Latin America at #TIFF15. Movies reviewed: Colonia, Desde Allá, The Clan
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
TIFF featured a number of notable South American films this year, so this week, I’m going to look at three of them. Two – an escape drama and a true crime drama — are set in the south, Argentina and Chile, under their rightwing, military dictators in the 70s. And one in the north, a drama set in modern-day Venezuela.
Colonia
Dir: Florian Gallenberger
It’s 1973 in Santiago Chile. Daniel (Daniel Brühl) is a German photographer who was drawn there by the excitement around the newly-elected socialist premier Salvador Allende. He is deeply in love with his girlfriend Lena (Emma Watson: Hermione in the Harry Potter series), a flight attendant for Lufthansa, who touches down regularly in Santiago. But when the government collapses with a CIA-backed military coup, the streets become dangerous. Thousands of people – including Daniel and Lena — are herded into the Santiago Football Stadium. Some are shot on the spot, others taken away in vans.
Lena is safe, but Daniel is horribly tortured, nearly to death, by Pinochet’s forces. Afterwards, he is comforted by a strange man with long gray hair who says Daniel will be safe under his protection.
Lena takes a week off work and tracks him down to an isolated farm in central Chile known as 
Colonia Dignidad, run by a German, fundamentalist Christian cult. Her plan? To pretend to join the sect, unite with Daniel, and quickly escape Chile forever.
But she soon finds herself trapped there. It’s a strange farm surrounded by electrified barbed wire filled with people who have never seen the world outside. Men, women and children are all kept completely separated. Little boys with Hitler-youth haircuts are forced to sing angelic choir songs before the nefarious Paul Schäfer (Michael Nyqvist) – known as “Pius” — who controls everything. The women are supervised by a stern female commandant named Gisele. By day, they pick potatoes like slaves; by night they are locked into their communal barracks. Any woman caught speaking of or even thinking about love or sex is punished at a “men’s council”, a ceremony where men are free to kick and punch accused girls or women. Lena searches for Daniel but he is nowhere to be seen. When she finally spots him, he appears to be feeble-minded from all the torture he endured. Can Lena ever contact him? Will he even recognize her? And can the two of them escape from the hell-hole known as Colonia?
Colonia Dignidad and Paul Schäfer were real. This film is actually a German movie, in English, not a South American one. If you’re looking for a political drama about Chile under Pinochet, you won’t find it here. This is more of an exciting escape drama, a prison break movie, with the politics kept low-key. Chile is the setting, with Pinochet a super villain, but it’s mainly about the notorious German settlement there. Bruhl and Watson are good as the heroes, but best of all is the realistic, slimy cult leader. I watched the whole movie without realizing he was played by Nykvist, the same actor who was the hero of the Swedish Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series!
Desde allá (From Afar)
Dir: Lorenzo Vigas
Armando (Alfredo Castro) is an odd, middle-aged man with a good income who lives alone in downtown Caracas. He has a creepy-looking job: his business is constructing and repairing dentures, inserting false teeth into intricate moulds. Occasionally, he visits his sister to talk about the horrible things their father did to them when they were growing up. What exactly happened is never said.
In his free time Armando has an unusual hobby. He approaches young, working class men on 
the street and offers them money in exchange for sexual favours. But the favours consist merely of Armando asking the guy to face away from him while partially undressed. That’s it.
But things start to change when he picks up an angry young man named Elder (Luis Silva). Elder is a violent, selfish thug whose father is in prison for murder. He’s the kind of guy who would lead his gang to attack his own girlfriend’s brother 
with steel pipes in a pool hall for no apparent reason. Despite this – and the vicious sneer permanently etched on Elder’s face – Armando approaches him on the street and hires him. But in his apartment Elder turns on him, beats him up and steals his wallet and some of his things.
Despite this (or perhaps because of this?) Armando approaches him again, not asking for his things back, but instead offering him even more money. And later — when a rival gang fights back and Elder needs a safe haven – Armando welcomes him back into his apartment. Far from being a sexual predator, Armando shies away from any
and all physical contact with Elder. Instead he behaves like a father-figure, teaching him moral lessons, feeding and clothing him. And the situation changes: now Elder starts feeling attached – perhaps even sexually – to Armando, who coldly turns him away. What is going on? And where will it lead?
