Conclave

Conclave

A conflicted Cardinal oversees a hotly contested election of a new Pope in Conclave. After the unexpected death of the Pope, Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), dean of the College of Cardinals, prepares to oversee the highly secretive election ritual of the conclave. Several frontrunners emerge to take up the papacy, including the left-wing reformist Cardinal…

Marcel The Shell with Shoes On

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On

A sentient shell enlists the help of a filmmaker to find his family in Marcel the Shell with Shoes On. Marcel (Jenny Slate) is a talking mollusk shell wearing pink sneakers who is discovered living in a house with her grandmother Connie (Isabella Rossellini) by filmmaker Dean (Dean Fleischer-Camp). Dean records a series of interviews…

Closet Monster

Closet Monster

A closeted homosexual teenager struggles with his identity and relationship with his father in Closet Monster. Oscar Madly (Connor Jessup) is an aspiring make-up artist living alone with his overbearing father (Aaron Abrams). After witnessing a brutal hate crime as a kid, Oscar fears the repercussions of people finding out he is homosexual, even though he begins…

Wild

Wild

From director Jean-Marc Vallée (Café de Flore, Dallas Buyers Club) comes this drama based on the memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed.  Cheryl (Reese Witherspoon) is a young woman desperate to escape her troubled life of drug use and promiscuous sex.  As her way to find herself,…

Enemy

Enemy

Jake Gyllenhaal faces off with himself in this new doppelganger thriller from director Denis Villeneuve (Incendies), which is an adaptation of Nobel Prize-winning author José Saramago’s novel The Double.  Adam Bell (Gyllenhaal) is a Toronto-based history professor, who lives a somewhat mundane and routine life with his girlfriend Mary (Mélanie Laurent). Based on the recommendation…

Keyhole

Keyhole

 TIFF’s annual celebration of Canadian Cinema is now well underway and today I saw the first of five films I plan on seeing in the Canada’s Top Ten series – Guy Maddin’s Keyhole. This was only the second of Maddin’s films that I have seen, the other being 2008’s My Winnipeg.  However, it’s definitely obvious…