The North Film Festival has just opened, and many friends are also rushing to the scene every day.
In fact, another international film festival has just ended, that is, the Toronto Film Festival (TIFF). From September 9 to 18, the duration is ten days.
This year, Alan, the special author of Taotao Film, also participated in the film festival in an online way.
Let's talk about this year's online Toronto, and the good movies he saw online!
Compared with those of us who are accustomed to running offline film festivals, online film festivals are a more unique way. Of course, due to the epidemic situation, there are also a number of film festivals this year, all of which have adopted an online approach.
Compared with offline film festivals, the biggest feeling is that online film festivals are really convenient!
First of all, there is no need to worry about rushing online.
In the past, participating in offline film festivals often had to worry about traffic problems, and it was easy to be late for the show. Because there is no time to eat in a hurry, or sometimes it is too tired to rush the scene, it is also common to fall asleep in the theater.
But online movie watching has no problems at all. In particular, TIFF gave the media a 48-hour viewing window per film this time, and media reporters had a large degree of freedom in scheduling. I watched 5 movies in the most day, and it was quite enjoyable.
In addition, TIFF's online movie-watching platform is doing quite well. Each movie comes with English subtitles. Compared with cinema viewing, you can pause when you need to, you can go back to see the details again, and if you like, you can even watch it repeatedly within 48 hours, which is really quite convenient.
However, the cinema experience is irreplaceable online. Although it is comfortable to watch movies in your own home, the effect is still much worse. In particular, many of the films participating in the film festival are highly artistic literary films, and the real perception of not seeing on the big screen will be discounted. In addition, there are too many things that can be distracted by watching movies at home. Watching those literary and art films with a very slow pace and no lines for half an hour, I really can't help but look at my mobile phone.
The most unfortunate thing is that many popular films have not chosen to screen online for multiple reasons such as copyright protection. This includes my most anticipated new film, "The Power of Dogs," which I'm most looking forward to, which has just won best director in Venice. The film was removed from the media's online screening schedule at the last minute.
But unexpectedly, the online screening of "The Power of Dogs" in Canada was still recorded, and there is already a version of the resource circulating on the Internet. This has also sparked a discussion about whether the festival should hold an online screening in the future.
Back to Toronto itself.
Although I didn't see the most popular films this time, I finally saw a lot of good works. The most obvious feeling is that this year's TIFF has seen a lot of works by female directors, female perspectives, and female protagonists, and the quality is not bad.
Serene Seaamer's Little Mama is the first film I've seen at this film festival. The film focuses on the story of family affection between three generations of women in a family.
Xi Anma's last work, "Portrait of a Burning Woman", has a very good reputation, with a high score of 8.6 in Douban's nearly 150,000 people.
This makes everyone have high expectations for "Little Mama". The film has already appeared at the Berlin Film Festival at the beginning of the year, and the evaluation has not reached the height of "Portrait of a Burning Woman".
Yes, Little Mama didn't disappoint me. One of the most successful things about Xi Amma is that her works always impress the audience with true feelings, whether it is the love of "Portrait of the Burning Woman" or the affection of "Little Mother", she does not deliberately stir up emotions, but impresses the audience by capturing the details of real life.
The plot of the film is very simple, which can be regarded as a relatively small work. Even the duration is only 72 minutes. But this does not affect the sincerity and movingness of the film.
In addition, the film's photography is also very brilliant. Sianma continued to work with Claire Mathon, the photographer of Portrait of the Burning Woman, to create a very warm and pastel tone for the whole film with costumes and sets. Add a lot to the story. And "Little Mother" will also be unveiled at the Beijing Film Festival, and the audience who can see it should not miss it.
Also a female director from France, Melanie Roland's self-written and self-directed "Crazy Woman's Ball" is also a new film that has attracted much attention from this year's TIFF.
The film tells the story of a woman named Eugénie (played by Lu de Lager) in France at the end of the 19th century who is imprisoned in a mental hospital because she can communicate with ghosts.
In those days, many "rebellious" or "different" women were imprisoned under the name of "psychosis." Eugénie meets Geneviève (Melanie Roland), a kind nurse in a mental hospital. The two have a wonderful chemistry reaction.
Judging from the plot summary, this story is also quite interesting.
Melanie Roland is also a very popular French actor and director. There are still some expectations before watching the film, but after watching it, you may still be a little disappointed.
Although "Crazy Woman's Ball" is well-made, with photography, costumes, and performances, the script is somewhat lacking in focus. The first 1/3 of the heroine Eugénie is still very vivid, but the second half has been showing her suffering process uncontrolledly, but ignoring the inner growth of this character.
The final ending was also a bit too hasty, resulting in some discouragement after watching it.
In addition, there are three female directors whose works are all about the growth of adolescent girls, namely Croatian director Antanta Kusyanovic's first work "Sea Eel"
Russian director Kira Kovalenko's "Let Go of the Fist"
and Danish director Tea Lindeburg's You in Paradise.
Each of these three films has its own strengths, and my personal favorite is "Let Go of the Fist," which won a kind of attention award in a kind of attention section at this year's Cannes Film Festival.
The protagonist of the story is a young Russian girl who lives in a small town with very poor supplies. Her father was morbidly in control of her every move in life; her brother was so dependent on her that he even called her mother; her brother, though very protective of her, fled the house alone.
Although the film focuses on the girl's life so miserable, it does not deliberately "sell misery".
The heroine still retains the innocence and desire that she should have at her age, which makes this story seem particularly real and heartbreaking. The script's handling of emotions between family members is also quite clever, and the entanglement and transformation between love and hate are very convincing. As the director's second work, the scheduling of the film is very mature. It is not surprising that I can win the prize at Cannes.
Midnight Madness's "You're Not My Mom" is director Kate Dolan's first feature film.
