Weekly round-up

An indie teen drama, a romantic marathon and a feel-bad Cannes prizewinner

by CRYSTAL CHAN and
MALCOLM FRASER

Terri

Azazel Jacobs’ indie drama stars Jacob Wysocki in the title role, an obese teenage boy in a small U.S. town who lives with his senile uncle (The Office’s Creed Bratton) and cements his outsider rep­utation when he starts wearing pyjamas to school. When the vice-principal (John C. Reilly) notices him and tries to take him under his wing, Wysocki is drawn into a community of sorts of the school’s misfits, including weirdo Chad (Bridger Zadina) and slut-shamed Heather (Olivia Crocicchia).

The film could be called a dark comedy, but although it occasionally flirts with Todd Solondz-style misanthropic doom, it’s more of a (sometimes painfully) realistic portrait of teenage melancholy. The tone occasionally feels a little off—it’s one of those films where you can’t always tell if the awkwardness is intentional or not—but it’s very nicely shot and well put together, and the top-notch cast saves the day.

Bratton shows a deeper side than we’ve seen in his Office madness, and Reilly once again demonstrates the subtleties of his acting range, but it’s the youngsters in the cast that really stand out. Wysoc­ki, in particular, has an amazingly expressive face set into his big frame. Watching a long, strange scene between him, Crocicchia and Zadina, you feel like you could be seeing the next generation of heavy-duty actors take shape. (MF)

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One Day

It takes two decades of foreplay for these lovers to get it on. This romantic drama from director Lone Scherfig chugs along on a Same Time, Next Year concept: it catches up with its characters once a year throughout their lives. It’s a literary kind of device; no wonder that this is based on a bestseller by David Nicholls, who also penned the screenplay.

On July 15, 1988, Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Dexter (Jim Sturgess) end up half-naked in Hathaway’s flat, but then Sturgess gives her the “we should be friends” line. We follow them until 2009, checking in on each July 15, except for one important July 16 (as Simpsons fans might know, July 15 is a British Groundhog Day known as St. Swithun’s). An “ugly” duckling, Hathaway goes from waitress to teacher to published writer; Sturgess finds himself through some globetrotting, then loses himself as an addict and greasy TV personality.

How much you liked Scherfig’s An Education or even her more austere Dogme 95 film Italian for Beginners will dictate how much of a soft spot you’ll have for this. It takes a while to pick up steam, and those over the pond are crying bloody murder over Hathaway’s accent. But seeing decades of pop culture flash by on film is always fun, and this heartfelt long-distance marathon of a romance refreshingly sidesteps the meet-cute formula that usually sees falling in love on celluloid take no more than, well, one day. (CC)

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Leap Year

This drama from Australia-born, Mexico-based director Michael Rowe won the prestigious Camera d’Or for best first feature at this year’s Cannes. Monica del Carmen plays Laura, a freelance journalist who enlivens her boring day-to-day existence by concocting elaborate lies about her life when talking on the phone to her family, and by bringing random dudes home for one-night stands. When she hits it off with Arturo (Gustavo Sánchez Parra), they begin a casual-sex relationship in which she submits to escalating scenarios of consensual (but pretty harsh) domination and humil­iation.

Extremely minimal in style, the film takes place entirely within del Carmen’s small apartment and consists wholly of long, static takes. Though this stark minimalism combined with the sexual content make for an intense viewing experience, there’s a nagging feeling of something missing at the core. The stylistic approach has been done before—quite a bit—and although del Carmen’s per­formance is certainly brave, her character can’t help but compare unfavourably to Isabelle Huppert’s similar masochist in The Piano Teacher, a much deeper and more complex film. A few references to the socio-political context of Mexico are interesting, but don’t offer much insight to outsiders.

Sitting through Leap Year’s heavy and drawn-out scenes, I couldn’t help but think of Hard to Watch—the dark indie drama that Tracy Morgan’s 30 Rock character stars in to fulfill his goal of win­ning an Oscar. I’m not quite ready to accuse Rowe of cynically concocting a film intended to win prizes, but it does seem like the kind of thing that’s catnip to a certain school of dour, “serious” cine­matic taste. Conversely, if you’re trying to win someone over to arthouse cinema, don’t take them to this one. (MF) ■

ALL FILMS OPEN THIS FRIDAY, AUG. 19

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