If movies were judged purely on their level of forced quirkiness, then Jesus Henry Christ would be in the running for the best of the year. Thankfully, we don’t live in that world and this movie will be quickly forgotten. This is another one of those unfortunate post-millennium comedies that Wes Anderson may not have made, but has to answer for. Much like how Quentin Tarantino spawned dozens of infinitely inferior pop-culture charged crime comedies, Anderson’s instant cult status bred a generation of filmmakers seduced by his deadpan whimsy who crank out movies that are more designed than directed. It’s ironic for a filmmaker who can’t seem to stop telling stories about fractured families that he’s spawned a sea of inferior children who he probably isn’t too fond of. Thankfully his films continue to stand out against shameless Xeroxes like Jesus Henry Christ, a movie that sneaks its best joke into the title, and even that one isn’t particularly good.

Dennis Lee’s second feature (following up the almost unwatchable family melodrama Fireflies in the Garden) is about a 10-year-old child prodigy named Henry (Jason Spevack) with photographic memory and the ability to complete a college entry exam in two minutes. Henry was born to single mother Patricia Herman (Toni Collette), who lost her mother and four brothers when she was a child and grew up embittered to the idea of families with a dink of a father who is essentially a poor man’s Royal Tenenbaum and not worth discussing. She was a political activist to all liberal causes though, so decided to have a test tube baby as personal act of rebellion. Her kid turned out to be a genius who eventually worked out that his father is Professor Slavkin O’Hara (Michael Sheen), a man who donated his sperm years ago when his doctor cruelly claimed he had testicular cancer as part of his plan to seduce O’Hara’s wife. However, O’Hara did manage to shoot out a daughter named Audrey (Samantha Weinstein) before the marriage collapsed, who he raised as a sociological experiment on sexual identity. Henry brings these four lost souls together to form a fucked up makeshift family custom made for some semi-dark quirky comedy.

The main problem with Jesus Henry Christ is that while Lee may have decided on the style of his movie early on, he never quite figured out the tone. Early scenes outlying the many deaths in Patricia’s family have a very dark, arch, and cynical edge to the humor, while at other times he seems to be trying find weepy emotions in his collection of one-note damaged goofballs. The movie is all over the place, clearly created by a filmmaker more interested in showing off just what a clever director he can be rather than someone with a story to tell or even something to say. As a visual stylist he’s even less assured, trying way to hard to show off his skills with-ever roving cameras and a near limitless supply of reverse zooms that add little to the storytelling. That said, he throws so many jokes at the wall that a few stick and the rigid adherence to the Wes Anderson playbook at least assures that the movie looks nice and moves along at a brisk pace. However, when that’s the best you can say about a filmmaker’s abilities, it’s not a good sign. Particularly for someone who clearly considers himself some sort of smartypants artist.

The main factor that makes the movie bearable is a cast far too good for this material. Toni Collette may have played at least five too many bitter single moms at this point, but she is quite good at it and knows how to balance comedy and pathos well. Michael Sheen is gradually turning into a fantastic semi-comedic character actor of the Stanley Tucci school and gets far more out of his role than he should. But even better than Collette and Sheen are the kids, Jason Spevack and Samantha Weinstein, who underplay play their roles in monotone with bursts of emotion in performances that are mercifully free of cutesy kid acting. The entire cast is strong enough to suggest that Lee at least has some skill with casting and working with actors, so perhaps once he stops trying to emulate other filmmakers and do his own thing he might have some promise. Although “might” is the key word there since all of these folks are so talented that they probably didn’t need much direction.

Jesus Henry Christ is definitely a disposable derivative effort that will receive a resounding round of apathy at the box office, but at least it isn’t painful to watch. Part of Lee’s constant desire to make his presence known behind the camera thankfully involves zippy pacing that never dwells on a bad joke or failed attempt to massage the tear ducts for long. Plus, the actors are always compelling even when the script isn’t and enough jokes land to keep the crickets at bay. As far as bad Wes Anderson knock-offs go, this movie is in the upper echelon. It’s still kind of crap, but crap that’s passably enjoyable. It’s a failed movie that won’t ruin your night. Now that’s a poster quote for the desperate.

Labaki’s story takes place in an isolated Lebanese village. The small population does everything together even though they are split down the middle between Christians and Moslems with all of the irrational prejudices that implies (segregated cemeteries, childish name-calling, the occasional fistfight, etc). However, things are fairly peaceful overall until a small TV comes into the town brining with it controversial news stories that gets the whole down in a divided tizzy. Well, at least that’s true of all the men in town. The women recognize how ridiculous, petty, and tragic all this fighting can be, with a death toll that has mounted over time (at one point one of the eldest women in the community poignantly cries out, “”Do you think we exist simply to mourn you?” and gets nothing but chilly silence in response).

This being a painfully patriarchal community, the women’s feelings are never acknowledged. However, they all get together and realize that as a team, they can manipulate all of the men in the communities using the good old fashioned techniques that women have used for decades, primarily sex n’ food (men are a weak bread, there’s no denying it). Their plans start with staging fake miracles to bring the rivals together and when that doesn’t prove to be strong enough, they import a collection of Ukrainian belly dancers to keep all the men distracted and hold a communitywide party catered with hash-laced pastries to get everyone giggling together. All of the hate and conflict built up over several stressful weeks quickly melts away via the magical powers of soft drugs and bare midriffs.

It’s a fairly amusing little tale whipped up by Labaki and one that is well performed by a talented cast of established actors and civilians with intriguing faces. Unfortunately this kind of light comedy with dark themes is a very tricky combination to get right and seems just slightly out of reach of the Labaki who is only on her second film as a director. The first third of the story drags on far too long with very little indication that the film is in fact a comedy. Then when the women hatch their plan, the humor arrives in fairly broad and goofy set pieces that clash awkwardly with the serious drama surrounding them. Musical numbers about hash, slapstick physical gags, double takes from horny old men leering at scantily clad young women, Labaki leaves no clichéd comedy technique unexplored, at times desperately reaching back into the silent era for ideas. Sometimes the gags work (the unexpected hash n’ stripper party is pretty great), but the filmmaker is never quite seems as comfortable going for laughs as she does in staging the more serious sequences.

Where Do We Go Now is never quite as funny as it wants to be, but it can’t be entirely written off since the ideas involved aren’t exactly geared to belly laughs. Labaki is trying to make a point with all her pratfalls and those themes resonate strongly as do the intermittent dramatic sequences. Considering the origin of the production, it’s quite refreshing to see a practically feminist movie emerge and Labaki’s ideas about favoring female compassion in society over male dick-waving and ego-fueled fisticuffs is sound. It’s a shame that she wasn’t able to find someone more adept at crafting comedy to help her with the screenplay because this could have been a fantastic little satire if the laughs were there. She didn’t find that funny co-conspirator though and in fairness, this isn’t the easies subject to mine for humor. In the end, Where Do We Go Now warrants a mild recommendation for concept and audacity alone even if it’s probably a better idea for a movie than an actual movie. A for effort, C- for execution. Just like my grade school gym class results.

They say that original movies don’t get made anymore (lord know I’ve whined about it through tears and/or booze-fueled rage many a time), but how about this concept: a film about the Victorian doctor and his drunken inventor pal who gave the world the gift of the vibrator. That’s right; it’s a costume drama about the birth of the world’s first sex toy. Is it the greatest film ever made? Absolutely not, but I certainly have to admit that I’ve never seen this movie before. The entertaining little project definitely wins points for the charm and novelty that makes up for the occasionally ho-hum storytelling. Simply put, if you’re only going to see one movie about vibrators this year, Hysteria should be at the top of your list.

