TFS Essential
The romantic comedy has been dead for a long time. Numerous autopsies – most recently, Christopher Orr’s much discussed piece in The Atlantic – have provided a range of theories speculating the cause of the rom-com’s creative rigor mortis. Blame is assigned to a lack of willing (or good) stars, the decline of the genre’s box-office potential, problematic representations of women, or screenwriters’ increasingly inane plot conceits. Those factors do bear responsibility, but I’ve always felt the malignancy is something far more fundamental: romantic comedies have inexplicably forgotten about the romance. Filmmakers no longer bother to invest any time in...
I was in my early teens when I was first introduced to the unbelievable phenomenon that is Dirty Dancing. It was the early ’90s, about five years after the film actually came out in 1987. I watched it on television and found myself mesmerized by it in a way that I’d never experienced with any other film before, and few films since. At the time, I was at the very start of my adolescence, so to me, the film was a romance, and a dance film, and little else. On that first viewing, I missed the fact that this film...
Last month, while standing in an interminable holiday rush line at Shopper’s Drug Mart, I was confronted by one of those stand-up cardboard displays meant to tempt a last second impulse buy. The cynicism with which I would typically greet such a crass commercial come on instantly melted away when I saw what the come on was for – the stop-motion animated classic Holiday specials of the late ’60s and early ’70s of creative team Arthur Rankin, Jr. and Jules Bass. With DVDs on offer of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, The Little Drummer Boy, Frosty the Snowman, and Santa...
TFS Essentials is a column we do every month that brings you a film or an element of filmmaking that we feel is “essential”. Somehow during our November pitch meeting I managed to get saddled with a column in which I talk about Christmas movies. Now, it is important to note that I am not a big fan of Christmas. My family is fairly fractured and when we get together, it’s basically just to exchange presents (read: things we do not need to give one another but do so anyway because it is the custom). We barely see each other...
(ed. note: Katarina Gligorijevic continues her thorough look at Hong Kong cinema and what’s considered essential viewing to start off your education in the genre. For Part One, wherein she looks at kung fu films and the masters of martial arts, look here.) Heroic Bloodshed and Gangster Style “Call this section John Woo and the action revolution,” Colin jokes. “No wait, John Woo and Heroic Bloodshed. Actually, Heroic Bloodshed and Gangster Style.” We’ve already discussed A Better Tomorrow, but Colin returns to the film to put John Woo into context within the larger HK gangster genre. “A Better Tomorrow kickstarted...
I sit at the kitchen table waiting patiently for my husband (TIFF Programmer, Kung Fu Fridays founder, and Hong Kong movie mega-fan Colin Geddes) to answer my not-so simple question: what are the essentials of Hong Kong cinema? “Essential Hong Kong cinema is such a broad topic,” he muses. “It’s just like saying “what are the essentials of American cinema. It’s a cinema that’s lasted like, a hundred years. So where do you start?” “Before even beginning to make a list of must-see Hong Kong films, let’s consider the cultural context. There are many films that are important in Hong...
As a rabid fan of the horror genre, I can honestly say that there is nothing more satisfying than when someone gets it right. You see, horror comes in many flavours from slasher flicks with lots of blood to tense thrillers with lots of jump scares to terrifying supernatural events to flesh rending zombies. As with any genre, there are good examples and bad examples, but horror is unique in its ability to use its medium to make a point; to truly send home a message. Where a drama will deliver its message set against the circumstances of real life,...
After all of the clamour that followed the announcement of surprise contender Silver Linings Playbook winning the coveted People’s Choice Award at this year’s TIFF, I thought it might be worthwhile to check out yet another People’s Choice winner that’s kind of dropped off the radar since it took home the trophy in 1995. Antonia’s Line is by no means a wallflower of a film. Not only was it the darling of several prominent film festivals that year, but it also received the Best Foreign Film trophy at the 1996 Academy Awards, yet whenever I mention to people that it’s...
Here’s how I think of Vertigo. It’s like one of those 1950s American cars – gorgeous and shiny, beautiful down to the last detail. But also well built – engineered to a tee, built to last. Vertigo is timeless and stylish, and not for nothing, was recently named by Sight & Sound magazine as “The Greatest Film of All Time.” Just like those classic Detroit cars, it’s a precision machine. Each delicate part of it functions smoothly with every other part to create a perfect engine of a movie. Just to belabour this point – there’s the Vertigo spiral. Fashion...
