REVIEW: TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL, THE - PART THREE

Festival Fury: The 2004 Toronto International Film Festival

Part Three: Darkest Europe

From midnight and through Asia, we're working counterclockwise back across the globe. Or something like that. Of course, it's lazy and ludicrous to simply categorize all the films below as 'European', since each represents a very specific culture and viewpoint. It's only the need for some brute-force categorization that I stooped to breaking this roster up into continents in the first place. Don't look at this lineup as some kind of 'new Euro cinema' manifesto or anything.

I can't even say that what's below represents a significant cross-section of the European films at the festival. It is a pretty good selection, though, and there are a few things here that I really hope people get a chance to see. Chief among them is the harrowing A Hole In My Heart, which Newmarket has picked up for distribution some time in 2005. Apparently they felt two Lukas Moodysson films (they also handled Lilja 4-Ever) would balance out one Passion of the Christ. Nice try guys, but not by a long shot.

The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things

(2004, UK, Asia Argento)

There's no better way to wake up then with a morning screening of Asia Argento's trashy Scarlet Diva follow-up. The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things is billed as a powerful shocker, but Argento often confuses portrait and caricature, and the film wavers between poles of truth and titillation.

Working with scribe Alessandro Magania, Asia has fashioned a brash road movie out of a collection of short stories by J.T. LeRoy. The director stars as Sarah, a bottle-blonde burnout who appears one day to rescue her eight year old son Jeremiah from his caring foster parents. On the drug-fueled ride that follows, Dario's daughter turns tricks and shacks up with an endless succession of lowlife father figures. Her emotions for Jeremiah run explosively hot and cold, forging a bond of spoiled love between them.

The movie isn't as nasty or (thankfully) as bad as Scarlet Diva, but I quickly realized that after A Hole In My Heart, nothing Asia did could graze me. I shrugged off a belt beating, and gamely accepted mother and son chugging pills together. Not until Jeremiah is counseled by a frighteningly earnest Winona Ryder did I shudder in revulsion.

No doubt, though, there's plenty of material here to cause a stir among audiences. Besides the explicit drug use and constant verbal and physical abuse, there's Sarah's own sexual life, and the relationship her boyfriends develop with Jeremiah.

Sometimes these stained liaisons are genuinely powerful and worth playing out. One of the strongest sequences occurs when Sarah enjoys a whirlwind marriage and the happy couple abandon Jeremiah to an empty house during the honeymoon. He responds by trashing the place out of boredom, drawing disturbing pictures on the walls as Argento layers a searing Sonic Youth instrumental onto the soundtrack.

Then there's another boyfriend, played by Marilyn Manson, who finds himself on the wrong side of Jeremiah's gender confusion and ability to manipulate. Argento plays the distressing result with a sense tenderness and pity for both boy and man. Both scenes are effective and truly disturbing, but they stand out among the routine litany of nasty relationships that feel in contrast like mere exploitation.

In her favor, Argento really seems to be taking this story seriously. Her compassion for Sarah is evident, and at times she's able to cut into the depths of desperate love that bind the mother/son duo together.

But scenes where Sarah spews vitriol balance every moment of clarity. For example, instead of drawing her parents in any realistic light, they're presented as a pair of Pentecostal emotional wrecks. As played by Peter Fonda and Ornella Muti, they barely register as more than caricatures. And Argento takes every opportunity to mock 'normals', society and religion, diluting her exploration of the ties between Sarah and Jeremiah.

With Sarah's drugged gaze and Asia's inability to distinguish between useless and worthwhile targets, the film just felt to me like The Courtney Love Story. What delicious irony, then, that she's slated to appear in Gus Van Sandt's Cobain-inspired Last Days in exactly that role. Still, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things is a dramatic step up from Scarlet Diva, so I'll hold out hope for Asia yet.

Innocence

(2004, France, Lucile Hadzihalilovic)

A coffin is carried gently through large wooden doorways, into a sparsely furnished yet comfortable dormitory. As a handful of young girls surround the container, the lid is removed to reveal Iris, a pretty girl perhaps five years old. She's assisted out, given bows for her hair, and welcomed into an alien new world. With that inexplicable introduction, Innocence introduces a vision of life at a baffling girls' school somewhere in France.

The film is the second feature from Lucile Hadzihalilovic, lately known more for the infamy of her partner, Irrèversible director Gaspar Noè. It would be easier to disregard that connection if this film was not also intrigued by the effects of time, and if it had been shot by someone other than Irreversible (and Calvaire) cameraman Benoît Debie.

