TIFF2012 - Condensed Mayhem - Volume 10, Saved.

It was bound to happen.  A flop.  We were having such a great run - ten for ten before last night's screenings.  But why, why did the flop have to be this one?  Disappointment really is a four-letter word.

Arthur Newman
Colin Firth, Emily Blunt

Yup.  This one.  It was awful.  I liked the story well enough - a man, desperate, depressed and lonely fashions a new identity for himself and seeks a new life, finding along the way a similarly storied woman.  It had some fun bits - sexcapades with Colin & Emily! - but overall it was a story poorly told in spite of solid performances.  I wanted to like this so much, even watching I was talking to myself "well, this is a tender moment".  Well, no.  It was postured and fake.  Even the scenery was crap.  There are many things I don't want to see on screen and one of them is Colin Firth smoking a bong.  Nevermind that.  This one left us deflated but I suppose we were due for a stinker.  But why, why this one?

English Vinglish
Sridevi Kapoor, Priya Anand, Mehdi

And then came this. Wow.  Loved.  Every. Minute.  Loved.  Every. Thing.  The story, the colours, the message, the joy.  Telling the story of a belittled and insecure Indian housewife who enrolls in English classes to find her true self.  It was funny, charming, heartwarming and poignant.  I cried during most of this film, not because it was sad but because I fell in love with this woman - seen as a typical conservative wife and mom by her family she knows she can do more, be more, is more but she needs to prove it to herself before she can even believe it - and I felt her so much.  She does, and more, showing all of us that while we are not always what others think and see of us, it can only be up to us to show them.  And, in the classic Indian way, there were dance numbers!

50/50 ain't too bad.

Today it's a three-fer.  Epic time & space travel, sex addiction and vampires.  And I'm late ... Ah, TIFF.

TIFF is mainly about standing in line.