“What is Dead May Never Die” is the first episode I’ve reviewed thus it’s the only one I’ve watched more than once, and as I suspected, a lot of it went over my head. I feel I should also mention that, unlike our other reviewers, I haven’t read the books, so this week you’re getting the more casual viewer’s take on the episode.

As with many HBO series, the first 3-4 episodes of any season seem to primarily be spent setting up the characters and events that make the second half of the season really pop. This can often make these episodes a little trying to get through, but there is still enough blood, flesh, and intrigue to entertain the patient and thrill-seeking viewers alike. Thrones, more so than 99% of the other series out there, demands that you give it your full attention in order to understand the story’s developments. It’s the second season and I’m still sometimes confused as to how all of the characters relate (on top of the sheer plethora of characters, incest, geography, and deception also help to muddle matters at times), fortunately there are family trees, maps and similar aids available online to help along the slow pokes like myself.

Now back to the episode at hand. As per usual I felt most of the highlights belonged to Tyrion. Not only is his character the most interesting, but Dinklage plays him with such a perfect mixture of poise, humour, and humility that it’s becoming clear that his character is best suited for the throne he’ll likely never reach (pun intended). The fact that he doesn’t seem to desire it makes him all the more suitable. Here we get perhaps the best example so far of Tyrion’s brilliance when he hatches a plan to discover who is spying for the Queen. He suspects Grand Maester Pycelle, Varys, and Littlefinger. In a very clever sequence, he holds private meetings with each and reveals plans to marry off Princess Myrcella, but names a different suitor to each suspect, all of which he knows Cersei will find objectionable. When Cersei confronts Tyrion about his plans to send Myrcella to House Martell, which is what he told Pycelle, the Grand Maester is ousted and subsequently de-bearded by Tyrion in a humiliating confrontation. This ruse is a perfect example of why you must always pay close attention to every interaction in order to prevent confusion, as I certainly didn’t fully grasp it the first time around.

Theon’s role in all of this is starting to become a little clearer as we learn more about the family he returned to in the previous episode. We quickly learn that Theon’s father, Balon Greyjoy, is not particularly fond of any of the Starks nor the son he sent to live with them, and is more keen on having his weirdo daughter lead an army to the North to invade Winterfell while Robb Stark is occupied with fighting in the South. Despite a shitty homecoming and a letter Theon writes to Robb warning him of Balon’s plans, it appears as though Theon decides to betray the Starks in favour of his family when he burns the letter and pledges allegiance to the ‘Drowned God of the Ironborn’ in a ceremony resembling a baptism. Seeing Theon torn between two families like this, between blood and love, adds a lot to his character and it will be interesting to see if the ceremony births a new man, or if it   was merely empty words to appease his father.

This episode also introduces Brienne of Tarth, a female warrior played by the 6 foot 3 Gwendoline Christie. Before it is revealed that she is a woman, we see her as a masked knight defeating Ser Loras and subsequently earning herself a place in Renly’s guard (much to Loras’ chagrin). I don’t know if I should blame the show’s director for lingering on the helmet too long before she removes it, or Lord of the Rings for making it a bit of a cliché, but it became painfully obvious to me before the reveal that the fighter was going to be a female, despite her deceiving size.  I’m looking forward to seeing what else Brienne capable of and hope she can help Renly deliver his promise of Joffrey’s head.

And while we gained a warrior with Brienne of Tarth, the end of the episode saw the demise of another: Yoren. His death can be seen as somewhat foreshadowed by a monologue he delivers in the preceding scene. Here he tells Arya of the events that led him to the wall. In order to avenge his brother’s death he put an axe so deep into the murderer’s skull “they had to bury him with it.” This is easily one of my favourite lines from the show so far and very well delivered as Yoren relays the gruesome image to the child with both pride and repentance. While nothing in his story directly foreshadows his imminent doom, it is simply the attention given to this tertiary character at this point combined with the uncharacteristic bearing of his soul that make us feel his life is nearing its end. It is then that Joffrey’s guard arrives in search of Gendry, when Yoren refuses to comply his death is a valiant one.

Speaking of the King you love to hate, he was noticeably absent from this episode, as was Daenerys with her winged companions, nor is much screen time is given to Jon Snow and the developments occurring on the wall. This kind of neglect is inevitable when juggling so many storylines, but I can say with confidence that those who missed those characters this week will not be disappointed next week.

The words “nervous” and “anxious” do not do justice to what I was experiencing as I sat in what is probably the swankiest private screening room in Toronto (located in Yorkville’s Hazelton Hotel) waiting to interview the fantastic Mr. Bogdanovich. Since our camera fell through at the last minute, we were armed only with a Fostex FR-2 sound recorder, a microphone bigger than most modern cameras, and a hope that he’d appreciate the old-school nature of the apparatus.

