Month: January 2022

  • Eat Pray Love (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, January 2020) It’s amazing/amusing to see that film criticism can simultaneously process the idea that cinema’s highest calling can be to make us empathize with different lives, while at the same time making the (often unstated) determination that some lifestyles are more respectable than others. Being practised by generally urbane, progressive, cynical, in-the-know commentators (formerly majorly male, although that’s thankfully changing), film criticism will privilege the hip, the foreign, the sarcastic but find itself ill-equipped to talk about a different set of values. At least that’s what comes to mind after watching Eat Pray Love and taking a look at its critical reaction. The general reaction was to dismiss the film as self-centred claptrap, and there’s some justification for that assessment. After all, the film is about a woman abandoning a comfortable life out of a vague sense of anomie, then travelling the world to find contentment. Of course, this worldwide tour goes for Italy (Eating), India (Praying) and Indonesia (Loving)—I’m not seeing ordinary places such as Rimouski on the list. Unlike other people with actual problems, our protagonist is just… bored. Aimless. Privileged enough to just think that something is off. So going off to hobnob with American theatre actors, Italian pasta-makers, Indian girls in arranged marriages and Brazilian businessmen is just what’s great for a movie travelogue. (Better yet: the protagonist is played by Julia Roberts and she’s supported by actors such as James Franco, Richard Jenkins, Viola Davis and, to top it off, Javier Bardem as the ultimate dreamboat.)  The film is adapted from a memoir that’s self-consciously showy and the film follows in the footsteps of that intention. (I recommend reading up about author Elizabeth Gilbert in context — “Eat Pray Love” is not the biggest event in the life of an ordinary person as much as a middle chapter in the life of someone living for attention). I found it far more interesting as a fantasy for middle-aged women: what if you could just leave everything behind, travel to picturesque locations, eat as much as you wanted, act as a compassionate figure for exotic people, sleep with a succession of seductive men before settling on a rich one and, best of all, give the impression that you’re on a journey of self-actualization by doing all of that? I hope I’m not coming across as merely sounding sarcastic, because I am, in fact, being very sarcastic. At the same time, though, I can recognize and appreciate that Eat Pray Love is worth quite a bit of attention as a lavish big-budget fantasy for an audience that may not recognize themselves in other Hollywood power fantasies, especially at an age of superhero box-office domination. Movie reviewers have a point when they talk about the film’s self-centredness, but at the same time, I’m not sure they’re able to appreciate films when they work on the level of someone else’s fantasy—particularly not the kind of middle-aged white women who want nothing to do with movie critics.

  • My Online Valentine (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, January 2022) There’s a charming quasi homegrown quality to My Online Valentine that makes it hard to resist, even when it’s demonstrably toward the bottom of the cinematic barrel. As a modern romantic comedy, it’s rarely less than likable even when it’s preposterous or meaningless: As the story of a young woman meeting a young man through a dating application, it’s both modern and traditional. The stakes are low, and the complications are contrived: should she accept her no-good ex-boyfriend’s attempts at reconciliation when she’s just met a hot new prospect? Obviously, no, but then there wouldn’t be much of a story considering how thin the plot already is. There’s plenty of wish-fulfillment here: our female lead is an attractive food blogger, while the male protagonist is a successful entrepreneur with chiselled abs. Shirtless scenes provide eye-candy for female viewers, while Taja V. Simpson and Laila Odom are effortlessly attractive to men. Still, there are plenty of shortcuts and missed opportunities in the way this low-budget small-cast film is put together: the stock footage of Houston is interesting at first, then repetitive and annoying the more the same shots are re-used. There are some significant, almost amateurish issues with the sound mixing, to the point of background noise changing between shots and dialogue muffled by static—surely a little bit of ADR would have helped. The narrative density of the film is surprisingly low, with meandering dialogue filling up the gap. The film is also surprisingly serious for such a lighthearted affair, to the point of barely qualifying as a comedy. This being said, I understand the budgetary constraints—My Online Valentine feels like a family affair, considering the title card featuring four producers with the same family name as the director, the tiny cast, static camera setups and a handful of locations—I would be surprised if the film’s budget reached the seven figures. But what works are the actors—not necessarily gifted thespians, but easy to like and reasonably interesting to listen to. Some clunky dialogue along the way takes a backseat to a crucially good scene of reconciliation that feels real and ends the film on a very good note. Romantic comedies don’t need to be all that well-made if they manage to succeed in the critical areas: you like the characters, you want them to end up together… and they do.

