Rated 18 Accompaniment
(Coarse Language, Substance Abuse, Violence) 80 minutes
Dir: Gary Yates, Canada, 2009
Timothy Olyphant, Stephen Eric McIntyre, Joe Anderson, Rossif Sutherland
Winner, Best Canadian Feature, Calgary International Film Festival.
“High Life is set in 1983 Winnipeg to a CanCon soundtrack. Its four junkies decide to rob a bank after the arrival of the first ATM machines. Predictably, things do not go according to plan. (A tip: don’t shoot up in your getaway car.) High Life’s excellent dark comedy makes it one of the best Canadian films of the past year... Playwright Lee Macdougall adapts his story with a profound cinematic sensibility, adding humorous flashbacks to flesh his out deeply crazed criminals. Director Gary Yates builds on the strength of the cast through intense pacing. But the film’s conflict and inherent watchability comes from the strained relationship between Timothy Olyphant (in his best role to date as Dick, the brains of the operation) and Stephen Eric McIntyre (as the April Wineloving psychopath Bug). In Hollywood-pitch terms, Dog Day Afternoon meets Requiem For A Dream is a sure sell. Yet, with its black sentimentality and unconventional finesse, High Life has its own identity - even when it’s just some deluded burnouts blasting I Like to Rock and just driving, man.” - Chandler Levack, Eye Weekly. “If you want to get off on a movie, go see High Life , a movie so cool you won't want to take off your coat when you get inside the theatre.” - Stephen Cole, The Globe and Mail