Tatiana Maslany

  • Stronger (2017)

    Stronger (2017)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2021) Despite good reviews, I passed on Stronger for years before finally deciding to see it. It’s the kind of film that you think you know simply from its premise: Here, the story of Jeff Bauman, a working-class Bostonian who lost his legs following the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. It’s a tale that superficially classifies as one of those “overcoming great adversity” stories, mixed with the added resonance of a famous national-headline event. But it doesn’t take a long time to see how Stronger takes a more interesting approach than most similar films. Going a bit quickly on the terrible moments of the bombing (don’t worry—you’ll dwell on all the gory details later), it quickly establishes its lead character as an unreliable, somewhat immature young man thrust without warning in a terrible situation. But Stronger doesn’t sugarcoat any of it: stuck in the narrow confines of a lower-class apartment, our protagonist is ill-equipped to handle the media attention and the heroism conferred upon him. Bad incidents follow, along with a decidedly half-hearted approach to physical rehabilitation that would enable him to use prosthetics for walking again. Jake Gyllenhall stars as Bauman, bringing his usual charm to a role that often needs it. A similar performance comes for a de-glammed Tatiana Maslany as his on-and-off girlfriend, who takes on more than she can tolerate as well. The raw, gritty nature of the film can’t quite obscure a carefully orchestrated production that eventually gets back to the inspiring nature of such films—It’s as much a story of (literally) how to get back on one’s legs after tremendous setbacks, but also how to learn to accept the symbolism of heroism that others project onto you. Stronger is a clever film, clearly aware of genre clichés and working hard to go beyond them while still delivering the life-affirming message that viewers expect from such films. It’s manipulative, but not unpleasantly so.

  • Two Lovers and a Bear (2016)

    Two Lovers and a Bear (2016)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2019) After seeing Kim Nguyen’s poetic Le Marais and then his techno-thriller-ish The Hummingbird Project, I was curious as to how a filmmaker could go from one to the other. It turns out that Two Lovers and a Bear holds part of the answer—or, at least, mixes a harsh reality with suspense mechanisms with an oneiric sensibility that occasionally turns the film into something quite different. There is some built-in interest in the premise, which follows two young people madly in love with each other in Canada’s deep, deep north—the kind of arctic-circle north that scares even Canadians that live in the kind of climate that scares Americans. Humans are not meant to live that far north without considerable assistance, and nearly everything there is measured against the imperatives of temperature and distance to the south where it’s not always frozen. Our two titular lovers are played by Dane DeHaan and Tatiana Maslany—it goes without saying that Maslany acts circles around DeHaan, but the climate suits him: he’s not nearly as annoying nor emotionally distant here than in many other movies. As for the bear, well, the bear is an imaginary companion that only speaks to him, not her. When they are convinced that a stalker is threatening her, they strike out southward, getting stuck in a blizzard and eventually discovering an abandoned military base that can act as shelter. But the stalker is as imaginary as the bear—and if it’s not clear enough from the get-go that these are not emotionally healthy characters, they then burn their sole shelter to make a point. The rest of the film barrels toward its tragic but romantic conclusion, with intrusions of the fantastic into reality that, to me, act as a bridge between Nguyen’s earlier work and the somewhat more realistic nature of his latest film. I can’t say that I really enjoyed Two Lovers and a Bear: I didn’t like the characters, the ending, the undisciplined blend of genres. But it did hold my attention, and there were a few moments that were particularly successful. Suddenly, I’m far more interested in Nguyen’s filmography: I can gather a sense of direction from it, and I hope that his next project will keep going even further in that direction.