Farewell for Now, Beloved Vanguard Blog Readers...

Welp, we thought if we just pretended like TIFF never ended we could keep living the Vanguard dream forever. Except it did. Two weeks ago. Wait, or is it three? You’re telling us it’s OCTOBER tomorrow?

Well, dang.

In any case, this was one of our best Vanguard years ever but we have a tendency to say that every year so it would be best to just start mentally preparing yourself for 2015 right now. We know we are.

All of our beautiful Vanguard babies have gone off in the world to other festivals and/or acquiring distribution and we could be more proud. Spring will be delighting even more audiences thanks to Drafthouse and Raven Banner. Shrew's Nest, Waste Land and Over Your Dead Body also played The Fantastic Fest. The Voices won two well deserved awards at l'Etrange Festival. Hyena will be distributed in North America by Tribeca Films. IFC Films scooped up Duke of Burgundy. Third World will be releasing The World of Kanako in 2015. Radius/The Weinstein Company will be bringing the terrifying children of Goodnight, Mommy to North America. Music Box picked up Alleluia for distribution and Media Luna will be distributing Luna (no relation).

So if you didn’t see these amazing films at TIFF (ugh, what a jabroni) you have a chance to redeem yourself during their theatrical releases. Just don’t mess it up this time, alright?

Until next year, beloved Vanguard Blog readers. Now, if you'll excuse us, we have something in our eyes. 

WASTE LAND and OVER YOUR DEAD BODY Final Screenings!

If this detective starts walking now, he can just make it to the TIFF Bell Lightbox.

This evening is the last chance to see Pieter Van Hees' Waste Land and Takashi Miike's Over Your Dead Body. Both deal with the incursion of the fantastic into the real. In one a cop's being drawn into a surreal world. The other the boundaries between a play and reality bleed.

"Choose me."

Unfortunately, they both play at 6:30. If you like cops on the edge, see Waste Land. If you like ghost stories and Japanese theater, see Over Your Dead Body.

WASTE LAND Final Screening: Sat., Sept. 13th, 6:30 PM, SCOTIABANK 13

OVER YOUR DEAD BODY Final Screeing: Sat., Sept. 13, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2 6:30 PM

WASTE LAND: Twitter Buzz!

Perhaps at this point in the Festival you're thinking, "Hrrm. Nothing would please me more than a gritty cop drama with surrealistic overtones." We've all been there, right? Good news! Pieter Van Hees's Waste Land has one more screening! Here is a sampling of the buzz surrounding the film.

There you have it, folks. Waste Land: a film to fill your gritty cop drama needs. Don't miss out! WASTE LAND Final Screening: Sat., Sept. 13th, 6:30 PM, SCOTIABANK 13

WASTE LAND: Cops Crossing The Line

Pieter Van Hees' Waste Land premieres tonight with a story of a cop "spiral[ling] into the abyss of his own darkness, haunted by the question of whether he'll be able to claw his way back."

And the VBPD is spiralling with him, as Dets. Leslie and Carol stake out movie police who are tempted, who cross the line, who go too far. And by the end, maybe we'll lose our badges and our guns. But we'll slam them on the captain's desk with pride, because we're so far gone we're doing this just because it's right. It's what this blog needs. Maybe it's what this movie needs. Hell, maybe we can't tell the difference between right and wrong anymore when all we care about is justice, justice and writing about movies. Now give us the damn bottle. No, we don't need glasses.

We each chose three film cops. Here are their stories.



Forget it, Leslie, it's Vanguard, or, Leslie's collars.

Hot yoga is great. You should really try it sometime.

Blade Runner

Rick Deckard is a retired police officer who grudgingly agrees to "one last job" for the police department (yeah, how many times have we heard that before?). But this isn't a regular job; it's a skin job. Three skin jobs, to be precise, and they're all deadly assassins. Deckard gets his ass kicked, falls in love with a replicant whose time is running out, and learns he might be one, too (depending on which version of the movie you prefer).

Don't worry, they can't tell you're from
Australia.

L.A. Confidential

While Edmund "Ed" Exley seems like a square with his police pedigree and fancy glasses, he's not above sleeping with a prostitute to further his agenda. That prostitute is not only involved in a murder investigation but also sleeping/in love with fellow cop Wendell "Bud" White. Exley and White already hate each other so when White finds out Exley moved in on his woman, fists fly. Eventually the two realize they're on the same side and work together to solve a case. Friendship!

Does this hat make my nose bandage look big?

