REVIEW: The Cocksure Lads Can’t Back It Up

The faux-Britpop band gets the movie treatment. The music is great, but it’s just a quarter of the film.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: Originally an homage to the Britpop bands that took North America by storm in the 60’s, The Cocksure Lads adopt a new shape as a faux-band on the verge of success. On tour in Canada, the moment they land in Toronto the Lads break up, following an ill-timed royalties negotiation courtesy of insufferable lead singer Dusty Fosterboard.

The foursome roams the streets of Toronto separately, undecided about cancelling a gig scheduled for later that day. As it happens in movies, each one of them has an encounter that enables them to face their own anxieties: Dusty’s obsession with monetizing his creativity, lead guitarist Reg’s musical snobbery, bass player Derek’s womanizing ways and drummer Blake’s obsession with cleanliness. Musical interludes throughout the film provide further insight on these characters’ psyches.

CRITIQUE: A pleasant, less-clever-than-it-thinks-it-is comedy, The Cocksure Lads Movie relays too heavily on the concept behind it. The idea of satirizing Britpop bands and their relationship with North American audiences has a lot of potential, but not much materializes here. The movie spends precious little time establishing the group before breaking it up, and the audience gets no good reason to be invested on the band’s faith.

Thankfully, the actors chosen to become the Lads are likeable or interesting enough to carry the film.  Derek and Blake’s misadventures trying to pick up Canadian girls are not particularly original, but are amusing enough to look forward to those segments. On the flip side, Dusty’s encounter with an attractive musician who reminds him of the joys of being part of a band it’s condescending. The manic-pixie-dream-girl plot device is so five years ago

The musical bits are fun and the melodies are contagious. The film could have used more moments like those and less comedy of the “I’m good at sex because I studied anatomy” kind.

WHAT WORKS:

·      Within the low-budget Canadian indie scene, The Cocksure Lads Movie looks impeccable.

·      Peter Higginson as the Lads’ long-suffering roadie out-acts everyone else in the film, and provides the rare moment of genuine emotion.

·      Overall, the songs show craftsmanship (no shocker here, they come from Great Big Sea’ Murray Foster and Moxy Früvous’ Mike Ford) and stand by themselves. “You Gotta Stay Cocksure” and “A Case of the Dropsies” and are sticky to a fault.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      The main plot point of the movie is that the band can’t continue without the lead singer. Problem is, Dusty is hardly a prodigy and at least two of the other members have serviceable voices, rendering the whole journey moot.

·      There is no much complexity within the characters. Each one could be defined by a single personality trait.

·      If the movie had excised every scene with the Lads’ agent in England, it would have been a step in the right direction.

RATING: **

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): ***

The Cocksure Lads Movie is now playing at the Magic Lantern Carlton Theatre and the Kingsway Theatre in Toronto.

REVIEW: Get Off My Lawn... and Into this Porch

Documentary filmmaker Sarah Goodman brings her non-fiction sensibility to the realm of make-believe.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: In the spirit of John Cassavettes –if considerably more gentle- Porch Stories chronicles a day in the life of three households in Little Portugal, Toronto, during a hot summer weekend. The ancillary tale focuses on Emma (Laura Barrett), a former musician in the process of moving out. Emma is engaged to Stefan, a caring if aloof individual who is not quite in the same wavelength as her.

Emma seems resigned to the idea of marriage until a former flame materializes outside her porch. The interloper is Gabriel (José Miguel Contreras), one of those aimless, easygoing drifters who coast on their counterculture stance but have little else to offer. In little time Emma finds herself torn, oblivious that there could be something calculated about Gabriel’s sudden resurgence.

Across the street, a bickering Portuguese couple sees their marriage disintegrate as a never-discussed indiscretion comes back to haunt them. Meanwhile, the ditzy neighbour next door must decide between the boyfriend she doesn’t care for and a suitor who may be too much of a nerd to have a relationship with him.

CRITIQUE: An unassuming yet biting portrait of city life, Porch Stories succeeds in many areas more expensive projects fail miserably: Builds a cohesive universe, the dialogue flows naturally and features properly developed leads.

Far from an affectation, the black-and-white cinematography keeps the audience focused on the story and hides any production design shortcomings (very noticeable in low-budget productions). While the cast is peppered with newcomers, the acting is strong, probably because nobody is stretching beyond their area of confidence.

The open ending feels more like unwillingness to commit than as artistic decision. At 73 minutes, Porch Stories could have used further development, particularly after making us care for the characters, not a small feat.