  • Always and Forever (2020)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, January 2022) I don’t exactly enjoy recognizing writer-director Chris Stokes’ name, nor having a (relatively low) opinion of his cinematic body of work, but the truth is that I’ve been watching a lot of BET original movies lately and he’s one of their go-to directors. After watching no less than six of his films in short order, I can say that he’s not always a bad director, but he doesn’t do very well under budgetary constraints—especially in the more demanding suspense genre. His comedies (Fall Girls, Swag Inc.) are better than his thrillers (Til Death Do Us Part, We Belong Together), where his limits as a screenwriter become more obvious. Still, his work fits well within the BET house brand of thrillers, that is: female-centric suspense films playing with familiar tropes often blended in wild ways. The specifics of the plot, the staging or the dialogue aren’t as important as delivering cheap thrills on a small budget. In this regard, Always and Forever is exactly what BET or BET’s viewers expect from a Stokes film: Attractive female lead put in danger, with a wild “twist” both ludicrous and predictable. The specifics in this instance are that a young lawyer (the beautiful Cynthia Addai-Robinson) finds herself in the middle of a dangerous situation when her childhood friends all start dying in mysterious ways. We, as viewers, having been teased with flashback scenes to her teenage years spent tormenting a pudgy young man, suspect that there’s a revenge story at play. It’s ridiculously easy to guess who’s the bad guy, so I suppose there’s some comfort in knowing where the story is going, despite the supposedly intelligent protagonist not having a clue. It escalates to a familiar place—a moonlit deserted summer camp where she and the killer go head-to-head, with the cavalry (a surprisingly intense Wood Harris) not far behind. Much of Always and Forever is simply preposterous, and that’s well before (and after) the Big Twist we’re not supposed to see coming: characters act in contrived ways more useful to the clunky plotting than anything else. (Such as leaving a gun on the ground so that the villain can then pick it up.)  Weird things only make sense in retrospect when they justify later plot points. Don’t ask questions about what’s not expressly shown on-screen (such as an entire murder trial where you would think a defence lawyer would do their job and expose The Twist) and especially do not ask yourself why the villain would hatch such a convoluted and insanely risky decade-long revenge. “He’s a psycho, that’s why” is an uncommonly frequent justification in the Stokes oeuvre. Still, I am now consciously seeking Stokes movies to watch and there’s got to be a reason for it: he is, for lack of a better word, an interesting filmmaker. His scripts are case studies of what not to do and his direction labours under budgetary constraints. But he’s got an eye for attractive actresses, he delivers wild material without even acknowledging its preposterousness and his movies have this strange mixture of narrative rhythm and plot problems that make them fun to dissect. No wonder I can’t stop watching his movies and writing about them.

  • Trauma (1993)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, January 2022) There are a few reasons why Trauma feels like an odd duck in the Dario Argento filmography, the biggest being that it’s clearly shot in the United States (Minneapolis, specifically). It also feels curiously restrained by Argento’s standards, the writer-director going for a more suspenseful, less gory approach in his bid to approach the American market. This being said, “Restrained by Argento’s standards” is a very relative thing when the film is a slasher movie with a psychopath running around with a decapitating device. There’s some noteworthiness in having Argento direct daughter Asia Argento in a leading role, although more questions are raised than answered when she (a teenager as of filming) ends up in a topless scene. The rest of Trauma is more annoying than anything else—it’s a slasher without the over-the-top nature of Argento’s best work, the final revelations are preposterous and the film errs into unintentional comedy far too often. Add to that the throwaway nature of slashers and there’s not much left to recommend here. At best, Trauma is a curio featuring the Argentos in America. At worse, it will put you to sleep so thoroughly that you’ll end up watching the ending twice.

