Film Festival Film #1: Year of the Carnivore

[bcholmes]

The film festival started today. And tonight, I got my first screening. I chose Sook-Yin Lee's film, Year of the Carnivore. A few months ago, I rented a DVD called Toronto Stories, which was a collection of stories set in Toronto. Sook-Yin's segment in that really stood out as different and quirky, with just the right amount of rough edges. So I thought I'd give this film a try.

It was also preceded by the short film, Big Head by Dylan Akio Smith. Big Head is a pretty simple story. 10-year old Billy has a big head. Naturally, he must be bullied because of this. Then he discovers that his classmate Lucy had a nose job. His problem seems like it has a solution! Plastic surgery! Eventually it turns into a morality tale about learning to love the body you have. The write-up said, "This dark comedy rings true for every kid who was bullied for something that was not wrong with them." For the record, my mileage varies.

It was actually a cute film, but I found the ending weak, mostly because it just arrives, uncleverly, at the "we're all fine just the way we are" place and that's kinda... well... predictable.

But Year of the Carnivore had me in stitches. The film is about Sammy, a neurotic woman with serious body-image issues, who works as a store detective in a grocery store. When she catches shoplifters, the store owner takes them into the back room and beats them up, so that there aren't any repeat offenders.

Sammy has a crush on neighbourhood busker, Eugene. And when things get a bit more serious between them one night, it kinda doesn't work out. Think fumbly, self-conscious attempts at sex.

Sammy concludes that she needs a lot more experience at sex, and begins a painful, dorky, foray into bad sexual adventures. It doesn't help that Sammy's parents (played by Sheila McCarthy and Kevin McDonald) are a middle-class loveless couple, and Eugene's father (played by Intelligence's Eugene Lipinski) is coaching his son to avoid the one mistake of his life: falling in love.

Is there more to Sammy's life than a dead-end job and embarrassing sexual encounters? You have to watch the film to find out.