But this is a very different inquiry into sexuality and time. Girls at the school are ranked by age, as indicated by the color of their bows. Seemingly brought against their will, the students are separated into a handful of dorm houses with little adult contact. Days are spent studying dance and other subjects, and enjoying the lush grounds.

At night, the eldest of each house walks a path up to a looming mansion. What goes on there is the subject of unbreakable secrecy, and Iris becomes preoccupied with the mystery to the exclusion of all else. Channeling the spirit of films such as Picnic At Hanging Rock, each scene and layer of ambiguity compounds a looming sense of a dangerously impending sexuality.

Each step in the girls' education seems to be one closer to the door into maturity, but the impenetrable walls and strict rules of the school imply that adulthood is perilous ground. Hadzihalilovic infuses her images with blankets of light and impossible greenery, which contrast with stark interiors and that improbable wall defining the property. A certain tension builds even as plot details are left vague, so that like Hanging Rock, much of Innocence can remain a blank state for each viewer's insecurities.

And yet I couldn't shake the feeling that Hadzihalilovic is indulging her own fantasies of childhood at the audience's expense. Lingering shots of naked pre-teens are tinged with perhaps too much fondness, and the film's conclusion is woefully trite. The final scene explodes in the only way that an exuberant meeting between teenage boys and girls can, and all the dense mystery of the past ninety minutes flies away like lost youth.

After The Day Before

(2004, Hungary, Attila Janisch)

I'd never thought of Eastern Europe this way, but apparently Hungary is at the end of the world. Or part of it is, at least, as a man wandering the countryside discovers. Dressed in a suit, a nameless man is dropped off in the back country, where he's inherited a mysterious farmhouse. On a borrowed a bicycle, he pedals over hills and along dirt roads, encountering impenetrable characters and glimpses of his own nature. Warned not to follow the path to its literal terminus, the man nonetheless finds himself at a chasm -- the end of the world.

The story is told in fits and starts, through disconnected flashbacks and jumps forward with only the barest clues to establish a 'real' timeline. In its best moments, After The Day Before captures the ghostly uncertainty of Don't Look Now. Every character feels dangerous, and most are, because they keep their motivations and alliances very private.

A woman and her daughter separately confide in the man that the other is trying to kill her. A decaying mill serves as local watering hole, complete with glaring, dangerous locals. And a middle-aged farmer beats his son before chasing the girl he catches the boy sleeping with. Very little is graphic, but the fierce intensity of each act, combined with the disarmingly golden landscape makes dread inescapable.

Like David Lynch in his best moments, this is a furtive glimpse into a barbaric, yet absurdly logical form of rural life. As an outsider, the man (and the audience) has little hope of decoding the actions of these guarded, violent people.

That's where the murder comes in.

As seemingly unrelated incidents begin to revolve around each other, we learn that a girl has been killed. The circumstances are unknown, as is nearly everything about her, and the people she knew. I wish it were otherwise, but this single act becomes the focal point for every bit of strangeness in the story, leading straight from ambiguity to concrete reality.

As a thriller, After The Day Before is far too unfocused to be effective. The disjointed narrative never built enough steam to carry me past the notion that the dead girl was simply the easiest way to justify the film's more dreamlike indulgences. But remove the routine plot, and the meandering pace would be more than enough to sustain itself. As it is, the conclusion is so obvious that the oppressive ambiance finally becomes just silly, because there's nothing left to hide.

Les Revenants

(2004, France, Robin Campillo)

Combine the phrases 'art film' and 'zombie holocaust' and for some people the result is 28 Days Later. For others, it's Les Revenants. This film is, among many other things, certainly high on the list of strange zombie movies, particularly because it's not really a zombie movie at all. Instead, let's call the film's inhabitants the 'not-dead'.

In a nameless French city, these not-dead are slowly streaming back into town. Like an audience from a senior PGA tournament, they trudge in wearing white and pastels, blankly gazing forward. The French do not know what to do about this. No one knows why the dead are back among the living, and it doesn't really matter. More pressing matters dominate: where to keep them, how to give them jobs, and what to do when a relative long thought dead is once again sitting on your couch.

Early on, it's easy to read the film as an allegory for nearly any large-scale social problem you care to choose. That's a cool concept, like putting some of Dawn Of The Dead's ideas through a refinery. Over time, though, Les Revenants becomes smaller, more personal. It peers into the personal horror of a couple whose resurrected child still seems to be quite dead and wonders if a man at the end of his life would reunite with the wife whose passing he'd finally accepted.

