MR. TURNER (TIFF 2014 - TIFF SPECIAL PRESENTATION) - Review By Greg Klymkiw

Mr. Turner
Dir. Mike Leigh
Starring: Timothy Spall, Dorothy Atkinson, Marion Bailey, Paul Jesson, Lesley Manville, Martin Savage, Joshua McGuire, Ruth Sheen, David Horovitch, Karl Johnson

Review By Greg Klymkiw

It seems fitting that the first film biography of the great Romantic landscape painter JMW Turner, oft-referred to as "the painter of light", is the product of one of the world's greatest living directors, Mike Leigh (Life is Sweet, Naked, Secrets & Lies, Vera Drake, Topsy-Turvy).

The exquisite properties of light in cinema, the glorious dance of film through a projector, the astonishing grace, promise and amalgamation of so many mediums into one, all driven by exposing and rendering the luminosity which, Turner proclaimed on his deathbed as God itself, is what yields this astonishing, moving celebration of a supremely important visual artist.

In a sense, Turner captured the qualities of light and motion on canvas in ways I always felt are what led to those same properties finding their way to be emblazoned forever upon celluloid to capture the heart, soul and visual radiance of illumination, of nature, of life itself. Not unlike insects drawn to amber to be sealed and preserved for all time, Turner's brilliance was creating work that could live forever and inform all visual arts. In his own way, he might well have had the soul of a filmmaker if technology had somehow moved its way up to meet him halfway. Thankfully, we have Turner's legacy of genius, and now we have Mike Leigh's glorious film.

Mr. Turner is perfection incarnate. It is so magnificent that one cannot imagine a greater testament to an artist and his art. Leigh captures a man, an aesthetic movement, a time of ideas and exploration and ultimately, he creates the means by which we can transport ourselves to an era where the sky was the limit with a simple, but deeply felt brush stroke.

Beginning with Turner (Timothy Spall) in middle age and continuing to his death, Mike Leigh pulls off the near-impossible in capturing what being a great artist is. Making use of a myriad of sumptuously-composed tableaux through the lens of cinematographer Dick Pope, Leigh gives us a glimpse into the process that defines artistry, but also allows us a fly on the wall perspective of what indeed might have made this great man thrive. Most wondrously, Leigh achieves this by cinematically recreating and/or imagining both Turner's work and what precisely the great artist could well have seen with his own eyes to inspire his breathtaking visions on canvas.

We delight in numerous scenes of Turner creating, socializing amongst the rich and famous, sparring with other artists and various intelligentsia of England's literary, critical, academic and artistic elite and most of all, Leigh provides us with a deeply felt and meticulously researched film that allows us to experience, at least from Leigh's considered eye, what made Turner tick as a human being. On one hand, he valued a Bohemian lifestyle, while on the other, was able to traverse with considerable freedom due to his wealth and fame. And much as we might crave a wholly sentimental portrait, Leigh fleshes Turner out, warts and all.

Turner eschews his duties as a father to the daughters born from an affair earlier in life and furthermore treats his long-toiling maid servant as a sexual receptacle for his gropings and loin-thrusts, in spite of the mounting ravages of psoriasis which wrack her body. Conversely, hs eals shown to be a man infused with great romance and tenderness, especially in his relations with a widow who at first provides him with seaside lodgings and eventually, a bed to share. Even more passionately, Turner is revealed to bear congenial familiarity and the deepest love for his father, a former barber and now his personal assistant and manager. Turner's connection to his father seems to know no earthly bounds and we both feel and believe it with the same conviction that leads our jaws to drop when he displays utter disregard and contempt for the mother of his illegitimate daughters.

This whole tale unravels in an unconventional manner which makes us think we're on board a solid narrative engine, thrusting ever forward, but in reality, we're cascading on a near-poetic series of vignettes, an episodic odyssey of an artist during one of his richest periods. It is Turner's discoveries as an artist that really carry us along, but the creative vessel, in spite of the occasional pock marks of selfishness and self-graitification in Turner, is also replete with humanity and we experience the man's ever-increasing love for life just as he's also at a point where he begins to sense his own mortality.

The pace of Leigh's film is leisurely, but never less than fascinating. He creates a world of so far away, so long ago, yet there is no fairy tale quality at play here, but rather an acute sense of time and place, so much so that we feel like the proceedings are rooted in a strict adherence to reality and historical accuracy. This, of course, is not to suggest there is no magic since Leigh conjures scene after scene which dazzles us with the sheer magic inherent in the way in which people must have lived. The dialogue and conversations, the drawing room and parlour discussions, the gorgeous, heart-achingly beautiful slowness of life, all unfold in a manner to allow both audience and characters to take in every moment and breath along the way. It is a pace perfectly in keeping with a world we'll never experience, but that we can participate in as viewers and get an overall sense of the pieces of Turner's time which Leigh captures so indelibly for our benefit.

There isn't a single false note in any of the exquisite performances. Even background extras live and breathe with the stuff of both humanity and fully-fleshed character. Though the pleasures from all principal and supporting players are almost incalculable, the film finally belongs to the astonishing Timothy Spall as Turner. Delightfully gruff, curmudgeonly, jowly and turtle-paced in everything, lest he spies a natural beauty of the world which ramps up his facial and physical gestures well beyond his normal demeanour, are just a few of the extraordinary feats of acting Spall offers. But Leigh has made a film of the deepest humanity and so too does Spall render his performance. There are moments in Spall's performance which will never, ever leave you. One of the greatest of these sequences is a look of despair Spall creates for Turner as his father dies before him. It's a look that blends sobs and laughs, tears and a crazed toothy smile and a sense that we are witnessing a man who becomes all too aware of life's dichotomous properties.

And yet, there is always the light, the glorious light. How appropriate then that Leigh begins and ends his film with the Sun in all its splendour. How, in a film that's all about light, could it ever be anything else?

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** 5-Stars

Mr. Turner plays as a Special Presentation at TIFF 2014 and will be released in Canada via Mongrel Media.