Fast forward to half an hour later, I’m speaking with Ben Mankiewicz, the Turner Classic Movie host presenting Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show at the TIFF Bell Lightbox as well as leading the accompanying Q & A for the TCM Road to Hollywood film tour’s only Canadian stop. I’m still high from my chat with the famed writer/ director and am surprised when Ben tells me “I’ve never met him, you now know Peter Bogdanovich better than I do.” Mankiewicz has interviewed the likes of George Clooney, Eva Saint Marie and George Lucas to name just a few (whereas the biggest name I can drop is Jake Lloyd’s, but I don’t), yet he admits “I’m a little intimidated about interviewing Peter because he’s so knowledgeable”

For those less familiar with his work, Peter Bogdanovich is not only a renowned filmmaker but also an extremely learned film historian and critic in the tradition of the French New Wave directors. As Mankiewicz puts it, ”this is a guy who in three minutes can mention John Ford, Howard Hawks, Otto Preminger, Roger Corman, Orson Welles, Frank Capra and have talked to all of them, and not in a name dropping way, more like a ‘here’s what I learned from Hawks, here’s what I learned from Ford, here’s what Welles told me.’”

Donning his trademark ascot, Bogdanovich looks exactly as he has in every interview he’s done in the last two decades.  It appears as though time has been kind to Mr. Bogdanovich, but the care with which he takes his steps betrays his 72-year-old age. He politely collected  the names of everyone in the room including myself, our sound man and a PR intern, then he informed us that he had to finish his “stupid apple” before we could proceed. We made small talk while he finished his snack, mostly about the quality of the screening room, when I asked if he had checked out the facilities exhibiting his film the following night he replied “It’s a nice house. Okay Noah, shoot…”

Dork Shelf: We’re going to get right down to the hard hitting questions: what’s a Peanut Patty and are they still available?

Peter Bogdanovich: (laughs)  Peanut Patty is almost all sugar. It’s just pink sugar, very hard pink sugar with little peanuts splattered through it, it’s terrible for you. I fell in love with them when we were shooting Picture Show. There’s a close-up of one briefly, Tim takes it in the first scene in the picture. I haven’t had one since we made the picture.

DS: So you’re not sure if they’re still around?

PB: I’m sure they’re around, how could they ever discontinue Peanut Patties?

DS: Those were new to you because you’re not from Texas.

PB: No, I’m not from Texas, so that was new to me and a lot of things were new to me.

DS: Since you were shooting on location with a lot of locals in the movie, were they ever concerned about how they were going to be depicted, was there any resistance or hesitance to let you in there?

PB: Well, not really, I mean there was a big problem trying to get into the school. We needed to get into the school for a couple of scenes and we almost lost but they had a vote and we won by one vote.

DS: Was that because they were concerned with how you would portray the school system?

PB: Well the book wasn’t liked much because I think Larry (McMurtry) dedicated it “with love and hate to my hometown” or something like that and a lot of the town didn’t like the book so we were guilty by association. But it worked out and after the movie was successful they were very happy about it. We had this one very funny incident because we had a shot where Sonny, Tim Bottoms, is inside the school looking out a window because he’s not paying attention in class and he sees a couple of dogs in heat, fooling around. The shot had to be through the window because it was his point of view so the camera was actually inside the building, the dogs are on the lawn. In order to light the dogs they put these huge arch lights so people driving by would see these two huge arch lights focused on two dogs going at it. It didn’t go over well with the town (laughs) they just didn’t know what we were doing.

DS: You’re blogging for Indiewire these days, have you been liking that? How does it compare to writing for something like Esquire?

PB: Well it’s not the same thing, Esquire was the top magazine in the country at that point. But doing a blog is like doing a column, I had a column at Esquire for years and I had a column in the New York Observer for a few years. It’s a little bit exhausting because you’ve got to come up with something every week, but I like doing it, it’s fun. You get nice feedback.

DS: On that blog you often refer to the “Golden Age of the Sound Era” being from 1929-1962.  Is there one last film you feel fits into that era?

PB: Yeah, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was the last film of the Golden Age the way I see it. If I was making a movie about the Golden Age of sound I would end it with The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, the train going off and that’s the end of it all. It was also the year that Bugs Bunny was discontinued, so if Warner kills Bugs Bunny what hope is there?

DS: Are there any films from the last 10 or 15 years that you feel capture what was lost after The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance?

PB: Well I think there’s been some good films made, there’s no question about that. You know during the Golden Age there was a lot of crap made too, so since the Golden Age there’s been some good movies. I like Wes Anderson’s work, I think he’s made some very good films, I like The Royal Tenenbaums and I like The Darjeeling Limited. And Noah Baumbach, I liked The Squid and The Whale and I think he’s a good director. Tarantino’s made some good pictures. Of course Spielberg and Scorsese know what they’re doing, they make some good pictures. There’s good pictures being made but the atmosphere around making pictures isn’t conducive to good pictures because every picture’s on its own, every picture’s starting over. You have nobody under contract, you gotta get everybody together, you gotta find the money, you gotta find the actors, it’s just torture. It used to be a factory system which had its bad points but it also had its good points.

DS: You’ve mentioned that these days you feel television is almost better than films…

PB: Not almost, it is better. When The Sopranos was on I don’t think there was a better movie made in that period and now I’ve been watching Mad Men - superb – and Breaking Bad blew my mind, it’s amazing. I haven’t caught up with all of it, but I saw the first season and a half, it’s amazing stuff. You don’t see a movie that well written.