Chinatown

Jake  "J.J." Gittes (what is it with cops and nicknames?) is investigating an extramarital affair when he uncovers some mysterious goings-on in the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. At one point, Roman Polanski shows up and slashes the tip of his nose with a knife! Ouch. Then Gittes gets romantically involved with the dead guy's wife and her crazy dad and uncovers some nasty family secrets. Lesson: stay away from Chinatown if your name is Jake. Or Marge.


Do you feel lucky, Carol? Well, do you? or Carol's collars.

Orson Welles was carefully coated in 3" of grime for the role of Cap. Harry Quinlan.

Touch of Evil

Mexican narcotics detective Miguel Vargas and his wife Susie are on their honeymoon when they witness a car bomb explode. Vargas is out of his jurisdiction, but offers his help to the magnificently corrupt local police captain, Hank Quinlan. Seriously, Quinlan just makes me feel grimy. In fact, this whole film makes me feel grimy as Quinlan plants evidence to convict a young Mr. Sanchez, who had married the victim's daughter secretly because of the victim's racism. Vargas investigates Quinlan's case history and Quinlan has Susie kidnapped, shot up with heroin and frames her for murder. And it's even worse when it turns out that Quinlan's hunch about Sanchez was probably right. It's not explicit, but the palpable corruption presented Touch Of Evil always makes me feel like I need a shower afterwards. That and Charleton Heston's brownface.

"Oh, I can't stay mad at you." "Jinx."

The Killer

Actor Danny Lee has made a career of playing cops on the edge. In The Killer, he's Inspector Li, pursuing Chow Yun-Fat's hitman with a conscience, Ah Jong. At first, Li is relentless, driven to stop Jeff after Li's partner is injured while pursuing Jong. But Ah Jong has charming eyes and saves a little girl from a crossfire. And then Jong starts caring for a chanteuse accidentally injured during a hit. And Li just can't help liking him. I know I couldn't help it. Li's suits go from white with black pinstripes to full on black as he wavers between the law and Ah Jong. In the end, Li just can't quit Ah Jong.

Maybe we should form a gang where we listen to sweet speakers and be handsome all the time.

Infernal Affairs 

Lau Kin-Ming (Andy Lau) is a Triad member who infiltrates the police academy and becomes a detective, but remains loyal to his gang and his Triad boss, Hon Sam, played by an unusually frightening Eric Tsang. Lau discovers that there is an undercover cop spying on Hon Sam and reporting back to one particular police inspector (Anthony Wong Chau-Sang). To things worse, the police totally stole Hon Sam's idea and the mole is a made Triad member, Chen Wing-Yen (Tony Leung Chiu-Wai). One day it's all listening to crystal stereo speakers together. The next thing you know, Anthony Wong's body is on top of a car, Andy Lau and Tony Leung are out-handsoming each other on a rooftop, and Lau has to make a choice about whether he'll be a bad triad member or a bad cop.

WASTE LAND screening times:
Sat., Sept. 6th, 9:30 PM, BLOOR HOT DOCS CINEMA
Mon., Sept. 8th, 4:30 PM, TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX 2
Sat., Sept. 13th, 6:30 PM, SCOTIABANK 13

WASTE LAND Premieres Tonight!

The second of three new Vanguard films premiering tonight is Waste Land from art world legend Pieter Van Hees. The premiere will take place at The Bloor Hot Docs Cinema at 9:30 PM. Head over to our previous posts to see the trailer, and a profile of director Pieter Van Hees.

Tickets can be purchased:

• ONLINE: TIFF.net's Ticket Product List Page
• BY PHONE: 416.599.TIFF or 1.888.599.8433 (Toll-free) 
• IN PERSON
• Festival Box Office; 225 King St. West
• The Bloor Hot Docs Cinema, 506 Bloor St. West

Further information about Waste Land can be found on the Festival website.

WASTE LAND screening times:
Sat., Sept. 6th, 9:30 PM, BLOOR HOT DOCS CINEMA
Mon., Sept. 8th, 4:30 PM, TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX 2
Sat., Sept. 13th, 6:30 PM, SCOTIABANK 13

WASTE LAND: Director Profile of Pieter Van Hees

Flemish genre movies are somewhat uncommon, but Pieter Van Hees joined the ranks in 2008 with his feature Left Bank (Linkeroever) a witchy tale about an archer who finds out her boyfriend's apartment complex was built on a pagan burial site, including a sacrifical pit called "The Devil's Vagina." (I'm not making this up.) Left Bank is a moody, creepy slow build of a movie, which evokes a lot of unanswered questions throught its body horror and scary imagery. Van Hees has stated that his generation is "influenced by Flemish theater" in which case, we should all probably find out more about Flemish theater.

The Devil's WHAT?!

