A scene from Post Tenebras Lux.
The Mexican risk-taking director behind Japon, Battle in Heaven and Silent Light walks a fine line between mournfully beautiful and the merely bizarre in this disjointed film that focuses on a well-off family living in rural Mexico. Visual elements are characteristically stunning, beginning with a little girl (the director's daughter) running around a stormy field at dusk, surrounded by cows. The oddest moment, though, is the appearance of a red animated devil who enters the house carrying a toolbox when the family is sleeping at night. The specific context of several scenes are anybody's guess, including a visit to a French sex club, English boys playing rugby and, most impressively, a sequence where an anguished man tears off his head.
Sept. 12, 9:45 p.m., and Sept. 13, 1:15 p.m., TIFF Bell Lightbox; Sept. 16, 6 p.m., Scotiabank.