crazy stupid love

Seriously, there is nothing about this movie that should appeal to me. The title is bad, the story looks so predictable - even the trailer music is bad. And yet, at the 2 minute and 21 second mark this movie became my must see film of the spring.

you again cast fight

You Again Cast Fight from Betty White

Saw this on Lainey today and it's totally worth sharing! So funny and even funnier because Kristen Bell IS known to be pretty much exactly like this in real life.

somewhere

A friend sent me this trailer today and it's got everything in it set to make me happy. 1) It's Sofia Coppola who I love. 2) Music by Phoenix who I also love. 3) That Elle Fanning kid who's done pretty darn great with stuff I've seen her do. 4) Stephen Dorff and frankly any girl my age had a Stephen Dorff thing at some point. 5) It's all father/daughter relationshipy stuff which these days is obviously enough to make my heart go all hippy dippy.

babies

Oh man, have you seen this trailer for the movie "Babies?" I don't know if it's just cuz I'm pregnant but it's killing me with it's cuteness. The Namibian babies at the beginning actually make my belly twinge they're so friggin cute!! And the very last scene in Mongolia? Laughed right out loud. From what I've read the movie follows 4 new babies from Namibia, Mongolia, San Francisco and Tokyo...from birth to their first steps. It's set to release on May 7th and I'm gonna try and track it down in Toronto this week. Knowing me lately, I'll probably need a tissue..

annual oscar rant

So maybe I need to rant about the Oscar race to help make me feel all jazzy again? Who knows but we'll give it a try. This year especially given my hate-on for Avatar? Oh yeah, I got LOTS to say...

Best Picture

Ok so there's 10 nominees this year which I think is just silly but what do I know? What movie do I WANT it to be? An Education. Which movie do think it will be if people vote with their brains? The Hurt Locker. Which movie will it be if the "drunk on special effects" public gets its way? Avatar of course. The way I see it, a movie absolutely should not be listed in Best Picture if it also doesn't have any acting nominations or writing nominations. After all, the best picture should be just that -- the best of all categories. Avatar can win every single technical category and that will be entirely justified. Even I will admit that. But the movie is written like a soap opera, the acting was cringe-worthy, the storyline borderline insulting. The Hurt Locker on the other hand? I think that if I liked it as much as I did - and keep in mind that I don't watch war movies as a rule and only made an exception for this cuz it was on TV - well that says a lot for me. The movie is crafted brilliantly from start to finish, it's heart-pumping, it's character driven and one of the best directed films I've seen all year. So it can win and I'll be happy even though An Education has a special place in my heart.

Best Actor

This category has got to go to Jeff Bridges hands down. Crazy Heart is a really, really good movie -- not an amazing movie -- but Jeff Bridges is totally what made that movie for me. And outside of The Big Lebowski, I've never really liked anything he's done. George Clooney? Well we all know I loved Up in the Air but he was nowhere near as good as Jeff. Not this time George..

Best Actress

Since I think Carey Mulligan is just the most adorable thing to grace a screen in a very long time and since I loved An Education so much, I'd LOVE it to be her. But unfortunately, we all know it's gonna be Sandra Bullock no matter how many times she says there's no way she'll win. The thought of Sandra Bullock beating out Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren though? That's just not right. Even though Julie & Julia was just an awful movie. And guaranteed she'll wear a bad dress. Ugh. I just think Sandra winning is the most boring and predictable choice ever.

Best Supporting Actor

Christoph Waltz, for me, was the absolute only good thing about Inglorious Basterds. But man, what a good thing he was. Just perfection.

Best Supporting Actress

Normally I can't fathom picking anyone over Maggie Gyllenhaal but she was just kinda "meh" in Crazy Heart. In my heart I want it to be Anna Kendrick but I just think she's way too new and still way too close to Twilight for people to vote for her. It's gonna be Mo'Nique for sure I think.

Best Director

Kathryn Bigelow -- it just has to be, if only to save us all from the inevitable horror that will be James Cameron's acceptance speech. Did you hear him at the Golden Globes when in the midst of the Haiti disaster he said "let's have a hand for all of us -- let's hear it for us!!!" What an asshole. James can direct his movies but he should never be allowed to write them. I just wish someone would tell him that. Speeches aside, Bigelow made a brilliant film and deserves to be recognized for it.

