GREG KLYMKIW's 2nd ANNUAL TOP 10 HEROES OF CANADIAN CINEMA (2012 EDITION)

The
2nd
Annual
Klymkiw
Film Corner
TOP TEN
HEROES
of
CANADIAN
CINEMA (2012)

in alphabetical order
by first letter
of first name or company

 

By Greg Klymkiw

DAVE BARBER

Dave Barber - He is legendary. Since 1982, Dave Barber has served as one of the country's chief advocates for the exhibition of Canadian Cinema as the Coordinator of the home away from home to 'Peg cineastes, the Winnipeg Film Group Cinematheque. His first love has always been to champion homegrown product generated in the City of Winnipeg, giving full support to some of the country's most visionary filmmakers and being a vital part of the product's penetration into the national and international marketplace. His second love is Canadian Cinema - period, and he's sought to provide a theatrical home for a myriad of films generated domestically in formats ranging from training/workshop opportunities to retrospectives and last, but not least, as full-fledged theatrical releases. His third love is cinema and he has tirelessly championed the theatrical exhibition of the finest films made internationally that would otherwise have no theatrical home. One of his earliest successes was being the first advocate of Francis Coppola's One From The Heart and providing a theatrical venue for it when the film was ignored by mainstream exhibitors. Since that time he's repeatedly sought out the most challenging cinema to present to movie-lovers in Winnipeg from all over the world. Importantly, Barber's devotion to all the aforementioned remains a chief influence upon several generations of important filmmakers who, from Winnipeg, have taken the world by storm. Everybody knows and loves Dave from all over the world - filmmakers, other exhibitors, programmers, distributors and pretty much anyone who loves and cares deeply about cinema. For decades, Barber was a fixture the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and while he still attends the Hot Docs Film Festival, he has been sadly missing for a couple of years at TIFF. This, frankly, has created a huge void for filmmakers in Winnipeg in addition to the hundreds of international guests who descend upon TIFF. Even though I haven't lived in Winnipeg for over 20 years, exhibitors, distributors, programmers, curators and filmmakers still look upon me as a 'Pegger and pepper me with questions like, "I've been looking for Dave Barber, where's he staying?" [OR] "Where's Dave Barber? Isn't he coming to Toronto this year?" [OR] "What do you mean they've stopped him from coming? I wanted him to see my movie." Sadly, budget "appears" to be the excuse for his absence outside of Winnipeg. As far as I'm concerned, his importance to cinema in Winnipeg (and by extension to the rest of the country) is so integral, that I'd not only have him representing the Winnipeg Film Group and its important place in the theatrical exhibition of domestic and international product at BOTH Hot Docs and TIFF, but I'd be finding any means necessary to scrape together the pittance that would ultimately be required to have him attend Images, the Toronto Gay and Lesbian Festival, the ImagineNative festival, the FantAsia festival, Toronto After Dark Film Festival, the Montreal Festival of Nouveau Cinema and the Vancouver International Film Festival. He needs to be out of the city, out of the office and out in the field. Barber is the lifeblood of cinema in Winnipeg and frankly, his presence is missed outside of the city. This is abominable and frankly, he not only needs to be reinstated to being able to scour for product amongst his old haunts, but to reiterate my aforementioned point, expanded even further. There are few who'd disagree. In fact, anyone who would disagree is full of shit. Then again, I can't frankly imagine anyone being that stupid. So, come on Winnipeg! Barber is important to both Canadian Cinema and the birthplace of Prairie Post-Modernism as an advocate, promoter and exhibitor. Now's the time to reinstate and expand his gifts as an ambassador from Winnipeg, one of the the most historically vibrant regions of independent cinematic voices in the country. As the hit man at the end of Scorsese's Mean Streets says before shoving his gun out the window of a speeding car and blasting away: "NOW'S THE TIME!!!"

ED BARREVELD

Ed Barreveld - 2012 was a banner year for Ed Barreveld and his visionary documentary production company Storyline Entertainment. This is a great thing for a great guy. I met Ed in the 90s when he was the Studio Administrator of the Ontario Office of the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). In those halcyon days, Ed was the man who truly held the purse strings and vetted every element of a film's production. Many administrators in similar positions, especially within the context of government agencies, fit the term "petty bureaucrat" like a glove. Not Ed. He made it his priority to do whatever he had to do to make the lives of the filmmakers at the NFB smooth as silk so they could do what they had to do - create cinema. If you had a problem or needed something, most bureaucrats looked for excuses to say "no" and/or delay stuff to make sure their stinking assholes resting in their feathered nests were secure until every "t" was crossed and every "i" was dotted. With Ed, the films and the filmmakers were always the most important thing. His answer to everything was,"Hmmm, let me see what I can do." And DO, he did. Since the turn of the new century, Ed's been an indie producer of documentary product. This year, his company Storyline Entertainment was tied to 4 tremendous pictures (2 stellar features, The World Before Her and Herman's House) and two very cool TV docs for History (The Real Inglorious Basterds and The Real Sherlock Holmes). He supports gifted filmmakers (Min Sook Lee) and socially committed artists (Angad Singh Bhalla), has a small core of magnificent talent in his office, production coordinator Shasha Nakhai and producer Lisa Valencia-Svensson and on Storyline's most feted picture, he committed himself to helping The World Before Her get off the ground whilst eventually partnering with director Nisha Pahuja's longtime producing partner Cornelia Principe who brilliantly fuelled the creative and logistical engine when the movie was shooting in India. Ed is all about great ideas, partnerships and collaboration. He's bright, funny, generous, kind and passionate. I could probably go on for about another 2000 words, but you'll have to wait for the next issue of POV Magazine for that.

