Books

Writing non-fiction’s a bitch – a truth not universally acknowledged.

– Will Aitken in This Writing Death

Theatre

Chekhov for Beginners

by Natalie G.

Comment

Don't know where you were sitting, but there were lots of laughs.

– comment by Suzy Charto

From the category archives:

FILM

Danse Macabre

A look at Pina - a dance film/eulogy best avoided by those confounded by contemporary convulsing

by Sarah Fletcher
07.02.2012

Perhaps I should have smoked a joint before this one. Alas, I exited this 3D experimental dance film clouded in sober confusion. What in hell was up with the hippo, and why did the lovely dancer in silk fondle him with such graceful abandon? She’s way out of his league, though he doesn’t seem to [...]

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FILM

Road to Nowhere

Chris Paine's documentary spins its wheels detailing the Revenge of the Electric Car

by James Gartler
28.01.2012

There was once a time when oil companies, politicians and car manufacturers wanted any notion of a mainstream electric vehicle dead and buried. Director Chris Paine chronicled it in his popular 2006 documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? and is now determined to declare the tides have turned with the release of his latest, Revenge [...]

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FILM

Feel Good, It Ain’t

American Psycho vibes haunt Shame.

by Sarah Fletcher
10.01.2012

A naked man wanders his apartment as a woman’s voice pleads with his answering machine. It’s Steve McQueen’s star sex addict, Brandon Sullivan, painfully indifferent and in dire need of a trim. It’s not his fault he’s emotionally unavailable. Maybe it all started with that untoward blow to the head.

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FILM

Spreading the Love

Inspiring documentary reveals the man behind Elmo’s upbeat attitude

by James Gartler
07.12.2011

It’s amazing to think that Kevin Clash has been able to walk down the street anonymously, considering he’s been entertaining children worldwide for the past 27 years. “I’m a black man, I’m six feet tall (and) they would never think that I perform this little red monster,” he remarks in Being Elmo: A Puppeteer’s Journey, [...]

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FILM

Definitely Not the Muppets

Melancholia's Wagner-heavy soundtrack, haunting imagery and lack of dinosaurs make for an enthralling art film

by Sarah Fletcher
05.12.2011

I arrived late to Melancholia as a planet collided with the Earth on the humble Cinema du Parc screen. The impact reverberated across the atmosphere as Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde Prelude hit a sublime crescendo. A second montage followed, and another. Yes, I smiled to myself, another pretentious art piece to cheerfully rip apart.

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FILM

Screening the Epidemic: No Sad Songs

A look back at Canada’s first documentary on AIDS

by Matthew Hays
01.12.2011

It’s hard to believe, but more than a quarter century has passed since Nick Sheehan made the first Canadian documentary response to the AIDS epidemic, No Sad Songs. In fact, his landmark 1985 film is one of the first documentaries to grapple with the disease and its impact, anywhere. And it’s an intimate, unblinking recording [...]

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FILM

Let Them Eat Cake

Reviewing the recipe for Ma Part du Gateau from Cinemania 2011

by Andrea Elalouf
30.11.2011

With the recent European economic crisis taking a sudden spin for the worse (France being no exception), much of the recently concluded Cinemania Festival’s politically and socially minded programming has struck as particularly relevant, groundbreaking and…clairvoyant?

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