The Madness is Spreading!

When I first started attending and working with TIFF back in 2002, Midnight Madness was pretty much known as the darkened corner of the Festival, the miscreant programme that featured the types of films that the other programmes wouldn’t touch.

Since then, the monster factory has brought us directors like Johnnie To, who graced the Midnight Madness screen in 2000 and 2001 with The Mission and Full Time Killer respectively. This year, To’s Office is a part of the prestigious Special Presentations programme, and this action-musical hybrid set among cubicles in an office definitely brings a little Midnight flavour with it.

With Midnight curator Colin Geddes taking the reins of the Vanguard programme, many Midnight directors jump back and forth between the two with ease - exposing their often gory and extreme visions to an audience that may not be so inclined to stay up to the wee hours. Filmmakers like Alex De La Iglesia (My Great Night, 2015) and Takeshi Miike (Over Your Dead Body, 2014), both Midnight Madness mainstays, have had films in Vanguard in the last couple of years - along with Fabrice Du Welz, Mark Hartley and others.

One of the biggest ‘graduations’ from the Midnight programme this year has to be Sarah Silverman, whose 2005 comedy Jesus Is Magic wowed the Ryerson audience for her big TIFF debut.  Since then, Silverman has become an unlikely supporting and leading actor in more serious fare--namely, 2011’s Take This Waltz and this year’s I Smile Back.

And of course, Ben Wheatley, whose organic move through TIFF started with Midnight Madness in 2011 with Kill List, continued through Vanguard in 2012 with Sightseers, brings High Rise to the Platform programme this year. Platform is a juried programme that aims to spotlight and award films from lesser-known directors (though he's already well-known to us Midnighters)--similar to the prizes awarded in Cannes or Berlin. High Rise will compete with 11 other films for the Platform award, and recognition and a big bag of cash that comes with it.

These examples are hardly the first filmmakers that have broken out from the Midnight programme - remember that Midnight Madness boasts early work from Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, 1993), Peter Jackson (Braindead, 1992), and so many others. But there is a palpable tectonic shift in the sorts of films that are being programmed elsewhere in the Festival, with sci-fi, horror, and the downright surreal taking high-profile spots in the more mainstream programmes. It also means that the filmmakers you're watching this year at Midnight Madness might one day be a Platform nominee, or maybe even a People's Choice winner. I, for, one, hope that the not-yet-announced A Talking Isopod?! will someday take TIFF's top prize.

A TALKING ISOPOD?!?!?!?!

@thesubstream - Midnight Madness '11 Ep. 10: Kill List!

Matt Price of MAMO asks Colin Geddes for his thoughts on this year's very different, very satisfying slate of films. Plus, the gang sees Ben Wheatley's Kill List, which you will either love or hate, as it turns out. We're sad to see you go, TIFF Midnight Madness 2011, but thesubstream.com salutes you - thanks for all the fun!

KILL LIST: A Gallery of Hitmen

Hitman movies are one of my favorite genres. I like the moral tension, the conflict between being a part and being apart, the slick suits. So while we wait for the genre-bending  Kill List, tonight, here's a little list of cinematic gentleman who live off of blood money. Feel free to share some of your favorites.

Citta Violenta / Violent City / The Family (1970) Charles Bronson plays, Jeff Heston, a double-crossed hitman out for revenge. Jill Ireland plays a pretty woman in the clutches of the evil and salacious gangster played by Telly Savalas, with all the leering salaciousness he can muster. There's a fantastic score by Ennio Morricone. (It serves as my wake up alarm in the morning). And I enjoy how the movie conveys a more European sense of the distance between New Orleans, Louisiana and Michigan.



In The Mechanic (1972), well-established Charles' Bronson's professional hitman takes a young upstart--and even full-on whippersnapper,  (played by a cocky as hell Jan Michael Vincent) as his protege. It's not really a good idea, but it does make for an excellent twist ending.



Golgo 13: Assignment Kowloon (1977) is a live-action version of Takao Saito's hardboiled manga series. JJ Sonny Chiba plays Duke Togo, a hitman hired by the United States government to eliminate a Hong Kong triad boss. Fans of Etsuko Shiomi/Sue Shiomi will be glad to see her do a little fighting in this film. Features the kind of violence you'd expect from a 1970s Chiba film blended with the coolness of 1970s Hong Kong.



