Toronto Film Festival: Day 8

September 12, 2008 by Liam
Filed under: Movie News

Since I didn’t see any movies on Day 7, I figured Day 8 was best spent with my ass parked in a seat where it belongs — in front of the big screen.

With that in mind, I got in line early Thursday for the opportunity to check out Nothing But the Truth. The movie stars Kate Beckinsale as a reporter who uncovers a scandal in the White House. The kicker is that she’s unwilling to reveal her source which lands her in hot water with the authorities. Given the choice to reveal her source or face the legal consequences, she roles the dice and loses. She is sent to prison to rot while her life crumbles around her. Not a bad movie but not exactly the greatest either. Beckinsale is well suited for the role and Matt Dillon and Alan Alda give solid supporting performances. (On a side note, just a few seats down from me was Roger Ebert. Pretty exciting for a film geek like me.)

Following the movie, I made my way to Hemingways (great restaurant!) to write my review which you can read here.

Next up on the menu was Lymelife. Going into this one, I knew next to nothing other than it featured a great cast. Well, the movie was quite the surprise. It stars Kieran Culkin as the son of a real estate developer named Mickey (Alec Baldwin) and his wife Brenda (Jill Hennessy). He’s a bit of a weakling who gets picked on by the school bully and hides a crush on his neighbor (Emma Roberts) who has her own issues with her father (Timothy Hutton) and mother (Cynthia Nixon). Things take a turn when the kids discover that his father and her mother are having an affair. Naturally, the movie ends in tragedy. This wasn’t exactly a fantastic movie, but it was still right up my alley. I’ve always loved movies about the secrets hidden beneath the facade of “domestic bliss” and this movie fits the bill. If you’re a fan of movies like “The Ice Harvest” or “The Chumscrubber” you’ll likely enjoy “Lymelife”.

I took the opportunity during this movie to sit with Peter Sciretta from /Film and Alex Billington from FirstShowing.net. I would’ve liked the opportunity to talk more about the movie with them, but I had to run to the screening of Me and Orson Welles which was just beginning a few doors down the hallway.

Me and Orson Welles stars Zac Efron (of High School Musical fame) as Richard Samuels, a kid who happens upon the Mercury Theatre in the late 1930s where Orson Welles is about to put on a production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. With a little bit of talent, Richard scores a minor part in the production and we witness as he goes through the highs and lows of theater life. Along the way, he falls for a girl named Sonja (Clare Danes). The real standout here is Christian McKay who plays Welles to a tee. McKay was cast in the role after being discovered performing as Welles in a one-man show. As for the movie, it’s a bit of a departure from everything else I’ve seen this week. The photography was very well done, and the acting was a bit over the top, but that’s to be expected from a movie about the theater. Although it’s a departure for Efron — at least for his tween fans — it’s worth a look. Whether it will ever make it’s way to the multiplex is another question.

That concludes our coverage of Day 8 at the Toronto Film Festival. Tomorrow promises a couple of more movies and whatever else comes our way.

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