African Phantasms: New African Short Films - Review By Greg Klymkiw - As part of Black History month, the TIFF Bell Lightbox is presenting a major series entitled "Music, Magic, Clash: New Voices in the African Diaspora". This program of short cinema displays the sort of artistry and maturity lacking in so many Canadian and American short films that are often little more than "calling cards" for features or worse, the horrendous, "Look Ma, I can use a dolly. Hire me to direct bad TV."

African Phantasms: New African Short Films
TIFF Bell Lightbox: ""Music, Magic, Clash: New Voices in the African Diaspora"

****

By Greg Klymkiw

I consider short films a genre unto themselves - a form of storytelling with its own unique set of rules (or, when rules are broken, their own unique parameters waiting to be burst open). This excellent series of short films from Africa is playing for one show only at the TIFF Bell Lightbox cinemas in Toronto, and at press time, only three of the five shorts were available for review, but if they're any indication of what I'm missing when they're all screened publicly, I think it's safe to say that this is a series that deserves to be toured as widely as possible and for those living in Toronto, it is absolutely NOT to be missed.

While these films are generated by "new voices", what struck me about the three shorts I did see is that they're actually ABOUT something. Having seen thousands of short films in my life (and far too many of them Canadian), I'm constantly distressed to see movies that are little more than "calling cards" for features or worse, the horrendous, "Look Ma, I can use a dolly. Hire me to direct crappy TV." There is this really appalling sense of "careerism" in Canadian and American short cinema - films not being made because they HAVE to be made, but because far too many basement dwelling rich kids think filmmaking would be a better "career choice" than having to work for a living. This attitude is supported by far too many educational and training institutions to keep tuition fees flowing in and/or to maintain their relevance/existence (and to keep things nice and cushy for the nest-featherers who administer such programs).

Cinema, however, is a calling - it's not a "career choice". Cinema chooses YOU! When a film is to be made, it should be made with the sort of passion and belief that the story MUST be told and that not doing so would render its maker doomed to a kind of artistic purgatory until it IS made.

The three of five short films I saw in this program are all infused with the sort of vitality of commitment to the medium and storytelling that makes me feel secure in the knowledge that cinema is still alive - somewhere! Granted, they are all rooted in places that, on the surface, are removed from the traditional North American experience. Though frankly, I'd argue there are corollary settings that are not being explored in North America because THOSE filmmakers are often passed over for the sort of pathetic garbage I detailed above. (Or worse, some genuinely good filmmakers avoid them in order to kowtow to the above.)

It sometimes sickens me when I realize just how many short films I have seen - especially from North America. The dross I've subjected myself to includes (but is not limited to) pallid rip-offs of John Hughes, Wes Anderson and/or Quentin Tarantino, juvenile philosophical dark ramblings that should have been left in the trash bin of the Existentialism 101 classroom and most horrific of all, the "joke" short - one in which the punchline, or "twist" is what drives the film.

Ugh!

In any event, do yourself a favour and catch the shorts in this series. Hopefully they'll be coming to a theatre near you beyond the borders of downtown Toronto.

Here are brief reviews of the three I have seen.

The Cassava Metaphor (2010) dir. Lionel Mata
Starring: Ricky Tribord, Mata Gabin, Daniel Ndo

****

By Greg Klymkiw

The film begins, as does Coco's (Ricky Tribord) day, with the ritual of washing. From within the interior of a car we watch as soapy water splashes luxuriously upon the windshield while a sponge sweeps back and forth, removing the dust that's settled upon it from the previous day. In a tiled shower, water cascades down Coco's leg as he bends down to meticulously wash his feet, taking care to scrub between each toe on each foot. He dresses and regards himself - it seems he might be going out on a date or have an important meeting. His brief reverie is shattered when a text message comes from his landlord that he's seven days overdue in paying his rent.

No date. No meeting. Just another normal day for this Yaoundé cab driver.

Luckily, his first fare of the day suggests his debt-load might be lightened and, for good measure, his dour spirits. A friendly, attractive young woman (Mata Gabin) sits primly in his back seat and she's headed for the airport.

He flirts with her good-naturedly - the banter worthy of any fine romantic comedy - but alas, things in life are not always what they seem. This is, one of the film's primary narrative strengths. It delights us with what at first seems like a romance, then moves deftly into borderline absurdist humour and finally into a deeply and profoundly moving dénouement.

With the sage assistance of an airport security guard (Daniel Ndo) Coco learns, as do we, that sometimes a cassava is just a cassava - nothing more and nothing less. And much like the cassava plant, which can grow heartily in dry, drought-prone climates, the film offers a glimpse into the resiliency of humanity within a continent that yields so much of this bittersweet staple.

Efficiently directed, beautifully acted and written with humour and tenderness, The Cassava Metaphor is one of the finest short dramas I've seen in many years.

It's a heartbreaker.

Drexciya (2011) dir. Akosua Adoma Owusu

****

By Greg Klymkiw

For experimental cinema to soar to the heights of great poetry, the images must be powerful, the rhythm impeccable and the structure very sound. Drexciya succeeds magnificently on all these fronts. The film directs its gaze upon the crumbling ruins of a derelict Olympic-sized swimming pool in Accra, Ghana. The topography surrounding the pool is flat, dusty and dry. In the distance is a building that looks unfinished. Local residents gather at the empty pool to dryy their laundry or just pass the day.

Director Akosua Adoma Owusu then places her camera to capture what seems like every crack and crumble and refuse located within the faded green tile of this long-abandoned pool. Finally, she focuses upon the rusting tower of what was once an Olympic-sized series of diving boards. Like some massive crucifix dominating both the frame of the camera and the big sky of Ghana. Up to this point, the soundtrack has been replete with both the sounds of the natural world of the pool brilliantly mixed with sounds of what must have been when it was in operation.

In this finale, focusing upon a cross-like structure - so infused with the notion of indignity, sacrifice and resurrection - the powerful African-American spiritual "Wade in the Water" takes over the soundscape. Sound and image blend perfectly and while watching it, I felt the gooseflesh rising mightily indeed. Both the rhythm and structure of the film leads you to this point so cannily and expertly that the poetic strength of both sound and image yield an extremely visceral and emotional response.

