I saw 14 films in five days during the first weekend of the Festival, and as always, I will break them down by days:
Friday, September 8, 2017
Usually I don’t watch a film on my first day there, but there was a film that I wanted to see that only showed Thursday, the 7th and on the 8th. Borg/McEnroe was a dramatization of the lives of the two tennis champions leading up to the titanic battle at the 1980 Wimbledon men’s final. As a confirmed Borg fan, I really wanted to see this movie!
This film was interesting in a couple of ways: first, notorious bad boy Shia LaBeouf played notorious bad boy John McEnroe, and he was quite good, but what made this more interesting was that this was a Swedish production, so the film dealt more with Borg’s side of the story. Since Borg is the notoriously quiet, icy assassin on the court, we never got a feel for his life. McEnroe has written books on portions of his life, but Borg’s story has always been untold. Borg, played by Sverrir Gudnason, was the stone faced man who was tormented by being number 1 and all of the attention. The film shows that the two men were pushed by similarly tough taskmasters: with McEnroe, it was his father; with Borg, it was his coach Lennart Bergelin, played by Stellan Skasgard, returning to his native Sweden. The men had more in common than they knew at the time.
The tennis was very well shot, with a Czech tennis stadium turned into Wimbledon with the help of CGI. One thing wasn’t CGI however, a kid played the teenaged Borg and looked just like him. Turns out, it was his son Ben Borg. The director, Janus Metz mentioned that while the story was dramatization, he asked Borg how close they had gotten to the truth. In typical Borg fashion, he nodded yes.
Saturday, September 9th, 2017
I am a huge fan of Aaron Sorkin. Writer of The West Wing, The Newsroom, The Social Network and so much more, I wanted to see his first directorial effort, Molly’s Game. Jessica Chastain plays a former Olympic level skier who uses his brains and guts to run high stakes underground poker games in Los Angeles then New York. Eventually, she runs afoul of Russian mobsters and the law and develops a significant drug problem.
Ms. Chastain was very good as was her lawyer, played by Idris Elba. Molly was the smartest person in her circle which was refreshing and did not need any man to help her. (I don’t know why, but for some reason, the big budget female empowerment movies seem to have to have Kevin Costner in them. He of course, was in Hidden Figures, and in this film, he was Molly’s dad.) I do not know the true story behind the film, but Molly did come off and a bit too good to be true, too noble in keeping her secrets, but that’s a minor knock.
My friends know that I have harbored a crush for years for Emma Thompson, so it was no great surprise that I would pick her new film The Children Act. Ms. Thompson plays a British judge on the family court who has an interesting case come before her. A young man, just months short of his 18th birthday is diagnosed with leukemia. The hospital wants to give him drugs to help save his life, but it would require that he receive a blood transfusion, which is not permitted under Jehovah Witnesses canon.
Add to that the fact that her character has withdrawn into work so much, the she has neglected her husband, played by the always excellent Stanley Tucci. He tells her that he is planning to have an affair, which of course leads to even more drama. Ms. Thompson has to rule on the case and deal with the ramifications of her ruling and also decide on what happens with this marriage. It was a typical BBC production, but I love those types of films and liked this one. (It should be noted that Mr. Tucci and Ms. Thompson were at the showing and despite sitting 15 feet or so from Ms. Thompson, I did not make a scene, make an international incident or get myself thrown into a Canadian jail.)
There was something about the description of Dark Is The Night, a Philippine film that just caught my eye. The Philippines of course is led by President Rodrigo Duterte, who has advocated the extrajudicial killing of drug dealers and drug addicts.
This film is about a family who makes their income off of the drug trade and are trying to stop dealing, but one problem is that their son has become an addict. Suddenly, the son disappears and the father and mother try to find out what happened to him.
I admit that I saw this film late at night, but all of the searches and all of the different characters ran together and before long, it was hard to keep up with what was happening and the unending search got monotonous. A violent last act brought the story to a close, but it wasn’t enough to make the film good.

Sunday, September 10, 2017
I thought that the best chance to see a star would be for The Current War, the latest film starring international superstar Benedict Cumberbatch. When you see the word “War” in the title, one might expect some military movie, but in this case, this is the story over the difference between Direct Current, that was recommended by Thomas Edison (Cumberbatch) and Alternating Current which was the brain child of George Westinghouse (Michael Shannon) and also the other genius who worked for both, Nickola Tesla (Nicholas Hoult).