Desde Allá is a strange and disturbing film, even more so at the end. Its shocking conclusion will make you rethink the entire movie. The acting of both the main characters is fantastic – and the film won the Golden Lion, the top prize at the Venice Film Festival.
The Clan
Dir: Pablo Trapero
It’s Buenos Aeries in the late 1970s. Alejandro Pucci (Peter Lanzani) is a handsome young rugby player on the Argentinian Pumas. His father (Guillermo Francella) is a successful businessman with ties to the military regime .Alex has it all. He’s a popular student, a national sports hero and owns a surfing store in downtown Buenos Aries. And he is in love with his girlfriend. But when the military government falls they are forced to lie low. His dad is a member of the Argentinian CIA, and partly responsible for the notorious Disappeared, the countless people missing or murdered by the military junta.
But the Puccis depend on these kidnappings to keep up their lifestyle and have turned it into a very profitable business. Most of the family is either involved in or aware of the kidnappings, since the victims are kept inside their home. But can any of them resist their dad’s orders?
This Argentinian drama is based on a true crime story out of Argentina that shocked the nation when it was uncovered. It’s also the most popular Argentinian movie ever. It’s a scary, dark and gruesome story. The movie reveals the downfall of the family in the very first scenes, but for me – never having heard of this case before – I would have preferred if those scenes were left till later. Still, there is such a dramatic scene at the end of the movie that it retains its ability to shock.
Colonia, Desde allá and The Clan all played at TIFF15; keep your eye out for these films. Opening today is Toronto’s Palestine Film Festival — go to tpff.ca for details; also opening is the delightful Grandma, a comedy-drama starring Lily Tomlin as a feminist grandmother on a quest.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Friday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website, culturalmining.com
Daniel Garber talks with Donnie Dumphy and Nik Sexton about their new film How to be Deadly
Donnie Dumphy lives a comfortable life in a remote corner of St John’s, Newfoundland. On Thursdays, he picks up his government cheque and invests in essentials for the weekend: pot and beer. For the rest of the week he survives on breakfast cereal and free coffee creamers. He hangs with his 
buds Jimmers, Tom and the rest of the gang. But his true loves are his longtime girlfriend Brenda and his midget dirt bike… not necessarily in that order. But can Donnie win a dirt bike competition? Or will his arch-rivals Versace and the 
Dirty Daggers beat him at his own game? And will we ever understand a word he says?
You can find out the answers tonight in a new movie called How to be Deadly. It just won Best Feature Film at the Canadian Comedy Awards and is showing in Toronto — for one night only — at the Cineplex Yonge Dundas Theatre at 7 pm.
I spoke to Donnie Dumphy and filmmaker Nik Sexton by telephone in Toronto. They told me how to be delicious and deadly, and shared their views on dirt bikes, wolves, mainlanders, creamers, CODCO, the 1980s, Jon Bon Jovi, Rick Mercer, Rex Murphy, St. John’s Nfld, Tommy Sexton, chastity jeans, youtube, bingo… and more!
Sudden changes. Films reviewed: Mountain, Girls Lost, Demolition, My Big Night. #TIFF15
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
TIFF, the Toronto International Film Festival is winding to a close but there are still many movies left to see this weekend. With the change of times, I’m going to talk about movies sudden changes. Four very good movies. A woman who lives in an Israeli cemetery discovers a change in her surroundings; three teenage Swedish girls who discover they can temporarily change their sex; a Wall Street investment banker who is left dumfounded by a sudden change in his life; and a group of people locked into a TV studio where nothing ever seems to change.
