Bad Hombres. Films reviewed: Silent Night, Deadly Night, Dust Bunny, One Battle After Another
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
It’s easy to root for heroes with clean-scrubbed cheeks and virtuous demeanours, but they make for boring movies. Much more challenging are films where the main characters are anti-heroes, fatally flawed and yet still compelling.
So this week I’m looking at three movies featuring sympathetic portrayals of bad hombres. There’s a murderous Santa Claus, a retired revolutionary, and a monster who lives under your bed.
Silent Night, Deadly Night
Wri/Dir: Mike P. Nelson
It’s Christmastime and like every year Billy Chapman (Rohan Campbell: Halloween Ends) is on the road again. He’s a drifter in his early 20s, picking up work wherever he can find it. He ends up in a small town, and finds work in a store specializing in Christmas ornaments and memorabilia. He forms a crush on Pamela (Ruby Modine), the young woman who runs the store with her dad. But this place is doubly significant because Christmas is crucial to Billy’s self-identity. You see, when he was just a child, he witnessed his parents brutally murdered by a man dressed as Santa Claus. And now he has taken on that role for himself. Dressed in a Santa suit and wielding an axe, Billy kills one person per day, following his advent calendar, until Christmas.
So is Billy a psychopathic serial killer? Well, yes… but, like Santa, he punishes naughty people but lets good ones have a merry Christmas. Everyone he murders is bad… real bad. And how does he know this? A voice in his head tells him who to
kill. But things change when he finds himself falling in love with Pamela. And the feelings seem mutual; they somehow click. (She has Explosive Personality Disorder, sort of like his murder sprees only much less violent). Billy thinks it’s time to settle down, maybe give up all the killing. Can Billy ignore the nagging voice in his head? What will happen if he stops killing bad people? And how will Pamela react if she ever finds out the truth about Billy?
Silent Night, Deadly Night is a classic, slasher-horror Christmas movie about a young killer Santa. It’s ostensibly a remake of an 80s film of the same name (and its sequels) but updated to fit our times. It’s bloody, violent and sometimes disgusting but always in a funny, retro-camp style. I’m talking red & black freeze frames, and old-school soundtrack. And it’s shot in Manitoba, complete with hockey games and lumber yards. Ruby Modine is hilarious as Pamela, and Rohan Campbell manages to make his serial-killer Santa almost sympathetic.
Not your typical Christmas flick but if you’re looking for a funny, gross-out slasher, you can’t go wrong with Silent Night, Deadly Night.
Dust Bunny
Wri/Dir: Bryan Fuller
Aurora (Sophie Sloan) is a little girl who lives in a beautiful, antiquated apartment in an unnamed city. She is brave and resourceful with a wild imagination. Aurora has all the clothes, toys and games any girl could ever want. So why is she always so frightened? Because there’s something scary under her bed that won’t go away. It’s a dangerous monster that lives beneath her parquet floorboards, and she’s convinced he’ll eat you up if you ever step on the floor at night. So she gets around on a wooden hippo with wheels, using her mop as a paddle. Her parents tell her repeatedly that there’s nothing under her bed, just dust bunnies, but Aurora refuses to listen. She ends up sleeping on her outdoor fire escape to keep ahead of the monsters. One night she follows a stranger down a dark ally, where she witnesses him slaughtering a dragon. Here’s someone who can keep her safe from the monster — and he lives in her building! When her parents disappear one night she knows she needs help to stay alive. So she attempts to hire her downstairs neighbour (Mads Mikkelsen: The Promised Land, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Riders of Justice, Another Round, The Hunt) as a hitman, to kill the monster hiding beneath her bed.
Problem is he doesn’t believe in monsters; he thinks someone was sent to get him, and killed her parents by mistake. But in
the end, he agrees to help her. This news gets her boss very angry. Uptight and evil Laverne (Sigourney Weaver) wants Aurora dead, since she witnessed one of his assignments (he’s a professional hired killer). Soon others start appearing at her door including a suspicious guy with a moustache (David Dastmalchian) and a dressed-to-kill social worker (Sheila Atim). Who are all these people really? And will no-one listen to Aurora about the monster under her bed?
Dust Bunny is a whimsical horror movie seen through the eyes of a young girl, balancing crime and the supernatural. The hitman making friends with a little girl harkens back to Luc Besson’s classic The Professional (1992), starring Jean Reno and a very young Natalie Portman). But the look and style of this movie is totally different. This is not noir, it’s horror fantasy. It’s exquisitely detailed with flowers painted on walls, brightly coloured outfits and creaky, steampunk gears in an ancient elevator. Sophie Sloan is great as the spunky Aurora and a good foil for a gruff Mads Mickelson. The other adults are all comical caricatures but still fun to watch. And the special effects are amazing using animation and puppetry to convey what Aurora can see.
Though scary in parts, I think Dust Bunny is suitable both for kids and grown ups.
I like this one.
One Battle After Another
Wri/Dir: Paul Thomas Anderson (Licorice Pizza)
It’s a couple decades ago, somewhere in the American Southwest. An underground revolutionary faction, known as “The French 75”, is carrying out their latest plan: to liberate hundreds of undocumented workers from an ICE-type detention centre. Members of the group have memorized codes and passwords, and only use their nicknames.
Like JunglePussy and Mae West. Perfidia Beverley Hills (Teyana Taylor) is one of the organizers, and her lover Bob aka Rocket Man (Leonardo DiCaprio) is their fireworks expert. Over the course of the action that night, Perfidia, in a power move, forces their chief enemy, a hardboiled military officer named Col Lockjaw (Sean Penn) to have coercive sex with her. This leaves Lockjaw infatuated, and Perfidia pregnant. After the baby is born, Perfidia is captured by Lockjaw, and rats on her allies, in exchange for witness protection. But she manages to escape to Mexico, while Bob and their newborn-baby Willa hide out in a sanctuary city in California.
