WorldWide Short Film Festival (WSFF) || Program Review: Celebrity Shorts

Shorter is Better!

The 2012 Worldwide Short Film Festival is fast approaching with a wholesome bunch of  films, 244 to be exact, from around the globe spanning 35 countries altogether. This year’s “Celebrity Shorts” program will be rolling out a star-studded line-up of films featuring some well-acclaimed favourites like Judi Dench, Anna Paquin (True Blood), Chad Michael Murray (One Tree Hill), David Duchovny (The X-Files) and Michael Fassbender (Shame) to name a few. Did I just hear some screams?

Truly, with such an eye-popping, head-turning set of celebrity names I felt compelled to watch and decide whether the quality of shorts will actually live up to the hype that has been created around this program. Guess what? The WSFF has really gone beyond expectations to bring you some amazing, often times shocking stories that are a must-see (and see again) during the festival.

Without giving away too many spoilers I’ll give you a brief synopsis of these shorts that are mainly US & UK based productions with  all but one  making their Canadian Premiere in Toronto at the CFC Worldwide Short Film Festival.

To get you in a good mood and your laughter going is the short “Friend Request Pending” (12 minutes), written by Chris Croucher, featuring Tom Hiddleston (Avengers) and Judi Dench as Mary, a mature woman who turns into a typical teenager while Facebook chatting with a man online for the first time. This short will be make you laugh and ‘aww’ at the same time as you discover how online interactions can turn an older generation of people into youngsters getting to know each other.

Next up is “The Carrier” (18 minutes) written by Colin Borden featuring Rita Wilson, Chad Michael Murray and Anna Paquin amongst others. It is the story about a grieving mother’s (Wilson) discovery about her playboy son (Murray) after his sudden passing away in a road accident. The story is heartbreaking and really shakes you in a number of ways; makes you question how well you even know those closest to you.  Wilson has done a wonderful acting job to really deliver the emotion that would be felt by a grieving mother whilst discovering things about a son she thought she knew.

“The Beaufort Diaries” (2 minutes) by Alex Petrowsky, featuring David Duchovny, shows how quickly and easily the pressures and fame of Hollywood can corrupt someone and really push them to the edge and in some cases,  over.  The short is a really cool animation that follows the story of a cartoon polar bear who leaves his hometown to relocate in the glitz and glamour of Hollywood land. The story felt so real, scary, and honest that it reminds you that things really are not what they may appear to be in the news and tabloids – that the reality is much different.

“The Voorman Problem” (13 minutes) by Mark Gill is a story about a psychiatrist, Martin Freeman (The Office) ,who has been called in to diagnose a maximum security prisoner, Tom Hollander (Pirates of the Caribbean), who is causing problems by saying he is God himself in an attempt to be sent to an asylum. The story is very clever and witty. It almost makes you uncomfortable to be in your own skin and made me question whether what I believe to be real is really real?

“The End” (17 minutes) is a French production by my favourite David Frankel, Arno Moria, and written by Didier Barcelo and Benjamin Parent. The short features and follows the story of once-famous actress Charlotte Rampling, who is going through a crisis after finding out that she is being replaced in all her older movies by a younger, more prettier actress.  This story really rings true in today’s era as the entertainment business has dramatically changed from relying on talent to revolving around the young, the pretty, and who can get the black-suit executives those millions of dollars!

“Butterflies” (2 minutes) by Sandro Miller and starring John Malkovich, is an experimental short about the addiction to television and is shot in a really apocalyptic kind of way. The no dialogue short delivers the audience exactly what we all think and feel about how television and other forms of technology have completely taken over our lives. Whether it’s a good or bad thing that’s up to you to decide.

“Blitzen Trapper Massacre” (7 minutes) is written by Brian Koch and Rainn Wilson.  It features Wilson as a hard-core fan of the band “Blitzen Trapper” who completely looses it after the band refuse to let him play a gig with them. The short is like a typical nightmare a celebrity or other well-known personality with a huge fan following would have! It’s hilarious to watch but made me actually feel the fear of stardom!

Lastly, but definitely not in the very least is “Pitch Black Heist” (13 minutes)  written by John Maclean, featuring Liam Cunningham (Game of Thrones) and … wait for it… Michael Fassbender (Shame). The short is about two safe crackers who must ensure they don’t trigger a light-sensitive alarm. However there is more to the story than just cracking open the safe, with a very shocking twist that is kept well-hidden and revealed towards the end which will definitely make the audience go Woah! Call it bias for Fassbender but I had to watch this short twice because of it’s truly “awesome” factor.

