[Movie Review] Oscars: Fall Film Fest Circuit Aims To Promote Early Contenders

This excerpt first appeared in Deadline Hollywood Reporter. Click HERE for the original.

September 11, 2020

For sheer heart, I loved Penguin Bloom, world premiering at TIFF, with an outstanding performance from Naomi Watts that with the right push from the right distributor, could land her a third lead actress Oscar nod, and her first since 2012’s The Impossible, in which she played a wife and mother whose vacation in Thailand turned tragic when a major typhoon hit the country. In this true story, just like that one, Watts plays a wife and mother whose vacation in Thailand turns tragic when she falls from a rickety roof railing and becomes paralyzed (maybe Watts ought to stay out of Thailand).

The highly athletic Sam Bloom begins an excruciating journey back to some normality of life with the help of an injured Magpie bird that comes into hers and her family’s life at just the right time. The Walking Dead’s Andrew Lincoln plays the husband. The bird is brilliant by the way, and the movie is heartwarming, humane, and a life-affirming story that is much needed right now. I believe this is the kind of film audiences would turn into a sleeper hit. For me, it is the best narrative film I have seen so far come from the fall fest circuit.