As the scope narrows, the art-zombie influence recedes, leaving a well-crafted exploration of emotional currents. Until the final act, that is, when a pseudo-movement among the returned leads the not-dead to make some unexpected moves. I'm not talking about a Romero Rebellion; rather it's a fitting way to bring the story back around to deal with the dead once our grip on reality has stretched a bit. With the not-dead premise constantly threatening to go over the top or become maudlin, Les Revenants makes it all work without feeling gimmicky or cheap.

One extra note: after sitting though several dozen films in a small time span, it's impossible not to tune into and isolate the themes and atmosphere that run as strands through the whole experience. As the first film I caught in the festival, Les Revenants augured a paradoxically dreamlike and insistent form of reality that would also be found in films like Innocence, After The Day Before and Vital. Then again, it's probably digging to call that a trend - maybe I just like to see dreamy flicks.

A Hole In My Heart

(2004, Sweden/Denmark, Lukas Moodysson)

Every year, there's one film that utterly polarizes audiences. Baise Moi and Irreversible have done it in the past, and many probably assumed this year that Catherine Breillat's Anatomy Of Hell would be the film with unrivalled power to provoke audience walkouts.

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This is the movie you challenge friends to see. It's confrontational, juvenile, memorable, and amazingly audacious. But Moodysson backs up his audacity with a fearless command of subject and imagery, and A Hole In My Heart grew to become my favorite film of the festival.

Set almost entirely in a dingy Swedish apartment, the film inhabits three rooms occupied by the slovenly Rickard and his withdrawn son Eric. Rickard and his friend Geko fancy themselves amateur pornographers, but their so-called studio (the flat's living room) doesn't even rate as pathetic. Nonetheless the pair find an enthusiastic starlet named Tess, and they endeavor to make a film as Eric drowns out their noise with inhumanly abrasive music.

At first, the trio is enthusiastic. In one of the film's many video confessionals, Tess can hardly contain her excitement about the film. An early scene reveals that she's keen enough about porn to have had surgery to reshape her labia, and if repeated close-ups of genital surgery don't sound appealing, this is your first warning.

But the project is riding on the barest shreds of humanity, and it goes south quickly. Geko falls asleep while performing a scene, and the domination and submission evident in so much porn quickly finds a home in Rickard's living room. Disgusted by his father, Eric withdraws into himself, but finds himself unable to ignore Tess.

Even the barest communication is difficult, however. All four are completely adrift in themselves, without a shred of culture, family or history to cling to. Their identities are unhinged: Rickard, Tess and Geko define themselves in terms of empty entertainment, while Eric is left hollow by a fierce desire to be severed from existence. They express themselves in lies and posturing, through pleading and games of dominance, and by role playing with anatomically incorrect action figures.

Still, exuding from every character is a palpable desire for something more. Tess and Eric find solace in quiet moments together, and Geko and Rickard break down in each other's arms after an intense set of revelations. Ever clueless, Geko counsels the wayward father on bonding with Eric. Take him to a shooting range, he says. That's what my pop did with me. Taking that advice to heart, Rickard creates a makeshift target stand in the living room, where they fire at a headless centerfold.

Nudity aside, the sex could be more graphic, but the film is built on a frank openness about desire and pornography that feels more taboo than any intercourse. Moodysson's synthesis of images pushes his conception of physical boundaries into uncharted territory, making the sex implicitly cruel. The threat of violence creates a constant anxiety, and events culminate in an orgy of food and fluids that's far more difficult to watch than rape.

But the concepts of family and need central to Moodysson's ideas are so smartly expressed through the graphic images that nothing feels arbitrary. Once the initial shock faded, I found myself constantly coming back to the moments where the barest spark jumped between any two people. That tiny light redeems a lot.

Watching A Hole In My Heart is like being fed fistfuls of scorched earth, but as horrible as that sounds, it's a fantastic film. I'll never forget the 97 minutes I spent watching it, even if I desperately wanted to be anywhere else for many of them. Lukas Moodysson has instantly redefined cinematic excess and boldness, but not without offering something utterly unique in return.

Off Beat

(2004, Germany, Hendrik Hölzemann)

In the German city of Cologne, Crash ("It's just a nickname") is an ambulance driver notorious for his crying jags and constant talking. The victim of a childhood car accident, this kid has immunity to bad luck, so he spends his time reviving junkies and carting drunks to the tank. During one run, one of the junkies dies, leaving behind a gorgeous, very pregnant girlfriend named November.