Best Cinematography, Best Editor, Best Art Direction, Best Sound Mixing and Editing, Best Visual Effects

This has to go to Avatar hands down. The other nominees shouldn't even show up. Or if they do show up they should just go ahead and get really drunk cuz they certainly don't have to worry about making a speech on international television. Even though I hated most things about this movie, even I must admit that it was GORGEOUS to watch and that fact frankly kept me from leaving the theatre. They crafted every single blade of grass, every flower petal, the night scenes are amazing and the technical team behind this film is truly, truly a gifted bunch and should get every single award they make. But that is all. The craftsmanship behind this film is what tricked people into thinking they were watching an amazing film. As my friend posted about this film "Artists: Working Hard So Writers Don't Have To."

Best Original Song

First of all, I think it's a total rip-off that the Best Song nominees aren't performing during the show this year. Seriously what's up with that?? It's the best part! Remember last year when "It's Hard Out There For a Pimp" busted out?? That song saved the whole telecast!! BUT, it's not going to happen so we must move on. My choice? Hands down, "The Weary Kind" from Crazy Heart. What a great song that is perfect for the film.

Best Animated Feature

It's going to be Up. Of course it is. Especially because it's nominated as Best Picture too and it's obviously not going to win that. And I guess I'm alright with Up winning cuz I've only heard amazing things about it. But I just loved Fantastic Mr. Fox SO much that my heart gets all happy when I think that maybe other people liked it that much too.

And that is all for me this year. I didn't see all the films this year. As I've said a million times, the Coen brothers are right up there in my top 3 favourite filmmakers so I imagine I'd be picking that film for Best Picture had I seen it but what can you do?

weekend round-up: derby and An Education

So I kind of got away from doing my weekend round-ups over the Christmas holidays basically because I was off for so long that my weekend round-ups would pretty much sound like every other day I was having. But now that I'm back in the swing of 2010, well heck let's start gabbing about the weekends again!

Friday started the weekend a bit early for me as I was treated to a lovely lunch with my Mom. Yay for lunches with Mom!!

Friday night took a bit of a turn for the strange. Strange but kind of fun. We had a fundraiser for our Nickel City Roller Derby League and so us derby gals headed out to a "club" here in town. I say "club" cuz it's exactly the kind of place I hate going -- bad music, frat boys and gals trying way too hard in far too few clothes. But in the spirit of derby -- off we went! Thank goodness for a pile of my friends that all showed up cuz that certainly made the night bearable. Man, I know we were all those girls at some point but leaving that place just made me feel bad for them -- they were trying SO hard and wearing SO little -- you know the majority of them went home alone after all that. Anyway, Marc and I were very happy to go home together and fall into a couch-full of pillows and put the driving bass behind us.

Saturday brought a really lovely walk in the conservation area with Sadie, some errand running and record shopping. After leaving with our arms full o'vinyl, we stuffed our bellies with croissants and cookies at a local bakery, ran some more errands and headed home for a delightful family nap.

Post-nap, Marc made me a delicious dinner of squash and pancetta risotto and took me out on date to see An Education, a really great movie. Not a new story - your standard young wide-eyed girl meets worldly exciting older man -- but it's a really smart story and one that is well told with some really meaty characters. And with a screenplay by Nick Hornby, of course it's quite witty and moves along at a great pace. And let's just talk about the adorable Carey Mulligan. She is just the most adorable thing I've seen since Audrey Tautou in Amelie. You just want to scoop her up and put her in your pocket. And on an even girlier note? Let's take a moment to appreciate the styling of this film. It made me want to slap on some pearls, sweep my hair up into a chignon and step into a fabulous printed shift dress. Gorgeous!! See this film and you won't be sorry.

Sunday we greeted the glorious sunshine with a nice long hike on the snowshoe trail up at the conservation area. It was such a stunning day it really seemed a shame not to spend it communing with nature. Marc even fed the chickadees right out of his hand. He's so zen. Spent the rest of the day in domestic bliss -- I cleaned, did laundry, baked muffins, and did all kinds of other domestic-y things. We did not watch the Superbowl but we DID watch the PuppyBowl (which Sadie actually watched with us - no joke) and ate nachos.

All in all, a truly great weekend with lots of great outside fun and some good couple-y-ness. Which I never complain about really....

papercutting magic

Discovered this amazing website today called The Heart of Papercuts -- it's dedicated entirely to papercutting, one of the prettiest things ever.

