By Chris Kriofske
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Garret Price
Country: united_states
Year: 2019
Running time: 92
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9351746/reference
Chris says: “Given his tragic death in a freak accident at age 27, there’s no away a documentary about Russian born, LA-raised actor Anton Yelchin can avoid being sentimental; still, once you get past all the childhood home movies, homemade greeting cards and teen-aged experiments with his video camera, LOVE, ANTOSHA begins to build a solid case as to how he evolved from precocious child actor to a full-fledged polymath of an artist who extensively delved into music, photography and filmmaking as well. Testimonials from family, friends and co-stars (the latter ranging from fellow STAR TREK cast members like Chris Pine and Zoe Saldana to such unlikely figures as Martin Landau and Jon Voight), along with revelations about his struggles with cystic fibrosis all serve to create a multifaceted portrait of a talent whose life was cut way too short. 3.5 cats
“(screened at IFF Boston 2019)”
Julie B. responds: “I didn’t think it was too sentimental I guess…
“I didn’t know anything about him and was surprised by this talented hard working positive minded guy. Here he is making the best of his situation and working so hard without doing stupid frivolous dangerous things in his life some many kids do. He seemed like the last person you’d want to have that freak accident happen to. So unfair other than perhaps it saved him from suffering a drawn out painful death that might have been upon him sooner than later. I am not an expert on Cystic fibrosis.”
TC says: “I’ll throw my two cents in here, since we didn’t see enough to be able to nominate this year. Kim and I adored Anton Yelchin as an actor; he was the actor’s actor of his generation.He was named our #1 Male Rising Star in 2008, I believe, based on his performance of the criminally underseen FIERCE PEOPLE, and he cemented our belief in him with his hilarious turn in another criminally underrated, over criticized film, CHARLIE BARTLETT. Although he was probably best known as Pavel Chekov in JJ Abrams’ ‘Star Trek’ universe, there was so much more to him. Even if the film he was in was a turkey – and he did several of those (TERMINATOR: SALVATION, BROKEN HORSES) – his performance was usually the one slight saving grace for those films. We both had no doubt he was destined for greatness. He still is. LOVE, ANTOSHA was named my favorite FILM – narrative or documentary – of what we DID see this year, simply because it is such a simple little film about a very complex young actor taken from us far far too soon. We found out so much we didn’t know about him, and sadly, we probably would have lost him before the age of 40 due to his cystic fibrosis (which we, along with nearly everyone else, were shocked to find out about), but we will ALWAYS celebrate his legacy. The emotional difficulty his parents have faced because of his loss truly touched our hearts, and I wish we’d known about his other passions (I knew about his music, but not his incredible artwork and his photography skills) before we lost him at age 27 in 2016. In our view, it is a loss the film world will never forget. And this film is an utterly beautiful tribute to his life. So I’m sentimental about it – so sue me…..:-) 5 cats