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THE DROP (TIFF 2014 - WORLD PREMIERE - TIFF SPECIAL PRESENTATION) - Review By Greg Klymkiw

The Drop (2014)
Dir. Michaël R. Roskam
Scr. Dennis Lehane
Starring: Tom Hardy, Noomi Rapace, James Gandolfini, Matthias Schoenaerts

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Cousin Marv (James Gsndolfini in his last screen appearance) owns one of those warm, dark, well-lived-in neighbourhood Brooklyn taverns that feels like a home away from home for its working class patrons. You know the joint. Every burgh has them. It's a place to catch a game on the TV above the bar and shoot the shit with your best buds. The place is full of memories, most of them good. Some, however, are not so good.

Bob Saginowski (Tom Hardy) is the quiet personable bartender, a neighbourhood boy with the kind of two-fisted warmth you'd be likely to find in a Rocky Balboa-type, not in the ring, but rather the dirty, mean streets. Yeah, Bob's a thug, but at first glance, you'd never guess. You could know him your whole life and never know it.

Bob is certainly a far cry from the repellent Eric Deeds (Matthias Schoenaerts, brilliant star of director Roskam's great first feature Bullhead), a loudmouthed braggart and overall slime bag who pumped up his street-cred in prison by admitting to the killing of an old pal of Bob's. Deeds also used to date local gal Nadia (Noomi Rapace). She unwisely gave him the benefit of the doubt and suffered his mental and physical abuse upon her.

The paths of all four inevitably cross in screenwriter Dennis Lehane's solid character-driven crime drama that's directed with the low-key, slow-burn styling Michaël R. Roskam brought to the very odd and chilling Belgian crime thriller Bullhead in 2011. It's a tale of redemption and revenge that often feels familiar, but every so often, confounds you by taking turns in the plot that are almost always unexpected.

What feels initially like a heist picture and mystery when Cousin Marv's bar is held-up by masked thugs, transforms into a gentle romance that begins with Bob and Nadia discovering an abused Pit Bull puppy her front yard trash can.

What ultimately drives everything though are the demands made of Marv by the vile Chechen mobsters who use the bar as a drop point to launder their dirty money. The thugs, you see, have made off with mafia money and the gangsters are holding Marv responsible.

As the elements of this tale unravel in a slow, deliberate fashion, with emphasis placed on getting to know the protagonists amidst an extremely danger-fraught situation, the film eventually builds to a climax of almost unbearable suspense and shocking violence. We can feel the lava roiling and we know there's going to be an eruption, but the degree to which the molten elements of Lehane's great writing explodes surpasses all expectations.

It's what makes The Drop so good - familiarity with the tropes of the genre that keep being skewed.

The Drop is Roskam's first film in America and proves to be a fine sophomore work from a director who already proved to be a stylish talent to watch with his previous film, but now, after happily lucking out with a superbly-written script by the first-rate Lehane, he's solidly placed himself at the forefront of foreign directors who might well be the saviours of contemporary American cinema.

You can't really argue with that.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***1/2

The Drop has its World Premiere as a Special Presentation at TIFF 2014. For further info visit TIFF's website HERE. Distributor is Fox Searchlight Pictures.

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L'IL QUINQUIN - TIFF 2014 - (Contemporary World Cinema) - Review By Greg Klymkiw

Ah, the bucolic lives of rural inbreds.

L'il Quinquin (aka P'tit Quinquin) (2014)
Dir. Bruno Dumont
Starring: Alane Delhaye, Lucy Caron, Bernard Pruvost, Philippe Jore

Review By Greg Klymkiw

I pretty much can't stand Bruno Dumont. His oh-so ironic plunges into northern French rural culture have always been rendered with a heavy enough hand that I've found it almost impossible to respond on any level but contempt. I especially hated his inexplicably acclaimed L'Humanite which involved an investigation of an especially brutal act of violence punctuated by scenes of cops actually taking weekends off to go to the seaside, eat cheese and sip wine. The non-thriller exploration of character and culture grew tiresome and just made me long for some of the more straight-up Gallic policiers I'd come to love over the years.

Though L'il Quinquin also involves an investigation into a series of serial killings similar in setting to the aforementioned, I was shocked to find myself sufficiently intrigued to sit all the way through this film's mammoth length of 200 minutes. Focusing upon a group of kids living in a seaside resort, the film is an all-out comedy and as such, works moderately well.

Focusing upon the pug-ugly title character and his friendship with a pretty little girl, one gets a sense of how mundane their lives are in the tiny one-horse village they live in and their antics are not without amusement value. Dumont's social observations seem less heavy-handed than usual and within the commitment to laughs, I daresay he's crafted a pretty darn successful outing this time round.

The boy and girl, in addition to a few local kids, happen upon the strange sight of a murder scene being investigated by the local police chief (who makes Inspector Clouseau look like a Rhodes Scholar) and his even stupider partner. The murders are curious. The victims have been hacked up and their body parts appear to be shoved deep into the assholes of cows lying dead in a variety of unlikely locales. (I have to admit I appreciated blood, viscera and fingers spilling out of a cow's ass.) Quinquin, strictly through his boredom and powers of observation proves to be an unwitting partner in the investigation (though the chief inspector has taken an intense dislike to the little rascal).

The movie is often knee-slappingly hilarious and its stately pace takes on a kind of clever deadpan that allows for it to never inspire looking at your watch to see when you can safely vacate the cinema. The performances of the kids are delightfully natural and the adults are all suitably bumbling or ignorant. Though this all could have proven intolerable, it's imbued with something resembling heart. This was probably a stretch for Dumont, but he pulls it off. The movie is sufficiently engaging that I'm actually looking forward to his next film. When it comes to directors I have no use for, that's quite an accomplishment.

L'il Quinquin is distributed by Kino Lorber and is playing in the Contemporary World Cinema series at TIFF 2014. For tix, times, dates and venues, visit the TIFF website by clicking HERE.