DS: If you could direct an episode of one of those shows, is there one that sticks out that you’d like to try your hand at?

PB: Directing episodics is not that rewarding for the director. I directed an episode of The Sopranos and luckily I knew everybody because I was in it and so it was not like most directors on an episodic. They come in, nobody knows them, they’re there for 8 or 9 days, whatever it is, and then they’re gone but the cast is there all the time. It isn’t the same as directing for a feature or theatre. You feel like a guest. A director shouldn’t feel like a guest, so I don’t have a tremendous amount of interest in directing for episodics. But if I were going to, which was your question, Breaking Bad would be very interesting.

DS: And now your daughter has taken to directing as well, she just finished her first short film.

PB: Yes my oldest daughter, Antonia. She had been working on some scripts with her writing partner and they were quite good. One in particular I like very much that she and her partner wrote and out of the blue she just wrote a short and found the money and made it and it’s very good. It’s very violent, I said to her “it’s savage” and she’s gotten into a lot of film festivals and looking through some papers of mine she found a script that had my name on it along with my first wife Polly Platt. It was something we wrote in the late 60’s called The Criminals and she fell in love with the script and she wants to direct it. I said “go ahead.”

DS: That’s the Second World War one about Polish prisoners, right?

PB: That’s right, based on a true event. I hope she does it. I feel like I already made the picture that’s why I don’t want to direct it, I figure she’d probably get a fresher look at it.

DS: If you had your own rep cinema or you were a programmer for one and it was being shut down what would be the last picture show at that cinema?

PB: Red River (laughs). I don’t know, that was what it was in Picture Show because it was Texas, but if I was doing it probably the last picture show would be something by Lubitsch because he’s one of my favourite directors. He as the ability to be funny and sad at the same time which I like a lot.

DS: My final question is something we ask everyone we interview, the site’s called Dork Shelf which refers to your shelf of collectibles. Do you collect anything?

PB: I have a lot of DVDs that I’ve amassed, but I wouldn’t say it’s a collection I’m particularly proud of or anything. I did for a long time collect Robert Graves books and I still have a considerable collection of Robert Graves’ books. He’s an author I fell in love with in the early 80’s and I collected everything he ever wrote and I still have quite a few of those. I don’t really collect films.

To hear these words as spoken by the captivating voice of the man himself, listen to the embedded audio below or download it here: **

After my time with Bogdanovich, Mankiewicz gave me some insight into his own interview tactics: “You wanna knock these guys off their game a little bit, but you don’t want to knock them to a place where they’re not comfortable. You wanna knock them outta the chair but when they get to the floor they’re like ‘oh, it’s okay here on the floor.’” I’m not sure if my Peanut Patty query really knocked the man to the floor, but Mankiewicz did at one point during our conversation take a graceful topple over the back of the screening room couch he was sitting on. That may have been due more to a headrest we didn’t realize wasn’t secure and not my hard hitting questions. I asked him the same last two questions that I asked Bogdanovich, Mankiewicz agreed that Red River was not a bad choice for the closing night of a cinema but believes The Last Picture Show would actually be the most appropriate. Regarding his Dork Shelf, he collects baseball cards and recently realized that he also unintentionally collects stuffed bears.

**sound recording courtesy of Martin Baena

Click here to view the embedded video.

It’s rare that a thriller comes along and pulls you into the world of a movie in a way that really makes you experience the protagonist’s fear. Try as it might though, The Odds is not one of those rare exceptions. Set against the oxymoronic backdrop of a “high stakes high school gambling ring,” the story spins a semi-decent mystery but suffers from a lack of logic and sympathetic characters we can identify with.

The film centers on Desson (Tyler Johnston), who we know is cool because he has a slow-motion entrance, wears wayfarers and resembles a young Tom Cruise. He and his friend Barry (Calum Worthy) are heavily ensconced in a teenage betting racket that includes fixed wrestling matches, card games and a craps table with dice even cooler than Desson, illustrated again by the slow motion employed every time they’re thrown. The meat of the story begins when Barry apparently commits suicide due to his mounting debts. A phone message leads Desson to believe his friend was in fact murdered, a suspicion which we as an audience already know is correct, since this clearly isn’t going to be a film about teen suicide. Instead of going to the police with this information, Desson decides to mount his own ill-advised investigation which results in him getting punched in the face… a lot.

One of the main problems with this story is that the characters have no one but themselves to blame for their troubles. They are privileged, middle-class Canadian kids who dig themselves into a hole for no apparent reason apart from boredom. It’s also hard to take a lot of the events seriously when they keep getting interrupted by Desson’s detentions. As the film goes on, we realize that slow motion entrances, trendy sunglasses and Cruise-like cockiness aside, there is nothing very cool about Desson.

Anyone who has read my last couple of reviews knows that I find it difficult to write about a Canadian film without commenting on the state of our national cinema in general. It’s so difficult for the few features that get made to find an audience that financing them becomes next to impossible. It’s because of this unfortunate cycle that I take no pleasure in pointing out this movie’s many shortcomings.

