Week in Pictures: May 14th – May 20th, 2009

By macleans.ca - Friday, May 22, 2009 at 12:24 PM - 0 Comments

Brad, Quentin and the Canadian 'basterd'

By Brian D. Johnson - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 11:08 AM - 2 Comments

Brad Pitt in motion at the 'Inglourious Basterds' press conference in Cannes (photo: BDJ)

Yesterday was Brad Pitt Day in Cannes—although hard-core cineastes, especially the Gallic variety, perhaps thought of it as Quentin Tarantino Day. And for die-hard Canadians, it was Mike Myers Day. In the biggest blitz of Hollywood talent that we’ve seen during the festival, all three were on hand for the premiere of Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino’s outrageous Second World War epic. It was one of the most anticipated titles among the 20 films in competition here. The 2,300-seat Lumiere theatre was packed for the morning press screening, well before the 8:30 a.m. start time. And at the end of the two-and-half-hour opus, the Palais erupted with some of the strongest applause we’ve seen here. The movie is a hoot, and so was the press conference that immediately followed the morning screening. More on that in minute, but first a few details about the film. Continue…

From Cannes: Up, Up and Away

By Brian D. Johnson - Thursday, May 14, 2009 at 9:42 AM - 2 Comments

'Up' inflates hype on the Carlton pier; Charles Aznavour voices Ed Asner's role in the French version/ photos by BDJ

On its opening day, the Cannes Film Festival lived up to its reputation for extremes. Last night the quite delightful Disney-Pixar movie Up became the first animated feature to open the festival in its 62-year history, not to mention the first 3D movie to open Cannes—presenting the bizarre sight of the Lumiere theatre filled with people in tuxedoes and dark glasses. Up is playing out of competition. But the same day, we saw the first competition entry, China’s Spring Fever, which also set a precedent of sorts. A bleak tale of a young man who betrays his wife for a homosexual romance, it has to be the first movie we’ve ever seen from China that’s loaded with explicit gay sex scenes. And this morning, as I sat down to watch Francis Ford Coppola’s Tetro, the opening film of the Directors’ Fortnight sidebar, a fellow critic pointed out that “humping is big” in the Fortnight, especially of the gay variety—notably in I Love You Phillip Morris, starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor, and a perky comedy called Humpday.

This is my 14th year at Cannes. For professional lovers of film, the May pilgrimage to French Riviera is a rite of spring. We come hoping to be surprised, provoked and, if we’re lucky, blown away by a film that shows up out of the blue and takes cinema to the next level. And each year, those of us who take part in this rite wonder if we”ll make it back here for another year. Well, the ranks are thinning. As media companies reel from the recession, film criticism is under assault wherever you look. Some North American newspapers have axed their critics. Others have decided that sending them to Cannes, the world’s cinephile summit, is a luxury they can no longer afford. This year both the Globe and Mail and the National Post have not sent their critics (although The Globe‘s London correspondent, Liz Renzetti, will be on hand for a few days.) This should not go unnoticed. It’s the first time the Globe has not sent its film critic since the 1970s, when the late Jay Scott first began coming here—and helped put Canadian cinema on the map, as Cannes discovered the likes of Denys Arcand, Atom Egoyan, Jean-Claude Lauzon and Patricia Rozema. Meanwhile, the U.S. presence is also severely reduced. Entertainment Weekly‘s presence is cut from three to one writer. People doesn’t have a staffer here. Vanity Fair is not holding its usual bash.

