110 Movies Like Her (2013) On Itunes Canada (Page 3)

The film stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Lou Bloom, an impromptu freelance videographer who begins covering the crime world in LA for a local TV station. Almost as dark as a mystery can get, it is disturbing, and plays out as a combination of "Drive" and "The Network". The film is visually stunning as well as immensely suspenseful. It then becomes almost impossible to look away, even when you're the most horrified by just how far Bloom is willing to go to reach success. Gyllenhaal's performance is widely compared to that of Robert De Niro in Taxi Driver, which should give you an idea of its caliber.

Genre: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Actor: Alex Ortiz, Ann Cusack, Bill Blair, Bill Paxton, Bill Seward, Carolyn Gilroy, Chris Wolfe, Christina De Leon, Dale Shane, Dan Gilroy, Dig Wayne, Eric Lange, Holly Hannula, Jake Gyllenhaal, James Huang, Jamie McShane, Jonny Coyne, Kathleen York, Kent Shocknek, Kevin Dunigan, Kevin Rahm, Kiff VandenHeuvel, Leah Fredkin, Marco Rodriguez, Merritt Bailey, Michael Hyatt, Michael Papajohn, Myra Turley, Pat Harvey, Price Carson, Rene Russo, Rick Chambers, Rick Garcia, Riz Ahmed, Sharon Tay, Stephanie D'Abruzzo, Viviana Chavez

Director: Dan Gilroy

Rating: R

This is a gorgeous French-Canadian movie with out-of-this-world sound work.

Laurence is deeply in love with his girlfriend, Fred. On his birthday, he announces to her that he wants to restart his life as a woman, having always hated his male body. Fred doesn't know how to take the news: “everything I love about you is everything you hate about yourself”.

Laurence Anyways is about how their romance continues after this revelation. There are so many reasons to watch this movie: the story, the acting, the cinematography; but trust me, the soundtrack alone is reason enough.

Genre: Drama, Romance

Actor: Alexandre Goyette, Alexis Lefebvre, Anne Dorval, Anne-Élisabeth Bossé, Antoine-Olivier Pilon, Bronwen Mantel, Catherine Bégin, Claude Gasse, David Savard, Denise Filiatrault, Denys Paris, Emily Hampshire, Emmanuel Schwartz, Éric Bruneau, François Sasseville, Gilles Renaud, Jacob Tierney, Jacques Lavallée, Magalie Lepine Blondeau, Manuel Tadros, Melvil Poupaud, Monia Chokri, Monique Spaziani, Mylène Jampanoï, Nathalie Baye, Patrice Coquereau, Patricia Tulasne, Perrette Souplex, Pierre Chagnon, Sophie Faucher, Susan Almgren, Suzanne Clément, Vincent Davy, Violette Chauveau, Xavier Dolan, Yves Jacques

Director: Xavier Dolan

Rating: Not Rated

How do you get rid of an irremovable stain? In Lodge Kerrigan’s psychological thriller, characters shave the dirt off in hopes of returning things to their original pristine state. In the process of doing so, however, permanent damage is incurred, which begs the question: is the eradication of filth correspond to cleansing?

Through erratic editing and an unsettling sound design, not only does Clean, Shaven put its audience in the disturbed mind of the protagonist Peter Winter, it also effectively depicts his struggle (and inability) to retain sanity amidst a prejudiced society. The film contrasts post-Cold War paranoia with the nobility of paternal love, and finds tragedy in Peter’s futile attempts to prove his “cleanliness” in a world intent to brand him as dirty.

Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller

Actor: Alice Levitt, Eliot Rockett, Ismael Ramirez, J. Dixon Byrne, Jennifer MacDonald, Karen MacDonald, Molly Castelloe, Peter Greene, Peter Lucas, Rob Benevides, Robert Albert

Director: Lodge Kerrigan

The highly unusual story of this documentary starts with Kevin Hearn, a member of the band Barenaked Ladies, realizing that his painting by famous Canadian Indigenous artist Norval Morrisseau is a fake. When he sues the collector he bought it from, he starts a series of inquiries that unravel a story that gets progressively darker: drug dealing, organized crime, addiction, sexual abuse, and completely crazy characters (reminiscent of Tiger King).

