Daniel Garber talks with Matthew Rankin, Ila Firouzabadi and Pirouz Nemati about Universal Language at #TIFF24
Photographs by Jeff Harris.
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
It’s December in Winnipeg. Matthew Rankin, a Montreal bureaucrat, is travelling home to see his elderly mother. Most of his favourite spots are still there, but something is different; he feels lost, alienated. He sees two girls trying to free a large banknote frozen in ice. And he encounters a man who welcomes him into his home. After many years spent working in French, he is relieved to return to his native tongue and culture. But who would have guessed his universal language… is Farsi?
Universal Language is the name of a dream-like and haunting new feature that reimagines Canada’s two solitudes: francophone Quebec, and the rest of the country a unique mixture of Iran and the vast northern dominion. It’s as if Winnipeg froze unchanged somewhere in the 1980s and morphed into a non-religious People’s Republic of Iran. It’s co-written and directed by award-winning Winnipeg filmmaker Matthew Rankin, whose experimental films reimagine the country in a stylized and retro milieu. I interviewed him in 2020 about his first feature The Twentieth Century. The co-writers are both Iran-born and Montreal-based. Actor and multi-disciplinary artist Ila Firouzabadi is known for the violence and intimacy of her sculptures; while independent filmmaker, artist and actor Pirouz Nemati is completing an upcoming documentary on the matriarch of Montreal’s Byblos Le Petit Café.
I spoke with Matt, Ila and Pirouz on site at #TIFF24
Universal Language was lauded at Cannes and TIFF, on the list for an Oscar nomination for best international film, and will open in theatres soon.
Bikes and books. Films reviewed: The Last Rider, Umberto Eco: A Library of the World
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
It’s Summertime and Toronto is melting. Luckily there are lots of new movies playing at festivals, both indoors and out. The ICFF is showing great movies from Morocco to China at the distillery district throughout July. Art of Documentary Film Festival is on next Saturday, July 15th, at Innis Town Hall Theatre featuring a talk by Shasha Nakhai and Rich Williamson, the great Toronto directors who brought us Scarborough. And later this month keep an eye out for the Female Eye Film Fest featuring memorable movies and shorts directed by women.
But this week I’m looking at two new documentaries that stimulate the body and the mind. There’s an Italian film about books and American one about Bikes.
The Last Rider
Wri/Dir: Alex Holmes (Maiden)
It’s 1989. Greg LeMond is a champion professional cyclist who was the first American ever to win the Tour de France. He has trained since a teenager in Lake Tahoe, growing up with a gut-knowledge of their mountains and steep roads. He meets Cathy, his future wife, like in a movie, at a Holiday Inn. He is soon recruited as a member of the Renault team, moves to France for training, and becomes world famous. Cathy comes with him, dropping out of College.
But after winning the Tour, he falls into a deep depression, followed by a terrible accident: he is accidentally shot and almost killed on a turkey hunt with his family. This happens while Cathy is in labour, so Greg barely gets a chance to see their newborn for weeks. But after a few years of recovery, they decide he should try once again.. Not to win the Tour de France, but just to see if he can finish it (remember: competitive cycling, especially climbing up 
gruelling Alpen roads like in the Tour, requires absolute perfection in strength, skill and stamina— and Greg still has metal pellets riddling his body!)
But to everyone’s surprise, it becomes a three way race for Greg, Pedro Delgado and Laurent Fignon. Who will wear the yellow jersey?
The Last Rider is a biographical sports doc about that historical and exciting race in 1989. It’s 75% period video footage — the Tour de France is heavily photographed, start to finish — and 25% new taking-head interviews with LeMond, his family and many participants in that race. 1989 was before the dirty side of professional cycling — all the scandals, illegal drugs and supplements that became endemic in the sport — so there is a sense of innocence and pathos permeating this story. I am not a big fan of the sport — I barely follow it — but it was still an exciting watch.
Umberto Eco: A Library of the World
Dir: Davide Ferrario
Umberto Eco is a writer, novelist and semiotician from Piedmont, Italy. He writes books — including international bestselling novels like The Name the Rose and Foucault’s Pendulum — and academic essays and treatises. He also accumulates and reads an astonishingly diverse number of books. And though he is an academic, he avoids ranking books by their moral or political value, ignoring the usual canons of good vs bad literature.
