We're starting to get a clearer picture of the Best Picture race thanks to the wealth of screenings at the Toronto International Film Festival. It looks like "Atonement," Joe Wright's adaptation of the Ian McEwan novel is very, very good. Jeff Wells of Hollywood-Elsewhere is all over it. Derek Elley of Variety also liked it.
"Rendition" from "Tsotsi" director Gavin Hood starring Reese Witherspoon, Meryl Streep, Jake Gyllenhaal and Peter Sarsgaard seems to fall flat. Todd McCarthy hated it, noting, "It’s not easy to make a dull film when your central components include terrorism, torture, secret CIA operations and contempo Middle East intrigue, but Gavin Hood has done it with “Rendition.”
"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford," is all the rave. Geoff Pevere of the Toronto Star writes, "we may have to make room in the tomb for another classic."
Todd McCarthy writes, "'Eastern Promises' instantly takes is place among David Cronenberg's very best films. Same could be said for Viggo Mortensen, whose tightly coiled star turn recalls the magnetic work of Hollywood's greats of yore."
"Michael Clayton" gets some good copy over at The Film Experience.
"Elizabeth: The Golden Age" is summarily panned by Jeff Wells at Hollywood-Elsewhere.
Coming up: "Sleuth" starring Michael Caine and Jude Law; "Across the Universe" starring Evan Rachel Wood; "Cassandra's Dream" from Woody Allen; "No Country for Old Men," from The Coen Bros.; "The Savages" starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney; and "In the Valley of Elah" from Paul Haggis.
