THE DESERT - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Argentinian 4-hander w/ 2 hunks, 1 babe and zombies @FantAsia2014

A hot babe w/ a gun & 2 hot hunks - always a bonus during the apocalypse!

Hot Babe gets porked, Hot Hunk gets pricked. Good deal.

The Desert aka El Desierto (2013)
Dir. Christoph Behl
Starring: Victoria Almeida, William Prociuk, Lautaro Delgado, Lucas Lagré

Review By Greg Klymkiw

As per usual, I'm always delighted when filmmakers expand the boundaries of genre filmmaking with new and original takes on the tropes. This is why I endured The Desert, a well-acted and intelligent Argentinian picture which eventually suffers from a detrimental reliance upon one well-intentioned arty-farty longueur after another. (I don't even mind the arty, it's the farty that drives me bonkers.)

A trio of attractive Argentinians have been holed up in a fortified apartment - long enough to have established some reasonable ground rules to approximate a normal life within extraordinary circumstances, a garden-variety post-apocalyptic world with zombies roaming about in search of human flesh. Ana (Victoria Almeida) is in a relationship with Jonathan (William Prociuk). Axel (Lautaro Delgado), understandably obsesses over her lithe form when she's sleeping and possesses himself equally with tattooing flies upon his body.

These, at least from my twisted perspective, both seem like reasonable-enough fetishes, especially given how this odd family unit appears to live. Considering the dire situation they're in, they seem to live reasonably well. Their rules to live by are both lifestyle and safety driven. All decisions must be made collectively and like a jury, they need to be unanimous. Games of the "Truth or Dare" or backgammon variety must be played if even one person wants to play and the others don't. When venturing into the outside world, two people must go - no solo efforts allowed. There are fucking zombies out there, yes? As for expressing themselves privately, given the claustrophobic nature of their existence, they have devoted one room where each can record their own video diary. They then deposit their tapes through a slot into a locked chest.

Given the lack of traditional power and water, they patch into a small generator for electricity and use rain barrels on their roof. Food is of the canned and dry goods variety. Hell, if they weren't mostly relegated to this one ground floor suite, it could, in fact, be a paradise. Alas, like the metaphorical title suggests, there is no oasis - the outside world is as much a desert-like environment as is their inside world. Emptiness is all-pervasive.

Luckily, for the audience, we catch these characters on the precipice of going a bit stir crazy, if not borderline bonkers. The biggest tension is between Axel and Ana. Axel wants some nookie and given that Ana's a sultry bit o' Chocotorta, one can't blame him. She knows he's been staring at her while she sleeps and even finds out he's been breaking the rules and sneaking her tapes out of the chest to watch. There's some discussion and consideration given to the idea of sharing her, but this creates added tension. At one point, during a game of Truth or Dare, certain confessions rear their ugly heads and even worse, one of the dares involves capturing and tattooing a zombie.

Ana has been keeping a memorial to every zombie they're forced to kill by giving each one a Greek name and etching it upon a wall. When the men drag home a live zombie for the tattooing dare, he's securely chained and Ana soon gives him the name Pythagoras (Lucas Lagré). He becomes a surrogate pet to her and she spends hours staring at it, attempting to communicate with the woeful wretch and even decorating his face with spray paint.

Here's the deal. There's nothing wrong with the story, nor is there anything wrong with the deliberate pace used to recreate a sense of both claustrophobia and tedium, but there are eventually far too many moments where the tedium forces your mind to wander and it's here where you're not only taken out of the story, but forced to mull over several unanswered questions and/or holes in the plot. While one is watching a movie is not the right time to be thinking about such matters and this results in an overall experience wherein a good many of the picture's parts are excellent, but the whole leaves a bit to be desired. (Sorry for butchering Aristotle here, but given the Greek names Ana's obsessed with, it seemed appropriate.)

