Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Live at Dragonmeet 2017

Ken and I talk live at Dragonmeet in our final podcast episode of 2017. We'll be back on January 5th with more stuff to talk about. Until then, have a safe happy time at holidays, with all the egg nog you desire.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: We Laugh at Your Fireball

In the latest installment of our swan-necked podcast, Ken and I talk Modigliani, mystery scenario structure, and what happens when a dewy-eyed American meets a couple of London book shops when the pound has fallen.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: The Friends We Met Along the Way and Ate

In the latest installment of their towering, snow-capped podcast, Ken and Robin talk change-averse players, the Kong Mountains, teaching criminology via games and Kaspar Hauser.

Finding Me at Dragonmeet 2017

The seminar schedule has been posted, so it’s time to confirm that I will once again be swanning to London to take part in Dragonmeet, this Saturday, December 2nd, at the Novotel London West in Hammersmith, London.

As is our custom Ken and I will be doing Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Live, in the seminar room at noon. The dragons in charge assure us that they’ve booked a much bigger seminar venue this time out, with room for everyone to attend and bombard us with questions about gaming, history, time travel, the occult, and of course food.

At 4 pm we will return with the rest of the Pelgrane crew to hand out clues and deplete your general pools with the Investigative Roleplaying Masterclass.

Otherwise look for me at the Pelgrane Press booth. Swing by to say hi, offer your opinions on the merits of various competing Christmas sandwiches, and perhaps get a book or two signed.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Egg Nog Related Time Travel

In the latest episode of our sweet and frothy podcast, Ken and I talk security cams in mysteries, the bogeyman, Wade Rockett and the Egg Nog Riot.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: I Don't Want To Say Tax Dodge

In the latest episode of our copiously authenticated podcast, Ken and I talk forgery vs magic, drama scenes that matter, and Ken vs Powell's.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: The First Two Things are Metaphors For the Third

In the latest episode of our luxurious robe-wearing podcast, Ken and I talk riffed murder suspects, Chicago film fest, our stand against vampires and Josephin Pela About Stuff.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Moral Crisis Dungeon Tile

In the latest episode of our ultraterrestrial-busting podcast, Ken and I talk social spirals, Jeanne Rousseau, Abramsification and the Aurora Airship Crash.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Vegan Vampire

In the latest episode of our nutrient-rich podcast, Ken and I talk green children of Woolpit, a granola bar ethos, auteurism, and the death of Henry V.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Diegetic Prod

In the latest episode of our aurally soothing podcast, Ken and I talk GM nudging modes, Cuban sonic attacks, the Kibbo Kift and Twin Peaks: the Return.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: All Seven Spleens

In the latest episode of their visionary podcast, Ken and Robin talk monsters made for mysteries, searching for Templar treasure in Iceland, setting Trail of Cthulhu in your hometown, and William Blake.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Profit Motive and a Fast Boat

In the latest episode of our coastally fortified podcast, Ken and I talk Toronto film fest, D&D resurgence, Byronic vampires, and Barbary Pirates.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Them Doritos is Rigged!

In the latest episode of our absolutely above-board, honestly run, no dice-shaving podcast, Ken and Robin talk clipjoint towns, WWI spies, Nicole Lindroos and NASA bacteria balloons.

Ken and Robin Live from Gen Con 2017

Climb into your time machines and set the dial to Indianapolis. It's Ken and Robin Live from Gen Con 2017!

2017 Toronto International Film Festival Capsule Review Round-Up

Below, in rough order of preference, are my capsule reviews for films seen at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.

The attentive reader will note that a header is missing. I saw a bunch of titles well worth recommending, but nothing on a par with the 2-3 best titles from a typical year. No transporting masterpieces, nothing that evoked that “am I really seeing this” feeling, nothing that crept up and stayed lodged in memory for days afterwards.

I programmed my fest as always, with a focus on films without distribution, especially international titles. From talking to others I am not left with the impression that I picked the wrong stuff. It just wasn’t there this year. I’m sure not looking at the schedule and slapping myself on the forehead for having passed up what critical reception has now pointed to as the obvious masterpieces.

And that’s with a slimmed down schedule, as TIFF cut its title list by around 50 in a bid to appear slimmer and more manageable to the perennially complaining press and industry contingent.

Even the films under the Recommended header, while definitely worth seeing, color within the lines. They work within familiar parameters of genre, tone and style. Those by established directors are solid mid-level contributions to their various filmographies. Only a couple of movies by this year’s large crop of first time directors announces the appearance of a striking new voice. The truly fresh and stylish entries came from the disreputable fields of Midnight Madness and the genre films shuffled from the now-defunct Vanguard program back into the regular mix.

A couple of theories come to mind to explain why the cross-section of world cinema paled this time out.

One, the most likely, is just plain old chance. Every so often the odds fail and the hundreds of people all making films all around the world collectively fail to deliver the gobsmacking new magic.