The tale takes place at a particular highpoint of British stuffiness. Doctors across England noticed that women were suffering from an outbreak of “hysteria.” At all social classes woman seemed uptight and overwhelmed by an inexplicable hunger. Fortunately, Dr. Robert Dalrymple (Jonathan Pryce) had a cure. Using the finest imported oils, the good doctor found that these mysterious attacks could be momentarily quelled with a gently vigorous massage in the nether realms of their pelvic region. Of course, this procedure was never considered sexual because women of that era didn’t experience sexual pleasure (according to “research”). Enter a young doctor named Mortimer Granville (Hugh Dancy) who takes a job at Dalrymple’s practice after being booted out of nearly every other medical establishment in London for his radical beliefs in germs and following current medical research. All the ladies of the practice seem to really appreciate the handsome doctor’s massage, business starts booming, and Dalrymple contemplates not only giving over his practice to Granville, but also the hand of his youngest and most painfully obedient daughter Emily (Felicity Jones).

Life seems perfect for Granville, until he starts experiencing hand-cramps due to his workload. He also becomes somewhat confused about the exact nature of his medical services after spending time with Dalrymple’s rowdy, independent, suffragette daughter Charlotte (Maggie Gyllenhaal) who defies her father’s wishes by working for the poor and supporting women’s rights (seriously, where does she get off?). However, Granville also understandably doesn’t want to lose the only medical job available to him in London and tries to come up with a solution. Enlisting the help of a wealthy drunken friend (an absolutely hilarious Rupert Everett), they invent an electronic massager that seems to work even better than an elderly doctor’s shaking hands. Thus, the sex toy industry is born and thanks to a love affair with Charlotte, a push for women’s rights also sneaks in to make sure everyone leaves the theater happy.

Director Tanya Wexler’s film works primarily because it never revels in the titillating or controversy-bating elements of the story. Instead, she plays the film as a gentle comedy, mocking the confused thoughts and ideals of old-timey England without ever digging too deeply. There’s a much darker film to be made about the same subject with a harsher look at the rampant misogynist repression of the era, but this ain’t it and the sitcom version is probably far more enjoyable anyways. The performances are strong across the board from the impossibly dapper doctor leads to the string of sour/elated faces of British character actresses playing their clients. However, the show is definitely stolen by Gyllenhaal who takes a character essentially comprised of rants outlining the filmmaker’s thesis and turns her into an endlessly charismatic early feminist. Her part still gets a little preachy in a way that often sits awkwardly against the featherweight tone of the film that surrounds her, but Gyllenhaal dives into the role with such glee that she somehow makes it work.

It’s safe to say that Hysteria is far from a masterpiece. This is ultimately just comedy fluff with a socially conscious agenda snuck in ever so slightly. There isn’t much to the movie beneath the surface and given the often ridiculous subject matter, Wexler and her cast never really hit the delirious comedy heights they were clearly striving for. Instead, this falls into a very specific brand of British comedy that treats dirty material in an impossibly genteel manner, as if the mere mention of a vagina is enough to cause uncomfortable chuckles from the audience. It’s a dated brand of sex comedy, but one that feels entirely appropriate to the Victorian setting. Though the conservative sexual jokes would never work if the movie was set in the modern day, they feel appropriate in this deeply repressed era and nostalgically naughty. The film will never win awards or become a favorite of British comedy snobs. Yet if you find the idea intriguing, I find it hard to believe you’ll be too disappointed. Hysteria is a strange and unique little comedy for thoughtfully perverted viewers and costume comedy lovers everywhere.

Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999) – Even all these years later, Being John Malkovich remains one of the most distinct, original, and downright fucked up movies to ever flicker before an audience’s eyeballs. A perfect combination of the twisted talents of director Spike Jonze and writer Charlie Kaufman with a tone that I can only describe as deadpan surrealism. The concept sounds like a goofy farce unsurprisingly born from mind schooled in sketch comedy (Kaufman was veteran of the underrated The Dana Carvey Show). Yet Jonze plays the material oddly straight and somehow pulls it off. Even the most outlandish sequences are presented through grimy naturualism that not only creates a deadpan comedic effect, but also lends genuine pathos to the material that makes it unexpectedly moving. It shouldn’t work, yet it does and simply sneaking a peak at Michel Gondry’ brightly and broad take on the similar Kaufman screenplay Human Nature shows just how vital Jonze’s approach was to this film’s success. There’s nothing else quite like Being John Malkovich out there with Jonze n’ Kaufman destine to spend their careers struggling to top one of the finest debuts of the 90s.

John Cusack stars as the now standard Kaufman lead, an unshaven tortured artist. In this case he is an absurdly ambitious puppeteer determined to express sexual desire and torment through marionettes. Unsurprisingly that doesn’t pay the bills. so on the advice of his monkey loving girlfriend (an equally disheveled Cameron Diaz) he takes a job as a paper filer on the 71/2 floor of a New York office building. While trying to impress the business’ resident sexpot Maxine (a never better Catherine Keener), he finds a portal that allows anyone who enters to experience life through the eyes of John Malkovich for fifteen minutes. From there, the absurdist concept gets increasingly surreal an emotionally complex with a twisted love triangle developing between Keener, Diaz, Cusack and the unwilling body of Malkovich, Cusack finding to manipulate Malkovich from inside his head, and of course the master thespian himself entering his own portal for one hell of a bizarre climax.

Kaufman’s bleak and uncompromising script remains as hilarious and unpredictable as it did in 1999, with his themes of celebrity obsession and fractured identity proving even more resonant today. Yet, despite all the oddball comedy and commentary, the film cuts most deeply as a tragic love story with a hauntingly heartbreaking conclusion as powerful as anything in the K-man’s equally loved Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind. The screenwriter’s voice may drive the film, but without Jonze’s deadpan realist approach it would never work so well. The project moved him out of innovative music videos and into film (a wise career move given that even MTV doesn’t play music videos any more) and he’s never found another script more suited to his distinct tone, although Where the Wild Things Are came close before sliding into emo indulgence. The cast are universally brilliant, particularly Malkovich without whose self-effacing commitment to Kaufman’s unflattering portrayal the movie just wouldn’t work. It’s inexplicable why Malkovich was the only conceivable choice, but that elusiveness is true of the effectiveness of the movie as whole. It’s hard to rationalize exactly why Being John Malkovich is so hilarious, insightful, and moving, but films this enigmatic and entertaining are rare so it’s best not to ask too many questions. Just give yourself over to the Jonze/Kaufman/Malkovich show and be grateful that you don’t have to be spat out onto the New Jersey turnpike afterwards. It would still be worth it, but you know, just a bit of a hassle.

Criterion’s Blu-ray is, like all of their releases, a damn-near perfect package. The HD transfer offers a rendering of Jonze and cinematographer Lance Acord’s cool n’ shadowy color palate that’s easily the best the movie ever looked outside of theaters (and for a film this stylized, that means a lot). The special features alternate between being insightful like Lang Bangs’ fantastic never-before-seen fly-on-the-set documentary and flippant Spike Jonze pranks like a hysterical commentary provided by Michel Gondry who had nothing to do with the production (though he does make a late-inning phone call to Jonze for some actual commentary on the film). The best feature is probably the refreshingly honest interview with Malkovich conducted by The Daily Show’s John Hodgeman to add a little sardonic wit. The bizarre collection of features perfect captures the mocking/sincere balance of the film itself and should please any fan of Being John Malkovich, Spike Jonze, Charlie Kaufman, or movies in general. There’s no reason not to pick up this disc unless you don’t like the movie, in which case I probably don’t like you. (Phil Brown)

The Best of WCW Clash of the Champions (Various) – From 1988 to 1997, the world’s then number two wrestling promotion WCW (formerly the NWA under Jim Crockett Promotions) put on infrequent sports entertainment spectaculars known as Clash of the Champions. These cards of matches featuring some of the biggest names in the industry (including the likes of Ric Flair, Sting, Hulk Hogan, and countless others) were run on basic cable for free when they could’ve easily been sold as Pay-Per-View cards. This week, WWE Home Entertainment (who would sadly end up usurping the money losing company early in the last decade) puts forth a comprehensive package featuring some of the best matches in this two disc Blu-ray set.