Off Beat is representative of what new German film is becoming -- colorful and vibrant, though tainted by a refusal to fully succumb to fantasy. This is an occasionally inventive film where unlikely stereotypes collide (sometimes messily) and memories and dreams infringe on reality. Even so, Off Beat definitely resides in a slightly dingy reality, where newlywed couple and their family violently argue, 20somethings party desperately, and the suicidal can't always be talked down.

There is a problem, though; Off Beat's achilles heel is the very character it tries to sell. I could never buy Crash as proffered: a good-looking, sensitive victim/guardian angel living in a trashy yet hip pad with his homebuilt skate ramp out back? Er, no. That's more like a letter to Seventeen Forum, assuming there was such a thing. "You must think most of these letters are made up, but this absolutely happened to me when I met Crash…"

That's too bad, because when Crash can simply be himself, he's actually a pretty great character. Matthias Schweighöfer is likable and can project that sensitive enthusiasm that makes girls cry. But when he's able to do so without also having to brood on a skateboard in the rain after saving a puppy, things are fine. Crash and November (Jessica Schwarz) make one of the few genuinely sexy couples I've seen onscreen in a while, though that may just be the pregnant sex talking.

There's also an able supporting cast in the form of Crash's ambulance co-pilots. Richie (Florian Lukas) is the skinny speed-freak, and Fido (Jan Gregor Kremp) the aging mainstay on the verge of his own family crisis. When serving as deliberate foils, the two come off forced and stereotypical, but when given their own breathing room, each driver helps to define Crash's own limitations. (And if anyone can tell me what the hell Fido's mom is making in one scene, I'd be really happy. Is that really a raw meat sandwich?)

Some of the film's gimmicks almost work, such as the rooftop escapade and the imaginative defibrillation attempt. But when Crash's dreams are supposed to feel like angelic predestination, too often the impression is of an overbearing script infringing on life. Hölzemann has created some solid characters and a great backdrop, but by taking a couple steps back, he could really let Off Beat come back to life.

Downfall

(2004, Germany, Oliver Hirschbiegel)

This portrait of Hitler's final days has already received a lot of dumb press, so let's hope this falls on the smart side of the fence. Downfall tells exactly the story implied by the title, of the final weeks in Hitler's Berlin bunker as World War II drew to a close. The dumb press has centered on Bruno Ganz's portrayal of Hitler, or more specifically on the scenes in which the Führer is less than a raving psychopath. That Ganz is brilliant doesn't seem to matter, nor does the fact that the rest of the film is often as dull as a couple weeks in a concrete hole in the ground.

Of course, atrocities are ordered. As the allies approach and then take Berlin, concern for the populace is simply not in Hitler's plan. If they were stronger, he reasons, no one would be in this mess at all, so they do not have his pity. Similar madness is a continual theme as he raves about impossible troop movements, determined they can still pull the Reich's ass out of the fire.

No matter how human Ganz's Hitler may become, Downfall is ultimately still a historical picture more than a character study. Lengthy scenes imagine the military councils and endless meetings that must have filled each day in the bunker, and the film gives ample time to most of the figures associated with Hitler's last days.

Some of Hitler's ranking associates prove to be compelling in their own right. Goebbels and his family prove to be the most interesting, as the minister remains fanatically loyal. His wife dutifully follows, and their final scenes are crushing. Eva Braun gets her own fair share of attention, as she takes the role of cheerleader, traipsing through the tunnels as if nothing is wrong. When she organizes a disastrous dance party, you can't help but wince over her willful blindness.

Most of the film, however, is as dry as a textbook. The endless parade of characters ensures that most remain distant from the audience, making full involvement difficult. As commendable as a literal, intelligent portrayal of these days may be, the final moments remain a foregone conclusion, leaving only the cast to keep things interesting. With the audience kept away, they don't get that chance. Ganz and his close cohorts create a magnetic nucleus, but the rest of Downfall ignores their pull, flying off in an a different, much less compelling direction.

Five Children and It

(2004, UK, John Stephenson)

Thanks to Harry Potter, kids' movies are suddenly box office gold. Warner Brothers is floating on a sea of Potter merchandise, Paramount is pinning hopes on A Series Of Unfortunate Events, and now a true classic becomes grist for the mill. Yes, E. Nesbit's Five Children And It is now a fabulous feature film, with a cast of thousands (well, dozens) and the irrepressible vocal talents of Mr. Eddie Izzard bringing to life the title creature. It, that is.

