Reviews

  • L’appât [The bait] (2010)

    L’appât [The bait] (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) Crime comedies are very close to being the platonic ideal of French-Canadian summer blockbusters, and it’s not that surprising to see the producers of the film look for a transatlantic crossover in L’appât by asking noted French-Canadian superstar Guy A. Lepage to star alongside French comedian Rachid Badouri. Clearly aiming for a large audience, writer-director-producer Yves Simoneau (in a surprising return to cinema screens after decades working in television) bets everything on accessible action-comedy. But does he succeed? That depends on your tolerance for broad, almost intentionally stupid execution. The narrative hook of pairing a dumb gaffe-prone municipal cop (Lepage) with a near-flawless special agent (Badouri) is promising, but Simoneau makes the French-Canadian character an exasperating grade of weapons-grade stupid with few redeeming traits, and the film has to carry that on its shoulders for the entire running time. It doesn’t help that Lepage plays the character like in a sketch comedy which doesn’t fit into the world of the film. Badouri comparatively does better, but the script is at the other character’s level. (At least we get to see striking Montréal-area actress Ayisha Issa in a small role.) It all feels like a waste of talent and resources, especially given how the film’s technical credentials shine whenever there’s a bit of action on-screen. But in the end, L’appât is not an action movie: it’s a broad-spectrum comedy, and it doesn’t quite succeed all that well at it. Sure, there are a few laughs… but they’re either accidental or guilty ones.

  • Viskningar och rop [Cries and Whispers] (1972)

    Viskningar och rop [Cries and Whispers] (1972)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Criterion Streaming, September 2020) I don’t watch Ingmar Bergman movies for fun, and so Cries and Whispers was on my list solely because it’s an Oscar nominee—otherwise, it’s not as if spending even 90 minutes in the company of a dying woman, her servant and her two sisters is an appealing prospect. It’s all made even worse by Bergman’s typically leaden style, crammed with more symbolism and ellipses than I care about. To cover the bases: Yes, this is a superior film, filled with odd atypical moment not seen elsewhere. Yes, it has powerful performances, especially from Harriet Andersson and Liv Ullmann. Yes, it’s filled with allusions that you can spend an afternoon decoding and authentic moments of cinema that no other director could hope to pull off. On the flip side: No, I did not enjoy Cries and Whispers. No, I did not like it. No, I did not want it to go any longer. But I have seen it, and I’m now one movie closer to my goal of having seen all of the Best Picture nominees.

  • Profondo Rosso [Deep Red aka The Hatchet Murders] (1975)

    Profondo Rosso [Deep Red aka The Hatchet Murders] (1975)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (TubiTV Streaming, September 2020) If anyone is looking at Italian giallo films as the logical progenitors of the American slasher genre, Profondo Rosso would be something along the lines of Exhibit A, a year after the Canadian Black Christmas but substantially more impressive in its willingness to go over the top. Writer-director Dario Argento’s work does not deal in subtleties or restraint: it’s about stinging musical cues, brighter-than-real red blood, impressionistic camera angles and characters screaming their heads off. Here, a photographer gets dragged into investigating the murder of a woman (one that’s a telepath, but that odd bit of weirdness could have been removed entirely from the film without making a difference). His investigation takes him to an abandoned house as the bodies pile up, but the details of the rather detailed plot are not as interesting as the way they’re executed—Perhaps taking lessons from contemporary Italian director Sergio Leone, Argento directs in high-impact close-ups, with plenty of blood and music to keep us invested in the action. I don’t normally like slashers or anything feeling like slashers, but Profondo Rosse (especially alongside Suspiria) is something different—cinematically potent enough to be interesting on a strictly stylistic level.

