These are the films I viewed this year JEUNE JULIETTE trailer Jeune Juliette is Anne Émond’s semi-autobiographical film about the most awkward period of her life. Fourteen-year old Juliette (Alexane Jamieson) lives in the country with her father and her older brother. When Juliette was younger, her mother left the family to pursue her career in New York; from that moment, Juliette started to gain weight. Today, she’s not obese, but she’s clearly the heaviest girl at her high school. But that doesn’t stop her from being vivacious, funny and unrepentantly rebellious. Juliette has big dreams: she wants to throw the best parties, move to New York to live with her mother, and date the most gorgeous guy in her school, an older boy who is about to graduate. In short, she wants everything she can’t have—which sometimes makes her forget to appreciate those who really love her. We follow this brazen and endearing girl during her hectic last weeks before summer vacation, and watch as she does some growing up—but not too much. 3.5/5 COMPULSIVE LIAR trailer A compulsive liar sees his world upended when every lie he’s ever told — from the smallest, whitest lie to lies so grandiose they threaten the very fabric of society — become true, all at once. Simon Aubert (Louis-José Houde) runs his entire life on lies. An executive at an aviation company, he lies about everything: the reasons he’s late, the reasons women should sleep with him, the reasons why people shouldn’t have to worry about them shutting down the plant, the fact that his parents used to beat him, the fact that his sister-in-law is in love with him. Simon’s self-serving lies are so abundant that the universe (governed by a handful of Buddhist monks, it seems) decides to right a wrong by teaching him a lesson and making all of the lies come true on the eve of a crucial meeting with a Russian businessman. Compulsive Liar takes a high-concept comedy premise into the realm of full-on fantasy. Though a more mainstream film, not as touching as Julliet (above). 3/5 BLUE NOTE RECORDS: BEYOND THE NOTES trailer One of the most important record labels in the history of jazz — and, by extension, that of American music — Blue Note Records has been home to groundbreaking artists such as Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Bud Powell and Art Blakey, as well as present day luminaries like Robert Glasper, Ambrose Akinmusire and Norah Jones. Founded in New York in 1939 by German Jewish refugees, Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff, the history of Blue Note Records goes beyond the landmark recordings, encompassing the pursuit of musical freedom, the conflict between art and commerce and the idea of music as a transformative and revolutionary force. An award-winning film burbling with an endless stream of beautiful jazz, Blue Note Records: Beyond The Notes explores the unique vision behind the iconic jazz record label. Through rare archival footage, current recording sessions and conversations with Blue Note artists, the film reveals a powerful mission and illuminates the vital connections between jazz and hip hop. 3/5 COLD CASE HAMMARSKJÖLD trailer On September 18, 1961, a plane carrying United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld and 15 others crashed near Ndola, Northern Rhodesia. There were no survivors and it was immediately suspected that Hammarskjöld was assassinated. Hammarskjöld was a highly controversial figure due to his support for decolonizing Africa, and at the time of his death was en route to negotiate peace talks during the Congo Crisis. Fifty years of unanswered questions and conspiracy theories lead offbeat journalist and documentarian Mads Brügger to reopen the case. Brügger traverses the continent, scouring documents and interviewing witnesses, hoping to finally unearth the truth. In his signature agitprop style, Brügger becomes both filmmaker and subject in this multiple award-winning film, challenging the very nature of truth by “performing” the role of truth seeker. As Brügger uncovers a critical secret that could send shockwaves around the world, we realize that sometimes absurdity and irony are the ingredients needed to confront what’s truly sinister. 3.7/5 NO FILTER trailer (no subtitles in trailer) Inspired by a true story, No Filter is about Beatrice (Alexandra Lamy), who has just published her first career novel called The Great Crossing. Her book tells the story of the past five years which she has just spent caring for her husband Frédéric (José Garcia). As the result of an accident, which turned everyone’s life upside down, Frédéric not only lost his sight but also lost the ability to filter his opinions and became obsessed with food. He now says everything he thinks and, though still funny and seductive, he has become an unpredictable man with no filter. When Beatrice is finally ready to celebrate the publication of her book and share it with her family and friends, they soon realize, even though she changed the names, that they are all there. At first delighted, they quickly realize that Beatrice has somewhat magnified some of their faults. What was intended as an homage to departure is quickly transformed into a minefield. Alexandra Lamy is beautiful. 3/5 THE QUIETUDE trailer The Quietude invites us to a family gathering that will prove to be anything but tranquil. Sisters Mia (Martina Gusman) and Eugenia (Bérénice Bejo) have spent much of their adult lives living on different continents, yet they retain a rare, almost disconcerting, intimacy. When their father suffers a stroke and slips into a coma, Eugenia leaves her Paris home and returns to La Quietud, the family home in rural Argentina where Mia still resides with their mother, Esmeralda (Graciela Borges). The alarm caused by their father’s affliction is alleviated by the announcement that Eugenia is pregnant, yet tensions shadow the reunion nonetheless. Mia and Esmeralda get into heated arguments over seemingly petty matters, family business matters demand attention, and both sisters re-entangle themselves in dormant love affairs. The façade of quietude won’t be sustained. A beautifully crafted, multilayered drama, The Quietude chronicles a collision of old grievances and long-held secrets. A melodramatic feast on the surface, it opens up darker questions underneath. 