I suppose it didn't hurt that I'm extremely familiar with "Wade in the Water". I first heard it as a kid in a movie (I wish I could remember which one) and then as a teenager, I found a great recording (for those who need to know, the long-defunct "Records On Wheels" on Portage Avenue in Winnipeg) - perhaps even the same one used in the film - on vinyl, and almost wore out the album from playing it so many times. The song dates back to pre-Civil War America and its lyrics urge the African-American slaves to avoid the flat ground and hit the water to avoid the trusty noses of the slave-traders' bloodhounds.

Ironically, the album was lost to a flood in my parents' home some years ago.

In any event, this is a picture that worked precisely on a poetic level and is an example of cinema's truly great potential to move beyond that of a bauble. Interestingly though, while I don't think I especially misread the film on a first viewing, I discovered after seeing it, that the film is inspired by the 90s Detroit-based electronic group Drexciya who created within their music the myth of an underwater world a la Atlantis which was populated by the spirits of babies born to African women that had been thrown off slave ships bound for the Americas.

Knowing this merely added to my appreciation of the film on a repeat viewing.

The Adventures of Mwansa The Great (2011) dir. Rungano Nyoni
Starring: Samuel Mwale, Owas Ray Mwape, Anna Mithi, Mwansa Bwalya, Becky Ngoma

****

By Greg Klymkiw

I normally have an aversion to short dramas that act as "calling cards" for feature films - especially when the shorts just feel like truncated features - but The Adventures of Mwansa the Great is one of those rare instances when a short film works perfectly as such, but frankly, is so entertaining that one wants to see more. I have absolutely no doubt that there is a first-rate feature that could even be franchised from this material. It's that good!

Set in a dry, seemingly-water-bereft (this seems to be a recurring motif amongst all of these shorts) village in Zambia, a group of children enact the most delightful adventures based on characters that have been told to them by their late father. In full costume, they romp and play with abandon. When Mwansa (Samuel Mwale) accidentally breaks his sister Shula's (Owas Ray Mwape) doll, she is utterly heartbroken. It was crafted from "magic mud" by their departed Dad. Never fear, Mwansa truly believes he is Mwansa the Great (a sort of mythic superhero) and he leads Shula and the rest of the kids on an odyssey to retrieve more "magic mud" to repair the doll.

The clay is, in actuality and movingly, slag from the nearby copper mine where Dad worked (and presumably died). Blending the real-life excursion with the fantasy elements that spring to life, we're led on a delightful, heartfelt journey wherein many obstacles must be overcome to reach the quarry.

And, let it be said, that through the power of imagination, a little boy believes he can truly fly.

I started watching this movie with two ten-year-old girls preparing meringue cookies behind me. Within seconds, they abandoned their culinary activities and joined me on the chesterfield. They, like I, were utterly entranced.

As the end-title credits hit the screen, my daughter yelped out, "Wow, Dad! That was a great movie!"

Indeed it was!

"African Phantasms: New African Short Films" is playing at TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto for one show only Sunday February 19 at 7:00 PM. In addition to the aforementioned shorts, two others will be screening ("The Deliverance of Comfort" by Zina Saro-Wiwa and "Hasaki ya suda" by Cédric Ido"). For further information and tickets, click HERE.

Here is a scene from MWANSA THE GREAT


Here is a scene from THE CASSAVA METAPHOR


Here is a short experimental film from the director of DREXCIYA











32nd GENIE AWARDS TRAILER

MONSIEUR LAZHAR - French Canada's Oscar Nominee is a crock; an entertaining and well acted crock, but a crock nevertheless.

Monsieur Lazhar (2011) dir. Phillipe Falardeau
Starring: Fellag, Émilien Néron, Sophie Nélisse, Danielle Proulx

**

By Greg Klymkiw

When a popular teacher in a Montreal public elementary school commits suicide, she is replaced by the title character Monsieur Lazhar (Fellag), an Algerian immigrant who helps the children heal while hiding his own political refugee status as well as the fact that his wife and children were murdered by extremist terrorists in his home country.

Lazhar blends "old world" teaching methods with clearly personal and unconventional approaches. He eschews curriculum in favour of both practical AND philosophical areas more suited to genuinely providing deeper learning to kids who have clearly been traumatized by this horrific action. His insistence upon using Balzac for dictation opens up areas of learning that otherwise would have been ignored. This even inspires a gifted young student, his pet, to suggest he try using Jack London's immortal "White Fang" instead of the Balzac. This is one of many lovely details that desperately compel one to forgive the serious storytelling flaws that keep the film from attaining the greatness it should otherwise have attained.

The kids fall in love with this rascally Algerian and so do we. (There's also a delightful sub-plot where one of his colleagues falls for him romantically.) A large part of the character's winning qualities are due to Fellag's exquisite performance. Lazhar's good humour, his zest for teaching, his love of children are all worn on this magnificent actor's sleeve whilst he alternately displays, deep in his eyes, the pain of loss that haunts him.

The hurt the kids feel from the suicide of their teacher is tackled by Lazhar's sensitive handling of the problem. He makes a difference in their lives - he's a teacher AND a friend.

This all sounds like perfect Oscar bait to me: Immigrant mends his broken heart by mending the broken hearts of children. And sure enough, the movie has garnered an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language film, a whack of Genie Award (Canada's "Oscar") nominations, a spot on the TIFF Canada Top Ten, glowing reviews, The Toronto Film Critics prize for Best Canadian feature film and excellent box office. The movie is well made in so many respects (lovely mise-en-scene, great performances all around and a heart nestled firmly in the right place), but the story itself is rife with far too many lapses in logic and/or credibility for the movie to be taken seriously as anything but a feel-good wallow for the less-discriminating.

Lazhar's journey allows HIM to live with the pain and guilt he feels for his own family being slaughtered by extremists in Algeria and make no mistake - this NOTION is profoundly moving, but it's an element of the tale that sadly loses the depth it could have had.

The narrative's first major stumbling block occurs early on when it is revealed that there are no takers for the replacement position because of the perceived stigma attached to replacing a teacher who has hung herself in her own classroom. This plot detail stunned me. Things might be different in La Belle Province, but given the fact that there are jobless teachers all over the country who can't get work, let alone steady work, it's pretty much impossible to buy that the school's principal (Danielle Proulx) can't fill the open spot.