GEOFF PEVERE

Geoff Pevere - When people ask me what film critics I read and why, the numbers have dwindled over the years to those I can count on two hands (well, one and a half hands). Thankfully this clutch of scribes continues to deliver incisive, humorous writing and perhaps for me, most importantly, THEY TELL ME SOMETHING I DON'T KNOW (or something I DO know, but need pointed cajoling to wholly embrace and/or build upon) and as such, engage me in the sort of stimulating dialogue I demand when reading said criticism. One of the digits on my hand (the right hand, to be precise) is a movie-nut spawned in Ottawa, our fair nation's capitol. From his earliest days as a contributor to the now-defunct Cinema Canada, through his superb program notes when he was the Canuck programming guru at the Toronto International Film Festival and of course, the myriad of freelance pieces he contributed over the years to Take One, The Globe and Mail, etc., as well as the seminal best-seller, the Can-pop-culture history Mondo Canuck (co-written with Grieg Diamond), it was Pevere - more so than the traditional Maple-flavoured bastion of mainstream movie criticism that always reminded me WHY cinema had become the most important mode of cultural expression in all of modern history. Frankly, Pevere spoke to me with the authority of one whose literacy in cinema from all periods was unimpeachable and who generated copy that sang the body electric. When he joined the Toronto Star as a staff movie critic I actually bought the newspaper to read his reviews and frankly, his pieces were the ONLY thing I bothered to read in that bloated advertising rag aimed at inner-city-pseudo lefties and brain-dead suburbanites. Then I started to notice a huge decline in the Star's entertainment pages. Pevere continued to keep up his end of the bargain, but frankly, even his pieces seemed to get shorter and fewer. The Star was one of the quickest to adopt the lowest common denominator approach to cultural reportage/commentary - especially in film: 500 words, a bit of opinion and lots of plot summary, thank you, muchly. Once Pevere took over the Book columnist position, I stopped buying the paper and sneaking looks at Pevere online. When The Star dumped the book column and relegated one of this country's great movie critics to general entertainment reporting, I still did byline searches online, but aside from an occasional think piece on movies or some other pop culture subject, there became even less Pevere to read. When I had the opportunity, along with a select number of folks, to read a brilliant multi-part series of features on alcoholism in the cinema and within culture in general, I was astounded to learn The Star had NO PLACE for this great writing. Pathetic! Pevere is one of Canadian Cinema's great heroes because his writing and passion for cinema in general, places him in a position as lofty as the best of the best. More importantly, and MORE THAN ANY OTHER WRITER in this country (including all the puffery slobbered upon the late, though great, Jay Scott), Pevere created an important body of writing on Canadian Cinema - some of which, and I'm being self-serving here - managed to place an entire body of work I was a part of, in a critical context that could ONLY have made sense to a critic like Pevere rather than the actual filmmakers. In recent times, his writing has dotted numerous literary journals and he wrote what is still and no doubt, will be the seminal book on Don Shebib's Goin' Down Tbe Road. These days, The Globe and Mail has wisely asked him to contribute occasional freelance pieces on film and he's launched a website of new writings on the cinema, The Blessed Diversion Network. Blessed, indeed!

HUSSAIN AMARSHI

Hussain Amarshi - Many Canadian film distribution companies have come and gone, or worse, been swallowed up into a variety of ever-morphing conglomerates. Mongrel survives because it is a company with true vision. Founded by the passionate cineaste Hussain Amarshi in 1994, Mongrel has always set its sights upon vibrant, original and independent work that has a passionate audience out there in the world, but one that many distribution entities were either too lazy, ill-equipped and/or not interested in serving properly. I recall meeting Amarshi in those halcyon days at the beginnings of that exciting New Wave of English Canadian Cinema when he worked on the Atom Egoyan and Jeremy Podeswa films of legendary Canadian producer Camelia Frieburg. What I remember most fondly were conversations that were almost impossible to have with most people in the business - a discourse that seamlessly wove its way through a passion for cinema as art and industry. Many of the glorified used-car hucksters and/or glorified secretaries/bureaucrats in the Canadian film industry who purported and continue to purport being blessed with this gift are little more than masters of lip-service. Not Amarshi - he's always been endowed with the truly magic blend of cinematic aesthetics and business - coursing through his veins like the Congo River's Gates of Hell. The power within, however, manifests itself on the surface with the cultured, erudite and charming persona that's all Amarshi (all the time). One needs only look at the properties Mongrel backs and distributes to get a gander at Amarshi's vision. And his support for the best in Canadian cinema is an unparalleled reflection of good taste. The past year alone saw works as diverse as Peter Mettler's The End of Time, Sarah Polley's Stories We Tell and Deepha Mehta's Midnight's Children - all bearing an unquestionable Canadian pedigree, but with an international flavour. And Mongrel's high levels of great taste are reflected in the superb work they pick up directly and/or the first-rate Sony Pictures Classics they unleash upon the Canadian marketplace. Again, in the past year, Mongrel released the epitome of COOL!!! Witness: A Late Quartet, Amour, Citadel, Holy Motors, Searching For Sugar Man - the list goes on. And lest we forget, Mongrel is distributing the extraordinary Canadian film War Witch (Rebelle), a 2013 Academy Award Nominee for Best Foreign Language Film. Truly great, visionary leaders surround themselves with only the best. Sadly, the Canadian film industry is replete with too many leaders who buffer themselves with milquetoast butt-lickers to satisfy the Status Quo. Again, not Amarshi. He's one of our country's true kick-ass, take-no-prisoners visionaries whose loyalty and belief in assembling and nurturing a great team is one of the ways in which Mongrel stays at the top of the heap. Witness: Tom Alexander, Mongrel's Director of Theatrical Releasing - the only MBA I know who has the makings of a first-rate film critic and instead hustles great product for a great company. Mongrel also has the great taste to utilize the inimitable veteran publicist Bonne Smith of Star PR to hustle the theatrical product to the media. The list, frankly, could go on - Amarshi's team is a veritable Round Table of Canadian Cinema's Knights. Amarshi is, of course, King. Mongrel Media, unlike the ostentatious Camelot, hovers inconspicuously (though impeccably interior designed) on Queen Street West, overlooking the rebuilt asylum across the street. Yes, I know it's politically incorrect to refer to these joints as asylums, but you know what? Mongrel on the home entertainment front also handles Kino Lorber product and as Mongrel was responsible for hustling a whack of first-rate Mario Bava pictures, I'm sticking to the word "Asylum". When you're the coolest of the cool, that's a view worth looking at.

