Home truths, lies, climate change and home invasion
99 Homes (out of 4) Starring Michael Shannon, Andrew Garfield and Laura Dern. Directed by Ramin Bahrani. Opens Friday at the Scotiabank. 112 minutes. 14A
Survival instincts and conscience collide in this raw drama inspired by the 2007-08 U.S. housing crisis. Michael Shannon and Andrew Garfield make for an incendiary combo, as a predatory realtor and his desperate protegé. When down-at-heels handyman Dennis Nash (Garfield) defaults on the home he shares with his mother (Laura Dern) and young son, he’s just another sucker to foreclosure vulture Mike Carver (Shannon).
Carver gives Nash a chance to save his home by joining his scavenging crew, but it’s a lifeline attached to an ethical grenade.
Ramin Bahrani ( Man Push Cart), auteur of the Everyman, knows exactly when to pull the pin. Peter Howell
This Changes Everything (out of 4) Directed by Avi Lewis. Opens Friday at TIFF Bell Lightbox. 89 minutes. PG
Based on Naomi Klein’s bestseller, this earnest documentary directed by Avi Lewis doesn’t change everything, but full marks for trying to by showing how activism can spark environmental change.
It distinguishes itself among similar planet-loving docs by showing evidence there is hope in what can often seem an overwhelming, bleak task to begin repairs to an industrial-damaged world.
Shot in nine countries over four years, including stops in Fort McMurray’s oilsands and Andhra Pradesh, India, narrator Klein explains how unified voices in the streets, fields and at the ballot box lead to change.
Pity this good-looking doc tends to drag. Linda Barnard
Knock Knock (out of 4) Starring Keanu Reeves, Lorenza Izzo and Ana de Armas. Directed by Eli Roth. Opens Friday at the Carlton. 96 minutes. 18A
Eli Roth’s derivative Knock Knock unspools like a gender-swapped version of Michael Haneke’s Funny Games, the frightful tale of a random home invasion by two male psychos.
The invaders this time are women, Lorenza Izzo’s Genesis and Ana de Armas’ Bel, who arrive drenched and confused at the door of affluent L.A. architect Evan (Keanu Reeves) but soon reveal themselves as femmes fatales with a violent agenda. Married-with-children Evan thinks he’s getting “free pizza,” but Genesis and Bel have punishment in mind — but is it for all men, or just the easily tempted Evan?
The over-the-top destruction that follows seems all out of proportion to the misdeed, but then logic isn’t the purpose of a film like this. Peter Howell
The Forbidden Room (out of 4) Starring Roy Dupuis, Clara Furey, Louis Negin, Karine Vanasse, Caroline Dhavernas, Mathieu Amalric, Udo Kier, Charlotte Rampling and Geraldine Chaplin. Directed by Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson. Opens Friday at TIFF Bell Lightbox. 119 minutes. 14A
Guy Maddin’s latest act of cinematic mayhem isn’t easy to parse, but narrative coddling has never been his intent.
There are shout-outs to the anarchic likes of Chris Marker, Georges Méliès, Man Ray, Luis Buñuel, F.W. Murnau, Frank Capra and Monty Python. Lumberjacks, submariners, skeleton women, crazed biker chicks, sacrificial maidens, confused vampires, talking bananas and an erupting volcano all compete for our dazzled senses, in a film that also finds time to engage in a “bladder slapping” contest and to instruct us how to properly take a bath.
Best advice is to disengage your brain and let your eyeballs frolic as one of Canada’s most interesting auteurs, with co-directing accomplice Evan Johnson, riffs on and remakes “lost” films, often to great comedic effect and an unusual (for Maddin) constellation of colours. Peter Howell
Labyrinth of Lies (out of 4) Starring Alexander Fehling, André Szymanski, Friederike Becht and Hansi Jochmann. Directed by Giulio Ricciarelli. 124 minutes. Opens Friday at Canada Square, Carlton. STC
If it seems inexcusable that until last month, NDP candidate Alex Johnstone didn’t know Auschwitz was a Nazi death camp, it’s equally hard to imagine how in 1958 Frankfurt young Germans expressed similar ignorance.
They were echoing the sentiment of a war-weary country that chose to put the recent past behind it. Among them in Giulio Ricciarelli’s riveting Labyrinth of Lies (German’s Foreign Language Oscar entry) is newly minted public prosecutor Johann Radmann (Alexander Fehling, very good). His eyes are opened by crusading journalist Thomas Gnielka (André Szymanski) who brings him a client (Johannes Krisch, heartbreaking as survivor Simon Kirsch), shattered to recognize a one-time camp guard working as a school teacher.
The quest for justice soon escalates in this powerful, truth-based drama. Linda Barnard