Behind all of that, There Are No Fakes is about the exploitation not only of Indigenous art but of Indigenous people in Canada in general.

Genre: Documentary

Actor: Kevin Hearn

Director: Jamie Kastner

There’s a vein of reality running through He Got Game that gives this Spike Lee joint a sense of pulsating immediacy. For one, the young basketball prodigy at its center is played by real-life pro Ray Allen, who shot the movie during the sport’s off-season period in 1997. The film also draws on a host of other ballers and ancillary figures — including coaches and commentators — to fully convince us of the hype around Jesus Shuttlesworth (Allen), a Coney Island high-schooler who’s been crowned America’s top college draft pick.

Lee takes this premise to much more interesting places than sports movies usually go. The plot is a melodrama of sorts, in which Jesus’ incarcerated father Jake (a top-tier Denzel Washington) must convince his son to declare for the governor’s alma mater in exchange for a reduced sentence. The pair are estranged — Jake is in prison for the death of Jesus’ mother — making this as much a tense examination of family and forgiveness as it is a sports movie. And what a sports movie it is: Lee makes his love of basketball not just abundantly clear but also infectious, opening the film on soaring, balletic images of the sport that suggest it’s no mere game, but something unifying, artistic, and ultimately salvatory.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Al Palagonia, Arthur J. Nascarella, Bill Nunn, Bill Walton, Charles Barkley, Chasey Lain, Denzel Washington, Dick Vitale, George Karl, Hill Harper, Jennifer Esposito, Jill Kelly, Jim Boeheim, Jim Brown, John Turturro, Joseph Lyle Taylor, Kim Director, Leonard Roberts, Lonette McKee, Michael Jordan, Milla Jovovich, Ned Beatty, Ray Allen, Reggie Miller, Rick Fox, Robin Roberts, Roger Guenveur Smith, Ron Cephas Jones, Rosario Dawson, Roy Williams, Scottie Pippen, Shaquille O'Neal, Thomas Jefferson Byrd, Zelda Harris

Director: Spike Lee

Rating: R

The acting... oh the acting! Your Sister's Sister is a fantastic comedy which makes great use of the amazing talents and suitability of its cast, including the criminally underused Emily Blunt. Far smarter, quicker and grown-up than most other Rom-Coms, it's a film built on secrets, lies and, yes, love, sex and family.

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Emily Blunt, Jeanette Maus, John Lavin, Kate Bayley, Mark Duplass, Mel Eslyn, Mike Birbiglia, Rosemarie DeWitt

Director: Lynn Shelton

Rating: R

This coming-of-age story based on the bestseller by the same name starts fun but veers towards darker territory. It's about a high-schooler who makes two older friends, played perfectly by Ezra Miller and Emma Watson. But as he gets closer to one of them, his anxieties and past trauma come to the surface. The impressive depth to which the makers of The Perks of Being a Wallflower were able to take it is what elevates it to greatness. It's the perfect mix between easy and challenging. If there is ever such a thing, it's this movie.