  • Boom Town (1940)

    Boom Town (1940)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) There’s something fun in seeing Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy play frenemies on-screen in Boom Town, each of them bringing their usual persona to the fore in a tale of duelling oil tycoons throughout the years. The story spans more than a decade, and sees them make a large fortune at a time when oil madness was sweeping the United States. Women, business deals and even revenge tie their characters as much as it compels them to competition, and if the film has a narrative backbone, it had to be the character played by Claudette Colbert who becomes a prize for them. (Meanwhile, Hedy Lamarr gets an early good role as the temptress that comes in between the lead trio.) Boom Town gets a while to get going, something that is not at all helped by a cyclical structure that keeps getting back to familiar ground, suggesting an unsatisfactory lack of growth for the characters. Both Gable and Tracy are good at being themselves and playing off each other (this was their third collaboration after San Francisco and Jet Pilot, and perhaps the best) while Lamarr is striking in a limited role, but Colbert is wasted in a role that barely touches upon her comic talents. The result is not bad, but it misses being better than good by a wide margin—not enough development, a repetitive structure and a disappointing ending. I still liked the look at the wild oil fields of the early twentieth century and the character interplay (Gable had worked with his father on such fields, so he had a better than average understanding of how that worked), but Boom Town could have been better.

  • Cook Off! (2007)

    Cook Off! (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) I can see bits and pieces of where Cook Off! could have been better. As a mockumentary taking on a cooking competition, there are clearly plenty of comic opportunities to seize. Unfortunately, writer-director-star Cathryn Michon casts her net too large in a 98-minute movie, with an ensemble cast that is too unwieldy to properly introduce before getting down to the necessities of plot. The film doesn’t quite get a chance to properly develop: the action is condensed in three days and too few events, and the characters step on each other’s toes in an attempt to get laughs. Then there’s the quality of the comedy that’s actually in the picture—while Cook Off! gets a few chuckles here and there, much of the humour feels needlessly laborious, stretched over too long a setup. It’s simply not at all funny despite the promising characters and situations. Even the conceit of having two rival newscasters at the cooking competition, leading to alternate takes on the events, is mostly left on the floor as a missed opportunity. The low-budget mockumentary conceit is better handled than most films of that type (much of the action takes place in a big room with cameras present), but there is still plenty of footage that should not logically exist due to any cameras being present. Perhaps the most interesting thing about Cook Off! is in its post-production history: The film was completed in 2007, shown at film festivals and then shelved for a full decade before popping up as VOD fodder and, now, Cable TV filler. One suspects that a minor role for Melissa McCarthy (then modestly known for her TV show roles, but nowhere near her post-Bridesmaids fame) has much to do in unearthing the film from the vaults. I’m still relatively sympathetic to the result, which does get a few smiles along the way and I’m curious to see what else Michon could go if given the proper means and a bit more focus.

  • School Ties (1992)

    School Ties (1992)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, September 2020) There’s some heavy-grade irony in seeing School Ties nearly thirty years later and spotting Brendan Fraser, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck—I’m not sure that anyone would have predicted their respective career path back then. They are easily the best thing about the film, a 1950s-set drama in which a Jewish young man (Fraser) heads to college on a football scholarship but manages to “pass” as non-Jewish until the secret predictably gets out. It’s an old-fashioned tale of anti-Semitic prejudice, and we can almost see every plot turn coming well in advance. If you’re approaching the film thinking that it will have some of that old-fashioned boarding school charm, then you’re looking at the wrong place: School Ties really isn’t one of those “inspiring teachers” kind of film and the lead character faces adversity at every turn in this very WASP-ish environment. There’s some structural oddness here and there, with minor characters popping up and then disappearing—almost as if the original intent of the film was bigger, and got whittled away to the anti-discrimination theme though successive editing. I don’t know. But there’s a limited appeal to School Ties nonetheless—while no one will object to its basic message of decency and anti-discrimination, the film doesn’t do much more than deliver on the essentials, and can’t help (by its predictability) to feel a bit perfunctory about it. It’s not exactly a bad watch, but it could have been better at achieving its own objectives.

