Tag: TIFF

AHFW’s Top 20 Films of 2020: #6 ‘The Father’

Jeff Mitchell

6. “The Father” – Anthony (Anthony Hopkins) and his daughter Anne (Olivia Colman) live together in a spacious, comfortable London flat, but she breaks some life-changing news to her dad.  She’s moving to Paris, and – because of Anthony’s dementia – he has to pick up his life and relocate to a nursing home.  Plenty of movies capture this unenviable topic, but director/co-writer Florian Zeller looks at the crisis from Anthony’s perspective, his world, which clouds our judgment about on-screen realities.  These two masterclass actors traverse through Zeller’s disconcerting puzzle…

AHFW’s Top 20 Films of 2020: #7 ‘Apples’

Jeff Mitchell

7. “Apples” – Director/writer Christos Nikou began scribing his “Apples” script – about a worldwide pandemic – in 2012.  Little did he know that COVID-19 would shake up the planet, but thankfully his plague dramedy carries a lighter touch.  For unknown reasons, random adults suddenly develop amnesia, including our lead (Aris Servetalis) – otherwise known as # 14842 –  and a team of doctors and counselors help him form a new identity and start over.  Nikou’s first feature film pits an average guy against uncomfortable, awkward surroundings, and through comic…

AHFW’s Top 20 Films of 2020: #10 ‘Shiva Baby’

Jeff Mitchell

10. “Shiva Baby” – Danielle (Rachel Sennott), a struggling college student, isn’t keeping up with the Joneses these days, but she’ll need to stay one step ahead of her parents, her best pal Maya (Molly Gordon), distant aunts and uncles, five dozen other acquaintances, and her sugar daddy in a hilarious, nerve-racking comedy debut from director/writer Emma Seligman.  Sennott is flat-out marvelous, as Danielle attempts to find solace – and quite frankly trap doors – from sticky conversations, double-takes, and wide-spread embarrassment during a period of mourning, a shiva.  (Her…