This is a film review from the Melbourne International Film Festival 2008. To see all my reviews from the festival, go here.
This is the first film I had seen from director Guy Maddin. i decided to see it since I heard such good reviews out of Sundance, but didn’t really know what I was getting myself into. The screening was scheduled at the end of a long and tiring weekend. The day before I was part of a wedding and the next day filled with shopping and traveling and other films to see. So coming in I was tired, ready to see the movie and travel back through the cold, Melbourne streets back to bed.
It was probably the perfect way to see this film. “My Winnipeg” is a sleepy, poetic ode to Maddin’s home town and family history. Mostly in dreamy black and white, it’s repetitive laden voice over weaves the narrative in and out of filmed segments, re-enactments, re-imaginings, stock footage, fact and fiction.
See it for: The re-enactments Maddin makes of his childhood by renting out his old childhood home and hiring actors to play his family. The amazing voice over work of Maddin himself - I heard that he performed the voice over live at Sundance, that would have been great. The history of Winnipeg’s various buildings and streets.
The Darkside Not much, the psychic re-enactment/dance didn’t really do it for me.
The Final Word What a great film. Somewhere between Michel Gondry and a song in your head just before you go to sleep.
*****
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