On the eve of war, we join five children as they bid farewell to their father, soon to be a proud pilot for the RAF. Nine-year old Robert (Freddie Highmore) is particularly distraught, but pop hands him a compass and tells him everything will be fine. Mum sends the kids off to live in the mansion of eccentric uncle Albert where, despite the presence of their very strange cousin Horace, the kids quickly settle in. Not even a laundry list of chores and house rules can dampen Robert's spirit of exploration, and when Albert explicitly forbids playing in the greenhouse, the boy makes a beeline.

From the greenhouse, a passage leads to an unexpected beach, and that's where the kids meet It, a thousand-year old sand fairy. Though embodied by CGI that never quite gels with the surroundings, Eddie Izzard voices It with such imagination and dastardly conviction that the creature leaps off the screen. Realizing the creature can grant wishes, the children immediately wish away their chores.

And what sort of morality tale would this be if that wish simply came true? From the moment when the kids find an army of clones doing chores (and destroying the house in the process) it's a slow climb to understanding that with great power comes great responsibility. Er. Wrong fable. But you get the idea.

Popular as it is, E. Nesbit's story has of course been filmed before, by the BBC for a 1991 television series. I haven't seen that version, but it seems woefully cute and clean. Here, director John Stephenson hews closely to the tone of the Harry potter films, which means a few dark corners, some vaguely off-color moments, and the sense that Tim Burton is hiding somewhere just off-set.

Stephenson has even borrowed Kenneth Branagh and Zoë Wanamaker from the Potter series, and they do good work in this creaky manse. As the eccentric mathematician Albert, Branagh is both warm and cranky, and just volatile enough to be a strange foil for the impetuous Robert. Wanamaker, dressed down in Coke-bottle glasses, adds a bit of bumbling good nature.

It's Izzard, though, that instantly shines. Equal parts raconteur, zen master and used car salesman, his loaded accents sets It apart from all competition except Willy Wonka. He's got that Wonka deviousness, and I immediately wished that Izzard could have been tapped for The Cat In The Hat instead of whomever that guy was who played him.

With such a solid cast to back up the kids, it's a tremendous disappointment that they're so uneven. Freddie Highmore is all over the map, and in general, the group doesn't feel much like a family, even one under duress. It's a weakness the film can't overcome, and watching Five Children and It feels like cheering for a baseball team with great pitching and no rotation.

That being the case, I've got to put this one in the same column as movies like Shadow of the Vampire. Much as Willem Dafoe's work lifted that otherwise listless exercise, Eddie Izzard is justification enough for catching this one.

The Sea Inside

(2004, Spain/France/Italy, Alejandro Amenábar)

When people see Alejandro Amenábar's name in front of The Sea Inside, many are going to flash back to The Others, and immediately draw unwarranted conclusions. But this is nothing like Nicole Kidman's foray into horror. Based on the true story of Ramon Sampedro, a man who fought for the right to die with dignity after being paralyzed from the neck down, The Sea Inside delicately questions the morality of euthanasia. Is life a right, or an obligation?

Though there's an inescapable current of sentiment and even melodrama here, The Sea Inside smartly explores the same terror of empty life that has lurked in the director's other films. As Sampedro, Javier Bardem is brilliant, allowing us to see not only the man's pride and intelligence, but his tightly concealed embarrassment at living paralyzed and bedridden.

A talented writer and devoted family member, it's not depression that has sent Sampedro into a suicidal spin. Instead, it's a practical sort of fatalism that breeds a desire for death. This man is the center of his family, he also has a strong sway over others. We see this in his relationship with Rosa (Lola Duenas), a depressed radio host, and more dramatically with Julia (Belen Rueda), a lawyer hired to bring Sampedro's request for death before a judge. But he sees in his ruined body an inability to experience life, making his continued existence a drain on his family and society.

It's to the film's credit that Sampedro's desire to live doesn’t miraculously reappear as his relationship with Julia deepens. Instead, their affair becomes a particularly powerful method for discussing an often taboo subject. (I could say that this is simple fidelity to the real story, but I have no idea whether that is actually true.)

With this movie, Amenábar pulls off a notable feat. Not only does he handle a treacherous subject with care; he also manipulates a fierce desire for death into one of the most life-affirming stories I've seen. Through Bardem, The Sea Inside makes a compelling argument for putting life in the hands of the individual. That he accomplishes all this without diving headfirst into a pit of treacle and Hallmark sentiment makes The Sea Inside all the more valuable.

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