I may, however, take a little pleasure in mentioning that the movie’s highlight is an unexpected, well-executed, kick to the dick. Apart from that, writer-director Simon Davidson deserves credit for getting his script realized and finding distribution for the finished product beyond the festival circuit and rep cinemas. In doing so he’s already beaten the odds.

At one time or another, most of us have heard an acquaintance say “I swear I saw your doppelgänger the other day, this guy/girl looked exactly like you.” Or perhaps you’ve been that apparent “doppelgänger” and were mistaken for someone else; if you’re Canadian you probably apologized for not being that person they thought you were. However it’s rare that we ever spot someone whom we consider to be our own double, which is the premise of Doppelgänger Paul (or a film about how much I hate myself), an offbeat Canadian comedy with a darkly dry humour that blindsides the viewer at its best moments.

The movie opens with a series of letters exchanged between Karl and Paul, establishing that Karl spotted Paul several weeks prior, and believing him to be his own doppelgänger has been obsessively following him ever since. Despite claiming to feel violated and angered by the confessions of his stalker, Paul carries on the correspondence and insists that they meet. When they rendezvous by Stanley Park’s polar bear enclosure, Paul immediately picks up on the curious fact that they look nothing alike.

While they don’t share much in the way of physical resemblance, we quickly learn that they share many other qualities, such as middle class guilt, depression, loneliness and, as the parenthetical title suggests, a propensity towards self-deprecation. All of the above is established in the early minutes of the film, the rest is a series of amusing events brought on by the meeting of these two which I will not attempt to recap and spoil in this review.

Both characters are given almost equal weight while maintaining a strange chemistry throughout. While Paul is more the protagonist, it is Karl played by indie film regular Tygh Runyan that gets all the best lines, which he delivers with deadpan absurdity. Lines like “I wanna smash your face. Yeah, I’m just stating what I want, dispassionately” have him come off as unintentionally hilarious and should earn him the nickname “Dry Runyan.”

Another thing that struck me while watching this film was how fresh the story felt. Pretty much any movie I watch these days will bring to mind several similar ones that have come before it, and while I’m not saying this is the most original film ever made, I would at least claim that it is without a doppelgänger. When asked who, if anyone, informed or influenced some of the film’s style or themes, co-director Dylan Akio Smith cited the Mumblecore movement, Miranda July, Charlie Kaufman, author Paul Auster and Hitchcock’s Strangers on at Train. Smith also worked as a cinematographer and an editor on the film, while long-time collaborator/screenwriter Kris Elgstrand shared directing duties.

When asked about the significance of the polar bear enclosure where several key scenes are set, Smith tells about how that was just one of those serendipitous things that happen while making a film. “We were originally supposed to film those scenes by a whale pool, but it just didn’t look very good on camera.”  It wasn’t until after they found the cheaper, more aesthetically pleasing enclosure that they learned the story of its last occupant, Tuk. In 1994 when they began to phase out the Stanley Park Zoo, Tuk was the only animal they decided not to move due to his old age. He lived three more years and apparently went mad with loneliness while becoming a “symbol for the shared guilt of society.”  This tied in so well to the film’s themes that they even decided to make the poster a picture of a polar bear, it’s just too bad that those unfamiliar with the story of Tuk will not understand the bear’s significance.

I suppose one recent trend that this film does kind of follow is that of the bro-mance picture. More than doppelgängers, this is a movie about soulmates, but I doubt anyone would want to go to see a film called “Soulmate Paul.”

If I had to sum up what most stories are about in one word, it would be “underdogs.” Ultimately we go to the movies for a chance to see the unlikely succeed, as this is a fantasy rarely realized in real life. As far as real life underdogs go, they don’t get much lower than the Canadian feature film. This is why anytime one manages to get financed, completed and then actually distributed, those of us concerned with this kind of thing watch with trepidation because we know that a Canadian film getting a second week in theatres is like an amateur boxer making it to round two against the champ. This makes Moon Point an underdog story in every sense, and while it struggles in places, it ultimately succeeds, at least on the fluffy entertainment level.

Our protagonist is Darryl, a 23 year-old underachiever with the meanest family on earth. Determined to prove he can get a date for his cousin’s wedding, Darryl sees a call for extras in a B-horror film starring his childhood crush as a chance at redemption. To do this he has to travel several towns over to a place called Moon Point, and with no other mode of transportation, Darryl literally hitches his wagon to his only friend’s electric wheelchair.  Perhaps my favourite aspect of this film is the idea of it being about the world’s slowest road trip, as it takes them days to cover what somebody with a car could have done in a couple hours. They quickly acquire the damsel in distress from the side of the road whom we know will ultimately come between them at some point.

While these three fresh faces do an acceptable job throughout the film, particularly Nick McKinlay in the lead, it’s the crazies they meet along the way that provide most of the laughs. The supporting cast is made up of an ensemble of Canadian talent whose names you likely wouldn’t recognize, (Art Hindle, Jayne Eastwood, Linda Kash, Laurie Elliott, Jessica Holmes, Christian Potenza, James Hartnett, anyone? Bueller?), their faces however have become familiar from dozens of commercials and comedy specials.