Ostensibly the story of Jeff, a hitman played by Chow Yun-Fat, who's attempting to right a wrong and find a new life with the young nightclub singer he's blinded, played by Sally Yeh, The Killer (1989) is just as easily described as a love story between a noble hitman and a sort of corrupt cop (Danny Lee) who each cross the same moral line. There is, however, a helluva lot of shooting, fashionable suits and style to burn. And I'm sure it's just an accident that the hitman here is named Jeff and is double-crossed by a gangster boss a la The Mechanic.



In Leon: The Professional / The Professional (1994), Jean Reno plays an hitman ("Leon") who takes in a stray girl after her parents are killed. The is one of Natalie Portman's earliest roles, and she does a great job as a girl who desperately tries to convince a hired killer to take revenge.




Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) is a comedy. John Cusack plays Martin Blank, a man who not only has an incredibly Hal Hartley name, but also believes he is conflicted about his life choices. He's forced a therapist (played by Alan Arkin) into seeing him and decides he needs to go to his high school reunion, conveniently located near a job his been hired to do. Blanks' interactions with his therapist are revealing in just how frightening a professional hitman would be in real life. Also, for fight fans, Benny "The Jet" Urquidez does some kicking.



Ghost Dog:  The Way of the Samurai (1999) is a Jim Jarmusch movie. It is very quiet, contemplative and conversational as a hitman movie. That is, it is not action-packed (though it is compared to Broken Flowers). Forrest Whitaker plays Ghost Dog, a hitman who's been trying to understand his profession through the 18th Century manual of bushido, The Hidden Leaves / Hagakure. Unfortunately, its precepts of service, duty and honor get Ghost Dog in trouble with the Mafia.

KILL LIST screening times:

Sat., Sept. 17th, 11:59PM, RYERSON

Sun., Sept. 18th, 3:15PM, SCOTIABANK THEATRE 4

KILL LIST Screens at Midnight Madness!

Kill List plays Midnight Madness tonight!. What seems like a straight up genre piece becomes something else entirely in this movie about a hitman who accepts a job from some shadowy clients.

Kill List is directed by Ben Wheatley (Down Terrace) and stars Neil Maskell, MyAnna Buring, Harry Simpson and Michael Smiley.

KILL LIST screening times:

Sat., Sept. 17th, 11:59PM, RYERSON

Sun., Sept. 18th, 3:15PM, SCOTIABANK THEATRE 4

KILL LIST Director, Ben Wheatley's No Budget Film School

There are still 3 more films at Midnight Madness before we get there, but Saturday night brings the Canadian Premiere of Ben Wheatley's Kill List to close out the Midnight Madness program. I was lucky (and impatient) enough to see an advance screening of it yesterday and I absolutely loved it! If I were to recommend one film for the remainder of the festival, it would be Kill List. The less you know, the better, but I knew a bit more than I'd wanted to going into it and still adored it.

Kill List is Wheatley's second feature film after his six thousand pounds budgeted dark and violent mob family dramedy, Down Terrace (which you should seek out immediately if you haven't seen it). The London Evening Standard recently interviewed Wheatley about making a no-budget feature. Aspiring filmmakers, take note!

Ben Wheatley's No Budget Film School

Trailer:


Kill List screens:
Saturday September 17 11:59:00 PM RYERSON
Sunday September 18 3:15:00 PM SCOTIABANK THEATER 4

The Guardian (UK) gives KILL LIST 4/5 Stars!

Lots of good press for Ben Wheatley's Kill List around the web lately, with the newest addition to the love-in being a 4-star review from The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw. In the review, Bradshaw claims that "[a]s far as British horror goes right now, Kill List is pretty much top of the range". Hard to argue with that kind of praise! Personally, the Midnight Madness closing film for this year is right at the top of my most-anticipated of the lineup. Don't miss out!

Mr Bradshaw's review has also just introduced me to the unequivocally whoopass term, 'infra-retch'. Stealing it!

Kill List screening times:

Saturday September 17 11:59pm Ryerson

Sunday September 18 3:15pm Scotiabank Theatre 4

AICN Hearts KILL LIST, DRIVE, and other TIFF selections at the Melbourne International Film Festival!

A contributor named 'Tyler Turden' over at Ain't It Cool News caught Midnight Madness selection Kill List as well as TIFF 2011 selection Drive down under at the Melbourne International Film Festival and had glowing reviews of both.