WHAT WORKS:

·      Besides the three main stories, we get to hear snippets of conversations taking place outside the porch. They are all compelling. It’s a nice little detail that makes the outcome richer.

·      Great casting work across the field.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      The levels of hipsterism on display can be off-putting (the concept of “organic sausages” is practically an oxymoron).

·      The Gabriel character is immensely unlikeable, even though Goodman clearly wants the audience to root for him.

RATING: ***

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): ***1/2

Porch Stories is playing Thursday 25th at 6.45 at the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto.

REVIEW: How Do I Get You Aloft?

Jennifer Connelly brings her brand of gritty-hot to Manitoba.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: The deck seems stack against Nana (Jennifer Connelly), a widow struggling to raise two kids in Northern Manitoba. Nana’s youngest is severely ill and in desperation, Nana agrees to see a healer. The visit takes a turn to the unexpected when is discovered she is the one with the powers. The development further strains her relationship with her eldest son, in desperate need of some maternal care.

A second storyline runs in parallel to Nana’s: Ivan (Cillian Murphy, 28 Days Later), a falconer with abandonment issues, agrees to participate in a documentary about his craft, unaware the journalist (Melanie Laurent, Inglourious Basterds) has an agenda that doesn’t involve birds of pray. The plotlines intersect in predictable fashion: There are scores to be settled and explanations to be offered. As for forgiveness, the wounds may run too deep for that.

CRITIQUE: Peruvian director Claudia Llosa gained notoriety thanks to The Milk of Sorrow, a magic realism-soaked take on political repression (the two subgenres Latin America is mostly known for). While significant, her transition to English-spoken films is not as radical as the one other Academy Award-nominated foreign directors have experienced (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck and Olivier Dahan come to mind).

Aloft is a correct movie, but there is very little to it to make it stick out.  The film goes through the motions with the falconry element as only distinctive trait. If nothing else, Aloft is consistent with the universe around it: The cold, harsh Manitoba mise-en-scene provides the story with a weight it doesn’t really have.

For such an emotionally charged film, Aloft is too dour to leave a mark. The blame falls squarely on the script and the direction, as Cillian Murphy and Jennifer Connelly do their darndest to service their characters. Murphy has seldom feel this human, and Connelly is at her best in gritty environments (see Requiem for a Dream, the misery-porn extravaganza Shelter). An interesting let-down, but a let-down nonetheless.

WHAT WORKS:

·      Cinematographer Nicolas Bolduc (Enemy, Rebelle: War Witch) does a superb job capturing the cold, merciless environment. Keep an eye on this guy.

·      A passionless affair in a pig farm in the middle of winter? Sex doesn’t get more depressing than that.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      Early Alejandro González-Iñarritu called. He wants his style back.

·      The hook-up between Ivan and the journalist. Comes out of nowhere and leads to nothing.

·      I find hard to believe anybody on the Prairies would leave a mother and her two kids stranded in the middle of nowhere, particularly during winter season.

RATING: **1/2

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): ***

Aloft is now playing in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton.

REVIEW: The Pigs of Berkshire County

As personal growth stories go, this one has a pretty high body count.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: An error of judgement turns model teen Kylie Winters (Alysa King) into the school’s pariah. Outside becoming her classmates’ laughingstock and landing in hot water with the faculty, Kylie is belittled by her own mother, utterly disappointed by her behaviour.

Unbeknownst to Kylie, her day is about to get considerably worse. Forced to babysit a couple of tykes at a mansion in the middle of nowhere, the mentally frail girl must battle three delinquents in pig masks and obscure intentions. Pushed to the limit, Kylie must learn to fend for herself, or die trying.

CRITIQUE: Part Degrassi, part You’re Next, Berkshire County has all the marks of a first-time filmmaker. Formally, the movie is fine, but lacks a voice of its own. Most of the film’s beats are preordained: The babysitter in trouble is one of the oldest tales in horror and it takes considerable work to give it a new twist (last time it happened was six years ago with The House of the Devil.) The dialogue is not only perfunctory, but also plain.

The second half of Berkshire County is better. Director Audrey Cummings doesn’t flinch when it comes to the gory stuff, but her efforts are hindered by the predictability of it all. Weirdly, as soon as the identity of Kylie’s antagonist is revealed, immediately becomes the most interesting character of the movie, based on the strength of the performer and the absence of a backstory. I would have liked to know more about this person, and less of Kylie or her suitor/fiend.

WHAT WORKS:

·      In spite of her character’s inconsistencies (Kylie goes from shrinking violet to Ripley in nanoseconds), Alysa King does a decent job as the troubled teen.

