Ong Bak was my very first film i saw at Midnight Madness. i started to attend TIFF in 2003. i distinctly remember watching Zatoichi http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363226/ at the Elgin. after that screening i walked up Yonge Street toward the Uptown. i ate dinner in the area, hung around Yorkville and then lined up for the MM screening of Ong Bak at the Uptown. i really miss that theatre.
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