So I feel lucky. It’s s good to be back, even on a recessionary shoestring. Continue…

Newsmakers

By Lianne George - Friday, May 1, 2009 at 2:40 PM - 1 Comment

Grandma drama

Sarah Obama, the 87-year-old step-grandmother of President Barack Obama, suddenly found herself at the centre of a religious tug-of-war last week in her native Kenya. Obama, a Muslim, accepted an invitation to attend a Seventh Day Adventist Church event, allegedy as an honorary guest. But local Muslim leaders protested, alleging that the event was part of a plot to convert Obama to Christianity now that she is a local celebrity. “Mama Sarah should not be forced by anybody to join Christianity since she is a Muslim,” said Sheik Mohamed Khalifa, of the Council of Imams and Preachers of Kenya. “Muslims will not sit and watch one of their own being coerced by some religious leaders to convert to Christianity.” Obama ultimately did not attend, but according to her son, Saidi Obama—the U.S. President’s uncle—this was not because of any attempted conversion. “She was to attend as a VIP,” he told the Telegraph, “but in the end she had other commitments.”

Safety minister’s safety lesson

British Columbia’s Solicitor General and Minister of Public Safety John van Dongen resigned on Monday after being taken to task for unsafe driving. Last week, van Dongen was alerted by the Office of the Superintendent of Motor Vehicles—an agency for which he was responsible—that he is prohibited from driving for four months due to two recent incidents of excessive speeding. “I’m not proud of my driving record that triggered this prohibition,” van Dongen told CBC Radio. “I take responsibility for it.” B.C.’s NDP Leader Carole James called on him to resign early on, but Premier Gordon Campbell praised him for owning up to his mistakes. The premier has had his own dangerous driving misadventures. While on vacation in Maui in 2003, Campbell was arrested for impaired driving, and fined US$913. Van Dongen still plans to run as a Liberal candidate in the May 12 election.

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Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp and the late Heath Ledger to light up Cannes

By Brian D. Johnson - Thursday, April 23, 2009 at 1:47 PM - 0 Comments

The Cannes film festival has just announced its official program today. And it looks like a strong line-up, heaving on established auteurs, and with the requisite spash of Hollywood glamour. The main competition is heavy with work from  master filmmakers, includings Pedro Almodóvar, Ang Lee, Lars Von Trier, Ken Loach, Michael Haneke, Alain Renais—and Jane Campion, who premieres her first feature in six years. Ang Lee will unveil Taking Woodstock, which stars Canada’s Eugene Levy as Max Yasgur, the farmer whose patch of land hosted the world’s legendary rock festival. Bratt Pitt should provide some celebrity wattage as the star of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds. And Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell may show up to celebrate their work in filling out the late Heath Ledger’s unfinished role in Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassass, which is screening out of competition. The festival will open with Up, a 3D animated feature from Pixar.

There appear to be no Canadian features in official selection, although I still have to double check the French-language titles. Here’s the complete list from Cannes, and more details can be found on the official Cannes site.

THE COMPÉTITION :

Opening Film :  Peter DOCTER – UP – Out of Comp.- 1h44
***

Pedro ALMODÓVAR – LOS ABRAZOS ROTOS (Broken Embraces) – 2h09

Andrea ARNOLD – FISH TANK - 2h02

Jacques AUDIARD – UN PROPHÈTE – 2h35

Marco BELLOCCHIO – VINCERE – 2h08

Jane CAMPION  -  BRIGHT STAR – 2h00

Isabel COIXET – MAP OF THE SOUNDS OF TOKYO -1h44

Xavier GIANNOLI – A L’ORIGINE – 2h30

Michael HANEKE  – DAS WEISSE BAND (The White Ribbon) – 2h24

Ang LEE – TAKING WOODSTOCK -1h50

Ken LOACH – LOOKING FOR ERIC – 1h59

LOU Ye – CHUN FENG CHEN ZUI DE YE WAN (Spring Fever) – 1h55

Brillante MENDOZA – KINATAY - 1h45

Gaspar NOE – ENTER THE VOID – 2h30

PARK Chan-Wook  -  BAK-JWI – (Thirst) – 2h13

Alain RESNAIS – LES HERBES FOLLES - 1h36

Elia SULEIMAN – THE TIME THAT REMAINS – 1h45

Quentin TARANTINO – INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS - 2h40

Johnnie TO – VENGEANCE – 1h48

TSAI Ming-liang – VISAGE (face)- 2h18

Lars VON TRIER – ANTICHRIST – 1h44

***
Closing Film : Jan KOUNEN – COCO CHANEL & IGOR STRAVINSKY – Out of Comp. – 2h00 Continue…

Dear Brad and Angie

By Scott Feschuk - Tuesday, March 31, 2009 at 2:34 PM - 12 Comments

According to new reports, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie will soon move one child closer to convening their own underage G20. The couple is said to be looking to adopt a child from India.

