Sukiyaki Western Django

Release date: 31 August 2007 (Japan)

If you want to talk about a director who knows how to work extremes, you should go no further than Japan's Takashi Miike, who one year after giving us the strange, stark, quiet murder mystery Big Bang Love, Juvenile A returns with this loud, funny, over-the-top take on the American cowboy western. The film centres on the fight for a town, rumored to have a buried treasure, and pits the "whites" and "reds" against each other in true War of the Roses' fashion (the association here to Henry VI will be apparent when you see this movie). A drifter in true Clint Eastwood style arrives in town to save the poor townsfolk from these two marauding groups of samurai and set to right the various injustices meted out during their battle for the town. This is all done in a style I can only best describe as Moulin Rouge crossed with Kill Bill crossed with Couching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. It is highly stylized complete with great costumes, much silliness in a Japanese game show way, nods to some of the classic cliches of westerns young and old, and even has Quentin Tarantino playing a key character. What else could you ask for?! If you're after a western of a much different ilk with a marvelous blend of east meets west, saddle on up to this fabled tale.

My rating 9 out of 10.

I'm Not There

Release date: 3 September 2007 (Venice International Film Festival)

Todd Hayes had a great movie in Far From Heaven, and I wanted to say that before reviewing his latest effort, I'm Not There. This film is apparently a biography on the life and times of Bob Dylan and it contains gobs of his music. Piers Handling, Director & CEO of the Toronto International Film Fest Group, gushed at the premier I attended about how it will "revolutionize how biopics are made". Well, if the future of biopics is about dullness, tedious boredom and utter confusion, he truly has hit the nail on the head as this film has this in spades. Utterly forgettable save the performance of Cate Blanchett as one of the Dylan incarnations (Oscar worth perhaps?). And what the hell was Richard Gere doing with his version of Dylan in this mess? A film for strung out artsy-fartsy folk and the film critics who chill with them.

To give Cate her due, my rating 3 out of 10.

Sad Vacation

Release date: 2007 (Japan)

Directed by Shinji Aoyama, Sad Vacation centres on Kenji, who, abandoned by his mother, Chiyoko, when a wee lad, gets by in the employ of the yakuza until he decides to care for an orphaned Chinese boy he comes across when smuggling illegal immigrants. That move leads to the death of his partner in the business and his need to hide. He ends up a driver chauffeuring bar hostesses to and from their homes. And then fate intercedes; later summed up by one character in that 'we are all fated to meet the people we meet'. On one drive, he happens to come across his mother, now remarried with a son and the proprietor of a successful transport company. It is the relationship of mother and son, and brother to half-brother which then consumes the remainder of the film, with startling effect at the end. Despite his attempts to have his mother feel the abandonment he felt as a young boy, Chiyoko opts not to abandon Kenji again despite the cruelness he brought to her. And perhaps that's what this movie is ultimately about: the depth of a mother's love and forgiveness. I enjoyed this film despite its sad ending.

My rating 7 out of 10.

Silk

Release date: 11 September 2007 (Toronto International Film Festival)

Directed by Canadian Francois Girard, Silk is based on a novel by Alessandro Baricco and is essentially a love triangle
between a 19th century silkworm smuggler (played by Michael Pitt), his wife (the ever-pretty Keira Knightley) and the concubine of a baron (Sei Ashina). While the story is, frankly, terribly predictable, Alain Dostie's cinematography makes it all worthwhile. The film, picture-wise, is gushingly gorgeous in a Memoirs of a Geisha fashion, even though the film is more The Last Samurai but with silkworms ... and just as dull.

For the teary love story, however, and more so the simply beauty of what Girard and Dostie set to film, my rating 6 out of 10.

Death Defying Acts

Release date: 13 September 2007 (Toronto International Film Festival)

Directed by Aussie Gillian Armstrong, who was on hand to give us a chat about the film before the screening, Death Defying Acts gives us the fictional story of a run-in Harry Houdini (played by Guy Pearce) had with a Scottish con artist, Mary Macgregor (played by Catherine Zeta-Jones) and her daughter, Benji. Harry has come to Edinburgh to perform his tricks and has set a challenge to all seers and clairvoyants, worth $10,000, if they can confirm the last words spoke by his mother on her death bed. Mary sees dollars signs and is confident she can con Harry out of the money. What follows is pretty standard fare but it is done very refreshingly, I thought, and I was captured by what is at heart a love story masquerading as a drama-thriller. Pearce and Zeta-Jones are bang-on, which certainly helps. The cinematography by Harris Zambarloukos is rich and velvety and gorgeous, perfect for the film. While Harry Houdini can't defy death in the end (which had some in the audience crying even!), the story of his amazing skills as a magician continue to feed us to this day, even when fictionalized.

My rating 8 out of 10.

