I like Crackerhead, but this latest experimental experience from filmmaker Mike Klassen is making me sweat – it’s a tough movie to review if you can’t crack through Klassen’s poker face. The film’s flippant facade has anarchy written all over it, but the drive behind Klassen’s directorial decisions and stylistic storytelling suggests a deeper, poignant project.
The craft of brilliant costume designers and make-up artists can transform the most recognizable actors into strangers. Such is the case for Manifesto, a one-woman-show featuring two-time Academy Award winner Cate Blanchett portraying 13 different roles. Of course, the production is also lucky to have one of the greatest living actors at the forefront. However, what Manifesto also displays is that sometimes the best artists overshoot their target.
9 Days with Cambria is sold as an experiment in character development and storytelling. It tells the story of a young woman by the name of Cambria, who was once raped by her boyfriend-at-the-time which led to their breakup and her worsened mental state. In more competent hands, this could have been an inquisitive work, but in the hands of directors Mike Klassen (Abolition) and Jason Armstrong, the final product is at best inconsequential and at…
I know Parker Mott as a fellow writer and a friend. We met on the set of Eric Marchen’s television show Cinema Seen years ago (when it was originally titled The Film Slate), and we’ve kept in contact ever since.
The ReFrame Film Festival couldn’t wait to begin. On Thursday, January 28, the festival held an exclusive sold-out Ontario premiere of Anne Troake’s OutSideIn, an experimental 3D film that featured choreography in its rawest form from two partially nude performers (Carol Prieur and Bill Coleman).
By: Addison Wylie TIFF’s short film programmes have always featured creative work made by gifted people. This year, Peterborough born filmmaker Zack Russell is one of those people. She Stoops to Conquer marks Russell’s filmmaking debut, but he couldn’t be farther from being a beginner. His sweeping theatre experience has allowed Russell to gradually learn how to communicate with actors, how to block a scene, and how to understand the emotions behind a playwright’s work. After watching…
Masculinity/Femininity (DIR. Russell Sheaffer) By: Addison Wylie It’s so limited, but it interrupts the whole filmmaking process. It’s not a steady stream of consciousness as much as some of the performers would like it to be. It kind of breaks it up. That’s a quote from someone describing super 8 film in Masculinity/Femininity. A format of film so cumbersome, it would take an ambitious individual to want to shoot on it to make a modern movie….
By: Addison Wylie I’m all for art taking different forms. Art doesn’t necessarily always have to contain deeper meanings. In the case of NY Export: Opus Jazz, having the intentions of emulating a classier time of musical cinema in a modern world is perfectly fine. However, when the featured silenced dancers show this much talent and capability as they do in NY Export: Opus Jazz, it’s hard not to expect something more than “just dancing”…
By: Addison Wylie When I reviewed Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers in March, I stated that “it may very well be this year’s most argued about film.” I still stand by that, and it’s bittersweet to do so. On the one hand, I’m right. On the other, there are still movie goers that react wildly negative towards Korine’s fever dream. However, just as many people are faithful to their opinion about Spring Breakers and even go as far…
By: Addison Wylie *NOTE: The review for Crispin Glover’s What Is It won’t be like the average review you’ve seen on this site. However, given that the subject and the subject’s film at hand aren’t like anyone or anything else, it feels appropriate to be writing this way. Anyways, carry on.* Crispin Glover established himself as an actor with his early work in Back to the Future and River’s Edge. Lately, audiences have seen Glover…