Christopher Zimmer Movies

In a time when India and Pakistan are being torn apart, true love still manages to take root despite the fear and intolerance that blights the troubled landscape. The year is 1947, and as India and Pakistan are split into two separate states the rivers run red with blood. Gian (Jimi Mistry) is a Sikh and former soldier who risks his life to rescue young Muslim Naseem (Kristin Kruek) from a rampaging mob. As this unlikely pair begins to realize their true feelings for one another, the bond between them helps to heal the tender wounds of war. But what chance does true love really have against the destructive force or religious zealotry? ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Canadian writer/director Sudz Sutherland makes his feature debut with the romantic comedy Love, Sex & Eating the Bones. Hill Harper plays Michael, a Toronto security guard who wants to be a photographer. He spends most of his time at an adult movie store called Pornocopia, renting videos starring Lisette (Marieka Weathered). One day in a laundromat, he meets young urban professional Jasmine (Marlyne N. Afflack), who has been celibate for some time. After a few dates, Michael finds out that his little porn habit has caused him to fear actual sex with another person. Love, Sex & Eating the Bones was shown at the 2003 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

Wasting no time after shooting his 2003 Sundance Film Festival entry The Event, director Thom Fitzgerald returned to Romania, the country that served as the setting for his 2001 Canadian-TV film Wolf Girl, for this cerebral study of commerce, camaraderie, and degradation. The Wild Dogs explores the circumstantial relationship of Geordie (played by the director) and Victor (David Hayman), two men who meet on a plane to Bucharest. Each is in the country for different reasons: Victor is a British diplomat in the city, and he and his wife Natalie (Alberta Watson) and daughter Moll (Rachel Blanchard) are among Romania's privileged class; Geordie, on the other hand, is a Canadian porn photographer sent to the country to shoot underage "talent" for his employer's website. Repulsed by the job he's been sent to accomplish, Geordie is instead captivated by the teeming masses of orphans, disfigured beggars, and the other homeless that flood Bucharest's streets. Just as he makes it his goal to help a crippled young man nicknamed "Sour Grapes" (Visinel Burcea, the spiritually-empty Natalie focuses on the dejected orphan Dorutu (Mihai Calota. Shot on digital video, the low-budget The Wild Dogs premiered at the 2002 Toronto Film Festival just a few months before the premiere of The Event. ~ Michael Hastings, Rovi

Picking up where the multitudes of late '90s/early 2000s reality-based television shows left off is the unexpectedly shocking horror film My Little Eye, from director Marc Evans. Five twentysomethings are assembled to live together for a period of six months in a house specially outfitted with a bevy of webcams in order to collect a one million prize. The one major caveat being if anyone abandons the house prior to the end of the six-month period, no one will win anything. After introducing the different characters -- intelligent Danny (Stephen O'Reilly), slacker Rex (Kris Lemche), frat boy Matt (Sean CW Johnson), good girl Emma (Laura Regan), and actress wannabe Charlie (Jennifer Sky) -- the story jumps ahead to the last few days before the scheduled end of the contest. At this point, it becomes apparent that outside forces are somehow manipulating certain events within the house, and the household is sent into chaos as one of the participants is found dead. Another participant receives an ominous note, and shortly thereafter, the remaining participants begin to realize the true intensity of their mortal peril. My Little Eye premiered at the 2002 Locarno International Film Festival. ~ Ryan Shriver, Rovi

Faith, family, and devotion are all explored in Polish director Agnieszka Holland's intense family drama. Julie (Miranda Otto) and her twin children, Nick (Ryan Smith) and Nicole (Bianca Crudo), cut short a ski outing due to Nick suddenly taking ill. As they arrive back at home, Julie catches her husband, Henry (William Fichtner), with another woman and promptly moves to end their marriage. Meanwhile, Nick has another spell similar to the first one and doctors discover a tumor in his brain. Further complicating matters is Nick's allergy to the necessary chemotherapy drugs, which prompts Julie to abandon traditional medicine and seek out a Polish healer named Alexei Ormow (Lothaire Bluteau). As the healer begins making progress on the youngster, Alexei and Julie begin to fall in love with each other -- a development that greatly troubles Julie as she struggles to determine how to proceed in the best interests of her family. In 2002, Julie Walking Home (aka The Healer) was selected for inclusion in the Venice Film Festival. ~ Ryan Shriver, Rovi

Based on an "Oprah Book Club" selection by novelist Mary McGarry Morris, Songs in Ordinary Time is set in Vermont in the 1960s. Sissy Spacek plays Mary Fermoyle, divorced mother of three children. Mary's life is forever changed with the arrival of an enigmatic stranger named Omar Duvall (Beau Bridges), to whom the Fermoyle family extends their hospitality. Drawing closer to the personable but secretive Omar -- who is also extremely popular with all the kids in the neighborhood -- Mary is forced to confront the possibility that her erstwhile sweetheart may be an escaped criminal. Songs in Ordinary Time debuted over CBS on October 22, 2000. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