IGOR DRLJACA

Igor Drljaca: Igor Drljaca and his family lived in Sarajevo. Then the Bosnian War started. Shells and missiles went off constantly. Tanks rolled through the city. The ground rumbled and shook like an earthquake. Communism kept Yugoslavia together. Communism was dead. The country was torn apart. Igor and his little brother were children when a view out their window could be deadly and peeking out from within framed a war that left its mark on millions. Weeks of terror instilled itself upon the Drljaca family until they escaped the country and fled to Canada. Young Igor was always an artist and when the time came, he studied film at York University. He made a clutch of phenomenal short films and this year, he unleashed his first feature film Krivina upon the world. Igor is Canadian - through and through. This is the country of his family's salvation, but it's also the country with which Igor discovered artistic freedom and the opportunity to make movies his way - movies that captured life in both Sarajevo and life in Canada. Igor's feature is perhaps one of the most powerful dramatic explorations of the experience of the diaspora uprooted by the Baltic and Eastern European conflicts of the 90s and their lives here in Canada. His acclaimed short film The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar was honoured as one of TIFF's Canadian Top Ten and most recently was nominated for a Canadian Screen Award. Krivina enjoyed its world premier at TIFF 2012 and has secured Canadian Distribution via legendary programmer Stacey Donen's brand new College Street Pictures. It has been selected to participate in the prestigious Rotterdam International Film Festival where it will represent Canada, a country that should be proud of this glorious film and this achievement. It is, after all, a Canadian Film, by a Canadian Filmmaker that deals with the despair suffered by the Bosnian diaspora as new citizens of Canada. It even shares the stylistic extension of a great tradition of Canadian Cinema that typified so much of the country's classic output during the 60s and 70s at the dawn of our feature film industry. Shamefully and almost embarrassingly, Drljaca's great film was invited by Telefilm Canada to apply for marketing assistance to reprsent our country in Rotterdam, only to be rejected on the grounds that the film is not in the English, French or Aboriginal languages. This appalling, short sighted and frankly, ethnocentric stand taken by the Federal agency responsible for assisting Canadian cinema is representative of this country's pathetic ignorance of the fact that there are (and have been since the earliest days of immigration) huge numbers of New Canadians who barely speak the official languages. This, however, is not a disgrace on the part of the diaspora of countries seeking a new life here - it's a reality and a vital part of the country's multicultural tradition. Multiculturalism via the late Prime Minister Trudeau was an official and important policy and is what makes Canada a leader in civil and human rights. Clearly, the federal agency that denied this film funding it deserved (and I reiterate, was invited to apply for) is not only unfair, IT IS DISCRIMINATORY. Some petty bureaucrat(s) looked at their idiotic rules and instead of taking the sort of brave chance one expects from those in the civil service who are there to serve ALL Canadians, they did the usual cowardly ass-covering and said, "Sorry, folks." There are, of course, many examples of civil servants who look at the idiotic guidelines of all sorts of things and make exceptions. These people are the real Canadians, like all those brave boys in the World Wars who didn't bury their heads in the sand and risked everything. When a bureaucrat takes a risk, they're hardly risking their life. In spite of this insult, Drljaca is clearly a proud Canadian filmmaker who has proudly made a genuinely great Canadian film and hopefully will continue to do so. I think we'll be seeing more and more Cultural Heroes like Drljaca in this country who are not going to be stopped by some of the pettiness of this country. They love this country and they will continue to make movies in this country we can all be proud of. Igor is a young, vibrant Canadian filmmaker. He's already delivered great work. This is one hero whose only limit will be the sky.

INGRID HAMILTON

Ingrid Hamilton - I love a great publicist, especially when they blend classic, old-style approaches with current, cutting-edge approaches and, frankly, forward thinking. Maybe it's my obsession with Sweet Smell of Success, having a Father who was a kickass, hands-on promotions and public relations guy, plus my own predilections as a promoter through much of my existence as a producer - whatever it is, I know a GREAT publicist when I see one and Ingrid Hamilton of GAT PR is nothing if not a great publicist. Most importantly: She loves movies. Loves them to death. She KNOWS cinema. Like the back of her hand. She also knows her clients' needs so well, she can take them on and run with them - far beyond anywhere they'd expect. She knows writers, too. She lets them do their thing, provides what they need and hangs back, BUT, she has an uncanny sense of certain writers' tastes and she'll subtly and helpfully, draw their attention to material they WILL enjoy writing about. This should come as no surprise to anyone who read Ingrid when she was a scribe for the inimitable Toronto Sun. I always believed the best journalists made great publicists or screenwriters. She's currently the former, but who knows what rabbits she'll continue to pull out of her hat. Versatility is the strongest suit in this crazy business - especially in Canada. Amazingly, Ingrid also toiled at CTV and more than ably handled their national publicity. Why, amazing? CTV has always been the most un-cool web in Canada and her golden touch brought the unheard of word "hip" to the stodgy old boys' network. Most notably, in recent years, she's been the PR mouthpiece for every great Canadian film type who is doing cool shit - Ingrid Veninger, Kinosmith, The Toronto Jewish Film Festival, the ImagineNative Film Festival, VSC, Indie-Can Entertainment, the new College Street Pictures - the list goes on and on and on - people and organizations that are cooler than cool, and Ingrid knows how to make even cooler. That, my friends is a GREAT publicist. And that is very, very cool indeed.

MICHAEL DOWSE

Michael Dowse - Dowse is a Canadian director who can do no wrong. He's a born filmmaker with the very art of cinema hard-wired into his DNA. His work is Canadian in the best sense of the word. He proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Canadian culture IS a thing unto itself, while at the same time, injecting the work with a humour and entertainment value that's universal. From his FUBAR hoser epics right through to GOON, his magnificent ode to hockey, Dowse is, quite simply OUR storyteller. His buckshot sprays effectively upon several generations in this country and try as we might, it's firmly lodged within us - a constant reminder of who we were, are and will be. Dowse is the real thing, and then some.

SARAH POLLEY

Sarah Polley - It's the second year in a row and Canada's true national treasure holds onto the throne (a Muskoka Chair) in my own privately declared Kingdom of Canadian Cultural Heroism. She's smart, funny, cool and three words ultimately suggest all one needs to know why this brave, brilliant writer, director, producer, actor, Mom and activist is a genuine hero of Canadian Cinema. Those three simple words are:

STORIES WE TELL

'Nuff said.