·      As location scouting goes, the house where the main event takes place is a find.

·      The coda is intriguing, if a bit Halloween II.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      Outside the lead and the main antagonist, the acting gets really dicey. Marcus had me wincing, but not of fear.

·      For a band of vindictive criminals, they are awfully careful with breaking any windows.

·      Motivation is a problem across the board. Inexplicable and senseless are not the same thing.

RATING: **

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): **1/2

Berkshire County is now playing in Toronto, Kingston and Calgary.

REVIEW: The Dry Wit of a Wet Bum

Sometimes, you have to swim forward, whether you like it or not.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: 14-year old Sam (the wonderful Julia Sarah Stone) is about to enter the worst spring of her life. Not only she must work cleaning rooms at the retirement home run by her mom (Leah Pinsent), Sam also has to endure considerable bulling at swimming class from girls more developed than her. Upset and self-conscious, Sam refuses to change her swimwear in front of the others (hence the title), causing further taunting. Her only source of comfort is the swimming instructor, who may or may not be a predator.

Unbeknownst to Sam, two of the people entering her orbit may possess more value than her first impression of them indicated: A lonely, kind retiree and a cantankerous old man (Kenneth Welsh) reluctant to accept the retirement community as his new home. Sam must learn to navigate uncharted territory with little guidance and experience. Mistakes are bound to take place, but also plenty of self-discovery.

CRITIQUE: Wet Bum works with a very limited canvas, but the creative team behind it makes the most of it. Since the lead is a painfully shy 14-year old, the movie doesn’t rely much on dialogue. Instead, we get a fairly complete character study based on Sam’s reactions: While sympathetic, the lead is allowed to be difficult or exhibit lack of judgement, much like an average teenager. Doesn’t hurt that Julia Sarah Stone has a singularly expressive face and her emotional state is easy to read.

Sam goes through teenage hell, and the payoff is far from Hollywood-like, yet is more lasting: Being at ease with oneself. Director Lindsay Mackay steers clear of Lars Von Trier territory (thankfully), but doesn’t shy away of Sam budding sexuality. In a particularly difficult scene involving the lead and an older suitor, Mackay underlines the improperness of the situation with remarkable grace.

The cinematography of Wet Bum exemplifies how far you can get with good composition and a clear idea of how do you want the movie to look like. Besides some nifty under-the-water camera work (the only place in the entire world Sam feels at ease), the cold palette on display is submersing.

There are some unnecessary flourishes (like the very opening scene) that add little to the story, but overall Wet Bum accomplishes what it set up to do.

WHAT WORKS:

·      I can’t emphasize this enough, Julia Sarah Stone is a find. Far cry from a Nickelodeon starlet-in-waiting, Stone has the screen presence and acting chops to carry a movie.

·      Leah Pinsent, recently wasted as the putative villain in Big News from Grand Rock, manages to create a more textured character with about the same amount of screen time.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      Some of the “kids” cast as high-schoolers look way too old for the part.

·      The ADR work is rather distracting, to the point that one wonders if it was really necessary to take the audience off the movie to correct a minor detail.

·      Was there a purpose to set Wet Bum in the late 80’s/early 90’s?

RATING: ***

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): ***1/2

Wet Bum is now playing in Toronto. Opens May the 29th in Vancouver.

REVIEW: Songs She Wrote About People She Knows

A twisted musical comedy for misanthropes.

By Sarah Kurchak

THE PLOT:

Carol (Arabella Bushnell), a pathologically repressed office worker, attends a workshop that encourages people to express their feelings through music and blossoms into a cantankerous and borderline homicidal songbird. While this transformation predictably alienates and angers most people, it also earns her some surprising and not entirely welcome allies.

When she leaves a ditty called “Asshole Dave” on her boss’s analogue answering machine, it touches Dave (Brad Dryborough) so deeply that he quits his job (via song), fires Carol, and tries to convince his newfound muse to join him on a music-making adventure. Misanthropic hijinks and droll musical numbers ensue.

CRITIQUE:

The audience for a musical about two seriously damaged people expressing their deepest innermost feelings through vicious song is small, but those in the target demographic (cynical weirdos who have listened to Morrissey’s “Sing Your Life” far too many times) will find much to enjoy here. Songs She Wrote About People She Knows is a brutally amusing film with bone-dry humour that takes the conventions of the golden era of movie musicals and reimagines them in the tone of a particularly surreal Kids In The Hall skit stretched to the most absurd limits of its premise. Much like Carol’s songs, the film will probably alienate most people, but find a few fervent fans along the way.