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LIFE IN A FISHBOWL (aka Vonarstræti) - TIFF 2014 (TIFF Discovery) - Review By Greg Klymkiw

In search of redemption:
WHORE, WRITER, BANKER

TIFF 2014 (Discovery)
Life in a Fishbowl (aka Vonarstræti) (2014)
Dir. Baldvin Zophoníasson
Script: Birgir Steinarsson & Zophoníasson
Starring: Hera Hilmar, Thor Kristjansson, Þorsteinn Bachmann

Review By Greg Klymkiw

As a Canadian who writes about movies, has made more than a few movies and loves movies, I'm ashamed to the depths of my bowels at having to admit that the highest grossing Canadian film over the last year was the utterly loathsome flop The Mortal Instrument: City of Bones.

By virtue of our nation's tax credit system and international co-production agreements and the blatant, sorrowful waste of our talent and locations, this sickeningly moronic teen fantasy-adventure based on a dreadful franchise of illiterate-ture, aimed at the lowest common denominator of those who purport to read, is no more Canadian, in terms of its content (if you want to call it that, I prefer to describe it as faecal matter), than a hairy, barefoot, offensively unwashed, stove-top-hat-adorned, shotgun-toting, Ozark-dwelling hillbilly.

Oh Canada, how dare anyone stand on guard for thee?

As these thoughts of national shame permeate the gelatinous goo of my brain matter, I seek respite from the horror and instead, as a longtime cottager in Gimli, Manitoba, I look to the tiny country of which I feel honorarily bound by virtue of so many years celebrating Islendingadagurinn and secretly whacking off to photographs of those grand old ladies crowned each year as "New Iceland's" Fjallkona.

Yes, Iceland, I'm looking at you, baby and I rejoice that your audiences recently supported a superb new indigenous film and turned it into a humungous domestic box office hit, higher and more powerful than the mighty Mount Askja.

That the film is a dark, disturbing, multi-layered, hauntingly textured and deeply moving multi-character drama that focuses on the legacy of three major banking institutions collapsing during the Icelandic Financial Crises of 2008, is what ultimately makes this picture's existence and success even more of a victory. North American exhibitors, broadcasters and distributors of motion picture product would never even green-light, much less allow an indigenous film with this subject matter to be seen by those who would embrace it. Thankfully, one of Canada's most visionary sales companies, Raven Banner, has done us proud by acquiring this motion picture for distribution.

Life in a Fishbowl was a very difficult and challenging work for me to get through - not because it lacked anything aesthetically, but because it's so damn rich and emotionally complex. That said, like all truly great drama, the surface layers work with very simple, basic standards to allow for its textures of theme, character and narrative complexity to bubble and roil like molten lava and when necessary, explode with the force of Icelandic volcanoes. The screenplay by director Baldvin Zophoníasson and Birgir Steinarsson practically sings with a musical quality - highs, lows, moments of contemplation and some sequences that both soar and jangle. When I eventually looked up the film's credits, something my readers and colleagues know I only do after I see a movie, I was delighted to learn that this was the first shot at screenwriting from the singer-songwriter of the legendary Icelandic rock band Maus. It made perfect sense to me. Let's not forget that one of the best contemporary screenwriters in the world, Nick Cave, has a similar pedigree to this film's co-writer Birgir Steinarsson.

Life in a Fishbowl compellingly and powerfully focuses on three characters who live out their lives separately after the horrendous Icelandic financial crisis, but all of whom intersect in a variety of interesting and gloriously meshed ways.

Eik (Hera Hilmar) is a drop-dead-gorgeous single mother who works in a pre-school. Ravaged with debt, she puts on a brave face for her child and others in her life. She has a strained relationship with her parents. They seem well-off enough to assist her, but even if they could, one doubts Eik would accept such help in light of an extremely horrendous and harrowing series of events from her childhood. Eik's nights are occasionally filled with part-time work to supplement her meagre income, but it's the kind of work she approaches by shutting herself down emotionally with as much inner strength as she can muster.

Hilmar's performance here is astonishing. She evokes a wide-range of emotions and the camera clearly loves her. She's got all the potential to be snatched up by the Hollywood machine as her star potential ascends very high, indeed. That said. her work here is so challenging and luminous, one questions whether she'd ever get the kind of roles in mainstream work that she's more than capable of playing. She's already been used in such typically cliched work as David S. Goyer's slick, faux-sophisticated, but empty TV series Da Vinci's Demons. Ugh! Please give this lady work worthy of her talent. Then again, one supposes she can always count on Icelandic, European or independent filmmakers to fill the need for truly great roles.

Móri (Þorsteinn Bachmann) is an acclaimed and much-beloved Icelandic literary figure, but he also lives alone in a house that seems untouched, as if it were a museum piece reflecting both happier times and tragedy. He's also an alcoholic. Many great writers have been and he, like they, uses booze to numb the pain which wracks his soul. He's written a new novel, but it's his first in a long time and while waiting for word from his publisher, he whiles away his time performing poetry in a local "arts" bar, downing gallons of fiery rotgut with other drunks in a less-than-upscale dive and during his benders, he's prone to both accidents and being beaten, robbed and left on the pavement by his "fair-weather", equally-soused cronies.

When Móri meets Eik and her daughter, he develops a loving friendship with both and even manages to hit the wagon. Unfortunately, all the elements that make his life have new, added meaning, are also the very things which threaten to knock him off the wagon.

Bachmann, like Hilmar, offers a deeply absorbing and complex performance. His moments of kindness, humour and even paternal caring betray his sensitivity, but he, like Eik, looks to shutting down emotionally. Móri, however, seeks booze to turn the inner faucet of his soul to the "off" position.

(As a side note, there were a few moments in Bachmann's performance wherein I was happily reminded of a legendary night of drunken laughs, tears, hugs and general male bonding in Toronto's Bistro 990, the now-defunct TIFF watering hole, where I shall never forget hoisting more-than-a-few with the great German documentary filmmaker and ZDF executive Alexander Bohr and the brilliant Icelandic auteur Friðrik Þór Friðriksson. But, I digress.)