It’s hard to say which one is my absolute favourite as I loved them all, so much that I feel I need to re-watch the Celebrity Shorts once more.  The program is playing next week, Thursday, June 7 at 7.45 PM at the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema. Do check it out! For more info, visit http://worldwideshortfilmfest.com/films/program/celebrity-shorts/.

Stay tuned as we journey through the 2012 WSFF to bring you ongoing coverage of many other exciting themes playing at this year’s festival and to help facilitate your choices!

Photo sources: CFC Worldwide Short Film Festival Image Gallery

By: Myra Rehman

T: @myrawales F: www.facebook.com/myrarehman

Also posted on: http://www.iheartmoviesto.com/

Review: Hysteria

*Based on True Events… Really.*  [ Hysteria Movie Review ]

Medically, according to the old school of thought there was no level of anxiety, anger, aggressiveness and possible depression that a good ol’ fashioned “pelvic massage” couldn’t cure! Last evening I settled down in the dire need to be upgraded chairs of Cinema 2 at the Varsity to watch an advanced screening of soon to be released comedy “Hysteria” directed by Tanya Wexler. Set against a Victorian time-period in the 1880’s “Hysteria” was the medical term used to refer to women who suffered from its likely “symptoms” of nervousness and/or anxiety that needed to be cured.

The story follows a smart, dedicated and medically forward-thinking practitioner Mortimer Granville (Hugh Dancy) who gets let go from several jobs for trying to move away from “leech-and-bleed” treatments being applied to patients and steering towards the application of the new hygienic practices that stemmed from the “germ theory”.  Mortimer (Dancy), finally lands a very suitable work position with the esteemed Dr.Robert Dalrymple (Jonathan Pryce) who runs an elitist club sort of medical practice that exclusively caters women’s medical issues. It is here that Mortimer discovers the art of the “pelvic massage” or in more simpler terms,  the act of “fingering” done by Dr.Dalrymple (Pryce) on female patients until they get an orgasm. In the name of medical practice and share curiosity Mortimer (Dancy) goes along with it and shortly after gets his own booked up schedule of “tending” to “patients” 8 hours a day . Not to mention that this job offer also came with eventually landing a suitable bride, Dr.Dalrymple’s (Pryce) youngest daughter, the very prim and proper, exactly what you expect Emily (Felicity Jones) along with the possibility of inheriting the business.

However, as the saying goes “opposites attract”,  it’s quite obvious from early on in the film that the doctor’s elder daughter, Charlotte (Maggie Gyllenhaul) is very much destined to be with Mortimer ( Dancy). Charlotte, (Maggie) is loud, more independent, intelligent, wise feminist who mocks her father’s practice for wasting it on pleasing women than putting it to good use by treating those in need of serious medical attention. From her very first presence on screen you can see that she is a staunch advocate for women’s rights and throughout the film is working on a community-driven project in London’s east with the hope of eventually getting women to change their mind-sets. Come to think of it the context of the film is quite befitting as even a century and some later in current times we are still battling for  getting women’s issues of choice, freedom and say over their own bodies resolved.

But honestly speaking how much foreplay can a man (or audience) really take before he cracks? Mortimer (Dancy) seriously cramps his hand from all the amount of fingering that he performs and is let go from this job as well which leads to him landing at his very wealthy, witty and subtle funny friend Edmund Smythe’s  (Rupert Everett) place where the invention of the very first vibrator takes place. It almost seemed like the hilarious Edmund’s (Everett) role was cut short and left the audience wanting more as every little screen presence he made overshadowed Mortimer’s (Dancy) simplistic persona. Not to say that Dancy didn’t have a presence, he truly carried the film throughout the best that his proper, rational character would allow him to. Quite a few of the hilarious moments felt like they rested in the first 15-20 minutes of the film when you are introduced to the characters and taken by a funny surprise by the actual “pelvis massage” scenes being performed on women from behind a tiny curtain! After that it almost feels like the topic of sexual pleasure is sort of being dragged on, sort of makes you wonder if it would have even been possible or not to get that many jokes made on it. The funny does return upon the invention of the vibrator and the moments in which it is tested on women but that does not successfully carry on for too long.

Being a fan of the old period sort of films I truly enjoyed watching the film being shot in locations and on sets that really make you reminisce over that era gone by. The performances were extremely strong across the board from Dancy, Pryce, Maggie and Edmund, however it felt like the story could’ve used some more strength than it just the prolonging on the subject of sexual pleasure and the eventual coming together of the two lead characters.Some of the characters could’ve definitely used some more substance and well fleshed out character lines so to add more value to the storyline of the film.