Two, we find ourselves in a lull before the creative storm. These are the films that went into production when people all around the world thought Hilary Clinton was going to be President. Next year we’ll see the films conceived in the heat of Brexit, the Trumpian maelstrom, and the international authoritarian lurch. Crazy times inspire wild, boundary-breaking, impassioned and just plain messed-up art. Maybe next year I’ll be praising the films but lamenting the fact that the sky is on fire.

Or three, we could be in for this for a while. Funding for art film is drying up, leaving the relatively inexpensive but often dull works of verité realism to dominate the field like a monoculture survivor species after a mass extinction. If you don’t spend money on a script, stars, music, a title sequence, artful shot-making, production design or color grading, you can still make a film, and win acclaim from a small cadre of austerity-lovers. But you’re not going to get five stars from me for a single-level work that sets aside so many of the key tools of the form to recreate for the thousandth time a film Agnes Varda made in 1955.

If it’s theories one and two, things will work out and TIFF 2018 will represent a return to form. If it’s three, well, this is the golden age of television and the talent has to come from somewhere. We are now in a world where Wong Kar Wai is making a TV show for Amazon! I can’t imagine that working out, but he’s not going to be making any features until that shakes out one way or the other.

But you’re here to see what movies to check out as they hit theaters, streaming, and home video over the next year and a half.

Of the higher-profile stuff that will soon come out, buzz in the line-ups centered around Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water and Armando Ianucci’s The Death of Stalin, plus an Israeli film, Foxtrot. Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird and Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Montana scored lots of critical praise; the latter also won the People’s Choice Award, which often foretells an Oscar win.

And on that note I’m out of further ado, so let’s get with my 2017 capsule reviews:

Recommended

Les Affamés (The Ravenous) (Canada, Robin Aubert, 4.5) Survivors of a zombie outbreak try to remain uneaten in the quiet vastness of rural Quebec. Depending on the handling, films in the tightly constrained zombie sub-genre can be about everything or nothing. With its assured use of stillness and an empathy for both the living and undead, Les Affamés, falls magisterially into the second category.

Faces Places (France, Agnes Varda and JR, 4) Legendary director Varda and acclaimed street artist JR go to French villages looking for people to meet and celebrate in enormous photo murals. Documentary double act full of life, joy, artistry and friendship.

Brawl in Cell Block 99 (US, S. Craig Zahler, 4) Principled drug courier (Vince Vaughn) goes to prison, where bad dudes intent on score-settling to settle have no idea who they are fucking with. Arthouse meets grindhouse as crisp dialogue and exacting formal control lay the groundwork for explosive hyper-violence.

Let the Corpses Tan (France, Helene Cattet & Bruno Forzani, 4) Armored car robbers shoot it out with a motorcycle cop in the ruined seaside villa of an eccentric artist (Elina Lowensohn.) Tribute to 70s Italian poliziotteschi in which every shot is an ostentatiously perfect shot further amped by slamming sound design.

Radiance (Japan, Naomi Kawase, 4) Naive writer of descriptive audio tracks for films is drawn to a blunt-speaking blind ex-photographer. Subtly layered romantic drama about loss and the role senses play in feeling and memory.

The Great Buddha+ (Taiwan, Huang Hsin-Yao, 4) Egged on by his trash-picker buddy, the night watchman at a religious statuary factory starts snooping on his boss’ dashcam footage. Satire and pathos don’t typically go together, but in this formally audacious tale of corruption and impunity they sometimes converge in the same moment.

Revenge (France, Coralie Fargeat, 4) When young woman’s desert hunting camp dalliance with a married rich guy ends in rape and attempted murder, she must pick up the gun to survive. Style-forward, semiotically loaded, gore-slicked feminist detournement of that ever-problematic grindhouse genre, the rape-revenge thriller.

Angels Wear White (China, Vivian Qu, 4) Young hotel maid copies security footage proving that a high official raped a pair of preteen girls. Devastating descent into a corrupt world starts as naturalistic drama and moves ineluctably into noir.

The Cured  (Ireland, David Freyne, 4) Four years after the outbreak, a man cured of the zombie virus is taken in by his dead brother’s wife (Ellen Page.)  A social problem drama  / political thriller that just happens to revolve around cannibal virus victims.

Good Favour  (Ireland, Rebecca Daly, 4) Young man with wound in his side stumbles from the woods into a Hutterite-like community, which takes him in. Richly imagistic, ambiguous religious allegory.

All You Can Eat Buddha (Canada, Ian Lagarde, 4) Prodigious buffet eater at modest Caribbean resort gains spiritual powers after rescuing a mystical octopus. Buñuelian satire of longing, consumption and upheaval.

Mademoiselle Paradis  (Austria, Barbara Licht, 4) At the behest of their status-conscious aristocratic parents, a pianist undergoes treatment for blindness at the clinic of Anton Mesmer. A fresh approach to lighting the 18th century provides the key to this story of healing and control, which depicts Mesmer with unexpected sympathy.

The Third Murder (Japan, Hirokazu Kore-eda, 4) Attorney defends a capital murder case in which the accused (Koji Yakusho) confessed but keeps changing his story. Goes past the legal procedural elements to question who people are and if we can really ever know why anyone does anything.