17 years later, Bob has become a useless pothead whose only responsibility is keeping his daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti) safe. She can never leave their house without carrying a tracking device, just in case the feds discover who Bob really
is: an underground leftist revolutionary. Willa studies martial arts with her sensei (Benecio Del Toro) and has a close-knit group of friends, named Bluto, Bobo, Riri and Autumn. They’re all getting ready for their high school dance. But little does she realize: her Mom, Perfidia — who she always thought was dead — is back in town; Col Lockjaw is planning a massive attack in order to capture his potential biological daughter; and Bob — following the capture of a key member of the French 75 — is called back to duty by the revolutionary group of his youth. What will become of this estranged family, their allies and their enemies?
One Battle after Another is an amazingly complex and satirical action thriller about a tiny cadre of underground revolutionaries and their rivals the CIA, Ice and the military. Add to this an underground railroad that helps threatened migrants; The Christmas Adventurers — a white supremacist elite fraternity courting Lockjaw as a member — and a monastery full of bad-ass nuns with secret connections… and that’s only part of the complex plot of this movie.
It’s inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland, but is set in the present, not the 1970s. Its dialogue is detailed and rich but always tongue in cheek, especially the outlandish names of characters and organizations. It’s also an out-and-out action thriller, with chases and close escapes, gun fights and explosions. Sean Penn acts like someone who has been chopped up and sewn back together, Teyana Taylor is perfection as the double/triple or quadruple agent; this is the first time I’ve ever seen Chase Infiniti, but she’s a powerhouse, and Leo Dicaprio — I’m no fan, but he’s so good in this movie, constantly beaten down but always surviving, like a Die Hard character but on the left. One of his best roles ever.
The film is beautifully shot in valleys and deserts, in a cinematographic style I’ve never seen before, like a camera mounted to the front of cars as they go up and down a hilly highway. Amazing! Soundtrack, costumes, art direction and the huge cast — many unforgettable roles I haven’t even mentioned yet — all so good.
One Battle After Another is an unforgettable movie. I recommend this one.
Dust Bunny and Silent Night Deadly Night both open in Toronto this weekend; And One Battle after another is still playing in some repertory cinemas; check your local listings.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Numerical titles. Films reviewed: Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, One More Shot
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
When you watch hundreds of movies a year, you start to notice certain trends, like avoid movies with numbers in their titles, especially sequels. But it doesn’t always work. Some people say The Godfather 2, Toy Story 3 or Rocky IV, are the best of their series.
So this week I’m looking at a couple more movies with numerical titles. There’s an Aussie who can travel in time using a swig of magic tequila, and an American who can bring automatons to life in a defunct pizzeria.
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2
Dir: Emma Tammi
(Based on the game by Scott Cawthon)
It’s some time in the not-so-distant past, somewhere in Middle America. Mike (Josh Hutcherson) is a guy in his twenties who takes care of his 11-year-old sister Abby (Piper Rubio). Abby is lonely because no one at school believes the stories she tells. Mike is a lonely former security guard. He used to work in the ruins of former family restaurant Frank Fazbear’s Pizza. In its heyday, the place was wildly popular with children because of its giant, grinning animal-puppets who performed mechanically on a small stage. But the chain was shuttered for good 20 years ago when the animatronics went rogue and killed some kids. Then, one year ago, Mike and Abby barely escaped with their lives when the animals came back to life. Now, if Mike never sees another animatronic monster in his life, it will be too soon. But Abby holds a special affection for them; she considers them her only real friends. They talk to her, understand her problems and look out for her. And it’s hard to get away from them in this town, since everybody knows about them: there’s a festival devoted to Freddy Fazbear and a robotics contest both just around the corner. Meanwhile, Mike is flirting with Vanessa (Elizabeth Lail), a former cop who helped save Mike and Abby in last year’s bloodbath. She also happens to be the daughter of a deranged megalomaniacal 
serial killer who built the original automatons, and who was personally responsible for the hideous crimes they committed. And it goes without saying that Vanessa hates her psychotic father.
But despite all their precautions, Abby is hellbent on returning to the the crumbling restaurant, and in the mayhem that follows , the creatures are set loose to seek vengeance on their perceived enemies in the town. Can Mike, Abby and Vanessa fight them off and save the city? Or will the robots win out in the end?
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 is the sequel to last years hit movie based on a video game by the same name, about an evil Chucky Cheese-style restaurant. It has some cool special effects, a few scary moments, especially involving a spooky villain known as the marionette. And I love the old 90s computers and the restaurant-gone-to-ruins motif. The main actors reprising their roles are all good. The problem with this movie is its meandering pointlessness, just a series of random episodes that have virtually no affect on what follows or precedes it. So an important character might be brutally murdered by animatronic creatures in one scene, and then 
they drop out of the movie and are never referred to again.
This happens over and over, which makes you wonder is their any coherence or point to this movie, other than chase scenes, brutal killings and jump scares? I went to a screening packed with fans dressed in cos-play cheering and shouting whenever a familiar character from the game appeared on the screen. They seemed to like it. But for the average viewer, like you or me, who’s never played the game, Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 is just another schlocky knock-off.
One More Shot
Dir: Nicholas Clifford
It’s New Year’s Eve, 1999, in Melbourne, Australia. Minnie (Emily Browning) is invited to a costume party to usher in the new millennium. She’s a doctor in her thirties, single and attractive. Many of her friends — and ex-lovers — will be at that party. She even has the words “party time” tattooed on her skin. But for some reason, she’s not in a partying mood. Her past relationships all went sour, and she’s been alone, and celibate, for far too long. At least her go-to sex buddy Joe (Sean Keenan) is back in town, so at the very least she’ll get some (Joe sports a matching tattoo which bonds them as sex partners forever.)
