Tag: TIFF 2021

Dear Evan Hansen, you owe us an apology | TIFF movie review
Dear Evan Hansen follows a high school senior with a social anxiety disorder who suddenly finds himself as the hero of his town after a student commits suicide

Undoubtedly one of the worst movie-musicals ever made. Overwrought and emotionless at the same time, insensitive towards trauma and mental illness, and out of touch with reality. Jail to everyone.

Dear Evan Hansen,

Today was not a good day because I was subjected to watching you.

Sincerely,
Me

Usually I don’t like being mean about the films I don’t like. Also, I’m a firm believer that almost every film made with the best of intentions has some good you can derive from it. However, Dear Evan Hansen doesn’t sit right with me. At its root, it feels rotten. Like its intentions are misplaced or, given the benefit of the doubt, misunderstood. Director Stephen Chbosky, whose films The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Wonder I truly enjoy, was simply handed a bad project.

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The movie follows Evan Hansen (played by Ben Platt), your typical high school senior with a social anxiety disorder who is tasked by his therapist to write a letter to himself every day. After a misunderstanding causes him to become the hero of his town following the suicide of his classmate Connor (Colton Ryan), Evan must continually expand his web of lies and keep all he has gained from the fallout.

This includes lying to Connor’s family (Amy Adams and Danny Pino) about being friends with their son, dating Connor’s sister (Kaitlyn Dever), working with Alana (Amandla Stenberg) on an entire organization and fundraiser honoring him. The list goes on and on. No one is safe from his deceit. The fact that this is a musical is confounding because watching Evan spin lie after lie in songs like “For Forever” and, even more maliciously, fabricate evidence in “Sincerely, Me” almost makes light of the damage his actions are bound to cause.

At this point, if you’re already asking yourself why this seemingly terrible human is the protagonist of the story then we are on the same page. The film, which is an adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name featuring music by Oscar winners Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, was meant to “immortalize” 27-year-old Platt’s Tony-winning performance. However, Dear Evan Hansen seems to be a story that only worked in the thin period of time when it came out. It already feels dated — as does Platt’s hair.

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Reportedly, changes were made in the adaptation to address some of the more polarizing issues with the story. If that’s the case, then I’d hate to see what was wrong with the musical. At its core, the musical is meant to preach that everyone is dealing with their own traumas whether it be depression, social anxiety, suicidal thoughts, insecurities, however it doesn’t take any time to actually explore the reality of those traumas. Instead, it’s a surface level assessment of them. Hollywood’s “glamourized” version where consequences don’t exist.

Because of its purely uninformed and disingenuous portrayal of mental illness — and apparent disregard of therapy — the movie feels overwrought and emotionless at the same time. It mines melodrama with no actual basis for it. It feels like the characters are just pawns in this power grab for sympathy. And while there is some good acting here — Julianne Moore, Amandla Stenberg, and Kaitlyn Dever, in particular — the rest of the cast feels like they’re in a competition of who can ugly cry the most.

Evan Hansen, whose actions throughout the film could only be described as monstrous, is meant to meet consequences at the end of the film and Connor is meant to be humanized. Instead, Evan’s behavior, which is harmful to the stigma around mental illness, is excused as a product of past trauma. Something the movie was supposedly supposed to fix. Or maybe, just maybe, this was a story we didn’t need to have told again.

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Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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September 10, 2021
TIFF 2021: Huda’s Salon, Encounter, & Dashcam | Review round-up
The Toronto International Film Festival is in full swing. Here is a round up of quick reviews for thrillers playing the fest.

Read all of my reviews, including full-length reviews, from the fest here!

Hany Abu-Assad’s Huda’s Salon. Courtesy of TIFF.

Huda’s Salon

As someone who both writes and consumes film criticism, there is nothing I hate more than hearing, “well, you just have to watch it.” However, there is so little I can divulge about the plot of Huda’s Salon, a new film by Palestinian director Hany Abu-Assad, without spoiling the fun that I have to tell you you just have to watch it. But I promise that you’ll thank me for my discretion

The opening scene plays out in a single long take as Huda (Manal Awad) does Reem’s (Maisa Abd Elhadi). The women discuss the latest gossip, complain about the men in their lives, and bond over the difficulty of motherhood. Then something happens. Something you don’t see coming and that will set off a cascading series of events that puts each of the characters in a pressure cooker that is just waiting to burst.

Abu-Assad allows the story to speak for itself rather than making any specific statements about life under occupation. The pure anxiety of the film is enough to tell you what it’s like. The movie struggles with the dichotomy of living in a place where you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. Whether it’s being a patriot or being a martyr. It plays like a 70s espionage thriller with a Hitchcockian twist as the plot unravels.

