Netflix's 'Rebecca' Forgets That It's Supposed to Be a Thriller Directed by Ben Wheatley

Published Oct 20, 2020

Novelist Daphne du Maurier wove her favourite inspirations — water, dogs, food, suspense — into everything she wrote, from the grandest plot...

Hollerado Spinoff Mav Karlo Turns Personal Stories into Universal Healing on 'Strangers Like Us'

Published Oct 14, 2020

If success in art is measured, not by any academic rubric, but by the universal resonance of a deeply individualistic and personal, often wr...

Country Music Film 'Yellow Rose' Contrasts the American Dream with Brutal Immigration Policies Directed by Diane Paragas

Published Oct 07, 2020

Yellow Rose — one of the first movies with a Filipina director to be released domestically with Hollywood studio backing — will mightily def...

TIFF Review: 'Underplayed' Highlights EDM's Diversity Problem — and Shows Why It's So Important to Fix It Directed by Stacey Lee

Published Sep 16, 2020

"You can't be what you can't see," says Alison Wonderland in Underplayed, a documentary about the dearth of gender, sexual, and ethnic repre...

'I'm Thinking of Ending Things' Is a Mind-Bending Glimpse into the Inner Workings of Our Psyche Directed by Charlie Kaufman

Published Sep 04, 2020

Charlie Kaufman's latest meandering mind-bender, I'm Thinking of Ending Things, is a difficult film to talk about because it talks about its...

'Fatima' Uses Religious Experiences to Explore Universal Ideas Directed by Marco Pontecorvo

Published Aug 27, 2020

The world we're in right now might not be the best to release a film about saints and miracles into, which is what it appears to Fatima is a...

'Tito' Is a Strange, Lonely Look at the Ups and Down of Friendship Directed by Grace Glowicki

Published Aug 26, 2020

Grace Glowicki's directorial debut, Tito, is a strange little experimental film that garnered much acclaim in 2019 at the South by Southwest...

Toronto Indie Rockers BLANKS Are Set to Break Out with Debut EP 'Beyond These Walls'

Published Aug 07, 2020

Beyond These Walls, the debut EP by Toronto-based power popsters BLANKS, is so great I wish it were a full-length album. Packing a new wave-...

'Ash' Is a Visually Stunning Film That's Designed to Test Your Morals Directed by Andrew Huculiak

Published Jul 23, 2020

Ash, written and directed by Andrew Huculiak of Vancouver band We Are the City, has been gaining much acclaim as it makes its rounds through...

'Catch and Release' Is a Scathing Statement on How Dangerous the Pro-Life Agenda Can Be Directed by Dominique Cardona and Laurie Colbert

Published Jul 14, 2020

How far have we come in this century in the fight to make abortions legal and accessible? Catch and Release, directed by Dominique Cardona a...

'Guest of Honour' Creeps Up on Viewers with Its Complex Narrative Layers Directed by Atom Egoyan

Published Jul 08, 2020

Guest of Honour, is a curious gem that really creeps up on you. Throughout, it evades categorization in the subtlest ways, again and again....

Toronto's Sahara Celebrate the Good Times with a Hint of Melancholy on 'Pure Glass'

Published Jun 25, 2020

Taking '80s synthpop and filtering it through a glittering shoegaze veil, Toronto-based band Sahara's debut full-length album, Pure Glass, i...

Hot Docs Review: 'The Chimney Swift' Shows Inhumane Labour from a Child's Perspective Directed by Frédéric Schuld

Published Jun 10, 2020

The Chimney Swift is simultaneously two different tales. The narration is a story gleaned from the actual accounts of adult chimney sweeps i...

Hot Docs Review: 'All Her Dying Lovers' Tells the Haunting Story of a Unique Form of Nazi Resistance Directed by Anna Benner and Eluned Zoe Aiano

Published Jun 10, 2020

Short film All Her Dying Lovers tells the story of an unnamed Czech nurse who put up a unique but tragic form of resistance against Nazi occ...

Hot Docs Review: 'Consuming Contemporary' Shows How Culture Is Safe-Guarded by the Upper Class Directed by Ana Aleksovska

Published Jun 10, 2020

On the face of it, Macedonian short documentary Consuming Contemporary is about an older woman, Sunchica, enriching herself through coordina...

CFF Review: Cringe-Inducing Documentary 'Shoot to Marry' Learns Nothing from Its Own Mistakes Directed by Steve Markle

Published Jun 05, 2020

Shoot to Marry is only about 70 minutes long, but it should be shorter. Ostensibly a comedic documentary about finding love, this film is di...

CFF Review: 'Hazy Little Thing' Exposes the Darkness Behind the Glamour of Social Media

Published Jun 03, 2020

We all know the repetitive cycle of social media — the way we scroll through Instagram, not because we're looking for something in particula...

Hannah Gadsby's 'Douglas' Is Hilarious, Even as It Gets Bogged Down by the Weight of Expectations

Published May 26, 2020

Hannah Gadsby's latest Netflix special, Douglas, is rigidly controlled, in a way diametrically opposed to the organic build and flow of her...

'Easy Land' Tenderly Explores the Canadian Immigrant Experience Directed by Sanja Zivkovic

Published May 20, 2020

Watching Easy Land, viewers will find themselves wanting to protect each character in it — but at the same time, there's something about it...

Netflix's 'Trial by Media' Puts Journalistic Bias Under the Microscope

Published May 15, 2020

"If it bleeds, it leads" is a saying drilled into you in journalism school. What it means is that death and fear-mongering tend to make the...