| Adoration | ||
| Director: | Atom Egoyen |  |
| Country: | Canada | |
| Year: | 2008 | |
| Language: | English | |
| Runtime: | 100 minutes | |
| Rating: | NR | |
| Principal Cast: | Scott Speedman, Arsinée Khanjian, Kenneth Welsh, Rachel Blanchard, Devon Bostick | |
| Trailer: | www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLuu2Asb9RQ | |
| SCREENING TIMES | |||
| Friday, August 28, 2009 | 7:00 PM | Art Gallery of Windsor | Tickets: $10 Art Gallery Gift Shop |
Winner of the Ecumenical jury prize at Cannes Film Festival, Adoration is the latest film by the legendary Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter, Where the Truth Lies) and a powerful and disturbing meditation on identity and family secrets set in a world ruled by paranoia and suspicion.
When translating a piece of writing for his high-school French class, teenaged Simon (Devon Bostick) decides to inject a little of his own personal history into the exercise. Unfortunately, he does more than a little to play with the truth, incorporating his own fantasies and the dark, disturbing stories told to him by his dying grandfather (Kenneth Welsh). Somewhat surprisingly, he's encouraged in this pursuit by his French teacher, played by Arsinée Khanjian. When the story winds up posted on a website, all hell breaks loose and Simon and his family are suddenly the topic du jour for his friends, university professors, conspiracy nuts and all manner of internet observers.
The set-up is vintage Egoyan, trading in family secrets and lies, with the incisive gravity and sometimes absurdist sense of humour that has won him admirers around the world. As in earlier films like Family Viewing , Speaking Parts and Exotica , Egoyan pays special attention here to the way memories are preserved and information and mythology are passed on. Complicating things here is cyberspace, which, as Egoyan presents it, offers instant "information" but absolutely no guarantee that what is posted is true. Rather, Adoration explores the manner in which instant communication undermines reflection, sparking deep-seated prejudices, and how, in these decidedly turbulent times, the internet actually fosters confusion and panic. Adoration is presented through the prism of family dynamics but it is as much about our addiction to chatter and our corresponding inability to actually listen.
A courageous analysis of the contemporary context in which world leaders intentionally mislead the public and exploit our fear of the new or the foreign, Adoration may be Egoyan's most timely film to date.