Granted, things in Quebec tend to march to the beat of their own drum more than in English Canada (or for that matter, the rest of the world), but given the strength of unions - particularly teaching unions - issues of seniority, etc. would definitely come into play here no matter what the circumstance.

I also grant that over ten years ago there was a weird generational cusp period all over North America where a teacher shortage did indeed exist and substitute teachers with little or no qualifications were hired at the discretion of principals in emergency situations. The movie appears to be contemporary and if, at any point it emphasizes being set during the turn of the new millennium, it does so rather ineffectively.

Here's the problem with such a lack of attention to these details. All the aforementioned speed bumps paraded through my thoughts while watching the movie and severely impeded my ability to go with the flow.

Further to the above, then, is that Lazhar is hired by merely dropping off his resume, expressing an emphatic interest in teaching AND the fake excuse the movie delivers about not being able to find a replacement for the teacher who snapped her neck. Again, the requirements to get a teaching job with any school board are so stringent and the hiring process so carefully regulated, that this is absolutely impossible to swallow. (Sure, stuff can slip through the cracks, but for this to register narratively in a believable manner, would have required a much more careful set-up.)

Other impediments to the flow of the drama are the fact that Lazhar is required to do is fill out some Ministry forms shoved at him by the principal and that while awaiting a ruling from the courts as to his eligibility to be considered a landed immigrant on the basis of political asylum, he seems to be completely oblivious to the seriousness of misrepresenting himself in order to get a job as a teacher. Astonishingly, we know early on that he actually ran a restaurant in Algeria and that his late wife was, in fact, a teacher. Surely such an understandable need to continue her work in the "new world" is a lovely character-touch, but is not at all exploited for its value in terms of both the moral issue of misrepresentation and the tension/conflict this could have added to the narrative.

Some might argue that all movies (and all stories, for that matter) require - to certain degrees - a suspension of disbelief. Yes, true; to an extent. But given that the above elements are so huge, so overwhelming that no matter how beautifully acted and directed the proceedings are, no matter how exquisite individual scenes and sequences are, no matter how important the themes of healing and acceptance are - if a movie doesn't do its job and address narrative elements that have so much potential to provide stumbling blocks, then the picture is not doing its job - period.

I'm willing to concede that this problem might have more to do with the original source material used to adapt the tale to film. Evelyne de la Cheneliere's play "Bachir Lazhar", a one-man show, would have been written closer to the period when a teaching shortage existed. That this appears to have been completely ignored in the film's journey from stage to screen is, however, a major lapse.

Given director Falardeau's welcome lack of the annoying Quebecois stylistic excess of the majority of the province's artier fare and his attempt to provide a mise-en-scene that's rooted in reality, it's shocking to me that the screenplay never bothered to address any of the above issues in any serious fashion. I still can't, for the life of me, figure out (or buy) how Lazhar got the job in light of everything detailed above.

As the movie unfolds, it's very hard to just sit back and enjoy the movie. I'd argue these holes and unaddressed issues would have all been easy fixes. In fact, if more had been made of the fact that Lazhar had to have brazenly and intentionally falsified his qualifications, there might even have been added elements of suspense in terms of his courtroom battle to gain political refugee status.

If Monsieur Lazhar was some Hollywood nonsense like Dangerous Minds, it might have been a bit easier to swallow, but because Falardeau is clearly a gifted filmmaker dealing with a story infused with important thematic issues of healing in a world so rife with strife, the narrative flaws are a bitter pill. It is not only hard to swallow, but ultimately, impossible to swallow. The movie tries to shove an oversized horse pill down our throats and in so doing, inspires our collective gag reflexes to work overtime.

So much in this film is so beautiful and yet, in spite of a desire to fall in love with it, I was unable to do so because of its sloppy storytelling.

That said, the tale's dishonesty might be enough to win it a surprise Oscar over the powerful Iranian favourite A Separation. Such a win, however, might well open the floodgates for more of the same. This will be a good thing, if any subsequent works inspired by Monsieur Lazhar take better care addressing basic issues of logic.

"Monsieur Lazhar" is nominated for a Best Foreign Language Oscar and currently in theatrical release via e-One. In Toronto, it is playing to sellout houses at the Toronto International Film Festival TIFF Bell Lightbox. While it has widened its reach to Cineplex Entertainment cinemas, if you must see it, try to see it at Lightbox or your local independent cinema for the best projection and to support venues that support Canadian Cinema.

MONSIEUR LAZHAR TRAILER











32nd GENIE AWARDS TRAILER

LE VENDEUR - Review by Greg Klymkiw - This stunning Quebecois kitchen sink drama is so raw and real, the pain evoked so acute, you'll be devastated by its quiet power while at the same time dazzled by its cinematic genius. The film had its World Premiere in Competition at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2011 and was cited as one of Canada's Ten Best Films of the year in the Toronto International Film Festival's (TIFF) CTT. That it has not garnered one single nomination for a Genie Award is an utter disgrace! Don't miss it!

Le Vendeur (2011) dir. Sébastien Pilote
Starring: Gilbert Sicotte, Nathalie Cavezzali, Jérémy Tessier and Jean-François Boudreau

*****

By Greg Klymkiw

It's a rare experience for me, but when it occurs, there's nothing like it. Sometimes I see a movie and after the final end-title credit has faded and the lights come up, I bolt from the cinema to be alone with my thoughts and to savour and extend the emotional response I had. Off the top of my head, other movies that made me feel this way were Au Revoir Les Enfants, Les Bons Debarras, The Straight Story, Ivan's Childhood and seeing the restored print of Nights of Cabiria. The experience, so indelibly etched into my soul, is as close to soaring as I'm ever likely to get.

And now, there's a new gun in town, pardner.