3/5 VARDA BY AGNES trailer The last film from the late French filmmaker Agnes Varda forms its core out of lectures she gave in her later years. But, in pure Varda fashion, the film is punctuated by humour as she dives into unexpected realms, tracing her career and life, and the ways they intertwined. Though 90 at the time of filming, Varda still emanates her characteristic vibrant energy. She offers a wide-ranging journey through her world: her filming process, her feminism, her photography and her long-time relationship with director Jacques Demy. Varda died only a month after Varda by Agnès premiered. Yet, like all of Varda’s work, it brims with life. And its takeaway is not a past-tense legacy, but a sense of how Varda lived through her films, of what she brought to the art form, and of finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. “Nothing is banal if you film people with empathy and love,” Varda once said. This is the inspiration she has left us with. 3/5 GOALIE trailer Goalie is a biopic about Terry Sawchuk, a kid from Winnipeg who played for four of the Original Six teams, held the all-time NHL record for the most wins, and died after a drunken fight in 1970. He was 40 years old, and a wreck. Director Adriana Maggs shows us how he got there. Goalie subverts the usual sports-hero mythologizing by acknowledging the damage that made the NHL legend who he was – and then simply tracking the physical and emotional scar tissue as it accumulates over the course of his life. It’s not a celebration; it’s a tragedy – an emotionally raw, performance-driven study of a man who gave everything to a sport, and couldn’t get anything back. The film rests on Mark O’Brien’s brittle, evasive performance as Sawchuk, a man who’s uncomfortable around his teammates, uncertain around the woman he loves (Georgina Reilly) and unceasingly deferential to coaches and managers, self-medicating with alcohol and slowly losing everything around him. 3/5 GENESIS trailer An almost operatic tribute to youth, Genesis uses an unconventional structure to capture the discomfort of adolescence. Its nonlinear timeline follows three interconnected experiences wrought by tragedy and cosmic coincidences. Its images form a unifying force in a deep examination of first love, real and imagined, in a confused and often cruel world. Sixteen year-old Guillaume Bonnet (Théodore Pellerin) and his older step-sister Charlotte (Noée Abita), are going through equally troublesome patches in their romantic lives. Guillaume seems insufferably arrogant but is also the very cliche of a sensitive outsider. Charlotte is two years older and in a committed relationship with Maxime (PierLuc Funk), who suggests they consider the possibility of seeing other people. His seemingly throwaway comment rocks her world, yet it is Charlotte who starts looking elsewhere for love. The characters show little regard for their own well-being, as if lingering at the edge of a cliff. This is an intimate, quietly transgressive, and unsettling portrait of desire. 2.8/5 LETO trailer Avant-garde Russian filmmaker Kirill Serebrennikov has truly crafted something original here and it needs to be seen to be completely understood. The setting is Leningrad in the early 1980s, when there was a fiercely committed rock and pop scene, with devotees fanatically consuming the latest imported albums and audiocassette bootlegs from the west, including classics like the Beatles, Dylan, Velvet Underground, Bowie and the Doors. The underground rock scene is boiling ahead of Perestroika. The film tells the story of the relationship between rock musicians Viktor Tsoi and Mike Naumenko, and Naumenko’s wife, Natalia, as well as the formation of the Leningrad Rock Club. Together they change the trajectory of rock n’roll music in the Soviet Union. Eventually winning the Soundtrack Award at Cannes, Leto hit a snag in August 2017 when Kirill Serebrennikov was arrested as the film was reaching the end of principal photography He has remained in Moscow, where he edited his film under house arrest. 3.6/5 Maiden trailer The Whitbread Round the World Race was considered an exclusively masculine endeavour when Tracy Edwards came along and, in the face of much sexist condescension, proved that skill, perseverance, and courage at sea knows no gender. Maiden traces Edwards’s formative experiences: the idyllic childhood that came to a devastating halt with her father’s death and the adolescent rebelliousness that resulted in her expulsion from school. At 16, she ran away to Greece, where she had her first taste of the seafaring life, rapidly graduating from cook to deckhand to first mate. She was still in her mid-twenties when she became determined to participate in the Whitbread with a crew of talented women from around the world. With its fundraising challenges and heated rivalries, the journey to prepare the “Maiden” was already complicated. But it was just the beginning of an epic adventure. Blending archival materials and new interviews in which Edwards and her crew members collectively narrate their experience, Maiden is captivating. Probably my favorite this year. 4/5
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AuthorI believe we are what we think. What we think depends on what we feed our brains. This is a partial record of what my brain has been eating. Archives
February 2023
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