By: Addison Wylie If Hot Tub Time Machine caught lightning in a bottle, Hot Tub Time Machine 2 begs the sky for another bolt. Steve Pink’s predecessor doesn’t nearly get enough credit. Hot Tub Time Machine has a niche, but rarely does it receive the recognition it deserves for going beyond the call of duty. The film could’ve been just another R-rated comedy filled with perverse shock, but Pink’s production decided to reach higher and use…
By: Trevor Jeffery In Some Kind of Love, the filmmaker makes a sloppy observation that his family is emotionally distant from each other, and he presumes that this is interesting and unique enough for an audience. Filmmaker Thomas Burstyn travels to London to document his aunt Yolanda Sonnabend, a 77-year-old hoarding, shut-in painter. When he arrives, he finds his uncle (renowned AIDS researcher Dr. Joseph Sonnabend) living with her and caring for her. Burstyn turns the…
By: Shannon Page Hunting Elephants certainly won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. There are a few laughs sprinkled throughout, but don’t go into this film expecting a passive movie going experience. The film boasts an impressive international cast that includes Iraqi-born actor Sasson Gabai (who audiences may recognize, or not, from his role in 1988’s Rambo III), Moni Moshonov of Israel, as well as the incomparable Patrick Stewart as a struggling English actor looking for…
By: Mark Barber Swedish auteur Roy Andersson completes his so-called “living trilogy” with the sombre, contemplative A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence, a masterful blend of dour themes and dark humour. Andersson’s Pigeon resists a coherent synopsis. The film is told through multiple intertwining stories. At the centre of these stories is a pair of travelling novelty salespeople–Jonathan (Holger Andersson) and Sam (Nils Westblom), both of whom share the same reflective deadpan…
By: Addison Wylie Larry Gaye: Renegade Male Flight Attendant is a vehicle made for Glenn Howerton (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia). The leading role, however, has been given to Royal Pains’ Mark Feuerstein, who commits to the dopey womanizing role but is far too driven to drill in each punchline. In Feuerstein’s defence, the actor is only following Sam Friedlander’s untamed filmmaking. The film deals with a lead character who is unfamiliar to his arrogance because he’s too…
By: Addison Wylie That title is a turn off, but (Dis)Honesty – The Truth About Lies is an enthralling investigative film that will hopefully serve as a role model for documentarians. Duke University professor Dan Ariely speaks to a crowd of eager ears at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, New Jersey. He stands at the foot of the stage and explains numerous experiments his team has conducted to test society’s moral fibre and…
By: Addison Wylie Carl Boenish wanted to test the human spirit. In doing so, his willingness to jump off breathtaking heights pioneered what we know now as “BASE jumping”. Filmmaker Marah Strauch has matched Boenish’s go-getter attitude and gumption with Sunshine Superman, a documentary about the jumper’s fearless outlook and how he serves as an inspiration for adventure and living life to its fullest. If you’ve seen James Marsh’s Man on Wire, you’ll sense Marah…
By: Trevor Jeffery Over the past few decades, the biopic has been more or less perfected and recreated over and over, to the point of boring predictability. While ultimately Love & Mercy is no exception, the film deviates from the structure enough to make the journey feel like a new, albeit shaky, perspective on the formula. Following Beach Boy Brian Wilson, the film jumps between the 20-something-prodigy Wilson in the 1960s (played by Paul Dano)…
By: Addison Wylie I went into After the Ball already admiring three of its main stars: director Sean Garrity, co-writer Kate Melville, and actress Portia Doubleday. After the Ball isn’t a type of film I get excited to see, but these are three people I’ve been wanting to see more of ever since they’re strong debuts. Garrity impressed me with his slow burn drama Blood Pressure, yet temporarily lost me when his filmmaking pizazz was…
By: Mark Barber Swiss surrealist H. R. Giger was something of a phantom, often disappearing into one of the many nooks and crannies of his own home. Yet, what makes Giger so unique and compelling–both as an artist and as a person–is another elusive phantom in Belinda Sallin’s Dark Star: HR Giger’s World. Dark Star disappoints not in its reasonably zealous adoration of Giger’s cyborg nightmares, but in its simplistic analytical approach to both himself and…