While its thematic concerns and narrative are both timeless and universal, and though it is set in a small factory town in Quebec, I was profoundly moved and deeply taken with just how Canadian Sébastien Pilote's astounding film Le Vendeur is. This staggeringly powerful, exquisitely-acted and beautifully written motion picture is easily the first genuine Quebecois heir apparent to the beautiful-yet-not-so-beautiful-loser genre of English Canadian cinema of the 60s and 70s (best exemplified by films like Don Shebib's Goin' Down the Road, Peter Pearson's Paperback Hero and Zale Dalen's Skip Tracer).

The title character of Pilote's great film is ace car salesman Marcel Lévesque (Gilbert Sicotte). He lives in a small town on the brink of complete financial collapse - the primary industry has shut down production and locked out its workers and yet, while people are starving, losing everything, moving away and many local businesses shutting down forever, Marcel turns a blind eye to all this. He's not the undisputed Salesman of the month in the dealership for nothing - and not just one month, but EVERY month, for years on end.

Financial crisis be damned! There are cars on the lot and they need to be moved.

And they will be moved.

At any cost.

Marcel, you see, has nothing. With a healthy nest-egg and no financial commitments, he's at an age when most men would retire and enjoy life. For Marcel, life is selling cars. His late wife has been six feet under for a long time and his only real human connection is to his daughter Maryse (Nathalie Cavezzali), a hairdresser and single mother to Antoine (Jérémy Tessier). If it weren't for them, he'd have even more time to sell cars.

He is, however, in spite of this obsession, a devoted, loving and caring father and grandfather. He makes regular visits to his daughter's shop, attends local events with her, watches his grandson play hockey in the local arena whilst gently tut-tutting any suggestion from his only surviving blood relations that perhaps he should retire.

He is a friend to everyone in town, yet in reality, he has no friends. His effusive manner with all he meets is part of his ongoing schtick - he knows damn well that people will buy from someone they like.

And he must be liked to be successful.

His colleagues love him too. It's no matter to his fellow salesmen that he outsells them ten to one. He's a great guy and because he's a great guy they all believe his prowess and luck will rub off on all of them.

And then there are the locked-out workers at the factory he passes every morning on his way to the dealership. They stand in the frigid Quebec climate, snow piled up around them and warming themselves on the fires raging in steel drums as they keep vigil over their only hope for employment - their placards demanding fair treatment while the factory's fat-cats get bonuses and they potentially lose their jobs, benefits and pensions.

No matter to Marcel.

The unemployed need to buy huge, gas-guzzling American cars they can't afford as much as the next guy.

And he's just the man to make the sales. Marcel prides himself on remembering and knowing as many details about his customers (past, present and future). For those times he needs his memory jogged, he maintains a collegial and caring rapport with the guys who work in the service department. He plies them with daily cans of Coke from the pop machine and when he spies a familiar vehicle up on a hoist, he gets as much info as he needs from the mechanics about the owner of the ailing vehicle. He then consults his files to confirm he actually sold the car (and any salient details that can breed added familiarity), finds the "mark" in the waiting room, greets him as if they've known each other their whole life and slyly presents options available to trade-in the old and buy the new.

One such mark is the sad-sack François Paradis (Jean-François Boudreau), an out-of-work labourer locked out of the factory. This is a man who is unsure of where his family's next meal is coming from, but all Marcel knows is that a trade-in (at a loss to the customer), easy financing (at usurious interest rates) and cars on the lot that must be moved are the ultimate order of the day.

A sale is imminent.

So too is disaster.

Marcel's single minded need to sell knows no bounds. When this results in not just one, but two major tragic events, Marcel holds the ultimate key to his own survival - he can sell.

Pilote has crafted an astonishing screenplay - rife with details that are indelibly rooted in the realities and truths we all have experienced and/or recognize. As a director, he renders his screenplay with one jaw-droppingly poetic shot after another and yet, as exquisite as Pilote's eye is, the frame is rife with the reality of both beauty and despair.

And it is so Canadian: The endless snow, the frosty breath permeating the air, the crispness of the night, the sun and clear skies beating down on a frozen Earth, the constant parade of tractors clearing the streets, removing ice from the windshields, plugging and unplugging one's car to keep the block and interior heaters working overtime in sub-zero temperatures, the hot cups of java in the local diner, steaming hot chocolate in the hockey arena, the forays onto the frozen lakes to ice-fish and the ice-and-snow-packed highways that convey people from one solitary place to another - sometimes even as solitary as death.

Pilote's mise-en-scene has been rendered with the keen eye of cinematographer Michel La Veaux and I submit this might well be one of the best shot Canadian films in years. The compositions are often painterly, but most astounding is both the lighting of the interiors (starkly beautiful with a delicate grain and considerable detail) and the stunning exteriors wherein La Veaux paints with natural light. One of the shots I'll take to my grave is an interior of a snow-packed frigid car - that special beauty of darkness and light that we've all experienced at some point or another as we enter a vehicle that's yet to be swept free of the layers of frozen precipitation. This is great shooting and puts so much of the more expressionistically flashy Quebecois cinematography to shame.

Finally, the most Canadian image of all in Le Vendeur is the bloodied carcass of a moose who has strayed in the path of a car cascading along the black ice on a wilderness-enshrouded highway and the twisted wreckage of said vehicle that has collided with the huge, lumbering beast. I'd argue that anyone who has not seen this with their own eyes, experienced it themselves or, at least knows or knows of someone involved in such an accident can't possibly be Canadian - or, at the very least, lives a very sheltered life from one of the more characteristic experiences of Canadian life. (I've accidentally hit everything from rabbits to porcupines to coyotes to deer on the highways of northern Canada and a dear friend was invalided for life after hitting a moose. I can assure you, it's not a pretty sight.)

This is Quebec. This is Canada. And this is a film replete with so many aspects of indigenous familiarity that adds to the already tremendously moving narrative of Le Vendeur.

Yet amidst these details that speak to our culture - both English and French - there are the details of both the character and narrative which reflect realities as profound and universally recognizable as such works as Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" or David Mamet's "Glengarry Glen Ross" or Joseph Heller's "Something Happened" or Saul Bellow's "Seize the Day". These are stories of men and families torn to shreds by the seeming freedom of capitalist society.

And so too is Pilote's Le Vendeur.