It’s somewhat telling that the compilation would be hosted by WCW stalwart and former head writer “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes (who comes across like your eldest, old school grandfather trying to tell you what it was like in his day) because a lot of the matches sadly end with what was mockingly known as the “Dusty finish,” meaning a match would end via a count out, a TV time limit draw (remember those?), or a disqualification to keep a feud going until the next actual Pay-Per-View. But those finishes while plentiful here, rarely dampen the joys of the matches shown here which will transport fans new and old back to a time when there was more action and less talking.

The first disc of the set, clocking in at over four and half hours of matches from the early years, including an epic encounter between Sting and Flair from the first Clash, which was designed to go head to head with the then WWF’s Wrestlemania IV and it managed to be a better show of athleticism than anything on their competitor’s pay card that year. Also on the disc is a phenomenal “I Quit” match between Flair and the legendary hardcore veteran Terry Funk, and elimination tag match with some great storytelling as Flair and Sting team up to face Big Van Vader and “Ravishing” Rick Rude (who still had one of the greatest gimmicks of all time), a brief but indelibly entertaining “Russian Chain Match” between Ivan Koloff and Ricky Morton, and an extremely athletic encounter between former tag team partners, the late Brian Pillman and the then “Stunning” Steve Austin.

The second disc has some decent matches, but fewer gems since the later year switch to focusing on Pay-Per-Views started to show. There’s a great match for the United States championship between Austin and Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat, but you might want to watch it with the sound off to enjoy it because commentators Bobby Heenan and Tony Schiavone won’t stop talking about a plot arc that night involving Hulk Hogan having to be taken to the hospital and totally ignoring a great technical match until the very end, and a Cruiserweight title match between Chris Jericho and Eddie Guerrerro lives up to what you would expect these legends would be able to accomplish. That being said, the main two hours or so of the second disc are okay, but there are three exclusive matches on the Blu-ray that make up for some of the slower efforts, including a tag match with Sting and Steamboat against Rude and Austin that warrants the extra few dollars for the nicer format. Then again, if you’re a fan and you have the means, it would be silly not to get this one on Blu-ray. (Andrew Parker)

In some ways, it’s kind of amazing that Paranormal Activity creator Oren Peli even has time to conduct interviews. The creator of the microbudgeted phenomenon (the fourth instalment of which hits theatres later this year and he has remained extremely tight lipped about) has parlayed his success into becoming quite a sought after producer and writer that has no fewer than six projects on the table with him working in various capacities.

This weekend finds Peli moving away from the found footage concept that his biggest hit was based around (as well as the short lived ABC series The River) to produce and provide the screenplay for director Brad Parker’s debut film Chernobyl Diaries, a more documentary styled tale of several American friends and a pair of Aussies who get more than they bargained for when travelling to the ruins of Pripyat in the Ukraine on an “extreme tourism” excursion to the town abandoned in the 1980s by the meltdown of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

Peli sat down with Dork Shelf while in Toronto about balancing his work load, stepping out from behind the camera to produce, and why you should always make sure you have the rights to any and all potential artwork before you shoot a film.

How did the idea for setting a film at Chernobyl come about?

It happened rather accidentally. I was browsing the web one day and I came across these photo blogs of people who actually went on tours in Pripyat. I had known about the Chernobyl disaster, of course, but I didn’t know that there was this town next to it – which makes sense since this is where the workers for the plant lived – that was abandoned over night and it just became a ghost town. When something like that usually happens, for economical reasons people will normally stop to pick up their things first and then go, but here no one had a chance to pick up anything when they left. It was like everyone vanished. There was definitely this post-Apocalyptic feel to it. In addition, there’s such strange growth of vegetation there that it’s become one of the eeriest places on Earth. That was why I thought this would make such a great setting for a horror movie.

Did you ever get a chance to visit Pripyat or would you want to?

It’s funny because not only did I want to visit it, but we were actually thinking of shooting it there because it could make the production cheaper since we already had the locations there. (laughs) Why not? And the initial research that we had done told us that the levels of radiation there aren’t that bad, actually, and if you’re there long enough and for a certain period of time that you’re going to be okay. Unless, of course, you’re there for days and weeks at a time non-stop. There wasn’t going to be a problem. It’s a real thing that people go there on trips. You can go on YouTube and search for Pripyat.

But the only main reason we didn’t shoot there was because in 2011 and for most of the year the Ukrainian government stopped allowing people to go in because of construction on the reactor. We tried really hard to pull strings, but they just wouldn’t let us in, so we had to find a Plan B. HOWEVER, the one thing that we did find out while we were already shooting on set in Serbia was something really interesting from a nuclear researcher that said it was true that you could hold a Geiger counter in the air and it would show that the radiation in the air was negligible and safe, but if you were walking around and there just so happened to be a patch of dust on the ground that you kick up and one of those particles happens to still be radioactive, you’ll breathe it in and it gets lodged in your lungs and you could get really ill. That’s when it felt good that we skipped the whole idea of a trip. (laughs)

Where did you finally end up shooting to make it look like it could have been this ghost town?

We found this great location in Hungary that was once a military facility in the 70s around the same time that Pripyat was built that had been abandoned by the Soviets in the mid-80s around the same time that Pripyat was abandoned. It had very similar architecture and a very similar level of decay. It was already a great basis point.

But the best part of shooting there was that Brad Parker could look at every location and say that certain spots would work perfect for certain scenes and what spots we could make look right later in post by using visual effects. He could visualize everything perfectly so we could flow from one location to another without telling what scenes have visual effects and which ones are practical. It all looks very similar from Hungary to Serbia where we filmed. No one would suspect the hard work we went through because we wanted to make Pripyat the main character in the movie and we wanted to be as faithful as possible to recreating it as closely as we could.

On one of the walls of one of the buildings, there’s a really amazing mural of a scientist on the side of a building. Was that something that was there originally?

That’s actually a story that was really heartbreaking for us, and I think this is the first time I’m telling it. What we did was that we had our art designers paint this mural on the side of the building that had been there originally. It was really expensive and time consuming to restore, but we loved it and it ended up being in the background of most of the shots. Then, very, very late in the process when we had about a week to deliver the movie, someone said “Are you sure you have clearance for that particular image?” (laughs) And we we’re just, like, “Um… Yeah, we were told that it’s… um, fine.”

Then we actually did look into it and we realized that the artist is alive and someone didn’t double check everything and it was done by this German artist who’s now in his late 70s. We had to then hire an attorney in German to track him down through an art gallery and contact him and ask if we could use his image, and he said NO. We tried to see what we could pay him and he still said no, no, no. He didn’t want it to be used at all. So at the last minute, we had to commission an artist to draw a new image and use CGI to replace it in the background of every shot. So that was one of the biggest near heartattacks during the production because we didn’t think we would be able to release the movie. Luckily we had a fantastic visual effects company, so they did it so seamless that no one would ever expect it. What you saw that looks so good was actually drawn by a friend of Brad Parker in a little more than one day.

This is Brad Parker’s first film as a director coming from a visual effects background, but you still wrote the film. Did you feel it was important to have a different set of eyes with a different set of design skills to bring the film to life?