Mountain
Dir: Yaelle Kayam
Zvia (Shani Klein) is an orthodox Jewish woman who lives with her husband and children in a stone house on a hillside. But not just any hillside, it’s the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, the hill that divides east and west. It overlooks the Dome of the Rock, but it’s also a graveyard filled with stone markers. Zvia, who wraps her head in a white- cloth turban, is alone all day when her husband is praying and kids in school. And alone again at night when everyone sleeps. She occasionally talks with the Palestinian grounds keeper, or 
mourners looking for a grave, but otherwise she is all alone, So she ventures out onto the side of the mountain, only to find a different nighttime population. In the bible, the Mount of Olives is where the idolators worshipped the gods Chemosh and Molek. And she looks with wonder and awe at the prostitutes having sex on the gravestones, the drug dealers and homeless lying desolate on tombs. Where she once came to visit a poet’s gravesite, now everything somehow seems defiled. But is she more at home here on the hill or back with her dysfunctional family?
Shani Klein is amazing as Zvia in this dark and troubling first feature. It leaves the viewer with many questions, but little sense of hope.
Girls Lost
Dir: Alexandra-Therese Keening
Sweden, present day. 14-year-old girls Momo, Bella and Kim (Louise Nyvall, Vilgot Ostwald Vesterlund, Tuva Jagell) are best friends, like the three musketeers. Momo has long brown hair, Bella is a redhead with glasses, and Kim has a dark, boyish haircut. They are bullied relentlessly for being non-conformists. Almost everyday they are attacked in the hallways, the playground and in gym class. Big crowds of people shout nasty 
names at them. But they, and their teachers, do little to fight back. Then a odd-looking seed arrives by mail. And when it grows, overnight, into a sticky, black orchid, the girls are intrigued. They decide, as a group, to taste the sap to see what happens. What happens is something big. The three girls, by the light of the moon, become three boys. Though they still have the same coloured hair and eyes, their faces, bodies and voices morph. And the same kids who rejected them as girls welcome them as 
boys.
They turn back into girls in the morning, but with a difference: now they have the confidence to fight back. But for Kim, the change was even more important. As girl-Kim she always feels awkward, but as boy-Kim everything suddenly works. If only he can stay like that forever. But as he asserts his male identity he falls into a troubled relationship with a rebel named Tony, confusing his gender and sexuality even more. Can the three musketeers stay true to one another? Or will the plant and its effects destroy the friendship they once had?
Girls Lost is a very cool look at gender and identity combined with a fantastical body-shift plot.
Demolition
Dir: Jean Marc Vallee
Davis (Jake Gyllenhall) is a rich investment banker who works at his father-in-law’s office (Chris Cooper). But after his wife dies in a car accident (he escapes with barely a scratch) things get strange. He starts compulsively taking things apart — his fridge, bathroom doors at his office — but lacking the compulsion to put things back together. At the same time, little things start to bug him, specifically the fact that the vending machine at the hospital where his wife died, took his money but didn’t drop the candy. So he begins to send 12 page handwritten letters to customer service, pouring out all his troubles and worries. TO his surprise, he gets a response from a real, living person, Karen (Naomi Watts) a single mom with a troubled teenage son (Judah Lewis). They eventually meet, even as his compulsions escalate. Get ready for lots of long scenes of him smashing and demolishing things on an ever bigger scale. Will he ever work through his loss before he destroys everything in his path?
This movie is pretty good, with a few surprises and unusual characters. And lots of breaking glass. The adventures of a rich middle-aged white guy getting to act like a self destructive adolescent with impunity was less palatable. While occasionally irritating, this movie is definitely worth seeing.
My Big Night (Mi Gran Noche)
Dir: Alex de la Iglesia
It’s New Year’s Eve in Madrid and there’s excitement in the air. On stage a chorus line whirls in unison, while the audience, in evening gowns and tuxes, sip champaign with uproarious laughter. Heading soon toward the stage are Spain’s biggest stars: Adanne (Mario Casas) a teen idol dressed like a fireman, and superstar singer Alphonse, (played by superstar singer Raphael). Unfortunately, the champagne is plastic, the 
viewers are all paid extras, and it’s not even New Years, it’s mid October! They’re shooting a glitzy, kitschy TV show. Meanwhile, they’re rioting on the streets outside, the set is collapsing inside, with one audience extra already dead; there are two groupies attempting to steal the idol’s sperm… and a psychotic with a gun 
— and the lover of Yuri (Carlos Areces) the son of the sadistic superstar — is preparing to assassinate the singer. And yet, the new years fun goes on, with love, sex, injury and death happening all around.
