This past week I traveled to Canada for the first time, attending the Toronto International Film Festival. Despite some warm weather when I first arrived, I really enjoyed the trip to the Great White North. I ate a lot of Tim Horton’s donuts, I watched thirty-three films, I got to explore a good chunk of Downtown Toronto including the very cool bookstores Little Ghosts and The Beguiling Books and Art. I even got a chance to watch one of my favorite bands - Murder by Death - perform at the Horseshoe Tavern, a great dive bar complete with leaky ceilings and sus bathrooms.
All in all, it was a tremendous experience, one I’m very fortunate enough to have been able to enjoy thanks to my job. Whenever I attend a film festival on the company dime, I always feel this intense pressure to watch as many movies as I can. I’ve got to justify the trip’s expenses, after all. Thirty-three movies is a lot of films, though. My head feels like a bowl of jelly and I am having a hard time remembering which scene happened in which movie at this point.
I’ve got a week’s break and then I do it all over again, attending Fantastic Fest in Austin beginning next Thursday.
I have some exciting WHERE WOLF-related news I’ll be sharing soon but, in the meantime, here’s a look at all the stuff I watched at TIFF:
RIDDLE OF FIRE
Three juvenile delinquents tangle with poachers in the Wyoming wilderness in this beyond charming “kids in peril” jam. Think I DECLARE WAR by way of Robert E. Howard - full of kids being kids and getting into no good. Also, forest magic.
THE ZONE OF INTEREST
Bleak Holocaust portrait told from the perspective of Auschwitz Commandant Rudolf Höss. As the Höss family engages in petty politics, atrocities occur in the background. As audiences find themselves sucked into the banality, they become complacent in these atrocities. Powerful stuff.
ROBOT DREAMS
Pablo Berger’s emotionally complex toon is based on a comic by Sara Varon. A lonely pooch finds friendship with a robot he orders from an infomercial. There’s some interesting stuff here about transactional friendships and people in love with being in love. The animation is superb and the film is the kind of stealthy deep that I really enjoy. A favorite from the festival.
EVIL DOES NOT EXIST
Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s slow-burn drama explores a struggle between a peaceful village and an agency trying to build a glamping site in the middle of it. Hamaguchi masterfully takes audiences into the perspective of both sides, trying to find a middle ground narratively.
KILL
Super fun action throwback from India in which an Army commando is stuck on a moving train with a gang of bandits with whom he has a bone to pick. Vicious carnage courtesy of just about every type of blade imaginable. Bloody AF.
THE BOY AND THE HERON
Finally an animated film unafraid to portray birds as the winged menaces they are. Hayao Miyazaki’s new (last?) film is a powerful and imaginative parable about grief. Stunning imagery, stirring emotions, nightmare fuel courtesy of birds with teeth.
FINESTKIND
Ben Foster continues to pick his roles based on how dirty he gets to be. Tommy Lee Jones is great in this film about two brothers who dip their toes into crime after their fishing business is jeopardized. Jenna Ortega is wasted in a thankless girlfriend role.
SOLITUDE
A hermit forced out of his home due to a development deal moves into a flat and befriends a young child in this Icelandic drama. The man attempts to be a part of his new community but will his distrust of society (and society’s distrust of him) get in the way?
DICKS: THE MUSICAL
I always get excited when I watch a movie that I love but that I know 90 percent of audiences will hate. It’s like I learned a new secret handshake or something. This movie is unabashed stupidness, done with precision-level cleverness and style.
NAGA
A Saudi woman races to get back before curfew after a day trip to get high in the desert goes very, very wrong. Kinetic and scrappy - in the vein of early Edgar Wright, the movie has big ambitions, one of which is to seemingly make audiences scared of camels.
WHEN EVIL LURKS
Demián Rugna’s demonic possession jam is very frequently butt-clenchingly intense but what I loved most about it was the incredible world-building. It reminded me of a horror paperback you might find on the dusty shelf of a bookstore. Scary as fuck. 4
WOMAN OF THE HOUR
Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut is tonally turbulent (in a good way!) film about serial killer and DATING GAME contestant Rodney Alcala and the various women who crossed his path. The movie is a searing look at the ways men make women feel unsafe. Shout out to the shocked audience member who panicked whispered to her friend at the start of the film, “This isn’t a comedy!?!?”
CHUCK CHUCK BABY
A karaoke-style jukebox musical in which characters sing along with pop songs to communicate their emotions. This queer romance sees two women rekindle a teenage crush against the backdrop of a chicken processing plant. Laid-back lovely Kleenex fuel.
AN ENDLESS SUNDAY
KIDS, in Italiano. A trio of asshole kids, on the precipice of maybe having to group up, spend their days doing asshole things. A beautifully shot look at Rome from the perspective of a teenager with too much time on their hands.
PICTURES OF GHOSTS
Kleber Mendonça Filho’s video essay explores the Brazilian city Recife’s change over time and its relationship with cinema - both global and the films Filho shot throughout his career. Niche documentaries are fun!