Sölvi (Thor Kristjansson) is a former pro-athlete who has been sidelined by a debilitating injury and now works as an executive in a financial corporation. Here, he seems destined for success, but his immediate superior is the kind of immoral scumbag who'd think nothing of perpetrating the kind of criminal actions that brought Iceland to its knees. Sölvi is placed in charge of a sleazy real-estate deal which will buy up a swath of properties to erect a new mega-complex.

Kristjansson deftly handles the complexities of this role wherein his character's sense of morality is challenged by his need to provide for his beautiful wife and child. After all, in tough times, how can anyone in this position place integrity ahead of business? This is also a business of temptations beyond getting-ahead, it is a world where part of getting the deal done involves bonding with male colleagues in the exploitation of women-for-hire.

There is a sequence of debauchery on a Florida yacht which clearly rivals the antics of Leonardo DiCaprio and Jonah Hill in The Wolf of Wall Street, Martin Scorsese's thrilling biopic of financial scumbag Jordan Belfort. I use this harrowing sequence of whoring and boozing as one which best exemplifies Zophoníasson's superb direction and proves that the excellent work he displayed in his phenomenal debut Jitters was no fluke.

Zophoníasson's touch here contrasts Scorsese's in a very interesting way. Where the Maestro from Little Italy injected immorality with a dazzling virtuosity that heightened the depravity by exploiting it, Zophoníasson captures the exploitation with a kind of documentarian's eye - it's not fun at all, at least not for the audience. In fact, it's gross and horrific what these grown men are up to on this yacht of banal depravity. Brilliantly though, Zophoníasson and Steinarsson's screenplay allows for a series of subtle directorial movements into territory that borders on another sort of dazzling style - one that is tender and romantic, but that eventually dovetails into something else altogether. There's a denouement to this sequence which occurs a few scenes later that is as maddening as it is heartbreaking.

One film "critic" recently complained that Life in a Fishbowl is hampered by "plot weaknesses and a tendency to the obvious", but what these purported weaknesses might be, are not (as per usual in mainstream criticism), detailed in any way, nor is the review forthcoming in explaining what is meant by a "tendency to the obvious". Yes, metaphorically one cannot help but see these characters like those fish in a bowl who have clearly been trapped into swimming endlessly in every available which-way with no hope of ever adding new boundaries or horizons, but it's these simple visual symbols that allow for films to be truly great and transcend them the way Zophoníasson's film clearly does.

The simple surface elements of the narrative also give way to layers of emotional and narrative complexity. The aforementioned whoring-on-the-boat sequence is just one of many moments wherein the filmmakers transcend the tools that only the very best will adhere to in order to create work that has lasting value and yes, maybe, just maybe, hope.

Make no mistake, Life in a Fishbowl is blessed with qualities that are not ephemeral. The movie is universal. It's what makes movies worth seeing.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **** FOUR STARS

Life in a Fishbowl is playing during the 2014 edition of the Toronto International Film Festival in the Discovery series. It's been programmed by one of the world's leading proponents of Nordic, Scandic and Canadian Cinema, Steve Gravestock. For further information on dates, times and tickets, visit TIFF's website HERE. Raven Banner is the film's distributor.

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MY OLD LADY - TIFF 2014 (Special Presentation) - Review By Greg Klymkiw

Maggie Smith. Kevin Kline. Head of boar.
What could possibly go wrong?

My Old Lady (2014)
Dir. Israel Horovitz
Starring: Maggie Smith, Kevin Kline, Kristin Scott-Thomas

Review By Greg Klymkiw

That 75-year-old writer Israel Horovitz has remain tethered to the theatrical roots of adapting his play to the big screen is not the main problem plaguing his belated feature-length directorial debut. The source material and, by extension, his screenplay for My Old Lady, is afflicted with a kind of narrative schizophrenia.

It's not, however, without some merit.

When we first meet Mathias Gold (Kevin Kline), he's penniless. Happily, his rudderless life in New York is behind him as he's depleted what little dough he had to fly across the pond and secure the Parisian home willed to him by his estranged and recently deceased father. Real estate values in Gay-Paree being sky's the limit, especially the choice property he's come into, Mathias feels like he's finally hit the freedom-58 jackpot.

His series of failed marriages, unpublished novels and flopper-roo suicide attempt seem like so many dust bunnies sucked up into a vacuum cleaner. Before hitting the big 6-0, maybe, just maybe, he's going to do some real living.

This, however, proves easier said than done. He is, after all, in France. It seems dear, departed daddy purchased the property under the perverse real estate laws of le beau pays de la romance and he's stuck with the original owner, the 92-year-old Mathilde (Maggie Smith), until she dies. Now, at this ripe age, you'd think it wouldn't be a problem, but the terms of such a purchase, known as a viager, stipulates that the rightful property owner must pay the original owner a generous monthly stipend. If these payments ever go into default, the buyer loses the property to the original owner.

Mathias has no money. None. Zip. Nada. He also has no home. Until he can figure out how to make the monthly payments, he's also forced into renting a room from the old lady. They do snipe ever-so amusingly and eruditely at one another. Never fear, though, Horovitz doesn't take us into some kind of sickening Harold and Maude wannabe territory. Mathilde, you see, has an unmarried, middle-aged, but super-hot daughter Chloé (Kristin Scott Thomas). She hates Mathias's guts, almost from the second she lays eyes on him, but I think you know where all this is going to lead, mais non?

Hmmmm, can love be round the corner? Well, not soon enough.

If My Old Lady simply settled into a drawing room romantic comedy with the trio verbally jousting until a few spanners in the works are overcome and everybody just damn well lived happily-ever-after, then we'd have been handed an innocuous well-played trifle. This would not have been the end of the world. Even I could have lived with that.