The film made Edison look like a selfish, driven, man, which he was, and made Westinghouse look too selfless even though he would made billions on the operation. The standout was Katherine Waterston who played Westinghouse’s wife. She had the guts to fight against Edison’s smear tactics and pushed her husband to be more aggressive. Again, for that time, the 1880s, women weren’t supposed to be so forthright. It wasn’t until the end of the film that I recognized the young actress playing the role: Katherine Waterston, who I thought was very good in Alien: Covenant. Shannon was also very good, as always (and he would be again in another film later in the Festival).
This was a decent film, but not a great one.
My love for Frankenstein led me to choose the film Mary Shelley, a film that dramatized the relationship between poet Percy Shelley and the 16 year old Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, the daughter of a poet and bookseller.
Elle Fanning plays the title character as a smart young woman who falls for the beautiful Shelley (played by the Robert Pattenson lookalike Douglas Booth) who was quite the cad, leaving behind a wife to marry Mary but not stopping in his hedonistic pleasures. Ms. Fanning does a good job of playing a girl who survives many tragedies including the loss of a child to come up with one of the greatest horror novels of all time.
The film had a female director, Haifaa Al-Mansour, who did an excellent job of capturing the time, the challenges of being a young woman in love, and the men who made their lives much more difficult.
I usually always see an Asian film and my first choice would have been Manhunt, the first action film from Hong Kong legend John Woo, but it didn’t play when I was there. So, I chose a film called Angels Wear White, a gripping and, like many Asian films, sad story, once again, about the troubles women have (and also directed by a woman).
Mia is an undocumented girl who works in a hotel in a Japanese town near the ocean. Covering for her sister, who was supposed to be the receptionist but was actually out with her boyfriend, Mia checks in an older man and two young girls into adjoining rooms. She suspects that something bad has happened to the girls, and eventually the girls’ injuries are reported to the police. The girls’ parents and the police blame the girls, especially since the attacker is a high ranking government official.
The young girls’ path keep intersecting with Mia, who is also a runaway, and the film follows the trials of the young girls and their attempts to find justice or at least blackmail the official.
Director Vivian Qu brings out the sadness in the girls’ stories, showing men’s society as oppressive to all women. Even the attacked is shown only from a distance and on closed circuit television, making him more of a metaphor for all men. A very harrowing story, well told.
Finally for the day, I saw a fine Australian film called 1%, the story of the world of motorcycle gangs in Perth. Matt Nable, who also wrote the film, plays Knuck, the leader of a gang who spent the past three years in prison. While he was gone, Knuck left the enterprise to Paddo (Ryan Corr) and his brother Skink (Josh McConville). Paddo did a good job bringing in more money and members but everything starts coming to a head when Skink steals some heroin from another gang.
Knuck gets out of jail and immediately exerts control of the gang, leaving Paddo and his girlfriend, the very ambitious Katrina hurt. Knuck does not care, including breaking a peace deal Paddo had made with the other gang to make up for the stolen heroin.
The story is very Shakespearian and very well photographed. It is not for everyone, but it was very good.

The Indignant Family and I have been on vacation, which is why I haven’t posted here is awhile, but I’m back trying to make up for it in grand style.
My first story concerns Detroit Lions QB Matthew Stafford. The Lions signed him to the largest contract in NFL history, a five-year, $135 million contract. Stafford will make an annual of $27 million, slightly more than Derek Carr’s contract with the Raiders signed in June. Stafford already holds the franchise passing records for yards (30,303), completions (2,634), attempts (4,285) and TDs (187). Last season, Stafford had his best season as a pro, even more amazing because he did so without future Hall of Fame receiver Calvin Johnson who retired last summer. The Lions went 9-7 with Stafford leading the team to an NFL record 8 come-from behind wins and a wildcard berth. Still, the Lions haven’t won a playoff game since 1991 and Stafford is 51-61 career as a starter and 0-3 in the playoffs.
Stafford has become a solid starter and at 29, is in the prime of his career. Sports, especially football, pays big for potential, which explains the huge salaries for Carr and Stafford. My question is, did the Lions have to pay so much?
Matthew Stafford is a good QB, a solid starter who has never entered into the elite QB Class. This club is the elite – Tom Brady, Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers have been elite for years. Other QBs have reached elite status for a time, but either don’t stay in the club constantly or the get hurt. Phillip Rivers, Eli Manning, Cam Newton, Matt Ryan, Russell Wilson, and perhaps over time youngsters Dak Prescott Kirk Cousins, and Jameis Winston may become elite. Matthew Stafford falls into that club – can be very good, but to truly be elite, you have to win consistently or a Super Bowl.
