A dog movie unleashes emotion in Marrakech
Festivals: Festival International Du Film De Marrakech
Liberated from the Oscar bait vying for her attention in New York, veteran film critic Thelma Adams lets go in the exotic darkness of a Moroccan movie palace
By Thelma Adams
MARRAKECH, MOROCCO -- "Each person dies as best they can," says Julian (Ricardo Darin) in the Spanish-language dramedy Truman, screened out of competition at the Festival International Du Film De Marrakech. Julian is a self-involved and straight-shooting stage actor riddled with cancer and reluctant to go another round with chemo. His best friend Tomas (Javier Camara) travels to Madrid from Montreal for a reluctant reunion. It will likely be their last. In this Spanish-Argentinian co-production there will be tears and tenderness, shared memories and wine bottles, conflicts and revelations – and steamy sex. In Spanish director Cesc Gay's seventh film, there is also a very large, soulful hound named Truman that Julian is seeking to surrender to a new ...
Theeb: A Middle Eastern Western
Movie review: Theeb
Jordan's official nomination for the best foreign film Oscar is a tightly wound adventure story about a Bedouin boy learning how to be a man on the eve of the First World War
Wim Wenders finds warmth in Canadian winter
People: Wim Wenders
The German filmmaker says he used stereoscopic 3D technology in Every Thing Will Be Fine, his latest art film about grief and loss, in a bid to bring depth to Quebec's unique landscape
By Katherine Monk
TORONTO – His voice sounds like something straight out of a fairy tale: a soft German accent bending over vowels with a delicate arc and a deep warm tone that seems to echo through hand-milled timber. Even his name, Wim Wenders, feels like a plucky character from a Grimm plot, so the fact that this German auteur has transformed the stark hues and blinding skies of the Canadian landscape into a cozy microcosm feels strangely natural. Every Thing Will Be Fine is Wenders’s 46th film, but it marks a series of firsts: It’s his first film in Canada, his first shoot in winter, and the first time any auteur has used 3D technology in the heady pursuit of an art film. Wenders always thought the technology was used poorly – a point he proved in ...
Love, Actually vs. The Holiday
Podcast: Pop This! Two pop culture experts play amateur marriage counsellors as they dissect the reasons why kindness is so hard to come by, then move straight into a knock-down, drag-out discussion about the merits of Love, Actually and The Holiday.
Featuring Andrea Warner and Lisa Christiansen, Produced by Andrea Gin
Don't say we didn't warn you. This week, the ladies are extra feisty as they weigh the merits of Kate Winslet's response to a question about equal pay, and expand into a larger discussion about the feminist tag -- and how willing, or unwilling, the rich and famous are to wear it. Warner offers surprise thanks to Sarah Palin, then the real battle begins... It's a smackdown between two favoured Christmas rom-coms: Love, Actually and The Holiday. Lisa refers to Love, Actually as 'Hate, Actually' while Warner calls The Holiday "a cold Journey to Hell." The gloves are off -- just so they can warm their fingers by the burning yule log. It's another episode of ...
Carol a modern masterpiece
Movie review: Carol
Todd Haynes creates a modern masterpiece that speaks directly to the female experience without words thanks to the silent chemistry between stars Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara
Every Thing Will Be Fine, not great
Movie Review: Every Thing Will Be Fine
German filmmaker Wim Wenders turns the Canadian landscape into a snow globe with 3D technology, and a cast that includes Rachel McAdams, Marie-Josée Croze and the near-omnipresent James Franco
Digging two Pitts By the Sea
Movie Review: By the Sea
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt look to the black and white classic starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in this flat, contrived and utterly self-conscious piece of cinema that isn't afraid of Virginia Woolf, or dark satire
Searching for the legacy of Al Purdy
When film critic Brian D. Johnson retired, he became a filmmaker himself. His first project: a documentary about the difficult, brilliant (and strangely forgotten) Canadian poet
By Jay Stone
TORONTO — “You can argue whether he was our greatest poet, but certainly he was our most Canadian poet. No one wrote about the land the way that he did. If the Group of Seven was a bar band, they might sound like Al Purdy.” It’s a warm September afternoon and Brian D. Johnson is sitting at an outdoor table at a coffee place he likes near the Toronto International Film Festival. He’s in the sun, hatless, and there is sweat on his forehead. Furthermore, people keep stopping to interrupt us because Johnson is a pretty popular guy in the film festival district, and also because, at this year’s festival, he’s a bit of a celebrity. He was the film critic for Maclean’s magazine for 28 years. Now, at 66, he has retired (“I’ve had a career. I’m looking for the sweeter ...
Youth ages the viewer via affectation
Movie review: Youth
Paolo Sorrentino's follow-up to The Great Beauty feels like opera sung in English: Pretentious, puffy and frequently plain stupid