  • The Kindness of Strangers (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2022) Prepare for misery as you approach The Kindness of Strangers, an ensemble drama that nonetheless focuses on the torrent of pain, fear, danger, humiliation and precarity experienced by a young mother and her two sons as they seek to escape their abusive husband/father by running away to Manhattan. Their journey takes them as far down in society as anyone would imagine, but by the end of the film they’re able to bond with people ready to help them. (Plus, a violent action from the antagonist that ensures that even he, as a cop, is put away for a long time.)  There are many noble intentions here, whether it’s rooting for a vulnerable woman and her kids, or trying to portray the web of interactions that becomes necessary to offer help to someone in need. Unfortunately, The Kindness of Strangers often feels like a mechanical exercise. An international production where simply figuring out the country of origin is an adventure, writer-director Lone Scherfig’s film feels pulled and pushed in various directions so frequently that, by the time we’re done, nothing remains except platitudes and easy decisions. The ensemble cast is not bad—Zoe Kazan does make for a likable protagonist, Andrea Riseborough remains intriguing throughout, Bill Nighy plays to his strengths as a sympathetic but somewhat befuddled figure and Jay Baruchel makes the most out of a supporting character. Still, it feels rote, arbitrary, overly manipulative and yet not terribly effective at it. In other words, The Kindness of a Strangers often feels like a slog that doesn’t lead anywhere interesting. Sure, things get better for the characters—but in a film where the interconnection between strangers is supposed to be an important thematic element, it falters when it comes to the moment to make a point. Not worth a look considering much stronger films dealing with similar issues.

  • Tintin et les oranges bleues [Tintin and the Blue Oranges] (1964)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Fourth or fifth viewing, On TV, January 2022) As someone who grew up on Tintin albums and whatever movies were re-run on over-the-air TV, there’s quite a bit of nostalgia in revisiting Tintin et les oranges bleues after a few decades. I still remembered bits and pieces of the film, but not enough to make this a repetitive experience. It’s not bad—the visual similarities to the comic book are astonishing, and the sense of adventure in mid-1960s Spain makes for a strong atmosphere. (Alas, the version still broadcast on French-Canadian TV channels is faded and dull—I’m told there’s a more recent restoration, but this wasn’t it.)  But while this second live-action Tintin film has a few fun gadgets, stunts and characters and was probably my favourite growing up thanks to the focus on Professeur Tournesol, I now like the previous live-action film (Tintin et la toison d’or) a bit more due to its sense of adventure. Oh well—I’m not sure how much of Tintin et les oranges bleues holds up for modern kids who haven’t mainlined the albums yet: it suspects that the decrepit, gritty, almost disreputable cinematography doesn’t help, nor the rather strong stereotypes about the Arabic characters. For me, though, it’s quite a bit of fun and a welcome excuse to revisit a film I saw a few times as a kid.

  • Balto (1995)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, January 2022) Fans of Jack London’s Call of the Wild will feel in familiar territory in Balto, a dog-in-Alaska story executed as a classically-drawn animated film with a live-action framing device. As far as kid-focused animal adventures go, Balto is nicely executed despite the annoyances—the blend of a rather serious story of adversity in the face of a medical delivery is sabotaged by the comic talking animals shtick that was (and remains) so prevalent in those films… Jack London it isn’t, finally. Still, the adventure can be involving, the animation is squarely in what was the norm before CGI took over, and the pacing is not bad. The framing device feels useless and the facts of the “true story” that inspired the film are to be taken with a great deal of liberty. Director Simon Wells would go on to make better (The Prince of Egypt) and so much worse (Mars Needs Moms) that we would never direct again. Balto makes for an acceptable family film today—nothing groundbreaking (the irony being that it was released the month after the epochal Toy Story, tanking its box-office) but still something reasonably entertaining, especially if dogs-in-the-wild stories are your thing.

  • Justice Society: World War II (2021)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, January 2022) Another six months, another direct-to-video DC animation movie. Justice Society: World War II is slightly more distinctive than most in that it takes a contemporary framing device focusing on The Flash and then jumps back in time to present an alternate take on Justice Society’s actions during World War II. I’m not always a big fan of those DC animated films—while most of them are watchable largely as background material (unimpressive animation, straightforward scripts, tepid pacing with low plotting density), the better ones are rare. While this one is not exceptional, the focus on a different cast of characters is welcome (anything with Black Canary and the newest Iris West is fine by me) and there are a few interesting details here and there—an alternate Superman as an unheroic war correspondent? Aquaman brainwashed into becoming a Nazi? Wonder Woman giving Flash a ring for his engagement to West? Not bad. Those help Justice Society: World War II into being a better-than-average entry, even though the sideshow aspect means that we’re still far from an essential.