Perfectly crafted and shot from beginning to end and full of terrific performances, but particularly Maisa Abd Elhadi, Huda’s Salon had me holding my breath from beginning to end.

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Michael Pearce’s Encounter, which premiered at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival. Courtesy of TIFF.

Encounter

Riz Ahmed, following his Oscar-nominated turn in Sound of Metal, proves again that he is one of the best actors of his generation in Michael Pearce’s Encounter. The sci-fi thriller follows Malik Khan (Ahmed), a marine veteran and father, who goes on a mission to rescue his sons after he becomes convinced that an alien invasion of bugs is controlling people leading them to become violent.

The beauty of Encounter is that it doesn’t intend to trick you. It’s easy enough to solve exactly what is going before it reveals it to you. Instead, it’s more interested in Ahmed’s Malik and his struggle with PTSD and his relationship with his two sons (Aditya Geddada & Lucian-River Chauhan). With that storyline, the movie finds surprising emotional depths as the older of the two boys struggles with his perception of his father.

However, the movie is formulaic and a subplot featuring Octavia Spencer as a parole officer takes a lot of steam out of the father/son relationship story that fuels the movie. It’s unfortunate considering Pearce’s direction is confident and systematically builds up tension around the mystery as different situations create cracks in Malik’s carefully structured world and the boys a reason to fear their father.

There is value in the film once you wade through the predictable plot. If anything, come for another terrific Riz Ahmed performance.

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DASHCAM

Rob Savage’s DASHCAM, which premiered in the Midnight Madness section of the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival. Courtesy of TIFF.

Director Rob Savage brought the world its first, and to date best, pandemic-era film with his computer screen horror Host. The brilliance of that film is that it took place where our world is currently taking place: on screens and on Zoom, more specifically. Though computer screen films aren’t new, Host is the first to feel like it didn’t have to stretch the medium to its absolute max to work – something that his new film DASHCAM has to do and more.

Our protagonist — if you could call her that — is Annie Hardy a Los Angeles-based musician who is supporting herself during the pandemic by live-streaming from her car freestyling for tips. This is the medium through which we see the movie. Annie doesn’t hide her Covid skepticism or MAGA-supporting tendencies from her viewers, some of whom support her and some vehemently hate-watch her as we see from the live chat that remains in the corner of the frame for most of the film. Hardy, who is playing an over-the-top version of herself and hosts a show called “Band Car,” is crass, rude, and unafraid to voice her opposition to restrictions and etiquette around the pandemic.

Looking to escape the “madness of America,” she hops a flight across the Atlantic to London where she intends to stay with her musician friend Stretch (Amar Chadha-Patel). He is none too happy about her presence, especially when she steals his car and ends up in an empty restaurant where she is asked to bring an elderly woman called Angela (Angela Enahoro) to another location. However, after defecating on herself and then attacking a woman who seems to be looking for her, it becomes clear that Angela may not be entirely human.

From there, DASHCAM becomes a dizzying found footage horror with scenes reminiscent of The Blair Witch Project as Annie and Stretch try to stave off attacks by Angela and the woman after her. And while the horror and gore are repetitive — we have more than one fake-out death involving the same person — it at the very least delivers the kinds of thrills and chills that you’re looking for in this kind of movie. However, through it all, it feels like Annie seems to be trying out material for her Netflix standup special. Her brand of combative libertarianism slowly becomes more grating than funny and the film’s genre inventiveness wears off. As a subversion of the found-footage monster movie DASHCAM is rough around the edges, but works. Whenever it tries to be something more it makes me want to log off.

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Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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September 17, 2021
‘Whether the Weather is Fine’ is Filipino cinema at its finest | TIFF movie review
Filipino film Whether the Weather is Fine takes a quirky approach to its story of the aftermath of a Typhoon

Carlos Francisco Manatad’s Whether the Weather is Fine will surprise you with its melancholic surrealist drama and absurdist comedy approach to a real-life disaster and capture you with its heart.

Whether the Weather is Fine, which had its North American premiere at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival, is perhaps the best indication that the Filipino film industry is alive and well. The film focuses on the City of Tacloban, Director Carlos Francisco Manatad’s hometown, amidst the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan — it was one of the strongest tropical cyclones ever recorded and one of the deadliest. However, the first two shots of the film tell us that this isn’t going to be your standard disaster movie.