This movie is hilarious, with a high level of excitement. If I were Spanish, the pop songs would mean more to me, but… I get it. And director de la Iglesias doesn’t disappoint — there are enough shocks, gross-outs and over-the-top gags to keep you laughing. I loved this goofy, kitschy, slapstick comedy.
Mountain, Girls Lost, Demolition and My Big Night are all playing at TIFF. Go to tiff.net for details. This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Friday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website, culturalmining.com.
Sentimental. Films Reviewed: Summertime, Brooklyn, Room at #TIFF15
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Guys aren’t supposed to like sentimental movies – they’re not tough enough. But a sentimental tear-jerker that’s done right makes for a great movie. This week I’m looking at sentimental films I like that are playing at TIFF — Toronto International Film Festival — right now. There’s a French woman tied to her family farm, an Irish emigree tied to her hometown, and a young mother (involuntarily) tied to her home.
Summertime (La Belle Saison)
Dir: Catherine Corsini
It’s 1972. Delphine (played by rock star Izïa Higelin) is a fresh, young, but naïve farm girl in northern France. She milks cows and bales hay, and hangs out with Antoine, her childhood friend (who has a crush on her). She’s vibrant and full of life. When her secret, long-time female lover dumps her, she packs up and moves to Paris. Right away she witnesses a feminist action: young women running down a street while pinching the bums of all the men
they pass.
She is surprised by what she sees, but likes it. When a man reacts violently, she steps in to fight back. She’s a heroine to the group. She’s found a home, a cause and new friends. Soon enough she’s joining raids on a mental hospital to liberate a young gay man locked up by his family; and participating in a flash-mob action to disrupt an anti-abortion meeting. She loves it 
all – it’s totally different from her life on the family farm. She becomes close friends with one woman in particular: the tall, beautiful and educated Carole (Cécile De France). Carole teaches Spanish and lives with her boyfriend. Delphine is crushed when her advances are rebuffed. Was it all in her mind? Doesn’t Carole loved her…? Soon enough, though, Carole comes around and lets loose. They visit 
Delphine’s farm when her parents are away, for a passionate weekend of splendor in the grass.
Back in Paris they live blissful lives. But when Delphine’s dad has a stroke, she has to rush home or lose the family farm. And Carole follows her there like a puppy, expecting many more rolls in the hay. But the open and uninhibited Delphine of Paris turns into the tense and secretive Delphine of the farm. Can their love prevail under the watchful gaze of a conservative village? Or will they flee, together, back to the city?
Summertime is a wonderful coming-of-age movie about how two women try to extend a season of love. I like this one a lot – it’s sexy, surprising and sad all at once.
Brooklyn
Dir: John Crowley
It’s post-WWII small town Ireland and there are no jobs. Eilis (Saorise Ronan) lives with her widowed mother and sister Rose. She works part time in a general store under a cruel and vindictive boss with no chance of advancement. So her sister talks with a local priest who pulls strings and helps her emigrate to America; Brooklyn to be exact. She lives in a rooming house filled with gossipy young Irishwomen trying to become more American, all under the eagle eye of their opinionated landlady Mrs 
Kehoe (wonderfully played by Julie Walters). Giddiness is the eighth deadly sin! she warns the girls. Eilis works as a clerk in a high-end department store (complete with pneumatic tubes), and takes classes at Brooklyn College at night. Almost everyone in her life is Irish. It’s almost like she never left home. But one night 
at a dance she meets a real live Brooklynite, Tony (Emory Cohen). Sparks fly when he admits he’s not Irish, he’s Italian. Eilis is fine with that. True love blossoms in Brooklyn, and they privately vow to stay together for life. But Eilis is called back to Ireland after a tragic event.
And things there aren’t as bad as she 
remembers. She’s offered work as a bookkeeper, and a rich young man named Jim (Domhnall Gleeson) sets out to woo her. Will she honour her agreement with Tony and return to America? Or stay with Jim in Ireland for good?