The writer commented that he was trying to capture the feeling of some of the John Hughes films he loved as a teenager, but I didn’t really get that vibe from Moon Point. The road trip aspect of it combined with the sometimes-too-broad humour reminded me more of a Farrelly brothers film, while the sugary ‘twee’ touches over-sentimentalized other parts. Needless to say there were several uneven tonal shifts, primarily caused by too much make-up/ break-up drama between the three main characters.

Unfortunately, like most real-life underdogs, this film will not overcome the odds and break into the mainstream, but at least first time distributor IndieCan is giving it a chance to be seen by some, most of whom I’m sure will get a kick out of at least a few parts, and that puts this one in the plus category of Canadian movies. It’s cuteness and romantic elements are well timed for Valentine’s Day and the holiday’s imagery is sprinkled throughout, let’s just hope Moon Point can still be seen by the time February 14^th comes around, otherwise all of the above becomes a moot point.

The Divide is a psychological thriller about post-apocalyptic survival that is often horrifying and all around nightmarish. From claustrophobia to torture, radiation sickness and murder, this movie is intentionally void of anything that makes an audience feel comfortable or at ease for longer than one or two brief moments. On this level it’s an achievement, but ultimately the story suffers from a shapeless script.

The first scene is very effective in throwing us right into the action when it opens on the tenants of a crumbling building running for their lives as the world around them collapses. Nine “lucky ones” make it into a bomb shelter before the rest are shut out by the shelter’s keeper Mickey, played by Michael Biehn. The scenario Mickey finds himself in suits his disposition about as well as most of Biehn’s characters, and he is given full reign to be his typical angry self. Aside from the fact that they all live in the same building, we never learn much about these characters’ lives prior to the nuclear attack. We do find out that Mickey is a former firefighter and it is hinted at that his wife was killed in the September 11th attacks, which presumably is supposed to give some insight as to why he maintains such a well stocked shelter.

At first it seems like it’s going to be the Mickey show, as Biehn’s is the most recognizable face in the cast and his character seems to hold all the cards. But surprisingly Mickey kind of falls by the wayside as Josh (Milo Ventimiglia) and Bobby (Michael Eklund), who start off looking like a couple guys from Jersey Shore, basically out-crazy Mickey and end up declaring themselves the resident alpha males. Shooting in chronological order with a loose script allowed the actors, who themselves had to go on an extremely scant diet, to really put themselves into the decline of these characters and get under the viewers’ skin as the last guys you’d want to be stuck in a bunker with. They’re disturbing and occasionally humourous performances were aided by some very effective hair and make-up touches. I can definitely see Saskatooner Eklund in particular having a successful career creeping people out in smaller character roles to come.

Another cult favourite who goes to an extremely dark place for this movie is Rosanna Arquette. The traumatizing events of the first part of the story leave her with a numb stare that tells us she no longer has any use for reality. She gives herself over to the brutality of the men so completely that we lose all hope for her early on. As with most films dealing with this subject matter, the themes that emerge deal with gender, power, trust, and survival of the fittest in this microcosm of society. The result makes Lord of the Flies look like Fantasy Island.

All in all, The Divide is a successful entry into a well-tread sub-genre of horror, but it is still essentially a B movie that suffers from some technical issues and a script that by most accounts was rarely consulted while shooting. If you have the opportunity to catch it during it’s limited theatrical release, don’t write it off as unworthy, but don’t expect it to brighten your day either.

Trent Reznor and his Nine Inch statue

Of course with Spielberg releasing two films this year we got two scores from the legendary John Williams, at least one of which he’ll surely see a nomination for. Considering that critics can’t seem to find enough top 10 lists to put The Artist on, a film in which the score makes up the entire soundscape, Ludovic Bource will likely see a nomination along with many of the other artists who worked on this film.  Fincher’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo would have been unwatchable without the score provided by last year’s winners Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, so we should expect to see their names on the nomination list again this year. Another safe bet would be Canada’s own Howard Shore for his work on Hugo. Since James Horner and Hans Zimmer don’t seem to be in the running this year, I can only confidently predict 4/5 of the nominations (assuming Williams only gets one), that being said I’m gonna throw established composer Thomas Newman’s name out there for The Help. So what do you think, did I nail it?

Danny Elfman is another vet whom people love, but since the films he provided scores for this year (Real Steel and Restless) probably won’t show up in many other categories, his chances for recognition diminish. I don’t know why, that’s just how the Academy rolls.

The Divide is a psychological thriller about post-apocalyptic survival that is often horrifying and all around nightmarish. From claustrophobia to torture, radiation sickness and murder, the only thing comfortable about this movie was how snugly it fit into the middle of Toronto After Dark’s line-up.

In a stroke of genius on the programmers’ part, the feature was preceded by the short Blind Spot in which we see the beginnings of some kind of apocalyptic events happening outside the car window of an oblivious man trying to change a flight reservation. This short dovetailed perfectly into The Divide, which opens with the tenants of a crumbling building running for their lives as the world around them collapses. Nine “lucky ones” make it into a bomb shelter before the rest are shut out by the shelter’s keeper Mickey, played by Michael Biehn. The scenario Mickey finds himself in suits his disposition about as well as most of Biehn’s characters, and he is given full reign to be his typical angry self. Aside from the fact that they all live in the same building, we never learn much about these characters’ lives prior to the nuclear attack. We only find out that Mickey is a former firefighter whose wife may well have been killed in the September 11th attacks.