 WHAT WORKS:

·      The opening credits, which are basically a soaring opening number turned on its head to become a monotone celebration of murderous intent.

·      Brad Dryborough’s complete commitment to his portrayal of Dave as a guileless neurotic with some serious boundary and life issues is so good and realistic that it would be painful to watch if it weren’t so funny.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      Carol’s character development is uneven at best, often taking a backseat to Dave’s antics. Her issues with her mother end on a satisfying note, but could have been even more cathartic with a bit more attention and care.

·      Carol’s neighbour, Judy, is an unnecessarily shrill minor character that seems out of place in both the tone and spirit of the rest of the picture.

 RATING: *** 1/2

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): *** 1/2

Songs She Wrote About People She Knows is playing at the Broadway Theatre May 16, 18, 19, 24, 29 and 31.

INTERVIEW: Katharine Isabelle, Low Budget Muse

A favourite of edgier independent Canadian cinema, Katharine Isabelle gets a major workout in 88, a thriller that hinges on her ability to portrait mental breakdown.

Katharine Isabelle in a scene of 88.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

If there is someone who fits the profile of Canadian scream queen, it has to be Katharine Isabelle. While Katharine started working when she was eight, she first left a mark as the title character in the Ginger Snaps trilogy. Her association with the Soska Sisters led to the darkly hilarious American Mary and See No Evil 2. Isabelle also moonlights as Margot, the sister of the dastardly Mason Verger in the cult TV drama Hannibal.

Katharine returns to the multiplex as the lead in 88, a heady thriller that unfolds in two timelines: In one, Isabelle is Gwen, an amnesic woman trying to put together the pieces of her life while trying to avoid a violent gang nipping at her heels. In the other one, Katharine is Flamingo, a career criminal whose only soft spot is for her boyfriend. The kick is that Gwen and Flamingo are the same person, and her psyche has been shattered by a traumatic event the audience is only partially privy of.

88 is the latest collaboration of April Mullen (director) and Tim Dorion (scriptwriter). The duo, also responsible for GravyTrain and Dead Before Dawn, booked two veteran thesps to accompany Katharine in her ourney: Back to the Future’s Christopher Lloyd and perennial tough guy Michael Ironside.

Isabelle came on board 88 very late. In fact, the day before production started, she was still on the set of See No Evil 2: “I shot all night, took a red-eye, arrived to Toronto Pearson, drove to Niagara Falls and went straight to hair and make-up. It’s the way it goes.”

Katharine phones from Victoria. No matter where her job takes her, she always returns to her native British Columbia.

-       Did you approach your part in 88 as two different characters?

-       I had to, to keep them straight. I got the script a day and a half before we started shooting. April was great at keeping me on track with who was I, where were we, what just happened, and what was about to happen.

-       I imagine you had a lot of questions for the writer-director team.

-       I did, but there is not a lot of time when you’re shooting a low-budget independent Canadian feature. It was mostly last-minute panic questions.

-       How gruelling was the shooting, given that the entire movie hinges on you?

-       It was gruelling. I’m in every scene except one. It was long hours. But when you have a great crew and a great script, it’s not painful. Also, we didn’t do many takes and the pace we shot at worked in my favour. If you do the same scene again and again, it can get stale.

-       You seem to eat a lot of food in 88.

-       I did. There was a scene in particular in which I’m swallowing pancakes, milk and smoking a cigarette. I had a barf bucket next to me just in case. I’m not fond of pancakes and, if I was ever in Fear Factor and they give me a glass of cold milk, I would be out right away.

“I LIKE EFFICIENT, FAST AND PLEASANT DIRECTING”

Katharine has succeeded developing a career within the Canadian film and television industry (not a small feat). While occasionally she gets parts offered directly to her, Isabelle owns up to be a working actor: “It’s still a grind. I have to bust my butt, audition and go after stuff.”

-       To what degree you plan your career?

-       Two days is the furthest I plan ahead. It’s a very carny lifestyle. I can’t plan vacations, trips, or even doctor’s appointments more than a week in advance.

-       Because of your career choices, I imagine you often have more experience than the people directing you. How do you deal with newcomers?

-       Thankfully, I’m no diva by any stretch of the imagination. I just yell at them and tell them where to put the camera and the lights. “We want to eat, don’t we? We want to go home, don’t we? Let’s get this shit done.” It’s definitely helpful to have the experience. Whether they want to listen to me is another story.

-       How do you like to be directed?

-       Pretty matter of factly: “What do you need? More happy or more sad?” I’m very technical and I like efficient, fast and pleasant directing.

