Where is Canadian cinema going? What is its purpose? And what can we say about how the country is being reflected back at us through this year’s TIFF15 crop of Canadian films?
Essays
Ville-Marie is gorgeously dispassionate ***1/2
Guy Édoin’s Ville-Marie is a visually striking film with a curiously dispassionate core. The film, co-written by Édoin, tells the stories of four individuals whose lives intersect one night at Ville-Marie Hospital in Montreal. A European actress (Monica Belucci) is filming in Montreal to reconnect with her son (Aliocha Schneider), who is trying to finally learn […]
TIFF 15 Review: Mia Madre is a mediocre comedy about a female director
Nanni Moretti’s Mia Madre revolves around a female director who is juggling both director problems and regular life problems, though the film never really hits its stride.
Coming-of-age in Ontario is messy in Sleeping Giant
Andrew Cividino’s assured debut Sleeping Giant — the opening film at this year’s Cannes’ Critics Week — captures the beauty of cottage country Ontario without ever quite transcending the often stilted performances of its non-actors. The film follows Adam (Jackson Martin) who is up north with his family for the summer where he meets two trouble-making […]
TIFF 15: Minotauro has interesting ideas but overstays its welcome
Nicolás Pereda’s Minotauro sees its North American debut in the Wavelengths section at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. This nigh impenetrable avant-garde picture is a narcoleptic journey into the interior lives of three young adults (played by Pereda regulars Gabino Rodríguez, Luisa Pardo and Francisco Barreiro) as they sleep, dream, read, and interact with occasional […]
Pericles, Prince and Tiresome at Stratford
Shakespeare’s Pericles, Prince of Tyre (rebranded by the Stratford Festival as The Adventures of Pericles) is less a play and more a series of scenes strung together. It opens with incest and runs through murder, resurrection, and the threat of sexual slavery before a visitation from the goddess Diana. Remarkably, director Scott Wentworth manages to impose unity on this unruly text by highlighting the theme of feminine virtue that runs through the play.