Couple amazing things? This ad from the New Zealand Book Council. I cannot imagine the work that went into this ad - I can't even imagine anyone in my neck of the woods going through this much trouble to make an ad encouraging kids to read. Maybe if the ads were like this more kids would. It's an amazing bit of filmmaking.

Something else that's amazing? This framed piece of paper-art genius. What I wouldn't give for this in my very own home. I think Elsita might be a genius.

nice globes 2009

So I'm a bit late on this, I know. Anyway, here's my annual rant on some of this year's Golden Globe nominations. Not that any of this really matters but I always have fun rambling about this kinda stuff so here we go.

To be honest I haven't seen many of the movies nominated this year but I'll do my best.

Best Motion Picture Drama: I don't so much care which one wins but if it's Inglorious Basterds I'll cry. That movie shouldn't even be in this category. I bet it's Avatar though.

Best Motion Picture Comedy: My heart of hearts wants it to be (500) Days of Summer because I loved every second of that film but I doubt it'll win. As long as it's not Julie & Julia I'll be happy. My guess? The Hangover. And rightly so.

Best Performance by an Actor Comedy: The thing I like the most about this category? Seeing Daniel Day Lewis and Joseph Gordon Levitt listed in the same category. Whodda thunk the kid from 3rd Rock from the Sun would one day be listed in the same category as one of the greatest actors ever.

Best Actress in a Supporting Role: If this doesn't go to Anna Kendrick then this award is rigged.

Best Animated Picture: If you're talking quality of a project then it HAS to be Fantastic Mr Fox but it's hard to believe anyone stands a chance against the Pixar giants etc.

Best Original Score: This will likely get swallowed up in the inevitable Avatar tidal wave but really it should go to Karen O for her brilliant soundtrack for Where the Wild Things Are. That soundtrack captured the true essence of a film like few others ever have.

Best Television Series Drama: Man what a category!!!!!! 4 of my favourite shows ever all in one category! This season of Mad Men was pretty spectacular though so that's my pick. But if it's Big Love, then I won't argue with that either - this last season was brilliance!

Best Performance by an Actor in a Drama Series: Again - what a race!! I really hope it's Jon Hamm but if it's Michael C Hall it'll be totally deserving - his work in this season of Dexter was really excellent.

Best TV Series Comedy: The face that Entourage is even nominated makes me question this whole process. That whole last season was a write off and was one of the worst TV seasons of all the shows this year. I bet Glee takes it this year though -- that show is taking over the world!!

Best Performance by an Actress in a Comedy: I love that Toni Collette got nominated this year -- I'm a huge fan of United States of Tara and think her ability to play 5 separate roles so incredibly well makes her well worth the win. I just don't know if anyone stands a chance against Tina Fey though.

Best Supporting Actress in a Series: This has to go to Chloe Sevigny I say -- she was all kinds of batshit crazy this season of Big Love.

Best Supporting Actor in a Series: I REALLY want John Lithgow to win for his work on Dexter this season -- he played one of the best TV villains ever!!! As long as Jeremy Piven doesn't get it for essentially doing more of the same I'll be happy. I bet Neil Patrick Harris wins it though.

And that's my opinion for this year.

what I did on my christmas vacation: up in the air

Marc and I also had a date night to see Up in the Air, the new George Clooney movie in which he plays a man whose job is to fly around the country firing people on behalf of their employers. I really, really liked this movie and what I liked the most about it is that for once, here's a George Clooney movie that he's not the life and breath of. Even though he's good, this movie is really all about Anna Kendrick -- she is what makes this movie great. She should run as fast as she can in the opposite direction from the Twilight movies and straight towards bigger and greater things and I suspect that's exactly what she's doing.

The movie is a bit disjointed in some places but all in all, it's a great story with great characters (if not a wasted character in Jason Bateman -- why did he take that role at all??) but for me, all about Anna 100%.

This movie also made me never want to travel for work ever again. I mean, I don't really relish work travel to begin with - I would just always rather be at home with Marc -- but watching this guy who travels 300 days out of the year just made my skin crawl.

what I did on my christmas vacation: fantastic mr fox

Over the holidays we ran full force to see Fantastic Mr. Fox -- a movie I was beyond excited to see and it did not disappoint on any level whatsoever. The latest effort from Wes Anderson, one of our favourite filmmakers, this is easily one of my favourite films of 2009.

It's stunning to look at, the story is charming and funny, the soundtrack is expectedly great (including my 2nd favourite Beach Boys song!!!), the casting is perfection -- I have nothing bad to say about this movie.