-       Do you remember a particularly bad adjustment?

-       I have run across directors who say “what you just did, don’t do that.” That’s not really helpful in any kind of way.

-       I was surprised you got killed in See No Evil 2 given that the Soska sisters directed it.

-       They don’t hold back, they are thrilled to kill me any time they can.

-       Are you in this season of Hannibal?

-       I’m allowed to say that I am. I’m not allowed to say more or something Hannibal-ish will happen to me.

-       The show has a very vocal fan community.

-       The fannibals are fantastic and I love them. This last year I went to a few conventions, and run into fans dressed as Margot Verger. It’s incredibly flattering. Hannibal is such an amazing and fucked up show.

-       What is the biggest misconception about you?

-       I don’t know… I believe people think I’m cooler than I am. (Asks her brother) Oh, a lot of people think I’m distant or standoffish and I end up hugging them and inviting them for drinks.

Katharine is currently working in the Wes Craven-produced feature The Girl in the Photographs and will return to Canadian screens later this year in How to Plan an Orgy in a Small Town.

88 is playing May 8th - 15th in Toronto, Vancouver, St. Catharine and Kanata.

HotDocs '15 - Day 7: Welcome to Leith/The Bolivian Case

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

Welcome to Leith (USA, 2015): In a foreboding corner of North Dakota you’ll find the town on Leith. The small, tight-knit community had no idea what was coming when a cantankerous, lonely man moved in. It wasn’t just a regular Joe trying to get away from it all, but militant white supremacist Craig Cobb, who soon enough started to buy land for his fellow neo-Nazis.

The excellent Welcome to Leith chronicles the legal battle that ensued between Leith inhabitants -who grew tired of Cobb’s antics very quickly- and the xenophobe himself, backed up by the NSM. Provocation was the name of the game for Cobb (who claimed his revolting hate speech was protected by the First Amendment), but miscalculated the endurance and commonality demonstrated by the townsfolk.

Many of the documentaries featured in HotDocs are bound to provoke a reaction from the audience, but Welcome to Leith was the first one that actually upset me. The tactics of Cobb and his fellow white supremacists are troubling, but since they have enough awareness to remain within the law, they get can get away with a lot (harassment, distress), more so in a place as isolated as Leith.

The film is a must watch. The storytelling is strong and the imagery will give you pause. Here is hoping for wide distribution. Four and a half stars.

The Bolivian Case (Bolivia/Australia, 2015): The story The Bolivian Case tries to cover is a fascinating one. Three Norwegian girls vacationing in the South American nation are caught trying to smuggle cocaine out of Bolivia. One escapes with the assistance of the Scandinavian consulate, the other two land in jail… until one of them becomes a celebrity of sorts in Norway and leaves the country with the assistance of a magazine while on bail (!). Furthermore, other members of the smuggling ring are on trial in the European country.

This is a story that oozes sex, race and media issues. Unfortunately, director Violeta Ayala chooses to address them directly instead of letting these wide and complex matters emerge organically from the narrative. Furthermore, The Bolivian Case has some structural issues in which the first half has all the strength and the second (focused on the dull judicial process in Norway) limps to the finish line. The material is there. The scenes inside the Cochabamba jail are fascinating: The place operates as a citadel, to the point the two incarcerated girls become pregnant during their stint in prison. Re-editing would benefit the film greatly. One and a half stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 6: Chuck Norris vs. Communism/War of Lies

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

Chuck Norris vs. Communism (Romania/USA, 2015): A usually successful strategy to make a documentary is to take a very specific phenomenon and see how it relates to a larger movement. The terrific doc Chuck Norris vs. Communism takes this approach and runs with it, with the added bonus of one fascinating subject.

During the Eighties, the only way to have access to American movies in Romania was through counterfeit VHS tapes. Western-made films were deemed detrimental to Ceausescu’s establishment and contradicted the Communist Manifesto. But the growing popularity of VCRs and a booming black market allowed the unhappy population access to Stallone, Schwarzenegger and Norris’ finest. Not only this trend undermined the oppressive regime, it may have played a part in the movement that toppled the government in 1989.

One of the bootleg chain links steals the movie: Irina Nistor. While maintaining a government day job, Nistor managed to translate over 3,000 movies (she didn’t dubbed them, just added an additional voice track to the original sound). Her voice became a staple for an entire generation of kids, who ended up associating it with the notions of insurgence and freedom.

Chuck Norris vs. Communism is canny enough to keep Nistor out of sight until the end and let those who lived through the events depicted in the film tell the story. This doc is a testament to the power of community. Four and a half stars.