Well, for many years now Brad has been doing some of the most recognizable commercials that you’ve seen. They were already mini-movies, so we already knew that he was an expert at the top of his game, but it’s true that he’s a first time director. We had to make sure that we were comfortable with him.

My producer Brian Witten and I met with him many, many times, and we just loved him as a person and we thought there was a lot of confidence in his abilities. We just had to make sure that we were all on the same page when it comes to working with the actors more than the visuals because we wanted to do some things that were really unconventional. The fact that he hasn’t been spoiled by “traditional movies” makes him very open minded to the unique ways we wanted to shoot the movie. We found out that he was very much a visionary filmmaker with a strong visual sense, and when we told him the way we wanted to go about making the movie so that it doesn’t feel like a typical horror movie, he came to us with a lot of really great ideas of how to make that possible, so that gave us a lot of confidence in him from the beginning.

The style of the film is quite different structurally from the Paranormal Activity movies. Was it a bit of a leap to making something that has to be a lot more directed and narrative oriented?

It’s true because this one’s not found footage. The best way to describe it would be that it’s halfway between found footage and a traditional movie. There’s a much greater sense of narrative, but at the same time we allow the actors to improvise a lot of the dialogue and we employ a more stealthy style of shooting. Just about every minute of the movie is still handheld, but it’s done this time by professional cameramen. It’s still shaky, but we wanted you to feel like you were actually going on a journey with these people as opposed to just watching actors reading lines. It was important to keep the actions really visceral and real and authentic.

It’s also your first film where the camera doesn’t function as a character in the movie.

True, but it’s not that much of a leap, really. Early on in production we thought for a moment that it was going to be a found footage film, but after a while we realized that it was going to stop making sense if we did it that way. It wouldn’t work and we dropped it immediately and we said that there’s been a lot of movies that have done this kind of style that have worked really well, like if you look at some of the earlier Paul Greengrass films and movies like Traffic, Children of Men, The Wrestler… these films aren’t pretending they’re found footage movies, but there’s something about them that’s really different from traditional movies. They don’t feel very polished. They feel raw and gritty and dirty in a good way that makes them feel a lot more visceral. That was sort of our guideline for how we were going to approach making Chernobyl Diaries. It still makes you feel connected to the characters without having to go in the directions that I had in the past.

The film definitely has this almost documentary and even video game influence to it with this third person floating camera aesthetic, and you used to work in software and game design, so were you ever making these conscious decisions when you were setting up the film?

If I did, it wasn’t really consciously, and I would really give a lot of the credit there to Brad and our cinematographer Morton Soborg, who was also the full time camera operator. He just shot In a Better World, which won the Oscar for best foreign film, before he came to us, so he was amazing. The main thing for us was to make those movements feel very free and unorchestrated. We never wanted to make it look like we planned anything with actors going from Mark X to Mark Y. We wanted it to always be sort of random.

Sound design has always played a huge role in all your work from producing to directing with the sound often coming before the visual payoff.

I heard while I was making the first Paranormal Activity that sound was 70% of what you end up seeing., and I believe that a really collaborative use of sound can be way more effective than anything you see. So you have these moments where you don’t really see anything – it’s darkness – and you hear a noise far away. It’s not even that you really know what the noise is or that you think the noise is even something threatening. Just the fact that you hear something clattering nearby when there’s not supposed to be anyone else there can be really scary.

It’s a really tricky matter to deal with sound and we take it very seriously. Our sound mixer on set was someone who just won an Oscar for The Hurt Locker, and we had another amazing sound designer from ILM who did some great work. Then we had this CRAZY guy, his name was Diego Stocco who did our music, or score if you can even call it that. It’s not really even music in the traditional sense, but he has all of these broken instruments that he takes these violins and pianos and he just bashes them to try to create very weird and discomforting melodies instead of a soundtrack, because we never really wanted people think there was actually music there. We wanted them to think that it was all blending in from the environment and the atmosphere. It becomes a very, very delicate process, and sometimes it’s even accidental, but a huge part of these kinds of movies is making sure everything sounds right.

It seems like a harder concept for a writer to convey than it would be for a director.

There’s no real trick to it. To me, the essence of the movie was people who find themselves way over their heads and trapped in a town in a foreign country where no one’s going to help them and there’s no way of getting out and you can’t stay there for too long sue to the threat of radiation. These people kind of have to wait it out while there’s this whole other thing to worry about that you don’t know what it is or how to defend yourself against it. That was the main thing to convey in the script. From there, you kind of work yourself backwards to creating characters that feel real and we get to know and like them. Then you move forward to figure out how they are going to try and get out of there based on who they are as people. You just keep going after it time after time over a period of months until eventually something that looks like story emerges.

Are there any plans for a sequel or will this be a stand alone film?

You know, I never think beyond one movie at a time, and when I did the first Paranormal Activity I never could have dreamed there was going to be a second, third, or fourth one. So you never know. We should be so lucky that the film should be successful enough on its own, but at this point we’re not thinking at all beyond the first one.

You have quite a bit on your plate right now and you’re starting to become quite a sought after producer with your hands in a lot of things. Did you ever dream that you would get to this point and do you see yourself doing more writing and producing in the future rather than directing?

Like I said before, I never looked past the first Paranormal Activity. I was just hoping that it would get out there and do well. It performed beyond my wildest dreams and everything that’s happened beyond that is just bonus. To think that I could write and still be given the opportunities to make movies like this is awesome and I feel like the luckiest guy.

As far as the future, I really don’t know. I never really thought I would ever get to make something like Chernobyl Diaries, let alone write and produce it. Sometimes it might make more sense for me to direct a movie and other times I may just produce, but I’m just going to take it as it comes and goes.

So you’re not going to talk about what Paranormal Activity 4 is going to be about, are you?

(laughs) I’m really sorry, but I can’t help you. You’re just going to have to wait and see. (laughs)

It’s that time once again! Dork Shelf and our friends over at Entertainment One want to send you and a guest to see A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO ENDINGS in TORONTO on Monday, May 28th or in VANCOUVER on Thursday, May 31st!

Click here to view the embedded video.

A Beginner’s Guide to Endings is a spectacular ride through the lives of an equally spectacular family and interweaves three stories of miraculous redemption. Duke White (Harvey Keitel), a hard living gambling man who has doomed his three boys to a horrible fate, and when his sons find out that they don’t have much time left to live, they decide to make up for a lifetime of misdeeds in one day. But making up for past mistakes and doing all the things in life that they should’ve isn’’t nearly that simple for the White boys – but then again, the White boys never did take the simple path. Starring Scott Caan, Jason Jones, Paulo Costanzo, Tricia Helfer, J.K. Simmons and the amazing Harvey Keitel.  It will hit theatres in select cities June 1^st.

For your chance to win simply email contest@dorkshelf.com with BEGINNER’S GUIDE and YOUR CITY in the subject line. Please include a mailing address in case you win. (Your name will not be added to any mailing lists.) Please only one entry per household. For additional chances to win, simply like the contest announcement from our Facebook page and/or re-Tweet the announcement from our Twitter! Deadline for entries is 11:59pm on Thursday, May 24th for Toronto and 11:59pm on Sunday May 27th for Vancouver.

Good luck! And as always, stay tuned to Dork Shelf for the latest news, reviews, and more killer contests in the future!

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, here comes Dork Shelf and Alliance Films with another great advance screening contest for you guys! We want to send 15 lucky winners and a guest of their choosing to see an advance screening of PIRANHA 3DD in TORONTO, OTTAWA, and WINNIPEG on Thursday May 31st OR in HALIFAX on Wednesday, May 30th.

