This Beautiful City

A gritty urban drama about two couples whose lives are spiraling out of control, THIS BEAUTIFUL CITY is a black valentine to Toronto. It explores what people find when they hit emotional and physical rock bottom. Carol and Harry are beautiful people and condo owners in the rapidly gentrifying West Queen West district. He's a passive-aggressive architect; her nerves are fragile. In the midst of a wine party, Carol goes outside and falls-or jumps-off the balcony to the street, several floors below. She lands right in the trash bins next to Johnny and Pretty, a pair of drug-addled hustlers working the street, who scuttle off in horror. A possibly deranged cop named Peter, who seems to be shadowing Pretty, leaps to Carol's aid. Thus director Ed Gass-Donnelly – who also wrote, produced, and edited – begins weaving a complex web that will connect the lives of these five lonely people in surprising ways. As it explores the psyches of people who get pushed to extremes, the film's unrelenting realism results in a kind of sordid beauty. Toronto musicians composed the film's edgy score. –B.B.