But when she arrives at the party, everything seems to go wrong. Joe has a new lover — an American bartender or “mixologist” as she calls herself (Aisha Dee) — and it looks serious. The hosts, Rodney and Pia (Ashley Zukerman, Pallavi Sharda) have a beautiful house and young kid, but they seem somehow at odds all the time; Flick and Max (Anna McGahan, Contessa Treffone), whose apartment she’s sharing want to 
kick her out; and the only stranger at the party is a douchey OB-GYN (Hamish Michael) who is also a coke-head. And at midnight, everyone anticipates a computer crash due to the Y2K. Can things possibly get worse?
Oh yes they can. Minnie keeps messing everything up, and alienating all her friends just for a chance to get laid. But then she discovers she has the solution: the ancient bottle of Tequila she’s brought to the gathering. For some reason, each gulp brings her back again to the first time she tried it, right at the door to the party. Can she right all her wrongs and erase all her mistakes before the bottle is empty? Or will she just end up as a drooling hot mess on someone else’s couch?
One More Shot is a very light social comedy about Australian millennials at play. It’s a cute, somewhat funny riff on the Groundhog Day theme. Which makes it more than a little 
repetitive. The cast is attractive and mildly clever, though I couldn’t really sympathize with any of them. But I do like time- travel comedies however they happen, and this version is pretty original. Kept me interested till the end.
While clearly no masterpiece, I enjoyed watching this one.
5 Nights at Freddy’s 2 opens this weekend in Toronto; check your local listings. One More Shot is now available on VOD.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Daniel Garber talks with Tasha Hubbard about Meadowlarks
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
At a hotel in Banff, Alberta, four virtual strangers are meeting there for the first time to get to know one another. They each had different upbringings in different cities and even countries. Who are these adult strangers and what do they have in common? They’re all brothers and sisters separated by the Sixties Scoop.
Meadowlarks is a new drama about survivors of the Sixties Scoop trying to reclaim their families, identities and themselves. It’s a powerful and heart-wrenching film that looks at trust, history and kinship. I saw Meadowlarks at TIFF earlier this year and it blew me away. Based on a true story, 
it’s the work of award-winning documentary filmmaker Tasha Hubbard, known for her powerful docs featuring indigenous subjects. Meadowlarks is her first narrative feature. I last interviewed Tasha in 2019 on this show about Nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up which won the Best Canadian Feature at Hotdocs.
I spoke with Tasha from Toronto, via ZOOM.
Meadowlarks opens theatrically in Canada on November 28, 2025.
Award season. Films reviewed: The Secret Agent, Eternity, Hamnet
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
One of the nice things about Toronto is the huge variety of people, music sports and culture. Imagine what mash ups they can generate! I just saw a show called Opera Mania, which combined actual singers from Opera Revue and genuine tag-team pro wrestlers! We were literally in ringside seats, arms-length from fighters body-slamming to the romance of Carmen’s Toreador and opera singers bouncing off the ropes while warbling flawless arias! All on a real-live wrestling ring. Never in my life…
This week, I’m looking at three new movies that played at TIFF this year and are finally being released theatrically. There’s an action thriller set in 1970s Brazil, an historical drama in Elizabethan England, and a rom-com set somewhere this side of heaven.
The Secret Agent
Wri/Dir: Kleber Mendonça Filho
It’s the 1970s in Brazil. Marcelo (Wagner Moura) is a bearded, bushy-haired prof heading north from Sao Paolo — where he’s lived for many years — to Recife. He’s trying to keep a step ahead of the authoritarian government’s agents and to make sure his son is being safely taken care of. What he doesn’t realize is a pair of ruthless hitmen have been hired to rub him out. He shows up at Dona Sebastiana’s home, which she has transformed into a safe haven. It’s a place where political activists (like Marcelo), dissidents, leftists, refugees from Portuguese speaking Angola, gay men, and other persecuted individuals can find a safe place to hide. Because of the importance of secrecy, they only use code names. And everyone is a bit wary of strangers. Marcelo changes both his name and his look, from hippy to clean cut, with an official-looking moustache, and lands a job at the highly corrupt local police force. They take a liking to him and place him in plain view at the station. He uses his job to look for his late mother’s missing papers, to clear up a long-held mystery. He also gets to see his son, who is staying with his late wife’s dad who runs a movie theatre. Can Marcelo 
secure his son’s safety, discover his family history, and keep his identity a secret from the two men who want him dead?
The Secret Agent a taut action thriller set in 1970s Brazil, before the fall of the military dictatorship. Always exciting and fast-moving with a complex plot, it’s full of disguises, bugging, lurid newspaper headlines, chase scenes and shootouts. Lots of blood. The plot is revealed both through flashbacks and flash forwards — strange scenes where unexplained present-day researchers are looking through old files to find out what really happened in this case. Wagner Moura is a total movie star, who switches identity more times than you realize over the course of the film. Now, I can’t help comparing this to last year’s stunning Brazilian drama I’m Still Here, also set during the dictatorship, but they are very different movies. This one is mainly there for the entertainment, sort of an I’m Still Here-lite.
But this is not a complaint — I loved this movie.