This will be a movie I watch to cheer me up when I'm sad.

girly day

Today I had the girliest of girly days to recover from the holidays -- slept in, coffee and breakfast, great dog walk, long hot shower and then a solo movie date with myself to see The September Issue during which I ate almost an entire bag of swedish berries.

Perfection.

weekend round-up

The weekend came and went with good food, the great outdoors and great movies.

Friday started with a massive pig-out at the cheesy yet super delicious Indian food buffet restaurant. Best idea ever courtesy of Dennis. Pretty much rolled ourselves home and straight into a glass of brandy.

Saturday there was some lovely morning lolling around and then out into the bush for another great hike with Marc and Sadie. It was such a gorgeous day and I've got a feeling that these days are few and far between from this point on. Saturday night was a surprise birthday party for our friend but alas, I found myself not really feeling up to the night at all so I opted for a quiet night in and Marc set out into the night to represent us both.

Sunday, more morning lolling!! But then out into the bush again and home in time to get all costumed up to do some filming! Our friend Ben, who makes these amazing short animated short films, is gathering some material for future projects and wanted some 16mm footage of Marc and I in 1930's garb acting the role of a couple on their wedding day. Even Sadie got in on the action and likely will steal the show from us. It was tons of fun and we got some great shots outside in the fall colours and even inside our place.

Sunday night we rewarded all our hard work with a trip out to see Where The Wild Things Are. This movie is brilliant regardless what any of the critics may be saying.

After the movie our friend Ben called it a "high concept kid's film not for kids" and I think he's exactly right. I can see why the studio hated it. It's certainly not what the movie-going public likes because mostly, the movie-going public is stupid and uncomplicated. Hence the continued success of movies like Big Momma's House. But what I don't understand is, why give the movie to someone like Spike Jonze if this isn't the end result you want??? And I'm sorry, if he's hand-picked by Maurice Sendak then you just have to shut your mouth.

Me, I thought this movie was breath-taking. It's stunning to watch and is like a perfect moving version of the book. It's sad and happy and fantastical and I fell in love with every character (but man, what a great job Max Records did with Max). Considering the book is only 10 sentences long, really you could have gone anywhere with the story to fill it in but it really seems like everything Spike and Dave Eggers did was exactly what went unsaid in the book. It's almost like from this point, the book and the movie can go hand in hand and how often do you get to say that about a movie version of a classic book?

This movie is what being 10 years old feels like: scary, unpredictable, uncontrollable, full of fantasy and love and also, overwhelming loneliness.

The very first scene in the movie -- this short crazy chaotic chase scene with Max -- is bang on and sets the tone perfectly.

And so much of the movie is done with actual puppets and not CGI which is crazy. So the scenes when Max is running with all the monsters and he's looking up at them with such wonder and even a bit of fear, you know a good chunk of that feeling's gotta be real.

And the soundtrack? Well I've been carrying on about it on Twitter for a couple of weeks now and have listened to it about a dozen times now. I cannot imagine a better score for this film. Karen O should perhaps rethink her Yeah Yeah Yeah's career and just do this full-time.

And yes I totally cried. At the end (and don't cry SPOILER cuz if you haven't read the book well shame on you) when the bull looks at Max and asks him if he'll say good things about them, my heart exploded and I got all teary. Then when Max is getting on the boat and Carol comes running I lost it completely. Although it was your standard teary goodbye scene, in a way it wasn't at all. It was just different enough to tug at your heart in a whole different way. The facial expressions on the monsters were perfection and when they started howling, I was done. A big weepy girly mess.

I have zero bad things to say about this movie except that no kid I know would enjoy it. But frankly, who cares? The movie's enough for me in every way.

the fantastic mr.fox

Oh man, I'm so excited for this movie!! Wes Anderson makes a killer foray into the world of animation with this flick and even in a short trailer is able to totally catch my undivided attention. This movie is stunning!! The cast is amazing (hello Jarvis Cocker -- yay!!!)!!! I want it to be playing right now. It looks like something right out of those 1950's "American Wildlife" textbooks. And shot on a Nikon D3 to boot!

whip it

Had a girly night out tonight with gal pal Liana and we went to see Whip It. While I enjoyed this movie, I suspect I enjoyed it more for the derby than the actual movie. The actual movie is pretty much your standard underdog sports story with a lead character that seemed written to be over-the-top awkward. I found myself waiting for the "story" parts of the movie to be over so they could get back to the roller derby parts. I also found myself re-doing the soundtrack for this movie in my head. While it was still better than most of the mainstream movies out there, you'd think a movie like this would just be aching for a killer soundtrack jammed with all the great chick anthems and it just wasn't. There was even a Radiohead ballad off of Pablo Honey for goodness' sake. Ahh well......not every soundtrack can be like (500) Days of Summer I guess. All in all still an enjoyable movie with a great performance by adorable Kristen Wiig and a terrifying performance by Juliette Lewis. Honestly, that girl looks like something out of your worst nightmare.