Comparisons to Nicolas Roeg and Roman Polanski would make any director feel overwhelmed, but Van Hees did not let that deter him In 2009, he directed Dirty Mind, which screened at the Karlovy Vary Festival in the Czech Republic. In this film, shy outcast and stunt technician Diego suffers a brain injury that leaves him with something called Frontal Lobe Syndrome. Although the doctors want to reverse his condition, Diego isn't interested as the accident has transformed him into the fearless, glib, womanizer he always wanted to be.

Tony T works his magic on the ladies.

Now Van Hees has a new film at the Toronto International Film Festival's Vanguard programme. Waste Land is the third movie in a trilogy about "love and suffering." He says that it's "loosely based" on the T.S. Eliot poem of the same name, but transported from London to modern Brussels. In Waste Land, homicide detective Leo Woeste leads a gritty, grimy life investigating crimes in the criminal underworld but shares his personal life with his partner Kathleen and her young son. At the same time Kathleen discovers her pregnancy, Woeste is tasked with a bizarre murder case and finds himself being drawn into a sinister subculture.

You'd be glum, too, if you just missed the last bus.

If this twist on film noir, intrigues you (and it should), it's probably best to check out a screening of Waste Land.

WASTE LAND screening times:
Sat., Sept. 6th, 9:30 PM, BLOOR HOT DOCS CINEMA
Mon., Sept. 8th, 4:30 PM, TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX 2
Sat., Sept. 13th, 6:30 PM, SCOTIABANK 13

WASTE LAND: First Look and Trailer!

If that intense, tortured stare featured in the still above is any indicator, you can probably guess that Waste Land, directed by Pieter Van Hees, isn't going to be a lighthearted romp through homicide detective Leo Woeste's life. Sure, he just found out that his partner is unexpectedly pregnant, and yeah, he promises that this case will be his last. Except this one last case drags him into a dark and unsettling underworld. Woeste's fears of becoming a father fully manifest as he struggles to keep his sanity and solve the case.

The thought of parenthood makes us want to wander the streets at night too.

If you're lucky enough to understand French or Flemish, you can also fully understand this trailer, instead of just appreciating—and being slightly disturbed by—the mood and sound and cinematography like this author. (Okay, she understood "un, deux, trois" but that was it.)

Waste Land is screening at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival as part of the Vanguard Programme. Check out more Vanguard films of the official Festival website. 

WASTE LAND screening times:

Saturday, Sept 6th, 9:30 PM THE BLOOR HOT DOCS CINEMA
Monday, Sept 8th, 4:30 PM TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX 2
Saturday, Sept 13, 6:30 PM SCOTIABANK 13

Vanguard's 2014 Programme Seduces and Thrills

Vanguarders and Vanguardians, the time is here at last--Vanguard has returned!

The Toronto International Film Festival's Vanguard programme seduces audiences with a sensory experience full of mystery and boundary--busting madness, with bold international films that walk the razor’s edge. International programmer Colin Geddes brings together the work of some of the most audacious auteurs in the world to present a cinematic adventure that takes audiences to the dark, dangerous places that both unnerve yet intrigue them.

“The Vanguard programme presents the intersection between genre and arthouse to showcase intrepid works that fearlessly defy convention,” said Geddes. “Daring audiences who have grown to love the extreme cinema of Midnight Madness will definitely be seduced by the subversive sophistication of Vanguard.”

The 2014 roster includes master of extreme cinema Takashi Miike (Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai, 13 Assassins), fantastical image manipulator Dave McKean (MirrorMask) , French fear jockey Fabrice Du Welz (Calvaire, Vinyan), the cleverly unsettling Peter Strickland (Berberian Sound Studio), and the wickedly charming duo of Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala (Kern).

Alleluia
Fabrice Du Welz, France/Belgium. North American Premiere

When Gloria and Michel meet on a dating site, nothing suggests the destructiv and murderous passion that will be born of their crazy love. Alleluia is inspired by a 1947 article about nurse Martha Beck and swindler Raymond Fernandez, who became involved in a deadly, tragic affair.

The Duke of Burgundy
Peter Strickland, United Kingdom. World Premiere.

Peter Strickland’s eagerly anticipated follow up to Berberian Sound Studio, screened in the 2012 Vanguard programme, and Katalin Varga is a gorgeously dark melodrama following two women who test the limits of their unsettlingly intense relationship. Starring Sidse Babett Knudsen (Borgen) and Chiara d’Anna.