STEVE GRAVESTOCK

Steve Gravestock - If looks were everything, this bespectacled, ball-cap-adorned, goatee-sporting long-hair might be mistaken for a denizen of the InnTowner Hotel in Thunder Bay - sitting sagely in a dark corner of its infamous bar, an abacus on the round table to calculate "tributes" from the "soldiers", wearing the colours of T-Bay's Spartans biker gang (and bearing the monicker of "Professor"), sipping straight from a can of Labatt's 50, nodding in time to the beat of a grinding metal band and surrounded by adoring tight-jeaned, big-haired blondes whose tresses are infused with so much hairspray that they glow like the light emanating from a nuclear reactor. Yes, while he'd definitely be at home in this environment, his talents are ultimately best served as a Senior Programmer with the Toronto International Film Festival Group where for years he has presided over the organization's representation of Canadian Cinema. A tireless devotee to the Nation's celluloid output, Gravestock continues to preside over all matters Canuckian including Festival and Lightbox showcases, special presentations, retrospectives, TIFF's monograph program in association with the University of Toronto Press and the Über-Important  TIFF Canadian Top Ten. People will always whine about awards and Top Ten lists, but let it be said that Gravestock and his Über-Colleague Lisa Goldberg run one of the best organized and superbly designed jury systems in the country. Yes, juries reflect the opinions of the jurors, but Gravestock makes sure those chosen for the task have informed opinions (like, for example, oh, I don't know . . . me? Maybe?) and then the jurors have no idea who each other are and must separately submit their numeric choices in secret. These are tabulated and . . . WOW! My recent experience as a jury member on the CTT yielded the most amazing results - I figured my own tastes would be short shrifted, but in fact, an extremely diverse group of people voted upon most of the films at the TOP of my list, while the others, to my mind, made total sense to be there. My personal favourite Gravestock activity of the Heroic Kind is the vital, ongoing initiative, the Canadian Open Vault series that resurrects and screens genuine classics of early Canadian Cinema. A recent screening of The Hard Part Begins starring Donnelly Rhodes, a gritty 70s beautiful loser drama set against the backdrop of small-town country and western taverns and replete with the decade's trademark existential male angst is one of my favourite examples of this series. It's an important showcase of the astounding parallel work going on in Canuckville during the Easy Riders, Raging Bulls period of cinema. Coolsville, Daddio, Coolsville!!! There are, to my knowledge, no Canadian filmmakers who don't have the highest fondness, respect and downright regard for Gravestock. He's all Canadian, all film loving and all supportive. Most of all, he's a rarity in the rarified film festival world - he's a mensch!

SOSKA TWINS

Soska Twins - Jen and Sylvia Soska might represent one of the most exciting breakthroughs for female filmmaking in Canada since Patricia Rozema dazzled the world with I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing. Sporting the monicker "Twisted Twins", the identical Vancouver sisters with the exotic blend of Hungarian and First Nations blood, looks and cross-pollinated sensibilities blasted onto the scream-screen-scene with the outrageous no-budget Dead Hooker in a Trunk. This year, they upped their game and delivered the best horror film of the year (from any country I might add) - the utterly, insanely, brilliantly creepy American Mary. Under the mentorship of Eli Roth, they're poised to hit the stratosphere. With a uniquely feminist sensibility, a delectable sense of black humour, a superb sense of time and place and a knack for delving into the darker recesses of humanity, the twins have knocked two out of the park. Next up - a Grand Slam. They're currently galavanting across the globe promoting the hell out of American Mary with companies as diverse and powerful as Universal, Anchor Bay and many others. While making their films they continued to work as bartenders/serving wenches in Vancouver's ever-so-cooler-than-cool watering holes. They're hands-on total filmmakers - auteurs in the best sense of the word since they gratefully accept the assistance and input from a clutch of Canada's best actors and artisans. They're down to earth, bereft (thank Christ!) of pretension and yes, they finish each other's sentences.

BETWEEN BOUNDARIES - THE SHORT FILMS OF IGOR DRLJACA including: "The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar" (TIFF 2011 TOP 10, CSA - Canadian Screen Award Nominee for Best Short Documentary), "Battery Powered Duckling", "Mobile Dreams", "On a Lonely Drive" and "Woman in Purple" - Review By Greg Klymkiw

Igor Drljaca's Krivina is one of the most important films about identity and war made during the past 20 years. That it's a debut feature is even more extraordinary. Before Krivina (Klymkiw Film Corner TEN BEST LIST and Klymkiw's TOP TEN CANADIAN FILMS) begins its theatrical run at Toronto's Royal Cinema on January 25 via Stacey Donen's newly unveiled and more-necessary-than-ever film distribution company College Street Pictures, I hereby DEMAND that you RUN, DO NOT WALK to a screening of Between Boundaries: The Short Films Of Igor Drljaca playing at the Royal January 17, 2013 at 7pm. Tickets are available at the door for $5 smackers. It'll be the best fin you've parted with in a long time.

The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar ****
(2011) dir. Igor Drljaca

Mobile Dreams ****
(2008) dir. Igor Drljaca

On a Lonely Drive ****
(2009) dir. Igor Drljaca

Woman in Purple ****
(2010) dir. Igor Drljaca

Battery Powered Duckling ***
(2006) dir. Igor Drljaca

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Given the fact that our screens are inundated with American propaganda all connected in one way or the other with war - one great (Zero Dark Thirty), one neither here nor there (Lincoln), one mediocre (ARGO) and the latter two being ludicrously overrated - the appearance of Sarajevo-born Canadian filmmaker Igor Drljaca and his extraordinary work couldn't be coming at a better time.

Drljaca was a child during the Bosnian War of 1992 and fled to Canada with his family. Always artistically inclined, he studied film at Toronto's York University and created an impressive body of work prior to shooting his first feature Krivina.

Given his own personal experiences, it's no surprise that the work on display in this program of short films focuses upon the effects of war upon children - works that are filtered through memory and often presented with healthy dollops of actual footage of the war in Bosnia.

There is, of course, an astounding tradition of cinema that deals with children during wartime and in terms of exposing the utter idiocy of war, what always strikes me is how war affects the innocent - adults, yes - but children even more. Children somehow represent an eternal hope for the future and to see depictions of their innocence stripped from them by the greed and stupidity of people who should know better is heart-wrenching.

Some of the great works include Rene Clement's Forbidden Games with a tiny Brigitte Fossey searching for family, any family, after watching her own family gunned down, Louis Malle's Au Revoir Les Enfants, the autobiographical portrait of his tragically shortened friendship with a young Jewish boy and last, but not least, Steven Spielberg's greatest film, Empire of the Sun, the adaptation of J.G. Ballard's autobiographical novel which features a very young Christian Bale as a child who goes - quite literally - insane during the Japanese occupation of China.