Samui Song (Thailand, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, 4) Actress hires hitman to vanish her abusive husband; he botches the job. Noir tale keeps the viewer off-balance with leaps in tone, viewpoint and time.

Five Fingers for Marseilles (South Africa, Michael Matthews, 4) Decades after his Apartheid-era shooting of a police officer, an ex-con returns to his hometown to find gangsters in charge and his former friends divided. Contemporary western where the motif of the old gunfighter again called on to pick up the gun takes on a fresh, distinctly South African resonance.

Manhunt (China, John Woo, 4) Chinese lawyer framed for murder by an evil pharmaceutical company is pursued by a maverick cop. Yeah, this overt attempt to evoke the director’s classic period suffers from the too-many-screenwriters syndrome currently afflicting commercial Chinese cinema, but Once A Thief-level Woo is still a gift at this point.

Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood (US, Matt Tyrnauer, 4) Documentary profile of Scotty Bowers, the pansexual Guadalcanal veteran who, as a hustler and non-profit pimp operating out of an L.A. gas station, took care of Hollywood’s clandestine erotic needs in its 40s and 50s heyday. Both a slice of hidden American sexual history and a visit with an unforgettable individual.

Princesita (Chile, Marialy Rivas, 4) Commune-dwelling teen being readied to bear her sect leader’s holy successor is sent to attend public school. As in Malick’s Badlands, a dreamy atmosphere marks the character’s dissociation from the horror of her experience.

High Fantasy (South Africa, Jenna Bass, 4) Racial and gender tensions bubble up when three friends and a random guy go camping and wake up with their bodies swapped. Found footage social justice comedy drama suggest that seeing the world with another’s eyes might just make things worse. Shot on a iPhone and looks surprisingly great.

The Poet and the Boy (South Korea, Kim Yang-hee, 4) Uninspired poet whose wife is pressuring him to do something about his woeful sperm count develops a crush on a handsome young donut shop clerk. Observational drama with early comedic touches stages the eternal battle between passion and obligation.

Sheikh Jackson (Egypt, Amr Salama, 4) When he learns that Michael Jackson has died, a youngish imam undergoes a crisis of faith triggered by memories of his awkward, King of Pop-loving teen self. Wry, compassionate drama of personal and familial reconciliation.

Euthanizer (Finland, Teemu Nikki, 4) Judgmental eccentric who puts pets to sleep cut-rate prices attracts an admirer and runs afoul of a wannabe neo-Nazi. Twisted, but never amoral, morality tale of karma and retribution.

Under the Tree (Iceland, Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson, 4) While one son’s marriage unravels, a woman embittered by the other’s disappearance escalates a neighbor dispute. Drama with satirical overtones indicates that Iceland’s feuding spirit still lurks within the national psyche, waiting for the right trauma to let it loose

Shuttle Life (Malaysia, Tan Seng Kiat, 4) Young man with mentally ill mom (Sylvia Chang) can’t get the birth certificate he needs to get his kid sister’s body released by the morgue after a hit and run. Neorealist drama about living with the deck stacked against you in Kuala Lumpur.

Lots of Kids, a Monkey and a Castle (Spain, Gustavo Salmerón,4) Documentary portrait of the director’s family, particularly his incorrigibly eccentric mother, a hoarder facing foreclosure on her castle full of junk. Lovingly funny look inside a family with a bittersweet streak of dark past memories squirreled away in a few of the boxes up in the doll room.

Good

The Summit (Argentina, Santiago Mitre) High-stakes oil summit becomes additionally fraught for the Argentinean president (Ricardo Darin) when his daughter suffers a breakdown. What seems like a sober-minded political procedural takes a surprising turn into Marnie-style style psychological mystery.

Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts (Indonesia, Mouly Surya, 3.5) Widow kills a gang of rapist bandits and heads to town with the boss’ head to report the crime. Tale of women versus predatory men mixes agrarian social drama with engagingly staged Leone pastiche.

Hostiles (US, Scott Cooper) In 1892, a Cavalry Captain (Christian Bale) reluctantly accepts a mission to escort his cancer-stricken foe (Wes Studi) from imprisonment in New Mexico to his peoples’ home in Montana. Though some of the text would be better as subtext, its classical storytelling sense and performances from a cast including Rosamund Pike, Ben Foster, Rory Cochrane, Adam Beach and Scott Wilson is worthy of consideration.

The Number (South Africa, Khalo Matabane) Longtime member of dreaded prison gang the 28s feels the pull of a reformist warden’s guidance. Based on a memoir, this conveys the local cultural detail overlying the universals of life behind bars.

Okay

Cocaine Prison (Bolivia/Australia, Violeta Ayala, 3) Low-level drug trade laborers languish in an uncontrolled, overcrowded Bolivian prison. Fly-on-the-wall documentary of third world injustice, with glimmer of hope.