So, run of the mill story with great derby in between. And oh the derby........the derby is so good. In theory, if we had roller derby in my town I'd slap on some skates and some fishnets so fast it'd make your head spin. You could call me Patsy Crime.

weekend round-up

The weekend you ask? Strange. Very, very strange.

Started innocently enough with a quiet Friday night at home with a movie and a fire. Watched Bobby finally as we somehow missed it completely the first time around. Great film, great cast -- learned a lot about something I really didn't know that much about. Even though Lindsay Lohan was in it.

Saturday met the Dogs=Awesome group for a dog play in the rain. God bless the one person who actually showed up ;). Ah well, gotta walk the dog anyway right? Ran some rainy errands and took a fruitful trip to the liquor store. I've decided I want to try drinking brandy so I wanted to chat with someone who actually knows something about good brandy. With all the fires we've been making at home, it just doesn't seem complete without a giant snifter of brandy. At least, that's what I'm thinking. It could go over like a lead balloon but we'll give it a try. Got home and made up a giant slow-cooker FULL of coconut chicken and vegetable curry. Honestly, I never love my slow cooker more than I do when it's cold out. As promised on Twitter, here's the recipe:

3 potatoes, chopped

some zucchini (but don't put in until about the last hour or else they will just disintegrate)

some tomatoes (optional, I opted IN!)

1 medium onion, sliced up

a good handful of carrots sliced

2 cloves of garlic minced

5-6 chicken breasts

Sauce:

1 14oz can coconut milk

1 cup chicken broth

curry powder to personal taste - I ended up with about 3 tsps

cumin - about 1 tsp

garam masala - 1 tsp

tumeric - 1 tsp

paprika - like 1/2 tsp

Hot pepper sauce or red pepper flakes or an actual hot pepper

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

For right at the end:

1 package frozen peas, thawed

1/2 cup plain yogurt

Place the potatoes, onion, and carrots in the bottom of the slow cooker and throw some olive oil in. Scatter the minced garlic over the carrots. The slow-cooker should be about half full.

Brown the chicken in some oil in a skillet and put aside.

Prepare the sauce by whisking the coconut milk, chicken broth, curry powder and hot sauce until smooth. Whisk in salt and pepper.

Put half the chicken on top of the veggies, pour half the sauce, put down the rest of the chicken and pour the rest of the sauce over top. Cook on high for about an hour then turn down to low and cook for another 4-5 hours. Don't touch it, don't take the lid off, don't stir it. In the last hour or so you can toss in the zucchini. In the last 30 mins, add the peas and in the 15 minutes add the yogurt. Serve it up on some yummy rice with naan bread.

Ended the night at the Townehouse and a great show by Zeus, one of our new fave bands over at Hot Bunny Radio. Great band, strange crowd...

Sunday began with another dog party before it started to pour rain. Then this is where it started getting strange. Driving home from the dog park, we pass by our neighbour's house and see his dog Rookie lying down in the grass in front. In the pouring rain. Strange right? Right. We turn around in the laneway and go back to confirm our fear -- the poor dog is, in fact, dead. We decide that we should ring the doorbell on the off chance our neighbour, an elderly man who lives with his ever more elderly mother, does not know poor Rookie's fate. When he answers the door sobbing uncontrollably we realize he does know. Mid-summer this neighbour lost his ancient family cat and then his OTHER old dog so losing Rookie just put him over the edge. So now, Marc and I are tearing up seeing his heartbreaking state. He says he's going to leave him there but we tell him no, we'll help him move him out of the rain and into the back of his truck so he can take him to be cremated at the vet in the morning. Rookie was actually 3/4 wolf so he was huge. Huge and beautiful. Imagine a cream coloured huskie the size of a Great Dane, very solitary and very wolf-like. The kind of dog that, if you met him at night, you'd be wary but in reality he didn't have a mean bone in his body. We roll him onto a plank of wood, our neighbour crying the whole time and stroking the dog's face. We get him into the back of the truck and our poor neighbour proceeds to fall apart, weeping over his poor dog who, we guess, must have had a heart attack on the lawn. It was just heartbreaking. Now there's 3 of us crying in the pouring rain over this poor dog. I can't imagine how lonely he feels now, losing all of his pets and only having his 95 year old mother to keep him company. Ugh.....it was just the worst and I couldn't shake the feeling all afternoon. Strangely, moving his body into the truck was the first time I ever actually got to touch Rookie because he was so solitary. Poor guy,,,

