Rising. Films reviewed: Backspot, The Goldman Case, Handling the Undead
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
Toronto’s Spring Film Festival Season continues with Inside Out closing, TJFF opening, and soon followed by three more: the Toronto Japanese Film Fest offers you the chance to watch the best of contemporary Japanese cinema, including samurai, anime, dramas and arthouse films, running June 6-20 at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre; The Future of Film Showcase celebrating rising young Canadian talent with three world premieres, including the directorial debut for actor Aaron Poole, at the lovely Paradise Theatre from June 20-23; and the ICFF Lavazza Inclucity festival set for June 27th and continuing through most of July, featuring films from Italy and around the world, accompanied by delicious food and projected, outdoors, on a giant screen in the Distillery District.
But this week I’m looking at three new features. There’s an ambitious young cheerleader trying to rise to the top; a convicted criminal trying to elevate his innocence; and dead bodies rising from their graves.
Backspot
Co-Wri/Dir: D.W. Waterson
Riley (Devery Jacobs) is a high school student obsessed with cheerleading. Along with her best friend — and girlfriend — Amanda (Kudakwashe Rutendo) they hope to get a place on with the Thunderhawks squad, the highly competitive award-winning varsity team at their school. They do handsprings, half turns and everything else they need, to qualify, acrobatically. But despite how hard they try, it seems unlikely. Until that team has an accident leaving three empty spots open to new members. And no one is more surprised than Riley and Amanda when they both win places. (Riley is the back spot — part of the base of the human formations they build on the floor.) The third member, for the centre spot, is Tracy (Shannyn Sossamon) known for her slim build, perfect face and hair. As not-so-perfect cheerleaders point out, it’s as much about your looks as it is about your talent.
The Thunderhawks is headed by two alpha leaders: the cold-as-ice head coach Eileen (Evan Rachel Wood) of the “winning is 
everything” school of thought; and assistant coach Devon (Thomas Antony Olajide) just as much of a perfectionist, but with a hidden secret life. Before joining the Thunderhawks, Riley and Amanda were inseparable, cuddling at the movies while pigging out on popcorn and liquorice (Amanda is a part-timer at a movie theatre). But as Riley becomes more and more tense, her hear of failure turning into panic attacks, they wonder whether their relationship can stand this much pressure. Can Riley balance her sports life with her love life and family? Can she survive all the potential accidents that come with the sport? Or will it drive her off the cliff?
Backspot is a good sports movie about friendships, relationships and competition. It’s a local film, set in Toronto, and stars indigenous actress Devery Jacobs (known for Reservation Dogs) of the Kahnawa:ke Mohawk nation, in a very strong performance. And they all seem to do their own stunts and acrobatics, which is very impressive. I like both the sports parts and the home parts of the film. The one small thing I wish for, though, is more camera time spent on the actual performance and less on the endless rehearsals and training. The grand finale has less oomph than its lead up. Still, it’s an exciting and moving portrait of women’s sports.
The Goldman Case
Dir: Cédric Kahn
It’s the 1970s in a Paris courtroom. Pierre Goldman (Arieh Worthalter) is on trial for the murder of two women in the armed robbery of a pharmacy. He was convicted of this crime earlier, but has always pled innocent to that crime, and is now at a retrial of his case. He wrote a celebrated autobiography in prison, outlining his story, and many supporters are there in the courtroom, calling for his freedom. Born in German-occupied France to two Jewish Polish-born Communist members of the French resistance, he later became a radical leftist himself. He travelled to Cuba and Venezuela to join the revolutionaries there, but rejected the protests of 1968 as a performance. In Paris he supported himself through small-scale holdups and robberies. He admits to those crimes but not to violence or murder, insists he would never kill someone, especially not a woman, and would never rat out another person to the authorities, even if their testimony could set him free.
At the trial, Goldman is a loose cannon, interrupting his own lawyers, calling the court system a farce, and accusing he police force as being a racist organization. His lawyer (Arthur Harari) is increasingly frustrated, saying Goldman is committing suicide with his impromptu testimony. But will he be found guilty or innocent of the crimes of murder?
