What to rent, what to rent ...

Too cold to go outside? Week too long to bother with company? Sounds like a rental weekend to me. You can just pop some corn and open a bottle, slide into your slippers and enjoy your couch. All you have to do first is drag your lazy butt to the video store. This is where I come in. Let me make the daunting task of scanning shelf after shelf a little easier to make it all go a little faster. The video store is a place where all movies, big and small, come to live forever. It is my mission to make sure that some of the small don’t get lost amidst the masses. The following are not to be missed …

THE VISITOR

When I saw this film in theatres, I was taken with just how well it navigated between the quiet of lonely spaces, the ambiance created by people making music and the deafening inner turmoil of love being torn apart. Seeing it again in my living room, showed me sides I hadn’t seen the first time out. Richard Jenkins is superbly subtle as Walter Vale, a university professor who has been sleep walking through his life ever since the death of his wife. He wants to wake up; he wants to be present, participating in the same moments of life as the people he sees him passing him bay every day. Only, Walter’s life is without inspiration. It isn’t until he begrudgingly travels from Connecticut to a New York City apartment he rarely uses and finds that a couple have been living there for two months without his knowledge, that he wakes up. All Walter needed was something real and that is precisely what he gets with Tarek and Zainab (Haaz Sleiman and Danai Gurira), two immigrants trying to make a life for themselves in a foreign land. This may not be their original home but it is Walter who is visiting the land where they live.

MONGOL

Everyone has to start somewhere. Even emperors can have humble beginnings. And so the great Genghis Khan, emperor of the Mongol Empire in the 12th century, was once a boy whose name was Temudgin. Great leaders and warriors don’t just become these things though. The values and strengths that make them great can be seen at a very young age and Temudgin definitely had what was needed all along. Russian director, Sergei Bodrov’s epic, MONGOL, follows Temudgin as he grows from a precocious child to an honourable master and does so with as much calculated structure and beauty as the Mongolians had regulation to follow.

North American art house audiences flocked to see MONGOL when it was released domestically following its Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language film. The stunning battle sequences satisfied those who wanted to see Khan (played in the film as an adult by Tadanobu Asano) as a warrior and a conqueror while the respectful and dedicated romance between Temudgin and the bride he chose when he was just 9, Borte (Khulan Chuluun) showed a civil side to Khan. The duality of the film is most suitable considering historians are divided on the kind of man Khan was. Ultimately though, Bodrov sides with those who believed Khan to be a fair leader, a reverential husband and father and a great man whose accomplishments earned him a rightful place in the history of the world.

THE STRANGERS

I don’t usually do scary. It keeps me up at night; it makes me jumpy in the middle of the day. I don’t see any actual need to put myself through this sort of torture. That said, I thoroughly enjoyed this seemingly conventional fright flick called THE STRANGERS. Written and directed by first-timer, Bryan Bertino, THE STRANGERS gets you right where it counts, at home. This is all the more reason to bring this one home with you – so that you can wonder what that noise was you heard in the kitchen. Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman play a couple on the verge of either getting engaged or breaking up. While this is never a good place to be, it is a much better place than his family’s country house. The couple has come up for the night after a wedding and is subsequently terrorized by a threesome of psychopaths. Bertino is having such a blast playing with time, space and sound, you won’t know what is coming or from where most of the time. The whole thing doesn’t amount to very much nor does it have anything distinct to say about senseless violence but it sure scared the crap out of me and ‘tis the season after all.

GRADES

THE VISITOR: B+
MONGOL: B
THE STRANGERS: B

And thus concluded my first WHAT TO RENT feature. Should you need any advice on what to rent, feel free to write me anytime. You can ask about specific titles or for recommendations … I’m here for you.

THE STRANGERS

Written and Directed by Bryan Bertino
Starring Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman


Kristen McKay: Why are you doing this to us?
Masked Stranger: Because you were home.

Before writer/director, Bryan Bertino’s debut film, THE STRANGERS commences, a peculiar voice narrates the text that appears on the screen. Apparently, there have been over 1.4 million violent crimes investigated by the FBI. It isn’t clear whether James Hoyt and Kristen McKay’s story is inspired by one particular real event - whether these two individuals that we are about to watch be mentally and physically tormented for hours in fact existed in real life, or whether this story is just an amalgamation of many horrifically tragic experiences all smashed into one for dramatic effect. Either way, the vague implication that this may have actually taken place is essentially unnecessary as the situation these two innocents find themselves in would have been frightening one way or the other.


I don’t remember the last time I saw a “scary” movie. I tend to avoid them as I don’t need anything else in my life to disrupt my sleep and it has also been my experience that the majority of these films are rushed efforts that rely on quick and easy startles to satisfy the crowd. Though some of these expected thrills give THE STRANGERS some of its more jumpy moments, it is the underlying randomness of the events that keep the uneasy tone lingering long after its close. Having returned home from a disappointing and potentially devastating evening, troubled couple, Hoyt & McKay (Scott Speedman and Liv Tyler) realize that they don’t know each other as well as they thought they did. The strangers sharing a bed in the secluded Hoyt summer home needn’t fear each other though as much as the strangers lurking in the surrounding woods. Finding themselves in a position that would drive anyone to panic, the two go between the offensive and the defensive, as well as inside and outside the home. Just like the fright flicks I remember, these two make decisions that seem utterly ridiculous while I sit safely watching from afar, which only drives my panic higher and my hands tighter over my eyes.


It is Bertino’s subtle and oddly gentle style that makes THE STRANGERS such an effective experience. Strange sounds seem to be coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once while the sinister trio of masked tormentors ominously appear from and disappear into the shadows at random intervals. They don’t know when or from where the next scream will come from and that is the last thing you need when you think you’re in the safety of your own home. By attacking the audience’s basest of fears, Bertino has simplified the genre. He has crafted a thriller that isn’t bogged down in explaining the face of evil or concerned with upping the gore factor. Subsequently, there’s a lot more time left over to just scare the crap out of everyone.

PROMOTION: THE STRANGERS

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE TRAILER FOR THE STRANGERS

Writer / Director, Bryan Bertino just got very lucky. His first feature, THE STRANGERS, has just been been made this last year and will be finding its way to theatres in wide release on May 30. It is the latest suspense thriller bent on fooling the audience into thinking that what they’re watching is a reenactment of real life events. Far as I can tell, the events that took place on February 11, 2005, at the summer home of James Hoyt and Kristen McKay, the same events that were so horrific they were never revealed to the public, never actually took place. Films inspired by real life events don’t actually have to have any base in real life t get away with the claim. When the films looks as dark, as eerie and as frightening as THE STRANGERS though, what does it matter if it actually happened or not?

Scott Speedman and Liv Tyler play Hoyt and McKay. The couple have just returned from a wedding reception for an evening of romance and celebration. They have retreated to the Hoyt family summer home. It is secluded and out of the way. It is the perfect private spot. Only privacy can lead to more than just romantic marathon lovemaking. While no one may be around to hear your cries of passion, there is also no one to hear your cries for help. It is the vulnerability of Hoyt and McKay that is the most terrifying thing about THE STRANGERS. What are we to do if we can never cast our fears aside long enough to relax?