The performances director Behl elicits from the cast are, as mentioned, superb. The triangle of friends/lovers feel like a genuine unit, albeit a frayed one. Almeida's Ana is a lovely mix of sexy, smart, cheeky and resourceful, but beneath the spitfire, she evokes, especially in her soulful eyes, a sense of sadness which plays beautifully with her overall journey as a character. Lucas Lagré is astonishing as the zombie - his remote, blank qualities conjure a sense of tragedy and empathy, except during occasionally shocking bursts of ferocity. Delgado's Axel is ruggedly handsome with an offbeat quality which he uses to superb effect - whether he's leering or obsessively fetishizing certain aspects of this life in hiding. Sanitation, or lack thereof, is certainly an issue and given the number of disgusting little bastards of the insect family Diptera (to carry the Greek metaphor to a pretentious, on my part, extreme), his need to tattoo flies on his body makes perfect sense, especially since one can only spend so much time under bug netting. Prociuk is an appropriately handsome and stalwart Jonathan - his intense Slavic features (forgive me, I'm an inveterate Ukrainian-spotter) are used to their fullest effect. He evokes an odd sense of emptiness and a kind of working-class roughness which ties in with Ana's own doubts about her love for him.

Behl's direction is, overall, superb - the blocking, sense of composition and the overall mise-en-scène of this world is clearly the work of a gifted filmmaker, as is his finely-tuned feel for observation. Alas, I do wish he'd have occasionally picked up the pace to avoid those stretches where we have too much time on our minds to think about some of the aforementioned plot-holes, most of which are niggling questions about the outside world, but annoying enough to rip us out of the drama. He's clearly a director to watch and if you have a hankering for some existentialist genre-bending and some patience (a definite must here), The Desert will offer you rewards not usually found in post-apocalyptic horror.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** Three Stars

The Desert enjoyed its Canadian Premiere at the 2014 edition of the FantAsia International Film Festival in Montreal.

GOD'S SLAVE (aka Esclavo de Dios) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - TJFF 2014 - Toronto Jewish Film Festival 2014

Vando Villamil is David, a Mossad agent fighting terrorism in Argentina

GOD'S SLAVE - Esclavo de Dios
Who is the slave?

GOD'S SLAVE (2013) ***1/2
Dir. Joel Novoa, Script: Fernando Butazzoni
Starring: Mohammed Al-Khaldi, Vando Villamil

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Some of the best cat and mouse thrillers that feature two characters on opposite sides of the equation will often present a surface duality, but as the picture progresses, the filmmakers will provide a number of analogous aspects twixt both parties which almost always, if not too obviously splashed on, add the kind of shading and moral complexity that allows the work to rise above the tropes of the genre. God's Slave, tersely directed by Joel Novoa from a finely wrought screenplay by Fernando Butazzoni is just such a film and as such, presents a tale that is as suspenseful as it is rooted within a deep humanity and understanding of the kind of conflicts ripping the world apart. What puts the film on an even loftier pedestal of quality are the shadings within each of the main characters that provide inner conflicts that betray their respective personal struggles with the dualities that nag at both of them.

Ahmed (Mohammed Al-Khaldi), a devout Muslim in Venezuala lives a seemingly charmed life as a successful doctor with a loving family. Alas, he is burdened with the haunting memory of his principled father (often accused of being a pro-Israeli Muslim) assassinated before his eyes by a masked Israeli agent. Ahmed's path, then, is clear. Willingly selected as a sleeper terrorist, he bides his time and waits for the moment when he'll be called by Allah to commit a suicide terrorist action. David (Vando Villamil) is a top Mossad agent in Argentina who lays, as if in wait, to either clean up and/or prevent terrorist acts. He is a devout Jew, similarly haunted by violent actions in his past and though he also has a family that loves him, he is so obsessed with his calling to fight terrorism that he's growing further and further away from those who care for him them most. These two men are dominated by past tragedies in their lives and are both on missions to destroy. The movie places both on an inevitable collision course, allowing us to get to know and respect both men. This, if anything, is what generates some of the nail-biting suspense, placing us on the edge of our seats, hoping and praying they'll find some way of reconciling that which haunts them and in so doing, avoid the inevitable confrontation that could mean death for both of them and possibly many others.

Mohammed Al-Khaledi is Ahmed,
a devout Muslim on a deadly mission.

This is one excruciating journey we take with both men and all the more so, as sides and motivations become blurred by their respective obsessions. I love the fact that the filmmakers have chosen to keep the title in a singular form. One of the wonderful aspects of the storytelling is that both men are, to varying degrees, slaves of God. This places equal weight and emphasis on both characters which better allows us to experience their similarities and differences. Finally, though, we get to fully appreciate how one man allows his devotion to God get in the way of what really allows him to be one with God, while the other is so entrenched in God's slavery that he's unable to ascertain the difference between God's Word and man's.