On the surface, Brooklyn is a conventional, sentimental look at love, seen through the immigrant experience. Big deal. What makes the movie really good are the dozens of eccentric characters, pithy dialogue (written by Nick Hornby based on Colm Toibin’s novel), the beautiful cinematography, period costumes… the whole deal. And Saorise Ronan who carries the entire film.
Room
Dir: Lenny Abrahamson
Jack (Jacob Tremblay) is a happy five-year-old who lives in a small but comfy room. He has long hair like his mom. He runs, plays, has an imaginary dog, watches TV, reads and talks with his Ma (Brie Larson). This is his world and he likes it, but he’s never been outside of it. You see his mom was abducted as a teenager 7 years ago, and she still lives in the windowless 
cell. The kidnapper uses her sexually once a week – and that’s where Jack came from. He was born in Room. But Ma made a deal. She doesn’t fight off her tormenter and in exchange he’s allowed no contact with her son; during the weekly visits Jack waits quietly in the wardrobe.
What for Ma is a cell, for Jack it’s his entire universe. She told him there is nothing but outer space outside Room. Everything he sees on TV is just for fun – it’s not real. But when their lives drastically change – and Jack sees the outside world for the first time – he is overwhelmed. Can he ever adjust to life outside Room?
Room is not a psychological thriller – though it has thrilling parts – and not a horror movie. It’s a mind-blowing drama about a boy, his mom, kinship, coping and privacy. The screenplay is by Canadian writer Emma Donoghue based on her own novel – and it’s superb. Brie Larsen and Jacob Tremblay (I hate to say it so early, but it’s true) are both Oscar material. Room is another fantastic movie by Irish director Lenny Abrahamson (who brought us Frank last year). Touching, strange and very surprising, I strongly recommend this one. I left the theatre emotionally drained.
Room, Brooklyn, and Summertime are all playing now at TIFF. For tickets and times go to tiff.net. Also look out for CTFF, RIFF and TUFF: Caribbean Tales Film Festival is featuring Queer Caribbean programming this year; RIFF is Real Indie Film Festival, coming in October; and TUFF, Toronto Urban Film Festival, shows one-minute movies in subways across the city.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Friday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website, culturalmining.com
Daniel Garber talks with filmmaker Mina Shum about her documentary Ninth Floor, world premiering at #TIFF15
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
In the 1960s, Canada opened its gates to new Canadians from the British Commonwealth and around the world. And in 1967, the 100th anniversary of Confederation, the world looked to Canada, especially Montreal, home of Expo 67, as the epitome of tolerance, progressiveness and multiculturalism. But just beneath surface trouble brewed. At Sir George Williams University, (now Concordia) a group of Caribbean students complained of racist treatment by a faculty member. Unrest gradually grew into the biggest student uprising in Canadian history. Crowds led to riots and a sit-in at the computer department became a conflagration on the ninth floor.
Ninth Floor is also the name of a new documentary that looks at the 
politics and history of this period through the eyes of the participants. It is directed by Mina Shum, the renowned Vancouver-based filmmaker, famous for her family dramas like Double Happiness and Long Life, Happiness and Prosperity. Ninth Floor, her first documentary, revisits a partly forgotten but vital piece of Canadian history. It’s having its world premier at TIFF. I spoke to Mina Shum, by telephone from Vancouver. She told me about Sir George Williams College, the computer lab, the sit-in, the mob, agents provocateurs, polite racism, housing discrimination, immigration, Montreal in the 1960s, Caribbean students in Canada, the RCMP, how she made the documentary… and more!
Bro Movie Week. Movies reviewed: Before We Go, Meru, The Transporter: Refueled
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Summer is almost over, so this week is Bro Movie Week. There’s an action-thriller about a driver who wants to get from here to there; a documentary about three mountain climbers who want to get from the bottom to the top; and a romantic dramedy about a guy who wants to help a woman he meets to get home.
