my ANGELO review, basically. #66ssiff #TIFF18

My @TIFF_NET wishlist for this closing weekend. I missed some of these films when my back pain was really bad. Others, I’ve heard excellent things about. Obviously, I can’t go to all of them, but I’ll head down today and she which ones I can get. #tiff18 #tiff2018

#HoldtheDark is DARK AF. I need time to process this one. @netflix #TIFF2018 #tiff18 @TIFF_NET

Instagram

Second film of #tiff2018 holdthedark @netflix @jfreewright #alexanderskarsgård #tiff18 @tiff_net @ Bell Light Box www.instagram.com/p/BntT_HHnj8Z/

Had my first celebrity sighting at #TIFF2018 today! @joshuahorowitz! He looked busy so I didn’t say anything but I love his interviews. #TIFF18 @TIFF_NET

With the caveat that I missed the big-ticket items by C-list directors (Cuaron, Chazelle,Cooper), a #TIFF18 Top 5:
1. BURNING
2. IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK
3. WIDOWS
4. COLD WAR
5. TRANSIT
Items likely to shift (upwards) during flight: SUNSET, HER SMELL
Letdowns: MAYA, PREDATOR

Stick a fork in #TIFF18 for me. Shoutouts to my longtime roommates and partners-in-gripe, @NoelMu and @gemko, and to first-timers @jessicakiang, @michelledeidre and @melvillmatic, who are delightful and brilliant people. Make new friends and keep the old...

TRANSIT (Petzold): Still sorting through the conceptual mishmosh of a WWII drama pushed into modern-day Marseilles, but Petzold's particular movie magic, evocative of THE THIRD MAN, CASABLANCA, Graham Greene, et al., works on me every time. Lovely festival ender for me. #TIFF18

NON-FICTION (Assayas): A delight. Great conversation, lots of laughs, a choice running bit on Michael Haneke. So plugged-in to trends in publishing and discourse that it's both satisfying of the moment and one for the time capsule. #TIFF18

AMERICAN DHARMA (Morris): One of those horror movies where you want to yell at the screen, only instead of yelling, "Don't run up the stairs!," you're yelling, "Ask him about the massive tax cut to the rich that was the '... and scene' to Bannon's faux-populist grift." #TIFF18

SUNSET (Nemes): Festival fatigue had me watching some of this through a haze, but Nemes’ rigorous visual strategy—close-ups + extremely shallow depth of field—turns the forces of history into a stalking menace. Great ending. #TIFF18

We could get a nice pick-up game going at #TIFF18 between Team Bannon Owned Morris and Team Bannon Hung By The Rope Morris Gave Him. I’ll choose my team tomorrow.

HIGH LIFE (Denis): Closest to TROUBLE EVERY DAY as an explicit genre play on the down-and-dirty basics of life, death and bodily fluids, though significantly more inscrutable. Don't ask me to break it down, but I sure loved watching it. #TIFF18

IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK (Jenkins): Case study in how racism can derail even the most modest of dreams. Jenkins’ approach to the past again mirrors Wong Kar-wai: Moments out of time rendered as vividly as a dream. #TIFF18

CLIMAX (Noe): Young dancers have an acid freakout without Bruce Dern to guide them through it. Not advisable. One spectacular dance sequence, but once the LSD drops, the chaos slides into tedium. #TIFF18

MAYA (Hansen-Løve): Another ode to the restorative qualities of India, this time in service of a French war reporter who spent time as a hostage in Syria. Listless, flavorless, stilted, the first of hers I’ve disliked. #TIFF18

HER SMELL (Perry): The discord of Perry's work is made literal in this girl-punk epic about a Courtney Love type on the downslope of addiction and excess. Grindingly long and unpersuasive, though the journey (and Moss' performance) eventually wore down my defenses. #TIFF18

MID90s (Hill): Larry Clark by way of CLERKS by way of early Scorsese by way of a movie star turned director with access to expensive music. Funny in spots but MINDING THE GAP this is not. #TIFF18

How fucking beautiful does the queen look? Omfggg I can’t handle this bitch! #Gorgeous #LadyGaga #TIFF18 https://https://t.co/tgmWvaMuMy

FREE SOLO (Vasarhelyi/Chin): A nerve-shredding experience to be sure, but plenty to engage the mind, too, from the technical particulars of the climb to the isolating mentality necessary to attempt it. #TIFF18

Here for the World Premiere of the new Alex Ross Perry, nostrils flaring in anticipation. GOLDEN EXITS felt like a transitional film. We’ll see what he’s transitioning into. #TIFF18

WIDOWS (McQueen): My reaction to this was like Uma Thurman taking a bump in PULP FICTION: “I said God damn!” #TIFF18

LIFE ITSELF is leaving critics speechless! #TIFF18

VOX LUX (Corbet): Extremely striking, odd, confident anti-musical, very much in the tradition of the Borderline Films collective. A story of pop music borne of violence and disassociation. #TIFF18⁠ ⁠

THE PREDATOR (Black): All I want is for Shane Black to build up enough studio capital to splurge on snotty L.A. noir. If this hectic, noisy time-passer gets him closer to another one, fine. #TIFF18

THE FRONT RUNNER (Reitman): Low energy! Arrives at a nuanced take on the relevance of Gary Hart’s personal dalliances to his moral and political fitness, but it’s Sleepy Eyes Robert Altman for most of the way. #TIFF18

SHOPLIFTERS (Koreeda): Most reminiscent of NOBODY KNOWS, and one of his better efforts. So rare to see stories of poverty like this, let alone so thoughtfully sketched. Bit of a stretch for the Palme, though, no? #TIFF18

DOGMAN (Garrone): A welcome return to GOMORRAH territory, with a striking milieu and a great lead performance. A feeling of inevitability weakens the final stetch, but mostly persuasive. So many good 🐶. #TIFF18

BURNING (Lee): Completely unexpected, completely brilliant. Did not think that beguiling, undefinable Murakami feeling could translate to the screen and yet it has. Best of my Cannes Catch-up quartet by far. #TIFF18

THE WILD PEAR TREE (Ceylan): An American indie about a college grad who returns to his bog of a hometown would be 90 minutes and feature Shins songs. Ceylan’s is twice as long and many times deeper, with a wrenching father-son bond at its core. #TIFF18