At first it seems like it’s going to be the Mickey show, as Biehn’s is the most recognizable face in the cast and his character seems to hold all the cards. But surprisingly Mickey kind of falls by the wayside as Josh (Milo Ventimiglia) and Bobby (Michael Eklund), who start off looking like a couple guys from Jersey Shore, basically out-crazy Mickey and end up declaring themselves the alpha males. Shooting in chronological order with a loose script allowed the actors, who themselves had to go on an extremely scant diet, to really put themselves into the decline of these characters and get under the viewers’ skin as the last guys you’d want to be stuck in a bunker with. They’re disturbing and occasionally humourous performances were aided by some very effective hair and make-up touches. I can definitely see Sakatooner Eklund in particular having a successful career creeping people out in smaller character roles to come.

Another cult favourite who goes to an extremely dark place for this movie is Rosanna Arquette. The traumatizing events of the first part of the story leave her with a numb stare that tells us she no longer has any use for reality. She gives herself over to the brutality of the men so completely that we lose all hope for her early on. As with most films dealing with this subject matter, the themes that emerge deal with gender, power, trust, and survival of the fittest in this microcosm of society. The resulting film makes Lord of the Flies look like Fantasy Island.

All in all, The Divide is a successful entry into a well-tread sub-genre of horror, but it is still essentially a B movie that suffers from some technical issues (the sound mix seemed unfinished) and a script that by most accounts was rarely consulted while shooting. Even though it was shot in Winnipeg, I doubt the film will see much of a theatrical run up here. If you do happen across it, don’t write it off as unworthy, but don’t expect it to brighten your day either.

Click to enlarge.

It’s a spider-man! It’s an iron man! No, it’s a super man! Earlier today Warner Bros. released the first image of Superman from Zack Snyder’s upcoming reboot, Man of Steel slated for a 2013 release. The image shows Henry Cavill as the titular ‘Man of Steel’ showing off the squareness of his jaw in a suit that replaces the vintage spandex look with the recycled basketball one people seem to really like these days.

But what’s happening in this photo? Clearly Superman is standing between us and a safe presumably containing something we want (The Dark Knight Rises?). His eyes and body language tell us that we’re not getting in, but so does the huge steel door. There also appears to be some damage done around the safe, but it looks as though that might have been caused by one of Superman’s trademark destructive entrances – superheroes are not known for respecting personal or public property. Does this image get you excited for the movie? Or are you already feeling a little disappointed?

So far my feelings toward this movie remain ambiguous. The Superman character has oft been criticized for being ‘too super’ and therefore less interesting than other heroes, a point which I agree with. On the other hand he is basically the first superhero and has survived because people find elements of his story quintessentially classic. I think a reboot a mere six years after Brian Singer’s entry into the franchise is forgivable since Superman Returns was utterly forgettable and only elicited excitement whenever it utilized John William’s classic theme – no word yet on whether Snyder will be using this music. While I don’t feel Snyder has really earned the ‘visionary’ title that marketers of his movies like to impress upon us, I did thoroughly enjoy Watchmen and think he did an admirable job with challenging material. Christopher Nolan’s under-defined involvement (producer and story credits) also bodes well (and certainly helps build buzz) for Man of Steel. The supporting cast boasts its own array of talent including Amy Adams, Russell Crowe, Diane Lane, Michael Shannon, Kevin Costner, Julia Ormond, Laurence Fishburne and professional badass Christopher Meloni.

In the early 2000s, shortly after Singer helped kick start this superhero movie revolution and just about every popular comic announced a movie adaptation, I predicted the market would become saturated with heroes, people would lose interest and studios would lose millions. Every subsequent year Hollywood has invested more and more money into proving me wrong (that’s right, it’s personal). One has to assume next summer will represent the culmination of this movement with The Avengers, Batman’s “epic conclusion” and the Spider-Man reboot providing a 1-2-3 punch that should be a hard act for Superman to follow. It will be interesting to see how to the genre fares after these high profile entries and over a decade of non-stop superheroism. With all these superheroes flying around, I’m starting to understand why people in Metropolis get so excited when they think they see a bird or a plane.

When was the last time you saw a good Canadian film? How many Canadian films can most people even name? Maybe that’s because unlike music and television, there are no government enforced quotas for Canadian content in our movie theatres, allowing Hollywood to dominate our screens. Consequently, the phrase ‘Good Canadian Cinema’ is difficult for some people to say without a rising inflection at the end of the sentence, making it sound more like a question than something that actually exists.

Fortunately, the city’s newest rep theatre, the Toronto Underground Cinema is taking long overdue measures to remedy this. Starting this Thursday, the Underground is dedicating all 8 of its weekend screenings to great Canadian films as voted in an online survey. Strict budgets and a continuous funneling of our talent South of the border have placed odds against these films which they have overcome with style. Despite their understated yet undeniable merit and international critical praise, the average Canadian has only seen perhaps one or two of them, and they are rarely exhibited this way. With the help and support of our city’s film lovers, the Underground hopes this will become a quarterly event that could change the way we perceive our national cinema and increase interest in its potential growth.

