By John Corrado

The 2024 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 5th to 15th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here.

Director Tallulah H. Schwab’s sophomore feature Mr. K is an absurdist tale set inside an old hotel that draws from obvious cinematic sources like The Shining, Barton Fink and Holy Motors. The film’s main selling point is a plum role for Crispin Glover, who stars as the eponymous Mr. K, a travelling magician in search of a place to stay for the night.

Glover’s Mr. K checks himself into an old hotel. What he finds is a place with peeling wallpaper, rattling pipes, tiny doors that open mysteriously, marching bands in the hallways, and random people who keep showing up in his room. The one thing he can’t find is the exit. As Mr. K searches endlessly for a way out of the hotel, and away from the odd cast of characters who seemingly want to keep him there, the setting becomes increasingly confining.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Schwab’s film can also feel too much like cinematic pastiche; along with the aforementioned influences including Kubrick and the Coen Brothers, there’s a little David Lynch and Jean-Pierre Jeunet worked in here. It’s also hard to parse out what, if any, deeper meaning we are supposed to glean from this. But Glover’s increasingly frazzled and bemused portrayal of Mr. K is what holds the film together, and there is some enjoyment to be found in watching him navigate the increasingly bizarre scenarios that Schwab puts him in.

The hotel itself is also a feat of production design, with its mazes of decrepit green hallways that seem to stretch out in every direction with no clear floor plan film captures that nightmare feeling of being stuck in a place with nothing as it seems. It’s a place that recalls that old refrain from the Eagles song Hotel California; “you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.”

Film Rating: ★★½ (out of 4)

Public Screenings: Saturday, September 7th, 2:30 PM at TIFF Lightbox; Sunday, September 8th, 8:45 PM at Scotiabank Theatre; Saturday, September 14th, 9:40 PM at Scotiabank Theatre