Click here to view the embedded video.

After the terror unleashed on Lake Victoria in Piranha 3D, the pre-historic school of blood thirsty piranhas are back. This time, no one is safe from the flesh eating fish as they sink their razor sharp teeth into the visitors of summer’s best attraction, The Big Wet Water Park. Christopher Lloyd (Back to the Future) reprises his role as the eccentric piranha expert with survivor Paul Scheer (The League) and a partially devoured Ving Rhames (Pulp Fiction) back for more fish frenzy. David Hasselhoff trades in the sandy beaches of “Baywatch” to be a celebrity lifeguard at the racy water park. Prepare for double the terror, double the action and double the D’s in this sequel also starring Gary Busey , Katrina Bowden, Danielle Panabaker, Matt Bush, Chris Zylka, and David Koechner.

Piranha 3DD opens in theatres across Canada on Friday, June 1st, but for your chance to see it early, simply email contest@dorkshelf.com with PIRANHA 3DD and YOUR CITY in the subject line. Please only one entry per household. For additional chances to win simply like the contest announcement on our Facebook page and/or re-Tweet the announcement from our Twitter! Deadline for entries is 11:59pm on Monday, May 28th.
Good luck, as always, and don’t forget to stay tuned to Dork Shelf for the latest movie, game, comic, and local music news as well as more wonderful contests and giveaways.

Agent K (Jones) and Agent J (Smith) are at a bit of an impasse in their professional partnership when K refuses to tell J the truth about escaped alien serial killer Boris the Animal (Flight of the Conchords’ Jemaine Clement), who wants K dead so his previously extinct race of universe destroying beings can destroy the world. In order to achieve his goal, Boris has to go back in time and…

Well, to tell you the truth, I honestly don’t know what the hell happens because none of it makes a lick of sense. Apparently Boris successfully goes back and kills K causing him to disappear from the present, but leading to an alternate reality where J is the only agent who remembers K’s existence in the present, but he really died in 1969. So, to stop K from dying in the past, J procures the only other time traveling device in the universe to try and kill Boris before K ever crosses paths with him. J fails in his mission and is introduced to young K (Josh Brolin) and teams up with him to track down Boris before he can come into contact with the motormouthed entity Griffin (Michael Stuhlbarg), who can simultaneously see all of the universes infinite timelines at once and also holds an amulet of some sort that can protect the universe. I can go into further spoilers, but you would probably just get more and more confused once I start adding more specifics.

Every detail outside of the cinematography and production design – both of which are top notch – is as arbitrary as possible. Even the stunning creature design is arbitrary since none of them exist except for the express purpose of getting blown away by the MiBs and turned into a steaming pile of goo. There’s zero tension with anything that transpires on screen because the staff of four writers never bother to develop any sort of characters or coherent story, simply coasting by content that the wacky idea of time travel will whisk away all of the film’s gaping logical and emotional holes.

Here’s the problem with time travel as a plot device: You can be lazy and use the theoretical paradoxes of time travel to explain away the logical problems, but it can’t cover up a complete lack of character motivation and lazy plot structuring. The problems in the present timeline of MiB III are barely addressed by the end and an entire subplot involving new bureau director O (a woefully slumming Emma Thompson) provides the biggest logical fallacy of the film. Well, that and the laughably inappropriate, illogical, and cloyingly “heartwarming” conclusion that nearly caused me to break my 3-D glasses over my knee and walk out.

Well, maybe it’s not exactly a logical fallacy because every character in the film constantly lies to every other character on screen. Possibly. I don’t even know. Maybe I need to go back to school and get my Ph.D. just to figure this thing out. They keep misinforming each other because this is the kind of movie where if just a single character told the truth, there wouldn’t be a movie. Then again, they could have just left it at everyone lying to one another since they wouldn’t have even needed the time travel device in the first place.

Since its flat out impossible to talk about the film’s structure any further without spoiling it (which you shouldn’t see, clearly, but I don’t want to ruin it for you if you’re dead set on going), let’s move onto the other biggest problems with the film, which are the performances almost across the board. Jones can’t be bothered to really care about what’s going on and Smith is only given recycled catch phrases for dialog leading to a complete lack of chemistry between the two of them that makes it look like they never worked together before in. Smith’s natural charisma can’t save this material. Despite a three year absence from the silver screen, even he seems tired here.

Clement is completely wasted in a villainous role that gives him nothing to do except act as a vessel for Rick Baker’s make-up effects. Finally there’s Stuhlbarg, who’s flat out doing the most hamfisted Robin Williams impression ever. Decked out in a woollen hat and winter jacket the entire time, his character proves to be entirely useless and thoroughly annoying to watch because he could at any time end the movie JUST BY FLAT OUT TELLING EVERYONE WHAT TO DO BECAUSE HE KNOWS EVERYTHING THAT WILL EVER HAPPEN AT ANY TIME IN THE UNIVERSE. But no, we just get a weak riff on Mork from Ork because that seems to be the era that Sonnenfeld’s mind seems to be stuck in.

I guess another plus for the film would be Brolin’s spot on impression of Jones, but again, the film doesn’t give him anything even remotely amusing to do with it. Even the gorgeous redesign of the late 1960s goes nowhere because the plot simply cobbles together the first moon mission, the Miracle Mets, jokes about segregation, and the rise of Andy Warhol into an incoherent mishmash of outdated references that were probably stale early in the 70s.

Men in Black III has absolutely no reason to exist, nor should it. Someone should go back in time and either fix this movie from being more complicated than it needed to be or prevent it from ever being made. Or better yet, go back even further and stop the second film from being made. Unless we’re in the alternate timeline where the second film was a good one and the first film was a bad one. Then maybe the Red Sox would’ve never won the World Series and Tommy Lee Jones would have never owed someone a favour or needed to pay someone a large sum of money. But if that happened, then my first cat wouldn’t have run away and my mother would have tipped that waiter at Benihana more than three dollars back in 1982, and then I wouldn’t have been bo………

The Secret World of Arrietty (2010, Hiromasa Yonebayashi) – Although it’s really just another retelling of Mary Norton’s famous children’s story The Borrowers, The Secret World of Arrietty showcases the trademark stunning visuals one comes to expect from Hayao Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli. Working from a screenplay by master animator Miyazaki, the film stays true to the story’s original roots despite stumbling slightly late in the film by adding tension and the appearance of a villain somewhat awkwardly.

Young Shawn (voiced by David Henrie) has recently moved to the country to live with his Aunt Jessica and her housekeeper Hara (Carol Burnett). Shawn is there to kill time away from his work obsessed mother before a serious heart operation that he might not live through. In the walls of Jessica’s house live the Clock’s, a family of little people known as “borrowers” who sneak into people’s kitchens at night and take only what they need to survive and keep house. The daughter of the clan, Arrietty (Bridgit Mendler), has just turned 14, meaning she’s old enough to start borrowing on her own. But when she’s spotted by Shawn on her first mission with her father (Will Arnett), it begins a series of events that put the small family in great danger. Shawn, desperate for a friend, looks to Arrietty for someone to talk to, much to the chagrin of Arrietty’s parents.

No dubbing of a Ghibli film will ever be equal to subtitled version of the same film (Amy Poehler seems pretty out of place as Arrietty’s histrionic mother), but here the script holds some of the film’s wonkier elements. While Miyazaki and co-writer Keiko Niwa (and translator/English dialog writer Karey Kirkpatrick) do a great job setting up both the world of Shawn and the background of the Clocks, the film’s pacing seems a bit off. While most adaptations of Norton’s original work make it known that the housekeeper character will turn out to be somewhat villainous, here the story turns almost on a dime and simply turns Hara into someone acting crazy just for the sake of having conflict. It creates a sense of disconnect in the film’s second half that’s a little hard to get past, but forgivable in the light of the film’s other strengths.