War of Lies (Germany, 2014): Ever wondered about the origins of the materials Colin Powell presented to the UN in 2003, when making his case to invade Iraq? According to the official narrative, the source was Rafed Aljanabi, a chemical engineer who worked at a weapons manufacture facility in Iraq. Aljanabi wilfully collaborated with German intelligence and the CIA to give the US an excuse to bring down Saddam Hussein, or so most news sources declared.

According to War of Lies, there was more to the story, mostly that the engineer was more ambivalent about his role in the conspiracy, and that the information he provided (later demonstrated to be false) was at the specific request of his liaison with the intelligence services.

Director Matthias Bittner tracked down Aljanabi and convinced him to participate in a feature-length interview. While his tale is damning, Rafed comes across as self-serving and arrogant. By excusing his actions as “means to an end” (Saddam’s fall), he exhibits the same moral relativism than those who supposedly coerced him into lying.

Bittner in turn doesn’t try hard enough to poke holes into Aljanabi’s story (his testimony is the only one in the film), and his continuous efforts to get Rafed to reconsider the morality of his actions -which led to a war that has caused thousands of casualties- amount to very little.  Two stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 5: Raiders!/The Nightmare

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

While this year’s HotDocs features plenty of hard-hitting, thought-provoking features, a couple of crowd-pleasers have made it into the line-up. Here are two of them.

Raiders! (USA, 2015): For most of their teenage years, three kids spent every summer filming a shot-by-shot recreation of Raiders of the Lost Ark. With no more resources than sheer will and gung-ho spirit, the boys succeeded for the most part: The adaptation became a cult film championed by the likes of Eli Roth and Harry Knowles. One scene was missing though: An expensive, complex action sequence at a landing pad involving Indy, three Nazi planes and a hulking henchman.

This hilarious coming-of-age doc Raiders!: The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made follows two of the boys, all grown-up, as they try to complete their magnum opus. The storyline (compelling in its own right) serves as a pretext to revisit the shooting of the rest of the movie. Children of the 80’s, Eric Zala, Chris Strompolos and Jayson Lamb come across as extremely ingenious and phenomenally irresponsible (some scenes involving stunts and fire will give you pause before cracking up).

Raiders! also offers glimpses of growing pains and dreams fading away, which only makes the movie more human and relatable. Four stars.

The Nightmare (USA, 2015): Three years ago, director Rodney Asher interviewed nine people to explore different deconstructions of the movie The Shining. The outcome became the doc Room 237, a tremendously entertaining exercise that gave the same tribune to legitimate readings (the massacre of Native Americans in Colorado as background) and crackpot theories (Stanley Kubrick’s atonement for faking the moon landing). Room 237 was more about cinema as an individual experience than about interpretations, but the outward layers gathered most of the attention.

The Nightmare is shaped similarly, but lacks the overarching undercurrent: A group of people of different backgrounds share a common condition: Sleep paralysis. Not only they awake in the middle of the night unable to move a muscle, every single one recalls a malevolent presence in the vicinity.

While the film creates at times moments of genuine dread, there is little interest in finding a reasonable explanation (or a consistent one, for that matter). Other than insinuating the possibility that mysterious entities covet the subjects’ souls, there is no method to this madness. The Nightmare is undeniably entertaining, but it’s just empty calories. Two stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 4: Deep Web/Western

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

A common thread on this year’s HotDocs’ line-up is the number of films depicting the conflict between the law and modern life. Often, legislation is not speedy enough or lacks the tools to tackle grey areas related to technology and human behaviour.

Deep Web (USA, 2015): Director Alex Winter may be better known as Bill Preston from the Bill and Ted movies, but is also one of the few filmmakers able to deal with the dark corners of the web with enough knowledge to understand what he is doing.

At first sight, Winter’s stance in Deep Web is hard to sustain, if all the information you have on the subject comes from news magazines. According to the film, Silk Road (the online open market that became the symbol of the deep net) was actually a force for good until the FBI shut it down in 2013. Silk Road made drug transactions violence-free, and was never a haven for hitmen and child pornographers as we’ve been led to believe.

The documentary smartest move is to make the film about the alleged creator and administrator of Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht, aka Dread Pirate Roberts. A brilliant libertarian, Ulbricht turned the marketplace into a platform for the right to privacy. Sure enough, Ross was declared guilty of trafficking, money laundering and hacking, yet secrecy and straight-up obstruction during the process point at powerful forces at play.

Deep Web keeps the eyes on the prize, outside a couple of detours to engage with the cypher-punk movement (deserving of a movie of its own). It may not engage the audience emotionally, but it’s pure brain candy. The narrator, you ask? Keanu Reeves, who else. Three and a half stars.