While watching the film, I could not get the aforementioned canon of English-Canadian loser cinema out of my head. For the townspeople who leave Le Vendeur's northern Quebec - especially the young men, I thought about Joey and Pete in Shebib's Goin' Down the Road, leaving their small Maritime town for new horizons, yet facing equally uncertain futures once away from the nest. I imagined the future of Marcel's hockey-playing small-town grandson and wondered, if fortune allowed him a full blossoming, would he too remain a big fish in a small pond like Rick "The Marshall" Dylan (Keir Dullea), the boozing, brawling, womanizing small potatoes hockey player from Peter Pearson's Paperback Hero? Worse yet, I wondered if Marcel himself was actually Joey or (more likely) Pete from Shebib's masterpiece if either had stayed in their small town and channelled the malevolent drive to succeed at any or all cost as imbued in the character of John the psychopathic debt collector in Zale Dalen's Skip Tracer?

Look, I doubt any of the aforementioned English Canadian films registered with Pilote when he wrote and directed Le Vendeur, but what's truly uncanny is just how connected and rooted to the English Canadian experience and aesthetic his film is. Perhaps the two solitudes are not as solitary as some would like to believe.

Like those films, Pilote has crafted what may well become a masterwork of CANADIAN cinema and one that is rooted in an indigenous cultural tradition no matter what side of the French-English fence one is on.

Le Vendeur is from Quebec.

And it is truly Canadian!

This is a good thing.

"Le Vendeur" is in limited release in English Canada via E-One Films. It begins a theatrical release in Toronto February 3 at the Alliance Atlantis Cumberland Cinema. Alas, it lasted one week there and moved over to the loathsome Canada Square Cinema for a mere two shows per day. If it's not playing in your city, demand it be shown at your local Cineplex Entertainment or independent theatre. It had its world premiere in competition at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2011 and was wisely - VERY WISELY - cited by the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) Canadian Top Ten (CTT). How it has not garnered one single Genie Award nomination is not only beyond me, but frankly, a disgrace. (Even the Quebec-based Jutra Awards have egg on their face for ignoring Pilote's direction, but citing the film in other categories - but the Jutras are regional and the Genies are national. They should know better.) In any event, do yourself a big favour and DO NOT MISS "LE VENDEUR" ON A BIG SCREEN WHERE IT MUST BE SEEN.

The film's official website can be found HERE

ELITE SQUAD: THE ENEMY WITHIN - Review by Greg Klymkiw - Blood spills, spurts and sprinkles every which way upon the streets of Rio in this slam-bang action epic from José Padilha, Brazil's coolest documentarian AND action director, plus Bráulio Mantovani, the screenwriter who gave us "City of God".

Elite Squad: The Enemy Within (2011) dir. José Padilha
Starring: Wagner Moura, Irandhir Santos, André Ramiro

***1/2

By Greg Klymkiw

Criminal activity wends its way through a metropolis like a labyrinth. When the city itself is Knossos-like; when around every corner, in every nook, every cranny, under every rock, behind every brick, perched on every rooftop and practically dropping from the Heavens are adversaries more formidable than a Minotaur (and armed with automatic weapons, knives and machetes), not even Theseus himself would stand a chance unless he was backed up by an elite para-military force. Such is the delightful Brazilian vacation hot-spot Rio de Janeiro and such is the setting of this spectacular fact-based action picture that plunges you deep into the maze of criminal activity - so insidious, so viral, so unbeatable that even when you think it's been wiped out, it's morphed into something even more powerful.

Elite Squad: The Enemy Within is a sequel to director José Padilha's hit 2007 hit Elite Squad which was based upon the book by real-life Rio crime-fighter Rodrigo Pimentel and part of Padilha's trilogy on criminal activities in Brazil that began with his harrowing feature documentary Bus 174. Elite Squad 2 as it's known in Brazil is that country's highest grossing theatrical release of all time and has even left James Cameron's Avatar choking in its dust. This is no surprise. If even a tiny percentage of the activities detailed in this film are true, one can only imagine how powerfully it would have captured the imaginations of its indigenous peoples.

The film details the efforts of Nascimento (Wagner Moura), leader of Rio's para-military police unit known by its acronym BOPE (Batalhão de Operações Policiais Especiais). These guys are monsters and easily as brutal as the criminals they fight. They're armed well beyond what normal law enforcement officers use in their day-to-day work. They specialize in urban warfare and more often than not, act as assassins - going into the favelas (slums) of Rio to engage in wholesale mass-executions.

The movie begins with Nascimento leading a BOPE unit within Rio's largest prison which is comprised entirely of three drug cartels (all separated from each other in three different wings of the prison). Incarceration is not a deterrent to their activities. Behind the prison walls, it's business as usual and a deadly one at that.

When a riot breaks out, Nascimento goes into immediate action and if necessary, he'll just blow everyone away including their hostages (criminals from a rival cartel - so no real loss). Fraga (Irandhir Santos), a leading academic/activist is called in by the political powers-that-be to mediate and when he's taken hostage, one of Nascimento's best men blows the bad guy away and saves Fraga's life. Alas, Fraga's pro-peace shirt is spattered with the blood of the man who would have slaughtered him like a pig. As any good bleeding heart Liberal would do, he uses this opportunity to make a case in front of the media that BOPE are nothing more than human rights violators of the highest order.

The government fires Nascimento to pleaae the bleeding hearts, but then promotes him to Head of all Security measures in Rio to please the majority of the population and right-wing elements who have hailed Nascimento as a hero. Once our crime-fighting cop becomes a high-level government bureaucrat, the movie (which has already begun with a major series of wallops) zooms into major overdrive and the events that follow become even more insane.

This is the section of the film I found especially gripping and fascinating. Every effort made by Nascimento to clean up the crime is detailed, carried out successfully and thrillingly and then, a whole new form of criminal activity morphs out of the rubble of what once was and becomes even more difficult to battle. The story takes on an epic sweep over several years and we're often open-mouthed at the various transformations within the constantly shifting crime scenes which, in turn, parallel the shifts in government policy and internal corruption at every level of law enforcement. As well, one of the chief conflicts of the film is between Nascimento and Fraga as they both rise on opposite ends of the law enforcement divide until they eventually are forced to play by the same rules.