  • The Gingerdead Man (2005)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, January 2022) Over the past few years, my reviews have chronicled my growing “appreciation” (it’s not the right word) for the work of Charles Band—a filmmaker specializing in low-budget, low-horror, high-comedy movies made for the sub-theatrical market. The Gingerdead Man does reflect many recurring elements of his filmography—short duration, unserious approach, substandard production means, and inanimate objects possessed by evil. But it’s crucially missing those elements that take the best of his film into something approaching viewing pleasure: sex-appeal, comedy or inspired lunacy. Gary Busey does feature in the opening scene and then as the voice of the possessed gingerbread man, but that’s really not enough to compensate for perfunctory production values and comedy that lead to more shrugs than chuckles. Band is often a director who succeeds in spite of himself, and The Gingerdead Man may be closer to the norm than an exception. Band’s Full Moon production company clearly thought well enough of the concept to produce three more follow-ups (including Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong, a crossover with another Full Moon property), but we’re certainly not forced to have the same opinion.

  • Shella Record— A Reggae Mystery (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, January 2022) As someone who has spent far too much time on the Internet tracking down anything I could find on relatively minor artists from decades past, there’s something both fascinating and relatable in writer-director Chris Flanagan’s multi-year journey as described in his documentary Shella Record—A Reggae Mystery. The quest begins in a used record store, where Flanagan discovers a terrific 1970s reggae track from “Shella Record”—an otherwise unknown artist with no other known tracks, which is mind-boggling considering her exceptional vocal performance. Flanagan’s initial investigation takes him around Toronto, but trying to get more information from the record producers meets a dead-end. A lucky break from a radio show airing then sends him to Jamaica, where he makes a pilgrimage to some sacred places of reggae and digs through the wreckage of a fire-ravaged studio to find the song’s original recording. Along the way, he confirms that this Shella Records is really Sheila Rickards, a jazz singer whose post-Jamaica whereabouts are unknown. After this initial breakthrough, the search slows down: trips to New York City and Los Angeles bring some colour to the search, but produce few results. Finally, it takes a private investigator with an interest in the paranormal to provide the very satisfying third act that the film deserves. Footage captured throughout the multi-year quest is enlivened by material from Flanagan’s miniature work and (less satisfyingly) by dramatic re-creations of historical events. Still, the documentary is steadily engrossing, and the final stretch brings authentic closure to the mysteries raised by the film’s first hour. Flanagan makes for a likable protagonist, but it’s the twists and turns of the tale that make it memorable. Best of all, the documentary illustrates an even happier ending, with the now-fully credited song being republished on vinyl, digitally mastered and played around the world to a new audience. Give it a listen, and see if it makes you want to watch the film.

  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2022) For this third (and final) instalment of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series, the crew heads to (of all places) feudal Japan thanks to some supernatural shenanigans that are barely surprising in the so-called logic of the series. It’s inane, but compared to the insanity of the previous instalments, it’s almost unremarkable. The overall plot isn’t anything special, but Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III’s best moments are in seeing the irreverent turtles longing for pizza and making pop-culture reference à la Clint Eastwood in this historical context. It’s not much, but I’m not sure writer-director Stuart Gillard aimed any higher—clearly aimed at kids with a fascination for martial arts, pizza and ninjas, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III fails to make the most of its admittedly decent production values. I’d say too bad, but really—were we expecting anything different at this point?

