"We're gonna bury Ferrari at Le Mans."VIFF 2019—Journeyman director James Mangold puts to screen the long-in-development biographical film recreating the events leading up the legendary 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans race. Structured like a racing procedural with a methodical pace mirroring the actual competition being dramatized, the immersive Ford v Ferrari (aka Le Mans '66) is an expertly realized ride chronicling of the Ford Motor Company racing program's humble beginnings and ultimate triumph.
"Thanks for indulging me."VIFF 2019—Dramatist Noah Baumbach's latest heartbreaking ode to his own relationship experiences, Marriage Story, so movingly recreates the emotional journey of a bi-coastal divorce on a young family of artists in often devastating fashion. What starts rather amicably turns ugly quickly due to mostly circumstances surrounding both the economies and realities of legal marital dissolution proceedings that draw out the histories of its characters to emotional extremes.
"I believed you braver."VIFF 2019—French filmmaker Céline Sciamma's burning historical romantic drama about painting and forbidden love is a striking work of female desire. Portrait of a Lady on Fire (aka Portrait de la jeune fille en feu) sensationally recreates its eighteenth-century period setting in a remote seaside mansion during a week where four different women must advance their own motivations.
"All we have is now."VIFF 2019—Texas filmmaker Trey Edward Shults continues his artfully unconventional method of telling American stories of grief. Waves, his third ambitious feature, centers on an affluent but troubled African-American family in deep turmoil in Southern Florida. Essentially two different but interconnected films about a series of escalating events, Shults uses teenagers to tell different sides and perspectives of a family incident.
"What are you, a teardrop socialist?"VIFF 2019—New Zealand filmmaker Taika Waititi reimagines the waning days of World War II in his take on a Hitler Youth comedy based on the 2008 novel Caging Skies by author Christine Leunens. Jojo Rabbit is a riotous, Nazi joke-filled "anti-hate satire" in the mold of the comedian's cannon of self-aware deadpan comedies.
"Who ya gonna call?"VIFF 2019—Extra Ordinary, first-time filmmakers Mike Ahern and Enda Loughman's supernatural Irish horror-comedy about ghosts and demons, is a delightfully weird adventure with some really clever laughs wrapped in a familiar but well-executed paranormal storyline.
"You can't hide away like this forever."VIFF 2019—First-time filmmaker Anthony Shim's low-budget tragedy drama Daughter uses all the usual indie filmmaking methods to express its familiar story of a middle-aged man coping with loss. The Vancouver set and shot film follows well-known local actor/producer John Cassini's Jim, a suffering father, well on his way self-destructing through abusing sex and alcohol.
"I don't believe in anything."