I would however recommend the film as worthy of a watch if you are in the mood for a good light comedy, (all in all keeping low on expectations of some serious hysterical laughters’) which also involves the almost true story of the invention of the most famous sex toy in the world AKA the vibrator.


By Myra Rehman

T: @myrawales / F: www.facebook.com/myrarehman

Also posted on: http://www.iheartmoviesto.com/

3.5/5 Stars

The 2012 BootLeg Film Festival Re-Cap

For the first time ever, this past weekend, Toronto was host to the 2012 Bootleg Film Festival which marks the festival's first official North American presence. The Tranzac Club, the official venue for the festival screenings as well as evening industry events is ideally situated in Toronto's Annex neighbourhood and got transformed into a cosy candle-lit space for festival attendees. This year's festival featured a brilliant line-up of the best in quality Indie Cinema from various countries around the world including UK, US, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Bangladesh,Venezuela ,Italy, France, South Africa, Germany, Netherlands and Belgium.There was a well balanced mix of 58 shorts as well full length features (runtimes ranging from 3mins -1:30mins), originating from various genres including thriller, drama, romance, comedy and animation to just name a few. The festival showcased a magnificent display of beautiful and real storytelling by tremendously talented and hardworking filmmakers who have successfully managed to produce low-medium budget films in order to bring tasteful cinema to their audiences.

Founded September 2008 in the basement of a small coffee shop across the pond in Glasgow, Scotland the festival has been gaining momentum ever since. Having gone through a similar process of extensive struggle that most indie filmmakers have to deal with after film completion, a british filmmaker Tom Wilton, Executive Director, who in this case was able to achieve success with his film (Icarus Broken, 2007 ) envisioned starting something called “project bootleg” to help facilitate filmmakers through this process. The idea behind Bootleg was to establish a platform “formed by a filmmaker (Tom Wilton) for other independent filmmakers worldwide” to give them an opportunity to showcase their work purely based on talent and quality of their movies.

Thursday, the opening day of the festival hosted by Danny Mendlow, screenwriter and comedian, screened three blocks of films (13 in total) with the opening film being “Bugbaby” , by Director, Rebecca Lorenne, a horror-comedy about an eerie couple that have in plain terms, a bug resembling baby that eats raw flesh which includes that of the child social services representative – “Who” will they feed it next? The evening event was a casual fun comedy night featuring comedic acts by Lashings of Apologies, Punch in the box and Jape. Darcy Michael was also a major part of this great evening whose Canadian film “One Skinny Bitch” was the night's special feature focusing the real life issues the lead character in a small town in B.C. deals with.

A very cool perk for attendees of this festival was the special tour of the “William F.White International Inc.” film studio. The festival had organized this daytime event mainly for their overseas filmmakers in attendance which was filmmakers' haven as far as learning more about the equipment available to them as well as what it would be like shooting a film in Toronto. It is beneficial for those new in the industry wanting to gather a better understanding of the the “nuts and bolts” available to them as well as what they need to work towards in terms of budget.The night carried on with a kick-ass Karaoke event hosted by Carson Foster that went on into the wee hours of the night.

Leading into the afternoon of day two of the festival was further indie film galore spread across different blocks of time (18 in total). The screening of the full length feature “Francis of Brooklyn”, directed by Josh Wick, picked up an award for “Best Director-Feature” which is a modernized take on the story of Francis, a traumatized Iraqi war veteran who gives up everything, forms a brotherhood to live a life of Gospel poverty on the streets of Brooklyn seeking to heal themselves through religion. Nowadays, the take on such a situation would be that the person going through such an episode has a depressive, troubled-mind that needs help. The direction is truly commendable as audience you really tend to get are engaged with the characters and sites.

The festival was also home to 11 wonderful Canadian films including a special screening of “The Seder” written and directed by Justin Kelly and has picked up two nominations at the Los Angeles Comedy Awards. The Seder is a story about a gay couple named Leo and Mitchell, where Leo has to bring his partner home for dinner to meet his jewish family and their guest of honour, Rabbi Solomon. The short deals with a difficult subject matter in a humorous way and really lets the audience really take a deeper look at dealing with certain circumstances in life. The film is well-paced with perfect comedic timing whereby giving the audience a chance to understand each characters anticipation leading up to the family dinner.

Another Canadian film that really made the audience laugh out loud was Director Josh Schultz's 2 minute comedy short “Mr.Shultz in Public” that tells the story of what happens when a teacher (Mr.Shultz) runs into his students whilst he is hanging out with his obnoxious friend who makes it a point to embarrass him. Josh Schultz is a teacher in real life and the short was shot entirely by his students.