Thankfully we had a lovely dinner invite from some friends to help us shake off the sad turn of the afternoon. Last year Marc bought a bottle of Sagrantino and he and our restauranteur friend Mark (owner and sommelier at Ristorante Verdicchios) have been planning to drink it together forever. Well we finally got our schedules linked and we got together for an amazing dinner with Mark and his wife Laura and their gorgeous son Alessandro and some wild boar stew that Marc had marinating in a full bottle of red wine since Saturday morning. It. Was. Insanity in a bowl served over polenta. Delicious. Marc and Mark took it upon themselves to rev up their Sunday night and I ended up putting us in a cab, taking us home, and tending to an essentially passed out Marc. Basically he was where I was last weekend. And Marc is SO rarely like this that it was a great source of amusement for me. Oh how the mighty have fallen...

See what I mean? Strange, strange weekend for me on all fronts....

sweet valley, say it ain't so...

Sweet Valley High, beloved pre-teen book series of my youth...

+

Diablo Cody, the now over-hyped Hollywood stripper turned writer...


=

Me being very very unsure about it all. Apparently a bidding war though so we shall see....

toronto film fest

Hey look what I found on the interweb! When we were in town for the Toronto International Film Festival a couple of weeks back we got tickets to the premiere screening of My Son, My Son What Have Ye Done directed by acclaimed German filmmaker Werner Herzog (and he was there!!) Anyway, the screening was at the breathtaking Elgin Theatre and look at that, there we are in the photo! Well, about a millimetre high anyway in the left hand balcony.

Photo by Malcolm Taylor/Getty Images North America

cinefest round-up

Man oh man, what a past week!! Saw a pile of movies, ate out at a pile of restaurants, chatted with a pile of people, threw a giant party, saw dawn and a hangover that will go down in the history books -- here's the full report. Well, the movies anyway:

Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky: This movie was great and perhaps my favourite of the whole week. Like 2 hours of eye candy for us Chanel fans out there. Honestly this movie must have been such fun for the art director and costumer -- please tell me you got to poke around in the Chanel archives for this!! Starring the stunningly beautiful Anna Mouglalis, this movie is perfection, covering the steamy affair between Coco Chanel and composer Igor Stravinsky. Hell you even forget she was almost charged with war crimes....

I know there's another one coming out shortly starring Audrey Tautou but for me, this one is the Coco Chanel movie to beat....

Son of the Sunshine: This movie was actually co-written by local writer Matthew Heiti and tells the story of a young man with Tourette's Syndrome and a strange ability to heal. Shot on a small budget begged and borrowed, you would never know it. This film was gorgeous to watch - like a warm 1980's polaroid. It was sad and strangely uplifting all at the same time. If you're like me and used to seeing really low budget projects look a certain way (usually like someone shot them with a Handi-Cam), see this movie. It will renew your faith in ultra small budget films.

It Might Get Loud: A documentary about the guitar starring rock legend Jimmy Page, gadget-king The Edge, and the all-things-archaic loving Jack White. This doc could EASILY have been 3 dudes sitting around talking about how great they are, stopping the bravado long enough to get all meedley meedley on the guitar. And while that all still happened, it never got out of hand. It made me want to go home and listen to all of our Link Wray and The Jam. One of the best music docs I've seen in a long while....

Survival of the Dead: Interrupting all our film festival snobbiness was a good old-fashioned zombie movie by George A. Romero. Was it anyway near as good as 1970's Romero zombie movies? Not at all. Was it fun and cheesy and gorey? Absolutely. It was a nice break in the week and made me laugh right out loud.