Western (USA, 2015): Across the border between Texas and Mexico there are two mirror communities -Eagle Nest and Piedras Negras- who for decades maintained a close relationship. Cattle business benefited both economies and Rio Grande was more of a common ground than a border.

All that came crushing down when the cartels moved their operations to the neighbourhood. Violence began to seep into Piedras Negras, while the US government reacted by suspending cattle trading and putting a (fairly useless) fence in the riverbank.

There is a lot of artistry in Western. Instead of using the genre’s oldest tools –talking heads, graphs, archive footage-, directors Bill and Turner Ross employ a cinema verité approach. They let the narrative emerge organically through scenes of raw beauty. While brave, the strategy slows the story to a crawl. Western is also hurt by its main subjects, neither particularly articulate or compelling.  Fans of Terrence Malick will eat this one up. Two and a half stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 3: Deprogrammed

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

Deprogrammed (USA, 2015): Cult deprogramming is a complicated affair: Those in need of it won’t participate voluntarily and kidnapping and unlawful confinement is, well, illegal. In the early 70’s –the heyday of religious cult activity- a high school dropout became the foremost specialist in the subject.

Deprogrammed tells the story of said man, Ted Patrick. His methods were questionable, his results 50/50, but undoubtedly he was onto something.  His main skill was his capacity to poke holes into ideologies. His modus operandi? Get the cult members to start thinking by themselves again.

Early on, Patrick got some leash from the law. He was frequently accused of kidnapping (even though parents hired him, his “patients” were old enough to refuse), but was seldom convicted and not for long, especially after the events in Guyana. During the 80’s however, legislation became tougher and the satanic cult paranoia actually got innocents damaged for life (see the West Memphis Three).

The documentary does a superb job depicting the nebulous area in which Patrick operated. Deprogrammed also establishes the need of a new strategy, especially now that ISIS and Al Qaeda is recruiting from among disgruntled young westerners and the law discourages an approach such as Patrick’s. Fascinating stuff. Three and a half stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 2: Thought Crimes/The Arms Drop

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

The emergence of two major players in the documentary field –Netflix and CNN- plus the continuous strength of HBO is doing wonders for the genre. If there was a time a couple of outliers were the only ones to leave a mark in the box office, now documentaries are easily accessible and are more poignant than feature dramas by a mile. Yesterday, the CNN-acquired The Wolfpack had the crowd going. Today, the HBO-backed Thought Crimes drew a significant audience.

Thought Crimes (USA, 2015): It could have been a curio: NY cop Gilberto Valle was convicted in 2013 of conspiracy to commit a crime (kidnap and eat women). He used the police database to track down female acquaintances and discussed online what he would do to them in graphic detail. Here is the kicker: Valle never acted on it. In fact, his defense claimed he was voicing a fantasy in an appropriate environment (namely, a fetish website).

Director Erin Lee Carr taps on an interesting subject: As hard to stomach as Valle’s sexual fantasies are (and it gets pretty rough), he may have been penalized for a thought crime. The line is very grey as intention is a critical factor. Instead of staying with the abstract discussion about the limits of freedom of expression, Carr goes back to Valle time and time again. Her decision is unimpeachable cinematically (the former cop is hard to read and disturbingly watchable), but the matter of thought policing could have used additional scrutiny. Also, some of the recreations (like Valle sitting in front of a computer screen) have a film school feel to them.

Regardless, Carr knows how to tell a story. Shouldn’t be a surprise: Erin is the daughter of the great, much missed David Carr. Three stars.

The Arms Drop (Denmark, 2014): In 1995, a Danish citizen, Niels Holck, planned to drop dozens of AK-47 in West Bengal. The idea was to arm local rebels against the repressive and vicious provincial government. In order to achieve this, Holck hired a British arms dealer, Peter Bleach, who in turn kept the English government and the MI-5 posted.

The plan went sour. Holck managed to escape, but his exploits didn’t go unnoticed and India demanded his extradition. Bleach landed in jail and the British intelligence denied knowing of him.

Oddly, this is just the setup of The Arms Drop, a fascinating spy story in which two guys who thought they were players realize they were just pawns. The film gets an extra oomph from the compelling Holck and Bleach. The British in particular, stiff-upper-lip, prim and proper comes across as more sympathetic. Twenty years later, Bleach seems still surprised he was betrayed by his government, and nurses the illusion of revenge against the agent that almost got him hanged.