  • Café Society (2016)

    Café Society (2016)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, September 2020) I’ve made my peace with the idea that, despite my overall dubiousness about Woody Allen’s personal life, I will eventually see most of his movies. The latter half of his career has been exceptionally consistent: A mixture of some nostalgia, straightforward plotting, capable actors and no-nonsense filmmaking. Occasionally, a performance will get nominated for the Oscars, or a topic matter will strike the imagination of specific people—and that’s how I feel with the Golden Age Hollywood material in Café Society. Much of the film’s first half is spent in the shadows of the movie studio system of the 1930s, as a young man moves from New York to Los Angeles in the hope of something better in service of his uncle, a powerful studio executive. The patter is heavy with movie reference that would have completely flummoxed me before taking a crash course in classic movies, and that’s part of the fun as the characters name-drop like crazy. Don’t expect to spend much time on set, as the film is limited by its budget to show us tight angles on exteriors and sets that can approximate 1930s Los Angeles. That part of the film is actually fun, and shot with luminous clarity. Then things get more complicated, as our protagonist unsuccessfully romances his uncle’s secretary and eventually decides, upon being rebuffed, to go back to New York, where he’s able to help his mobster brother set up a nightclub. Much of Café Society’s second half plays off the thrill of the first, letting the pieces of an unconsummated romance fall where they are exposed in time for the wistful ending. It’s not bad, but it’s not designed to make you feel happy: the more the film advances, the more it becomes apparent that it’s reaching for regret rather than laughs. Oh well; that’s where Allen wants to go for this film. At least the acting talent is worth a look: Now that Allen merely narrates the film, Jesse Eisenberg is probably one of the two best actors to play Allen-like characters and his second time doing so after To Rome with Love. Kirsten Stewart is not bad opposite him, although she once again plays a very specific kind of character. Steve Carell flexes some antagonist muscles as the uncle wooing the same girl. In the end, the rush of the opening half having dissipated, Café Society fells like many, many twenty-first century Allen movies: pleasant enough to watch, with some good actors along the way and a decent-enough plot to follow, but not particularly memorable or worth getting excited about. Even by his latest standards, it’s middle-tier material.

  • My Own Private Idaho (1991)

    My Own Private Idaho (1991)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (YouTube Streaming, September 2020) I suspect that most circa-2020 viewers will approach My Own Private Idaho because it happens to star young Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix and you know what? That’s a perfectly respectable reason. Phoenix’s talent, taken too soon, is showcased here, and Reeves turns in a looser performance than in many of his other roles. But it’s not the only reason to watch My Own Private Idaho. Some will flock to it because of its strong gay themes at a time where such topics were not yet part of the mainstream; others for watching one of writer-director Gus van Sant’s early efforts; and others for the film’s stylish presentation halfway between realism and dreamlike escapism. It is because of this whole package that My Own Private Idaho remains interesting, even to those who, like me, aren’t particularly interested in either of those specific reasons. It’s a film that doesn’t quite play out like expected. The expressionistic moments are refreshing in the middle of so much grimy meditation on the outcasts of society; and the narrative remains a stream of surprises. While I don’t particularly like My Own Private Idaho (too long, too scattered, too sad), I can certainly respect it, no matter why anyone would want to watch it.

  • Caged Heat (1974)

    Caged Heat (1974)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) Not every Oscar-winning director has an immaculate high-art past, and so it is that the celebrated Jonathan Demme got his start on Roger Corman exploitation pictures, and exploitation thriller Caged Heat was his first directing credit. As a better-than-average women-in-prison film, Caged Heat has all of the nudity, violence, girl-on-girl fighting, anti-establishment screeds and sadistic wards that you’d expect from such films. The plot first goes where you think it will go (unjust arrest; meet the cast; early rebellion; punishment; greater rebellion; escape and so on) and then doesn’t, with the details along the way being little bits of titillation thrown to the audience. Where Demme does bring his touch is that the result is noticeably better than other films of the subgenre: there’s some humour to the proceedings, social critiques, scenes that go beyond the strict minimum, and the film minimizes (but does not eliminate) male-on-female violence to focus on female-on-female oppression (or rather system-on-women oppression). Some of the casting does work: Barbara Steele does have one weird role as the wheelchair-bound warden, and Juanita Brown is simply captivating. It’s not much, but it does work: most of the film plays according to exploitation expectations, but there’s enough going on here to keep interest if you’re committed to the film. I suppose that if you must watch a women-in-prison film, you could do worse than Caged Heat.