It’s not fair to judge one player in a sport that requires teamwork as much as football does by the win-loss record, but those are the breaks. You can be elite without a championship (Dan Marino, Archie Manning and Dan Fouts are Hall of Famers without titles), but you have to be a true great to be considered great. The Lions have made the playoffs three times with Stafford, with no wins. While franchise QBs don’t come along often, you have to pay them the going rates, but I have to ask why Stafford could have signed for $100 million or $110 million? That is still a considerable amount of money, in the top echelon of salaries.
Why is it that sports stars and CEOs always have to be the highest paid in the sport/industry? Also since all it does is raise the bar for the next one to come along and beat your record? I remember when the Cubs signed Ryne Sandberg to $7 million per season back in the 1980s. The previous record was $5 million per year, but the Cubs skipped $6 million and went straight to $7 million. The rest of the sport was angry – the Cubs could have made him the highest paid player and still saved $1 million per season, and of course, when that water level rises, it rises all boats.
I don’t begrudge athletes making as much as they can considering the short longevity and risk they take and I certainly don’t think Matthew Stafford doesn’t deserve big money. I just wonder if he deserves to be the highest paid player in the league.

Training camps are shutting down this weekend; the NFL season begins in a week and once again, numerous players have suffered injuries in preseason games and will miss the entire season. And once again, people, including yours truly will ask if there really need to be preseason games at all, or at least so many?
The coaches know what the players can do – they have miles of film from college and practices and previous years for veterans. Other than pocketing the money from the games (the players get per diem only – they don’t share in the preseason money), are the potential injuries worth the meaningless games? Add the frightening spectre of CTE, which causes depression dementia and death, and with the future of the sport on the line, one wonders why the players are willing to put themselves out for games that are even more meaningless that regular games?
Colleges have no preseason (although one could say that the non-conference season with “lesser” opponents is similar), every game counts in the final analysis. Do the pros really need preseason?
I think the answer is becoming a resounding “NO!”

I very rarely am on the side of sports owners. They are very rich; they are or are wannabe oligarchs; they often distance themselves from the common people, looking down at us, or just as money to be taken. Often, they treat their players like pawns. Not people easy to root for, or even congratulate.
One of the hardest families to empathize with are the Ricketts family. Father Joe, made billions as owner of Ameritrade online brokerage, but is also known as a chief Republican financier and Right Wing advocate. Son Peter is governor of Nebraska, a very Red state. Leading the family in their ownership of the Chicago Cubs is Tom Ricketts, who allowed the family millions to buy into the real life fantasy baseball game played by the other baseball owners.
After taking over the team, the Ricketts tried to bully the City of Chicago and have batted .500. They don’t play as many night games as the team would like, but they do have aa lot of concerts and they are getting to build their hotel and complex around venerable old Wrigley Field. The Ricketts finally fought and defeated the owners of the rooftops around the outfield, buying up the properties and building video scoreboards that obscured the rooftops. Then they pulled the ultimate trick, sucking for four years, building up future stars and last season, ending the longest championship draught in history – winning the World Series after 108 years.
Winning solves all problems and the Cubs’ win has made the Ricketts’ into a liked group of people, if not exactly beloved. However, they did do a good thing this week.
The team has tried to make up with Steve Bartman, the unfortunate fan who has been wrongly blamed for the alleged interference for getting in the way of Moises Alou making a catch when the Cubs were in the 2003 National League Championship Series. The Cubs lost the game, and the series. Bartman was escorted out of Wrigley Field and the public and the media turned this man into Howard Hughes. He remains in seclusion to this day, and to be fair, has not made any money from his infamy. Requests for interviews have been turned down. No book was ever written; he has turned down opportunities to go public for money
I used to work at Wrigley Field and remember the incident. The ball was clearly in the stands, which means that the ball is fair game for the players and the fans. Bartman was in his rights to go for the ball. The true blame belongs to Alex Gonzalez’s fielding failure, and Mark Prior’s overworked arm, but all of the simpleton Cub fans blamed Bartman. The ball was purchased and blown up at Harry Caray’s restaurant a few years ago in an attempt to “exorcise the demons” that haunted the franchise in the 108 years. They did the same thing in bringing a goat into
So, the Cubs made and gave a championship ring to Bartman – inviting him back to the team, a sentiment that the team has made evident for some time. It isn’t a ring like the players received, but it is one like the front office staff receive, but it is still pretty cool (I admit that I have copies of the Blackhawks championship rings and the White Sox World Series ring from 2005).