A Touch of Grey: I went to this movie after receiving a really lovely handwritten card from the writer/director inviting me personally and by name. Honestly, nobody does that anymore - how could I not go??? 4 lifelong friends getting together for one night of drinking, sharing, crying, fighting and even some duct tape tie-ups. I usually am not a huge fan of movies that take place only in one location - I like my movies to flow in and out of different settings - so that was a bit of a stumbling block for me but overall a sweet story that women of all ages can relate to. It'll make you send your mom some flowers...

The Woman of Ahhs: Loosely based on The Wizard of Oz, this film tells the story of a man searching for a woman he's never met, a woman he's only ever seen on the internet. Definitely an arty dark comedy, this movie had dance pieces, a documentary feel and a great wee little dog. This production company recently relocated to Northern Ontario and while I can't say this movie was my favourite of the week, I sure do like the producing team a whole lot.

Daybreakers: I know, I know, a big Hollywood vampire flick?? You're disappointed in me, I can tell. But it's Ethan Hawke and I will always have a giant crush on Troy Dyer and I am drawn to every movie he makes. That aside though, it certainly was not your average vampire flick. The gore was stupendous and there was nary a gentle Twilight-y love bite to be seen. It was all throat-tearing, blood-spewing vampire greatness. There were ladies all around me jumping clean out of their seats throughout this whole movie. Yeeeeeahhhhhh........

Tetro: The new film from Frances Ford Coppola, funded through the profits of his winery, this film is a visual masterpiece. Filmed in black and white (artsy fartsy I know), this film could have taken place in any country, in any decade. Admittedly, this film was much much too long, despite how much I loved it. The talk around the town is that Alden Ehrenreich is the next Leo DeCaprio and seriously, google this kid's face and tell me it's not true. Mainly, I am happy to see Vincent Gallo doing something good cuz man, when he's good he is SO good. But then he does something like Brown Bunny and it all goes to shit. This was like Buffalo 66 kind of Vincent Gallo...

And that's about it. Buckets of congrats to our friend Ben Bruhmuller who won first place in the shorts competition for his film Vs, taking home $2500!!. I'm so so proud of him ! His film really is something special. And of course I gotta say congrats to Marc too (he did the music for Ben's film)!! The two are already working on Ben's next project.

At work we hosted our annual party for Cinefest on Saturday so I didn't get to see anything else over the weekend. First reason being I was setting up the party and second reason being that the party took a turn for the crazy and got home at 6am meaning I did nothing at all on Sunday except want to die. But I guess that's the sign of a good party?

See you for Cinefest 2010!!!!!!!!

what I'm doing right now

...hence the reason I'm not blogging. BUT that means you can expect a whack of film reviews at the end of the week.

weekend round-up

This weekend was all about the Toronto International Film Festival and me and the bossman kicked it off Thursday afternoon with a trip down to the big bad city!

Friday we were in meetings most of the day and narrowly missed seeing any real celebrities by seemingly minutes judging by the hordes of people everywhere went. At one point, we came out of the Intercontinental Hotel and walked right into a large throng of gawkers and papparazzi who were REALLY hoping we were George Clooney. Alas, we were not.

Friday night we got all gussied up for the OMDC hosted TIFF party celebrating Ontario filmmakers and then out for a late dinner at the Queen Mother with friends Ben and Fran. For those of you who don't follow my Twitter, Ben has a film screening at TIFF this week! It's called "Vs" and my handsome husband did the music for it. If you're in the big city I highly recommend checking out his work - he does some amazing stop-motion animation/still photography/16mm film combo that is truly excellent.

Headed home Saturday into the waiting and napping arms of Marc - yay!!! Spent the rest of the day lazing around and then out to dinner for what's that??? All-you-can-eat-sushi restaurant????? Youpee!!! I think all-you-can-eat-sushi should officially be named the cure for everything ever. Quick drink with my favourite Big City Kelly who showed up in town and then home to bed......sweet sweet bed.

Sunday slept in and spent the day making applesauce made from scratch with the apples from our very own apple tree and since I was in the mood I busted out some of Martha Stewart's kick-butt cowboy cookies and then took a really huge and lovely walk with Sadie to the lake and all around the surrounding neighbourhoods. Home in time to enjoy a dinner of ribs, taboulleh salad loaded with our farm-share veggies and sauteed tatsoi -- YUM!!!

Sunday night (as if you even have to ask) I hunkered down to watch the season finale of True Blood which really kinda sucked. Talk about lack-lustre. Add to that another lack-lustre episode of Entourage and you can imagine how happy I was for the start of Weeds. Mary Louise Parker fixed my Sunday.