TIFF Shocker: Isabelle Huppert is "Perverse" Again

I like to start my film festivals with an atypical choice just to get the globe-trotting adventures rolling. So my first screening at TIFF, which I drunkenly forgot the name of the night before --  "Undefebeatable?" "Indestructafeated" -- was a mixed martial arts 'ultimate fighting' movie. I don't only watch movies about actresses, people! Those are just the ones I like best is all. I chased the MMA fighters with some Romanian actressing and French perversity... although it was more like Romanian Actress Perversity (Lhuminita) AND French Actress Perversity (Huppert - who else?)

So basically this was me settling in with each movie on Day One.

Movies make me feel goooooooood.

UNBEATABLE
In many ways Dante Lam's mixed martial arts fighting movie is just one giant wheel of cheese. It's a wheel of cheese so big I was reminded fo the cheez-it commercial as it rolls through Hunnan, Beijing, Macau and into Hong Kong before it slams into its bone crunching finales.  The movie never met a plot advancing montage it didn't like and there's a lot of plot so cue the music again! (I may never be able to hear "The Sound of Silence" without shuddering at the ways its egregiously deployed here and the incongruous things it accompanies.)

Eddie Peng & Nick Cheung are trainee and coach in Unbeatable

Yet despite these deal breakers, the only thing broken is a few bones but no spoilers! The movie totally works and that's largely due to its character focus even though it clearly knows how to stage and film a fight scene, something that too few action movies can claim. Nick Cheung headlines as a one time shady boxing champ who has fallen so far in life that he can't shake the name "Scumbag" even though he's become a decent guy. Taiwanese Canadian actor Eddie Peng is his young fiercely committed protege and the film. Their chemistry is so great that they can even pull off a really funny winking scene about the latent homoeroticism of wrestling without making you hate them The acting from the supporting players is broad, sure, but vivid. The actress playing a young girl Scumbag befriends (I can't find her name) gets some of the best scenes and a really great final moment -- "Come stomp on me!" which makes playful make-believe violence into affection. And also accurately describes both the movies love of its genre and the masochistic impulses of the MMA set. Unbeatable isn't really unbeatable as movies go but it is not remotely unenjoyable. B

CHILD'S POSE
Romania's great actress Lhuminita Gheorghiu (The Death of Mr Lazarescu, 4 Months3 Weeks and 2 Days) has a doozy of a role in Child's Pose. Her character Cornelia, is a rich and smug society wife. Cornelia is rarely seen without a drink in one hand and a stubby cigarette in the other and she still has hands free for figuratively greasing palms around town, or literally greasing down her son's back in one provocative scene. Let's just say that she seems to be a spiritual film cousin to Angelica Huston's Lily in The Grifters. One might derisively and accurately refer to Cornelia as "a piece of work."

This fine Romanian picture (is there another kind?) won the Golden Bear in Berlin earlier this year and is now the country's Oscar submission for the upcoming Foreign Film race. The best thing about Child's Pose, aside from Lhuminita's intense gripping star turn, might be the way it so thoroughly isn't what it keeps seeming to be. Cornelia is the anti-hero of this fine Romanian picture (is there another kind?) a woman who will stop at nothing to keep her son from being held responsible for a car accident which killed a young boy. But to the movie's credit she doesn't appear to be at first (when your sympathies are with her, or at least warily near her - she's not exactly a warm presence) and doesn't quite remain so even after her often heinous behavior. It's a slippery thorny picture, forcing you to observe lots of ugly situations, and confront relatable if unpleasant emotions as it shapeshifts subtly from biting satire about the entitlement of wealth, to really uncomfortable family drama, to tense bureaucratic police procedural. It finally comes crashing head on into the ugly truth, the very thing Cornelia is most eager to swerve around. B+

Isabelle Huppert as Maud as Catherine Breillat in Abuse of Weakness

ABUSE OF WEAKNESS
I still have psychic scars from Catherine Breillat's breakthrough Romance (1999) though I tried not to hold that against her when viewing her latest. Abuse of Weakness is an indulgent autobiographical picture of sorts though Catherine is now going by "Maud". Contrary to what any synopsis and the film's first couple of reels suggest the picture is not really about the director's physical illness, but about a post-stroke relationship with a conman who fleeced her of all her money.