Drljaca continues this tradition with his own unique style - a strange blend of Neo-realism with the sheer poetic power he shares with many Central and Eastern European filmmakers - most notably Alexander Dovzhenko and Sergei Paradjanov. Drljaca's work is infused with a purity, if you will, of poetic realism.

The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar is considered to be a documentary portrait of Drljaca's experiences during the outbreak of the Bosnian War, but it's crafted with such exquisite attention to narrative detail that until the final credits, I thought I had been watching an astounding recreation of home movie footage blending real video footage from the war.

It's not, but it might as well be, because the footage Drljaca uses plunges the picture into some mighty cool post-modernist territory.

The simple tale involves a young boy who receives a school assignment to paint a picture representing the coming of spring. He runs out of the proper paint and uses what he has. He's dissatisfied with his work because he fears the picture will now represent the Fall. He spends the entire Spring Break worrying about displeasing his teacher and receiving a poor mark.

And then, war strikes and the film veers into territory that will move you beyond words. There's one shot on the street after a massive shelling in the boy's neighbourhood that's as devastating as an early moment in Clement's Forbidden Games. Realizing that this is a documentary, using actual footage, it is an image that would have haunted me anyway. but knowing it's the real thing, puts it on another level altogether.

The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar is playing with four other Drljaca shorts.

Mobile Dreams features some of Drljaca's stunningly composed long takes in this profoundly moving tale of an old couple who fit each other like a glove in spite of their seeming non-communicative relationship. When the old man brings his wife a gift that will presumably keep them in touch, the inevitable amusingly and touchingly takes place.

On a Lonely Drive will rip your guts out. It depicts a lonely drive, indeed, just after a domestic altercation and, with tragic results.

Woman in Purple opens with a stunning shot of high rise buildings full of shell and bullet holes. It's post war and Drljaca follows the J.G. Ballard-like adventures of an orphaned boy who engages in criminal activity - seeking freedom through illicit means, but also struggling for dignity. Yet another perfect short that will knock you on your ass.

Battery Powered Duckling is a clever, ambitious dystopian SF drama. It's always engaging and while not quite as accomplished as the others, you'll recognize Drljaca's burgeoning style and wonder if a feature length version will ever exist.

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THE PENALTY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Lon Chaney is one of the best screen actors of all time. His performance as the deformed Blizzard is preserved on this gorgeous BluRay/DVD by KinoLorber

"Crying won't help, talking might."

The Penalty (1920) *****
dir. Wallace Worsley
Starring: Lon Chaney, Claire Adams, Charles Clary, Ethel Grey Terry

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Imagine the horror.

One day you're a happy-go-lucky kid from a well-to-do San Francisco family and the next you wake up from an anesthetic-induced slumber to discover you've been transformed into a deformed, legless freak. This is what they call a living nightmare - one that will last the rest of your life. Even worse, you overhear the senior surgeon chastising the junior surgeon for accidentally performing unnecessary amputations.

"Good God, you should not have operated," the senior doctor says to the flabbergasted young surgeon. "You've mangled this child for life."

Now you know for sure.

Your legs could and indeed SHOULD have been spared.

What happens to you, now?

Many years later, far from the hearth of your family's home, you live amidst the squalor of seedy bars and whorehouses within a radius of several city blocks, the notorious Pacific Avenue leading directly from the waterfront to provide a myriad of opportunities for sailors and dock workers to engage in all manner of sinful and sordid activities. However, unlike the shady denizens of the Barbary Coast you now call home, you wear only the finest tailored clothes and in spite of the knurled stumps below your thighs, jammed into a pair of steel legs, you've clearly acquired considerable power and respect - even though it's amongst the scum of the Earth.

Your name is now Blizzard (Lon Chaney) and you're hellbent on both revenge and masterminding a massive criminal coup to bring the City of San Francisco to its knees. You're one mean, downright reprehensible son of a bitch. Every woman you cast your eyes upon, no matter what their station, become your whore and anyone - ANYONE!!! - who dares cross you or fuck you up will die.

"Laughter burns a cripple like acid."

The Penalty, directed by Wallace Worsley (The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Ace of Hearts) and co-written by Gouverneur Morris (adapted from his famous and utterly insane novel) with ace adaptation specialist Charles Kenyon (A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Petrified Forest, The Iron Horse), is one lollapalooza of a crime picture.

Sumptuously shot and cut with a blistering pace, it's not only a movie that knocks you on your duff, chills you to the bone and at times, totally creeps you out, but is infused with elements of tragedy that even move you. Though Blizzard is one of the most foul creatures put on celluloid, the astonishing performance by Lon Chaney, Worsley's terse, brilliant direction and a screenplay that takes one unpredictable turn after another ultimately yields a picture that manages to rip humanity out of the soul of its main character.

While you're not necessarily rooting for him, you come to recognize elements of redemption dangling in front of him and you're riveted by the hope (against hope) that he'll grab one of the olive branches extended by the universe to lift him out of the grime to remove even one or two black spots on his tortured soul.

And what a tortured soul Chaney creates. When a young artist seeks the ultimate model for a sculpture of "Satan After The Fall", she takes one look at Blizzard's mug with its horrendous sneer and eyes radiating a mixture of hatred and agony, and knows instantly, he's the one.

She sees him as a "model". We, however, have already seen several instances of Blizzard conducting himself with Satanic gusto during the perpetration of cruel and criminal actions. In fact, his treatment of a woman who betrays him, but realizes too late that she loves him is akin to a psychologically abusive pulling the wings off a fly until finally, he warns his slaves (yes, slaves!) that she "now sleeps on a marble slab".

Chaney as Blizzard is no mere movie villain. He infuses the role with pure, unadulterated evil and hatred. He's beyond bad, beyond creepy, beyond villainous - he's fucking scary. And finally, what makes him scary is the humanity he pulls from the depths of the character.

When Blizzard declares that "Laughter burns a cripple like acid," we're alternately moved and horrified. We dare not doubt for a second that he's been the target of endless derision and at the same time, we know what lengths he'll go to in order to avenge the butchery perpetrated upon him - first with the literal butcher and then with the whole world.