Thursday, December 2nd

7pm – The Sweet Hereafter (Atom Egoyan, 1997)

Ian Holm and Sarah Polley lead an all star cast in Atom Egoyan`s profoundly tragic drama focusing on a small Canadian town dealing with the emotional scarring of a school bus accident that killed 20 children. Holm plays a lawyer from out of town handling the civil suits arising from the accident, but he also brings a lot of his own emotional baggage.

Click here to view the embedded video.

9:30pm - Last Night (Don McKellar, 1998)

A snapshot of the end of the world. It never says why, or how the world is ending, all we know is in a few hours it’s over. We follow a wide assortment of different people, spending their last few hours doing what they want to. Some party, some despair, some go about their business making sure everything runs smoothly right up until the end. Touching, funny, tragic, and oddly uplifting, this is a fascinating film that asks the viewer, “what would you do?”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Friday, December 3rd

6:45pm – Hard Core Logo (Bruce McDonald, 1996)

In this mockumentary, director Bruce McDonald follows washed-up punk band Hard Core Logo on their reunion tour of Western Canada. Featuring the talents of Hugh Dillon, Callum Keith Rennie and a slew of awesome music cameos, it’s hard to believe that Hard Core Logo isn’t a real documentary about a real band.

Click here to view the embedded video.

9pm – Pontypool (Bruce McDonald, 2008)

Pontypool is the story of disgraced shock jock Grant Mazzy who, on his first day on the job in the small Ontario town of Pontypool, has to contend with what appears to be a large scale viral outbreak happening directly outside the building. Director McDonald creates an intense claustrophobic experience while creating a sprawling vision of the world outside Grant’s broadcast booth using the scariest things at his disposal: simple words and sounds.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Actors Stephen McHattie and Lisa Houle, as well as the author Tony Burgess, will be in attendance for a Q&A following the screening.

Saturday, December 4th

7pm - Porky’s (Bob Clark, 1981)

The classic Bob Clark sex comedy that all others would be forever judged against. Essentially nothing more than a really horny version of Happy Days, Porky’s focuses on the exploits of a dive bar and the young Florida teens who spend their summer just trying to get laid. Porky’s really does establish the template for this type of movie quite well.

Click here to view the embedded video.

9pm – Cube (Vincenzo Natali, 1997)

A group of people find themselves trapped inside a maze seemingly made up of cubes with devious traps and puzzles at every turn. There is no escape unless they can all figure out where they are and why they are there. Dizzyingly brilliant, Cube is a cerebral horror film that is made so very rarely and has rarely been done better.

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Screenwriter André Bijelic will be in attendance for this screening.

Sunday, December 5th

7pm – Naked Lunch (David Cronenberg, 1991)

When you pair a text from William S. Burroughs with director David Cronenberg, you know you are in for one heck of an experience, whether you can stomach it or not. A drugged out writer (loosely based on Burroughs himself) watches his typewriter turn into a cockroach and in a fit of paranoia becomes embroiled in intrigue of an Islamic African town. Not for the squeamish, but then again, what Cronenberg is?

Click here to view the embedded video.

9:30pm – Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy (Kelly Makin, 1996)

The groundbreaking sketch comedy troupe comes to the big screen in this tale of a new pharmaceutical that makes everyone happier than they have ever been, despite a few unfortunate side effects. The line between profiting and the greater good is skewed to a hilarious degree.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Good Canadian Cinema is sure to be an awesome weekend of film, be sure to check it out.
For more info visit the official Facebook event page.

As much as I always loved the first Fubar movie, I never once asked myself “why are we not seeing the further adventures of Terry and Dean?”  Perhaps that’s because I remember reading about a poorly received book they released 5 or 6 years ago (which I imagine was similar to the Beavis and Butthead ones I enjoyed when I was 12) and the subsequent promotional tour around Canadian university campuses. Does anyone else remember this? Probably not. So I was very skeptical when I found out they were premiering the sequel at this year’s festival.  To mix metaphors, I thought they were returning to the well to milk a dead cow. Fortunately there was enough water left in the well to keep the cow alive and ready to be milked for our viewing pleasure once again!

It’s not a perfect follow-up, but we all know how rarely that happens (Slap Shot 2: breaking the ice went about 10 feet wide of the goal). I appreciated it for the ways it was different from the first film, and could have done without the ways it was similar.  With Farrel out of the picture (R.I.P.) , they’ve done away with most of the  mockumentary techniques utilized in the first film, but director Michael Dowse holds onto a couple of them like someone easing himself into walking on his own by shedding one crutch at at time.  I understand that these actors improvise a lot, so they’re going to stick with the handheld camera and jump cutting, but there are still three or four instances when a character (I think almost always Terry) talks to the camera. Why? Who are they talking to?  Are Terry and Dean still being documented?  It’s an odd balance that I’m sure most people won’t even notice. Not only has the first film already acclimatized most viewers to this motif, but so has the popularity of shows like The Office and Trailer Park Boys.*

Fubar II delivers the expected laughs,  but I wasn’t expecting to get as involved in the story as I did.  The movie opens with an eviction party where we see the notorious Tron (who had settled down with his old lady in the first movie) has returned to his old partying ways as the boys demolish the house.  Tron has also come into some money by working the oil fields of Fort McMurray.  Terry and Dean follow him to make their fortune and despite finding some prosperity, it’s not quite the snabba cash they thought it would be.  I don’t want to give too much away, but the film also includes a love triangle, a suicide pact, a trip to the West Edmonton mall and a surprisingly sentimental, Christmassy third act.  There was clearly a well thought-out script in place while shooting, which again made me wonder why the director still stuck so closely to the mockumenatry aesthetic.