Eternity
Co-Wri/Dir: David Freyne (Review: Dating Amber)
Larry and Joan (Miles Teller, Elizabeth Olsen) are a happily married elderly couple, heading to a grandchild’s birthday party. Sure, they argue all the time, but that’s because they know each other so well. And they have to deal with Joan’s cancer.. But when Larry chokes to death on a pretzel at the party, he suddenly finds himself in a strange new world. It’s like Grand Central Station, with trains departing every few minutes. Is he in Heaven? No, it’s a way-station called The Junction, where you choose where to spend eternity. And to help with that decision, there’s a huge convention space with hundreds of booths, each catering to specific tastes. Maybe you like museums, or the great outdoors, or lying on a beach. Or maybe you want to spend eternity as a tourist in 1960s Paris, where everyone speaks English but with a heavy French accent. There’s something for everyone, and you have a week to decide. But Larry wants to wait for Joan, so they can choose a place together. Anna (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) is his AC (afterlife coordinator) who is supposed to help him on his way, but doesn’t approve of him sticking around. Luckily he finds a sympathetic ear in Luke, a handsome young bartender (Callum Turner) to whom he pours out all his troubles.
He finally consents to leave the Junction, when… he sees Joan just arriving! She’s young and beautiful, in her early 20s (Larry is in the body of his 35-year-old self; when you die you revert to your favourite age.) Now that all his troubles are solved, he’s ready to leave with Joan. But not so fast! Joan was married before she met Larry and her husband died in the Korean War. And it just happens that her late first husband is none other than Luke, the Bartender. He’s been waiting for 
Joan in the junction for 60 years. Will Joan choose to spend eternity with Larry, her long time partner? Or with her first true love?
Eternity is a fantasy/ romantic comedy with an unusual view of the afterlife. It’s a “high concept” movie with a simple question: should you choose a lifelong partner, or a passionate lover? And there are some fun parts: I liked the cheesy convention centre, the commuter train motif, and the Archives they visit (no spoiler). But they don’t do much with it; it devolves into a very basic rom-com, barely exploring the potentially fun aspects of the story. A former teen idol, Miles Teller plays his role as a grumpy old man trapped in a younger man’s body, but he does it in a most unappealing way. Callum Turner as Luke is also uninspiring, and while Elizabeth Olson is better as their object of interest, there’s still not much to go on. Da’Vine Joy Randolph and John Early provide much-needed comic relief as the ACs, but you can’t rescue a ship that already sank.
I wouldn’t want to spend eternity with any of them.
Hamnet
Co-Wri/Dir: Chloe Zhao
(Reviews: Songs My Brother Taught Me, Nomadland)
It’s England in the late 16th century. Will (Paul Mescal) is a part-time tutor expected to follow in his family business as a glover. But his Dad is nasty and cruel, so he wants to get as far away from him as he can. One day he meets a young woman named Agnes (Jessie Buckley), like no one he’s ever met before. She’s a witch and a healer who knows how to make poultices and tinctures, and carries a trained falcon on her arm. She knows all the secrets of the forest, including the sacred caves and ancient trees, passed on to her for generations. She is suspicious of Will’s worth, but eventually he proves his love, they marry and have children. Although he spends much of his time in the city, when he’s home he loves playing with the twins, especially his son Hamnet whom he teaches how to defend himself with a wooden sword. So Will and Agnes are crushed when Hamnet succumbs to the plague while Will is away writing. 
How will they deal with the death of their young son?
Hamnet is a lovely, rich and extremely moving film about William Shakespeare, his wife and the death of their son. It’s based on the novel by Maggie O’Farrell. It starts as a slow-moving historical romance, with lots and lots of details about daily life in Elizabethan England. You almost think — what’s the point of this movie? But then it turns into an amazing, emotional story, culminating in a no-holds- barred performance of Hamlet, which Will wrote about their son. (Noah Jupe, the actor who plays Hamlet in the play-in-the-movie is the real life brother of Jacobi Jupe, who plays Hamnet). Paul Mescal is appropriately restrained as Will, but Jesse Buckley holds nothing back, she puts her heart and soul into this role. If you’re not gushing tears by the end of this movie, I don’t know what to say.
Hamnet is a must-see.
Secret Agent, Eternity, and Hamnet are all playing right now in Toronto; check your local listings.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Daniel Garber talks with Zacharias Kunuk about The Wrong Husband at #TIFF50
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Photos by Jeff Harris.
It’s 400 years ago in the north. Kaujak and Sapa have known one another since they were babies and they were promised to one another. But when kaujak’s father dies suddenly — at the sometime as a stranger, Sapa leaves for a hunting trip. While he is gone, a man with no wife who is a figure of fun, arrives by Kayak. He takes her and her daughter Kajuak away. In the new area people are not kind and life is bad. But Kaujak continues to fight back. And always lurking in the background is a terrible beast, a giant troll who takes people away.
Will the proposed young couple ever see each each there again? Or will Kaujak be forced to marry the wrong husband?
The Wrong Husband is a new film from Nunavut that interprets ancient stories and the oral tradition with traditional ways of life. It combines the supernatural; with religion to make a moving emotional Romeo and Juliet story. The story is told in Inuktitut with an Indigenous cast. The film is directed and co-written by award-winning Inuit director Zacharias Kunuk. His feature Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner 
won the Camera d’Or at Cannes and countless Canadian prizes, and was a critical and commercial success. Other notable films include The Journals of Knud Rasmussen and Maliglutit or Searchers. The Wrong Husband had its Canadian Premier at the Toronto International Film Festival.
I spoke with Zacharias Kunuk on site during TIFF50 at the Royal York Hotel.
The Wrong Husband is opening in Canada on Nov 28, 2025.
Winner: Best Canadian Feature Film Award, TIFF ’25.
It’s all lies! Films reviewed: Jay Kelly, Zodiac Killer Project, Wicked: For Good
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
This week, I’m looking at three new movies, about people who lie. There’s a movie star who smiles for the cameras, onscreen and off; two witches and a wizard who hides behind his curtain, and a filmmaker who looks at what lies behind True Crime documentaries.
