2022 Toronto Int. Film Fest Diary: Entry 2 - Premieres and Prestige

We're now past the first weekend of TIFF, which means some of the biggest titles of the festival have finally gotten their premieres out of the way. One of the most anticipated was Rian Johnson's "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery," the sequel to his 2019 box office hit "Knives Out," which also bowed at TIFF. I was no fan of the first film, which I caught at the festival and described as "being trapped in a room with a theater kid for two hours." And yet, slave to the zeitgeist that I am, I went into this sequel, curious to see what this new story would be like knowing that Netflix paid a staggering $450 million for the rights to this and one more sequel.

So color me surprised that I had a pretty good time with "Glass Onion." My issues with "Knives Out" came mainly from how hard it tried to impress, with every laugh line, pop culture reference, and plot twist feeling as forced as a bad TV sitcom. Now, hundreds of millions of dollars later, Johnson doesn't have to prove anything, and that confidence allows him to run wild with a larger scale story. This time, detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) finds himself invited to a Greek island owned by a tech billionaire (Edward Norton) as part of an annual get together with his longtime friends: a US governor (Kathryn Hahn), a scientist (Leslie Odom Jr.), a Joe Rogan-like streamer (Dave Bautista), and a former member of the group (Janelle Monae) whose unexpected presence causes tensions to rise. The party is murder mystery themed (hence Blanc's invite), until a real murder happens, and Blanc tries to figure out which person on the island did it.

Part of the problem with "Knives Out" was its political commentary, with Johnson centering the story around Ana de Armas' lower class caretaker while all the rich jerks she worked for spouted off the kind of lame arguments you'd see on Twitter at any given day. With "Glass Onion" making Craig's eccentric detective the main character, Johnson indulges in the opulence of the rich suspects and lets that speak for itself, although there are times he can't help himself (at one point Blanc tells Hudson's character there's a difference between speaking truthfully with speaking without thinking, a line Johnson was probably glad he never tweeted out himself).

Yet even with all the indulgences, including a slew of cameos ranging from fun to unnecessary, "Glass Onion" pulls off exactly what it sets out to do. Every cast member brings their A-game with Monae likely to get the lion's share of praise (in a less competitive year she'd probably be in the conversation for Oscars), twists and turns keep the film zipping along at a breakneck pace, the island locale and cinematography make it easy to look at, and even the film's satire on the tech industry and 'disruptors' gets a nice, anarchic payoff by the end. I'm glad that Johnson decided to take things less seriously with "Glass Onion," and hope he'll continue that trend whenever "Knives Out 3" finds its way to people's TVs.

Another anticipated title was "The Inspection," Elegance Bratton's feature debut that scored both the Opening Night pick for TIFF's Discovery program (for new filmmakers) and the prestigious Closing Night slot at the upcoming New York Film Festival. It's Bratton's first fiction feature, comes with the backing of A24, and takes inspiration from his own life story growing up queer in an oppressive environment. In other words, it's a very marketable title for Oscar season, and one's feelings on it will depend on how partial they are to awards bait in general.

Jeremy Pope plays Ellis, a 25-year-old gay man living on the streets in the 2000s. He gets no love from his homophobic mother (Gabrielle Union), and with little options left he opts to join the Marines. The film takes place during Ellis' time in boot camp, where it doesn't take much for his fellow soldiers and commander (Bokeem Woodbine) to suss out his orientation and try to break him down completely. At the same time, another commander (Raul Castillo) looks out for him, with the implication that he's hiding his identity (after all, this is set when "Don't ask, don't tell" was the army's policy).

Despite the autobiographical angle, "The Inspection" plays out as a conventional drama, which Bratton handles in a competent if unremarkable way. The boot camp setting lets the story fall into a straightforward structure, with all the peaks and valleys along Ellis' journey to prove himself as an individual to himself, his fellow soldiers, and his mother. But Bratton can't really sidestep the fact that his protagonist is tying his value to a deeply problematic institution, and as much as he highlights the homophobia, racism, sexism, and toxic masculinity within the Marines, Ellis and Castillo's character make an implicit argument that the issues amount to no more than bad apples. Given the individualist nature of "The Inspection" I don't think there would be any way to overcome that obstacle, so as well put together this film may be (Pope's performance is best part of the film, and it's always nice to see Union show off her skills), it's the messy politics that make the strongest impression.