There's great writing here. Juggling the constant power shifts and myriad of characters while infusing the movie with resonance beyond a Jerry Bruckheimer-styled actioner with Brazilian spice is handled with both intelligence and efficiency. I was less fond of the subplot involving Nascimento's family (and the somewhat hackneyed use of Fraga as a current lover to Nascimento's wife), but it works on a level of proficiency in terms of adding that audience-pleasing "now it's personal" touch.

Padilha coaxes superb performances out of his entire cast and his direction of the action scenes is top-flight. He uses his keen documentary eye to deliver a flavour of immediacy and real-life frissons, but at the same time, not resorting to the overly herky-jerky approach used by bargain basement Paul Greengrass wannabes. Frighteningly, Padhila's mise-en-scene inspires me to predict that the almost Third-World conditions of the United States might well mirror all of this in our lifetimes.

But, let's put those concerns aside for now. For little boys and those little boys that never grew up, Elite Squad: The Enemy Within is first-rate derring-do and I'd be remiss to leave out how cool BOPE's uniforms are - they're easily on a par with the totalitarian Triumph of the Will-influenced uniforms in Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers and the real-life emblem of BOPE (a skull with crossbones comprised with deadly weapons) is cooler than cool.

Best of all, the guns are shot and framed like steely penile implants that explode superior firepower.

Damn! I can hardly wait to see the next movie from Padilha.

He rocks. Big time!!!

"Elite Squad: The Enemy Within" is currently available on DVD and BLU-Ray. In Canada it's available through VVS Films. If your favourite video store is not stocking it, DEMAND IT! And if you love action/crime pictures, it's definitely worth owning anyway. I've even seen it for sale at Wal-Mart, so you have no excuse.












32nd GENIE AWARDS TRAILER

IN DARKNESS - Review by Greg Klymkiw - This powerful true story of the Holocaust, a Canadian-Polish co-production, has been nominated for a Foreign Language Oscar. The true story of a Polish war profiteer in the Ukrainian city of Lviv during WWII is replete with great performances, a fine screenplay by David F. Shamoon and expert direction from Agnieszka Holland.

In Darkness (2011) dir. Agnieszka Holland
Starring: Robert Wieckiewicz, Benno Fürmann, Michal Zurawski, Kinga Preis, Agnieszka Grochowska, Maria Schrader, Herbert Knaup

****

By Greg Klymkiw

Whenever a new film about the Holocaust appears, the oft-heard refrain is, "Not another one!" It's as if the subject itself is enough to inspire such dismissive reactions - which, frankly, I've never understood. Genocide is one of the greatest blights upon mankind as a species and given the especially horrific events of the 20th century, stories such as In Darkness must be told.

Set in the Ukrainian city of Lviv during World War II, we're introduced to the Polish plumber and sewer-worker Leopold Socha (Robert Wieckiewicz) who supplements his livelihood during the Nazi occupation by thieving and black marketeering. A group of people in the Jewish ghetto have burrowed into the sewers in order to escape the impending horrors that await them. Socha happens upon the Jews and agrees to hide them beneath the old city where nobody will find them - for a price, of course.

A major payday awaits when Socha's old friend Bortnick (Michal Zurawski), a member of the Ukrainian SS, mentions the substantial reward available for pointing officials to Jews in hiding. Socha gets the bright idea of soaking his Jewish charges until their money runs out and THEN betraying them for the bounty.

War, however, has different effects upon different people. Some take the easy road, while others face up to who they really are and make sacrifices with their very lives.

Much of the film takes place in the dank, dark sewers of Lviv and we are privy to the horrendous conditions the Jews must live in order to survive. While we follow Socha's adventures above ground, life for the Jews is presented in clear juxtaposition.

Here is where David F. Shamoon's screenplay adaptation of Robert Marshall's book really shines. Given the number of characters, above and below ground that must be juggled, he presents a series of evocative portraits on both sides of the divide. Above ground, not everyone is a villain, whilst below ground, not everyone is a saint. The screenplay provides humanity with a layered dramatic resonance.

The fine script allows for a flawless cast to deliver a series of performances that will burn in your memory long after seeing the film. Holland's direction is precise and classical. She doesn't miss any dramatic beats and it's finally a movie that never lets up - it's compelling, surprising, shocking and finally, profoundly moving from beginning to end.

I have one major quibble, however. I will admit that it would probably not even be a problem if I was NOT of Ukrainian heritage, but luckily I am, because it allowed me to pinpoint a missing political element that might well have added an even deeper layer to this fine film.

Here's the problem, as I see it. The city of Lviv was, prior to the Nazis marching in, already an occupied city. Poland had claimed a huge portion of Western Ukraine as its own and parachuted (so to speak) huge numbers of Polish citizens to populate and run the city. Many Ukrainians were forced out and eventually settled in outlying areas of the Oblast. Being in the midst of researching my own family tree, I have discovered that a great many of my blood ancestors were driven out of Lviv by the Poles. Ironically, many of them formed their own village which also bore my surname. The village was subsequently destroyed by the Poles when they decided to build a dam and flood the whole village. From there, my ancestors split up and settled even further West in and around Ternopil.

I have to admit that in light of this research I was troubled that the script ignored the fact that this "Polish" city was, in fact, already an occupied city prior to the Nazis. I was further disturbed that the only Ukrainian character in the tale was portrayed as a vile Jew-hating pig who doesn't collaborate with the Nazis for the usual reasons Ukrainians collaborated (many were duped into believing the Nazis would be their liberators from both Polish and Russian oppression). These are issues of ethnocentric ignorance that are hurtful, but let's cast them aside for a moment and think about this otherwise compelling story if it had added the element of Poles being an occupying force to begin with who were, in turn occupied. From a narrative standpoint, I'd argue this might have made the piece far more interesting and added an additional layer of complexity to one in which the filmmakers do not present easy Hollywood-style answers to the dilemmas facing all the characters.

It's the fact that the screenplay so diligently creates drama and conflict by presenting a myriad of complexities within the characters that it disappoints me the film did not take the time or effort to explore this avenue also.

This will no doubt be seen as an easily dismissed and biased quibble, but the fact remains that World War II and the Holocaust are fraught with horrendous sufferings and issues that are not black and white.