Motorrad (Brazil, Vicente Amorim, 3) Pals on a dirt bike trip are attacked and hunted for sport by mysterious black-clad bikers. Survival horror flick is strong on dread, weak on action staging.

Not Recommended

I Kill Giants (UK, Anders Walter, 2.5) Teen RPG fan with a chip on her shoulder resists the friendship of a new arrival in school and the concerns of its psychologist (Zoe Saldana) to continue her mission laying traps for the giants she believes are about to attack her seaside town. I loved the portrayal of the nerd experience from a girl’s s perspective, but the script withholds the true nature of the lead’s problem until the end, even though it’s told from her POV--a massive cheat.

Pyewacket (Canada, Adam MacDonald, 2) Girl mad at her mom (Laurie Holden) for moving her to the country performs a ritual to summon an evil spirit. The idea of a verité-style teen drama that turns into a horror flick is kinda cool, but to pay off this would have to escalate sooner and go further.

The Lodgers (Ireland, Brian O’Malley, 2.5) When a twin brother and sister turn eighteen in their damp, decaying manor, she determines to escape the terrible fate the water shades of their ancestors have laid out for them. Evocative, but lacks the ruthlessness of great horror and an adherence to the ghost logic it establishes.

Western (Germany/Bulgaria, Valeska Grisebach, 2) German construction worker on a river diversion project tries to fit in with the locals, in contrast to his bullheaded boss. Like too many verité dramas is uninterested in pace or emphasis but fascinated by people performing quotidian tasks.

The Motive (Spain, Manuel Martín Cuenca, 1.5) Aspiring writer manipulates the lives of his new neighbors to make them better source material for a novel. Darkly comic material cries out for speed and energy but gets a director clearly more comfortable with deliberate pacing and an understated performance style.

1% (Australia, Stephen McAllum, 2.5) The return from prison of a brutal motorcycle gang president (Matt Nable) puts him on a collision course with the protege who has been running it more effectively in his absence. Populated pretty much exclusively by charmless, malignant half-wits eminently deserving of failure and doom, without the layer of black comedy that makes that setup work.

Sergio & Sergei (Cuba, Spain, Ernesto Daranas Serrano, 2) After the dissolution of the USSR, a struggling Cuban art prof and ham radio enthusiast makes contact with the cosmonaut trapped in the Mir space station. Cutesy stab at feel good entertainment for the subtitle crowd shows that a script can be overstuffed and still have nothing in it.

Valley of Shadows (Norway, Jonas Matzow, 1) Boy whose older brother has just died seeks lost dog in a forest he believes to be inhabited by a werewolf. Beautifully shot, with fine score by Zbigniew Priesner, and as slo-o-o-o-w as one snail going to visit a second snail to discuss the possibility of ordering tickets to a Tarkovsky retrospective.

The Little Girl Who Was Too Fond of Matches (Canada, Simon Lavoie, 1) In 1930s backwoods Quebec, a pregnant teen raised by her religious fanatic father to believe she’s a boy fashioned from clay yearns to escape him and her rapist brother. Allegory of Quebec before the Quiet Revolution attacks its parade of grotesqueries wildly overblown utter seriousness

Mary Shelley (Ireland,  Haifaa Al Mansour, 1) Young Mary Godwin (Elle Fanning) falls for handsome poet and free love advocate Percy Shelley, causing the suffering that inspires her to invent the science fiction genre. Squanders a top-notch cast, not to mention the subject matter, on a script creaking with hackneyed biopic devices.

#TIFF17: Wild Poliziotteschi and Celebratory Varda

Let the Corpses Tan (France, Helene Cattet & Bruno Forzani, 4) Armored car robbers shoot it out with a motorcycle cop in the ruined seaside villa of an eccentric artist (Elina Lowensohn.) Tribute to 70s Italian poliziotteschi in which every shot is an ostentatiously perfect shot further amped by slamming sound design.

Samui Song (Thailand, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, 4) Actress hires hitman to vanish her abusive husband; he botches the job. Noir tale keeps the viewer off-balance with leaps in tone, viewpoint and time.

Vampire Clay (Japan, Soîchi Umezawa, 3.5) Sculpture students are stalked by killer modeling clay. Showcase for adorably icky practical effects.

You can't say it’s like all the other killer modeling clay movies.

Faces Places (France, Agnes Varda and JR, 4) Legendary director Varda and acclaimed street artist JR go to French villages looking for people to meet and celebrate in enormous photo murals. Documentary double act full of life, joy, artistry and friendship.

And that’s it for TIFF ‘17. I’ll collect the capsule reviews into a handy round-up to clip and save, with ruminations on a decidedly lackluster year, either later today or on Tuesday.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Saddle Up for Western Day

I didn’t set out to program mostly Westerns / allusions to the Western today, but sometimes that’s just how the schedule shakes out.

Western (Germany/Bulgaria, Valeska Grisebach, 2) German construction worker on a river diversion project tries to fit in with the locals, in contrast to his bullheaded boss. Like too many verité dramas is uninterested in pace or emphasis but fascinated by people performing quotidian tasks.