Jay Kelly
Co-Wri/Dir: Noah Baumbach
Jay Kelly (George Clooney) a major Hollywood star known for his action movies, is wrapping up the last scene of his latest film. He gets a few days off before starting his next feature after attending a tribute to him in Tuscany, as his friend and manager, Ron (Adam Sandler) keeps reminding him. But then a series of unfortunate events begins to occur. Ron tells him that Peter (Jim Broadbent) a noted director who launched Jay’s career when he was just an acting student — has died. And his younger daughter says she’s heading off to backpack and ride the rails in Europe before starting University in the fall… meaning his nest will be empty from now on. So when he runs into Tim (Billy Crudup) at Peter’s funeral — a blast from the past who he hasn’t seen in decades — he decides to join him for a drink at one of their old LA haunts. Tim was a method actor, someone so good he could read a menu aloud in a way that will make you cry. But their drinks turn to fisticuffs when Tim blames Jay for stealing his first role, sleeping with his girlfriend and generally ruining his life. Jay leaves the reunion with a black eye and Tim with a broken nose and a smouldering grudge.
So Jay decides on a change of plans: he’ll fly to Europe and surprise his daughter in Paris for some spontaneous fun. But nothing can be spontaneous for an A-list movie star. Jay flies there in his private jet, with a huge entourage, including his manager, hair stylist, PA, bodyguard and publicist (Laura Dern). But aside from his adoring fans, he can’t seem to make friends, spend time with his family, or do anything of lasting value. What’s a lonely, rich-and-famous guy to do?
Jay Kelly is a sardonic look at the hollowness of a Hollywood movie star’s life. Jay Kelly seems to be modelled on George
Clooney’s own career; they even show clips from Clooney’s past films at Jay Kelly’s tribute, thus blurring the line between reality and fiction. Jay Kelly is always flashing his pearly whites, but seems to have no actual feelings, just poses — that his director, or his publicist tells him to do. The movie’s not bad, but it’s hard to have deep feelings about someone so fake, a character that only finds his true self on the silver screen. It’s like he’s always acting. The biggest surprise is Adam Sandler in a serious role, without any bombastic elements. He’s actually good!
Jay Kelly is a cute light story, with a dark undertone. While not fantastic, it’s still worth watching.
Zodiac Killer Project
Dir: Charlie Shackleton
Charlie Shackleton is a documentary filmmaker from the UK who is obsessed with the case of the Zodiac Killer. He was a notorious serial killer who murdered any number of victims in the 1960s around the SF Bay Area, but was never caught. Part of his mystique was the many killings later attributed to him, and the series of cryptic letters sent to his victims and fans. Charlie wants to make a documentary based on a book by a policeman who actually encountered the killer… but negotiations with the authors of the book falls through, thus killing any chance of making the Zodiac Killer doc. Instead he decides to make a doc about how he would have made the doc he can’t make.
So the movie ends up being a spoken word-essay — Charlie’s words throughout — as he walks us through what he would have shot, scene by scene: a road stop outside of San Francisco; an urban street corner in Vallejo; a modernistic suburban church. Mundane images all, but always accompanied by clanky music and his eerie descriptions of what eyewitnesses saw in their search for the Zodiac Killer. Added to this are short clips and commentary of other True Crime docs, including films like Joe Berlinger and Bruce 
Sinofsky’s Paradise Lost trilogy, about the three teenagers falsely accused of ritual child murder in West Memphis, Arkansas.
(Which is a great series, btw). But what Charlie points out is, many True Crime directors manipulate viewers using music, camera work and edited interviews to put the suspicion on someone the filmmakers want to blame, but who may or may not be responsible for the crime. And he calls into question the myth of the documentary director as an impartial observer rather than a biased manipulator of the truth.
Zodiac Killer Project is not a normal movie, by any stretch of the imagination (though it is pretty funny) It’s a filmmaker’s monologue on (what I think is) a very interesting topic, that is the deception and self-righteousness behind an entire genre — True Crime; accompanied by extended film images of, frankly, mundane locations. If you’re a cineaste, a movie buff, or a true crime fan, I think you’ll like this one; I do. But if you go expecting the bread-and-butter of True Crime media, the titillating images, the exploitational gross-outs, or self righteous harrumphing about the killer’s innate barbarism, you ain’t gonna find it here.
Wicked: for Good
Dir: Jon M. Chu
It’s another day in the Land of Oz, but things have changed over the past few years. Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) has been in hiding ever since a massive government propaganda campaign has labeled her the “Wicked Witch of the West”. Her former best friend Glinda (Ariana Grande) is a figurehead who appears before the public in a mechanical bubble. She has no real magic but her job is to keep the peasants calm. She publicly professes her love for handsome Prince Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey) a captain in the army, but he pines only for the green-faced Elphaba. And Elphaba’s little sister Nessarose (Marissa Bode) is now an autocratic Governor, passing vindictive laws. But Nessa, too, suffers from setbacks: her long-time companion, the Munchkin Buck (Ethan Slater) has had enough of her (he’s secretly in love with Glinda.) And under the under the direction of the two scheming bullies with the only real power in this world — the Wizard of Oz (Jeff Goldblum) and Madame (Michelle Yeoh) — Oz is passing ever more draconian laws, including the stripping of all rights from animals, who once lived and worked side by side with 
humans. Will Elphaba and Glinda ever be friends again? Can they stop the Wizard’s nefarious plans? And who will Prince Fiyero choose to marry?
Wicked: for Good is part two of the film adaptation of the hit Broadway musical. It’s an intriguingly revisionist version of the original Wizard of Oz story. Dorothy and the cowardly Lion appear but only as insipid background characters, The Wizard of Oz is a bad guy, and the Wicked Witch of the West a potential heroine. It’s 2 1/2 hours long but never boring, including three new songs by Stephen Schwartz that weren’t in the original play. Now, personally, I’m not a fan of that genre of music, but Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande’s voices are a pleasure to listen to. It’s visually dead-on, from the artificial, candy-coloured palate of the Emerald City, to cute and rustic Munchkinland. And I love the Art Deco, steam-punk machinery everywhere. It’s exquisite. Great production values all around: sets, costumes, elaborate dance numbers, and, of course, the flying monkeys.
