Author Archive
 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Tracks”

  There’s no cutesiness to be found in John Curran’s film TRACKS, a bracingly non-Disneyfied true-life nature tale.  In the mid-1970s, a young Australian woman named Robyn Davidson decided to walk across almo...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Third Person”

  There is a reason, or at least an argument, for why almost everything in Paul Haggis’s THIRD PERSON feels synthetic and contrived–but I can’t make it here, because doing so would expose the film’...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “You Are Here”

  If there were no credits on the new comedy-drama YOU ARE HERE, it would almost be inconceivable that an audience member would imagine it coming from the typewriter of Matthew Weiner, the creator of Mad Men.  It’...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Him and Her”

  THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ELEANOR RIGBY: HIM & HER is an extraordinary feature debut for its writer/director Ned Benson.  Indeed, it’s so remarkable that it comes close to not needing the modifier “debutR...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Dallas Buyers Club”

  DALLAS BUYERS CLUB is more Erin Brockovich than Brian’s Song, and that’s why it works so well.  Jean-Marc Vallee’s film, written by Craig Borten and Melisa Walack, is too angry to be sentimental. �...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Can A Song Save Your Life?”

  Less intimate but perhaps even more irresistible than his micro-indie smash Once, John Carney’s follow-up CAN A SONG SAVE YOUR LIFE? plays a similar tune with broader orchestrations.  The city this time is New ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Rush”

  The writer Peter Morgan is a whiz at boring into little-remembered (and in the US, sometimes little-known) crannies of recent history and scooping out the rich drama inside, with scripts like The Deal, Frost/Nixon and Th...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Gravity”

  It’s not really a surprise to see Alfonso Cuaron join James Cameron, Martin Scorsese and Ridley Scott in that small group of film artists who have made 3D part of the essential toolbox of their imagery (no, Baz Luh...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Labor Day”

  LABOR DAY is a beautifully performed, well crafted Harlequin romance.  As such, it’s a shock coming from writer/director Jason Reitman (based on Joyce Maynard’s novel), one that goes in a completely differen...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “The Past”

  Like his Oscar-winning A Separation, Asghar Farhadi’s THE PAST is concerned with the abyss of uncertainty and mystery that lies under seemingly straightforward actions, the ever-increasing complications that bec...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Hateship Loveship”

  Earnest and low-key to a fault, Liza Johnson’s HATESHIP LOVESHIP might have felt more at home in the Narrative Competition at Sundance than in Toronto.  It has a dramatic recessiveness, almost a passivity, for m...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “Prisoners”

  The prevailing atmosphere in Denis Villenueve’s PRISONERS will be familiar to anyone who’s been watching cable TV drama for the past few years.  Gloom, grief, hopelessness, helpless rage–it’s h...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW: “12 Years A Slave”

  Steve McQueen (the filmmaker) doesn’t take it easy on audiences.  His first feature Hunger provided an excruciatingly detailed look at the fatal hunger strike of the Irish convict Bobby Sands, and he followed it w...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED’S TUESDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 9/3/13

  An extremely stable night. NBC:  AMERICA’S GOT TALENT won the night for NBC with a 2.3, up 0.1 from last week. ABC:  The season finale of EXTREME WEIGHT LOSS tied the 1.2 both of last week and last year’s f...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SKED’S MONDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 9/2/13

  For the most part, Labor Day brought the networks some modest increases. ABC:  MISTRESSES may be gaining some momentum at the right time, as its 2d try at 9PM (and penultimate episode of the summer) increased a healthy ...
by Mitch Salem