The problem with The Arms Drop is that not even the audience has any clue what was the goal of the forces at play, outside Holck’s. There are no theories or insights, just two men fumbling in the dark, trying to remain afloat. Three stars.

HotDocs '15 - Day 1: Drone/The Wolfpack

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

Drone

While documentaries seldom get the same distribution opportunities as feature films, there is a built-in audience looking for them. HotDocs, one of the foremost festivals dedicated to the genre, is already attracting crowds in Toronto. Judging by the first two films I had the chance to watch, the 2015 version is looking strong.

Drone (Sweden, 2014): The War on Terror’s favourite toy, drones are transforming the nature of warfare: They are cheap, broadly effective, don’t require a crew and can be operated from miles away (namely, a barely secluded location in Nevada). But drones also have introduced a battery of moral and legal issues, most of which the main offender hasn’t bother to confront.

This Swedish doc by Tonje Hessen Schei covers a lot of ground in succinct fashion: Recruitment in videogame conventions (!), PTSD in drone pilots, the lawlessness of drone operations and, above all, the indiscriminate killing of civilians (arguably over three thousand since 2001 in Pakistan and Afghanistan). Turns out the unmanned aerial vehicles are a lot less discerning than we have been led to believe.

If there is any problem with Drone is that each angle it covers deserves a documentary of its own. Three and a half stars.

The Wolfpack (USA, 2015): The winner of the Sundance Film Festival’s Grand Jury Prize has nothing to do with The Hangover movies (thank gawd). It’s actually the story of the Angulos, seven siblings holed up in a Lower East Side apartment in Manhattan. Their dad prevented them from leaving their home growing up, so their only experience of society was through movies, thousands of them.

Slowly, a cute setup (the brothers recreating their favourite Tarantino films) gives way to a much darker reality. While the teens are pleasant, home-schooled and oddly well adjusted, their perception of life outside is warped, perhaps irremediably. Director Crystal Moselle shot the Angulo family for over four years. During this period, the siblings -tentatively first but with growing resolve- conquered the fear that clouded their development.

At no point The Wolfpack comes across as patronizing. For the most part, the filmmaker treats the kids as peers and, in turn, the Angulos reward Moselle with endearing openness. Here is a director fully aware of documentary filmmaking golden rule: If you have good subjects, let them do the talking. Four stars.

REVIEW: Cast No Shadow Looms Large

·      This powerful allegory about child abuse deserves notice.

By Jorge Ignacio Castillo

THE PLOT: Jude, a 14 year-old on the cusp of teenagedom finds himself overwhelmed by new feelings he can hardly understand. An essentially good kid, he boy lacks decent role models: His dad, a small town dealer and user, lacks the tools and the will to lead his son through his development.

Unable to deal with the hardships of life in a small town (where he is poorly regarded), Jude finds shelter in fantasy: He believes a troll who lives in the woods is stalking him and getting him in trouble. A shed of light comes in the form of Alfreda, an eccentric old woman –thought by some to be a witch- who may hold information regarding Jude’s mother.

CRITIQUE: Unassuming and minimalistic to a fault, Cast No Shadow is exceptionally effective. Director Christian Sparkes gets superb performances from a mostly unknown cast, including the young protagonist, Percy Hynes-White. His credible, understated work anchors the film and earns the sympathies of the audience, in spite of some questionable behaviour.

Sparkes use of Newfoundland’ scenery serves the story. Instead of abusing of the province’s landscapes, goes for an American Gothic approach: Still beautiful, but unpolished, with a palpable sense of danger in some corners.

The potentially cheesy troll element (see, uh, Troll) is used wisely. Without openly showing it, the movie never closes the door at the possibility that the creature exists. The mystery is solved in a chilling and effective manner and gives the film a new –yet perfectly appropriate- perspective.

WHAT WORKS:

·      There is a noticeable effort to make the main characters multidimensional. Even the diciest character, Jude’s dad (a toxic presence by all accounts), can elicit a modicum of compassion.

·      The relationship between Jude and his would-be girlfriend is problematic, but dexterously handled and informs the protagonist’s mental state faultlessly.

WHAT DOESN’T:

·      The conclusion. The subtlety that characterizes most of the film is lost briefly, but at a critical juncture.

·      During the denouement, Cast No Shadow gives the sensation the screenwriter painted himself into a corner. His solution -instead of leaving the audience imagining the possibilities- is abrupt and unsatisfactory, particularly after all the audience has been through with the character.

RATING: *** 1/2

RATING (CANADIAN CURVE): ****

Cast No Shadow is now playing in St. John, Toronto and Halifax.