The Goldman Case is a powerful, dramatic retelling of an actual 
famous trial. No flashbacks, no memories, no reenactments of the crime, merely a series of witnesses, testimonies and cross-examinations. Just the facts. The acting is superb, with Arieh Worthalter winning this year’s Cesar for best actor for his amazing characterization of Goldman. In North America, we’re inundated by such trials — both real and imaginary — in the news, on TV shows, and in courtroom dramas. But French trials — which portray a very different legal system — are becoming increasingly popular, in films such as Anatomy of a Fall and Saint Omer. There’s a different kind of emotion and drama there. Courtroom dramas can be tedious, but this one kept my attention. I wanted to see this movie because its director Cedric Kahn tells stories like this of non-conformist anti-heroes who reject mainstream society while holding onto certain core beliefs. This one fills that pattern exactly. The Goldman Case is an intriguing drama about real events.
Handling the Undead
Co-Wri/Dir: Thea Hvistendahl
It’s present-day Oslo, Norway. Three families are going through a period of mourning, having lost people near and dear to their hearts. A single mom (Renate Reinsve) and father Mahler have been catatonic since the death of her little boy. She works in an industrial kitchen, while he is retired, but they can barely speak to one another. An elderly woman (Bente Børsum) is bereft when her longtime romantic lover and partner dies. She misses dancing and talking and listening to music together. And when Eva dies in an unexpected accident, her close-knit family — her husband, David (Anders Danielsen Lie: The Worst Person in the World, Oslo, August 31st ) a standup comic, their rebellious teenage daughter Flora, and their young son Kian — is left shocked and rudderless. They walk through their day on autopilot, celebrating the boy’s birthday but with little happiness.
But something strange is in the air after a city-wide power outage. Grandpa — who slept on his grandson’s grave — hears a knocking underground. He digs up the coffin, and carries him home with him. David is in hospital when his wife — who died in the accident — seems to stir again. And when Tora reclaims her lover’s living body from her casket laying in state at the funeral home, she feels like it’s a gift of the gods Somehow, the dead are waking up again. But are they still the same people the living remember?
Handling the Undead is a very slow and low-key horror movie about how ordinary people react to a seeming miracle, despite all indications to the countrary. It’s beautiful shot indoors and out among natural beauty and scenic islands on the water. And it has a compelling soundtrack. It’s based on the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist who also wrote Let the Right One In, and like that one, despite elements of the supernatural, much of the story is devoted 
to ordinary mundane lives. So part of the movie is devoted to the rebellious daughter and her boyfriend, just hanging out in their shack smoking drugs and having sex — nothing to do with the undead. There are also repeated scenes of ritual cleansing of the dead bodies, both loving and grotesque. The living interact with the undead, with one, the single mom, going so far as to carry her son to a cabin on an isolated island, to avoid trouble with the police. But there’s a dark enveloping metaphoric cloud of misery and sorrow hanging over city that seems totally empty and deserted. If you’re looking for a screaming, bloody, slasher film, you’re looking in the wrong place. But if you like pondering, pensive, Nordic art-house horror… this is a good one for you.
The Goldman case is playing at the Toronto Jewish film festival, and Handling the Dead and Backspot both open theatrically this weekend 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.
Extreme non-conformists. Movies reviewed: Sworn Virgin, Wild Life PLUS Drone and EUFF
Hi, this is Daniel Garber at the Movies for culturalmining.com and CIUT 89.5 FM.
The horrible attacks in Beirut and Paris last week have shaken the world. But how to respond to these attacks? For many governments, the War on Terror is the answer. Others turn toward diplomacy. Some say drone attacks are what keep terrorism at bay. But other experts warn that US drone kills are the best recruitment ads groups like ISIS have. A new documentary that opens today across North Amerioca is called Drone (Dir: Tonje Hessen Schei). It features Brandon Bryant, a former drone pilot turned whistle-blower, as well as the people in the lands where the drone attacks happen — Afghanistan and the Middle East — who experienced drone attacks as “collateral damage”.
Some non-conformists choose to dissociate themselves from mainstream culture. They find non-conformity works better if you live far from other people, away from the mainstream. This week I’m looking at two European dramas about non-conformists who leave it all behind. People who flee the cities but at a price. There’s a French father and two sons who go back to the wild, and an Abanian who heads for the freedom of the mountains, before ending up in Italy.