Murderer, thief, pimp and white slaver. Blizzard's body is not only twisted, so is his soul.

And the sheer physicality of the role is a marvel to behold. We have no doubt Blizzard is legless. Chaney clearly underwent endless pain to keep both legs tucked and burrowed deep into the steel legs. Every move, every breath and every step he takes seems genuinely wracked with utter agony. Even more tragic are the very few moments where Chaney's eyes reveal brief sadness, regret and yes, even a deep-seeded tenderness that creeps out from within his soul.

Chaney really was a great actor and he had so much to offer in film after film. For me, he truly is one of the actors who defines the very notion of what it is to deliver a full-on, full-blown screen performance. Known as the "Man of a Thousand Faces", Chaney used his astounding prowess with makeup effects to apply physical manifestations to his "look" for every role so he could go a few steps further to embody whatever character he played.

The Penalty is a bonafide classic of cinema. The picture is so riveting and skilfully wrought that at times, it's hard to fathom that the movie is over 90-years-old. Though the film is silent (this should be enough to betray its age), the expert storytelling, the crazily inspired writing and Worsley's superb direction all conspire to render a picture that feels far ahead of its time.

So much of this feeling comes from Chaney himself.

The camera loved him.

More importantly, Chaney loved the camera.

"The Penalty" is available on Kino-Lorber. Mastered in HD from a 35mm restoration by the George Eastman House Motion Picture Department and featuring an astounding new musical score by The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, this is a Blu-Ray to cherish. It also includes surviving footage of Chaney's now-lost "The Miracle Man". "By the Sun's Rays", a very cool 1914 one-reel western with Chaney as an unlikely thief is on the disc as well as vintage original trailers from "The Big City" and "While The City Sleeps". Feel free to order the film from the handy links below. Great prices and you'll also be supporting the maintenance of this site if you do so.

THE PATRON SAINTS - Review By Greg Klymkiw

"WHAT AM I DOING HERE?"

The
Patron
Saints
(2011) ****
dir. Brian M. Cassidy, Melanie Shatzky
Review
By Greg
Klymkiw


"What am I doing here? Please tell me." says the old woman. She wants to know why she isn't home with her mother. She wonders if she'll ever go home to be with her mother ever again. And then, "I don't know where I am. I don't know how I got here."

The old woman is in a nursing home, of course. She's not going home. She's there until she dies.

"All around this place are these hills with trees on them and they're so nice to look at," says a fat, seemingly punch-drunk old goodfella from the bed he never seems to leave. He's been institutionalized for most of his life - from foster homes to prison and now a nursing home. A bit of nature, even though it's in the distance, is just what the doctor ordered for a man whose only freedom were those ever-so brief moments when he held a gun in his massive fists while striding into liquor marts, convenience stores or banks to hold them up. At least, that's what we imagine.

The joy those distant hills give him is short-lived. The sentimental symbol of escape into the natural world yields slightly cynical and forced laughter. The hills, he explains, are really piles of garbage that could be stacked no higher and were covered over with sod and seed, resulting in trees sprouting to the heavens from mounds of filth.

"I believe in God. He wants me to lose a little more wright and He's going to get me up walking. I don't pray for nothing. I pray to get out of here." says the old goodfella. "God's got a plan for all of us. Though I'm really not sure what He's got planned for all of us in this nursing home."

His question is no doubt on the minds of most of the nursing home's residents - at least those who have something resembling their faculties. Looking at one resident, a blind, twisted, toothless and bed-ridden old woman, one can only guess what God's plan is for her. Spending a lifetime of rape and abuse at the hands of her brother, a brother who is still allowed supervised visits to the sister he brutalized, one can only imagine what plan God has for her?

And what, God forbid, does she dream about? What will be those final images flashing in her mind before she's enveloped in the darkness and light of death?

The Patron Saints is an unremittingly agonizing documentary film by Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky that focuses its lenses upon the residents of a nursing home for the aged. As harrowing as the experience is, the filmmakers employ a strange amalgam of fly-on-the-wall direct cinema techniques with a dash of cinéma vérité. In the former documentary style, the lives of the inmates are presented without narration, no questions, no overt manipulation and seemingly no intrusion on the part of the filmmakers. To the latter style, however, there are subtle, skillfully engineered aspects to the process in that one can recall nary a single shot that is not stunningly, gorgeously, sumptuously composed.

The filmmakers not only point their cameras in the direction of the inmates. We are shown the dedication and compassion of those who try to make the lives of these people better. And yet, for all these affirmations of man's kindness to man, the filmmakers punctuate many sequences with exterior images of airplanes flying endlessly over the facility, the weeds sprouting like an ocean around the institution itself and yes, those mounds of garbage in the distance, adorned with flora to hide the filth beneath.

And if we do get images of flight, of escape, they're presented from within the back of an ambulance, a motionless body strapped to a gurney, leaving its place of incarceration, its spirit hopefully journeying to some better place.

There's a strong sense that the camera, like those forests touching the skies whilst rooted within the filth of the landfill below, perform a similar service. In fact, I'd say the filmmakers provide a twofold service. The camera, through the eyes of the artists, captures the last days, weeks and/or months of this mass of forgotten humanity - sometimes with humour, but mostly through an unremitting sadness which, in direct cinema terms is completely and utterly unavoidable given the circumstances. Much as we might want to repress it, what the cameras expose is the reality of where ALL of our lives are headed, unless of course we mercifully die before. As life itself is dichotomous, so too is the reality as presented by the film. In a sense, the cameras provide these people, in spite of the aforementioned bleakness and whether they're aware of it or not, a voice and a presence in the outside world. Most importantly, though, the beauty and artistry of the compositions provides a kind of love and compassion - the eyes of the artists deliver a terrible beauty to these peoples' lives and in so doing, force us, the audience, to do the same.

No matter how dire and desperate the final days of these people are, it is finally cinema that speaks for them.

This is the power of movies and ultimately, thanks to the talent and sensitivity of the filmmakers, it is why The Patron Saints is one of the most haunting, moving, original and important documentary portraits of the elderly ever committed to film.

"The Patron Saints" is currently unspooling at Toronto's Royal Cinema via Vagrant Films and will roll out on a platform release prior to a variety of home entertainment formats. It's a big-screen experience. Intimacy on this level deserves more than watching it on a small screen.

