Wednesday, September 15, 2004

The Most Exciting City in the World

Canada won the World Cup of Hockey, a 3-2 win over Finland at the Air Canada Centre. Along with the Toronto International Film Festival, the celebrations last night made Toronto the most exciting city in the world. Traffic, high energy screaming fans, and honking cars packed Yonge Street in the wee hours of the morning. I was walking home sometime past 2am and the street party was still at full-blast. Things got out of hand.

*****

Film Festival Talk

* I was at the North American premiere of Calvaire (The Ordeal). I didn't know much about it when I got my ticket. In conversation with other festival-goers at the ticket holders' line, I was warned the movie was a wild gore-fest.

At the half hour point, I was falling asleep. I wanted to walk out as the pacing was slow, but the Director sat directly behind me. I didn't want to be rude. Also, I was wondering if the rumours were true. I was waiting for carnage. And then... it did get bloody! Still, in contrast, a far cry from The Passion of the Christ.

* The film I was eagerly anticipating to watch all week was Dylan Kidd's sophomore work: P.S. I admired his screenplay and direction in Roger Dodger. He showed such promise that I even placed his first film #2 on my top 10 films of 2002. P.S. is a good film, short of greatness. [photo1, photo 2]

* A film that I absolutely loved was Alexander Payne's Sideways. The entire cast was present at the public screening [photo1]. I really enjoyed his previous film About Schmidt with Jack Nicholson. According to Roger Ebert, "[Sideways] is the best guy movie of recent years, and a lot more than that."

* I can't quite say the same thing about Enduring Love from Notting Hill director Roger Michell. I didn't care for the book, I didn't care for the movie. What it has, however, is a very gripping opening scene involving a hot air balloon that has to be seen, and not described. It goes downhill from there, folks. At least the Q&A afterwards was funny.

* I saw other films like the off-beat Throw Down or ultra creepy Creep which will never get any distribution in North America. I also saw a western/horror/civil war period film called Dead Birds. Interesting combination, but still DOA.

Anyways, that's enough film talk for now.

//posted on 9/15/2004 01:47:00 PM. I want to hear from ya - Send me an e-mail.