Some biases, it seems, are acceptable, while others are not.

The bottom line though, is that it's a terrific film. That said, even great pictures have potential to be greater and I believe my "bias" might well have improved the tale considerably.

"In Darkness", 2011 Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film is currently in theatrical release and now playing in Canada via Mongrel Media.

Les Anges du péché - Review by Greg Klymkiw - WOW! Bresson does nunsploitation with, of course, that Ole' Bresson Black Magic! "Les Anges du péché" is part of the continuing TIFF Cinematheque retrospective of the complete works of Robert Bresson as organized/curated by legendary film programmer/curator James Quandt. MAJOR NEWSFLASH FOR TORONTO MOVIE-GOERS - AN ADDITIONAL SHOW HAS BEEN ADDED DUE TO PUBLIC DEMAND!!!! (see below for more info)

Les Anges du péché (1943) dir. Robert Bresson
Starring: Renée Faure, Jany Holt

****

By Greg Klymkiw

Robert Bresson does nunsploitation like no other!

Well, I guess Les Anges du péché doesn't really count as nunsploitation, but I'd hazard a guess that many of those crazed practitioners of the popular Euro-trash genre of the 70s would have been acquainted with Bresson's weird, compelling semi-thriller (and, for good measure, Powell-Pressburger's crazed-nutty-nun-o-rama in the Himalayas, Black Narcissus).

Nunsploitation, much like Nazisploitation (Ilsa: She-Wolf of the S.S.) and the Women-in-Prison pictures (Jonathan Demme's Caged Heat), was one of those weird 70s genres involving sex, sadism and gore-galore. The nunsploitation flicks featured extremely attractive Euro-babes in nun habits indulging in all manner of perversion - including the requisite nun-on-nun-action, due, of course, to their cloistered Über repression. There'd often be a strict Mother Superior (not unlike a concentration camp commandant or prison warden), a good nun, a bad nun and everything in-between. Les Anges du péché is populated with similar characters, though you might have to use a bit more imagination conjuring up the decidedly salacious details of its 70s grandchildren.

The nun pictures, were always my favourite of these disreputable 70s genres (perhaps being brought up in the twisted Eastern-Rite Ukrainian Catholic Church had something to do with it, in addition, no doubt, to the fine programming available at the delectable array of urine-soaked, cum-stained, hooker-heaven grindhouses in my old Winter City of Winnipeg). Many of them, like Guilio Berruti's delightful Killer Nun with Anita Ekberg and Joe Dallesandro, Joe D'Amato's deliciously sexy The Nun and the Devil and Gianfranco Mingozzi's genuinely fine Flavia the Heretic with the phenomenal Florinda Bolkan, all featured critical portraits of the Catholic Church. However, amongst such "serious" anti-Papal thematic concerns, they were blessed with generous dollops of flagellation and fleshly desires. (Flagellation can, of course, be found in Carl Dreyer, but you've gotta scratch below the surface to find it in Bresson. Fleshly desires in Bresson, are a bit easier to pinpoint, though.)

I doubt Powell-Pressburger would have minded the (somewhat) dubious distinction of being a precursor to the nunsploitation genre with their own Black Narcissus, but something tells me Robert Bresson might have had a thing or two to say about it.

Les Anges du péché is a tremendously entertaining picture. It's often considered his first film (though he had already delivered the delightful musical-comedy Affaires publiques about ten years earlier).

And what a movie!

Though it features the beginnings of what would become his trademark style, as well as themes not dissimilar to those on display in the later Diary of a Country Priest, Bresson delivers a gorgeously photographed, almost expressionistic semi-thriller in a studio-bound melodrama.

We follow the tale of Anne-Marie (Renée Faure), a young (babe, 'natch!) who abandons her life of privilege to join a convent of nuns to serve God in his work amongst the female criminals in a nearby prison.

(Yee-haaa! Bresson does nunsploitation AND women-in-prison! Sorry, Robert, I'm no doubt forcing you to spin in your grave.)

One of Anne-Marie's goals is to work on the unrepentant prisoner Thérèse (Jany Holt). Not unlike the 70s women in prison pictures, she's lacking remorse for her "crime" because she's taken the fall for her loser boyfriend who was, in fact, the real thief. She just wants to serve her time quietly (not unlike the silence of the nunnery).

Disaster strikes when a brutal murder is committed and the nuns are forced to provide sanctuary. The bourgeois Anne-Marie faces an even greater challenge here - one that leads to a deadly dénouement.

Good Lord! Bresson even provides a cinematic precursor to the delightful Gialli popularized by the likes of Dario Argento ande Mario Bava, etc. (Yes, Robert, I know - you're spinning like a dervish now!)

Seriously, though, this is really terrific stuff.

Not only do we experience Bresson delivering a picture replete with both his style AND the tropes of mainstream suspense, but the movie - made during the Nazi occupation of France - deals very cleverly and subtly with the way in which the nunnery operates in comparison to the prison and most importantly, how the secular world is essentially the Vichy and the religious world, the Resistance.

There's no other way to describe it - Les Anges du péché is cool!

No, it's Über-Cool!!!

Some might find it odd to equate this picture with the aforementioned genres of the 70s, but I think it's important for Bresson to be viewed outside of the normally rarefied atmosphere of critical deification that his work is so often subject to. He inspired and influenced filmmakers of every stripe and I'd argue that his best work, while truly extraordinary, is as gripping and entertaining as that of those who worked and continue to work - not only in art films, but in genre pictures and the mainstream.

Bresson is probably one of a handful of directors who deserves to be considered one of the best of all time. I find him untouchable, in that sense.

However, in the words of an old-time film distributor I used to know, Bresson puts one "one helluva great show!"

"Les Anges du péché" is part of the TIFF Cinemtheque's major retrospective organized and curated by the legendary programmer James Quandt. Aptly titled "The Poetry of Precision: The Films of Robert Bresson", this and every other Bresson film is unspooling at the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto and over a dozen cinemas across North America. "Les Anges du péché" is also available on a stunning import DVD. This is definitely worth owning, but only AFTER or in TANDEM with seeing the picture ON A BIG SCREEN - ON FILM.

