Fresh blogs are best blogs…so as exhausted as I am after a
full day of TIFF, here goes…
Part of the TIFF experience is making friends with
strangers. I mean really, you wait in line with strangers, you sit next to
strangers, it’s a great time of year to befriend strangers in the TDot! Today’s first film was
no exception.
I met this woman sitting next to me in Ryerson theatre. She
and I bonded over giggling at a woman who clearly was a “princess” and not a
“regular” TIFF-goer. A poor TIFF volunteer was getting an earful. The woman
next to me apologized for laughing at first, but then she realized we were on
the same page.
We went through the obligatory TIFF questions: How many films
are you seeing? Is this your first one of the day? Which has been your
favourite? We got past those and questions and then realized we both had seen
Third Person yesterday afternoon. She gave me a little more insight and we
traded notes on the “clues” Director Paul Haggis gave us. Very insightful. I
now understand the film a lot better! Thanks stranger!
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| Peter Chan, moderator, Du Juan |
First film of the day was directed by Peter Ho-Sun Chan,
titled American Dreams in China. It was not what I expected. Although, I’m not
sure what I expected. TIFF called it the Social Network of China…I think it was
more about Chinese “best friends” with a dream. The actors in the film were
incredible, bringing out amazing raw emotion and I have to say, I’ve never seen
Chinese people display so much emotion before….(just sayin’ and I’m half
Chinese, so I can say this!) The film’s director introduced the film and
answered questions about the real life story the film was based on. He also
brought the film’s main actress Du Juan, who is a Chinese supermodel and SUPER
tall!
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| Director Yuval Adler |
Second film of the day was Bethlehem, directed by first time
directed Yuval Adler. It tells the story of an Israeli secret service agent and
his young informant in Bethlehem. Truly, the story gets to the heart of the
struggle between those who you “should” be loyal to and those you can trust. All
the main actors in the film were just real people, as opposed to professional
actors. They were beautiful and so natural. It made it easy for you to “relate”
with the characters. Adler put it simply, he wanted to make a film that just “showed”
audiences something, not “told” them something. And in true Israeli fashion,
this is what he did.
My last film today was titled The Dinner from the
Netherlands. To me it seemed to be a very “Hollywood” film if there could be a “Dutch-Hollywood”
film. It was quite dark and for a good hour after the film I think was a little
depressed. It tells a bizarre tale of an extremely dysfunctional family and at
its core it deals with what lengths you go to, to protect those you love…My
TIFF buddy Phil says it reminded him of this amazing film we saw years ago
called the Method/el Metodo (2005), but nah…I LOVED that film, this one I just
liked.
TIFF13 Rundown
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| Cute Dog on the Subway |
1.
Third Person – True love must be experienced to
be understood.
2.
American Dreams in China – best friends go into
business and live the “Chinese Dream”
3.
Bethlehem – the struggle between trust and
betrayal between an Israeli secret service agent and his young informant
4.
Exit Marrakech – wanderlust, relationships, and
coming of age in Morocco
5.
Ilo Ilo – A nanny from the Philippines changes
home relationships in Singapore
6.
The Dinner – the lengths we go through to
protect those we love