Unfortunately, a whole series of dark secrets begin to unfurl and plunges us into a half-baked melodrama we're supposed to swallow. Don't get me wrong, I love melodrama and I respect Horovitz for trying something akin to dramatic suicide, but the fact remains is that it simply doesn't work. The movie goes off the rails quite dreadfully and just keeps chugging its wheels until tedium and utter disbelief becomes the order of the day.

The movie does, thankfully, wrap itself into a nice bow with some funny bits just as we're about to throw in the towel, but it's too little too late. As a film director, though, Horovitz does manage to jockey things smoothly until his writing begins to tumble into a murky abyss. The verbiage, when it's funny, is pretty crisp and even the monologues (when they're not too deathly serious) don't feel stilted. Horovitz opens his play up - it is Paris, after all, so why not get a few good eyefuls of it, but occasionally he errs in opening up, seemingly for the sake of opening up. This is never something I'm happy to see when it feels forced and here it's too often shoved down our throats.

By the picture's end, we're left with a bit of a dog's breakfast, but when things click, they do so very nicely indeed. Finally, though, the glue that holds the entire thing together is the presence of Smith, Kline and Thomas who give it their all. It's not quite enough to save the picture, but I do suspect admirers of this trio will find some morsels of engagement in their very solid performances.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **½ Two-and-a-half Stars

My Old Lady via dFilms is a Special Presentation at TIFF 2014. Visit the festival website HERE.

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FORCE MAJEURE - TIFF 2014 - Review By Greg Klymkiw

Force Majeure (2014)
Dir. Ruben Östlund
Starring: Johannes Bah Kuhnke, Lisa Loven Kongsli, Kristofer Hivju, Fanni Metelius

Review By Greg Klymkiw

A perfect nuclear family from Sweden - gorgeous, physically fit and full of smiles - pose for holiday snaps on the slopes during a ski vacation in the French Alps. They appear, for all intents and purposes, to have a perfect existence. Tomas (Johannes Bah Kuhnke) and Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) are such peas in a pod they perform nightly ablutions together with vigour and their two kids actually get along, happy to play like little pigs in a pen. All four even wear stylish matching pyjamas as they nap together after a few hours of exercising their ludicrously lithe bodies in out-of-doors family-fun-frolics.

How could anything go wrong?

Well, from the very opening frames and onwards, filmmaker Ruben Östlund has us believing that nothing could be this perfect. His miss-en-scene is rife with gorgeously composed, almost perfectly symmetrical shots with long takes and very judicious cutting. The pace is so meticulous, so strangely mannered, that something, anything, could happen. Sure enough, whilst they all happily dine on an outdoor terrace, a huge avalanche crashes down and everyone in view of the fixed position of the camera disappears in a spray of snow.

False alarm.

As they fog of snow dissipates, it's clear the avalanche fell with considerable force, but at a great distance away. Ebba and the children, still at the table, gather their wits about them. Tomas enters the frame and the four sit down to eat. Little does Tomas know, but he's in big trouble - or rather, his actions during the false disaster have placed a seed in Ebba's mind that's only going to grow - a seed of doubt. It's going to produce a sharp thorn that Ebba's going to repeatedly pierce Tomas with until she creates an open wound that's going to fester like some rapid flesh eating disease.

Does Tomas really love his family? Does he love Ebba? Does he care about anyone other than himself? If he did, why would he leave his family behind and run like a coward when disaster seemingly struck? This is a question that comes up again and again and yet again. Ebba not only casts aspersions upon her husband's manhood, but begins to construct a belief that their marriage is in serious jeopardy. If she kept it between them, it would be one thing, but she hurls her accusatory doubts in front of the children, strangers and even close friends who join them on the trip. The construct becomes an inescapable reality and over the next five days in the Alps, Östlund serves us domestic fireworks - Swedish style, of course - as things get intensely, harrowingly and even hilariously chilly.

Force Majeure is, for most of its running time, a tour de force of domestic drama dappled with mordant wit amidst a snowy backdrop. With sharp writing, gorgeous, controlled direction and performances that are quite perfect, it's too bad Östlund's screenplay hands us a major copout during the final third when he manufactures a false, forced symmetry to the aforementioned situation - one that's so predictable we can't actually believe it's happening. When it does, indeed, unfurl, the almost inept balancing of the conjugal power dynamic feels painfully didactic. In a movie where we're normally on the edge of our seats, wondering what could be lurking round every corner, we suspect Östlund could take us in this particular direction, but we assume he never would.

We assumed ever-so mistakenly.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** 3-Stars

Force Majeur from FilmsWeLike is an official selection of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF 2014). For further information visit the TIFF website HERE.

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TO BE TAKEI - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Kuchar Bros. Film Biographer Jennifer M. Kroot serves up superb doc on Star Trek's Mr. Sulu @TIFF BellLightbox followed by a DVD Release via Anchor Bay Entertainment Canada

NOTE: The Film Corner's Star Ratings will now appear at the end of the review.

One of Takei's favourite movies as a kid was Errol Flynn
in the classic swashbuckler The Adventures of Robin Hood.

During a celebrity roast, Mr. Takei carves
William Shatner up like a RUMP ROAST.

To Be Takei (2014)
Dir. Jennifer M. Kroot

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Most of us know George Takei as Mr. Sulu the stalwart Asian helmsman of the multi-racial S.S. Enterprise crew on Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek, the immortal science fiction television series (and its subsequent blockbuster feature film spin-offs). In recent years, however, Takei has become a symbol of Asian actors who broke out of the offensive stereotyping American drama prescribed for our Asian brothers and sisters. Maybe most important of all, Takei has been one of the world's most tireless champions for Gay Rights and in particular, Gay marriage. As Star Trek is surely the greatest television series ever produced, Mr. Takei is one of America's most important actors and activists. With this in mind, it's fortunate for Takei and audiences all over the world, that his documentary biographer is the extraordinary Jennifer M. Kroot who studied under the late, great filmmaker George Kuchar and went on to direct It Came From Kuchar, the ultimate big-screen love letter to her mentor George and his brilliant brother Mike - two filmmakers who defined 20th century cinema.