This horror film combines elements of Irish folklore, and the protagonist of the story is a female high school student who discovers that her mother mysteriously disappeared and mysteriously returned home after a strange change...
The film has some similarities with the horror film "Ghost Book" that was highly evaluated by film critics in previous years, and it is not the same as the kind of horror film that is shocking or blurred by flesh and blood, which mainly relies on creating a horror atmosphere to create psychological thrillers.
"You're Not My Mom" does have a few rather weird passages that make people a little uncomfortable, but the whole is still a little bit ordinary. However, the film won second place in the People's Choice Awards in the Midnight Crazy unit. There are still a lot of people who like this horror movie.
In addition to the above-mentioned female directors, British female director Eva Yu Song brought "Mother's Day Reunion"
Another British female director, Harley Wootreeff, has The Truth, both of which have a very delicate female perspective.
The cast of "Mother's Day Rendezvous" is very strong.
Oscar-winning colin Firth and actress Olivia Coleman starred as husband and wife in the film, just as the red boy Josh O'Connor contributed a large-scale nude scene in the film, but the absolute protagonist of the film is the relatively less famous actress Otesa Young.
She does quite well in the film. Personally, I like this movie. However, the film's narrative rhythm and script have certain problems, and most of the media response is more general.
In addition to the women's themes that shine at this TIFF, several African films at this film festival also brightened my eyes.
First of all, I was greatly shocked by a science fiction song and dance film from Rwanda, Neptune Frost.
The two genres of science fiction and song and dance rarely appear in the same movie, and the themes explored in the film include gender, technology, ecology and many other content. The film's music and styling are avant-garde, and it is definitely a never-before-seen movie experience. At this time, it is very suitable to take out Ang Lee's emoji:
Maybe this kind of movie is not my subjective favorite, but it is definitely the one I think back the most after watching it. Such works may be one of the important significance of the existence of film festivals.
In contrast to Neptune Frost, another African film, Salom from Senegal, is a genre film. It tells the story of three battle-hardened mercenaries who encounter unprecedented difficulties.
It's a fast-paced film that combines elements of action movies and supernatural horror films. Although some action scenes are a bit stretched due to low cost, the overall style of the film is very strong, which is very surprising. All in all, these two African films are definitely the highlights of this year's TIFF.
The Toronto Film Festival has become an important bellwether for the Oscars in recent years, and "Green Book", "The Land of No One", "Three Billboards" and "Philharmonic City", which won the People's Choice Award at TIFF, have all won important awards at the Oscars. Therefore, over the years, there are many Hollywood movies that want to rush to TIFF.
Unfortunately, this kind of movie is the most afraid of being leaked resources, including "Belfast", "Spencer", "Dune" and so on in the end I could not see online.
Several films I've had the pleasure of seeing, including "Myna" starring Melissa McCarthy, "Kanaya Zoji" starring Sigour, and "Lakewood" starring Naomi Watts, are very, very general and disappointing. To put it mildly, comparing it to other quality films at film festivals is simply a TV drama texture.
"Myna"
The only thing that could really hit the Oscars is Rainman director Barry Levenson's new "Harry Havett."
The film is based on real events of real people.
Harry Havet was a survivor of Auschwitz, where he survived by beating his opponents in consecutive boxing. After immigrating to the United States, he wanted to get his photo in the newspaper by playing against a well-known boxer, hoping to find his old love who had lost contact in this way.
The film's male protagonist, Ben Foster, is very good. In the film, he wants to play the skinny appearance in the concentration camp, and he also has to play the image of a very strong boxer in the later stage. This kind of performance that needs to torture his body is very appetizing to the Oscars, plus the concentration camp theme bonus, which is obviously aimed at next year's Oscar for best actor.
However, I really don't like this kind of stereotyped Oscar movie. And the editing rhythm of this film is not a small problem, I don't know if it will be adjusted after the film festival.
Finally, I would like to recommend to you a movie that I didn't expect at all to enjoy. That's Benedict Cumberbatch's The Passionate Life of Louis Wayne.
It is a biopic about the life of the English painter Louis Wayne.
Louis Wayne was born with rabbit lips, and combined with his eccentric personality, he was generally less likeable. But he had a pair of eyes that found beauty. Because of his cute illustrations, he changed the stereotype of cats in that era, which made cats a popular pet.
In fact, his illustrations are still very familiar to everyone, and we feel the following:
However, since louis wayne was not well known, there were hardly any expectations for the film before watching it. Moreover, he did not know anything about the director of this film, Tomomori Fukuda.
Will you think that his biopic can be good?
As a result, after watching the movie, I foolishly applauded in front of the computer screen!!!
To put it bluntly, my intellect tells me that this film is not perfect.
Its core is actually a very cheesy romance film. But it was so beautiful. Some of the passages in the film are very similar to the storybook style unique to Wes Anderson, both in composition and tone. There are several scenes in the film that are really beautiful like oil paintings. I was impressed by the Japanese-British director.
What's more, the film, while a bit cheesy, is extraordinarily warm.
I very much agree with RogerEbert.com famous film critic Robert Daniels' assessment of the film: "'The Passionate Life of Louis Wayne' is a film with obvious shortcomings, and there are many irrationalities in logic and overall atmosphere. But even so, you can feel the director identifying with the character of Louis Wayne. This telepathy gives this strange biopic a different heartbeat. The Passionate Life of Louis Wayne is an unusually sincere film. ”
Something sincere always moves people. In the introductory video before the film begins, Tomomori Fukuda says it's a film for people who don't fit in solitably.
Maybe I happen to be his audience.
And just like that, my TIFF ended, and I watched 31 movies in 10 days, short and very happy.
Of course, if you can, I still hope to go to the scene in Toronto next year and see more good movies, movies, after all, still belong to the cinema.