The Blu-ray looks phenomenal, bringing out every colour perfectly, and the film offers the viewer to watch the film subtitled with the original DTS-HD Japanese Master Audio, which sounds even crisper than the English language dub. There’s also another version of the film in the special features made entirely from storyboards as the English dub plays along that’s pretty neat for completists to follow along with. There’s also a couple of music videos and the original Japanese trailers, teasers, and TV spots included here. (Andrew Parker)

CONTEST: Enter to win a copy of The Secret World of Arrietty on Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack from Dork Shelf and Walt Disney Home Entertainment! (Ends Wednesday 5/23)

The Grey (2012, Joe Carnahan) - If you had told me ten years ago that Liam Neeson would reinvent himself as a late-career action hero, I would have slapped you in the face and called you Mr. Sillypants (or perhaps a slightly more insulting name). Yet, somehow the actor has pulled it off, stepping into Harrison Ford’s shoes as Hollywood’s go-to grumpy aging action star in over his head. The Grey reunites him with writer/director Joe Carnahan after the duo collaborated on a feature film version of The A-Team that was far better than it had any right to be. This time they are stripped of any ties to a campy 80s TV show and create a rough n tumble survivalist thriller. Despite some occasionally misplaced art film aspirations, The Grey is a thrilling R-rated mid-budget genre flick, the kind of movie that isn’t supposed to be made anymore.

Neeson stars as a damaged man (obviously) who works for an isolated Alaskan oil team. His job is to sit with a sniper rifle and kill any carnivorous wild life that threaten the other workers (in other words, he’s a professional bad ass). The whole gang piles onto an airplane to visit their families and it crashes, leaving them stranded in the artic in the middle of a wolf den, who slowly hunt them down one by one. It’s a classic guy movie survivalist set up executed by filmmakers who clearly love the genre. Neeson and his team of miscreants are all fantastic as they get worn down by the elements and bicker over alpha male status.

For Carnahan, it’s yet another rock solid B-movie following up the likes of Narc and Smokin’ Aces. He directs his team of dude’s dudes well and ratchets up suspense expertly, crafting a number of genuine shocks and thrills (including a spectacular POV plane crash and some surprisingly effective CGI wolves). Unfortunately, as the film wears on he becomes a little too enamored with the existential themes of the story, trying to awkwardly transform a solid genre flick into a thinkpiece with mixed results. Still, all of Carnahan’s efforts have been flawed in some way and The Grey is easily one of his most consistent outings. The guy has it in him to create a fantastic John Carpenter-esque B-movie with a brain and has shown enough signs of improvement over his career to suggest that will happen sooner rather than later. Carnahan is definitely a genre filmmaker to watch and hopefully this isn’t the last time he puts Liam Neeson through the ringer.

The Grey’s Blu-ray is unfortunately a mixed bag. The technical specs are fantastic and there’s no better way to see the movie. However, the special features are a little lacking. The featurettes are clearly promotional viral videos barely clocking in at 3-minutes a piece, while the cast and crew interviews are comprised of awkwardly edited B-roll from those viral clips with embarrassing sound-drops. Considering that those slapped together featurettes suggest someone had a collection of interviews and on set footage from the punishing artic shoot, it’s a mystery why a proper making-of documentary wasn’t cut together. The commentary with Carnahan and his editors is also a disappointment, too often turning into a self-congratulatory back slapping-session that takes the film way to seriously (at one point they call The Grey “a thinly veiled art film” and compare it to The King’s Speech) without offering much in the way of production details. Still, even if the special features disappoint, the film doesn’t. If you miss 80s/90s era of R-rated genre movies aimed at teens and regressed adolescents in age brackets that classify them as “adults,” The Grey is a must see. (Phil Brown)

The Woman in Black (2012, James Watkins) – While in no way a reinvention of the haunted house film, The Woman in Black offers genre fans a tightly crafted and loving throwback to Hammer horror films and sly nods to the works of genre veterans Sam Raimi and Wes Craven. Director Watkins and star Daniel Radcliffe work together to make this slight, but atmospheric chiller into something gripping and exciting.

At first, it might be a little surprising to see just how much Radcliffe has grown up in the role of Arthur Kipps. Radcliffe not only plays an adult here, but a young, widowed father of a young boy. Arthur is an early 1900s legal aide forced by his boss into getting back to work by sending him from London to the coastal countryside to go over the paperwork of an estate currently up for sale. Upon his arrival in the village where he intends to stay, the locals do everything in his power to send Arthur away before he even makes it to the secluded former estate of Alice Drablow. Driven by the desire to provide for his son and to keep his currently tenuous job, Arthur presses on and learns the hard way the tragedy that befell the residents of Marsh House.

Watkins uses his eye for detail to cleverly misdirect the audience at every turn, and Radcliffe makes the most of what’s essentially a one man show, including a wonderful extended sequence where there’s no dialogue and he’s the only person in the house. Things do get a bit amped up for the conclusion (which borrows a bit too much from Raimi’s Drag Me to Hell) as it turns into a pretty standard film, but there’s surely a lot to like here.

The Blu-ray has great sound, amplifying the creaks and groans of Marsh House splendidly, but the picture quality doesn’t really bring out the darker tones of the film as nicely as they looked on screen. There’s a couple of small featurettes that don’t do much, and a commentary track from Watkins and screenwriter Jane Goldman, which is pretty mechanical when talking about filmmaking details, but oddly entertaining and candid to listen to. (Andrew Parker)

INTERVIEW: Check out our interview with star Daniel Radcliffe!

This Means War (2012, McG) – Great news everyone (and by great I mean terrible)! One of the most insufferable films thus far in 2012 is now available in an even longer version for added “value.” The woefully botched and amateurish Spy Vs. Spy styled romantic action caper This Means War isn’t helped by any sort of added content despite a stacked Blu-ray. It’s just as terribly acted and pointless as it was back in February.

The asininely named Tuck (Tom Hardy) and FDR (Chris Pine) are two best friend CIA operatives and wetworkers who fall for the same woman, a perky-but-not-exactly-quirky consumer rights advocate named Lauren (Reese Witherspoon) who has been forced into the world of online dating by her married, alcoholic, quirky best friend (Chelsea Handler). Tuck meets Lauren through the dating site and is immediately smitten with her, while FDR meets her by chance in a video store (which I will get back to in a minute) and they have their own “meet cute” flirting session. Lauren doesn’t know that the two men are so close they’re practically brothers/lovers, so she dates the two men concurrently while the animosity between the besties grows to heights that find the men using company resources illegally to spy on and sabotage each other’s dates. Oh, and this all happens while a crazed criminal genius (Til Schweiger) looks for revenge on Tuck for accidentally killing his brother in the film’s opening sequence.

An absolute nadir in the career of the already much derided McG, this film is ugly, incoherent, illogical, and worst of all, lazy to the point where no one on screen seems to care about what’s going on. Witherspoon looks like she just got up from a nap. Hardy seems to be constantly looking around for direction, but at least makes the only effort from the cast. Pine suffers the worst with a performance so bad it nearly erases any good will he’s earned in recent years. Also, please don’t get me started on Chelsea “I only know one joke that I’m going to run into the ground until the day I die” Handler as Lauren’s married friend.