Jesus Camp

Release date: 20 January 2007 (USA)

This documentary, directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, follows the lives of several children who have been indoctrinated by their Pentecostal parents into believing - on a level that is frankly terrifying - the Bible is the written, inviable word of God. Sadly, as such, these poor, sad children have no understanding of tolerance, moderation, diversity or the importance of inclusion. They have one poisoned view of the world and are just as fanatical as any al-Qa'eda terrorist. What's worse, they are the future of America. It is a sobering view of what I've long said is the greatest threat to our world: fundamentalist Christians. Lord help us!

My rating 7 out of 10.

The Good Shepherd

Release date: 11 December 2006

A Robert De Niro directed film, The Good Shepperd follows the career of Edward Wilson (played brilliantly by Matt Damon) as he is recruited from college into the secret world of the CIA shortly before World War II. If you like espionage movies, rush out and rent this one. Loaded with great star power - Angelina Jolie, Joe Pesci, Alec Baldwin, Timothy Hutton, Billy Crudup, William Hurt and an outstanding Michael Gambon as Dr. Fredericks - it is essentially a character study of one man's challenge to remain true to his country or his family. There are endless plot twists and turns and you'll need to stay glued or risk missing an essential point. It is gorgeously filmed by De Niro and has a deep and rich feel to it complemented by a perfect soundtrack. While the film is too long by a half hour (typical of De Niro who needs to be more ruthless with his editor), the journey is more than worth this minor inconvenience.

A solid, satisfying film worth my rating of 9 out of 10.

Simon Birch

Release date: 11 September 1998

Based loosely on John Irving's wonderful book, A Prayer for Owen Meany, Simon Birch follows the story of a young boy with stunted growth syndrome from his birth to his untimely death. It sounds very heavy, but in the hands of director Mark Steven Johnson it comes out endearing and funny, if a tad predictable. Simon is the community's outcast - relegated to the role of baby Jesus in the school Christmas play each year - but his best friend, Joe (played by Joseph Mazzello) sees the person beneath the body. Even when Simon unwittingly has a hand in Joe's mother's death, the friendship endures. Like a John Irving book, there is no end of odd and truly unique characters here, and, while from the very opening scene we know the film will end tragically, there is still enough humanity in the story to make it worth the ride.

My rating 6 out of 10.

The Prestige

Release date: 20 October 2006

Filled with gobs of star power - Scarlet Johansson, Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine and David Bowie, doing an excellent stint as the real-life scientist Nikola Tesla - The Prestige directed by Christopher Nolan recounts the fictional tale of two magicians battling to out-do each other. The crux of the plot spins on the death of the wife of one (played by Jackman) at the hands of the other (played by Bale). This film demonstrates the strength of a bold, brilliant script in the hands of a good director. It is engaging, dark, thoroughly captivating, and will have you guessing what magic is going on right until the very last minute. I loved it and thought tying in the real-life character of Tesla was so very inventive. There's pure magic in this film, and if you loved "The Illusionist", you'll love this too.

My rating 9 out of 10.

Mr. Bean's Holiday

Release date: 22 March 2007

Rowan Atkinson revives his classic Mr. Bean character and takes him on vacation for this fun romp. I suspect if you're not British you'll not likely enjoy this film. However, I am a British-Canadian and adore the utter silliness that is Mr. Bean's fumbling. His vacation sees him heading to Cannes only to have his plans - not surprisingly - derailed in Paris. This is slapstick, self-depreciating humour. What makes it good is the subtlety beneath the fumbling. The nod to the Tour de France; the nod to the farce that is the Cannes Film Festival; the nod to the silliness of fine dinning ... each is perfectly done, planting a tiny seed of depth beneath the lightness of the comedy. While you certainly should not go pay money to watch this film (wait till it is out on dvd), it is worth the rent. The ending where Bean ties up the bits of the film, only to sum it up as an homage to friendship makes it worth the price of a rental.

My rating 4 out of 10.

Ju Dou

Release date: 7 Sept 1990 (Toronto International Film Festival)

Former cinematographer, Zhang Yimou, directed this 1990 Shakespearean masterpiece that follows Ju Dou's (played by a very young Gong Li) trials and tribulations as the wife of a brutal dye mill owner in the middle-of-nowhere rural China. Beaten for not producing an heir, Ju Dou takes solace in the arms of the mill owner's nephew, Yang Tian-qing (played by Bao-Tian Li). The result of this affair is a son, whom Ju Dou must raise while pretending the young lad is the mill owner's. Predictably, familial tension, cultural tradition, and the twists and turns of simple human passions result in several tragedies. Zhang films the family's fall into fate slowly and stunningly. At its heart, this film is so much bigger than its subject and characters and as such, it is a crowning achievement ... capturing the sadness a child born in such circumstances can reap on an entire family.

My rating 9 out of 10.