As the first weekend of the 2012 Hot Docs International Documentary Film Festival draws to a close today, we bring you even more reviews from the front lines of first person filmmaking with looks at The Imposter, Off Label, G-Dog, Shadows of Liberty, The Punk Syndrome, Buzkashi!, Welcome to the Machine, Where Heaven Meets Hell, and My Mate Manchester United.
On the first official day of Hot Docs 2012 following last night's gala, Canadian content dominates our reviews with looks at El Huaso, The Final Member, Legend of a Warrior, Crimes Without Honour, Who Cares?, and Fists of Pride. We also take a look at Big Boys Gone Bananas!*, My Thai Bride, Her Master's Voice, Planet of Snail, Colombianos, Ping Pong, and Laura
We break out the big guns for today's Hot Docs 2012 preview with a lot of titles that have gone rush, including Indie Game: The Movie, We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists, Detropia, Finding Truelove, Bones Brigade: An Autobiography, and The World Before Her. Also looks at Sexy Baby, Mom and Me, Beware of Mr. Baker, and The Job.
While it will probably appeal to the most adoring fans of producer Judd Apatow and star Jason Segel, The Five-Year Engagement is a mean spirited, mostly unoriginal comedy that can never decide if it wants to pander to women or to bros, when it's a plot clearly designed to pander to the latter.
Our first batch of reviews for Hot Docs 2012 are in! Today we have a look at opening night film Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, The Invisible War, Wildness, Smoke Traders, Playing the Fool, Jeff, The Mystery of Mazo de la Roche, Inocente, The Great Liberty, and James Franco's Francophrenia (Or: Don't Kill Me, I Know Where the Baby Is).
Dork Shelf film writers , Phil Brown, Will Perkins, and Noah Taylor take a look at some of the films playing at this year's Canadian Film Fest, running from March 28th to March 31st at The Royal in Toronto.
In our new archival DVD column, takes a look at the splatter action classic Battle Royale, while Phil Brown takes a look at Jim Jarmusch's revisionist western Dead Man.
Between Tinker Tailor Marilyn Muppets and a Girl With a Dragon Tattoo there's a lot to cover this week in DVD.
It's another big week of DVD/Blu-ray releases. This week Phil Brown takes a look at Steven Spielberg's big-screen adaptation of The Adventures Of Tintin, Lars Von Trier's crushing end of the world tale Melancholia, Jason Reitman's dark comedy Young Adult, HBO's Game of Thrones Season One box set, and more!
Not much of anything romantic on DVD this Valentine's Day (unless you count the family dynamic in the brilliant Take Shelter), but there are a pair of decent horror films, a drunken Johnny Depp, Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones arguing in a room for 90 minutes, and some pretty great philosophical discussions. Something for everyone! Except romantics.