THE QATSI TRILOGY (KOYAANISQATSI, POWAQQATSI, NAQOYQATSI) - BLU-RAY REVIEW By Greg Klymkiw - The Criterion Collection Keeps On Outdoing Themselves With Every New Blu-Ray Release. Just apply for another line of credit. What the hell, eh? There's only a major financial crisis on and during the Great Depression, everyone sought solace in the movies. Why not now? So sit back, fire up a doobie and relax.

The Qatsi Trilogy (Criterion Collection Blu-Ray Box Set)
dir. Godfrey Reggio (2013 - BRD Release) *****
Koyaanisqatsi (1982) dir. Godfrey Reggio ****
Powaqqatsi (1988) dir. Godfrey Reggio ***
Naqoyqatsi (2002) dir. Godfrey Reggio **

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Turn out the lights. Close the curtains. Mute your phones. Relieve yourself of all waste matter. Sit. Fire up a mega-doobie. Sit.

Do not move for 274 minutes except to change discs, fire up more doobies, address munchie/thirst-concerns and/or (if you must) relieve yourself of any additional waste matter that builds up. Given the themes of the films in question, you must engage in all the aforementioned activities in a completely off-grid environment (including waste relief in a compost toilet).

Everybody loves a good "head" film. Since the 1960s, eager youthful audiences always sought out movies that could be appreciated under the influence of marijuana and/or hash. LSD was not always recommended, but some braved this type of motion picture experience with mega-doses of acid anyway. Different strokes. IT'S. ALL. COOL. BY. ME. MAN. Some of the bigger "head" films (intended as such or not) include 2001: A Space Odyssey, El Topo, Holy Mountain, Liquid Sky, Eraserhead and the grandaddy laugh riot head film (about "heads") of them all, Louis Gasnier's masterpiece Reefer Madness.

In spite of the considerable virtues of the aforementioned, Director Godfrey Reggio delivered the ultimate cinematic "head" experience of all time - stoner celluloid of the highest order - and not just one movie, but an entire trilogy of cinemalis cannabisus sexualis.

Koyaanisqatsi, Powaqqatsi and Naqoyqatsi might well be the best mind bending movie trips for drug addicts ever made. I'm not certain is Mr. Reggio would agree with my assessment, but what I'm especially certain about is that there isn't a single spell-check program in the known universe that's going to give even a smidgen of help with these titles. (If spell-check in Hopi exists, please illuminate me.)

What you're going to get from these movies is absolutely no plot, though in their own psychedelic mind-fuck-eye-candy fashion, they tell a story - the story of man and his relationship to the natural world, or in other words, a beautiful world that man is fucking up with his increasing reliance upon technology which, in turn, creates waste that destroys all that is natural.

Each film is comprised of seemingly unrelated images, but they are all indeed connected, gorgeously shot and accompanied by music written by Philip Glass, everyone's musical go-to boy for hypnotic, repetitive, New Age-styled beats. The third in the trilogy even has cello solos by the incomparable Yo Yo Ma. Get 'yer dancin' clogs on.

Reggio's first stab at this avant-garde exploration of man and nature is without question the best of the lot. Koyaanisqatsi is the clearest of all three in terms of stunningly reflecting the translation of the title, which is: "Life Out of Balance". Seeing one gorgeous piece of natural beauty after another in an America mediated through optical manipulations, stop motion effects, experimental use of stock, lighting and filters, then accompanied by haunting images of technology wreaking environmental havoc, this is a work that is as profoundly important as it is a perfectly fashioned bauble of big sledge hammer activist cinema.

Every element of the picture works like clockwork and yields powerful, imaginative images that are expertly captured by cinematographer Ron Fricke (who would go on to direct his own similarly-styled head films, Baraka and the recent Samsara). Though Reggio's touch is decidedly lacking in any subtlety, the message is an important one and profoundly clear. Even more astounding is that the movie was initially released theatrically by a major studio, generated fabulous box office and continued to amass grosses in repertory, non-theatrical markets and eventually home video. The Philip Glass score here is also first-rate - perfectly in balance with the themes and images and a sure addition to the overall experience for those many who choose to partake in the film under the influence of hallucinogens of their choice.

Powaqqatsi feels like more of the same, even though we're clearly into new territory. The rendering of images that follow adhere to the English translation of the title from Hopi into English as "Life in Transformation". Here, Reggio leaves America behind and shoots in a variety of third world countries. The focus is upon mostly images of man engaged in work - hard, physical labour against the backdrop of the natural world. Cinematographer Ron Fricke abandoned his post and moved on to directing Baraka and though the movie has more aural Clarence Carter-like "strokin'" from Philip Glass, the movie is not without merit, but loses a fair bit of the punch Reggio's first outing had.

Naqoyqatsi definitely has its fans, but I'm not really one of them. The title translated from Hopi to English means "Life as War" and here, Reggio dabbles in the idea of a complete lack of personal communication in a digital age, coupled with violence mediated through even more impersonal technological means. All of this is presented within the super-obvious context of The Tower of Babel. We get Philip Glass, Yo Yo Ma cello strokin' and tons o' digital imagery, but the movie sadly feels dated compared to the "old-fashioned" Koyaanisqatsi which successfully managed to remain vital and ahead of its time in spite of the fact that it's over 30 years old.

All in all, this is a truly worthwhile purchase - especially on Blu-Ray. Criterion provides Reggio-approved HD transfers, first-rate sound and a treasure trove of extra features that enhance the viewing experience of all three films.

And, I should also clarify that the trilogy, while a stoner experience of the first order, can be equally appreciated by those who remain straight. Much of it is mind-blowingly mind-fucking without mind-altering substances.

The Qatsi Trilogy is available on Blu-Ray and DVD from the Criterion Collection.

VILLA RIDES - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Yet another picture Sam Peckinpah was supposed to make, but didn't. Yup, he was fired.

Villa Rides (1968) dir. Buzz Kulik
Starring: Robert Mitchum, Yul Brynner and Charles Bronson

**1/2

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Does the name Buzz Kulik ring a bell? Well, it probably shouldn’t because he’s essentially a proficient hack who delivered thousands of hours of American series television, a few forgettable features and a handful of decent made-for-television movies. On the plus side, most of his television work is from the Golden Age and anyone who camera-jockeyed shows like “The Twilight Zone”, “Gunsmoke”, “Perry Mason” and, among many, many others, “Have Gun – Will Travel” can’t be dismissed entirely. He also delivered the goods on two of the best dying-sports-star TV-weepers of all time, “Brian’s Song” and “Babe” as well as an extremely memorable movie-of-the-week thriller called “Bad Ronald”.

