FLIGHT

^_^ Okay, so I'm up to my 5th movie at the fest this year and after seeing all of them I'm surprised that it didn't occur to me to go to any of the previous ones until now. I think it was just some odd predisposition that I had to the idea of a film festival, but this weekend has probably been one of the best experiences I've ever had. It's like doing a movie marathon, but with none of the movies [that I've seen so far] being bad, and in a theater, and world premiere screenings too! It's great...but enough about that, I'm probably the only one here who hasn't been to a film fest until now so instead let's talk about the films.

1) Yes Madame, Sir. This is a documentary about Kiran Bedhi, the first female officer to join the Indian Police Service, and all of how they tried to get rid of her, and how she stepped up to every one of their challenges and showed them up with flying colors. The documentary was made by Meghan Doneman, an editor for a lot of Hollywood blockbusters, and so as you can expect, the editing in the documentary is of some of the highest quality, even though the camera image may not be. It's all perfectly sequenced and shot over a period of six years and unlike most documentaries, it never once bores you. It's almost like watching a high drama film, but then you realize that this is a documentary. It's incredible.

2) Treeless Mountain. This film was good for all that it was supposed to do, as an Ozu-esque Korean film about abandonment it does what it does perfectly. The distracting shot scale is meant to be used to represent the level at which the young main characters see the world, the acting is natural and sometimes seems pointlessly unscripted because it's supposed to seem like non-fiction, the ideas in the story are cute, the characters are nice, but...something about the film just didn't keep me hooked. So as an artistic film, it's good, but as a film that I'd watch over and over again, it's not so great.

3)Sky Crawlers is Mamoru Oshii's latest anime film and it's really good. Great storyline [not wholly original or unpredictable, but still great], the characters and dialogue are fleshed out and well thought out, and the animation was just breathtaking as usual. It was a very enjoyable and satisfying film [but if you see it you HAVE to stay to the end of the credits or else you miss the film's true ending and leave feeling somewhat disappointed].

4) The Secret of Moonacre stars Dakota Blue-Richards [this being her second film] and her acting is probably the best thing in the whole film save for the CGI sequence at the end [which is then rudely and randomly interrupted by several pointless sequences] and certain set and costume pieces. The film is horribly paced, awkwardly shot, and the script is mediocre. It's a very mediocre film overall, but it's got so many freaking animals in it that it's going to be a hit at the box office because it has that sort of cutesy magic that kids will fall for, even if none of it makes any sense at all.

P.S If any of you do choose to see this film, see how many times you can hear the word "Moon Princess" and not start thinking of Sailor Moon.

5) The last film I saw was a French-Canadian film called Un ete sans point ni coup sur, and I've got to say that this film took my breath away. It was charming, witty, well written, shot, organized, used various techniques, all to the advantage of the film, none for any pointless reason and the acting was nothing short of brilliant for the most part. It sort of felt like Forest Gump and A Christmas Story in a baseball film; but even that's not doing it an ounce of justice. It's going to be on DVD release in December so if you can order it, do so because it's fantastic...or if you live in Toronto, it's going to be playing again tomorrow at 9:30pm.