Inspired by true events, director Novoa brings a rich, effective mise-en-scène to the table, utilizing a perfect blend of classical compositions and movement with the harried, documentary-like immediacy of hand-held perspectives. The latter, however, if always expertly achieved and feels like it's been planned down to its last detail, avoiding the sloppy herky-jerky of those directors who are ultimately masking their directorial incompetence (Christopher Nolan, J.J. Abrams, Same Mendes, to name a few), but also creating his own sense of floating-like handheld movement as opposed to aping the riveting, expertly-fashioned Paul Greengrass/Kathryn Bigelow styles. Novoa uses both approaches, the classical and the documentary to bring a sense of intimacy that allows for the visceral suspense to blend perfectly with writer Buttazoni's intelligent, delicately wrought screenplay.

God's Slave is so compulsively gripping and well made, that I was the tiniest bit disappointed with its denouement which seems far too pat, too resolute, if you will. While everything up to the slam-bang climax ticks like clockwork, the story has an added beat that might have been so much better if left more ambiguous which, frankly, would seem to have flowed more honestly with the movie as a whole. As it stands, the final beat almost feels like the kind of thing an American Hollywood remake would bring to bear upon the material and coming close to negating the power and intent of all that's preceded it. My brief dissatisfaction here, is not the end of the world for this fine picture, just the kind of annoyance that often trips up that which is not only skilfully directed, edited and acted, but otherwise presents a fresh take on familiar material.

God's Slave is playing at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival 2014. For tickets, visit the TJFF website HERE.

THE GERMAN DOCTOR (aka WAKOLDA) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - TJFF 2014 - Toronto Jewish Film Festival 2014

Just looking at the brilliant Alex Brendemuhl as Josef Mengele
makes you feel mired in filth and in need of a good scrub.

Astonishing newcomer
Florencia Bado delivers
a knockout performance
as the very unfortunate apple
of Dr. Josef Mengele's eye.

The German Doctor Dir. Lucia Puenzo (2013) ***
Starring: Alex Brendemuhl, Florencia Bado, Natalia Oreiro,
Diego Peretti, Elena Roger
Review By Greg Klymkiw

From the very first moment we see Dr. Gregor (Alex Brendemuhl) eyeballing the fetching little girl Lilith (Florencia Bado), it's a fait accompli that this film is heading for dangerous territory. Based on director Lucia Penzo's novel, in turn a fiction rooted in fact, it's even more obvious that a living Hell awaits us when the good doctor takes a room in the family-owned Patagonia hotel of Lilith's Mom and Dad (Natalia Oreiro, Diego Peretti) and even worse, that his obsessions with: (a) assisting Dad in perfecting the design of toy dolls, (b) offering to fix Lilith's recessive genes to cure her stunted growth and (c) taking special interest in Mom's pregnancy with twins, suggest he's not all he seems to be. That Dr. Gregor is spending far too much time in this beautiful out of the way Argentinian town with other German gentlemen bandying about the word Führer and that a concerned photographer (Elena Roger) is making secret telephone calls to Israel whilst being suspiciously looked-upon by the town's upstanding Aryans, we're even more convinced that the well-dressed, soft-spoken Dr. Gregor is none other than the epitome of Nazi evil, crazed geneticist Dr. Joseph Mengele.

The German Doctor makes for compelling viewing on two counts. First of all, there is a definite grace and intelligence with which Puenzo unfolds this chilling tale and secondly, and perhaps most of all, the performances on every level are charged with the stuff of supremely bravura work. Brendemuhl as Mengele is chillingly muted, but at the same time, he occasionally lets the ooze of evil creep out so subtly that we almost feel tainted by having to lay eyes on him -- even to the point where we feel like we need to scrub away the filth he sullies us with, by his mere presence. This is certainly a brilliant and brave piece of work.

The newcomer Florencia Bado has a magnificent screen presence. The camera clearly loves her and she tackles her role as the diminutive Lilith with natural ability and surprising maturity. The scenes where Brendemuhl and Bado share screen time are especially creepy and much of this comes from the chemistry between both actors.

Director Puenzo does not ever really create the mise-en-scène of a thriller, but rather allows the material to move at the pace of a straight-up drama (albeit one infused with sheer evil and darkness). We are, for example, never in the territory of Franklin J. Schaffner's nerve-jangling, bigger-than-life film adaptation of Ira Levin's The Boys From Brazil, but are sucked into a whirlpool on a much smaller scale so that Puenzo can concentrate on the subtleties of character.