While imagining the childhood of Andy Warhol, Lou Reed once wrote, "There's only one good thing about a small town: you hate it, and you know you have to leave." A similar notion seems to have occurred to Mooney Pottie (Liane Balaban), a 15-year-old Canadian girl growing up in a village deep in the rugged coal mining area of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. Mooney wants to be an artist and feels out of place among the rough-hewn villagers and her unsophisticated family. When her art teacher, Cecil Sweeney (Andrew McCarthy), tells her that he could arrange for her to attend an art institute in Manhattan, her parents refuse to allow her to go. Stranded in a place she hates, Mooney finally discovers a kindred spirit when new girl Lou (Tara Spencer Nairn) moves into the neighborhood. Lou's father was a boxer from Brooklyn, and she's inherited his talent for fisticuffs; Lou has a way with a sucker punch that soon has all the girls in town begging her to knock out their boyfriends when they get out of line. Mooney and Lou soon team up on a plan that will allow them to move on to bigger and better things. Canadian filmmaker Allan Moyle returned home for this comedy set in the mid-1970s, which features a soundtrack of classic Canadian rock, including vintage tracks by April Wine and The Stampeders. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Can a stodgy intellectual who regards the 20th century as a waste of time find happiness with an American teen idol who doesn't really know him? That's the question posed in this gentle satiric comedy. Giles De'ath (John Hurt), who takes great pains to remind people that his surname is pronounced "Day-ath," is a well-regarded British author whose wife passed away a decade ago. Since then, Giles has retreated into a world of his own; he is thoroughly disinterested in contemporary culture and lives in the 20th century only to the degree that it is absolutely necessary. However, one night Giles accidentally locks himself out of his apartment just as a rainstorm has begun to open up the sky. Soaked to the skin, he takes refuge in a nearby movie theater, since he's heard that the works of E.M. Forster have lately become popular screen fodder. However, once inside the multiplex, Giles discovers to his disgust that he's accidentally bought a ticket for a low-brow teen flick called Hot Pants College II. Just as he's about to register his repugnance with the management, actor Ronnie Bostock (Jason Priestley) appears on screen, and immediately Giles is entranced. In Ronnie, Giles discovers an unexpected sort of beauty that he's never considered before, and he's eager to learn more about the young actor. However, Giles soon discerns that reading up on his new obsession means buying teen-oriented fanzines (whose covers proclaim him "Snoggable!"), where he learns that Ronnie's own cultural signposts include Axl Rose and Stephen King, whose names could just as well be Sanskrit to Giles. He also discovers that to view the rest of Ronnie's screen work, he must visit a video rental store, which means he must first purchase a VCR, and that he'll also require a (gulp!) television in order for the VCR to work. Eventually, Giles finds out that Ronnie lives in a small town on Long Island, and decides to fly there, hatching a scheme to meet Ronnie by first making the acquaintance of Audrey (Fionna Loewi), Ronnie's fashion model girlfriend. Based on the acclaimed short novel by Gilbert Adair, Love and Death on Long Island was adapted for the screen and directed by Richard Kwietniowski. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Canadian defense attorney Gina Antonelli (Lolita Davidovitch) takes on her most unusual case--and her biggest professional challenge--when she agree to defend Pauloosie (Paul Gordon), a 19-year-old Inuit living in a remote Arctic village. Accused of sexual assault of a minor, Pauloosie has by the standards of his people alrady done penance for his crime (which in his eyes was not a crime), pleading unconditional guilt and offering a gift of atonement to the girl's family. But ambitious prosecutor Daniel Metz (Henry Czerny) intends to make an example of Pauloosie by demanding the maximum sentence under Canadian law, a move that has divided the region's political interests straight down the middle. It is up to Gina to burrow through a maddening maze of cultural conflicts and arrive at a legal decision that will satisfy both the government and the natives--and also will assure the fairest amount of justice for the stoic Pauloosie. Produced for Canadian television in 1994, Trial at Fortitude Bay first aired in the US over the Lifetime cable network on March 15, 1996. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Maggie (Isabelle Mejias) is an ordinary Canadian girl who has signed on to work in a Catholic mission in modern-day Africa. She is comes to the job amply supplied with enthusiasm and ignorance, and manages to consistently do things which show her lack of understanding of the local culture and which trample on local sensibilities. For instance, when she discovers that some things in her house have been stolen, she foolishly reports the theft. This results in her houseboy being arrested and sent away to prison for ten years. It is not a question of who was guilty (he might have been), but of the abitrariness of his treatment. This jars the heretofore clueless girl out of her complacency, and she belatedly makes some attempts to understand her environment. In this, she is aided by her houseboy's wife, who has, despite everything, allowed Maggie to become her friend. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi