Volume 20 Issue 1 - September 2014

Bang Bang Babyof an immensely popular Bravo!FACT video she shot of the poetmusicianTanya Davis performing her poem “How To Be Alone”(approaching seven million hits on YouTube as this is being written).In the new film, Davis returns to guitar picking and songwriting as ameans to get over a break-up with her artist boyfriend, a lovely idea intheory, but for me, most of the music just didn’t click.A more successful and equally low-key Canadian film, StéphaneLafleur’s Tu Dors Nicole is a finely-etched portrait of a 22-yearoldyoung woman maturing over one aimless summer. The musiccomponent appears in the form of her older brother and his band,who move in to record an album. They, along with Nicole’s best friendand a pre-teen former babysitting charge, all contribute to the comicwisdom of this understated little bijou, filmed in rich black and white.Drawing inspiration from the life and death of the GermanRomantic poet and playwright Heinrich von Kleist, who killed himselfin a suicide pact in his early 30s, Austrian writer-director JessicaHausner’s Amour Fou debunks the romantic myth of dying for love.Not without irony, Hausner makes the most of the distancing effectof the stilted 1811 dialogue. She’s well aware of the absurdly comicformality of her characters and their desires – the film’s title is noaccident. Still, despite its great attention to period detail, beautifullycomposed cinematography and unerring artfulness, it left me cold.You, on the other hand, may be charmed. The musical bonus: threesongs by Mozart, Beethoven and the Danish composer ChristophWeyse, performed without pretense and completely in tune with thetimes.In the Greek film Xenia, a 16-year-old dreams that his older brother,a gifted singer, could become the next “Greek Star.” Boychoir’sprovenance is more promising, since it marks director FrançoisGirard’s return to a musical subject after the superb Thirty-two ShortFilms about Glenn Gould and the immensely popular The Red Violin.Actor Garrett Wareing is its 12-year-old centrepiece chorister, DustinHoffman the demanding choirmaster and the talented Eddie Izzard,his right-hand man.In Timbuktu, Abderrahmane Sissako takes a clear-eyed, moving,humanistic look at the jihadist takeover of northern Mali, bringing uswholly into the lives of his well-developed characters, ordinary peoplewho want nothing more than to make music, play soccer and, for thewomen, to feel the breeze on their hands without being forced to weargloves at all times. The remarkable Malian singer-actress FatoumataDiawara (who appeared in concert at Koerner Hall last February)plays a woman being beaten for making music. As the severity of thebeating builds, her cries intensify into an unforgettable wailing song,defiantly acting out the very thing for which she is being punished.Girlhood, Céline Sciamma’s classical coming-of-age story setin the Parisian suburbs, vibrates like a street opera, reaching itsmusical apex when its protagonists, four teenage black girls whoseenergy and camaraderie are completely natural and infectious, singalong to Rihanna’s song “Diamonds” as they treat themselves to thepleasures of a stay in a fancy hotel. More noteworthy though, is thedirector’s choice of Para One to write an original score consistingof only one theme that returns many times over the course of theContinues on page 78thewholenote.com September 1, 2014 – October 7, 2014 | 9