Thursday, September 15, 2016

tiff2016 - it's what we do

Orphan

Directed by : Arnaud des Pallieres
Starring : Adele Exarchopoulos, Gemma Arterton

Orphan is a character study of a young women's life told over four time periods as she reconciles a harsh upbringing with making amends for past behaviour.  This could have been so much more but it wasn't,  It's interesting to me, as the themes and structure of Orphan are so similar to Moonlight yet this fell so flat.  Nothing drew me in, nothing made me care.  Meh.

Christine

Directed by: Antonio Campos
Starring : Rebecca Hall

VERY powerful account of the life of Christine Chubbuck, a television reporter who committed suicide live on air in 1974.  Christine is a tightly wound reporter in a male dominated industry.  She's highly competitive, a perfectionist and a depressive.  These factors culminate to a most explosive boiling point and this film humanizes the life of someone who has become a sensationalized footnote in television news history.  Rebecca Hall is absolutely incredible portraying the troubled Christine - a woman we can all relate to in some way.  No one works as hard as us.  no one has as much integrity as we do, why is no one listening?!  Christine's mental health won't allow her to find reasonable answers or ways to cope with these feelings of loneliness and failure, and it's so very sad.

Una

Directed by: Benedict Andrews
Starring : Rooney Mara, Ben Mendelsohn

Based on the play Blackbird by David Harrower, Una tells the story of a young woman who, a decade later, tracks down the man who sexually assaulted her in search of answers.  The film had moments of intensity, and was extremely well acted by both Rooney and Ben, but it somehow missed the mark on being the powerhouse film I felt it could be.  Perhaps it was the translation from stage to screen - as their world became bigger we lost the intense focus I felt necessary to really tell this story.  Perhaps I was just too damn cold in that bloody theatre.  Either way, Una was solid but ultimately a disappointment.




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