The acting was solid, these guys have clearly immersed themselves in the characters many times before, but the real breakaway performance in the movie was Terra Hazelton as Terry ‘s love interest Trish.  It’s rare to see someone who can do something that’s funny, dramatic and believable all at once.  This is her first film role but I think that her’s is a face we’ll get used to.  Andy Sparacino as Tron is also given a lot more to do this time around and does it admirably, especially considering he is also without any non-Fubar related film credits.

Fortunately for Paul Spence (Dean) and Dave Lawrence (Terry), their schtick has aged as well as they have. It’s been almost a decade since the first film, but their ship has not sailed yet.  The jokes don’t taste stale and it doesn’t feel like we’re watching the guys from Anvil, Wayne’s World, or Bob and Doug Mackenzie try to recapture their youth.  They avoid having too many “Give’rs” and replaced them with new potential catchphrases like “life is deadly.”   As writers they have matured, and despite occasionally recycling a used idea or joke, they’ve managed to take these characters to a place that is interesting and realistic and most importantly, kept us laughing.

*Despite the Trailer Park Boys airing their first season a year before the first Fubar movie came out, I can’t help but feel like the Fubar films kind of bookended the TPB phenomenon.  Although Alberta is a long way from Nova Scotia, you can’t deny the similarities.  Ricky, Julian and Bubbles say they’ve left the Sunnyvale trailer park for good, but I think they should meet up with Terry and Dean in Toronto for the party to end all parties.

One need only watch the film’s trailer to get a sense of the beauty and craftsmanship present within The Illusionist. It is even more pleasing to the eye than Silvain Chomet’s massively successful first feature, The Triplets of Belleville, although the story is not as engaging. Based on an unproduced script by renowned writer, director, actor, and mime Jacques Tati (1907-1982), the tale centers on a magician whose tricks are no longer sought after in the age of television and rock and roll. Chomet based the look of the magician on Tati himself, which works well within the story since his ordinary appearance is constantly upstaged by the fantastic looking characters around him who are contributing to the end of his era.

It has often been said that the purest and most difficult style of filmmaking is one that does not rely on dialogue or exposition to tell the story, but does so solely through moving images. As with Triplets, Chomet does this once again by having characters that rarely speak and deliver mostly grunts and other barely audible sounds when they do.  Their personalities come from their exaggerated faces and physicality, which represent the most impressive accomplishments of Chomet and his animation team.  For example, the effeminate and jovial way that the famous rock musicians carry themselves evokes laughter every time.

This speechless style of filmmaking is also the most difficult because it often will come at the detriment of audience involvement. As endearing as these characters are, there is a bit of a disconnect created by never hearing them speak, it can be very difficult to sustain a 90 minute story this way. I’m not the first to admit that I had trouble staying awake during this film, which is not to say it was boring or bad in any way, but that it is not the kind of story that has you sitting on the edge of your seat wondering what happens next. The predominantly visual experience has a very relaxing effect which is enhanced by an almost aimless narrative (and by seeing it after a late night working and an early morning screening of Snabba Cash). Though to be fair, I should not criticize the cohesiveness of a film that I drifted off once or twice while watching, but until I see it again I’ll consider it one of those ‘chicken or egg’ conundrums.

Much of the film concentrates on the relationship formed between the magician and the young woman who takes care of his current lodgings (where he is relegated to sleeping on the couch). It is mostly due to the age difference that we never view this as a romantic relationship. She enjoys his slight-of-hand and he seems to have taken a liking to her as well, and we’re made to assume they are fulfilling some kind of father/ daughter relationship that was lacking in their lives before meeting. The film is actually dedicated to Tati’s daughter whom the constantly preoccupied filmmaker always regretted not having a better relationship with. Ultimately I found we didn’t really know enough about these characters and their history, nor did they have enough scenes together for us to fully understand and care about their relationship.

One thing missing from this film that added so much to Triplets is memorable music. Of course there is music present in The Illusionist, in fact Chomet himself provides the score, but it does not play the same kind of central role that it did in his first film. Apart from musical performances, The Illusionist does delight us by depicting many other forms of performance, such as dancing, flying trapeze artists, and of course, magic.

As I review my review, I notice that have been very critical about certain points of this film, so I want to reiterate that this a true piece of art well worth seeing. Using a gorgeous, labour intensive yet almost antiquated method of animation feels like a very appropriate way to pay homage to both Tati and the kind of performer that does not really exist anymore as represented by the magician. This film has been over five years in the making, and the results are stunning. Look for a limited release around Christmas time.