Friday, September 28, 2007

Film Fan Fridays for Friday September 28, 2007

Hello Film Fans and Fanatics!

Welcome to Film Fan Fridays for Friday September 28, 2007! It's bizarre to see films that had huge buzz at TIFF 07 come out so quickly, and then to be in such limited release, and for the limited releases of those for to be the American films. Wild. A clear half of the releases this week are hot of the festival trail. With a sizable eight releases this week, there should be something for everyone.

Our limited releases this week include the occult under toned Puffball, hot buzz Sean Penn directed film Into the Wild, and click flick The Jane Austen Book Club.

Wide releases this week include the Canadian Shake Hands with the Devil, a docudrama based on the autobiographical book by General Romeo Dallaire and his experience during the 1994 Rwandan genocide. What stuck with me the most about this film was during the Q&A, director Roger Spottiswoode said that when Dallaire watched the film he commented that for the first 5 minutes he was watching Roy Dupuis, and after that he was watching himself. Now that is some amazing acting. Other wide releases include Feast of Love, The Game Plan, Silk and long time coming release of The Kingdom - for which previews have been shown since January and have had at least two very different tones.

Festival Watch

Commffest
Community Film Festival
September 27-30, 2007 at Rainbow Cinemas, 80 Front St E, Toronto, Ontario
www.commffest.com

Friday September 28, 2007 Releases

Feast of Love
Dir: Robert Benton (The Human Stain, Nobody's Fool <1994>)
Cast: Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear, Radha Mitchell, Selma Blair
USA

The Game Plan
Dir: Andy Fickman (She's the Man)
Cast: Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Madison Pettis, Kyra Sedwick
USA

Into the Wild
Dir: Sean Penn (The Pledge)
Cast: Emile Hirsch, William Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Jena Malone
USA
Limited Release

The Jane Austen Book Club
Writer/Dir: Robin Swicord - feature film directorial debut
Cast: Maria Bello, Emily Blunt, Kathy Baker, Amy Brenneman, Maggie Grace, Lynn Redgrave
USA
Limited Release

The Kingdom
Dir: Peter Berg (Friday Night Lights, The Rundown)
Cast: Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Chris Cooper, Jason Bateman, Ashraf Barhom, Ali Suliman
USA

Puffball
Dir: Nicolas Roeg (Two Deaths, Don't Look Now, The Man Who Fell To Earth)
Cast: Kelly Reilly, Miranda Richardson, Rita Tushingham, Oscar Pearce, Donald Sutherland
UK/Ireland/Canada
Limited Release

Shake Hands With the Devil
Dir: Roger Spottiswoode (Tomorrow Never Dies, The 6th Day, Shoot to Kill)
Cast: Roy Dupuis, James Gallanders, Michel Mongeau, Owen Lebakeng Sejak, Deborah Kara Unger
Canada

Silk
Dir: François Girard (The Red Violin, Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould)
Cast: Michael Pitt, Keira Knightley, Alfred Molina, Koji Yakusho, Mark Rendall, Miki Nakatani
Canada/Italy/Japan/UK/France

**please note this list of releases reflects first run film released in Toronto, Ontario, Canada September 28, 2007**

1 comment:

Suzie Ridler said...

Thanks so much for the heads up Shannon. Sadly, The Jane Austen Book Club is not playing in BC at all! At least when I did the search. Dang, I heard great things about the book.

That is the coolest about Romeo Dallaire's comment and that you got to hear about his reaction from the director. What an amazing experience.