GOING HOME: Director Atom Egoyan and his wife

actress Arsinee Khanjian at the Toronto International

Film Festival gala screening of the film 'Where the

Truth Lies'' in 2005. His latest film, "Citadel," marks a

bittersweet travelogue cum homecoming of his native

Lebanon. (Donald Weber/Getty Images)

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Stories Silly and Serious: Montreal Film Festival

Film Reviews from the Montreal Festival of New Cinema

By Frederic Eger

Special to The Epoch TimesNov 03, 2006

[ Editors' Note: ] According to its publicity

material, the Montreal Festival of New Cinema

held in October each year presents a distinctly

avant-garde focus. Viewers will watch film and

video, installations, websites and performances

with special emphasis on digital work. The

festival has four main sections�Feature Length

Film and Video, Short and Medium Length Film

and Video, New Media, and Digital Cinema.

Reviewer Frederic Eger has selected his top

picks to critique.

Linda Linda Linda

Drummer Kyoto (Aki Maeda), guitarist Kei (Yu

Kashii) and bassist Nozumi (Shiori Sekine) must

recruit a new lead singer on short notice for the

high-school rock festival. A Korean exchange

student, Son (Doona Bae), is a last-minute pick

even though her Japanese is not perfect. They

rehearse, and rehearse, and rehearse night and

day until the singer starts singing correctly in

Japanese.

Almost oversleeping in the rehearsal room

before the concert, the exhausted/burnt-out

quartet nearly misses its fifteen minutes of

fame at this "so-important-end-of-term-rock-

festival." In a pouring rain, they make it to the

concert at the last minute�everything is last

minute in this film!�and the crowd goes wildly

hysterical to the title song�one could assume some inspirational song of the director's teenage years. The

one good thing about Linda Linda Linda is the cinematography. But besides that... Um...

According to some sources, Nobuhiro Yamashita made his reputation directing comedies. This film was an

attempt at mainstream Japanese film but ends up as a time-consuming exercise about uninteresting

characters. Why producers spent their money on a film with no story... write to me if you have the

answer. With effort, this reviewer stayed until the end. I noted that some in the Asian audience laughed

during scenes. Must have been a private joke because I didn't get it.

Linda Linda Linda

Directed by Nobuhiro Yamashita

With Aki Maeda, Yu Kashii, Shiori Sekine & Doona Bae

Runtime: 114 min

******

The Citadel

Atom Egoyan selected the Montreal New Cinema Festival to present what could have just been some home

video footage taken from his private library. He calls it a documentary, "a journal, an essay." No matter

what it is, Atom Egoyan and his wife, Arsinee Khanjian, were there to introduce their film and host a Q&A

with an audience of festival attendees.

After 28 years of living in Canada, Mr. Egoyan and his wife travelled to Lebanon's West Beirut where he

and his wife, both Armenian Christians, grew up. Mr. Egoyan declares the resulting video

footage/chronicle to be a gift to his son about the war-torn country he emigrated from.

With a tremendous sense of humor and irony, Mr. Egoyan plays tour guide as if he were reporting on the

Tour de France. We discover a modest family house where spirituality and Christian symbols are part of

everyday life.

When driving from East Beirut populated by mostly Christians to West Beirut populated by Muslims, Mr.

Egoyan reflects on the "cult" of suicide bombers whose photographs hang on pillars throughout a city

whose residents consider themselves direct descendants of the Phoenicians.

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By producing such a documentary, Atom Egoyan could have easily fallen into the pitfall of producing a

film that declares "Look how bad these Israelis are!" On the contrary, he explains the why and the how his

and his wife's family�like any family�have suffered from the absurdity of war. A beautiful film.

The Citadel

Written, Directed & Produced by Atom Egoyan

With Atom Egoyan (Himself), Arsin�e Khanjian (Herself)

Runtime: 93 min

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The Epoch Times | Stories Silly and Serious: Montreal Film Festival http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-11-3/47745.html

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