I didn’t believe anything in Considering Love & Other Magic. These characters are so disengaged, you could set them on fire and all they would do is shrug. They’re all too busy pondering about death; mostly the long-term existentialism that lingers when a loved one passes away. The press release describes Dave Schultz’s film as a “family movie”. Try explaining that pitch to your kids. You’ll owe them ice cream after the show.
Starting Friday, November 10, Toronto movie goers can finally check out Poor Agnes, a Canadian thriller that was an award-winner at this year’s Fantasia Film Festival and this past month’s Toronto After Dark Film Festival. As someone who has seen the movie, I’m anticipating the release because I want to know if people will have the same reactions I had. Much like the unfortunate victim who falls for Agnes’ manipulative tricks, Poor Agnes sent me into a freaky frenzy…
Signs posted around a low-income housing block in Toronto announcing “new developments” promises desirable changes, but it’s the community who are woefully anticipating the shift. This upcoming demolition, in pending stages of growth, means permanent relocation for these residents. Kids and teenagers are encouraged to direct their focus on other, less stressful interests, such as poetry and music.
Set in the Roncesvalles neighbourhood of Toronto, Great Great Great is the story of Lauren (Sarah Kolasky) and Tom (Dan Beirne), a couple in their early thirties whose relationship is coasting along steadily despite Tom’s inability to find steady employment as an urban planner. Nothing about Lauren and Tom‘s life is particularly awful: they eat food, they go to the gym, they have relationships with friends and family. Everything begins to fall apart when Lauren‘s parents…
Writer/director Pat Mills follows up his 2015 comedy Guidance with the equally hilarious Don’t Talk to Irene. However, his latest flick is certainly cut from a quirkier cloth, but that doesn’t make it any less sarcastic. It’s certainly one of the funniest films of the year.
A documentary about The Tragically Hip’s Man Machine Poem Tour needed to be made. After all, it was a pivotal imprint in modern Canadian culture as the entire nation collectively considered the band’s timeless legacy and paid respects to terminally ill musician Gord Downie. Finding filmmakers to handle such sensitive subject matter would be an intimidating order, yet Jennifer Baichwal (Watermark) and Nicholas de Pencier (cinematographer on The Ghosts in Our Machine) rise to the occasion and exceed…
At the moment, there isn’t a more indulgent director than Frank D’Angelo. The Canadian entrapreneur/musician has made a film career out of mob movies featuring (and recycling) loaded casts, essentially, playing cops n’ robbers. The material is more than criminals and anti-heroes pointing guns and using twelve-letter words to berate each other, but some have argued otherwise. The Neighborhood, unfortunately, gives the haters ammunition.
By: Jessica Goddard Kathleen Hepburn’s Never Steady, Never Still is a serious, greyscale, dragging meditation on subjects so inherently sombre, it’s practically masochistic to sit through the whole film without allowing yourself a break.
Written, directed, and produced by Martine Blue, Hunting Pignut is the story of Bernice, played by Taylor Hickson (Aftermath, Deadpool), a teenager in a rural Newfoundland community. She is a typical teenage misfit: lonely, bullied at school for no obvious reason, and picked last at sports. When Bernice’s estranged father dies of a drug overdose, his wake is crashed by a gang of gutter punks claiming to have been his closest friends – one of…
By: Jessica Goddard Mina Shum’s Meditation Park is an engaging, quirky, and empowering film about the overdue self-actualization of a Vancouver woman (Cheng Pei-pei) in light of the discovery of her husband’s affair. This thoroughly modern film also expertly highlights the immigrant experience in multicultural Canada, while making clear that the narrative is culturally universal. There is an exquisite balance of humour and poignancy in the writing, strengthened by an excellent cast.