TIFF Day Two

The Great Kilapy [Angola, Zézé Gamboa, 2] Handsome player's yen for the good life puts him in the crosshairs of the secret police, both as a student in Lisbon and then in his native Angola. Rookie screenwriting mistakes show the failed struggle to fashion a compelling narrative from a colorful true story.

Note to aspiring screenwriters: if your script has more than one instance of friends hugging, cut out all instances of friends hugging.

The We and the I [US, Michel Gondry, 4] A crosstown bus ride on the last day of classes takes a group of NYC high schoolers from raucousness to melancholy. Energetic, Altmanesque group portrait with occasional flash-cuts to the director's trademark whimsy.

Dead Europe [Australia, Tony Krawitz, 2] A hallucinatory confrontation with dark family secrets ensues when an Australian photographer ignores his Greek parents' pleas not to visit the old country. Heavy-handed exercise in Polanskian paranoia.