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Program
- Hits: 516
Sunday, September 17, 3:30 pm
Rainbow Cinemas, Northumberland Mall
Nora and Hae Sung, two deeply connected childhood friends, are wrest apart after Nora's family emigrates from South Korea. Two decades later, they are reunited in New York for one fateful week as they confront notions of destiny, love, and the choices that make a life, in this heartrending modern romance.
Cast: Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro
Director: Celine Song
Writer: Celine Song
Genre: Romance, Drama
Language: English (and some Korean)
Runtime: 1h 46m
Rating: PG-13 (Some Strong Language)
Review by Trace Sauveur
Past Lives begins in a bar, with an unseen couple playing a game where they attempt to figure out the relationships of their fellow drinkers. Right now, they’re probing the connections between three people: Nora (Lee), who is nestled between Hae Sung (Yoo) and Arthur (Magaro). Are the Korean Nora and Hae Sung together? Are they tourists here with their white tour guide? Or are Nora and Arthur actually the ones together? Nora looks into the camera knowingly, as if to communicate what the viewer likely already knows: It could never be so simple.
- Hits: 401
Sunday, October 1, 3:30 pm
Rainbow Cinema, Northumberland Mall
Trained to be part of a daily Polish circus act, humble grey donkey Eo finds himself torn from Kasandra, his sympathetic, doting handler. But with the sweet remembrance of rare human kindness etched on his mind, the gentle soul meanders through the vast countryside on a peril-laden grand mission to reunite with his only friend at all costs. And as innocent Eo observes the natural world with his big doleful eyes, he crosses paths with humans of various qualities and characteristics and expands his perspective on life. However, in this emotionally draining journey, who are the real beasts?
Director: Jerzy Skolimowski
Writers: Ewa Piaskowska, Jerzy Skolimowski
Cast: Sandra Drzymalska, Isabelle Huppert, Lorenzo Zurzolo, Mateusz Kosciukiewicz, Tomasz Organek
Running Time: 1h 26m
Genre: Drama
Original Language: Polish
Rating: 14A
Review by Phil de Semlyen
Soulful and mysterious, this donkey odyssey is an unforgettable experience
Okay, hands up: who had a donkey on their bingo card as the breakout movie star of 2023? The little mule at the centre of this intensely life-enriching, gloriously shot, sometimes acid-trippy parable about the tumultuous life of one beast of burden in modern-day Europe proves that you don’t need words to be captivating on screen.
- Hits: 351
Sunday, October 22, 3:30 pm
Rainbow Cinema, Northumberland Mall
Winner of TIFF’s 2022 Platform prize and the Canadian Screen Awards’ best screenplay award, Vancouver filmmaker Anthony Shim’s Riceboy Sleeps promises to give us one of those very special Christie Pits Film Festival nights to remember. The semi-autobiographical story finds young Korean newcomer mother So-Young (Choi Seung-yoon) and her son Dong-Hyon/David (Ethan Hwang) as new immigrants in 90s Vancouver. Emotionally frozen, they live in an in-between space between a Korean past they were forced to leave behind and a Canadian present that is unwelcoming of them. So-Young holds her memories close to her heart, until a time comes when mother and son are prompted to look back in order to build meaningful new stories. Anyone who has experienced immigration – or had parents, grandparents, or ancestors who did – will find themselves recollecting memories of past lives in another world.
Cast: Choi Seung-yoon, Dohyun Noel Hwang, Ethan Hwang, Anthony Shim
Director: Anthony Shim
Writer: Anthony Shim
Genre: Drama
Language: English, Korean
Runtime: 117 minutes
Review by Jessica Kiang
There comes a time in many lives when a kind of matter transference takes place in the relationship between parent and child. Like a sudden change of filter or aspect ratio, we see our mothers and fathers in new ways, realizing they existed before we did, thought thoughts and felt feelings entirely separate from our own. Almost always, it’s a flower of understanding that blossoms just a bit later than we would like and when it does, it asks of us an impossible question: what to do with this new knowledge, this strange flood of retrospective awe? Perhaps, when you’re far on the other side, looking back through the reverse end of time’s telescope, and if you’re Canadian director Anthony Shim, you make a film like “Riceboy Sleeps,” a familiar immigrant song sung in such an elegant, sincere voice that it feels like a whole new arrangement.
- Hits: 353
Sunday, November 5, 3:30 pm
Rainbow Cinema, Northumberland Mall
Madeleine, 92 years old, calls a taxi to take her to the retirement home where she will be living. Charles, a disillusioned driver with a tender heart, agrees to drive by the places that affected Madeleine's life. Through the streets of Paris, her extraordinary past is revealed. They don't know it yet, but they will forge a friendship during this drive that will change their lives forever.
- Cast: Dany Boon, Line Renaud, Alice Isaaz, Gwendoline Hamon, Jérémie Laheurte
- Director: Christian Carion
- Writers: Cyril Gely, Christian Carion
- Genre: Comedy, Drama
- Original Language: French (France)
- Runtime: 1h 31m
- Rating: Not rated in Canada
Review by Lisa Nystrom
When 92-year-old Madeleine is informed that she’s no longer deemed capable of living alone, she calls down-on-his-luck taxi driver Charles for a ride to her new home in an assisted living apartment across town. What should have been a simple fare becomes something more, as Madeleine tows Charles along on a greatest-hits-tour of her life in Paris, reliving some of her fondest memories and bleakest moments from her past.
Beloved French actress and singer Line Renaud, with her piercing blue eyes and captivating presence, doesn’t so much command the screen as she gently beckons the audience to come sit by her as she spins her tale. As memories weave with revelations, she beguiles the listener, making the near-immediate fondness between Madeleine and Charles (Dany Boon) entirely believable. Between legendary performer Renaud and top comedy actor Boon, both leads imbue their characters with a tenderness and genuine warmth that will have audiences leaving the cinema newly determined to be extra nice to their elderly relatives.
- Hits: 327
Sunday, November 19, 3:30 pm
Rainbow Cinema, Northumberland Mall
In 1930s Paris, Madeleine, a pretty, young, penniless and talentless actress, is accused of murdering a famous producer. Helped by her best friend Pauline, a young unemployed lawyer, she is acquitted on the grounds of self-defense. A new life of fame and success begins, until the truth comes out.
- Cast: Nadia Tereskiewicz, Rebecca Marder, Isabelle Huppert, Fabrice Luchini, André Dussollier, Dany Boon , Edouard Sulpice, Evelyne Buyle
- Director: François Ozon
- Writer: François Ozon
- Genre: Comedy, Drama, Crime
- Original Language: French
- Runtime: 1h 42m
Review by Lisa Nesselson
A willfully theatrical, proudly retro yet delectably pertinent confection, The Crime is Mine (Mon Crime) parlays mid-1930s Paris into a sly slice of feminist triumph against lecherous producers, self-serving legal authorities, cultural gatekeepers and the tendency to discard older women only to learn they likely harbor a few tricks up their sleeves. Several generations of France’s finest thespians are clearly enjoying themselves in this stylish tale of how notoriety — even for presumed murder — need not be the slightest impediment to social and professional rewards.