Alex Brendemuhl and Florencia Bado: Creepy Chemistry

Since she does not want to be in thriller territory, part of me feels bad saying that her approach seems far too muted given the intensity of the material. Yes, this is her intent, but there is the old saying that "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" and if we apply the interpretation of said meaning that the intent yields the kind of cinematic inaction that feels far too precious, then I do think it's worth mentioning that the film's whole is, indeed less than the sum of its parts.

The problem for me is that when we edge closer to the utter horror of the tale, there's an inevitability to it that detracts from the picture's overall ability to deliver a genuine knockout punch. I appreciate Puenzo's desire to handle her material with both taste and detachment, but there are times, when good, old fashioned Hollywood "vulgarity" can yield far more satisfying experiences and still manage to do so with taste, style and a good dose of slam-bang. It is, however, a worthy effort even as is.

The German Doctor makes its Toronto premiere at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival (TJFF 2014). For tickets and showtimes, contact the festival website HERE. It opens theatrically in Toronto via A-Z Films on May 9, 2014.

RAQUEL: A MARKED WOMAN & FROM HOLLYWOOD TO NUREMBERG: JOHN FORD, SAMUEL FULLER, GEORGE STEVENS Toronto Jewish Film Festival 2014 (TJFF 2014) - Two Docs, Great Material, Mediocre Execution

Raquel Liberman
Forced Into Sex Slavery

Raquel: A Marked Woman (2013) **1/2
Dir. Gabriela Böhm

Review By Greg Klymkiw

There's a great story here. At the turn of the 20th Century, a wave of Jewish immigrants settled in Argentina to begin a new life. Alas, the Old World has a way of following everybody. When Raquel Liberman and her two sons came to join her husband in the South American country, unexpected hard times weakened her husband to a point wherein he fell ill and eventually died of tuberculosis. Duped into accepting a seamstress job, she's coerced into prostitution by the powerful criminal organization Zvi Magdal.

She services so many clients that eventually she can buy her freedom and sets herself up as a successful business woman. The gangsters feel this will send a wrong signal, so they assign one of their own to seduce Raquel then marry her. The wooing is successful and under Argentinian law at the time, all her money and property is transferred to her husband who squanders it and sends her back to work in the brothels. Unwilling to accept that this will be her fate, Raquel does the unthinkable and takes on the mighty Jewish Mafia of Argentina. Her brave efforts smashed the criminal organization and she was single-handedly responsible for saving thousands of women from sexual slavery.

Is this not a great story? Of course it is, and it's a true story as well. Unfortunately, the film leaves a fair bit to be desired. It's a very conventional television-style documentary with a competent assemblage of archival footage and interviews. Dragging things down to even more conventional levels, the filmmaker foists a whack of cheesy dramatic recreations upon us that are also reminiscent of television doc tropes of the most egregious kind.

Perhaps someday, this will be made into a great feature length dramatic film by a director with some style and panache like Steven Spielberg or Darren Aronofsky and then Raquel's haunting, strangely uplifting story will get the royal treatment. In the meantime, we will have to make do with this by-the-numbers work that at least presents the material to make us aware of this tragic tale in the lives of Jewish women in South America and the bravery of one of them to not take it anymore.

Kudos are in order for bringing the tale to light, but that's about all one can recommend here.

Harrowing Footage from WWII

From Hollywood To Nuremberg: John Ford, Samuel Fuller, George Stevens (2012) **1/2
Dir: Christian Delage
Review By Greg Klymkiw

This should have been a great film, but it's far too compact to do little more than skim the surface. The film focuses upon the film unit of the American Armed Forces during World War II and their mission to capture footage of America's war effort. This resulted in several powerful Academy Award winning documentaries and important propaganda films in favour of America's war efforts. We get glimpses into the official work of directors John Ford and George Stevens and the unofficial work of infantryman Samuel Fuller who shot footage with a small movie camera as his unit, The Big Red One (also the title of his 1980 autobiographical war film), made their way from D-Day to the liberation of Nazi concentration camps.

There is an attempt to look at the filmmakers' output before and after the war to display how the carnage they shot changed the way they made movies in later years. This is, sadly, the least successful portion of the movie. A project of this scope and complexity deserved an exhaustive Ken Burns-styled documentary epic crossed with Scorsese's monumental filmmaking documentaries. The approach here, though, is cursory at best and goes so far as to virtually ignore the efforts of Frank Capra during this period when so many filmmakers turned their attention away from what they were doing in order to do this duty for their country.

