The Missing Picture Nominated this year for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars (but strangely not for Best Documentary, where it also could have been a contender) and winner of the Un Certain Regard prize at Cannes last year, Rithy Panh’s multimedia look at the devastation caused by the Khmer Rouge during the Kampuchea Revolution […]
Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2014: In the Shadow of the Sun Review
In the Shadow of the Sun In the African nation of Tanzania, home to approximately 170,000 people who could be classified as albino, having an off colour pigment could be deadly. Not only do these people have to deal with the kind of teasing and potential for bodily harm that goes hand in hand with […]
Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2014: Highway of Tears Review
Highway of Tears Aside from the victims of high profile serial killer trial of Robert Pickton, more than 40 women and possibly hundreds more have gone missing along the tragically monikered Highway of Tears in Vancouver. Home to a large First Nations population still scarred from years of residential schooling abuse and a constantly acrimonious […]
Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2014: Big Men Review
Big Men “Everyone has the desire and drive to be well off in life,” or so says one of the subjects of Rachel Boynton’s fascinating, frightening, and multi-faceted look at the often corruptible and highly lucrative African oil trade. It’s a line said by a savvy investor who thinks he’s “movin’ on up like The […]
Solo Review
The Canadian thriller Solo lives up to its modest title and supplies no more and no less than what’s needed to be effective. A stripped down killer-on-the-loose yarn and survival narrative, first time feature filmmaker Isaac Cravit has crafted a taut, beautifully shot, and well performed reworking of genre formula.
Stalingrad Review
Stalingrad is essentially the Russian equivalent of Pearl Harbor in terms of both historical context and as a kind of appropriate comparison between this box office hit in its home country and a sort of North American counterpart. It's a serious battle with stunning sequences that can't realize how silly of a movie it is.
Non-Stop Review
Non-Stop is great. It’s not great in the way that a traditional award winning kind of film should be great, but it’s a near perfect bit of action entertainment that solidifies Liam Neeson’s status as one of the best leading men the genre has ever had.
The Dork Shelf Guide to the Toronto Irish Film Festival
We take an overview of this year's Toronto Irish Film Festival (starting this Friday and running through Sunday at the TIFF Bell Lightbox) and review the delightful opening night documentary The Irish Pub and the not so delightful indie drama Made in Belfast.
Public Hearing Review
Blending the experimental filmmaking with a degree of detail oriented accuracy that Frederick Wiseman would appreciate, the black and white docudrama Public Hearing (screening for free this Thursday at 9:15pm at Toronto’s Revue Cinema as part of the ReFocus screening series) is exactly what it says on the tin and so much more bubbling under the surface.
True Detective Episode 1.6 Recap
For the first time in True Detective’s run we have been left with an image, burdened with a heavy past, moving toward a future not known by anyone inside the show’s delicate clockwork collage. It’s no longer a matter of whodunit, it’s a matter of who’s-gonna-do-it.
A Girl on Girls: Episode 3.8 Recap
Hidey-ho readers! Your friendly neighbourhood Girls recapper is here with some sweet, sweet catch-up.
The Lego Movie: The Video Game Review
The video game tie-in for The Lego Movie is perfect for good-hearted co-operative play with the family. Read on to find out why.
3 Days to Kill Review
Alarmingly misguided, horribly directed, astoundingly racist, and insanely incomprehensible, the McG/Luc Besson/Kevin Costner team-up 3 Days to Kill best's last week's previous low water mark set by Winter's Tale as the worst major studio release of 2013 so far, leading us further down one of the worst starts to any year in film history.
Tim’s Vermeer Review
It would be easy to pithily dismiss a documentary like Tim’s Vermeer, the feature directorial debut of Teller from noted magician and pundit duo Penn and Teller, as something akin of a Mythbusters-styled lark, or even worse as a filming of a forgery. But as with the great work of art the film’s protagonist is trying to understand, there’s a far deeper meaning on scientific, emotional, and artistic levels coming into play.
Cheap Thrills Review
Dark, twisted, and emotionally disturbed in ways almost too delightful and clever to spoil, the coal black comedy Cheap Thrills certainly lives up to its name and then some thanks to clever writing and solid performances.