The film opens exceptionally well with credits over white sheets which begin to move oddly, trouble broiling under the pristine surface. The camera moves until we're looking at cinema's great chilly ginger Isabelle Huppert, as Maud, writhing about naked and then very disconcertingly dropping to the floor, her body betraying her. The first few scenes reenact  Breillat's debilitating stroke and her physical therapy but the picture doesn't really get started until Maud falls for a true "character" she sees on television, Vilko (Kool Shen) telling her assistant that they just don't make actors like that. She invites the criminal to be the star of her new picture and they begin a friendship wherein he drops in repeatedly and begins to "borrow" money from her. He also repeatedly calls her "perverse" which Isabelle/Maud/Catherine obviously enjoy hearing said about them. Vilko is coldly hesitant to help her in and out of chairs and up and down stairs when she's physically struggling but he's right there with a helpful hand to hold down the checkbook while she scribbles on it.

This goes on and on until the film's finale a long virtual monologue though lawyers and children occassional egg Maud on in her own confession. Huppert nails it by underplaying, glassily admitting her own stupidity, and rewitnessing from afar what she just lived from afar, never quite "present" in her foolish decisions. Huppert's face is a marvel, trouble always broiling under its glassy surface. Abuse of Weakness has a fine beginning and a killer ending --  too bad there's no movie in the middle. It's all just a series of check-signings and a very vaguely observed relationship that's never truly examined by the protagonist living it or the director filming an actress reliving it. It's as if Breillat is determined to make the same mistakes all over again, botching her own would be exorcism. C

TIFF: Festive Arrivals & Frightening Omens

The signage that tempts me each time I walk from hotel to movie theaterDear Readers,

I am happy to report that I have arrived in Toronto. Wednesday night went smoothly (but for "Best Shot" posting -- delayed. My apologies!) though the long trip to get from the airport to my hotel and press office gave me shudders thinking about Monday night when salivation-worthy titles like August: Osage County & Under the Skin can't really be done unless I miss my flight. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

After arrival had yum dinner with Amir who I think you'll agree is doing a bang up job organizing those "Team Experience" events each month. We then hit a "welcome to TIFF" style critics party hosted by Calum Marsh with so many great writers (fun putting faces to bylines) that I probably shouldn't name any because I'll leave someone awesome out. But you should follow me on twitter for more of that sort of thing.

The topic was so often "what are you planning to see?" which should be the easiest question when you hit a festival but had me flustered each time because I keep changing my schedule. I always tried the safest answer "well, I'm starting with..." but then kept forgetting the title of the movie "Undefebeatable" "Indestructabeatable?"

It's my first time. Be gentle.

Isn't it a beauty? That's the press pass. I consider it a very good omen that snatching it upon arrival was easy as can be. And that it's both green and purple, which are literally my two favorite colors and the ones I always wear (though not at the same time because that's too Arkham Asylum).

But just as I was feeling super confident and excited for the festival, I saw this:

Two of the three Oscars won by Crash (Best Picture and Best Screenplay) prominently displayed at the Festival HQ. Ill omens! O Canada... nobody wants to be reminded of that! The festival is also celebrating David Cronenberg this year but sadly his is not the Crash we're talking about. 

First Round of Movies Next!

Wanna Help Me Plan My TIFF Schedule?

I am pleased to report that I'll be covering TIFF for the first time since (gulp)... I don't even want to talk about how long it's been though I love that city dearly. TIFF has been kind enough to grant me accreditation but because the news came so late i've only been able to carve out about 4½ days for movie watching. I'll cram in as many movies as I can. Amir will also be there to help bring you TIFF festivities. If it goes well this year, we'll carve out 7 to 10 days next year. How's that? Have you looked at their massive slate? Which movies are you most excited to read about? 