Every sequence is shot like a Honda commercial, with very little inventiveness outside of the occasional production design achievement. The action sequences are edited into incoherence, are relatively bloodless, and hold absolutely no dramatic tension. They are also marred by some of the worst and least convincing CGI outside of an Asylum release, especially in the first of the film’s three(!) endings, which thanks to the wonder of Blu-ray drags out even longer to an unconscionable 107 minutes. (Also in the special features there are 2 MORE alternate endings, serving as further proof that no one here had any clue what they were doing.)

The Blu-ray looks and sound fine, and McG delivers commentary on both the theatrical and extended cuts of the film (with little difference), some deleted scenes and a previz look at an alternate opening. There’s a halfway amusing gag reel that’s funnier than the actual movie, but it’s in no way worth buying just for that. (Andrew Parker)

Red Tails (2012, Anthony Hemmingway) – Corny as an Iowa field and oddly put together, Red Tails feels pretty slapdash despite being one of producer George Lucas’ passion projects. This tale of the formation of the famed all African American fighter pilot squad, The Tuskegee Airmen,  never takes off thanks to some surprisingly cut rate production values, scenery chewing performances (especially from squadron higher-ups played by Cuba Gooding Jr. and Terrance Howard), and a script that’s way too overstuffed with needless subplots.

The film starts in 1944 Italy where American pilots are vastly being outclassed and outmanoeuvred by German pilots with better technology and a better idea of their surroundings. In search of a new tactic that could help win the air war, the US government reluctantly begins using the underutilized squad of all African-American fighter pilots in the 332nd fighter squad. The film follows the exploits of a handful of the soldiers into battle after previously only being used for taking out trains and other forms of transportation.

Aside from the stunning dogfights and the massive attention to period detail (except for an insert wide shot of the Pentagon that was clearly shot in modern day), Red Tails has no structure or discipline whatsoever. This film feels unfinished and almost in unreleasable condition. No scenes actually transition between each other with some bleeding over or fading into the next one without rhyme or reason.

The Blu-ray can’t save all of the film’s problems, but it does come together in a nice package. The picture and sound have improved since the theatrical release, but there’s still quite a bit missing on screen. There is, however a pretty great hour long documentary (narrated by Gooding) that chronicles the history of the squad, as well as some great featurettes that show the effects guys at ILM working their tails off. There’s also talks with Hemmingway, Lucas, composer Terrance Blanchard, and the individual cast members. (Andrew Parker)

“I’m reminded of a recent, very popular movie. And in the spirit of Rambo, let me tell you: we’re gonna win this time.” The year was 1985, the speaker was President Ronald Reagan, the war “we [were] gonna win this time” was the invasion of Cambodia, and the movie was Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985). In 1985, Sylvester Stallone was not simply the biggest movie star in America, (boasting the #2 and #3 box office champions of the year), nor was he simply a symbol of America (as discussed exhaustively here). Long before cinematic catchphrases like “Mission Accomplished!” and “We’re gonna smoke ‘im out of his hole!” were expected – nay, encouraged – from Commanders in Chief, Sylvester Stallone was a small component of American foreign policy!

Click here to view the embedded video.

To interviewers, Stallone often has rued Reagan’s comment for “politicizing” Rambo, professing shock – shock! – that his movie about a war-scarred Vietnam vet who heads back to ‘Nam to retrieve forgotten POW’s would be perceived as political. Rambo: First Blood Part II as a polemic? Bah! You’d needta be some sorta liberal socialist to see politics in such lines as “Sir, do we get to win this time?”

Click here to view the embedded video.

“A lot of people say, ‘Oh, why is Rambo so right-wing?’” said Stallone to Sean Hannity in 2008. “First of all, Rambo is kind of politically agnostic […] Rambo lives in a very neutral environment, but the one thing that he does believe in – and I dunno how you believe in this – at this point in his life he believes that war is natural, peace is an accident. You can start a war in literally five seconds; to make peace takes hundreds of years.” Later in the interview, he went on to explain how he hoped that Rambo (2008) would shed light on the Burmese Civil War, and inspire the international community to intervene. So, in other words, Rambo is apolitical, except when he’s political.

Click here to view the embedded video.

In 2010, during the release of The Expendables, Stallone took an even more disingenuous stance on The O’Reilly Factor. This time, the charges against him were a little more abstract: L.A. Times critic Steven Zeitchik derided the film’s “apple-pie-patriotism” as being symptomatic of a toxic political climate (the helpful caption: “Too Patriotic?”). With tongue firmly in cheek, Bill O’Reilly asked, “Correct me if I’m wrong… this is an action movie, correct? Guys, macho guys like you, killing bad guys. That’s pretty much what it is.” In his best “aw shucks” tone, Stallone agreed. The general tone of the interview skewed heavily towards “There’s no political dimension to The Expendables because there isn’t!” with a side order of “Pauline Kael said Dirty Harry was fascist but it made a lot of money anyway so nyah!” (And, with typical class, O’Reilly felt the need to specify that Kael was “a woman critic”).

Click here to view the embedded video.

It’s during interviews like these when I find myself liking Stallone the least. If you agree with his politics, then Rambo is a symbol for America’s warrior spirit, and a beacon for our underappreciated servicemen. If you disagree, chill the fuck out, man! It’s just a fun movie where things go boom. Yes, Stallone makes action movies, but he also makes political movies, and it’s time for him to man up and start taking responsibility.

Also out in 1985: Rocky IV, which you’ve already seen a million times on TBS so I don’t really need to summarize. For the sake of form: when Soviet superfighter Ivan Drago (America’s sweetheart, Dolph Lundgren) emerges as the world’s most fearsome boxer, Rocky’s ex-opponent/current-trainer Apollo Creed (the immortal Carl Weathers) decides it’s time to punch his Aryan ass back to Russia. Things go about as you’d expect for a long-retired boxer who couldn’t even beat an unknown Philly longshot: Apollo gets beaten to death in the second round.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Now, having already validated his existence in the first two films before reclaiming his caged, vaguely tiger-like fury in the third, the only thing left for Rocky to do is 1) avenge Apollo Creed, and 2) end the Cold War, roughly in that order. So Rocky agrees to fight Drago, but victory won’t come easily. While Rocky retreats to a cabin in the Russian wilderness and trains the old-fashioned way, Drago trains in a laboratory, pumped with electricity and performance-enhancing drugs, more machine than man.  Outrage of outrages, Drago has even been taking steroids. Our man Rocky would never stoop to such tactics. He’s an honest fighter. He’d never… oh, I dunno… be arrested at an airport for smuggling 48 vials of banned human growth hormones into Australia, or anything of that nature.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Rocky IV is obviously a hilarious piece of Cold War ridiculousness, but for all its right-wing excess, I would argue that it has a tiny bit of political nuance. When Apollo challenges Drago to a fight, he barely bothers to train, assuming the Russian will be easily defeated by his inherently superior American fighting technique. When the match rolls around, Apollo enters the ring in full Uncle Sam uniform, joined this time by a lavish production number featuring James Brown singing “Living in America.” That Apollo’s cockiness leads to his bloody death teaches Rocky/America a valuable lesson: there is no such thing as manifest destiny. If Rocky/America is to stand up to the challenge of Drago/Communism (or for that matter, fascism, terrorism, and any other theoretically un-American concept), he/it will to shed itself of his/its American entitlement. He/it will need to work hard – so hard that even the underhanded tactics of Drago/(insert enemy here) will crumble under his/its weight.

Although the movie does end with an entire stadium full of Russkies chanting “Rocky! Rocky!” before our hero literally drapes himself in the American flag. So, y’know, Stallone isn’t Gore Vidal or anything.

Click here to view the embedded video.