  • The Prize (1963)

    The Prize (1963)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) Nothing, exactly nothing about The Prize makes any sense—least of all the plot, which is rather embarrassing for a narrative-driven thriller. The beginning sees an alcoholic, womanizing American author somehow winning the Nobel Prize for Literature (based on, what, a corpus of one novel?) The action begins after he flies into Stockholm to receive the prize, and meets the other winners. A lovely young Scandinavian (Elke Sommer, in an early role) is assigned to him as hostess, and his meetings with the other winners show an eclectic group of intellectuals. But as various strange events occur, we stumble onto a premise that only made sense at the height of the Cold War: a dastardly plan by the Soviets to replace the Nobel Prize winners with lookalikes so that the lookalikes can denounce the western world in their acceptance speeches and then “defect” to The Soviet Union. Trying to even pretend that this premise makes sense is tiresome, so let’s skip to the overall impression left by the film: it’s about as scattershot as its premise in blending comedy, young-punk protagonist, some danger from the spying team at work in Stockholm, Paul Newman in the lead role, Edward G. Robinson in one of his late-career performances, a scene set at a nudist convention, and many more idiosyncrasies than you’ll know what to make of. The film was a success upon release, but newer viewers are more likely to be perplexed by the ungainly blend of ill-fitting elements. At least Newman is quite likable, despite a character not necessarily written to be so. He’s almost enough to make us forget a plot that wouldn’t make sense even at the protagonist’s most drunken state.

  • Standing Up, Falling Down (2019)

    Standing Up, Falling Down (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) Clearly easing into an elder statesman of comedy roles, Billy Crystal has slowed down over the past few years—fewer film parts and more elements of his filmography “as himself.” And why not? He doesn’t have a lot left to prove, and as a seventy-something-year-old could coast into retirement without anyone putting up a fight. You can almost feel that late-career contentment at play in Standing Up, Falling Down as he plays a dermatologist with a pronounced sense of humour who comes to mentor a young comedian who has moved back to his parent’s place after a failed stint in Hollywood. As a younger and an older man begin a friendship, you can count on most of the tropes of such films to be trotted out, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing: a strong script, directed by Matt Ratner, allows Crystal to provide the laughs even as the film moves into bittersweet territory. Crystal has some easy chemistry with co-lead Ben Schwartz, and the film isn’t in a hurry to get everything done right away even at 91 minutes. Standing Up, Falling Down is not a big event film—it’s meant to play leisurely at home, entertain audiences with a well-executed portrait of male friendship and bow out. As such, it’s reasonably successful in its aims… and it gives Crystal a good later-career role to show everyone that he’s still reasonably funny under the right circumstances.

  • The Clearing (2004)

    The Clearing (2004)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, September 2020) In between the dark scary forest of genre crime thrillers and the featureless plains of straightforward drama, there is a zone that is neither—a place where crime stories can be used to illustrate human concerns without necessarily becoming genre stories nor completely fall in the vast expanses of straight drama. The Clearing is in such a zone, as the kidnapping of a rich person becomes more of a dramatic vehicle for a good cast than a conventionally satisfying story. In this case, the cast is a trio of legends: Robert Redford plays the kidnapped, Willem Defoe the kidnapper and Helen Mirren the wife who must deliver the ransom. But writer-director-producer Pieter Jan Brugge (directing his first film after a long producing career) isn’t really aiming for a visceral thrill-a-minute kind of film. Instead, he spends his time ambling along with the characters, and even misdirects the audience’s attention to stretch the story for even longer than it is. The result of such shenanigans is not what he had hoped for: The Clearing, in the end, feels like a trick more than a movie. The misdirection hides an unsatisfying ending, and distances audiences from the characters. Neither ends up being a winning move considering the coldness of the film. Despite good work from the actors, The Clearing is not only a disappointment, but something that’s likely to fade away from memory far quicker than a conventionally entertaining genre piece would have.