Goodnight Mommy (Ich seh, Ich seh) 
Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, Austria. North American Premiere

 In the heat of the summer in an isolated house in the countryside between woods and corn fields, 10-year-old twins wait for their mother. When she returns with her head wrapped in bandages after surgery, nothing is as it was before. Stern and distant now, she shuts the family off from the outside world. Starting to doubt that this woman is actually their mother, the boys are determined to find the truth by any means.

Hyena
Gerard Johnson, United Kingdom. International Premiere

Michael Logan is an anti-hero for our times: a natural predator, a high-functioning addict , and corrupt police officer. But his dark world is evolving : a recent influx of ruthless Albanian gangsters is threatening to change London’s criminal landscape. Michael’s razor sharp instincts have always kept him one step ahead, but now his increasingly self-destructive behavior and the sheer brutality of the new gang lords send Michael spiraling into a descent of fear and self-doubt.

Luna
Dave McKean, United Kingdom. World Premiere

Renowned artist and filmmaker Dave McKean (MirrorMask) brings his distinctive blend of live action and gorgeously wrought animation to this dreamlike reverie about four people--Grant, Christine, Dean and Freya--whose long weekend in an isolated house by the sea brings up old resentments and the life of a dead child is revisited in a series of strange dreams.

Over Your Dead Body
Takashi Miike, Japan. International Premiere

A star, Miyuki Goto (Ko Shibasaki) plays Oiwa, the protagonist in a new play based on the ghost story, Yotsuya Kaidan. She pulls some strings to get her lover, Kosuke Hasegawa (Ebizo Ichikawa) cast in the play , even though he 's a relatively unknown actor. Other performers Rio Asahina (Miho Nakanishi) and Jun Suzuki (Hideaki Ito) lust after Miyuki. Off stage the cast's possessive love and obsessions exist as reality. Trapped between the play and reality, the cast's feelings for each other are amplified. When it becomes clear that love is not meant to be both on and off stage, love turns in to a grudge and crosses the blurred line between reality and fantasy.

Shrew’s Nest (Musarañas)
Juanfer Andrés and Esteban Roel, Spain. World Premiere

Spain, 1950s. Monste’s agoraphobia keeps her locked in a sinister apartment in Madrid and her only link to reality is the lit tle sister she sacrificed her youth to raise . But one day, a reckless young neighbour, Carlos, falls down the stairwell and drags himself to their door. Someone has entered the shrew’s nest... and perhaps he’ll never leave.

Spring 
Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, USA. World Premiere

A young man in a personal tailspin flees the US to Italy, where he sparks up a romance with a girl harbouring a dark, primordial secret in this edgy, romantic drama with a supernatural twist.

They Have Escaped 
JP Valkeapää, Finland. North American Premiere

A boy and a girl meet at a custody center for youth with difficulties . The boy has come to serve his obligatory civil service. The girl is one of the youths in custody, and she is constantly in trouble, with a fire inside her and a lust for life t hat can't be quashed or controlled. The boy becomes infatuated with the girl. He is a quiet one; a stutterer. But there is a fire inside him as well. Rules, laws, punishment; the shackles of the hostile environment with no understanding around them can be broken. They steal a car a nd flee together. Thus begins a journey with endless escapes.

Waste Land
Pieter Van Hees, Belgium. World Premiere

Leo Woeste is a homicide investigator living with his girlfriend Kathleen and her five-year-old son, Jack. Kathleen gets pregnant unexpectedly just as Leo must solve his most bizarre case to date: the ritual murder of a young Congolese man, which may or may not involve Leo’s hedonistic new colleague, Johnny Rimbaud. As the case’s complexity mounts by the minute, Leo is pulled away from Kathleen and his role as a father, and heads deeper and deeper into the Waste Land.

The World of Kanako (Kawaki)
Tetsuya Nakashima, Japan International Premiere

When beautiful straight-A high school student Kanako goes missing, her mother asks ex-husband Akikazu—a drifting, irresponsible former cop—to find their daughter. He embarks on a desperate search in the hope of reuniting his family by any means necessary. But as his investigation progresses, Akikazu starts to discover the darkness that lies behind his daughter’s impeccable façade. Clue by clue, revelation by revelation, he starts his descent into the hellish underworld of Kanako’s secret life...

Purchase Festival ticket packages online 24 hours a day at tiff.net/festival, by phone from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. ET daily at 416.599.TIFF or 1.888.599.843

Or visit the Gupta Box Office in person from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. ET daily at TIFF Bell Lightbox, Reitman Square, 350 King Street West until August 20 (while quantities last).

The 39th Toronto International Film Festival runs September 4 to 14, 2014.

Social Media:
@TIFF_NET
#Vanguard #TIFF14
Facebook.com/TIFF
and, of course, right here at the Official Vanguard Programme Blog.