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REVIEW: Jia Nian Hua [Angels Wear White] [2018]

2017/10/042017/11/02 Jared Mobarak

“There’s other ways to pay” Let’s think about the title to Vivian Qu‘s sophomore effort Jia Nian Hua [Angels Wear White] because the meaning goes far beyond the words themselves. On the surface it’s simply describing religious iconography and the idea that angels wear flowing white linens with halos on heads and harps in hands. But we’ve taken this concept and brought it into real life too. “White” has become synonymous with purity, trust, and expertise. We see a white lab coat on a doctor and automatically provide him/her a…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Princesita [2017]

2017/09/232018/01/29 Jared Mobarak

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars” Miguel (Marcelo Alonso) compares God to a fire when explaining how the ones our religions’ sacred books describe aren’t quite right. Our creator is simpler than those iterations. He has the power to turn wood into ash and water into steam. He has the power to transform. But just as fire forges from its flames, it also destroys. It’s this duality that director Marialy Rivas and co-writer Camila Gutiérrez gives form to in their film Princesita. As cultist Miguel’s young disciple Tamara…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Vinterbrødre [Winter Brothers] [2017]

2017/09/222017/11/02 Jared Mobarak

“Everyone has a little darkness in them” It opens in darkness—the beams from headlamp flashlights and sparks of metal on rock our only points of illumination. This is the oppressive environment holding the over-worked and under-paid miners while their boss sits in his factory office without a care as to who the men in his employ are besides a social security number. They let off steam with a bottle of homebrew alcohol to cut the monotony of their daily routines before returning to their respective trailers back in town that…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Of Sheep and Men [2017]

2017/09/212017/09/22 Jared Mobarak

“In this country, the big fish eat the small fish” It’s the cusp of Eid in Algiers, Bab el Oued circa 2016 and the rams are running wild. Well, not wild per se considering each is bought, sold, and always owned. They seem to be a huge staple in this impoverished town as a means for wool, meat, and entertainment. Yes, along with all the usual uses you could think of for the animal (including a sacrifice to Allah) is a prevalent fight circuit where competitors seek out new opponents…

TIFF17 REVIEW: شيخ جاكسون [Sheikh Jackson] [2017]

2017/09/212017/09/21 Jared Mobarak

“You can’t guarantee living till tomorrow” The thing I could never wrap my head around religious-wise is the idea of strict right and wrong. As a Catholic it’s somewhat easy as far as sin and repentance. You’re allowed to do a lot as long as you feel remorse and guilt enough to learn your lesson. But other religions are more stringent than Ten Commandments and more vehement in how each version of its worship follows its specific edicts. There’s no better place than the Middle East to see this in…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Licht [Mademoiselle Paradis] [2017]

2017/09/202017/09/21 Jared Mobarak

“If you cannot see, you are not seen” Maria Theresia von Paradis was the daughter of Empress Maria Theresa’s Court Councilor and thus a young woman of standing despite the blindness that took her eyes before the age of five. Her father Joseph Anton and mother Maria Rosalia had the means to therefore teach her the finer things such as piano—a vocation to which she found expertise. The Empress allowed her a disability pension as financial assistance to help offset the strain of raising a daughter in the eighteenth century…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Soldatii. Poveste din Ferentari [Soldiers. Story From Ferentari] [2017]

2017/09/192017/09/20 Jared Mobarak

“Come here before I get angry” Based on lead actor Adrian Schiop‘s fictionalized biography, Ivana Mladenovic‘s Soldatii. Poveste din Ferentari [Soldiers. Story From Ferentari] shows a world of poverty and futility possessing few avenues of escape for those born within. Schiop’s character Adi arrives at the Bucharest ghetto known as Ferentari to study its people’s music of choice: manele. He’s researching the sound for his PhD thesis, the recent dissolution of a relationship at the behest of his ex-girlfriend providing the room to uproot himself for the work. But while…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Motorrad [2017]

2017/09/152021/07/31 Jared Mobarak

How did you get past the wall? You won’t find a better locale for a film than Serra da Canastra in Minas Gerais, Brazil. Its rocky landscapes and serene hills are gorgeous, their quiet solemnity a perfect contrast to the loud gas-guzzling motorcycles director Vicente Amorim has roaming their dirt paths in Motorrad. The only other man-made objects found are constructions out of flat stones—an isolated home or ancient wall that shouldn’t be where it’s found. The same stones line the shores of calm lakes with which to let off…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Jusqu’à la garde [Custody] [2018]

2017/09/092018/06/25 Jared Mobarak

“Which of you is the bigger liar?” It didn’t win the Oscar for best live action short in 2014, but Xavier Legrand’s Just Before Losing Everything was by far my favorite nominee. Discovering his debut feature Jusqu’à la garde [Custody] was constructed as an expansion of that story therefore made it a must-see. The short is soon revealed as a prequel, its look at the fallout of domestic abuse hopefully in the rearview considering Miriam Besson (Léa Drucker) readies to plead her case as to why her now ex-husband (Denis…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Verónica [2017]

2017/09/082017/09/14 Jared Mobarak

“You have to do right what you did wrong” The story goes that the police were dispatched to a Madrid residence in June of 1991 only to find a teenage girl screaming from what appeared to be self-inflicted wounds. Strange phenomena was seen/found throughout the apartment, so much that the detective assigned the case could do nothing but corroborate the paranormal explanation being delivered by those close to the family. Everything supposedly stemmed from a séance gone wrong three days earlier at the exact time of a solar eclipse. The…

TIFF17 REVIEW: Le sens de la fête [C’est la vie!] [2017]

2017/09/082017/09/18 Jared Mobarak

“Can you repeat the options?” I went into Olivier Nakache and Eric Toledano‘s latest film Le sens de la fête [C’est la vie!] knowing nothing about it. My assumption from their two previous works Intouchables and Samba was that it would prove a charmingly funny dramedy tinged with relevant politics and racial complexity. Boy was I wrong. Whereas the latter film honed in on the former’s politics, this one strips them away completely to focus solely on the comedy. The result is an uproarious contemporary riff on Robert Altman‘s underrated…