As the dark title screen of The Samaritan dissolves into grainy focus, we get a point of view shot of some bruised and battered guy with a gun barrel to his forehead begging for his life, seconds away from getting his brains blown out. The scene sets the stage for a very intimate and gritty film that director David Weaver has attempted to make with The Samaritan, but it’s a shame that this neo-noir’s gloomy tension only leaves us high and dry.

The Samaritan follows the story of ex-tough guy Foley (Samuel L. Jackson) who we see released from a 25 year prison stint for a crime we’re initially given little information about. This is good, as Weaver uses Foley’s ominous allusions to his mistakes only to give us a taste of the bitter and corrupted past that precedes the now reformed Foley.  Although Jackson’s role in the film is essential to The Samaritan, it unfortunately only contributes to the film’s lesser success as a ‘hard boiled’ styled thriller, and instead only adds to it’s larger failure as a film of this genre.

We meet Foley as he lies awake in his decrepit jail cell, haunted by memories of his past. It’s watching Foley’s lonely glide through the prison gates amidst other rehabilitated felons in loving embrace with their family members, solitarily drifting off into the lonely horizon that sets Foley apart from the rest. Weaver hits a nerve here and Jackson’s quiet and mysterious demeanour are well acted- for this portion of the film at least. As Foley visits desolate bars and walks empty downtown streets with steam pluming from every subterranean orifice, Weaver’s handle of the traditional ‘hard boiled’ atmosphere here is formidable. Filmed and set entirely in Toronto, it’s really quite interesting to see our typically shiny and sleek metropolis become a dingy Gotham City of sorts and when the nefarious playboy Ethan (Luke Kirby) comes into the picture, it’s clear that we have our Joker.

At first, Ethan is just as cryptic as Foley’s:  he asks Foley to accompany him to his night club, offering him Cocaine and sex with a cracked out, yet somehow beautiful, prostitute Iris (Ruth Negga). Weaver sets this early part of the story up wonderfully as he recreates the essential allure that most noir’s strive on: the absolute uncertainly that we as spectators have about any character’s motives, and the undeniable desire to sort out the pieces to this often deadly puzzle.

All of this sounds pretty good, right? Well the real problem with The Samaritan begins once Foley starts dating heroin addict Iris, I guess as some kind of homage/ alternate reality to one of the grittiest films of all Taxi Driver. Unlike the more or less single note (and towards the end psychotically obsessive) societal cynicism that Martin Scorsese’s Travis Bickle exudes, Foley transitions from the ‘man with a haunted past’ persona to ‘old guy in awkward relationship with young girl’ disposition. This isn’t something I would typically find detracting from a film, but seeing as The Samaritan starts off in such an abrasive manner (we literally feel like we’re holding a gun to the beaten up dude’s head), it’s unbelievable and just weird watching Jackson make out with someone 40 years his junior.

When Foley is manipulated by Ethan’s disturbing revelation of the true nature of Foley and Iris’ relationship, we see Weaver paying homage to one of the most notorious revenge plot films ever made (without giving too much away, its Korean if that helps) with The Samaritan. But when the film radically shifts gears to become a heist picture of sorts, it becomes increasingly obvious that The Samaritan is a confused film.

Running from May 17th to the 27th the Toronto LGBT Film Festival will feature screenings, filmmaker Q&As, panels, installations at Toronto’s TIFF Bell Lightbox. With more than 200 films being screened at this year’s fest, Inside Out is literally the biggest and most important event of its kind in Canada.

Among this year’s highlights are Cloudburst (which we reviewed in our Canadian Film Fest piece), Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nominee Bullhead, and Hot Docs prize winner Call Me Kuchu. As for the rest of the fest, Dork Shelf film writers Phil Brown, and Brandon Bastaldo have taken a look at some of this year’s other Inside Out offerings. Read their reviews below.

Margarita

Directors: Dominique Cardona, Laurie Colbert

Directed by Dominique Cardona and Laurie Colbert, and written by Colbert and Margaret Webb- it’s fair to say that that Margarita certainly has a ladies touch. We’re introduced to Margarita (Nicola Correia Damude), who is a live in house keeper (and so much more) for an upper middle class family.

Margarita is pretty much the super nanny you would die for: she cooks, she cleans, she even repairs the roof and Damude is well cast as this strong and honourable hard working woman. Although Margarita is light fun, the film often finds itself pushing boundaries. An unofficial Canadian citizen, Margartia is threatened by deportation which as a result raises issues about Margarita’s ability to practice her sexual orientation and because of this Margarita is deals with the tough realities this house keeper/ immigrant/ lesbian extraordinaire unique situation affords.

When the financially affluent, but emotionally devoid, couple who used to employ Margarita are forced to take up house hold duties themselves, they come to find that the biggest chore they have neglected is their teen aged daughter Mali (Maya Ritter), who has relied upon Margarita as role model. Shot in Toronto, Margarita is an easy going, yet conscious expose of a queer immigrant’s perspective. (Brandon Bastaldo)

Screens

Saturday, May 19, 7:15pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2

Kiss Me (Kyss Mig)

Director: Alexandra-Therese Keining

More than anything else, Kiss Me proves that even the simplest idea can work when executed with conviction by a group of talented collaborators. The story is deliberately threadbare, Mia (Ruth Vega Fernandez) visits her father—who she hasn’t seen in years—for his engagement party and announces her own engagement to her 7-year boyfriend/business partner. Then, when Mia is unexpectedly left alone on the island estate with her stepmother to-be and future stepsister Frida (Liv Mjones), a sudden and instant attraction develops between the semi-siblings despite the fact that Mia has never openly expressed that side of her sexuality. Rather quickly, the pair fall in love and Mia realizes that she might have to abandon everything she has built and knows in her life for a new relationship.

Pretty basic torn-lovers stuff with a lesbian twist; however, writer/director Alexandra-Therese Keining takes her time to develop the love story between her two leads naturally and sensually. It’s unabashedly romantic and works thanks to two painfully honest performances as well as Keining’s knack for shooting steamy love scenes without ever slipping into softcore. Sure, Mia’s boyfriend has little to do other than devolve into jealous rage, but in a movie landscape where most token female love interests are irritatingly one-note, it’s at least a change of pace. Keining’s script playfully toys with romance clichés and when the chemistry between the leads of this sort of movie is this strong, it’s hard to go wrong. Given the modest ambitions of the project, Kiss Me also can’t be described as anything less than a success. (Phil Brown)

Screens

Friday, May 25, 9:30pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1

Jobriath A.D.

Director: Kieran Turner

There’s something unexplainable about Kieran Turner’s Jobraith A.D., a docu-bio dedicated to the unsung and tragic praise for Jobriath Salisbury’s glittering genius. Sitting in aged dressing rooms and fore grounded by vanity mirrors, Jobraith A.D. collects the opinions of Los Angeles and New York’s oldest stage performers, family, and friends to tell this peculiar story of a man whose reputation as the gay messiah of the music industry follows 30 years after his death.

Turner delivers a curious surplus of testimony and praise for Jobriath, the first openly gay musician signed to a major record label. But as Jobriath’s sleazy and often incompressible manager Jerry Brandt makes grand claims (saying that Jobriath got more attention than any other artist in the history of the business) the astounding praise for the first true performance artist is at time wacky and Zoolander-esque.

Still, confronted with images and sounds of Salisbury’s raw talent, we cannot deny the flare of this trendsetter whose career stayed in the shadow of glam rock king David Bowie, and suffered because of the sad fact that audiences were not ready to submit to an openly gay man’s charms. Part of Inside Out’s Icon documentary series, Jobriath A.D. is a bedazzled account and celebration of a man whose grand talent and musical genius will leave you haunted. (Brandon Bastaldo)

Screens

Saturday, May 26^th, 4:30pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1