Hot Docs 2008: Vesterbro

Vesterbro (11:55 p.m., Bloor). A sort of cinéma vérité film that concentrates on the difficult relationship between two young Danes, this is another film that makes us think about the place of fiction in films today—not because it’s fictional in any way (other than the usual documentary contrivances), but because if someone asked us to see a film about two young people in Denmark falling in and out of love that had a script we’d be fine, but while watching two people do it "for real" we often found ourselves wondering why on earth we should care. That's not to say Vesterbro is bad in its very small scope. Though it's not always interesting (depending on the level of crisis), it's a realistic and overall positive love story (of sorts)—even if it does cheat a bit by having an amazing soundtrack, including stellar works from Why? and The Knife. After all, what are relationships but ups, downs, and long periods in between were things are just fine? 3.5/5

More of today’s picks:

12:00 p.m. – Carts of Darkness (Isabel Bader)
12:00 p.m. – At the Death House Door (ROM)
2:00 p.m. – Seaview (Isabel Bader)
4:15 p.m. – Be Like Others (Cumberland)
7:00 p.m. – Mechanical Love (Cumberland)
9:00 p.m. – Stalags – Holocaust and Pornography in Israel (Al Green) – A very descriptive title, that one.
9:30 p.m. – Planet B-Boy (Innis Town Hall)
9:30 p.m. – Dreams With Sharp Teeth (Isabel Bader) – Harlan Ellison tells it like it is.
9:30 p.m. – Bloody Cartoons (ROM) – We feel that South Park might have said all that needed to be said about the "Danish cartoon controversy" but another look wouldn’t hurt.