It does feel like the second part of a two-act play — following a year-long intermission — and it is a much darker ride than last year’s Wicked — but I still enjoyed it.
Jay Kelly, Wicked for good and Zodiac Killer Project are all playing now in Toronto; check your local listings.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Daniel Garber talks with Brishkay Ahmed about In the Room
It’s August, 2021 in Kabul Afghanistan. The Taliban is at the city gates and large crowds are congregating at the airport. Some manage to get out, but the women who remain face unheard of restrictions imposed by the Taliban. Restrictions in dress, education, work and general daily life: there’s no school after grade 6, women barred from universities, government work and from most professions, along with freedom of speech, expression, and even congregating in 
public… leaving some women virtually locked away in their rooms.
In the Room is a new NFB documentary about a group of dynamic ex-pat Afghan women who don’t fit neatly into their stereotypes. We meet a model, a TV news chief, an influencer and an actor and activist, in this unusual doc. The film is by noted Canadian documentarian Brishkay Ahmed whose work has frequently taken her back to the country of her birth. She’s known for her films In the Rumbling Belly of Motherland, Story of Burqa. The film won the Audience Award Showcase at its premiere at VIFF in Vancouver and played at the Reelworld film festival Toronto.
I spoke with Brishkay in Vancouver via Zoom.
Beginning on Tuesday, November 25, the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) will release In The Room for free streaming across the country on nfb.ca and the NFB app.
Dysfunctional Dystopia? Films reviewed: Sentimental Value, The Running Man, Left-Handed Girl
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Still more Fall film festivals coming at you in Toronto, with the EU film fest — free films from each country of the European Union, plus Ukraine — and Ekran, the Polish Film Festival. So much to see, but look out for Agnieszaka Holland’s biopic of Franz Kafka (called Franz) at Ekran.
But this week, I’m looking at three great new movies, one action and two dramas. There’s an estranged family in Oslo; a fugitive on the run in a dystopian America, and a dysfunctional family in Taipei, Taiwan.
Sentimental Value
Co-Wri/Dir: Joachim Trier
Nora Borg (Renate Reinsve) is a successful stage actress who lives in a grand old house in Oslo. It’s been in her family for generations: it’s where her grandmother killed herself, and where she grew up with her sister Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) and their mom. Their dad, Gustav, (Stellan Skarsgård) disappeared after their divorce when she was still young, and they haven’t heard much from him in decades. Until now. Their mom just died and she and her sister have to deal with the house and go through all their family’s possessions (that’s the “sentimental value” of the title). And dad owns part of the house, too. But he has a second reason for showing up.
He wants to make a movie there, to use the house as his set. He’s a famous film director, but not in his prime anymore; he hasn’t shot a movie in decades. And he wants Nora in the main role of what is likely his swan song. You’re the only one who can do it, he says, just read the script! Nora refuses; bad blood runs deep. So, partly to get the funding he needs to make the picture, Gustav casts a Hollywood actress to play the role that Nora turned down. Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning) is a big name, and she’s also a fan of Gustav’s work. What will happen to the house? Will Gustav make his film? And will they ever be on speaking terms again?
Sentimental Value is dramatic comedy about a Norwegian family. It’s full of clever asides and wide-ranging topics, but with a solid core at its centre. What makes Trier such a good director (The Worst Person in the World, Thelma, Oslo August 31st) is he creates believable characters in tough situations but without losing his sense of humour. He constantly plays around with his audience as to what is real and what is 
artifice: we see Nora having a deep, emotional breakdown and then discover she’s acting a role on a stage set. He also uses biting satire to get his points across, skewering the superficiality of both Hollywood and bourgeois Norwegian society. He also repeatedly casts from a company of actors in his films. Elle Fanning and Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård are new, but Renate Reinsve and Anders Danielsen Lie are familiar faces if you’ve ever seen Trier’s movies (and if you haven’t, you should).
Sentimental Value is moving, funny and full of good stuff to think about. I really liked this one.
The Running Man
Co-Wri/Dir: Edgar Wright
Based on a story by Steven King
It’s some point in the not-so-distant future in a dystopian America. A few rich people live luxurious lives, but the majority eke out a precarious existence within the endless sprawl of urban slums. They’re constantly surveilled by cameras, drones and DNA detectors while a brutal paramilitary police force patrols the streets. What keeps the people satisfied? Watching the reality shows and game shows broadcast from a single, big-brother-like monopoly network which controls the government, big business and media.
Ben Richards (Glen Powell) is a skilled labourer and union rep. He also has a volatile temper. He points out dangerous problems on the shop floor, which in this world gets you fired. So he’s out of work, his wife depends on tips in a hostess bar, and their 5 year old daughter is dying of an ordinary flu because they can’t afford basic medicine. What to do? There’s only one choice left: compete on THE RUNNING MAN, a reality show where all contestants try to survive for 30 days being hunted by a gang of professional killers. The winner gets a huge cash prize. And the losers pay with their lives. Luckily, the show’s producer, Dan Killian (Josh Brolin) takes a liking to Ben Richards — he’s smart, strong and most of all, angry! And the audience starts to like him… and his messages of rebellion. Can Ben outsmart the powers that be and survive? Or will the Network crush him, like they did with every Runner before him?