Gurus of Gold Begins

What will Oscar love this year? It's the question that never quite leaves the mind of the Oscar fanatic. Especially not this time of year when the bulk of the baity films are about to reveal themselves at festivals and on movie screens. August is practically the last moment of "anything could happen" dreaming. Reality (or whatever passes for it in the land of Loud Opinions) is about to set in.

So it's a perfect time for the Gurus of Gold to begin. This long running group of key awards pundits, assembled by David Poland at Movie City News has a new member this year. Me. I'm truly grateful for the honor of a place at that table.

To "set the field" we were asked to submit our top fifteen (unranked) assumptions about which films might be Best Picture bound. My fifteen won't be difficult for you to guess since they're there on TFE's Updated Best Picture Chart but here is the Guru chart. The joy of group punditry is investigating where consensus emerges and where pundits are out on limbs alone. For instance, I'm the only Guru that named Ridley Scott's The Counselor as a Best Picture possibility and I don't have much company at all when it comes to Dallas Buyers Club either. Spike Jonze's Her, JC Chandor's All is Lost, and Bennett Miller's Foxcatcher, all featured in my top ten (not just my top fifteen) don't seem to be inspiring consensus opinion in terms of Best Picture heat either. As for the consensus titles that I'm cooler on than the almost all the other Gurus, that'd be Monuments Men (the trailer worried me) and Inside Llewyn Davis (I just don't see how the Coen Bros can hit gold every time) but I have good company in doubting those with Pete Hammond and Mark Harris, respectively.

12 Years a Slave was one of only 3 films to receive 14 of 15 votes

What'cha think? The Gurus of Gold chart (as well as my own) will invariably be shaken up by TIFF the festival that always changes everything by way of "First!"

UPDATED OSCAR CHARTS RIGHT HERE
Picture | Director | Actress | Actor | Supporting Actress | Supporting Actor

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Housekeeping Note: I'm running very late today so if you're planning to join us for tonight's "Hit Me" on The Bad and the Beautiful, you have extra time. My post probably won't go up until tomorrrow at noon.

EW First look at Kit Harington in Pompeii. Someone's been working out in their off duty moments on that dull wintry wall. 
The Dissolve remembers the great writer Elmore Leonard (RIP) with an indepth conversation about his rich cinematic legacy
CHUD first look at Steve Carell in Foxcatcher - i can't wait to see this movie. He's such a strong dramatic actor despite his comedic fame
IndieWire lists the 4 million films showing at TIFF this year 
Vulture on the exciting young world of TV criticism 

Cinema Blend rumors suggest that it's Elizabeth Olsen who'll get the Scarlet Witch role in The Avengers: Age of Ultron. I'm proprietary about Quicksilver & Scarlet Witch and this idea doesn't upset me so... good news!
MNPP puckers up for Tom Sturridge -On the Road is now on DVD and Olivier Assayas Sils Maria is next
Empire Beautiful cast lining up for the adaptation of the best-seller Dark Places, a drama about a woman who survived a Satanic massacre, with Charlize Theron headlining and Nicholas Hoult, Corey Stoll and Christina Hendricks supporting
i09 has a Fall Movie Guide for 20 upcoming genre films. Summer is forever. 
Huffington Post Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner may marry after 42 years together  
/Film on the tight focus of Edgar Wright's Ant Man. In other words: yet another origin story. Does no one believe in 'In Media Res' anymore? Did the world learn nothing from 1977's Star Wars? Skip to chapter 4 people! Let the audience catch up. The last thing the world needs is another origin story. In this way the superhero genre is just as dull as the biopic, with their obsession with This Caused This! How Things Came To Be

Exit Video ...here's a cute video of iconic and funny t-shirts from the movies! Which bring back the most memories?