Still, the film is worth seeing for explaining how and why this motion picture unit existed and most importantly, the haunting footage provided of battle, camp liberation and the aftermath of the war. Until such a time as someone does tackle this important story in a proper manner, this middle of the road effort will have to do.

Raquel: A Marked Woman and From Hollywood To Nuremberg: John Ford, Samuel Fuller, George Stevens are both playing at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival (TJFF 2014). For tickets, visit the festival website HERE.

WHITE ELEPHANT - TIFF 2012 - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Two mismatched crime-fighting priests and a babe-o-licious social worker go head to head with gangs and cartels within one of the worst slums in the world. I can assure you this is as entertaining as it is replete with a healthy social conscience.

White Elephant (2012)
dir. Pablo Trapero
TIFF 2012 Special Presentation
***
Starring:
Jérémie Renier,
Ricardo Darin,
Martina Gusman

Review By Greg Klymkiw

In Villa Maria, the most notorious slum in Buenos Aires, crime is a disease.

Jesus is the cure.

That said, one of the most powerful images in this film is not Sylvester Stallone from Cobra wearing a crucifix instead of 80s gold chains round his neck, but the "white elephant" of the title, a humungous grey shell of a hospital that's been started by a couple of Argentinian regimes, only to never be completed. This rotting, crumbling monolith is an ever-present reminder that someone has to help these people. As well, it's an ever-present symbol of government neglect within this crime-infested shanty town.

It's a world unto itself, rife with filth, poverty and crime and begging for a good clean sweep. In the immortal words of Travis Bickle (who I just can't seem to get out of my head these days), "One day, a real rain will come. . ." And in White Elephant, Pablo Trapero's gripping, engaging crime picture with a difference, a torrential downpour upon the scum of the streets comes from the unlikeliest of places.

For those in the crossfire of gangs and drug lords, the no nonsense street cleaners of Argentina's corruption-ridden capitol are the mismatched crime-busting odd couple Father Julián (Ricardo Darín), with his careful, measured approach and rookie Father Nicolás (Jérémie Renier), a live wire who believes that actions speak louder than words. Inventively adopting the tropes of the cop-buddy thrillers of the 70s and 80s and applying them to committed Catholic Priests on a Mission from God is both entertaining and vitally imbued with a social conscience.

Okay, White Elephant is not really Danny Glover and Mel Gibson trading in their magnums for rosaries (though Darín and Renier do trade a few decent ecclesiastical Lethal Weapon-like quips), but in its own way, this is one strange, compelling and reasonably exciting dramatic crime thriller. These guys are tussling with some pretty rough customers and they're not only dealing with crime, but doing everything humanly possible to make life bearable for both the innocent and, even the guilty.

Food, medicine, revitalization projects and yes, spiritual guidance are all on the agenda. Add Luciana (Martina Gusman) to the mix - a smart, tough, savvy babe-o-licious social worker and yes, this is probably the first movie about priests that can genuinely be described as gangbusters!

What's kind of cool is that the movie extols the virtues of these two priests while, at the same time, exposing the bureaucracy and hypocrisy of the Catholic Church itself. Their hands are continually being slapped or tied by a smarmy Bishop and a bunch of pencil pushers with black robes. There's no love lost between myself and organized religion of any kind, but I've always detested knee-jerk reactions to those who have chosen the Cross rather than the Sword to do good work in the name of God.

And co-writer/director Trapero serves up a genuinely supportive and harrowing tale of men who use their faith in a higher power to selflessly serve those who can't help themselves. This is no mere whitewash, either. The narrative dabbles in the aforementioned area of organized religion's downsides, poses constant challenges to Faith in the Cloth and in one surprising, but very welcome subplot, Trapero delivers perhaps the greatest moral challenge of all - especially to Catholic priests.

The movie moves at a nice clip, features stunning location photography and is always exuberantly acted. Though the movie never scratches too deep below the surface, this is probably why it has just enough food for thought to keep it real, but also provides good, old fashioned entertainment.

"White Elephant" is a Special Presentation at the Toronto International Film Festival 2012 (TIFF 2012) and showing Thursday September 13 TIFF Bell Lightbox 1 9:45 PM, Friday September 14 Scotiabank 2 3:00 PM and Sunday September 16 Scotiabank 2 5:45 PM. For further information and tickets, visit the TIFF website HERE.