Five Fingers for Marseilles (South Africa, Michael Matthews, 4) Decades after his Apartheid-era shooting of a police officer, an ex-con returns to his hometown to find gangsters in charge and his former friends divided. Contemporary western where the motif of the old gunfighter again called on to pick up the gun takes on a fresh, distinctly South African resonance.

Sheikh Jackson (Egypt, Amr Salama, 4) When he learns that Michael Jackson has died, a youngish imam undergoes a crisis of faith triggered by memories of his awkward, King of Pop-loving teen self. Wry, compassionate drama of personal and familial reconciliation.

Hostiles (US, Scott Cooper, 3.5) In 1892, a Cavalry Captain (Christian Bale) reluctantly accepts a mission to escort his cancer-stricken foe (Wes Studi) from imprisonment in New Mexico to his peoples’ home in Montana. Though some of the text would be better as subtext, its classical storytelling sense and performances from a cast including Rosamund Pike, Ben Foster, Rory Cochrane, Adam Beach and Scott Wilson is worthy of consideration.

Well, with one day to go this is looking like a lackluster year. Normally by now I’d have logged 2-3 titles that completely blew me away, earning a perfect 5 score. So far, none. It’s no 1988, when everything was actively terrible and the absolute best world cinema could do was Salaam Bombay. I did what I could to program the final Sunday with all killer, no filler. But statistical probability is not on my side here.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: There Will Be Doves

Manhunt (China, John Woo, 4) Chinese lawyer framed for murder by an evil pharmaceutical company is pursued by a maverick cop. Yeah, this overt attempt to evoke the director’s classic period suffers from the too-many-screenwriters syndrome currently afflicting commercial Chinese cinema, but Once A Thief-level Woo is still a gift at this point.

Does it have doves, you ask?

Rookie question. Not only does it have a dovecote; it has an establishing shot setting up the dovecote. Try again.

Okay, does it have freeze frames?

WHY YES, YES IT DOES HAVE FREEZE FRAMES.

Cocaine Prison (Bolivia/Australia, Violeta Ayala, 3) Low-level drug trade laborers languish in an uncontrolled, overcrowded Bolivian prison. Fly-on-the-wall documentary of third world injustice, with glimmer of hope.

Radiance (Japan, Naomi Kawase, 4) Naive writer of descriptive audio tracks for films is drawn to a blunt-speaking blind ex-photographer. Subtly layered romantic drama about loss and the role senses play in feeling and memory.

The Motive (Spain, Manuel Martín Cuenca, 2) Aspiring writer manipulates the lives of his new neighbors to make them better source material for a novel. Darkly comic material cries out for speed and energy but gets a director clearly more comfortable with deliberate pacing and an understated performance style.

You can see enough of the satiric bones of the book this is based on to see what a meal Alex de la Iglesia would have made of it.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: All the Cute Girls are Capulets

In the latest edition of our ENnie-winning podcast, Ken and I talk death spirals, summer movies and occult Kashmir.

#TIFF17: The Day All the Films Had Murders In Them

All You Can Eat Buddha (Canada, Ian Lagarde, 4) Prodigious buffet eater at modest Caribbean resort gains spiritual powers after rescuing a mystical octopus. Buñuelian satire of longing, consumption and upheaval.

So many films every year follow the de Sica or Tarkovsky traditions; I always find it refreshing when someone looks to Buñuel.

The Third Murder (Japan, Hirokazu Kore-eda, 4) Attorney defends a capital murder case in which the accused (Koji Yakusho) confessed but keeps changing his story. Goes past the legal procedural elements to question who people are and if we can really ever know why anyone does anything.

Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts (Indonesia, Mouly Surya, 3.5) Widow kills a gang of rapist bandits and heads to town with the boss’ head to report the crime. Tale of women versus predatory men mixes agrarian social drama with engagingly staged Leone pastiche.

Birds Without Names (Japan, Kazuya Shiraishi, 4) Young woman who has demoted her pathetic older ex to roommate status embarks on an affair with a married watch company middle-manager. Scabrous relationship noir where the plot is as twisted as the characters’ decisions.

Pyewacket (Canada, Adam MacDonald, 2.5) Girl mad at her mom (Laurie Holden) for moving her to the country performs a ritual to summon an evil spirit. The idea of a verité-style teen drama that turns into a horror flick is kinda cool, but to pay off this would have to escalate sooner and further.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Vince Vaughn, Prison Berserker

The Little Girl Who Was Too Fond of Matches (Canada, Simon Lavoie, 1) In 1930s backwoods Quebec, a pregnant teen raised by her religious fanatic father to believe she’s a boy fashioned from clay yearns to escape him and her rapist brother. Allegory of Quebec before the Quiet Revolution attacks its parade of grotesqueries wildly overblown utter seriousness.

Shot in B&W, this is what you might get if Guy Maddin lost his sense of humor in a tragic Carl Dreyer accident.