Far messier is "The Whale," Darren Aronofsky's return to the director's chair after his controversial 2017 film "mother!" split audiences right down the middle. Based on the play by Samuel D. Hunter (who also handled writing duties for this adaptation), "The Whale" takes place over one week in the life of Charlie (Brendan Fraser), a 600 pound gay man who's told by his friend and nurse Liz (Hong Chau) that he's bound to die from heart failure before the weekend. Charlie has no intention of saving himself, having decided to eat his way to the grave after the death of his boyfriend several years ago, so he uses his final days to reconnect with his teenage daughter Ellie (Sadie Sink), who despises him ever since he left them for his boyfriend when she was a kid.

It's easy to see why Aronofsky would be drawn to Hunter's play, given its story of a character's self-destructive path to some form of grace falls directly in line with his prior films "Black Swan" and "The Wrestler." But the subject matter of "The Whale" demands a level of care and nuance, two things one would never associate with a filmmaker like Aronofsky. Shot in 4x3 ratio, the film is largely told with suffocating close-ups, with scenes of Charlie eating made to look as grotesque as possible along with multiple shots of his body that amount to gawking. It's just heinous directing through and through, wallowing in the suffering of its character with the expectation that viewers will confuse its sadism for bravery.

Even putting the moral issues aside, Hunter's screenplay is a collection of ideas and symbols lazily thrown around, one after the other, landing on screen with the loudest thud possible. Aronofsky directs within the single set of Charlie's apartment in a mannered, uninspired way, with characters pacing from one area to another like they're going through early stages of a rehearsal. The only positive thing I can really say about "The Whale" is that the cast gives it their all, but that only goes so far. Brendan Fraser and Hong Chau might give two of the better performances I've seen this year, but it doesn't mean much when they're contained within something so rotten. I don't see the point of celebrating the nicer parts of a whole that's just circling the drain.

The highlight of these first several days ended up coming from a film that probably won't come close to any awards shows next year. Last winter, British filmmaker Joanna Hogg announced she made a film in secret during lockdown, and the result is "The Eternal Daughter." Set at an old Welsh hotel located in what looks like the deep forest, Julie (Tilda Swinton) checks in with her elderly mother Rosalind (also Tilda Swinton) and her dog (Louis, Swinton's real life dog) to have a small trip with a purpose for both of them: Julie gets to work on her a screenplay for a new film, while Rosalind gets to revisit a place she remembers as a child and organize old family photographs she brought along. It takes little time before the daughter realizes things are off, whether it's the random noises at night, the impatient hotel receptionist (Carly-Sophia Davies), or the fact that they haven't seen any other guests since their arrival.

Everything about "The Eternal Daughter" has the makings of a great gothic horror story, although Hogg is never one to play things out as one might expect. For a good while, "The Eternal Daughter" establishes and builds out its unsettling mood, with more dread than horror, before revealing what it's really about. It's best to let that discovery happen than detail it here, but needless to say the dual roles by Swinton are not stunt casting or practicalities due to shooting in lockdown. It's more of a representation of how we project ourselves onto our parents, and how that projection underlines how the distance between the people we think our parents are and their true selves increases as we get older and face the inevitable.

Swinton continues to prove why she's earned her status as one of the best actors working today in her dual performance, bringing just the right amount of nuance to her two roles where it's easy to forget you're watching the same person. And the small cast surrounding her performs just as well, from Davies and her constant passive-aggressiveness bringing a surprising amount of comic relief, and Joseph Mydell who makes a brief but strong impression as a hotel employee working the night shift. The film is a welcome evolution for Hogg after her autobiographical "Souvenir" films from the past several years, transitioning to something more personal and complex in its exploration of familial relationships, memory, and acceptance.