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Cashback is a feature film in which director Sean Ellis embedded his 18-minute Oscar nominated short film of the same name. It stars Sean Biggerstaff as Ben, a young man whose recent breakup has induced insomnia. He gets as job on the night shift at a supermarket, where he discovers that he has the ability to stop time.

Ben is a gem of a character. I found myself drawn into his story and the flashbacks to his childhood. I also really liked Sharon (played by Emilia Fox). Parts of the film and certain characters, however, seemed like filler, and I am curious to see what was added to turn it into a feature-length film. (Apparently the Cannes cut was twelve minutes longer, so perhaps they initially added too much.) I found that some of the characters and the humour derived from them tended to take away from the story rather than add to it.

There were a lot of striking shots and great transitions between scenes (when going into a flashback). It is refreshing to see some organic special effects being used. The time-freezing, Ellis revealed in the Q&A after the screening, was often done by literally having people stand still.

Overall, I’d say that I liked Cashback, and really liked parts of it. It is fitting that Ellis’s film is presented as part of the Discovery Programme - an series of films featuring first- or second-time feature film directors who are likely to do some great work in the future.

Below is a photo I took of Cashback’s star Sean Biggerstaff and director Sean Ellis, at the film’s Q&A:

***
Cashback (2006) * Director/Writer: Sean Ellis

This afternoon’s screening of the elusive Chet Baker documentary Let’s Get Lost was especially exciting due to the panel discussion centering around the film’s director, and world-famous photographer, Bruce Weber. I had been trying to get my hands on a copy of this film for years. Finally I was able to see it in its entirety, in the festival’s second most uncomfortable theatre. What made up for the extremely uncomfortable seat was was the announcement that the print of this film had just recently been restored and that it would be “beautiful” - and that it was.

There’s so much to say about Chet and this film that I’m going to try not to. His music is brilliant and exhibits such moods that it’s no wonder that his personal life was so unique. Weber did an incredible job of putting us in a place where we think we understand him, as much as you can understand somebody from another planet. We love and trust him and a minute later we think he is vile and manipulative. But through it all is the music, which was Chet’s way of both dealing with his problems and forgetting about them.

I have been a great fan of Chet Baker for over ten years and it was amazing to not only watch the film, but hear stories and anecdotes from Bruce. His love for Chet as a person, not just a subject, is apparent. There is a gentle grace in this film’s photography. This is a beautiful film that I hope will soon finally be released on DVD.

Volver started about half an hour later than we’d expected, and the end credits started to roll at about 11:55pm - and I was supposed to be at Ryerson for Gwoemul (The Host) at midnight! I got out of there as quickly as possible to find that it was pouring outside - luckily, I’d brought my ‘brelly. It took ten minutes to catch a cab, and then anther ten minutes to get from Roy Thompson Hall to Ryerson Theatre - I ran into the building and the movie had started about a minute ago. Phew!

This was a Midnight Madness screening, so it attracts hardcore fans of the genre. The audience was so excited and burst into applause many times throught the film. It was a pretty rowdy crowd but it was all in good fun.

The film was great. It’s a monster movie, about an odd family of a father and his three children who don’t get along very well. One of the siblings is a single father, whose daughter is captured by this big monster. There is a hilarious scene of the family grieving for their loss that only the wackiness of Oriental cinema could have brought.

The monster is believed to be the host of a deadly virus, so everybody who has come into contact with it need to be decontaminated and quarantined. But, the single father’s cell phone suddenly rings, and it is his daughter! From here on, the film is about this family escaping the quarantine and searching the city’s sewers for their lost girl.

The film is quite funny and I wasn’t expecting that. There are also a lot of political overtones regarding the way the virus contamination was assessed and handled, not to mention the unmentioned but implied reasons for the monster’s existence. The US Military had a fairly large presence in the film. I wouldn’t be surprised if the entire monster thing was a metaphor for the reality of nuclear weapons, etc.

Last but not least: the monster. One thing that struck me was the monster’s size. It was not a gigantic Godzilla/King Kong/etc type of monster. It was relatively small, and was pretty agile underwater, but I think it can only breathe above water. Anyway, the special effects went from pretty good to almost awesome; basically, despite working with three of the best special effects units in the world (Weta Workshop, Creature Workshop and The Orphanage), you can still see the difference between an $8 miillion budget and a $100 million budget.

The heart and soul of this film, however, is not in the visuals, but in the characters. It goes all-out in this respect and I’m sure that, fun action aside, this is what made this South Korea’s biggest box-office success of all time. Unfortunately, there are already rumors of a US remake…

Michael, Lora, Felix and I went to see the North American premiere of Pedro Almodóvar’s Volver, starring Penelope Cruz. The entire female ensemble cast won the “Best Actress” Award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and it was certainly well deserved.

I have see a number of Almodóvar’s films and this one seems to retrun to a style that he had briefly left. It’s a quirkly drama about two sisters, a daughter, a close family friend, and one of Almodóvar’s favourite subjects: a mother. Only this time, the mother is dead, but keeps appearing to her family.

Penelope Cruz is breathtaking not only in appearance but in her peformance. She and her fellow female castmembers work together with incredible comfort and give each other room to shine. Highly recommended - not my favourite Almodóvar, but a great film with generous emotional overtones.

This was a Gala presentation, so it was opened by a speech from Almodóvar and then Penelope Cruz. Here’s a picture I took of them:

Lora and I headed over to Ryerson theatre to try to catch a glimpse of Borat on the World Premiere Red Carpet of Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. I heard that there were 350+ in the RUSH line for this sold-out screening - crazy!

Music (Kazakhstanian?) started playing and Borat rode in on a horse, which was was on a cart being pulled… by women! I managed to take a few pictures, but it was difficult as we were far away and there was such a crowd.

After he went into the theatre, I realized that I’d been standing behind my friend Jay! He was also there to take pictures of Borat, so that was pretty cool.

The rest can be found here.

Here’s a list of the films that I will be screening at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival:

Friday, September 8, 2006
1. Volver (2006, Pedro Almod?ɬ?var) (Gala)
2. Gwoemul (The Host) (2006, Joon-ho Bong)

Sunday, September 10, 2006
3. Let’s Get Lost (1988, Bruce Weber)
4. Cashback (2006, Sean Ellis)

Monday, September 11, 2006
5. Sleeping Dogs Lie (aka Stay) (2006, Bob Goldthwait)

Tuesday, September 12, 2006
6. Indigènes (Days of Glory) (2006, Rachid Bouchareb)
7. Blóðbönd (Thicker Than Water) (2006, ?ɬ�rni ?ɬ�sgeirsson)

Wednesday, September 13, 2006
8. Zwartboek (Black Book) (2006, Paul Verhoeven) (Gala)

Thursday, September 14, 2006
9. Flandres (2006, Bruno Dumont)

Saturday, September 16, 2006
10. Red Road (2006, Andrea Arnold)
11. 46-okunen no koi (Big Bang Love: Juvenile A) (2006, Takashi Miike)