His shelves are filled with Charlie Brown bobble heads beside Voltaire, devoting equal space to fumetti — low-brow italian comics — and pulp fiction, as he does to obscure codices scribed by medieval monks. The more obscure the better. There are illuminated manuscripts of animals with human heads. And — unlike the current vogue of labelling works as misinformation, disinformation or “fake news” — Eco loves writers who churn out huge quantities of books of dubious credibility and provenance. Like the 17th-century German Jesuit Athanasius Kircher, who studied and wrote about practically everything, including travelogues of China (despite never having been there), and treatises on mathematics, music, medicine, the tower of Babel and Egyptian hieroglyphics. There’s always room for mysticism, conspiracy theories and apostate Cathars. Eco died in 2016 but left behind a stupendous collection of books, including his own 
Umberto Eco: A Library of the World is a fascinating, esoteric and aesthetically pleasing documentary about Eco and his writing, the books he read, and about libraries worldwide. Members of his family tell their stories and they and actors recite aloud some of Eco’s works, both profound and mundane. There are also 
If you like Umberto Eco’s work, this is a must-see; and if you’ve never heard of him watch this movie — you’ll learn learn a thing or two.
Umbertio Eco: A Library of the World starts next Friday at Hot Docs cinema, and The Last Rider which recently opened in Toronto is playing later this month at the Lavazza INCLUCITY FESTIVAL in the distillery district; 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 documentary filmmaker Joanne Belluco about Stuck, premiering at Cinefranco
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
What do these people have in common?
A writer and storyteller in Toronto; a dancer in France; a stand-up comic in New Brunswick; a theatre director in Sudbury; a cinematographer in Winnipeg; an electronic musician in Northern Ontario; and a brother/sister musical duo in Montreal?
They’re all francophone Canadians who work in the performing arts. And during the pandemic they all find themselves stuck! Stuck à la maison, stuck at home.
Stuck is also the name of a new documentary feature that looks at the effect of the coronavirus — and the restrictions it brought — on these people’s lives and careers.
Stuck was directed by Joanne Belluco, a French-born, Toronto-based documentary filmmaker, producer, writer and journalist.
I spoke with Joanne in Toronto via ZOOM.
Stuck is having its world premiere at Toronto’s Hot Docs Cinema on November 1, at 7:30 pm at Toronto’s CineFranco film festival.
Critical Mass. Films reviewed: Dolittle, What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, Les Misérables
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
This week I’m looking at three movies. There’s a man who talks to monkeys; a kid who steals a lion, and a movie critic who monkeyed with the way we look at movies.
Dolittle
Dir: Stephen Gaghan
It’s early 19th Century England, in a village called Puddleby-on-the-Marsh. Young Stubbins (Harry Collett) a boy out hunting with his dad accidentally shoots a squirrel. But instead of “putting it out of its misery” as his father suggests, he tries to save it. Stubbins stumbles on a derelict hospital run by the reclusive Doctor Dolittle (Robert Downey Jr) the legendary animal doctor. The hospital is full of steampunk devices and wild animals — gorillas and polar bears, insects and parrots — wandering around just like people. And even more surprising, Doctor Dolittle can speak all their languages. Stubbins wants to convince the doctor to take him on as an apprentice so he can talk to the animals, too.
But trouble is brewing at Buckingham Palace. Someone has poisoned the Queen! And only the doctor knows the cure, a panacea found in a distant land. Dolittle and the gang set sail to find it. Can they trick the evil King Rassouli (Antonio Banderas) into giving them the map? And will they defeat a tiger, a dragon, and various palace villains, 
and manage to cure the Queen in time?
I grew up surrounded by Hugh Lofting’s books, TV cartoons, and movies, and though I wasn’t a devotee, I knew all about the stories and characters. And I don’t love Robert Downey Jr. So I was all set to be disappointed: where’s the chimp? And what happened to my favourite animal, the two-headed Pushmi-Pullyu?
But you know what? I liked it! It was cute, full of adventures, close escapes, exciting trips to exotic lands, and all the quirky animals (voiced by Octavia Spencer, Rami Malek, John Cena, and Emma Thompson). Keep in mind, this movie is for little kids, not grown ups, who may find the jokes too stupid, but the exciting scenes and the fast-moving action kept me satisfied. Not a terrific movie, but a very cute one.
What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
Wri/Dir: Rob Garver
Pauline Kael was a single mom who grew up on a California ranch during the time when movies were still silent and B&W. Her first published review was Charlie Chaplin’s Limelight — she hated it. She ran a movie theatre in Berkeley where she wrote the reviews and descriptions of the films playing there, encouraging locals to see them. She wrote for Macall’s but was fired for not loving big-budget cinema. And she quit her job at The New Repulic because they edited out her writing. She finally found a post at The New Yorker, where she became one of the most influential 
movie critics in the world.