The festival bid farewell on Saturday, its closing day by showcasing its final few sets of indie film screenings followed by an evening of three special screenings and the Awards announcements. One of the festival favourites of the morning block was an animated short called “Being Bradford Dilman” by Emma Burch, winner of “Best Short” in which little lonely Molly Flowers is told by her neglectful, alcoholic mother that she was actually born a boy but they chopped off her“willy”. This led Molly into seeing an imaginary character called “Bradford Dilman” and the funny doesn't stop! The animation was sweet, the story was fresh and dialogues were super funny, though you couldn't help but feel really sad for little Molly's character.

Being a thriller/horror genre fan “Dorothy” directed by Eros Romero really en captured both the good ol' fashioned scary, gory bits with crazy clowns and a little ghost girl (Who isn't scared of that??) and adds in the perfect element of surprise towards the end.

“La Mia Mantia”, directed by Giulio Vita is the story of a girl named Amanda who returns to her hometown after her father's death. The film is a beautiful story of finding yourself, taking chances and the locations shot make you want to travel to Italy.

“38:50” directed by Chris Capel tells the story of two scientist friends who hike to an isolated area to “fix” an unfortunate situation that has resulted from an accident. The film is well written, suspenseful and almost reminded me of something from The Walking Dead, I take it this is actually as very possible incident that could be the start of a zombie apocalypse! Better get your “getaway” bags ready now. Another thriller “Weaverfish” directed by Harrison Wall was a full length feature about a group of youngsters who enter the prohibited Fountainhead Creek not knowing the danger that awaits them. The script was gripping and kept you guessing as to what was coming up next, the cast did an awesome job in really making you believe the story. It also picked up the “Audience Choice Award”.

“Historias de la Urbe” directed by Carla Forte, winner of “Best Feature”, “Best Cinematography” follows different stories of immigrants trying to settle into the Miami lifestyle. The film is a full length feature and was amazing to watch how its been shot to interconnect the different stories of the film. It's also a very sharp and chilling look into the tuff task of settling in the downtown/midtown area of Miami city.

“Thrown” directed by Ryd Cook, who well-deservingly picked up the award for “Best Director- Short” is an extraordinary short about loss of a family member leading to the disposal of a favourite chair and how that completely changes. The film is like a little road trip of hilarity with two guys who have an old chair tied to the top of an automobile (Ryd's car) and the dialogues don't stop getting funny! The film is really well shot start to finish the story is complete and apart from the funny, uplifting feeling that you get from watching it there is also an emotional element within the movie that really tends to move you.

“Friday Night, Saturday Morning” directed by Neil Rolland, winner of “Best Screenplay” at first glance of the title makes you think that its pretty self explanatory isn't it? Well think again because this really bold with an almost disturbing to watch short is almost like a wake up call to too much fun for those who might not care to foresee how horribly wrong things could go.

“Undrawn” directed by Jeffrey Nesker is a really raw, “almost makes you feel guilty for watching but still feels good in a way?” short/teaser on six incompetent superheroes and their “unusual” superpowers who are trying to achieve success by being featured in a movie or a comic book series. This short witty, funny, so wrong but still want to watch and is currently in the process of possibly being turned into a TV series.

“Vision of Yellow” directed by Christopher Poole is the story about a man with an implanted user interface that becomes infected with a virus. The film is almost perturbing in the sense that we live in a world where technology has pretty much taken over our lives and the effects of too much use can really effect you to a certain degree. Personally, yellow stands out as a soft, peaceful and positive energy but this really makes you question whether the future is really yellow?

Overall, having worked and being part of other local film festivals here in Toronto, I can definitely say that The Bootleg Film Festival 2012 really surpassed expectations and was positive, terrific three day journey into the world of global indie cinema that is a must see for filmmakers and cinephiles alike. Now that it has made its first successful North American debut the festival will go on doing what it does best by continuing to provide independent filmmakers the outlet that they need to tell their stories. The hope is that this festival will return to Toronto in the near future, however the concept of the festival is not to have a fixed location and to keep it moving from city to city around the world.

To get the complete list of the 2012 Award winning films and to learn more about the Bootleg Film festival visit their website : https://www.bootlegfilmfestival.com

Alternatively,

Follow them on Twitter at: @bootlegfilmfest

by Myra Rehman

T: @myrawales / F: www.facebook.com/myrarehman

Also posted on: www.iheartmoviesto.com