SLIFF 2008: Ben X

2007 // Belgium - Netherlands // Nic Balthazar // November 21, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Plaza Frontenac Cinema)

From its loopy credit sequence—presented as though the film were an online fantasy role-playing game—it's apparent that Ben X relies on first-time director Nic Balthazar's assured familiarity with its narrative elements. Based on his own novel, the film confidently tackles subjects that should be challenging to translate to cinema: video games, digital socializing, and the daily tribulations of Asberger Syndrome. Looking suspiciously twenty-something and relying too heavily on bug-eyed cowering, Greg Timmermans portrays Ben, a withdrawn kid who is only comfortable in an online RPG. Indeed, Ben approaches the real world as a game, a strategy that enables him to navigate relentless bullying and social confusion. With furious, often flailing stylization, Balthazar shows us a cruel, overwhelming world through Ben's eyes, while snippets of grave talking heads foretell that Something Bad will happen. Although Timmermans' cartoonish presence never quite solidifies Ben's profound agony, Ben X searingly engages as it follows his conflict with a pair of sociopathic thugs and his quest to meet up with an online romantic prospect (Laura Verlinden). Unfortunately, the film's novel style and potent aura of despair unravel when Balthazar starts cutting corners for a twist conclusion that's both implausible and cheaply moralizing.

SLIFF 2008: Stranded

2008 // France // Gonzalo Arijon // November 19, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Tivoli Theater)

The overdue documentary response to Frank Marshall's 1993 drama, Alive, Stranded conveys with profound respect and tremendous upwellings of emotion the story of the Andes flight disaster. It's a survival tale seemingly so familiar that the human power that underlies is often forgotten. Director Gonzalo Arijon seeks to rectify this with a stirring, sublime film that focuses on the first-hand experience of the sixteen survivors. Emulating Errol Morris with stylized recreations and an absence of narration, Arijon allows the survivors to convey the story of the crash and the ordeal that followed, dwelling not only on the grisly choices they made, but also on the sheer uncanniness of their situation. The survivors recall the details of their trial with stunning clarity, and Arijon delicately frames their meticulous remembrances and their sobering meditations on life and death. Time and again, the men profiled in Stranded return to the notion that the world in the Andes was a New World, different from the world of family, friends, and comfort they left behind. Exhibiting a mysterious blend of pain and ecstasy, they speak of sacrifice, death, and resurrection with the authority of saints. What a powerful film.

SLIFF 2008: The Pope's Toilet

2007 // Uruguay // César Charlone and Enrique Fernández // November 19, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Tivoli Theater)

The Pope's Toilet functions as both a wild-eyed melodrama and a rather pointed anti-papal jab. Directors César Charlone and Enrique Fernández rely on an apposite bitterness for the emotional foundation of their film. And why not?: There's nothing to suggest that this desperate, occasionally witty tale of a small-town Uruguayan smuggler and his get-rich-quick scheme—involving a pay toilet and Pope John Paul II's 1988 visit to the region—will end happily. César Troncoso delivers an engaging turn as Beto, a grasping, defeated little man who seems incapable of thinking beyond the next week, despite his airy ambitions. However, The Pope's Toilet calls out for a more appealing protagonist; Beto's venality only seems mild compared to the corrupt border official who bedevils him. More interesting than their clumsy characterization is Charlone and Fernández's ambivalence about the role of Catholicism in Uruguayan society. The pontiff's visit is little more than a financial opportunity for Beto and his fellow villagers, one that proves ultimately hollow. The Pope's Toilet asserts with a sharpness born of disillusionment that even the tangible blessings of Catholic faith are farcical, mere honeyed promises that do little to alleviate poverty.

SLIFF 2008: Konkakt

2005 // Macedonia // Sergej Stanojkovski // November 19, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Plaza Frontenac Cinema)

The ragged comedic swagger of Sergej Stanojkovski's marvelous Kontakt is a complement to the tragic realism of Aditya Assarat's Wonderful Town. This fable of challenging, unlikely love in a contemporary Macedonia of slate skies and festering wounds ambles along with a soulful awareness of human misery. The avaricious schemes of a relation brings together two social castoffs: Habitual convict Janko (Nikola Kojo) grudgingly accepts a job to renovate the dilapidated villa where Zana (Labina Mitevska) convalesces after three years in a mental institution. They immediately dislike one another. However, this is not the convenient, overwrought antagonism of a screwball comedy, but a plausible defense thrown up by souls fed a diet of mistrust, anxiety, and hostility. Kontakt weaves in other narrative threads as well as Macedonian cultural and historical embellishments, but the odd relationship between Janko and Zana is at the forefront of the film. With bouts of dark chuckles and an effortless hand, Stanojkovski renders their fitful romance so gradually its believability fades away as a concern. Never mind that portly Janko is a violent misanthrope, or that skinny Zana is an emotional cripple. The first time Janko utters the word "sweetheart"—almost off-handedly—one's heart thrills.

SLIFF 2008: Amal

2007 // Canada // Richie Mehta // November 19, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Plaza Frontenac Cinema)

Richie Mehta's fable of Delhi slums and mansions, Amal, aims quite explicitly to be a Diwali Gift of the Magi. While its Indian setting is rarely superfluous, Amal's focus on the endurance of decency and the morally eroding nature of privilege is uncluttered and accessible. The film presents autorickshaw wallah Amal—portrayed with captivating subtlety by Rupinder Nagra—as just about the most honest, patient, and gentle soul in the world. His kindness towards a grumpy vagrant triggers an amazing destiny that rushes invisibly towards him, even as he struggles with the suffocating demands of clients, his mother, and an injured orphan under his care. Implausibility worries the edges of Amal's character, but Nagra convinces with his tentative speech and nervous smiles. Some of the film's characters border on cartoonish, and Mehta never quite attains a needed balance between the film's sagging realism and its fairy tale glint. While the pacing staggers around a bit initially—Mehta seems reluctant to reach obvious conclusions and essential destinations—Amal picks up steam in its second half, when the twists and revelations quickly begin to click into place. It's no kind of masterpiece, but it is a sweet and memorable tale.

SLIFF 2008: Son of a Lion

2007 // Australia - Pakistan // Benjamin Gilmour // November 18, 2008 // Theatrical Print (Landmark Plaza Frontenac Cinema)

In some respects, the war-rattled Pakistani setting of Benjamin Gilmour's Son of a Lion is almost incidental. The film assumes the shape of a thousand other tales about a father-son conflict over values, rarely discovering novel territory. However, the contemporary relevance of its cultural specifics engage, as does its grubby dusting of authentic familial pain. Eleven-year-old Niaz (Niaz Khan Shinwari) works as an apprentice in the village gun shop owned by his harsh father (Sher Alam Miskeen Ustad), a devout, humorless veteran of the Afghani mujahideen. With sensitivity and a studious gaze, Gilmour reveals that the illiterate Niaz dreams of attending school, perhaps to study music, an aspiration encouraged by his urbane uncle in Peshawar. Sher Alam will have none of it: He thinks only of his glorious battles against the Russians, his notion of Pashtun masculinity inexorably bound up with his religiosity and lust for firearms. Gilmour eavesdrops on conversations that hint at the complexity of the mainstream street-level worldview in central Asia, one characterized by hand-to-mouth despair, political canniness, and disgust with terrorists. Yet Son of a Lion's fundamental strengths are the heartbreaking performances from Shinwari and Ustad, who lend muscular pathos to a well-worn formula.