Genre: Comedy, Drama

Actor: Adam Hagenbuch, Brian Balzerini, Chelsea Zhang, Dihlon McManne, Dylan McDermott, Emily Marie Callaway, Emma Watson, Erin Wilhelmi, Ezra Miller, Joan Cusack, Joe Fishel, Johnny Simmons, Jordan Paley, Julia Garner, Kate Walsh, Landon Pigg, Leo Miles Farmerie, Logan Lerman, Mae Whitman, Mark McClain Wilson, Melanie Lynskey, Morgan Wolk, Nicholas Braun, Nina Dobrev, Patrick de Ledebur, Paul Rudd, Reece Thompson, Stacy Chbosky, Stephen Chbosky, Tom Savini, William L. Thomas, Zane Holtz

Director: Stephen Chbosky

Rating: PG-13

“It is better to live miserable than to die happy,” or so says one of the characters in Jia Zhangke’s anthology film A Touch of Sin. On its surface, the “sin” referenced in the title might pertain to the acts of murder that the four protagonists commit, but in the context of China’s rapidly changing capitalist landscape (a theme explored in the director’s other pictures), it reveals itself as a malady shared by Chinese laborers treated as dispensable resources by the powers-that-be. Murder, then, is explored as an extremity, the effectual breaking point of people no longer able to contain the injustice within themselves. Beneath the splatters of blood is a plea for empathy and understanding, at once remorseful and full of conviction.

Genre: Action, Crime, Drama

Actor: Baoqiang Wang, Han Dong, Jiang Wu, Jin Zhang, Li Meng, Lu Liu, Luo Lanshan, Qiang Wang, Wang Baoqiang, Wang Hongwei, Wang Qiang, Zhang Jiayi, Zhang Jin, Zhao Tao

Director: Jia Zhangke

It’s hard not to watch The Unknown Country and think of Nomadland: along with similarities in their Terrence Malick-inspired visuals, both films follow lone women seeking catharsis on the road as they grieve profound losses. But Morrisa Maltz’s debut feature is a decidedly lower-key, more spiritual affair — and is all the better for it.

The film is light on plot exposition, but it’s clear from her soft melancholy that Tana (Lily Gladstone) has set off on this road trip following a personal loss, a meandering journey that takes her from freezing Minnesota to Oglala Lakota reservations in South Dakota and down through Texas. Along the way, she reunites with loved ones and crosses paths with total strangers, all of whom are played by charismatic non-professional actors whose real life stories earn as much of the spotlight as Tana’s impressionistically shot journey. These moments of documentary, Gladstone’s naturalistic performance, Andrew Hajek’s contemplative images of lush American landscapes, and the film’s aversion to outright drama enrich the fictional elements by grounding them in earthy reality. There aren’t many more emotionally rewarding ways to spend 80-ish minutes than watching this poignant meditation on the tangled richness of human lives and the land we live on.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Devin Shangreaux, Lainey Bearkiller Shangreaux, Lily Gladstone, Raymond Lee, Richard Ray Whitman

Director: Morrisa Maltz

Rating: NR

If you’ve ever seen a movie by kings of social realism Ken Loach or the Dardenne brothers, you’ll recognize the cinematic tradition The Measure of a Man is coming from, but if you haven’t, don’t fear. The filmmaking here isn’t complicated, academic, or laden with references — in fact, the opposite is true. Stylistically pared back, the intensely modern and human story at the movie’s center expands to fill the frame so we have nowhere else to look.

With a disabled son to provide for, middle-aged Thierry (Vincent Lindon) desperately searches for a job, undergoing several state-required indignities — such as practice interview sessions in which fellow jobseekers critique everything from his body language to his tone of voice — just for a shot at being able to pay his bills. So many scenes and conversations here are palpably laden with the anxieties of real life, both economic and personal. And yet, for all the dehumanization and desperation clouding its edges, Measure of a Man isn’t a hopeless movie. We’re reminded by happy scenes at home just how rich Thierry’s life is, unemployed or not — but it's perhaps his moral compass, which begins to twitch when he takes a security job with an unscrupulous corporate employer, that’s most heartening of all.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Christophe Rossignon, Karine de Mirbeck, Mathieu Schaller, Soufiane Guerrab, Vincent Lindon, Xavier Mathieu, Yves Ory

Director: Stéphane Brizé

As black a comedy as they come. Nick Naylor (superbly portrayed by Aaron Eckhart) is the chief spokesperson for tobacco and shows the world why smoking is as key to protect as any other liberal value. This movie is funny, smart, thoughtful and raises some good questions about the ego, the morale and what we leave behind, from unexpected sides.