The Poet and the Boy (South Korea, Kim Yang-hee, 4) Uninspired poet whose wife is pressuring him to do something about his woeful sperm count develops a crush on a handsome young donut shop clerk. Observational drama with early comedic touches stages the eternal battle between passion and obligation.

Motorrad (Brazil, Vicente Amorim, 3) Pals on a dirt bike trip are attacked and hunted for sport by mysterious black-clad bikers. Survival horror flick is strong on dread, weak on action staging.

Lots of muted and desaturated color palettes this year. Let’s hope that's a short-lived trend.

Shuttle Life (Malaysia, Tan Seng Kiat, 4) Young man with mentally ill mom (Sylvia Chang) can’t get the birth certificate he needs to get his kid sister’s body released by the morgue after a hit and run. Neorealist drama about living with the deck stacked against you in Kuala Lumpur.

Brawl in Cell Block 99 (US, S. Craig Zahler, 4) Principled drug courier (Vince Vaughan) goes to prison, where bad dudes intent on score-settling to settle with him know not who they are fucking with. Arthouse meets grindhouse as crisp dialogue and exacting formal control lay the groundwork for explosive hyper-violence.

From the director of Bone Tomahawk.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Noir China and Secret Sexy Hollywood

Angels Wear White (China, Vivian Qu, 4) Young hotel maid copies security footage proving that a high official raped a pair of preteen girls. Devastating descent into a corrupt world starts as naturalistic drama and moves ineluctably into noir.

Sergio & Sergei (Cuba, Spain, Ernesto Daranas Serrano, 2) After the dissolution of the USSR, a struggling Cuban art prof and ham radio enthusiast makes contact with the cosmonaut trapped in the Mir space station. Cutesy stab at feel good entertainment for the subtitle crowd shows that a script can be overstuffed and still have nothing in it.

The Great Buddha+ (Taiwan, Huang Hsin-Yao, 4) Egged on by his trash-picker buddy, the night watchman at a religious statuary factory starts snooping on his boss’ dashcam footage. Satire and pathos don’t typically go together, but in this formally audacious tale of corruption and impunity they sometimes converge in the same moment.

At the halfway point of the festival, this, from a director making his feature debut, is the first I’d describe as presenting a truly new and surprising cinematic vision.

Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood (US, Matt Tyrnauer, 4) Documentary profile of Scotty Bowers, the pansexual Guadalcanal veteran who, as a hustler and non-profit pimp operating out of an L.A. gas station, took care of Hollywood’s clandestine erotic needs in its 40s and 50s heyday. Both a slice of hidden American sexual history and a visit with an unforgettable individual.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Several Flavors of Revenge

Revenge (France, Coralie Fargeat, 4) When young woman’s desert hunting camp dalliance with a married rich guy ends in rape and attempted murder, she must pick up the gun to survive. Style-forward, semiotically loaded, gore-slicked feminist detournement of that ever-problematic grindhouse genre, the rape-revenge thriller.

Princesita (Chile, Marialy Rivas, 4) Commune-dwelling teen being readied to bear her sect leader’s holy successor is sent to attend public school. As in Malick’s Badlands, a dreamy atmosphere marks the character’s dissociation from the horror of her experience.

Under the Tree (Iceland, Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson, 4) As one son’s marriage unravels, a woman embittered by the other’s disappearance escalates a neighbor dispute. Drama with black comedy overtones indicates that Iceland’s feuding spirit still lurks within the national psyche, waiting for the right trauma to let it loose.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Mesmerism and a Woke iPhone Body Swap

Mademoiselle Paradis  (Austria, Barbara Licht, 4) At the behest of their status-conscious aristocratic parents, a pianist undergoes treatment for blindness at the clinic of Anton Mesmer. A fresh approach to lighting the 18th century provides the key to this story of healing and control, which depicts Mesmer with unexpected sympathy.

Valley of Shadows (Norway, Jonas Matzow, 1) Boy whose older brother has just died seeks lost dog in a forest he believes to be inhabited by a werewolf. Beautifully shot, with fine score by Zbigniew Priesner, and as slo-o-o-o-w as one snail going to visit a second snail to discuss the possibility of ordering tickets to a Tarkovsky retrospective.

Mary Shelley (Ireland,  Haifaa Al Mansour, 1) Young Mary Godwin (Elle Fanning) falls for handsome poet and free love advocate Percy Shelley, causing the suffering that inspires her to invent the science fiction genre. Squanders a top-notch cast, not to mention the subject matter, on a script creaking with hackneyed biopic devices.

At one point I was thinking, “It’s doing everything wrong you can imagine them doing wrong, but at least they aren't cutting to an indifferently staged version of the resurrection scene from Frankenst… oh wait. Never mind.”

High Fantasy (South Africa, Jenna Bass, 4) Racial and gender tensions bubble up when three friends and a random guy go camping and wake up with their bodies swapped. Found footage social justice comedy drama suggest that seeing the world with another’s eyes might just make things worse. Shot on a iPhone and looks surprisingly great.