Canadian Film Centre World Wide Short Film Festival 2012 Toronto - Opening Night Gala: Award Winners From Around The World - Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw

Opening night gala presentations at most film festivals are usually stacked with inoffensive fare that's soon forgotten once the festival really gets underway. The Canadian Film Centre's Worldwide Short Film Festival has not been immune to this, but traditionally the programme includes a carefully selected group of award winners from around the world. Awards, of course, do not ALWAYS ensure great cinema, but the beauty of an evening of short films is that there's bound to be some genuinely great stuff. Judging from the 2012 Opening Night Gala lineup, the pickings out in Award Winner Land must have been mighty slim. Read and weep. (Though I can assure you it only goes up and in some cases, WAY up during the festival, after this opening night of - ahem - winners.)

Luminaris (2011) dir. Juan Pablo Zaramella
RATING:**1/2
Review By Greg Klymkiw
Equation de Klymkiw: Magic Realism + Whimsy = (for this fella) Explusion of Bile (though, for many others, delight).
The craft (I hesitate to use the word "artistry") in this digitally animated short is undeniable. This annoyingly predictable tale of a creative soul and his babe-o-licious co-worker hemmed into a dehumanized cubicle is, like most whimsical magical realism, almost sickeningly jaunty. The couple, along with hundreds of other toilers in an environment that inspires homogeneity rather than imagination, eventually break free of the shackles of bureaucratic efficiency in order to create a light from within that offers both freedom and love. If you're easily dazzled by eye-candy, but precious little else, you'll gobble this up. The rest of us can regurgitate it and/or file under "forgettable". Winner of the Annecy 2011 - Audience Award & Fipresci Award, Special Jury Prize - Seoul Int. Cartoon and Animation Fest

Dripped (2010) dir. Léo Verrier
RATING:***
Review By Greg Klymkiw
L'équation de Klymkiw: French Movie + Whimsy + Jackson Pollock Tribute = Good Intentions & Mild Entertainment Value. Superb craft is on display in this not-so-sickeningly whimsical animated short and a pretty cool idea to boot. An art thief blessed with a unique gift involving two of my favourite things - ingestion and regurgitation - scurries about Gay Par-ee in the 1950s plying his trade in a most unique and genuinely surprising way. It's basically a one-note joke with a decent punchline, but thematically it has a couple of layers and offers eye candy, a morsel of food for thought and a few decent laughs. Winner of Best Animated Short, Sitges, Special Prize, Krok IAFF

Armadingen (2011) dir. Matthias Schulz
RATING:**1/2
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Armageddon + Predictable Humanity = Sickly-Sweet Feel-Goodery. This live-action (and yes, whimsical) German drama about an old farmer beleaguered by his gruff wife with endless chores presents a by-the-numbers arc involving a pudgy couple in the rut of familiarity and how an impending disaster draws them closer together. Hubby tries his damnedest to shelter his harridan hausfrau from the inevitable armageddon and they gradually use their final hours on Earth to experience the joys of another form of familiarity - their love. There's nothing dreadful about this movie, but within two or three minutes I knew, almost beat-for-beat where it was going to end up and when it got there, I wasn't sure it was all that worth it - even at a mere 23 minutes. Undiscriminating audiences might be delighted and moved, but for this fella, the apocalypse has been done to death and with fond memories of Stanley Kramer's On The Beach, Don McKellar's Last Night and Lars Von Trier's Melancholia dancing in my brain, this was Armageddon Lite. The direction is certainly competent and the performances solid. Official Competition at the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival.

Grandmothers (2011) dir. Afarin Eghbal
RATING:****
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Supreme Artistry + Thematic Complexity + Perfect, Simple Narrative = A Great Film That's Actually About Something. A Grandmother's voice speaks for all the grandmothers of Argentina in this delicate, heart-breaking trip through rooms that carry artifacts from an earlier age - haunted by the ghosts and memories of both happier times and sad. Gorgeously lit, designed and visually composed, Afarin Eghbal delivers a simple, yet stunning (and ultimately layered) film. Using live-action images via stop-motion-styled animation, this is a genuinely great film - short or otherwise. Telling what's ultimately a horrendous tale of one segment of "the disappeared" of Argentina, it earns its rays of hope honestly. Eghbal creates cinematic poetry of the highest order and it's a perfect demonstration of film's great potential to render narrative with the poetic qualities inherent in the medium.Winner of Encounters - Honourable Mention - Best Doc , Austin - Best Documentary Short