Genre: Comedy, Drama

Actor: Aaron Eckhart, Aaron Lustig, Adam Brody, Aloma Wright, Brian Palermo, Bruce French, Cameron Bright, Catherine Reitman, Christopher Buckley, Connie Ray, Courtney Taylor Burness, Dana E. Glauberman, Daniel Travis, David Koechner, David O. Sacks, Dennis Miller, Earl Billings, Elon Musk, Eric Haberman, Eva La Dare, J.K. Simmons, Jeff Witzke, Joan Lunden, Jordan Garrett, Katie Holmes, Kim Dickens, Marc Scizak, Maria Bello, Marianne Muellerleile, Mary Jo Smith, Melora Hardin, Michael Mantell, Nancy O'Dell, Rachel Thorp, Renée Graham, Richard Speight Jr., Rob Lowe, Robert Duvall, Robert Malina, Roy Jenkins, Sam Elliott, Sean Patrick Murphy, Spencer Garrett, Terry James, Timothy Dowling, Todd Louiso, William H. Macy

Director: Jason Reitman

Rating: R

Director Crystal Moselle based Skate Kitchen on NYC’s eponymous crew of young female skateboarders, who actually play fictionalized versions of themselves here. That real-life casting lends the film a documentary-esque quality: the girls’ bantering chemistry and die-hard loyalty feel warmly authentic, and the movie would be well worth a watch just to bask in this vibe alone.

The Skate Kitchen girls are an eclectic bunch, but what’s so refreshing — and therapeutic — about the film is that they’re also deeply, instinctively empathetic. These misfits don’t just tolerate but celebrate one another’s uniqueness and respect their differing boundaries (the way the girls and the movie treat shyness as a feature rather than a flaw to be resolved is particularly moving). What’s more, in its own low-key way, Skate Kitchen is an inspirational watch for its portrait of young women building the sanctuary they need themselves — not just in a largely male subculture but on a broader canvas, too. Rather than skulk anxiously on the sidelines, the girls use skating to carve out a space of their own in New York, a way to make the big, scary city feel warm and intimate. Amidst all the steezy ollies and clean rail grinds, these might just be the greatest tricks they pull off.

Genre: Comedy, Drama

Actor: Ajani Russell, Darlene Violette, Dede Lovelace, Elizabeth Rodriguez, Hisham Tawfiq, Jaden Smith, Javier Nunez, John Palumbo, Kabrina Adams, Kobi Frumer, Nico Hiraga, Nina Moran, Rachelle Vinberg, Samuel Smith, Tashiana Washington, Taylor Gray, Thaddeus Daniels, Tom Bruno

Director: Crystal Moselle

Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano), a young and promising novelist imagines and writes about his idea of a perfect female companion. Somehow, his words manifest into reality - the beautiful and corky Ruby Sparks (Zoe Kazan). Soon, however, his magical love turns shallow as his creation begins to think for herself and wrestle against her creation. This romantic comedy has the right amount of wit and emotion with a deep message of loving people just the way they are.

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Romance

Actor: Aasif Mandvi, Alia Shawkat, Annette Bening, Antonio Banderas, Casey Genton, China Shavers, Chris Messina, Claudia Bestor, Deborah Ann Woll, Diana Parros, Eden Brolin, Eleanor Seigler, Elliott Gould, Emma Jacobs, Jane Anne Thomas, Janine King, John F. Beach, Kai Lennox, Mark Roman, Mary Jo Deschanel, Michael Berry Jr., Paul Dano, Rick L. Dean, Rightor Doyle, Steve Coogan, Tatiana Sarasty, Toni Trucks, Wallace Langham, Zoe Kazan

Director: Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris

Rating: R