Kroot's sophomore effort proves she's no one-trick pony and has carved a lovely niche for herself as one of the medium's best documentary biographers and, in fact, can be considered as one of the foremost filmmakers working in America today. To Be Takei is absolutely joyous - a funny, touching and compelling portrait of a great, great human being - so much so that you'll only be disappointed that the picture eventually ends. Her first-rate DNA-hardwired filmmaking prowess is responsible for leaving us wanting more, in all the best ways. The movie is as close as we're likely to get to actually being able to mainline Takei as if he was the purest heroine. And yes, she's chosen an ideal subject, but her skill and artistry as a filmmaker is what ultimately raises both Takei and the film to stellar heights. By focusing so resolutely on his achievements with all the aplomb of a master storyteller, Kroot has made a movie that not only dazzles, informs and entertains, but is - without question - as important a film as any of us really want all of our film experiences to be. Such is the living legacy that is George Takei.

At 77 or 30, George Takei is the epitome of HOT!

And such is the consummate artistry of Jennifer M. Kroot that she spins the Takei yarn in the context of 20th Century American history. If you ever wanted a portrait of pre-War life amongst Asian Americans, you'll get it here. If you've yearned for a deeply moving and personal exploration into America's racist policies of interning Japanese Americans in concentration camps upon the attack of Pearl Harbor, you've got it. If you're interested in the childhood memories of life in such a concentration camp from the erudite, detailed perspective of a 77-year-old man, Kroot delivers the goods. For a portrait of a young Asian actor finding his place in an American Cinema replete with disgraceful stereotyping, look no further. If you've a hankering for an illuminating look, through the eyes of said actor, at American television and film history from the 50s to the present, To Be Takei offers a riveting, informative window into the last half-century and beyond. As well, the themes of burgeoning sexuality in a repressed America, living in the closet, coming out of the closet (when the dough-headed, at-the-time California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the state's same-sex marriage legislation) and a fervent commitment to activism, fill the film to overflowing.

If, perhaps most movingly of all, bearing witness to the deep love between two wonderful human beings, Takei and his spouse Brad Altman, you'll discover it here.

And then some.

The aforementioned to-die-for grocery list of sumptuous morsels to tantalize, tickle and touch, doesn't even include Takei's brilliant use of social media, his stellar political career, his unwavering support of public transit, his longtime on-air creative relationship with the insanely brilliant shock-jock Howard Stern, his open and generous relationship with fans and his astounding, obsessive and triumphant production of Allegiance, a musical (!!!!!) about the internment of Japanese-Americans.

Hell, if sainthood wasn't tied so inextricably to the evils of Catholicism, George Takei would be an ideal candidate for such lofty canonization and it's this very thing, Takei's importance and impact upon 20th Century (and beyond) culture, which is what makes Kroot's film so damn terrific. There's no need to provide a warts-and-all look at this great man. There are, so to speak, no warts. There is, however, considerable conflict in his tale which Kroot manages ever-so-deftly to provide a stirring narrative.

dif tor heh smusma - WORDS TO LIVE BY

One of the coolest revelations in Kroot's film, at least to me (being the inveterate John Wayne lover that I am) is the regard with which Takei speaks of "The Duke" giving him a juicy starring role in his epic blockbuster war extravaganza The Green Berets (you can read my own in-depth review of the film HERE). It's a movie I love deeply, in spite of its clearly skewed politics, but the fact remains that Wayne, like it or not, broke incredible ground by choosing to make a Vietnam War film at the height of a war that was, and still is, one of America's many dark hours.

That said, seeing this reasonably extended segment in Kroot's film reminded me of how important it is for artists - especially those with "pull" - to always seek out that which is as audacious and unheard of as Wayne did. To not only give Takei a rich role in a high-profile film suggests Wayne's acumen as a filmmaker, but reminds me of how many such individuals, including Takei, pushed all manner of limits - artistically and politically. As well, Kroot's film contrasts this with the horrendous use of Takei in a stupid Jerry Lewis comedy which moronically fell back upon the racist stereotyping of Asians. Takei's regret in this regard, is deeply and profoundly moving.

Needless to say, Takei's regard for Wayne is also touching as is his respect for the visionary genius of Gene Roddenberry to realize that a futuristic space voyage on the scale depicted in Star Trek would, in fact, have to be populated with a multicultural crew.

Kroot herself populates the film with a multitude of faces, places and media to relate this great story. Using archival clips and photos, as well as a variety of all-new interviews (expertly handled, by the way), she boldly takes us to places no documentary biographer has dared to go by affording herself with all the available tools anyone might use, but does so in a fashion that's so seamless, we never feel weighted down by tropes, but instead are veritably cascaded on a journey that takes us into Takei's heart and mind, and in so doing delivers a portrait of life, politics, art and history.

Some of the more delightful interviews come from expected and not-so-expected places. The talented young actor John Cho (the current Sulu and co-star of the hilarious Harold and Kumar films) discusses the childhood thrills he (and his family) experienced whenever Takei came on screen. Sex columnist Dan Savage points out the obvious - how unbelievably HOT Takei is. And perhaps the most literate and heartfelt thoughts come from the great actor/director Leonard Nimoy who shared the Star Trek stage with Takei as everyone's favourite Vulcan, Mr. Spock.

And in the words of Mr. Spock, Kroot has fashioned a film that will ensure that George Takei will "Live long and prosper" - for now and forever.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *****
5-Stars, Highest Film Corner Accolade

To Be Takei is platforming theatrically across North America with a flagship engagement at the majestic TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto, to be followed by a massive home entertainment release via Anchor Bay Entertainment Canada and Anchor Bay on October 7, 2014. Feel free to order directly from the Amazon links below.