She’s is known both for the movies she hated (she described The Sound of Music as asexual revisionist treacle, and trashed Kubrick’s 2001!) and those she loved (Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde, Scorcese’s Mean Streets, Spielberg’s Sugarland Express). Some directors’ careers were made by her patronage, while others lived in dread of her columns. She rejected 
the ennui-ridden academic view of Auteur theory, without falling for manipulative Big-budget schlock. She liked trash, mind you, but it had to be good trash.
What She Said is an immaculately researched,spot-on look at Pauline Kael’s reviews,and her influence on audience and filmmakers. It delves into her fascinating life and and undeniable influence without resorting to endless kiss-assery. This movie is a labour of love, combining vintage TV interviews with Dick Cavett and Brian Linehan, and talking heads — from Tarantino to David Lean — with readings from her work by Sarah Jessica Parker. Best of all, these voices are illustrated by a barrage of 2-3 second film clips from hundreds of movies over the past century that I haven’t seen in a documentary since Los Angeles Plays Itself (2002). (I grew up reading her reviews in The New Yorker — that and the cartoons were all read — and while I disagreed with her half the time, I always wanted to see what she had to say.)
If you love movies, I strongly recommend this doc.
Les Misérables
Co-Wri/Dir: Ladj Ly
It’s Paris in the high-rise banlieue that circle the city. It’s 35 degrees outside and the crowds are high on the country’s win on the soccer pitch, singing la Marseillaise at train stations. But trouble is brewing…. it seems a lion cub is missing from a travelling Roma circus and the four brothers that run it are threatening a rumble with the locals.
Power here is shared by the secular — led by community leader called Le Maire (Steve Tientcheu); the religious — Salah (Almamy Kanouté), an Imam who runs a kebab shop; and the criminal — a gang of thieves who work directly with the cops. Attempting to keep the peace are the feckless police who 
mainly harass kids and sex workers. The regular team — an abrasive white guy Chris (Alexis Manenti) and his calmer black partner Gwada, who grew up in the hood (Djebril Zonga) — is joined by a newbie. the wide-eyed Stephane/Pento (Damien Bonnard) is a hick, straight from the farm. But the only ones who really know what’s going on are the local kids, who know every broken fence, every fire escape and back alley — they are watching everything. Especially Issa (Issa Perica) a 
feisty 10 year old, and his pal the nerdy Buzz (Al-Hassan Ly). Issa is the one who liberated the cute lion cub, and Buzz who records everything from the rooftops with his trusty drone.
But when the cops overstep their bounds and use weapons — which is caught on camera — things start to go really wrong. Chaos reigns.
Can the trouble be defused by the cops and community leaders? Or will the kids triumph? And could this lead to a repeat of the Paris riots of 2005?
Les Misérables (this is not Victor Hugo’s novel, but the location is the 
same) is an amazing dive into the lives of Parisians in the outer suburbs, their alienation, and the tension brewing there. The acting and story are superb, and I love the way multiple strands are woven together into a seamless whole. It’s nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar, and, though violent at times, it holds a real love and understanding of the characters portrayed. This is a great movie.
Dolittle opens today in Toronto; check your local listings. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael is opening today at the Hot Docs Cinema, as is Les Misérables at the TIFF Bell Lightbox.
This is Daniel Garber at the Movies, each Friday morning, on CIUT 89.5 FM and on my website, culturalmining.com
Daniel Garber talks to director Majdi El-Omari about his new film STANDSTILL
Hi, This is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Karhiio is a Mohawk science student in Toronto who steals some offensive nicknacks he sees in a souvenir shop and goes to jail. His Dad, John, a war photographer, drives out from Montreal to meet him there. He owes his son a debt for breaking up with his ex-wife, an artist. But he also has a responsibility to his neighbour in Montreal: Widad, a Palestinian woman who is hiding in plain sight after a crime. Until he addresses his obligations, his life is at a stand still.
Standstill is also the name of a new Canadian movie. It’s a film where English is rarely 
spoken — not so unusual for a film from Montreal. What is unusual is that most of the characters speak Kanien’kehà:ka, the language of the Mohawk First Nations, and possibly the first such film ever made. Shot in beautiful black and white, it’s a pensive character study of three alienated and misplaced souls.
It’s directed by award-winning filmmaker Majdi El-Omari, and Standstill is his first feature. It opens in Toronto at the Royal Cinema on March 13th, 2015.
I spoke to Majdi by telephone from Montreal. The Palestinian-Canadian director talks about the Oka crisis, Quebec, indigenous people, the film’s genesis, existentialism, media stereotypes, resistance, the role of police, internal violence, cultural representations, the Mohawk language, and more!
culturalmining.com 
leave a comment