DREAM SCENARIO
Milkshake Duck: The Movie. Nic Cage plays a man who finds out he’s appearing in people’s dreams all over the world. Bemusement turns to panic as the dreams become horrific nightmares. One of the smartest explorations of cancel culture I’ve seen.
THE HOLDOVERS
Alexander Payne’s ‘70s cinema LARP is very charming. Dominic Sessa is great as a teen left behind for the holidays at his prep school and Paul Giamatti is at his Giamattiest as the cranky teacher left to babysit him. Feels good to love a Payne movie again.
THE MONK AND THE GUN
A monk sends his assistant to find a gun on the eve of the country’s first democratic election in this Bhutan film. It’s a funny and humanistic ensemble that proves slight doesn’t need to be an insult. Small, but with no shortage of heart.
HUMANIST VAMPIRE SEEKING CONSENTING SUICIDAL PERSON
This French-Canadian comedy plays like an indie pop cover of LET THE RIGHT ON IN. The plot is exactly what’s on the tin - a young vampire girl who doesn’t want to kill meets a suicidal boy who wants to die. Charming, sweet, inventive and stylish. I can’t wait for a generation of young goths to fall for this film.
NEXT GOAL WINS
A disgraced soccer coach attempts to help a disgraced soccer team. Your miles will vary depending on how much you still like Taika Waititi’s schtick but I found the film a charming warm hug of a movie. It’s paint-by-numbers, but the numbers are very funny.
THE PEASANTS
The filmmaking team behind LOVING VINCENT adapts Władysław Reymont’s Nobel Prize–winning novel into an oil-painted animated film. A much-sought woman marries a rich farmer, throwing her village into petty chaos. Beautifully animated, lush music, hefty drama.
HAJJAN
I loved this throwback adventure film about camel racing from Saudi Arabia. A plucky kid, a cute animal, a dastardly villain. The film checks all the boxes. If you’re a fan of animals going really fast and have an aversion to hedgehogs, this is the film for you.
HITMAN
Glen Powell (who also co-wrote the script) is fantastic as an undercover cop who falls for the woman who tries to hire him as a hitman in Richard Linklater’s very charming comedy. The film plays fast and loose with facts but who cares when the story is this fun?'
DEAR JASSI
Tarsem Singh Dhandwar is back, baby! While aesthetically restrained compared to THE FALL or THE CELL, this true-life Indian spin on Romeo and Juliet packs a huge emotional wallop. A young man and woman find their love threatened by societal standings. Emotional napalm. I never thought I’d see a Tarsem movie with a Wal-Mart prominently displayed in the background of a shot.
BOY KILLS WORLD
Slapstick Skarsgard-fueled action about an assassin trained to take down a dystopian despot. Plays out equal parts Looney Toons, THE PURGE and THE RAID. I will always slowclap in my heart for films unafraid to untether their imagination.
AGGRO DR1FT
Less a movie than something created for the soul purpose of being projected on the inside of a barn while a bunch of teenagers do drugs and have sex. Harmony Korine directs this 80-minute art film/music video/trolling exercise about an assassin in Florida, shot entirely with infrared. I hate when people call shit like this a “vibe” but, yeah, it’s a vibe.
THE CONTESTANT
A documentary about A LIFE IN PRIZES, a Japanese TV show from 1998 in which a man was dropped naked into an empty apartment and had to clothe, feed and basically survive by winning mail-in contests from magazines. An exploration into televised cruelty.
POOLMAN
Chris Pine writes, directs and stars in this neo-noir riff on CHINATOWN. An obsessive pool maintenance man attempts to dig into city corruption. It is as fun as sharing a UBER with a mentally unstable street performer. And, while I did not like the movie, fuck those assholes who were loudly heckling the film during its P&I screening.
SLEEP
A couple finds their burgeoning domestic bliss interrupted when the husband begins displaying erratic and violent behavior in his sleep. Surprise! There’s a ghost. I love any horror movie that features a character putting together a PowerPoint presentation.
NOT A WORD
A conductor steps away from work after her son is involved in an accident that may have been a case of self-harm. Furthermore, the distance between them grows to distrust when Mom suspects her son of evil acts. Moody thematic adaptation of Mahler’s 5th Symphony.
SMUGGLERS
Ryoo Seung-wan’s aquatic heist film follows a group of Korean women whose small-time smuggling operation puts them smack-dab in the middle of a three-way conflict. Great underwater stunts, fun twists, likable characters - blockbuster filmmaking at its best.
SORRY/NOT SORRY
This New York Times-produced documentary explores the open secret-turned-career “ending” allegations against Louis C.K. and how the comedian has managed to continue to steadily find work and success despite owning up to his sexual misconduct. If there’s a path to redemption after being “cancelled,” this is not it.
100 YARDS
A martial arts master’s death leads to a feud between his son and the master’s top student. As that feud sprawls out into their village, outside forces step in to curtail their violence. Stylish, classically inspired martial arts from Xu Haofeng.