movie film review | chris tookey
 
     
     
 

My Winnipeg

 (12A)
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  My Winnipeg Review
Tookey's Rating
3 /10
 
Average Rating
7.57 /10
 
Starring
Darcy Fehr, Ann Savage, Amy Stewart
Full Cast >
 

Directed by: Guy Maddin
Written by: Guy Maddin, George Toles

 
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Released: 2008
   
Genre: DRAMA
DOCUMENTARY
   
Origin: Canada
   
Colour: C/BW
   
Length: 80
 
 


 
This is the all too prolific Guy Maddin’s characteristically fey, self-indulgent portrait of his home town – and its all-important effects upon himself. As so often with this Canadian auteur’s work – and I’m in the tragic position of having sacrificed much too much of my own life to his art - it’s a weird mixture of sly, self-deprecating humour, laborious and badly-acted hommages to silent cinema, and generalised whingeing. Even at 80 minutes, its lack of structure makes it extremely long-winded.
Reviewed by Chris Tookey



As so often with socialist film-makers nowadays, it’s full of indignant ranting about the destruction of working-class traditions, and its mood – if not its politics - is paradoxically ultra-conservative.

Maddin indulges in hilariously hamfisted recreations of crises in his own family life, with special emphasis on the awfulness of his mother (impersonated by elderly film noir diva Ann Savage, pictured). Whether this is of the slightest consequence to anyone except him remains highly dubious.

This is a not particularly distinguished example of “personal” film-making. Critics routinely praise this kind of self-absorbed maundering above films which actually have some pretensions to entertaining an audience and saying something important. I’m not sure why.


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