Filmfest diary 1.08: Wrapping up

The 2007 Toronto International Film Festival draws to a close today (well, technically, tomorrow morning at around 1:30), and I was there in the afternoon to watch my last movie of the festival. Before it all started (which seems so long ago), when I was picking which movies I wanted to see, I decided that I wanted my last one to be a fairly big movie. For the most part, I tried to avoid the movies which were guaranteed to get a wide release in Australia. However, I did feel that I needed to spoil myself a tad bit. The first of such movies was George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead (which is now officially my pick of the festival). The last was the movie that I viewed today, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Director: Sidney Lumet
Country: USA

In this modern film noir, Hank (Ethan Hawke) and Andy (Philip Seymour Hoffman) are two brothers involved in a heist gone wrong. As they try to cover up their tracks, they are forced to make decisions that slowly lead to their lives spiraling out of control.

Writer Kelly Masterson and director Sidney Lumet craft this story in a very well-paced fashion, splitting up sections of the film to follow each individual involved one at a time so as to reveal events slowly and deliberately. The story itself is very gritty, and profiles three lives in turmoil. The three characters in question - Hank, the divorced father of one in need of child support money, Andy, the drug-abusing corporate accountant, and Charles, their father - are all handled skillfully by accomplished actors (Ethan Hawke, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Albert Finney, respectively).

This is a very good film that explores the psychology of desperation realistically without condoning or condemning it. Sidney Lumet shows why he is still a great filmmaker after his debut effort (the classic 12 Angry Men) 50 years ago. Philip Seymour Fans (of which I am one) will be glad to hear that his superb acting skills continue to amaze with this performance. Highly recommended.

Final film festival findings

There were many things I liked about the festival. The Q&A sessions (when they were held) were almost always interesting, the inevitable "yarr!" coming from the audience whenever the anti-piracy message showed up before a movie always produced laughs, the applause for the volunteers at every screening (and they did one hell of a job helping out in running such a huge festival) was quite noteworthy, and, of course, watching the great films on show was an absolute pleasure.

What irked me a bit were the exorbitant (almost extortionate) prices that were being charged for screenings (and the ticketing system in general) and a few of the cinemas (in particular, the ones with bad seating arrangements that greatly detriment the view of the screen for short people). I think I'll also include "nitpicky guy", as there seems to be one at every other Q&A session. However, all in all, I thoroughly my first full film festival experience (not counting last year, when I attended the first-ever Tropfest to be rained out, though that too was enjoyable, but for different reasons), and would love to return to Toronto some time in the future to do it all again.

TIFF overview

Films viewed: 12
Well-known celebrities spotted: 3 (all at Q&A sessions)
Thumbs up: 2
Theme song/s: Feist - I Feel It All