July 27, 2018

Welcome to TFCA Friday, a weekly round-up of film reviews and articles by TFCA critics.

Opening this Week

Angels Wear White (dir. Vivian Qu)

“Vivian Qu’s critical look at patriarchal structures in China and the way it manipulates women to turn on themselves” — Radheyan Simonpillai, NOW Magazine

“The question, in Qu’s excellent study, is whether one can hold on to one’s dignity in the face of such overpowering adversity” — Gilbert Seah, Toronto-Franco

The Bleeding Edge (dir. Kirby Dick)

“Exposé filmmaker Kirby Dick has given audiences another disturbing but entertaining and cautionary winner” — Gilbert Seah, Festival Reviews

Blindspotting (dir. Carlos López Estrada)

“Gentrification, police brutality, and the prison industrial complex are just some of the many, many talking points Blindspotting grapples with in ways that are intimate, insightful and wildly entertaining – but also frequently frustrating” — Radheyan Simonpillai, NOW Magazine

“Start-up culture, corporate branding, social media, the justice system … Blindspotting is eager to take them all on with style and wit, and it succeeds more often than not” — Barry Hertz, The Globe and Mail

“All of this adds up to a timely film about interracial fear and fascination” — Liam Lacey, Original-Cin

Generation Wealth (dir. Lauren Greenfield)

“Generation Wealth, as wild a ride as it starts out to be, offers a confused message to viewers living in a profoundly disquieting time” — Marc Glassman, POV Magazine

Mission: Impossible – Fallout (dir. Christopher McQuarrie)

“You can enjoy the moments (and clearly, audiences are doing exactly that), but on balance it’s not as interesting or engaging a Mission: Impossible movie as the last three” — Norm Wilner, NOW Magazine

“Cruise emerged from Fallout with only a broken ankle. And, it should be noted, the most thrilling, entertaining, stand-on-your-feet-this-is-bananas blockbuster in recent memory” — Barry Hertz, The Globe and Mail, including an interview with Simon Pegg, geek god

“The scenes are impressive, but as the train of stunt sequences rolls on, the machine-tooled “escapism” feels increasingly predictable” — Liam Lacey, Original-Cin

“Certain action scenes are nothing short of amazing” — Gilbert Seah, Festival Reviews

Our House (dir. Anthony Scott Burns)

“With a brief runtime and a script that doesn’t dig deep enough, both the drama and the scares are underserved” — Radheyan Simonpillai, NOW Magazine

“Doesn’t break any new ground… this well-intentioned film fails to scare audiences” — Gilbert Seah, Afro Toronto

Shock and Awe (dir. Rob Reiner)

“There have been a few other crusading-journalism movies since 1976 … but director Rob Reiner … remembers All the President’s Men the best. Occasionally he seems to lift scenes right out of it” — Kate Taylor, The Globe and Mail

“It’s no All the President’s Men, but it does pose the question as to the most detestable US President in history” — Gilbert Seah, Festival Reviews

“Unfolds with an almost self-parodying sequence of familiar “newspaper movie” moments: excitable phone calls, gathering around the breaking news on the television, inspiring speeches and meetings with salty-talking sources in bars” — Liam Lacey, Original-Cin

TIFF 2018

Barry Hertz breaks down the 2018 Gala / Special Presentation line-up, with a consideration about Through Black Spruce’s re-emerging controversy

Step Brothers Turns 10

In The Globe and Mail, Barry Hertz celebrates the movie that “changed the course of modern American comedy forever”