  • Ron’s Gone Wrong (2021)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Disney Streaming, January 2022) Techno-skepticism makes it to family animated movies in Ron’s Gone Wrong, a middle-school comedy that doubles as a metaphor for how technology increasingly pervades our kid’s experiences. Here, a fictional company called Bubble develops an all-purpose robot (“B-bot”) meant to help kids make friends, but our story focuses on the only boy at his school without a B-bot. Out of desperation, his parents finally find him one—a damaged unit that should have been scrapped and barely works out of the box. Much of the main plot has our protagonist dealing with a not-so-defective robot and navigating the tricky web of social interactions at school, but there’s an arguably more interesting subplot showing how well-intentioned technology can be misused by people with less noble motives. Fortunately, Ron’s Gone Wrong works well in the execution: while the film shies away from telling people to destroy their phones and delete their social media accounts, it does make a reasonable case for technology as a help for fulfilling human desires rather than becoming a goal by itself. The animation is quite good (especially from newcomer Locksmith Animation, even if it has the Aardman pedigree), and the script is a well-engineered machine. The culmination of much of the craziness is a wild playground sequence that makes not sense from an IT security viewpoint, but does get a few laughs. As a family film, Ron’s Gone Wrong is more interesting than many, considering that adults will keep making the techno-parallels that may be missed by some of the younger audiences.

  • A Matter of Time (1976)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2022) The weirdness about A Matter of Time starts early: What is Vincent Minelli, once a darling director of MGM’s golden age, doing shooting a film for low-rent studio American Pictures International? Why are the sumptuous Roman exteriors act as background to such stilted dialogue? For that matter—why does Ingrid Bergman look so dreary in a bad wig, while Liza Minelli looks so good in a good one? For that matter, why are Bergman and Minelli slumming in a film shot in TV aspect ratio? Why does the film feel like a crash between A Star is Born and a Broadway musical? Well, maybe the year can be a clue—well past the Golden Age of musicals, late in Bergman’s career, early enough in Minelli-fille’s career to be part of a project for Minelli-père. (It ended up being his last movie after a six-year silence, capping an illustrious thirty-six-year-long career.)  The result is not unwatchable—Minelli is unusually cute with a long wig and there are a few nice moments here and there. But Minelli-fille aside, A Matter of Time often feels like a tired attempt at recapturing various glories—those MGM musicals, for one, but also the short glorious Hollywood-on-the-Tiber energy of the early 1960s. For a film that mixes fantasy and reality, it’s a clunker—the framing device brings down the film, and even from the opening narration (“This is a true story […] adapted from a novel”), it’s reaching for gravitas that it can’t quite create by itself. Whether you can claim that the film is the result of Minelli-père’s veteran direction is unclear: According to rumours, an initial three-hour-long film was cut to barely 97 minutes, which probably accounts for much of the resulting choppiness. A Matter of Time remains an essential part of movie history if you’re interested in the Minellis, but it may remind you that in Hollywood, career endings are seldom glorious.

  • I’ve Been Waiting for You (1998)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, January 2022) You would think that a horror film about a teenager being possessed by a witch would be sexier, funnier or better than this, but I’ve Been Waiting for You certainly isn’t worth any wait: This made-for-TV film (there goes the sexiness) is inspired by a glum YA novel (there goes the fun) and in execution seems copy-pasted from other YA slashers of the era (there goes the quality). Executed on a modest budget by Christopher Leitch, the film struggles to attain narrative velocity. Indifferent acting doesn’t help, nor does perfunctory production values or straightforward directing. It’s amazing that a premise as rich in possibilities (both high and low) at multi-generational witchery and revenge could lead to an unremarkable slasher. Clearly aimed at an undemanding teen market at a time when they were even less demanding than usual thanks to the Scream-inspired mini-boom, I’ve Been Waiting for You leaves no lasting impression.

  • A Walk in the Spring Rain (1970)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2022) The lead casting in A Walk in the Spring Rain is promising: Ingrid Bergman (in a rare late-career American film) and Anthony Quinn in a complex mature romance between the neglected wife of an academic on a sabbatical in Tennessee, and a rural local quite unlike her husband. There’s further drama, but you’d have a hard time getting excited for it, as the film unspools leisurely with no real stakes and even less passion for its own material. Quinn plays his rough persona and Bergman is rarely less than quite good—but the film itself can’t measure up to its location shooting, its premise or the power of its actors. It’s almost obscure today, which is understandable enough: there have been far better movies about similar topics, and this one is often a chore to get through.