Sworn Virgin
Dir: Laura Bispuri
Hana (Alba Rohrwacher) lives with her parents in an isolated part of the mountains of Albania. But when her parents die, she is found and adopted by a family in a village. But she runs into trouble almost immediately just for living her life the way she always has. Her new sister Lila (Flonja Kodheli) tells her what’s what.
It’s not good to drink before a man drinks, speak before a man speaks, smoke, touch a rifle, go into the woods, choose a husband, do a man’s work, even look at a man funny. Basically, she has no rights at all. Hana says that’s just not fair, how can she live this way, how can she stand it? Is there a way out? There is. A woman can live like a man does and get all his privileges. BUt there’s a catch. She has to cut her hair, bind her breasts, wear pants and carry a gun. But she has to take an oath and give up all sex and live her life as a so-called sworn virgin.
So the movie picks up many years later in a Tyrolian town in Italy. Mark shows up at Lila’s 
door direct from the mountains of Albania. He’s still a sworn virgin but wants to give that life up. But Mark is the ultimate fish out of water. Exposed to weird things like women’s bras, nudity, supermarkets, money, and synchronized swimming, it’s almost too much to take in. Lila’s daughter Jonida (Emily Ferratello) finds Mark fascinating, but doesn’t understand him. And for Mark, making the shift back to life as a woman, is overwhelming. The women’s and men’s bodies he sees at the local swimming pool is all a fascinating mystery. Lila is the only person he’s shared a bed with. But Bernhard – the swimming cioach at the pool attracts her. Which way will Mark/Hana choose for their identity, gender and sexuality?
Sworn Virgin is an incredibly fascinating movie, based on a true practice. To this day there are people in Albania – largely unknown in the rest if the world — who choose to live as so-called “sworn virgins” for the advantages it gives them. The movie, especially the performance of Alba Rohwacher, looking like a young KD Lang, is really remarkable, like nothing you’ve ever seen before.
Wild Life
Dir: Cedric Kahn
Paco and Nora (Mathieu Kassovitz and Celine Sallette) meet in a teepee circle in France, and fall in love. Along with Nora’s own son, Thomas, they have two sons together: Tsali and Okyesa (David Gastou, Sofiane Neveu). They live a nomadic farming life in rural France. A back-to-nature, hippie life. But after about a decade Nora calls it quits and takes the three boys – kicking and screaming – with her. Overnight, their lives change home-schooled hippy-farmers to conservative townies at Nora’s parent’s home. And Paco is forbidden all contact, except on national holidays, until the custody agreement is settled. Which takes many years.
But Paco — and the two youngest sons — decide to go back to living a wild life, back to the woods, with no possessions and only the clothes on their backs. They do the mandated education – French dictee, times tables – but they also learn to catch fish with their bare hands, to tame wild birds, and handle live scorpions and snakes without getting bit. They can catch and skin a rabbit, climb trees, and hide from any passing helicopters.
As they grow older, the boys have to use fake names, and avoid cities, trains, and police at all costs. Paco
is a fugitive. Paco tells them they are allowed to go back to their Mom at any time, as long as they ask. The boys say they choose to be with him… but can ten-year-old boys make such decisions? They eventually settle at a hippy commune and build stone houses from scratch, and live with no electricity.
But as teenagers, Paco is dismayed to see them reading comic books, dancing to rave music, spending cash and hanging out with friends they meet. They want to be accepted, see the world, see their mother again. And they want to meet girlfriends, have sex, move away… just like any other teenager. Can this fragile family stay together?
This is a great movie. It’s doubly interesting because it’s based on true story, a book written by the people who lived it — the Fortin Brothers and their father. The actors playing the briothers as kids, and later as teenagers (Romain Depret, Jules Ritmanic) are all new to the screen. But they seem to be the real thing. Only the troubled idealistic Paco (played by well-known director Matthieu Kassovitz) is familiar. Don’t miss this one.
Sworn Virgin, played last weekend, and Wild Life is opening tonight at the EU 
Film Festival. This is a festival that shows movies from each country in the European Union for free at the Royal Cinema on College St. Go to europeanfilmfest.ca for details. Also opening today is the wonderful drama Brooklyn about a young migrant woman in the 1950s (Saorise Ronan) who travels between big city New York and small-town Ireland. Do not miss this movie.
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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