In spite of the abovementioned, however, it’s still a disappointment that he is the director of the all-star feature western “Villa Rides” – not because his work is bad, but because the material suggests just how good the picture might have been if its original screenwriter, Sam Peckinpah, had had a shot directing it.

After the studio butchery of “Major Dundee” and his unfair firing from “The Cincinnati Kid”, Peckinpah, that late, great iconoclast of contemporary cinema, took a few gun-for-hire jobs during an extremely low point in his career when he was essentially persona-non-grata in the business. One of these jobs was to write a screenplay about the legendary Pancho Villa.

Watching the picture, one is occasionally distracted from the proceedings by constantly trying to imagine the picture it could have been. On the surface, it tells a relatively simple tale wherein a barn-storming American aviator (Robert Mitchum) runs guns to the Mexican army, witnesses a genocidal slaughter of a Mexican village (a result of his sale of the guns) and his eventual switchover to fight the good fight during the Mexican Revolution with Pancho Villa (Yul Brynner) and trusty right hand (Charles Bronson). From that point on, lots of things blow up real good.

But that’s about all they do in Kulik’s hands. Blow up.

This is unfortunate. Few American filmmakers had just the right feel for Mexico and could bring equal amounts of sentiment, sorrow and brutality to the proceedings. Peckinpah was at the top of this very small list. Considering that Peckinpah’s script (rewritten by Robert “Chinatown” Towne) is replete with tougher-than-nails men’s men who begin on opposite sides of the fence and eventually bond by causing violence for the greater good, one looks in vain for the sadness and obsession that infused much of Peckinpah’s work.

Alas, it is not really there in the final product.

What remains is an engaging stalwart cast and some not-unexciting action scenes. “Villa Rides” has a good amount of entertainment value and makes for fine Saturday afternoon home viewing. One can’t sneeze at this in any, way shape or form. However, knowing who wrote the film and seeing, from time to time, almost-trademark Peckinpah themes and situations within it, one longs for more. Even the extreme proficiency and entertainment value of the action scenes pales in comparison to the mere THOUGHT of what Peckinpah might have brought to them if he were at the helm.

We’ll never get it, of course. It’s not there. It’s solid western action – no more, no less. If you’re able to forget the pedigree of the screenwriter, a rollicking good time can still be had.

And that, finally, ain’t nothin’!

It’s just not Peckinpah.

“Villa Rides” is available on DVD from Legend Films.

Feel free to order from the direct links below and assist with the maintenance of this review site:

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MISSILE TO THE MOON - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Glorious Retro Sci-Fi from the 50s (and it's chock-full o' babes!!!)

Missile to the Moon (1958) dir. Richard E. Cunha
Starring: Richard Travis, Cathy Downs, K.T. Stevens, Tommy Cook

***

By Greg Klymkiw

Truly great science fiction is rooted firmly in science fact. Missile to the Moon is just such a motion picture. Directed with passion and panache by the great Richard E. Cunha, audiences will thrill to the care and effort taken to plunge us into a celluloid world that reproduces – blow by blow – what it truly must be like to travel in space and to walk, ever-so-boldly on the surface of the Moon. What especially will blow your mind is the astounding accuracy of what actually exists beyond the boundaries of our atmosphere.

First and foremost is the painstaking attention to the details of what an actual space program must be like. Even though the picture was released in 1958, it’s so ahead of its time that one can only apply the word “visionary” to its awe-inspiring use of fact and fiction to transport us to a reality not quite achieved either before or after this picture was made. At the beginning of the movie, a group of scientists are seen on the cusp of sending a missile to the Moon. The chief scientist reveals to his colleagues his incredible rocket and while some might mistake it for a crudely carved phallus against a cardboard backdrop, they would be … well; uh … they would surely be mistaken. Many missiles look like phalluses (or is the plural “phallusi”?) and who really knows what anything looks like from the launch bridge of a place like Cape Canaveral. Unless one has actually been there personally, it might well all look like painted cardboard.

Secondly, how can one possibly ignore the accuracy with respect to security at the launch site? In a world where crazed terrorists can hijack passenger planes and fly them into buildings, surely it is possible to believe that the crew of the first missile to the moon could be manned by two petty criminals who wander into the top secret launch site and hide in the missile itself. In light of the realities of a world where Osama bin Laden continues to reign supreme and plot his revenge upon the infidel, does it not take a visionary like Richard E. Cunha to show how a missile can be manned by a scientist and his girlfriend who accidentally find themselves on the launch pad and eventually in the ship itself?

Thirdly, the travel into space itself is handled with customary adherence to fact – everything from the accurate use of seatbelts to the meteor shower of paper-mache-like boulders that threaten the missile and finally, how it does not really affect the missile’s use of fuel and/or resources to have several unaccounted-for passengers on board.

And last, but certainly not least is the stunningly accurate rendering of the Moon itself – a world where the rocks have arms, legs and pointy heads and appear to have been brought to life by Art Clokey himself, a world with giant spiders (and unless we’ve seen one up close, how do we know they don’t look like puppets?) and an entire race of babe-o-licious women who rule the Moon with firm, but gentle hands.

Is this picture a pile of crap? It sure is. But what a pile of crap! This is no guilty pleasure. One must feel pride in relishing every delightfully absurd moment of this undeniably entertaining movie that is so idiotic that, like the work of Ed Wood, it’s impossible to believe that Cunha and his collaborators had no idea of what they were doing. Of course they did, and for the good of the picture, and for entertainment value that has spanned the decades since its first release, Cunha and company delivered a fast, fun and insane little picture.

The Legend Films DVD is also a lovely way to see the picture. It presents both the black and white version and a colorized version in addition to the inclusion of some 50s TV commercials as extras. If truth be told, however, and in spite of the excellent colorization job, I preferred the black and white version, because the colorized version chooses to deliver all the babes on the moon with skin that is colored green. Green just doesn’t inspire the proper degree of manhood engorgement that the straight-up black and white rendering of the babes most certainly does. "Missile to the Moon" is available on DVD from Legend Films.

12/22/07