Using his previous film, the embellished period thriller Operation Avalanche, as a stepping stone towards his latest feature, Canadian renegade Matt Johnson takes another crack at the biopic genre with BlackBerry. Director Johnson (co-writing with frequent collaborator/producer Matthew Miller) chronicles the rise and fall of the titular game-changing portable device that allowed users online access and exclusive text-based communication.
Films are rewarded when they think outside the box and resist their genre’s conventions. But sometimes, a movie can remind us of how narrative prerequisites can be misinterpreted as cliché by indifferent filmmakers.
It’s normal for an audience to be distracted by the picturesque Alaskan landscape in Sugar Mountain or the tunes sang by Blackwater Railroad Company. After all, filmmaker Richard Gray uses these pleasant qualities to soften up his highly unlikable movie.
By: Trevor Jeffery Neil (Jesse Carere) is a regular high school kid: he enjoys hanging out with his friends, he’s awkward around girls, he’s good at magic tricks, he’s an unknowing blood sacrifice for his Satanic church, he likes video games. When he finds out that he is in fact a blood sacrifice for his Satanic church, he and his friend Matt (Daryl Sabara) quest to corrupt his purity through losing his virginity. While overall…
By: Addison Wylie Last time we checked in with TIFF’s Mel Brooks retrospective, it was to recover old memories of his classic Blazing Saddles. Another reason why It’s Good to Be the King is a useful look back at Brooks’ filmography is that it allows audiences to see how the filmmaker’s sense of humour has aged. Unfortunately, Robin Hood: Men in Tights isn’t exactly a fond way to remember Mel Brooks’ signature silliness. His love for cinema and poking fun…