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SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Rodriguez-Miller Noir Sequel Too Little, Too Late

Sin City: A Dame To Kill For
Dir. Robert Rodriguez, Frank Miller
Starring: Mickey Rourke, Josh Brolin, Eva Greene, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Powers Boothe, Julia Garner, Jessica Alba, Rosario Dawson, Jamie Chung, Dennis Haysbert, Bruce Willis, Stacy Keach, Christopher Meloni, Jeremy Piven, Christopher Lloyd, Jamie Chung, Marton Csokas, Ray Liotta, Juno Temple, Jude Ciccolella, Jaime King, Alexa PenaVega, Lady Gaga

Review By Greg Klymkiw

The biggest sin this movie commits is being more boring than a soused, fat, old, skunk-pussy whore trying to pathetically coax a hard-on from a flaccid dick, but failing miserably with every attempt to inspire even a half-mast to poke through the globs of cellulite folding over a fetid, purulent orifice of love. This is especially disappointing since nine-years-ago, Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller grabbed us by the short and curlies with the stylish, audacious and supremely entertaining Sin City. This time around, the neo-noir magic just isn't there. In fairness, the overwrought visual palette of high-contrast black & white splashed with snot-balls of garish colour hasn't lost its appeal, nor has the extreme violence. What's dishearteningly awry in this installment of short, loosely-connected pulp stories is that they're simply no match for the compelling, original nastiness that slugged us repeatedly in the face like a solid pistol-whipping that felt like it was never going to end. In fact, we didn't want it to end. I would have been happy for Rodriguez and Miller to keep smacking away at my flabby mug with some cold, hard, black steel. Here, though, we're constantly compelled to check the time on our smart phones every ten minutes or so and on occasion, the temptation to open up a game app like Bejeweled is stronger than the pull of the thundering Niagara Falls when you insanely hop the barrier and creep too close to the edge.

Alack and alas, the five stories in this prequel/sequel are simply not as good as those in the previous outing and the hard boiled overripe dialogue feels way more machine-tooled. The latter element jackhammers away at us with such force that it pretty much numbs us to the few decent lines peppered throughout.

Happily, Rodriguez and Miller don't save the best for last. The first tale, "Just Another Saturday Night" genuinely captures a fair bit of the old magic and sets us up to expect a ride as crazed and original as the first. We focus on everyone's favourite pug-ugly muscle-packed hood Marv (Michey Rourke) flaked out on a lonely stretch of highway overlooking The Projects and he's got no idea why he's there. The dead bodies strewn about provide enough clues to retrace his steps from earlier in the evening. His adventure-laden flashback includes ogling Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba) gyrating onstage at Kadies, stopping some rich young scumbags from torching a drunk, stealing a police car in pursuit of the well-to-do filth, following them into the projects and engaging in a delicious spree of mayhem.

So far, so good. It's just after this point where, aside from a handful of bright spots, our hearts sink. "The Long Bad Night (Part I)" isn't bad, mind you. Johnny (Joseph Gordon Levitt) joins a card game in Kadie's back salon which is presided over by A-1 dirt-bag Senator Roarke (Powers Booth). With babe Marcie (Julia Garner) in tow for good luck, Johnny cleans up. The Senator is pissed at being humiliated. A big secret is soon revealed. A certain someone gets their fingers broken with a pair of pliers. And revenge, is sworn. Close, but no cigar with this tale, and we're on to the next dark segment.

"A Dame to Kill For" is surprisingly the weakest of the bunch. Too bad it's the centre-piece. A prequel to the first film's glorious "The Big Fat Kill", the story features the pre-plastic surgery Dwight McCarthy (Josh Brolin). He was played by Clive Owen in the previous picture and Brolin is a decent enough replacement. Unfortunately this long, deadly-dull tale involves his old flame Ava Lord (Eva Green) hinting at needing protection from her sexual deviant rich hubby Damian Lord (Marton Csokas) and the powerful manhandling Manute (Dennis Haysbert, replacing the late, great Michael Clarke Duncan). The convolutions involve a whack of femme fatale manipulations, a couple of cops Mort (Christopher Meloni) and Bob (Jeremy Piven), one of whom goes rogue, the return of hot whore Gail (Rosario Dawson, looking very bored) plus the deadly assassin Miho (Jamie Chung, a lame replacement for Devon Aoki). There's a too-short appearance by Stacy Keach as the sweating, corpulent, repulsive mobster Wallensquist and even a supernatural angle involving witchcraft.

The whole thing plays out like molasses.

The only decent stuff is the first few minutes involving Juno Temple as a whore marked for death by a slimy Ray Liotta, but it's disappointingly short and dispatched ingloriously in favour of and as a lead-in to the aforementioned nonsense with Ava. Eva Green is often wonderful, in spite of how dreadful this segment is and it might be great to see an entire feature devoted to her character. Green, to be blunt, is definitely as boner-inducing, if not more so than in Zack Snyder's 300.

"The Long Bad Night (Part II)" is a completely inconsequential tale of Johnny's attempted revenge upon Roarke and its only pleasures are to be found in Christopher Lloyd's great cameo as a heroin-shooting private doctor whom Johnny hires to straighten out his broken fingers.

"Nancy's Last Dance" involves our gyrating stripper "daughter" of Bruce Willis (who appears as - I kid you not - a ghost) and her desire to kill Roarke who's eventually going to rub her out to avenge the death of his "Yellow Bastard" son from Sin City. And no, this is not a case of best-for-last, but thanks to a great sequence with Marv and Nancy zipping along on their respective motorcycles and a genuinely decent blood bath in Roarke's mansion, the tale is more akin to being not-bad-for-last.

Powers Boothe, by the way, is always terrific as Roarke and he, like Eva Green, demands his own movie.

The addition of 3-D adds nothing and as per usual, renders everything murky in all the wrong ways.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ** 2-Stars

Sin City: A Dame To Kill For is an e-One release. It's also a humungous flop at the box office.

