The following short reviews of films screening on Friday, Sept. 10 at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival are by James Bradshaw, Guy Dixon, Dave McGinn, Rick Groen, Liam Lacey and Gayle MacDonald. Star ratings are out of four.
The King's Speech
Tom Hooper (U.K./Australia)
4 STARS
Colin Firth excels as England’s shy, repressed, stammering monarch, George VI (aka “Bertie”), in a performance that’s deftly matched, syllable for syllable, by Geoffrey Rush as the monarch’s brash Aussie speech therapist. In this latest crowd-pleasing peek into palace life, some historical liberties are taken (did the king really need to learn how to drop F-bombs before leading his nation into the Second World War?). Supporting performances tend to be mischievous caricatures: Helena Bonham Carter as the king’s candy-addicted wife, Elizabeth; Guy Pearce as the sex-besotted abdicating monarch, Edward VIII; Timothy Spall as a gargoyle-like Churchill; Michael Gambon as the fierce George V; and Derek Jacobi as the wheedling Archbishop of Canterbury. Spoiler alert: England won the war. L.L.
Sept. 10, 6:30 p.m., Roy Thomson; Sept. 11, 12 p.m., Ryerson
Biutiful
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Spain/Mexico)
3 STARS
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Biutiful, the Mexican director's first project after his much-publicized breakup with former screenwriting partner Guillermo Arriaga (Amores Perros, 21 Grams and Babel) is an overdose of sorrow. Javier Bardem plays Uxbal, a petty criminal in Barcelona (without the famous architecture) working with Chinese importers and African street sellers to sell knock-off goods, and offering fake psychic readings to bereaved families. Almost scene by scene, Uxbal’s troubles increase – a diagnosis of prostate cancer, trying to care for his young son and daughter, dealing with his bipolar, promiscuous former wife, and his involvement in a shady scheme to import illegal Chinese immigrants. Ultimately Inarritu’s habit of melodramatic piling-on becomes wearying, but Bardem’s charisma and the poetic vitality of the street scenes create some breathing room in this overschematic script. L.L.
Sept. 10, 8 p.m., Winter Garden; Sept. 11, 9:30 a.m., AMC 6
Dhobi Ghat (Mumbai Diaries)
Kiran Rao (India)
3 STARS
Move over Bollywood, because India is going indie. More precisely, it's showing some early signs of returning to the auteur-driven sensibilities of a director like Satyajit Ray. Here, making her feature debut, Kiran Rao takes us to teeming Mumbai in the monsoon season, then glides fluidly through the urban strata embodied in her three principal characters – an affluent Indian-American woman with photographic ambitions; a dour artist with a troubled marital past; and a hunky laundry boy (a dhobi) keen to climb out of the slums and into the movies. Perched on their different rungs, each is looking up or down the social ladder and doing the same thing but from different motives: peering, either curiously or enviously, into the lives of others. As they do, the film means to be the cinematic answer to Suketu Mehta's book, Maximum City – that is, it wants to draw a vibrant portrait of Mumbai in all its cruel beauty. Wants to, and almost succeeds. R.G.
Sept. 10, 6 p.m., Elgin; Sept. 11, 8 p.m., Scotiabank 1; Sept. 18, 12 p.m., Bell Lightbox 1
Stone
John Curran (USA)
3 STARS
Does sin come naturally to human beings? That, and how to look to be forgiven for it, is at the heart of Stone, especially where crimes that never reach a courtroom are concerned. Edward Norton steals the show as Gerald (Stone) Creeson, a convict of eight years looking for freedom through his parole officer, Jack Mabry (Robert De Niro). Norton is thoughtful and clever, but reptilian and rough. As Mabry, De Niro grapples ably with his own demons, entangled with the efforts of Lucetta Creeson (Milla Jovovich), a seductive manipulator trying to spring her husband. This film isn’t without flaws: For example, its religious overtones, framed by the devout rituals of Jack’s wife Madylyn and squawked out over Christian radio, don’t quite strike the right chord. But it’s worth the price of admission to see Norton and De Niro sparring across a prison-house desk. J.B.
Sept. 10, 9 p.m., Elgin; Sept. 11, 2:30 p.m., Varsity 8; Sept. 18, 6 p.m., Ryerson
Route 132
Louis Bélanger (Canada)
3 STARS
