Toronto Film Festival Sept. 5- Sept 15, 2019

[Chris Knipp]

More, and final, D'Angelo TFF '19 reviews.


VIRGINIE EFIRA IN SIBYL

He saw Motherless Brooklyn too and gave it a 60. Substituted it at the last minute for Soderbergh's The Laundromat "which hasn’t been very warmly received[Metascore 56%] and will be readily available on Netflix soon whereas this he'd have to "shell out $10-12 to see at home." He thinks liking it so much is partly a function of organizing his festival viewing around "challenging art films," so something mainstream and enjoyable (relatively) comes as a relief. But he had a good time and was impressed with Norton's technique, though hearing the film violated the novel in various ways.

The Personal History of David Copperfield (Armando Iannucci, UK): 35. He feels Dickens has too much plot, and felt it was being "projectile-vomited" at him "for two solid hours."

I was exhausted after roughly 15 minutes, and stared glassy-eyed at the rest, springing to life only when Peter Capaldi and Hugh Laurie occupy the screen simultaneously and my brain needed to expend extra effort in order to keep track of which one is which.

[But the Guardian review gave it 4/5 stars and the Metascore is 73.]

The Moneychanger (Federico Veiroj, Argentina/Germany/Uruguay): 48. He found the exposition neglected the money-laundering complexities of the main character and treated the viewers like idiots. "Granted, the film is primarily a character study, not a procedural, but Daniel Hendler never makes this worm interesting enough that we become invested in seeing him turn. Only Dolores Fonzi, as the moneychanger’s scarily pragmatic spouse, provides any real charge."

[The trailer looks both bolder and more conventional than Veiroj's previous films.]

Sibyl (Justine Triet, Belgium/France): 63 [I'm so glad he liked this so much: Amerivcans have not seemed to particularly "get" Triet's previous films.] "Stupendously diected from the very first shot." Triet "shoots like an editor and repeatedly took my breath away with simple cuts..E ven the "ruthlessly configured" "expository flashbacks" satisfied him. Some plot elements went totally astray for him, but Virginie Efira "looks like a potential breakout" and "Triet’s so blatantly gifted that I’ll follow her anywhere for a while." He has not seen her previous ones. We'll see if he sees them and how he reacts.