Before We Go
Dir: Chris Evans
Nick (Chris Evans) is a bearded busker who’s playing his trumpet in Grand Central Station. He’s in NY City for an important audition the next day – the chance of a lifetime to join a famous jazz band. But he’s dogged by memories of a long lost love. Brooke (Alice Eve) is a well-dressed woman in a hurry. She wants to get back to her home in New Haven as fast as she can. And if she doesn’t get there in time… big 
trouble.
The problem is she missed the last train, and is penniless and without any ID. Her purse got snatched in a bar that night. So as the station is closing, Nick goes out on a limb for her, and says he’ll help her get home. At first she’s cold and standoffish but soon realizes he’s her only chance. And so they step out into the scary streets of the city that never sleeps.
Over the course of the night, they find themselves in a dangerous den of thieves, performing on a stage at the wrong wedding, and running into lost 
loves at a party. Will Brook ever tell Nick why she has to get home? Will Nick find closure with his own relationship? And have the two of them forged a new friendship — or possibly a lasting romance — of their own?
Before We Go isn’t terrible, it’s just OK. More meh than anything else. The plot is uninteresting and predictable, and the characters are mediocre. Chris Evans is better known as Captain America so I guess this is his try at directing a movie. Nice try Chris, but try again. I’ve seen Alice Eve in lots of TV shows and movies, but she’s also unremarkable in this one. If you really need to watch a “Night in Manhattan” movie see Martin Scorsese’s After Hours instead.
Meru
Dir: Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi
Renan Ozturk, Jimmy Chin and Conrad Anker are three American mountain climbers. They’re not ordinary hobbyists. These are the guys with weather-beaten faces you see staring sternly at a cloud on the cover of Outside magazine; or dangling from a sheer face of rock in National Geographic. Climbing is their life. Profession, too. They make a living partly from taking the pictures and videotape of the mountains they’re climbing. But their white whale, their unconquerable peak, is a mountain 
called Meru.
Meru is a formidable, bare, sheer peak of rock on a snow-covered mountain in the Himalayas. Its top is known as the Shark’s Fin. In comparison, Mt Everest is a popular tourist spot with plenty of sherpas there to help would-be climbers. Meru – at the source of the river Ganges in northern India – is a do-it-yourself climb. Basically, you carry, on your back 
everything you need to eat, wear or use. You’re on your own. This movie chronicles the two attempts made by these driven climbers to get to the top of the un-climbable Meru.
The photography in this movie is quite spectacular. And some of the incidents caught on film – like an avalanche on a mountain side, or shots of the climbers inside a tent pinned near the top of a peak – is amazing. So if you’re into outdoor or extreme sports, or chronicles of guys who risk their lives climbing mountains just because they’re there, then you’ll love this movie. Otherwise… I think it only has niche appeal.
The Transporter: Refueled
Dir: Camille Delamarre
Frank (Ed Skrein) is a driver in Monte Carlo. He’s known for his unmatched skills in a car. He can get anyone anywhere they want to go, no questions asked. Cops or robbers can’t stop him. So when he’s hired for a large
But there’s more to the story than that. They hire Frank again for another job, and just to make sure he comes through, they kidnap his dad, Frank Senior (Ray Stephenson). And give him a time-release poison to which they hold the only antidote. They want to take down the mob, including Karasov (Serbian actor Radivoje Bukvic). But can Frank’s lightning-fast fighting and driving skills teamed with the vengeance-driven sex-workers defeat the worst gangster-pimps of Monaco?
This is the latest installment in an endless action movie franchise, that 
starred Jason Statham as the Transporter in earlier versions. It’s dumb and ridiculous, and sexist of course, and riddled with logical impossibilities and melodramatic acting. And the dialogue is atrocious: did they take an already bad French script and feed it into Google Translate? Still, I have to say I actually liked it. The chases, the fights, and the shootouts were all good, and Ed Skrein (Game of Thrones) is credible as the new, artfully-scarred driver. It’s a crime action thriller, a B movie (maybe a C movie), but I still enjoyed it.
Transporter: Refueled opened earlier this week and Meru and Before We Go both start today in Toronto and on V.O.D. Check your local listings.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Friday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website, culturalmining.com
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