I can just hear the original Nordic lions of the Dogme 95 movement looking at this and muttering, “why I remember when we had to walk three miles across a snowy fjord to shoot on a prosumer DV cam and transfer it to a muddy gray super 16 print that looked like a herd of reindeer trampled it…”

Lots of Kids, a Monkey and a Castle (Spain, Gustavo Salmerón,4) Documentary portrait of the director’s family, particularly his incorrigibly eccentric mother, a hoarder facing foreclosure on her castle full of junk. Lovingly funny look inside a family with a bittersweet streak of dark past memories squirreled away in a few of the boxes up in the doll room.

For those of us with hoarding in the family, the big laughs may accompany a terrible echo of past or future hell.

Oh, Lucy! (Japan, Atsuko Hirayanagi, 4) Depressed office worker (Shinobu Terajima) with a crush on her sketchy English tutor (Josh Hartnett) pursues him to L.A. when he runs off with her niece. Wise script and strong performances drive this cross-cultural comedy-drama.

Hartnett has acquired a lived-in quality and this role is by far the best thing I’ve seen him do.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Weird Miracles and Former Zombies

I Kill Giants (UK, Anders Walter, 2.5) Teen RPG fan with a chip on her shoulder resists the friendship of a new arrival in school and the concerns of its psychologist (Zoe Saldana) to continue her mission laying traps for the giants she believes are about to attack her seaside town. I loved the portrayal of the nerd experience from a girl’s s perspective, but the script withholds the true nature of the protagonist’s problem until the end, even though it’s told entirely from her POV--a massive cheat.

Also starring Imogen Poots and the Call of Cthulhu Creature Companion.

Treatment of the hobby remains positive even as it flirts with the Trouble Distinguishing Fantasy From Reality trope,

The Lodgers (Ireland, Brian O’Malley, 2.5) When a twin brother and sister turn eighteen in their damp, decaying manor, she determines to escape the terrible fate the watery shades of their ancestors have laid out for them. Evocative, but lacks the ruthlessness of great horror and an adherence to its own ghost logic.

Good Favour  (Ireland, Rebecca Daly, 4) Young man with wound in his side stumbles from the woods into a Hutterite-style faith community, which takes him in. Richly imagistic, ambiguous religious allegory.

If I’m recommending a film that can rightly be described as Bressonian, you know it’s gotta be strong, because that is not my metier.

(Metier is French for “jam”, right?)

The Cured  (Ireland, David Freyne, 4) Four years after the outbreak, a man cured of the zombie virus is taken in by his dead brother’s wife (Ellen Page.)  A social problem drama  / political thriller that just happens to revolve around cannibal virus victims.

Ellen Page is now the official famous person I can say I saw at the fest. And evacuated a theater with, as the fire alarm went off mid-screening, sending the house of 1,100 out onto the sidewalk for 20 minutes right at the third act break. (The Ryerson Theater, part of a university campus, is notorious for this.) They did restart the film at the point of interuption, which is now a thing you can easily do in the age of digital projection.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

#TIFF17: Zombies of the Quebec Wilds

If it’s early fall in Toronto I must be attending the Toronto International Film Festival. This year sees a somewhat pared (but still mammoth) number of films, the retirement of a couple of further-flung venues, and a focus on women filmmakers. The notoriously truculent escalators at one of the main houses are allegedly repaired and ready to face the throng of reviewers, industry types, and civilian filmgoers like your humble correspondent. Let’s all get in line, breathe in the popcorn dust, and prepare ourselves for 2017’s cinematic deluge.

The Summit (Argentina, Santiago Mitre, 3.5) High-stakes oil summit becomes additionally fraught for the Argentinean president (Ricardo Darin) when his daughter suffers a breakdown. What seems like a sober-minded political procedural takes a surprising turn into Marnie-style style psychological mystery.

The Number (South Africa, Khalo Matabane, 3.5) Longtime member of dreaded prison gang the 28s feels the pull of a reformist warden’s guidance. Based on a memoir, this neorealist drama conveys the local cultural detail overlying the universals of life behind bars.

Les Affamés (Canada, Robin Aubert, 4.5) Survivors of a zombie outbreak try to remain uneaten in the quiet vastness of rural Quebec. Depending on the handling, films in the tightly constrained zombie sub-genre can be about everything or nothing. With its assured use of stillness and an empathy for both the living and undead, Les Affamés falls magisterially into the second category.

I’m hedging my bets with that rating.  This has the potential to creep up to a 5, but it’s early days and you can’t go around handing those out like dinner mints. Or it could drift down to a 4. Films that conjure an elusive mood take a while to fully settle in. Will I still be thinking about the shot with the girl in the tunnel after 42 more movies?

Now for the zombie taxonomy. Speed: fast. Distinguishing characteristics: pack behavior, including hunting coordination; retention of simple emotions.

The subtitles translate the title as Ravenous. I’m betting they’ll change that if it gets distribution beyond Quebec (as well it should.) The 1999 cannibal Western with Guy Pearce and Robert Carlyle of that name is still a bit too recent, and the name doesn’t carry quite the right connotation for this one. The Famished? The Hungry? Think it over, Seville Pictures.