"Les Anges du péché" is screening at TIFF Bell Lightbox for ONE SHOW ONLY Thursday February 16 at 6:30 PM. DO NOT MISS THIS!!! ONE SHOW ONLY!!!

YO! YO! YO! HOLD THE PHONE! NOT JUST ONE SHOW! DUE TO OVERWHELMING DEMAND, A SECOND SHOW HAS BEEN ADDED!!! SO NOW YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE!

The second show is playing Sunday, February 26 at 8pm.

To order tickets and read Quandt's fabulous program notes, visit the TIFF website HERE.

To read my opening tribute to Bresson and this series, feel free to visit The Robert Bresson Man-Cave™ HERE. I am reviewing every film Bresson ever made. In case you missed it, my review of "A Man Escaped" is HERE, my review of "Pickpocket" is HERE, my review of "Mouchette" is HERE and my review of "Diary of a Country Priest" is HERE.












32nd GENIE AWARDS TRAILER

THE SNOWS OF KILIMANJARO - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Low Key Drama explores bourgeois dreams and values tarnished in a world of downsizing when the haves become have-nots and the have-nots-who-never-had want what the new have-nots appear to have, but do not, indeed, have.

The Snows of Kilimanjaro (2011) dir. Robert Guédiguian
Starring: Ariane Ascaride, Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Gérard Meylan, Marilyne Canto, Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet

*1/2

By Greg Klymkiw

Inspired by Victor Hugo's poem "How Good Are The Poor" ("Les pauvres gens"), The Snows of Kilimanjaro is a low-key drama with an annoying lefty thematic sledge-hammer that finally gets in the way of enjoying this promising tale of haves, have-nots and when the lines between both get blurred. On the plus-side, it's about adults. On the downside, the Liberalism of these adult characters leads to the sort of grey areas in the story that some might consider freshly ambiguous, but ultimately leaves a bad taste in one's mouth, knowing how much potential has been squandered because of the didactic nature of the approach.

Things begin promisingly enough with a mysterious lottery taking place on the docks of Marseilles. A wide array of mugs resembling a kind of Gallic assemblage of On the Waterfront types stand in a circle as twenty names are drawn and each person whose name is called walks grimly forward. These twenty men are being laid-off due to a lack of work. The big surprise is that union-rep Michel (Jean-Pierre Darroussin), didn't have to throw his name into the hat, but did so out of his lefty ideals of "being fair". And, what do these ideals, get him? A tin-handshake, the shaft - the old sack-eroo. This is probably not a great thing to happen to a 50-something welder whose wife Marie-Claire (Ariane Ascaride) works as a cleaning lady to help make ends meet.

Still, he takes it in stride, as does his wife. Their home is paid-off, they have a passel of adult kids and grandchildren and they have their health. To sweeten the pot, the union and their kids throw a huge 25th Wedding anniversary soiree and everyone chips in to send them on an expensive African safari to Tanzania.

Things could be worse.

Still, Michel is incredibly distressed, misses life on the docks, can't get work and spends his days in a sort of addled forced early-retirement. Marie-Claire is his rock in all this and she's both compassionate and understanding - to a fault. This is the first sign that things might be going awry with the narrative - this woman is a lefty wet dream, a saint. Another sign that this movie is going into the territory of didacticism is when Michel laments the fact that he and his wife have, over the years, becomes bourgeois.

Oh Jesus, give me a break. They've worked their asses off, supported a family and own a lovely home - what's to feel guilty about?

One night, they entertain another 50-something couple Raoul and Denise (Gérard Meylan and Marilyne Canto) over a game of bridge and the four of them are subjected to a violent home invasion by armed, masked thugs. Here things get even more problematic. The filmmakers are more concerned with their theme than narrative logic. The home invaders make it clear they know Michel and his wife have a whack of dough and airplane tickets for their trip to Tanzania. In spite of this, they spend a fair bit of screen time in the aftermath of this robbery wondering why they have been singled out for robbery. Surely this might have been a salient-enough detail to report to the police, but no, it takes a ridiculous coincidence lacking any credibility for Michel to pinpoint one of the two home invaders. Uh, these guys already admitted to knowing about the cash and airfare for the trip. All the laid-off dock workers were invited to the anniversary party.

Duh.

There's no need for a hackneyed deus ex machina-styled moment to reveal who our villain is. Frankly, what might have made sense narratively is for Michel to begin hunting down the culprit by going through the list of his fellow laid-off co-workers. But no, that would have been far too, uh, bourgeois, too American. Why have a character betrayed by a union "brother" turn into a Charles Bronson type when you can have him sitting on the bus in a large port city just as the answer to what haunts him presents itself ever-so conveniently?

Why? Because it will be easier to espouse a fake lefty agenda if one avoids what any betrayed dock worker might do. Better to make him feel guilty for turning in a "brother".

Buddy, your "brother" ripped you off, assaulted you, your wife and your friends and now you're in a financial sea of shit over this whole thing. Well, the filmmaker takes us to these places, not because it makes narrative sense, but because he wants it that way, but doesn't really want to do the work necessary to make anything credible.

When Michel is handed a lead pipe by a cop and told he can visit the thief to "have a talk" with him and that the cop will be happy to trump up a "resisting arrest" alibi if Michel might find it in him to use the pipe, I found myself perking up a tad. But no, the thief hurls an insult at Michel about his bourgeois ideals and all Michel can muster is a slap across the thief's face.

Where I really gave up on the movie being any good at all is when Michel starts to actually feel sorry for his "brother" and wants to drop the charges. (That said, the uninspired use of Joe Cocker’s “Many Rivers to Cross” should have been reason enough to give up on this oh-so square lefty tract.)

There was a very interesting and compelling story idea buried in this film, but director/co-writer Robert Guédiguian clearly had no intention of properly exploiting this charged material and was more interested in propagating some pro-milksop-whiner myth.

To what end?

Oh, I don't know. Let's rifle through Guédiguian's wallet and see if he's got a membership card with the Communist Party.

"The Snows of Kilimanjaro" is in very limited theatrical release and is playing at the independent Royal Cinema in Toronto. It's seems destined for a life in home entertainment venues. In Canada, the film is distributed via Mongrel Media.












32nd GENIE AWARDS TRAILER