Trotteur (2011) dir. Arnaud Brisebois, Francis Leclerc
RATING: **
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Quebecois Artiness + High Production Value = Dullsville. Typically glossy high production value inherent in so many Quebecois films, an annoyingly soulful score, stunning period detail, a pseudo-Chariots-of-Fire slow motion race (between man and machine, no less - BIG IDEAS, EH?) and arty flashbacks to childhood that yields a fine calling card for television drama or a pretentious Quebecois feature replete with typically glossy high production values inherent in so many Quebecois films, an annoyingly soulful score, stunning period detail and arty flashbacks to childhood. In Official Competition at the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival and Canadian Premiere.

The Fisherman (2011) dir. Samantha Pineda Sierra
RATING: *
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Magic Realism + Day of the Dead = Take One Guess. As an old fisherman clambers into his boat and rows out to the wide open spaces, a little part of me thought, "Ah, perhaps we'll get some fabulous tale steeped in neorealism with a dash - only a dash, mind you - of existentialism. An old man and the sea. Arthritic hands. The meticulous detail with which he must continue to practise his livelihood, his craft - nay, his art." The phonograph in the boat should have given me a clue to the contrary. When he uses an old photograph as bait, my heart sunk. "Oh Christ!", I thought, "He's going to fish for his memories." I think you know the rest. On a positive note, it's not whimsical - at least not too much. Winner of an Honorable Mention, Morelia.

The Elaborate End of Robert Ebb (2011) dir. FX Goby, Matthieu Landour, Clément Bolla
RATING: *
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Spoof Of Cheesy SF + No Feel For The Genre = Not Always The Sincerest Form Of Homage. Dreadful, juvenile, thoroughly unfunny spoof of cheesy 50s SF monster movies with no feel, love or passion for the genre. The tongue is buried too deep in the cheek. Nothing is played "straight" - which is always the best way to ensure good-natured, knowing laughs. The monster suit is genuinely cool. Too bad the movie isn't. Astoundingly, it took three credited directors to helm this abysmal nonsense which could have just died the good death of so many of its ilk save for its questionable, noggin-scratching inclusion in good festivals. Official Competition at the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival

Canadian Film Centre Worldwide Short Film Festival - Toronto
OPENING GALA: AWARD WINNERS FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Bloor Hot Docs Cinema: Tuesday June 5, 7:00 pm
Bloor Hot Docs Cinema: Sunday June 10, 9:30 pm
Tickets and Info: HERE

LUMINARIS - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Canadian Film Centre Worldwide Short Film Festival 2012 (Toronto) - Opening Night Gala: Award Winners From Around The World

Luminaris (2011) dir. Juan Pablo Zaramella
RATING:**1/2
Review By Greg Klymkiw

L'équation de Klymkiw: Magic Realism + Whimsy = (for this fella) Explusion of Bile (though, for many others, delight).
The craft (I hesitate to use the word "artistry") in this digitally animated short is undeniable. This annoyingly predictable tale of a creative soul and his babe-o-licious co-worker hemmed into a dehumanized cubicle is, like most whimsical magical realism, sickeningly jaunty. The couple, along with hundreds of other toilers in an environment that inspires homogeneity rather than imagination, eventually break free of the shackles of bureaucratic efficiency in order to create a light from within that offers both freedom and love. King Vidor, frankly, wrote the book on cubicle-styled dehumanization in his masterpiece The Crowd - with, thankfully, NO whimsy. Vidor did his thing in 1928. It's dark and cool - even to this day. That said, if you're easily dazzled by eye-candy, but precious little else, you'll greedily gobble Luminaris up. The rest of us can regurgitate it after the initial ingestion and/or file under "forgettable". Winner of the Annecy 2011 - Audience Award & Fipresci Award, Special Jury Prize - Seoul Int. Cartoon and Animation Fest

Canadian Film Centre Worldwide Short Film Festival - Toronto
OPENING GALA: AWARD WINNERS FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Bloor Hot Docs Cinema: Tuesday June 5, 7:00 pm
Bloor Hot Docs Cinema: Sunday June 10, 9:30 pm
Tickets and Info: HERE