Instead of strictly focusing on the negative aspects of “cancel culture” or “self-assured woke-ness”, with his latest film Testament, Quebecois filmmaker Denys Arcand (The Barbarian Invasions) is curious to find if a heartwarming lede is ever being buried by self-righteousness and political correctness. And by doing so, the filmmaker has created a monster.
By: Trevor Chartrand Who’s Yer Father?, from writer/director Jeremy Larter (Pogey Beach), is a quirky dark comedy with an Eastern Canadian twist. Funny and fast-paced, this movie has a stylized bluntness to it; almost as if it’s Prince Edward Island’s own Napoleon Dynamite – but with a much more sinister tone.
By: Jeff Ching I’ll get right to it without any literary foreplay: The Holdovers is one of the best movies of the year.
Kyle Armstrong’s sophomore feature Hands That Bind is a western that’s more introverted than expected.
A reclusive bank employee, Morán (Daniel Elías), is tempted to use his privilege to take advantage of his workplace. His plot to rob the bank is on standby until the perfect moment – cue Román (Esteban Bigliardi), a teller who leaves work early and is used as an incidental accomplice once Morán steals $650,000. Román, now more aware, is brought into the fold by the amateur thief and is told to hold the money while…
Nobody “phones it in” for Mathieu Turi’s subterranean thriller The Deep Dark, although their efforts are for naught; simply because this movie isn’t a good fit for their work.
With Anatomy of a Fall, writer/director Justine Triet gives audiences one of the most realistic courtroom dramas ever made for the big screen.
The swashbuckling comedic action-adventure sub-genre featuring a macho man saving a high-profile damsel in distress seems like a dated idea. It’s possible for filmmakers and storytellers to modernize this premise (The Lost City as a recent example), but to leave this two-dimensional dynamic at its infant stages for most of the movie feels like a no-win risk. If this is generally agreed upon, then pardon me for the switcheroo: I had a lot of fun with…
By: Trevor Chartrand Director Danny Madden brings us 15 Cameras, the second sequel to 2015’s 13 Cameras, just in time for this year’s spooky season. The third entry in this series is serviceable, with an interesting twist on the original premise. It’s a creepy thriller through-and-through, despite being a tad obvious with its metaphors.
By: Jolie Featherstone Ariane Louis-Seize’s feature film directorial debut, Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person, is an intriguing horror-dramedy that has the makings of a cult classic. Think gothic Wes Anderson, or Richard Ayoade’s Submarine (2010) meets Tomas Alfredson’s Let The Right One In (2008).