TIFF '09 Day Deux

One of the little things that I always notice when I'm in Toronto is the pedestrian crossing signal. The Lite-Brite man looks so confident in his stride, no hint of the slight trepidation apparent in the posture of his American counterpart. I finally figured out why that is: universal health care! You see, the Canuck doesn't care if he gets hit by some reckless driver. There's no chance he'll lose his house or face financial ruin due to exorbitant medical costs. Of course he can walk across the street with that cocksure strut. Pinko bastard...

Ahem, back to the films, yes?

Day 2 of the festival was pretty light viewing, only two films.


The first was a Filipino film, an earnest little movie called If I Knew What You Said about a rebellious young girl who reluctantly befriends a deaf kid at a camp. The film feels competently shot most of the time. It looks like it was shot on DV which added to the somewhat amateurish feel of the production. Actually it felt like something that might play as an ABC Afterschool Special. There was an interesting part showing how the deaf kids learned to dance to music they couldn't technically hear. Also I found myself intrigued at how easily the characters went back and forth from Tagalog to English. Other than that, I couldn't really recommend it. Still glad I saw it though.

Daybreakers, the second Midnight Madness film turned out to be much better than I ever expected. I'd watched the Spierig brothers first film, Undead on the dearly departed Monsters HD. It was decent enough with a dash of quirky humor. Didn't really give any clue that they would be capable of this.


The world of Daybreakers is one where vampires outnumber the human population to the point where the vampires fear humans may go extinct. This is causing the dominant vampire society (which is practically identical to our own w/r/t social/economic structures) to become unstable. It's also causing undo stress to our protagonist, Ethan Hawke, who is working nights and pulling all-dayers in order to perfect a blood substitute. Hawke's vampire hematologist also has a conscience and refuses to taste human blood, preferring to sustain himself on animals instead. He not only wants to find a blood substitute but save humankind from being cattle. Of course, there are others who have different plans. Sam Neill gives a great turn as the corporate reptile employing Hawke who wants to preserve not only the vampire way of life but his own economic fortunes.

What so impressed me about the film was all the little details that the Spierig brothers managed to cram into the picture. Their vampire world doesn't feel so much like a fantastical concoction as the natural and plausible result of their deceptively clever scenario. I sat there never doubting the world they'd created. The film doesn't overdo it on the action, nor does it try to shoehorn in any unnecessary love interests. It just handles its business.

Oh, and I forgot to mention it has a kick-@$$ Willem Dafoe element to it.

Every time I think the vampire genre is dead, that there's no more juice in that turnip, something like Daybreakers happens. I'm not complaining. I'll probably pay to see this again.