The Running Man is a non-stop action movie, with good 
acting and an interesting plot. It’s set in the future, but done in a 1980s style, with zines, nerds and gadgets over spacemen and phasers. There are chase scenes using planes, trains and automobiles, and fiery explosions that level a city block. Glen Powell is wonderful in the lead role, appealing and heroic, painted like a Luigi Mangione fighting the corporate super-villain played by a slimy Josh Brolin. Director Edgar Wright — who brought us Toronto’s greatest Scott Pilgrim vs the Universe — keeps it funny and nerdy; he even casts Michael Cera as a nerdy revolutionary.
The Running Man is a lot of fun to watch.
Left-Handed Girl
Co-Wri/Dir: Shih-Ching Tsou
It’s Taipei’s night market, and a small family is moving into a tiny apartment nearby: I-Jing (Nina Ye) a little girl with a wild imagination, I-Ann (Shih-Yuan Ma) a diffident teenager with a chip on her shoulder, and their hardworking mom (Janel Tsai). She’s opening up a noodle stall to pay their basic rent cheque. Dad is nowhere to be seen; he ran off years ago, leaving the family high and dry. I-Jing quickly adjusts to her new kindergarten class and life in the constantly-moving marketplace. She even helps Johnny (Brando Huang) — a huckster with a heart of gold who sells carnival junk to unsuspecting shoppers — by making announcements on his loudspeaker. Mom is constantly busy, cooking and cleaning her stall, but can’t seem to earn a living. She also takes time to visit her ex-husband, now dying of cancer in hospital. Sadly he leaves his 
abandoned family nothing but funeral debts and a pet meerkat. And I-Ann — who was once top of her class until she suddenly dropped out — works as a scantily-clad “betel nut beauty” selling smokes and the addictive chewing treat from her boyfriend’s shop.
But things get tense when the kids’ Mom is forced to visit their grandparents to ask for some money to tide them over. Mom’s brother is the golden boy who can do no wrong, and her two sisters both live in nice houses and are unsympathetic about her economic condition. And worst of all is grandpa, who scolds i-Jing for being left handed. He tells her left hand belongs to the devil (which she interprets as having an evil hand over which she has no control.) Now grandma is smuggling migrants through airports, mom faves eviction from the market, I-Ann missed her last period, and tiny I-Jing is turning into an avid shoplifter, using her “devil’s hand” to do the dirty work. Can this dysfunctional family ever pull itself back together?
Left-Handed Girl is a social drama about a family of women living on the brink. It’s tender, shocking and hilarious. It’s full of fast, clang-y music, flashy lights and hyper-saturated colour. It’s specifically Taiwanese in details (from bubble tea to class snobbery) but universal in its emotional appeal. And it’s co-written and edited by Sean Baker (Tangerine, The Florida Project, Red Rocket, Anora), who swept the Oscars last year with Anora. The characters speak Chinese but it’s clearly a Sean Baker movie, full of imperfect women in precarious times. And its Taiwanese-American director Shih-Ching Tsou worked on all of Baker’s films, so this is part of a long term partnership, with her taking the helm. And it’s Taiwan’s selection for best international Oscar.
I loved Left-Handed Girl, too.
Sentimental Value — opening this weekend — and Left-Handed Girl — next weekend — both played at TIFF. And The Running Man is now playing across Canada; check your local listings.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Parts of history. Films reviewed: Fanon, Train Dreams, Christy
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Toronto’s Fall Film Festival season continue with two series on right now. Reelasian features films from Asia and its diaspora, including two great ones from Canada: Min Sook Lee’s heart-wrenching doc There are No Words, and Koala Kid’s whimsical, animated Space Cadet. Cinefranco has movies in French from Europe, Africa, and Quebec, including many Toronto premieres: look out for la Venue de l’Avenir by Cedric Klapisch (Ma Part du Gateau), and le Dernier Souffle by the legendary Costa-Gavras.
But this week, I’m looking at three new films set in historical eras. There’s a lumberjack at the turn of the previous century, a psychiatrist in Algeria in the 1950s, and a female boxer from West Virginia in the 1990s.
Fanon
Co-Wri/Dir: Jean-Claude Flamand-Barny
It’s the early 1950s in Algeria. Frantz Fanon (Alexandre Bouyer) is a renowned psychiatrist from the French Island of Martinique. He is starting his new job at a mental hospital. But he’s shocked at how Algerian patients are treated there. In contrast to Europeans, the “savage” north Africans are kept shackled in filthy cells, because of their “barbarous and dangerous” nature. Fanon (who is black) insists his North African patients be treated like any others. He lets them walk in the garden, plant vegetables, play soccer and make friends. Their mental health quickly improves. He’s assisted by diverse Algerian interns and staff: Hocine (Mehdi Senoussi) Jacques (Arthur Dupont) and Alice (Salomé Partouche), all followers of his techniques. But he’s strongly opposed by traditionalists and the French military, who are increasingly violent in their tactics. (Algeria was annexed by France but most of the locals are not considered full citizens.) He and his wife Josie (Déborah François) are upper-middle-class French citizens playing their role supporting the sprawling Empire. Fanon fought the Nazis in WWII. He likes Sartre, elegant suits and and fine wine. But his views are changing. He now writes 
books (dictated to his wife) about the effect of colonization on the mental health of the colonized in Algeria. Their own self-image is denigrated by their oppressors, he writes, when they internally accept their status as “the other”. Word gets out and he’s invited to join the FLN, (considered terrorists by the French). But the threat of violence reaches his hospital, as personified by Sergeant Rolland (Stanislas Merhar), a particularly violent soldier who checks in as a patient. How can Frantz Fanon simultaneously balance his various roles — as a husband and father, as a Black man serving the French empire, as an innovative psychiatrist, and as an intellectual joining the Algerian struggle for independence?