  • Waxwork (1988)

    Waxwork (1988)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, September 2020) If there’s such a thing as an “exact median” 1980s horror film, I would nominate Waxwork for the title: it’s a bit too good to be dismissed, but not good enough to be praised. It’s certainly attuned with the 1980s horror movie atmosphere, as it pays homage to everything that’s come before it, mixes all of those influences together, and even nods toward some of the decade’s other films. Plotting-wise, it feels like a blender full of homages, as teenagers exploring a creepy wax museum are… sucked into parallel dimensions to meet the real versions of the wax monsters, then have to… fight off an evil prophecy that would deliver the world to eighteen evil forces? What? Unable to keep an idea in head longer than it’s still interesting, writer-director Anthony Hickox flits from one horror trope to another, delivers his House of Wax homage, then (obviously, because that’s what happens in war museum horror films) burns everything up in time for the climax. Waxwork is, again, not terrible and not great but somewhere in the intermittently interesting middle. It will be far more interesting to fans of the genre more than neophytes.

  • Class Action Park (2020)

    Class Action Park (2020)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) One of the most interesting kinds of laughter is what I call the disbelief laughter—whatever comes out when you’re just astounded, in denial, or still trying to process new information that just simply shouldn’t be part of reality. Since that information can be violent or macabre in nature, it’s the kind of laughter that makes you feel a little bit like a psychopath. All of this to say that you may find yourself laughing quite a bit throughout the documentary feature Class Action Park, and at things that are resolutely not funny. Don’t worry—that laughter is your brain trying to catch up. The film is all about New Jersey’s infamous Action Park, an amusement park so dangerous and badly supervised that no less than six deaths have been linked to the park rides—and that’s not mentioning the countless injuries (“several ambulances per day”), the high-risk culture of the place, and the rampant inebriation of visitors and staff. (Yes, they sold alcohol on-site.) Much of the lively film is spent in interviews with past attendees and supervisors—most of whom cheerfully recall the park’s dangers (in a “wow, I can’t believe we survived” kind of way) while soberly acknowledging that it wasn’t a place that should have kept going. Why it kept going is an interesting question in itself, as allegations of corruption and evidence of insurance fraud legal action are mentioned. But it’s in the crazy-stupid anecdotes that the film is at its most…er… hilarious. Don’t be surprised to laugh and laugh at recollections of the “Cannonball Loop” water slide also include that due to the design of the ride, users would frequently be stuck at the top of the enclosed loop, unable to slide further… and with further users coming down the pipe cutting themselves on previous riders’ stuck teeth. There are many more such incidents mentioned in the film, from a pool nicknamed “The Grave Pool” to altercations between visitors and staff. While Action Park is a memory by now, it’s not an uncommon memory to New Jersey residents—as it was the closest and cheapest water park, it attracted crowds that the park was ill-equipped to handle. But what’s just a fond (if sometimes painful) memory for the film’s interviewees can see like an unbelievable tall tale to anyone who wasn’t there and will have trouble believing that such a thing could ever exist in today’s litigious context. Indeed—documentarians Seth Porges and Chris Charles Scott III can’t quite reconcile the allure of the park’s danger with the consequences of its failings: the ending hits both themes in such rapid succession that you can’t help but… laugh.  And if you’re laughing throughout the entire film, that’s you struggling to make sense of it all. Ironically, if you think that Class Action Park is the stuff of fiction, rest assured that a movie partially inspired by Action Park does exist as Action Point, starring (who else?) Johnny Knoxville. Alas, it’s not nearly as funny as the documentary, even if it’s a very different kind of laughter.

  • Shine a Light (2008)

    Shine a Light (2008)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2020) Look, if you’re going to shoot a concert film for **The Rolling Stones**, obviously you’re going to get **Martin Scorsese** for it. Legends to present legends, right? It makes more sense than most picks—Scorsese, after all, has directed concert films before (most notably The Last Waltz) and considers the Stones a formative influence. It certainly helps that The Stones, as of 2008, were still incredible performers: Mick Jagger can’t just stand still and sing when there’s dancing and crowd-hyping to do. Combined with behind-the-scenes footage, celebrity testimonies (the recorded concert at New York’s Beacon Theater was a benefit for the Clinton Foundation, so you’ll never guess who shows up), archival footage and swooping moving cameras, Shine a Light is at once majestic and intimate. Inevitably, the music is iconic, the energy is infectious and Scorsese clearly knows how to package everything into one great package.