I’m hope that the whole sorry “Bartman Saga” is over and he can live and go to ballgames in peace.

For decades now, the opening of the NFL training camps was like Christmas – the anticipation, looking forward to numerous football games: the increase in the monthly DirecTV bill for the Sunday Ticket payments; going out to buy the NFL Preview magazines. This year however, the anticipation is still there, but muted. I have three reasons for that and I’d like to discuss them.
1) Lack of hope – there is nothing that drives a fan more than hope, but this year, for the Chicago Bears, there is little to be excited about. The team goes out and signs the top free agent quarterback Mike Glennon, who has little experience and tons of potential, then goes out and drafts Mitch Trubisky, another quarterback, but one with little college experience and a ton of potential. Other positions, also needing lots of work especially after a 3-13 season in 2016, were addressed with no names or not addressed in the draft at all.
So the Bears look to be bad, which is one thing, but they also don’t generate a lot of buzz, heat. They are picked for the bottom of the NFC North again. Snore!!!
2) Last week’s report on CTE and head injuries among football players was not good for the league. Just after the announcement, Ravers lineman John Urschel who has been pursuing a doctorate in mathematics from MIT degree retired from football. Not worth the risk seems to be the reasoning and who would blame him. My old Sportswriters on TV friend Rick Telander wrote an article this week that he would be donating his brain to science when he died because he played high school football, was a safety with Northwestern, was drafted and was cut by the Kansas City Chiefs. His NU teammate Mike Adamle has quit hi broadcasting career due to dementia and mental issues. Hopefully, Telander got out without serious injury.
But one has to look at football in a different way now. It is not just young men banging each other around with no concern about the future. We have seen too many tragedies to relatively young men – depression, suicide, dementia, to really look at the current state of the game the same way.
3) And finally, the blackballing of Colin Kaepernick. Yes, I’m saying that the league is engaged in a concerted effort to keep this quarterback from making a living in his chosen profession. Kaepernick led the 49ers to a Super Bowl, but he is known more for his National Anthem protest of last season. Every team in the league has had the opportunity to sign Kaepernick, there have been more bad QBs signed without the history or the pedigree since the end of last season, but still Kaepernick remains unemployed. Keapernick ended his protest in the middle of last season, and has said that he has ended his protest, but still, no calls. Kaepernick has donated much money to charities around the world, no takers. There were reports that Kaepernick was asking for starting QB type money, but Kaepernick’s agent disagrees. In a sport where every coach and GM thinks that they can turn any player around, all they need is to have them as coach/GM/Coordinator.
To be so reliant on young black men for talent, to blatantly punish a black player for speaking out is hypocrisy, and to try and hide in plain sight denying that they are blackballing him is insulting to my intelligence. To say that the NFL is afraid of insulting right wing snowflakes who like their football players quiet, but the league is willing of insulting African-American fans, who also have money and can see what’s happening, is silly.
So, with the NFL training camps open, I should be excited. Ordinarily, I would be, and maybe before long the old feeling will come back, but it may take awhile.

Over the weekend, Adrian Beltre became the 31st player in baseball history to have 3,000 hits. In the past, that was a guarantee for passage to the Hall of Fame, but with steroids and other performance enhancing drugs, there are several members of the club who remain outside. Unfortunately, every player who played in or plays after the steroid era will be under a cloud. Clean or not, every baseball player of the “postmodern era” is under a cloud.
Which leaves us with Adrian Beltre. He has 3,000 hits, but has never been on a World Series Champion. In 20 seasons in baseball, he’s been an All Star only four times. He’s hit for over 190 hits in a season four times, once having the magic 200 hits. He has 454 home runs and 1,605 RBIs, commendable numbers but not earthshattering. He has made a lot of money in the game, hundreds of millions.
There’s always a question about players who play long enough to amass Hall of Fame worthy numbers. Should they get in just because they were able to play a long time? To me, Adrian Beltre’s name doesn’t exact ring out “Hall of Famer.” Will he be a Hall of Famer? Probably. Will he be a first ballot member? I’m not sure. Which I guess is one of the things that makes the Hall of Fame interesting, the arguments.