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SHARKTOPUS - Review By Greg Klymkiw - The Crown Jewel of Anchor Bay BLU-RAY "SHARK 4 Movie Collection"

NOTE: The Film Corner's Star Ratings will now appear at the end of the review.

One can never go wrong with any movie featuring a ROGER CORMAN cameo.

One can never go wrong with any movie featuring
TONS OF BABES IN BATHING SUITS!!!

Sharktopus (2010)
Dir. Declan O'Brien
Producers: Roger and Julie Corman
Starring: Eric Roberts, Kerem Bursin, Sara Malakul Lane, Liv Boughn, Hector Jimenez, Blake Lindsey

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Sharktopus is a hoot! As a matter of fact, I haven't enjoyed one of these ludicrous shark pictures so much since I saw Sharknado. The big difference is that this one is actually good. Or rather, well, maybe good isn't quite the word, but this movie delivers everything you'd want from a low-budget creature feature and with a few dollops of "and then some". This, of course, is all due to the powerhouse husband and wife producing team of Roger and Julie Corman who ensure that the film delivers massive-impact carnage, a ludicrous number of babes in swimsuits and the same, crazy sense of looney humour that Corman's stalwart tutelage delivered with such delightful 70s New World horror classics like the Joe-Dante-directed Piranha. Though Sharktopus doesn't quite soar to the heights of Dante's giddy, goofy gobble-em-up, it flies a lot higher than such lumbering big-budget creature-feature affairs like Pacific Rim and Godzilla 2014.

The mad monster of the film's title is exactly what it spells out - a shark with octopus tentacles. This allows the creature to attack its victims "normally" like "Bruce" in Jaws or coil its tentacles round the (mostly) nubile bikini-clad babes then stuff 'em down the deadly sharktopus maw and not unlike the insects in Starship Troopers, the dextrous arms are equipped spear-like tips which impale before devouring. Now before you think we're supposed to buy that a creature like this actually exists, let it be said loud and clear that sharktopus is a mad combination of genetic engineering and computers hard-wired into the brain of this human-engineered freak o' nature. Developed by a private corporation using scads of military moolah, the sharktopus is meant to be a secret weapon to be used in battle - whether against genuine countries Uncle Sam is fighting or worse, Somalian pirates, drug smugglers, various cartels and the like.

Eric Roberts is the head of the firm and his gorgeous daughter Nicole (Sara Malakul Lane) is his right hand. Unbeknownst to her, Dad has secretly rewritten the genetic code so that sharktopus becomes an unstoppable killing machine. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem for the American military, but when the computer in the creature's brain goes awry, it starts to munch anything and everything and the plucky father-daughter are ordered to track the beast down and stop it from decimating innocent people.

Luckily for everyone, sharktopus heads for the Mexican resort of Puerto Vallarta. It's lucky for us because we get nice scenery and endless frames jam-packed with babes in bikinis. It's especially lucky for producer Roger Corman on two counts. First of all, he and his co-producing wife and key crew members get a nice vacation in the famed sunny resort town.

One can never go wrong with 4 BluRays for 1 low price.

Secondly, the film's production costs will be rock bottom because it's, uh, Mexico. This might be the most important reason of all for Corman to shoot in the Land of Tacos, Tamales and Tequila.

The plot, such as it is, thickens once Eric Roberts hires a hunky, cocky shark hunter (Kerem Bursin) who very quickly falls for Roberts's babe-o-licious daughter. There are some subplots, none of which are all that important, but allow many opportunities to parade babes in front of the camera who will also get munched.

The acting ranges from barely competent to well, uh, competent, with the exception of Eric Roberts, Julia Roberts' brother, Emma Roberts' Dad and at one time, a promising and brilliant young actor during the 80s (Star 80, Runaway Train, The Pope of Greenwich Village and Raggedy Man). Roberts manages to register above the thespian Richter Scale by chewing the scenery with aplomb and oozing slime in his smarmy, villainous role.

Declan O'Brien's direction is competent at best, the special effects are so good-God-awful they're funny and the script perfunctorily hits all the checklist items a movie like this needs (mostly, opportunities for babes in bikinis to strut their stuff before being munched).

One can never go wrong with ERIC ROBERTS

Occasionally, the writing delivers individual lines of dialogue and some banter that's genuinely funny.

In the end, Sharktopus has two elements that raise it above its cellar-dweller aspirations. First of all, it features an absolutely hilarious cameo appearance by Corman as a dirty old man following a babe in a bikini on the beach who's scanning the sand with a metal detector. Corman's eyes appear to be on her ass, but just after she discovers a valuable gold doubloon in the sand, she gets dragged into the ocean by the sharktopus. Corman keeps his eyes peeled on the treasure lying in the sand, ignoring her screams for help. He retrieves the doubloon and happily saunters off. Secondly, most of the killings are delightfully hilarious and some of them border on the surreal - especially since we're treated to some ludicrous musical numbers on the stage of a resort and we get to see cheesy costumes and ethnic dancing until the sharktopus lunges itself onto dry land by using its tentacles as legs and starts eating Mexican señoritas in full traditional Mexican garb. And, of course, one of the best killings involves a mega-babe (Corman's own daughter) getting munched during a bungee jump. Seriously, can you think of any movie featuring a walking octopus/shark and a bungee-jump kill?

One can never go wrong with babes being eaten.

I thought not.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** Three-Stars

Sharktopus is available on a nice 4-disc/4-movie Blu-Ray set from Anchor Bay Entertainment Canada. It features a super commentary track with Corman (and his lovely wife/co-producer Julie). Both are gracious, erudite, full of terrific anecdotes and solid information about making movies. And keep your eyes peeled. The Film Corner will review all four films in this set. The other three include one more Corman production, DinoShark, as well as Jersey Shore Shark Attack and Bait.

In the meantime, feel free to order this terrific four-disc set (and any of the other wonderful Corman titles) directly from the Amazon links below and in so doing, support the ongoing maintenance of The Film Corner.