TIFF 51: “Tender Loving Care” could be Mike Leigh’s perfect swan song

by Cláudio Alves

In 1971, Mike Leigh appeared on the scene with Bleak Moments, an exercise in social realism that wouldn’t immediately open the doors one might hope for in the British film industry. Instead, he became a TV writer-director, slowly building his reputation and drawing on the easy rapport with actors and improvisational methods he’d developed on stage. By 1988, he’d make his grand return to theatrical features with High Hopes. Eight years later, he won the Palme d’Or for Secrets & Lies. Eight years later still, he’d take the Golden Lion for Vera Drake. In the past decade or so, such accolades meant little, as he struggled to finance projects after a couple of period drama flops whose majesty proved unpersuasive to investors. By the time he returned in 2024 with Hard Truths, headlines were written about how Cannes and Venice had rejected his comeback before a more modest world premiere at TIFF. It’s been a storied, eventful, and difficult career. And it might be over. 

Tender Loving Care, which premiered at Telluride before screening at TIFF, the NYFF, and sweeping San Sebastián by taking the Golden Seashell, Best Leading Performance for Kate O’Flynn and Best Screenplay for Leigh himself, is likely his last work. At 83, health issues have turned filmmaking into a painful endeavor, and financing remains an issue. Well, if this is to be Mike Leigh’s swan song, it’s a pretty perfect one at that…

Click to read more ...

TIFF 51: Mahershala Ali learns to be a better father in “Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother”

by Cláudio Alves

In the current political climate, it feels incredible, nigh impossible, for such a movie as Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother to come out of a major Hollywood studio. Yet, here it is, in all its MGM-backed glory with a TIFF world premiere to boot.

Bassam Tariq’s third feature and follow-up to 2020’s Mogul Mowgli, concerns a man of that profession which seems ever-so-common in moving pictures, but not so much in real life – the contract killer. He’s Latif, whom we meet in a peculiar scenario, intercutting between the mess of murder in a public toilet and a mysterious dialogue spoken by childish voices, illustrated by intertitles that disrupt the violence. It’s about Islamic scripture, a reflection of Latif’s devotion and a prelude to the news that is about to shake him to his core. Whom do you owe the most respect? The prophet, asked this three times, answers the same words each time: your mother. And who have Latif’s children lost while their father was away, spilling blood? Their mother…

Click to read more ...

Review: "Resident Evil" perfectly toes the line between Comedy and Horror

by Ben Miller

It should come as no surprise that director Zach Cregger knows how to blend horror and comedy together successfully. Even when taking a piece of well-established IP such as Resident Evil, the director delivers a thrilling blend of fun and entertainment in a way only he can.

While this film serves as a reboot of the franchise, the spirit of the games in well intact. Characters reference the Umbrella Corporation, while Racoon City is one of the main settings. It might be a big idea, but Cregger keeps everything pretty small-scale. This is a story about one guy attempting to survive and the little people he comes in contact with. It's not about the overarching story, or even with any recognizable characters. It's just the character-driven story, which is a nice change of pace for a video game movie...

Click to read more ...

TIFF 51: “Fjord” works great as a conversation starter

by Cláudio Alves

I don’t want this to become a yearly tradition. However, it’s notable that, for the second TIFF in a row, I chose to cap my first day at the fest with a Cannes prizewinner starring Renate Reinsve, coming hot into the awards season with NEON’s backing and the recommendation of a battalion of fellow critics I follow. And at the end, I find myself a contrarian. But while Sentimental Value was merely a disappointment, Cristian Mungiu’s Fjord is much worse, an outright catastrophe that’s probably my most despised Palme d’Or choice since Sophia Loren’s jury decided to give the festival’s top prize to The Birds, the Bees and the Italians, way back in 1966. Reinsve innocent, though… 

Click to read more ...

Review: John Early cooks up a marvelous melodrama with “Maddie’s Secret”

by Cláudio Alves 

Women on screen are more interesting than men. This is a truth universally acknowledged by actressexuals everywhere, and, by the looks of it, John Early is an actressexual like no other. For his feature directorial debut, the openly queer comedian-turned-actor-turned-maverick-filmmaker has decided to take these passions to the next level. Rather than watch from afar, he has become one of the great actresses he’d like to see on screen. And yet, for all it plays with gender, Maddie’s Secret isn’t necessarily a trans narrative nor what one usually expects from a drag queen movie, especially one whose cast comprises so many sketch and stand-up comedians. The film’s genealogy harkens back to Old Hollywood melodrama and its queer revisionisms and reinventions by the hands of auteurs such as John Waters and Todd Haynes. Run a DNA test, and you’ll find some of Polyester in there, some Superstar, but also those moralistic “based on a true story” spectacles that filled the small screen during the TV movie heyday. 

Arriving in cinemas this week, through Magnolia Pictures, Early’s passion project is an essential Pride Month watch…

Click to read more ...