1% (Australia, Stephen McAllum, 2.5) The return from prison of a brutal motorcycle gang president (Matt Nable) puts him on a collision course with the protege who has been running it more effectively in his absence. Populated pretty much exclusively by charmless, malignant half-wits eminently deserving of failure and doom, without the layer of black comedy that makes that setup work.

Euthanizer (Finland, Teemu Nikki, 4) Judgmental eccentric who puts pets to sleep cut-rate prices attracts an admirer and runs afoul of a wannabe neo-Nazi. Twisted, but never amoral, morality tale of karma and retribution.

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Capsule review boilerplate: Ratings are out of 5. I’ll be collecting these reviews in order of preference in a master post the Monday after the fest. Films shown on the festival circuit will appear in theaters, disc and/or streaming over the next year plus. If you’ve heard of a film showing at TIFF, I’m probably waiting to see it during its upcoming conventional release, instead favoring choices that don’t have distribution and might not reappear.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Mom! He’s in Cisalpine Gaul!

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Gen Con 2017

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Finding Me at FanExpo Canada 2017

If the Labor Day weekend is on its way (or Labour Day weekend as we say in these parts), I must be getting ready to do the panel thing at my hometown show, FanExpo Canada. My contributions to the  massive multitrack extravaganza go something like this:

GAME MASTER  MASTERCLASS  Saturday 11:00 AM   Room 714B   
GAME DESIGNER SPOTLIGHT: ROBIN LAWS  Saturday 3:00 PM Room 712   
GETTING STARTED WITH TABLETOP ROLE-PLAYING GAMES  Saturday  5:00 PM    Room 712   
PLAYTESTING GAMES Sunday 3:45 PM    705

I won’t be working a booth, so if you’d like to chat or get something signed, corral me at the above locations before or after the seminars.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: 13/10, Would Betray

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Snouted Meepers

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Finding Me at Gen Con 2017

Every year it’s hard to believe it’s that time of year again already and that goes double for the 50th anniversary edition of Gen Con. Why, it feels like I was working on the 40th anniversary Gen Con history only yesterday…

If you’re at the show, please swing by and say hi. During exhibit hall hours, when I’m not at a panel or in a meeting, I’ll be signing and chatting at the Pelgrane Press booth, #1317.

I will be pontificating at the following panels:

Thursday 4 pm: One GM, One Player Masterclass (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

Friday 1 pm: Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Live (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

Friday 4 pm: Dramatic Interaction Masterclass (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

Saturday 2 pm: Swords, Spies and Shoggoths: The Pelgrane Press Panel (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

Saturday 4 pm: Investigative Roleplaying Masterclass (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

If you prefer to hear me encouraging other people to talk, I will be moderating but not pontificating at these panels:

Thursday 1 pm: Gaming Saves the World (Crowne Plaza Pennsylvania Station B)

Saturday noon: In the Shadow of the Castle (part of the 50th Anniversary Gen Con Retrospective) In the 80's D&D ruled Gen Con from its big castle in the exhibit hall. Hear stories from the other side of the moat, from Steve Jackson, Mike Pondsmith, Greg Stafford, John Nephew, and Jordan Weisman. (Convention Center Room 105)

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: That’s More of a Gloss on Aristotle

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: A Different, Less Pear-Like Shape

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Where, As Opposed to What and AAAHH!

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A Perfectly Safe, Normal Announcement

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Ken and Robin talk for the 250th time, which can only mean… LIGHTNING ROUND!!!

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: You Take What Toes You Can Get

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Bill Somewhat American Johnston

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: So Fair It Shines as a Marketing Quote

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The Kickstarter for The Yellow King Roleplaying Game is Now Live

The curtain rises on Pelgrane Press’ Kickstarter for my latest epic project, The Yellow King Roleplaying Game.

The Yellow King Roleplaying Game Kickstarter Launches Wed at 8 pm Eastern

The Kickstarter for The Yellow King Roleplaying Game, from yours truly and Pelgrane Press, launches this Wednesday, June 21st, at 8 pm Eastern.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: A Number of Anonymous Grand-Dukes

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Floaty McBeercan

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: You Have to Sit in the Jar

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Ken and Robin Have New Shirts For You

Just in time* for displaying enigmatic erudition on boardwalks and beaches, the first of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff themed T-shirt designs have now arrived at our TeePublic merchandise storefront.

Wear them in a variety of styles, or emblazon these words to live by on mugs, phone covers, laptop covers or stickers.

Go straight to your design of choice:

Metaphor Drift! Metaphor Drift!

You Need Canapes to Have a Secret Society

We’ll be rolling out more wearable in-jokes in the weeks and months ahead…

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*Weather observation void in southern hemisphere.

Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: I Do Not Wish to Be a Moth Hat

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Brain Out

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: New Hampshire’s Second Most Famous Notch

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Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff: Bush Bachelor

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