Reviews - Page 88

Giving you our points of view on the latest docs in release and on the circuit.

Review: ‘Animus Animalis (a story about People, Animals and Things)’

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Animus Animalis (a story about People, Animals and Things) (Lithuania, 69 minutes) Dir: Aiste Žegulyte Programme: Animal Magnetism (North American Premiere) In a series of vignettes, humans interact with animals. Hunters kill and butcher a deer, taxidermists preserve carcasses while museum patrons and staff interact with stuffed animals in exhibitions. But Animus Animalis (a story about People, Animals, and Things) is less concerned with the animals in its title, and more concerned with how humans interact with them when they die. Aiste Žegulyte’s latest film is a fascinating subversion of an anthropocentric gaze. It privileges human experiences despite a focus on animals,

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Review: ‘The Magic Life of V’

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The Magic Life of V (Finland, 85 minutes) Dir. Tonislav Hristov Programme: World Showcase (Canadian Premiere) The Magic Life of V opens with V, the original character created by Veera, who is headed to a live-action roleplay (LARP) camp. In the Harry Potter-esque world, V and fellow LARPers don cloaks and chant spells. But Veera, breaking character, struggles emotionally. Tied to her character is her real-life trauma, and despite the fantasy of her situation, Veera’s memories are being brought up. Persevering, V participates in a ritual to expel her negative memories, to emerge healed and stronger. Moving away from the LARP camp, Tonislav Hristov’s

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Review: ‘Campo’

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Campo (Portugal, 100 minutes) Dir. Tiago Hespanha Programme: Animal Magnetism (North American Premiere) Shot at the Alcochete firing range, one of the largest military bases in Europe, Campo presents a mix of contradictions. Showing soldiers as they train, as well as the animal life that surrounds them, Tiago Hespanha overlays his film with a philosophical narration which draws on creation myths, while grappling with the central conflict of the word “campo”: in Latin, it means both a field where animals are raised as well as where soldiers are trained. Bringing together the etymological tension of the term with the real-life contrast of

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Review: ‘Merata: How Mum Decolonised the Screen’

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Merata: How Mum Decolonised the Screen (New Zealand, 88 min.) Dir. Hepi Mita Programme: Artscapes (Canadian Premiere) In cinema around the world, there’s a fair and long overdue demand to see more women and people of colour behind the camera. In Canada, there’s an especially strong urgency to create space for Indigenous voices and ensure that the original inhabitants of this land have the opportunity to tell stories about their cultures and histories. While Merata: How Mum Decolonised the Screen isn’t a Canadian doc, it features a fair bit of Canadian content and provides another great example of how Australia and Zealand

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Review: ‘Killing Patient Zero’

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Killing Patient Zero (Canada, 98 min.) Dir. Laurie Lynd Programme: Special Presentations (World Premiere) “People who are young do not understand in any real way, even if they know the fact, that homosexuality was against the law,” says author and activist Fran Leibowitz in Killing Patient Zero. “It was against the law—not just that your parents didn’t like you or people you went to school with didn’t like you. It was actually a crime.” Leibowitz makes an emphatic point in the introductory of Killing Patient Zero that encapsulates the pervasive homophobia that allowed the AIDS crisis to devastate the gay community while the powers that

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Review: ‘The Sound of Masks’

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The Sound of Masks (South Africa/Portugal, 70 min.) Dir. Sara CF de Gouvei Programme: Artscapes (North American Premiere) The Sound of Masks is a wicked cool arts doc about the power of dance. It’s a story of resistance and of keeping cultural identity alive through the arts as director Sara CF de Gouvei spotlights one man, Atanásio Nyusi, and his devotion to preserving Mozambique’s anti-colonial history through dance. Nyusi’s passion is Mapiko, a form of masked dance from Makonde culture that involves telling stories and sharing history through artistic expression. The film, one of the better works to screen at the

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Review: ‘The Disappearance of My Mother’

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The Disappearance of My Mother (Italy, 95 min.) Dir. Beniamino Barrese Programme: Made in Italy (Canadian Premiere) It would be easy to dismiss ahead of time Beniamino Barrese’s portrayal of his mother, the iconic model and activist Benedetta Barzini, as a strangely oedipal fascination that lacks any outward perspective. Yet we’re instead treated to a unique look at a subject who, for very compelling reasons, is reticent to have cameras pointed at her, aware like few others of the power of the lens to manipulate and obfuscate in equal measure. Barzini’s story is in itself fascinating – far more than

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Review: ‘Shooting the Mafia’

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Shooting the Mafia (Ireland, 94 min.) Dir. Kim Longinotto Programme: Artscapes (Canadian Premiere) Kim Longinotto turns her lens on Letizia Battaglia, an 83-year-old photographer who helped document the violence that has plagued her native Sicily. As one of the first photojournalists to cover the brutal mafia wars, Battagliia has become a fixture in local society, praised for her outspoken nature and keen eye. Unfortunately, Longinotto’s own work seems jumbled and uncertain, and never fully comes to grips with a subject who is admittedly reticent to truly open up about her work and passions. Jumping from era to era, the film

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Review: ‘Midnight Traveler’

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Midnight Traveler (USA/Canada/Qatar/UK, 87 min.) Dir. Hassan Fazili Programme: World Showcase (Canadian Premiere) There are many stories to come out of the conflict in Afghanistan, and many more regarding the plight of refugees from areas of conflict, but few have been as harrowing and effective as Hassan Fazili’s Midnight Traveler. Shot over a period of years on mobile phones, it traces the Fazili family’s escape from their native country into Europe. What sets the story apart is that Fazili was forced to leave because of a film he made. This is the escape of a filmmaker because of an earlier film

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Review: ‘Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool’

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Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool (USA/UK, 113 min.) Dir. Stanley Nelson Programme: Special Presentations (International Premiere) No two-hour documentary could possibly contain the multitudes of Miles Davis’s talent, but as a general primer on the titanic talent, this PBS documentary does a decent enough job of introducing the performer to a wide audience. From son of a prominent dentist in East St. Louis to trumpeting in the clubs of Manhattan’s 52nd Street, the doc follows Davis as he dabbles in bop, sees his turn with the ground-breaking ensemble album that gives the film its title, as well as through the quintet

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