We Are What We Watch

Here's another bastardized cliche saying...ever "bite off more than you can write?"  That was me the past couple of weeks, taking on my usual writing assignments for Toronto Film Scene, making a feeble attempt at a bid for a Toronto After Dark Film Fest press pass, and accepting additional movie reviews on top of it all.  My inner thesaurus felt like it'd run dry, and the only words out of my mouth to friends at film screenings & events were frets about looming deadlines.  In short I've been a barrel of laughs, only people were likely laughing at me and not with me.

When my editor sent around an email asking 'who wants to review a 2.5 hour re-release of a 1963 black & white documentary about the Parisian working class by next week?", I hit reply with "Me! Me! Me!" yes, I'm a heap of pretentious and have some serious issues.  But luckily, Le Joli Mai was far from painful to watch, and 60's Paris is stunning in remastered black & white footage. 

My full review can be found here: http://thetfs.ca/2013/10/18/review-le-joli-mai/

The night before Toronto After Dark started, I had bunch of reviews to get done, and even more to do at the office since I was planning to leave work a little early to get to We Are What We Are on Thurs (Oct 17th).  So what did I do?  I got wind of Deadmau5 performing at the Microsoft Surface 2 launch event down the street and went to the show instead.

What can I say, Deadmau5 never disappoints.  He played a set just shy of 2 hours, which is pretty decent for one of these events.  Also ran into one Mr. Paul Hunter, tech & game blogger extraordinaire.  Always a pleasure to spend time with friends I haven't seen in a long while.

Thursday: finally, the opening of Toronto After Dark was finally upon us... Nothing quite like an evening of horror with Sachin and Jae, so despite my exhaustion I wasn't going to miss this one.  Plus We Are What We Are was my number one flick to catch at TAD. 

This is an adaptation by Jim Mickle of the Mexican original of the same title. Mickle also directed another of my recent favourites - Stake Land (2010). We Are What We Are is the quietly creepy tale of a reclusive religious family bound by their traditions and customs...which just happens to include cannibalism. Classifiable under Arthouse Horror, We Are What We Are brings out the beauty rather than the ghastliness of the events that are unfolding. Does that count as glorifying violence and bloodshed? Not more so than a large-breasted woman weilding a gun twice her size, but we'll save the discussion about Bounty Killer for later. Mickle selects a superb cast including Bill Sage as the unstable domineering patriarch, and Ambyr Childers and Julia Garner as his two daughters.  The film builds on psychological terror as opposed to a human feast, although that's worked in there too. I highly recommend it, and if you missed it at After Dark...well, some websites indicate it's to open in theatres within the next few weeks, but I've yet to see a confirmed listing for Toronto.  I did however see a little something on ye olde interwebs...if you're not the law-abiding type...

Other films I've had a chance to see and review from Toronto After Dark include:

The Battery
http://thetfs.ca/2013/10/18/toronto-dark-2013-review-battery/

Solo
http://thetfs.ca/2013/10/20/toronto-dark-2013-review-solo/









That about brings us up to speed.  In the next little while... plans to check out a couple documentary screenings, and I'm finally up to bat with a post on short story adaptations for TFS' Books on Film month.