Fanon is a vibrant biopic about a decade in the life of the renowned author. I find it gripping and fascinating. Alexandre Bouyer is strong and statesman-like in the title role. I’ve known of Fanon for many years — as the author of books like The Wretched of the Earth and Black Skin, White Masks — but never knew about his background in psychiatry. Though occasionally heavy-handed and hagiographic, this movie opened my eyes to the exciting and intellectually stimulating story of his life in Algeria and the history that surrounded it.
I like this one a lot.
Train Dreams
Co-Wri/Dir: Clint Bentley (Jockey)
It’s the early twentieth century in the US Northwest. Robert Grainier (Joel Edgerton) is a bearded lumberjack who rarely speaks. He earns his living chopping down trees at migrant lumber camps and building the railroad. He meets a woman named Gladys (Felicity Jones), they fall in love and build a homestead in a grassy patchl near a flowing river. He cuts all of the wood by hand. Gladys is good with a rifle and shoots foul and deer to eat. The rest they buy in town at a general store owned by Ignatius Jack (Nathaniel Arcand).
He spends lonely months away earning money, but always returns home in the end. He makes friends with a Chinese labourer named Fu Sheng — they don’t talk but that’s fine with Rainier who never has much to stay. But he is shocked when a crowd decides to murder Fu Sheng just because he’s a celestial. He later makes friends with an old-timer named Peebles (William H. Macy) who handles the dynamite explosions. He loves their new baby girl but his home and family are threatened when a wildfire sweeps through the forest while he’s away. What will Grainier do?
Train Dreams is a series of events in one unremarkable man’s life set along the early 20th century northwestern frontier. A folksy omniscient voice narrates the story, hoping to add profundity; it doesn’t work. The film is meandering, pointless and stupid. It gives token nods toward environmentalism and against racism but they’re not really part of the plot. I hated this movie from the first few seconds, with its over-produced images and inappropriate soundtrack. We see a guy sawing wood until the camera pulls back revealing…? Nothing, just more trees, as if we’re supposed to applaud the scenery! At times it’s twee, like a Wes Anderson film, but without the 
humour or intellect. The men all look like they’re posing for a Carhartt fashion shoot. I try to feel sympathy toward Rainier but he’s deliberately opaque. Worst of all are the Train Dreams of the title — we keep seeing the same montages of flashbacks from previous scenes… but the original ones are as short-lived as his memories of them.
You might enjoy the pretty pictures in Train Dreams, but I can’t see any other reason to watch this annoying blunderbuss of a film.
Christy
Co-Wri/Dir: David Michôd (The Rover)
It’s 1989 in West Virginia. Christy Salters (Sydney Sweeney) is a high school kid, and a star player on the girls’ basketball team. She’s also in love with her girlfriend Rosie (Jess Gabor), a relationship her mom (Merritt Wever) doesn’t approve. She ends up trying out as a novelty act at a boxing match, and, though she has zero training, she scores a KO on her first try. She’s a natural. She catches the eye of a middle-aged boxing entrepreneur named Jim Martin (Ben Foster). He reluctantly takes her on and lets her train at his gym, but he will not allow her to see — or even talk to — Rosie. He sets her up in a trailer park where he can keep an eye on her. Though a great fighter, she’s isolated and unprotected outside of the ring.
Christy is a powerhouse. Her career takes off, including a new hairstyle and a trademark pink silk hooded robe to make her look more “feminine”. She knocks out all contenders and after much pressure, the 22-year-old Christy sleeps with the middle- aged Jim… and they eventually marry.
Her career soars, she meets Don King (hilariously played by Chad Coleman) and is signed to Mike Tyson’s slate. She gains fans worldwide, but her life is micromanaged by her Svengali husband. She may be a professional fighter but he’s twice her size, unstable, and increasingly violent. And he tries matching her up with boxers way above her weight class; that’s just dangerous. Is there any way to escape this oppressive relationship?
Christy is a biopic about the first prizewinning female boxer, who paved the way for a new professional women’s sport. I was hesitant about this one — ugh, yet another boxing movie — but Christy is as good as Rocky. It’s exciting, thrilling and 
moving, and despite her flaws, Christy Martin’s life is super-sympathetic. Sydney Sweeney is amazing. Yes, it’s Oscar-bait (you can tell by the prosthetic teeth and mullet haircuts, playing down her image as a sex-object) but she totally gets into this role. And Ben Foster is superbly hate-able as Jim — I seriously didn’t realize it was him till the credits rolled; he’s that skillful.
Christy is a good, old-fashioned biopic and a hell of a great boxing movie.
Train Dreams and Christy both played at TIFF and are opening in Toronto this weekend; check your local listings. And Fanon is premiering today at Cinefranco, 4 pm at the Carlton Cinema.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Saturday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website culturalmining.com.
Daniel Garber talks with Eric San (Kid Koala) about Space Cadet at ReelAsian
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
It’s the near future in a major North American city. Celeste is a graduate of the space academy, studying rockets since she was a little girl. Her mother was a famous astronaut who disappeared on a space mission. So she is raised by a robot, who serves as her best friend and her parental unit. Now it’s her turn: she’s heading out on a six month trip into the far reaches of the galaxy… and beyond. Can Celeste travel to new planets, collecting samples for 
scientific research and return safely to her home? And will her beloved robot still be waiting for this space cadet?
Space Cadet is a new animated film entirely without spoken dialogue. It’s a funny, poignant and bittersweet look at our futures. It’s the work of Montreal-based composer, musician, graphic novelist, scratch DJ, and director/producer Kid Koala, aka Eric San. His music has appeared on everything from NFB films to Sesame Street, movies like Scott Pilgrim and Baby Driver, and even Nintendo games. Space Cadet played at TIFF and Berlin to great acclaim.
I last spoke with Kid Koala on this show in 2014.
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