By: Addison Wylie Porch Stories has a good eye and ear for the city; most notably Toronto, Ontario. After a parade disperses, the sidewalks are lined with kids hanging out with friends and families enjoying the nice weather. In the distance, we can almost make out whirring white noise of busy cars and streetlights. Sarah Goodman’s film is black-and-white, and I’m unsure why she signed off on this artistic decision. On the one hand, she…
By: Addison Wylie Wrong Cops is from the mind of writer/director Quentin Dupieux, who found love from Midnight Madness audiences with his films Rubber and Wrong. That same crowd may find themselves straining through forced smiles when they set eyes on Wrong Cops. Wrong Cops is the type of film you shoot during breaks on the sets of music videos. I guess instead of taking advantage of his per diem and down time, Dupieux rounded…
By: Addison Wylie Early on in Results, two workout trainers are telling the other not to provoke them. These two trainers are Trevor and Kat, played by Guy Pearce and Cobie Smulders. Over the course of Andrew Bujalski’s film, the audience finds out that these two characters need to be provoked in order for them to be challenged, which in turn makes Results interesting. The person who does most of the poking and prodding is…
By: Addison Wylie Mars Horodyski’s Ben’s at Home is a film you can’t help but root for. I’ve been cheering the movie on since I saw it at this year’s Canadian Film Festival, and was overjoyed to hear it won Best Feature as the festival was winding down. Besides its win at the Canadian Film Festival, Ben’s at Home has won all sorts of affection; which is very impressive considering how small scale the movie is. It’s a daunting…
By: Shannon Page You could be forgiven for feeling like you’ve seen Adult Beginners before – you probably have. Directed by Ross Katz, the film follows 30-something entrepreneur Jake (Nick Kroll) as he loses everything on the eve of his company’s launch and is forced to move in with his somewhat estranged and pregnant sister Justine (Rose Byrne) and brother-in-law Danny (Bobby Cannavale)in the suburbs. Desperate to stay away from Manhattan and his former business…
By: Addison Wylie I can easily sell you on Relative Happiness by describing Melissa Bergland’s dynamite performance. She’s spunky and wise, manages an adorable Bed and Breakfast in Nova Scotia, and her sense of humour is quick-witted towards those who condescend her. She takes the audience’s attention and commands the screen. I wish it was that easy to describe Deanne Foley’s lukewarm dramedy. Mostly because of a deceptive bait-and-switch at the halfway hump which converts…
By: Addison Wylie Fresh off its stardom at the Canadian Screen Awards after earning nominations for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Original Score, the general moviegoing public gets to see if Cast No Shadow lives up to the hype. I congratulate director Christian Sparkes and his team on the nominations, but Cast No Shadow didn’t work for me. Slivers of ideas are buried under the uneven tone of the film. If you disregard…
By: Addison Wylie Earlier this year, I gave I Put a Hit on You an unfavourable review. This led me to believe that making a compelling comedy about snippety people bumming around their house was impossible. Mars Horodyski proves me wrong with Ben’s at Home. This film is funny and fully realized, successfully capturing an introvert’s post-breakup buffer period. Ben (played with wit by Dan Abramovici) chooses to stay housebound because he’s satisfied with personal…
By: Addison Wylie Barn Wedding seems like it was conceived by hopeful actors supporting a “let’s put on a show” credence. Unfortunately, when things start to get interesting, Shaun Benson’s directorial debut is a day late and a dollar short when the stakes are raised. The performances in Barn Wedding are sensible portrayals of drifters who are faithful to their friends. They unite for a wedding, but the group grows suspicious about the intentions behind…
By: Mark Barber Loitering with Intent has all the right ingredients for a compelling short film. Unfortunately, it has been unnecessarily bloated into an 80-minute feature. Raphael (Ivan Martin) and Dominic (Michael Godere) are two struggling actor-writers who are commissioned to write the screenplay for a low-budget Chandleresque noir film. The screenplay subplot is quickly dropped once the two are settled in their writing retreat: the cottage they occupy suddenly becomes a festering nightmare of…