The first real shot of the movie is of a clear blue sky outlining the irony of beautiful weather following the destruction. The second shot introduces us to Miguel (Daniel Padilla doing terrific work), who inexplicably wakes up on the couch of a destroyed home. A few feet from him lies a corpse and from his pocket, he pulls out a fish. It’s that tongue-in-cheek tone that immediately sets Whether the Weather is Fine from any expectations you may have based on its premise.

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Eventually, Miguel finds his girlfriend Andrea (Rans Rifol) and his mother Norma (Charo Santos-Concio) amongst the destruction. With an eerie loudspeaker warning of an incoming second storm, the trio decides it’s time to move on. How each of them accomplishes that differs.

Manatad captures the dreamlike state victims of disaster find themselves in with magical realism. All senses are heightened. It’s like the world doesn’t entirely make sense. And that’s because it doesn’t — much like Joe Talbot’s terrific The Last Black Man in San Francisco. When something as life-altering as Typhoon Haiyan happens, what you once knew no longer applies.

Through it all, the film maintains a darkly comedic tone as each of the characters tries to find what they’re looking for — escape, a purpose, forgiveness. The increasingly surreal and bleak scenes — helping a dog leading one character to become the messiah, an impromptu song and dance — become set-dressing to the engrossing journey each of the characters goes on.

However, it’s in the moments of hope that Whether the Weather is Fine comes together. There are two musical sequences that highlight what the film ultimately trying to say. There’s something about the Filipino spirit that is unbreakable. Something as a Filipino-American I’ve always tried to capture. Manatad tells us that through all the absurdity of life, sometimes all you need is an escape. And sometimes that escape is breaking out into song.

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Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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September 22, 2021
‘The Guilty’ puts Jake Gyllenhaal in the Oscar race | TIFF movie review
The Guilty follows a suspended police officer working 911 dispatch who falls upon an abduction case that he becomes determined to solve

The Guilty is a tense, innovative, and constantly twisting police procedural that unfolds in real-time and solely through phone calls to incredible effect. However, it elevates itself by also acting as a character study and indictment on policing and toxic masculinity. Jake Gyllenhaal has officially entered the Oscar race.

The Guilty, a remake of the 2018 Danish film of the same name, is a masterclass in adapting a non-English language film for American audiences. The trend of making English-language versions of acclaimed and successful foreign films has been picking up steam to mostly negative results — I’m looking at you Downhill. And more often than not, it’s because the studios commissioning these films don’t understand what makes them successful in the first place. That’s not the case with Antione Fuqua’s adaptation, which premiered at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival.

Fuqua, best known for his thrillers and directing Denzel Washington to an Oscar for Training Day, doesn’t set out to recreate the Danish film. He’s too singular of a filmmaker for that. Rather, he filters the original’s plot through a distinctly American — and Fuqua — lens.

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Jake Gyllenhaal plays Joe, a former police officer relegated to 911 dispatch duty pending his trial. The reason for his suspension is kept close to the vest, however, Joe’s discontentment with the situation is not. He regularly snaps at co-workers, has coughing bouts that are caused by the wildfire smoke in the air (and maybe something more mental), and regularly pushes the boundaries of his job often talking back at 911 callers.

And that’s why when a woman named Emily (Riley Keough) calls feigning talking to her child Joe takes it upon himself to solve the case. Unfolding in real-time and the most intense episode of Law & Order: SVU, Joe realizes that Emily was taken against her will by her estranged husband Henry (Paul Dano) leaving her six-year-old daughter and infant son alone at home.

Coordinating with the California Highway Patrol, his partner Jim (Eli Goree), and various others and armed only with the information in the police database, Joe attempts to find Emily before it’s too late. That part of the plot is similar to the Danish version. However, in the background of all this — and throughout the screenplay written by True Detective’s Nic Pizzolatto — the wildfires and general distrust in the police loom large. That change alone validates the American version’s existence.

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There are many twists and turns that we only hear through calls that come through with the brilliant immersive sound design that puts us firmly in Joe’s point of view. Being in his point of view and watching the film unfold in real-time adds a sense of urgency, desperation, and helplessness. And while Fuqua’s smart directorial choices are one reason for this, Gyllenhaal’s terrific performance is captivating. It’s especially impressive considering he never leaves the screen for a single second of the film.

As thrilling as it is to unpack The Guilty as a police procedural what makes it great — and an Oscar contender for Netflix — is its grounding as a character study into toxic masculinity and the psychological effects of giving power to a person. Joe, our “hero,” brings his own outside circumstances to the situation — his own separation from his wife and daughter, his impending case — and uses that to motivate his decision-making for better or worse. He changes throughout the film. We watch as this case tears away at his psyche before the dam breaks — and with it, Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance soars.

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More movies, less problems
Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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September 10, 2021