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).
Late last year, Canadian indie Toronah snuck into a single theatre in the titled city. The film piqued my curiosity, and I did some more research. I ended up missing out on the film, but I began a dialogue with the film’s director Rick Smiciklas. When I mentioned that I was interested in reviewing his film, Smiciklas suggested that a reality show titled Wingmen would act as a good introduction to Toronah since key players crossover.
The Orange Man is voluntarily uneven. After presenting itself as slasher horror, the film has a change of heart and decides to be a break-up comedy for bros, and then flip-flops some more. It’s a shame since the slasher bits are the most fun.
Dirty Grandpa wasn’t a film that I expected to enjoy as much as I did. The casting of the two leads had me doubtful.
I’m compelled to call the Romanian drama One Floor Below a “one man show” since it features a solitary character (Sandu played by Teodor Corban) dealing with a possible murder he heard from outside an apartment, and how he handles confrontation with the alleged suspect. The camera is focused on him, and Corban does follow through with his end of the deal – he’s very believable.
There are ultimately two extremes within the canon of horror cinema: those films which are focused on artistry and only use the set pieces of horror to create atmosphere, and those films which are focused on being scary without much artistic flair. Christian Hallman’s Sensoria manages to bring these two extremes together by being neither artistic nor scary, resulting in something that just seems to exist for about an hour and twenty minutes. I considered using…
Eco-friendly independent documentaries are sometimes a hard sell to the general moviegoing public. Unless you have pre-invested interest in the subject matter (in this case, fracking) or the film’s guiding hand (in this case, indigenous activist Caleb Behn), these movies can come across as droning strolls through textbooks of material. It’s a shame since so many of these films are thoughtful and important.
The Masked Saint has a premise you’d expect in a Saturday Night Live sketch: a former wrestler takes to preaching, but turns to the past when he realizes how the sport can help himself and his community. It’s a near impossible sell despite being inspired by true events, but it’s a set-up that hooks curious audiences toward a satisfying film.
Every so often, I would pull myself out of Nintendo Quest because it made me either gasp loudly or smile until my face hurt. Robert McCallum’s documentary wasn’t just connecting with me on a nostalgic level, it’s also an entertaining thrill ride.
Stonewall quickly came and went. It was played at TIFF last year, and screened in the U.S. markets for a short time. Critically and popularly reviled, Roland Emmerich’s pet project is completely different from his usual disaster films like Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow. Indeed, Stonewall is a heavily whitewashed take on the famous New York riots that played an integral part in formalizing the LGBTQ equality movement.