An open letter to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie:

It has come to my attention – through stories in the press and the telltale sound of millions of orphans simultaneously raising their arms and shouting, “Oooo, pick me!” – that you are thinking of adopting another child. I commend you both on your noble impulse. And I humbly prescribe a provocative course of action as you plan an even larger family.

You should adopt me.

There’s no denying I would be an unconventional choice. For one thing, I am a full-grown adult – which puts me at something of a disadvantage. For instance, I couldn’t find a wicker hamper big enough to leave myself on your doorstep.

But believe me, I’ll fit right in, and not just because I too hate Jon Voight. For instance, you both work tirelessly to ease suffering among the world’s least fortunate – whereas I had an Amnesty International sticker on my math binder in high school.

In media interviews, you’ve indicated that you place a priority on achieving further diversity in your family. Advantage, Feschuk. You are two of the most attractive people on the face of the Earth, whereas I am neither beautiful nor thin. Talk about balancing the ticket.

And that’s not all. Your oldest child, Maddox, is Cambodian. Shiloh was born in Namibia. What a happy coincidence that I too hail from an exotic and mystical land. Perhaps you have heard of Canada? No? Well, it’s very much Continue…

Maclean’s Interview: Russell Peters

By Kenneth Whyte - Monday, March 2, 2009 at 9:30 PM - 0 Comments

Q: We’re going to talk about Oscar and the movies, so let’s start with Slumdog Millionaire. Did you see it? Did you like it?

A: I sure did. All of the above. I liked the fact that that movie could have been set anywhere and still been a fantastic film.

Q: Do you think the movie will do anything for perceptions of the subcontinent and for Indian people?

A: I mean, after such a huge sweep like that I think it will only give it some good attention that we’ve been lacking for many, many years. So I think it’s a good thing. It’s probably a double-edged sword, though. Now every product that comes out with any kind of Indian twang to it will always be compared to that.

Continue…

Some families are better than others

By Anne Kingston - Monday, February 9, 2009 at 1:54 PM - 3 Comments

Last week, two extreme examples tested the limits of what society deems acceptable motherhood: Nadya Suleman, the 33-year-old who delivered octuplets in California two weeks ago via in vitro fertilization, and Ranjit Hayer, the 60-year-old who gave birth to twin boys in Calgary after receiving fertility treatment in India. And, as tends to be the case when limits are tested, so too are hypocrisies revealed.

First Suleman, a tragic example of a woman overwhelmed by celebrity culture. Watching her on NBC’s  Today was like watching Angelina Jolie’s doppelganger—same hair, same expansive lips—to the point the Internet was quickly awash in speculation the new mother had cosmetic surgery to resemble the actress. Other strange similarities exist. They’re both 33 years old. Both have admitted to experiencing troubled childhoods. And both have displayed a passionate desire for families whose size far exceeds the current norm. Suleman said she intended to have “only” seven children through in vitro fertilization but now has 14 under the age of seven. (“You take risks, and it turned out perfectly,” she explained.) Jolie has six children through adoption and birth and has expressed the desire for more.

Of course, few question Jolie’s motivation or capacity to be a good mother. She and partner Brad Pitt have the wealth to afford the retinue of help to care for and the multi-roomed mansions to shelter their brood. And no one asks the two superstars with high-octane careers, as they do Suleman, whether they have enough time to lavish individual attention on their children. The unmarried Suleman, with no visible means of support and a history of mental illness, represents the sinister side of a cultural mania for “babies” (as opposed to raising children) so entrenched that First Lady Michelle Obama wasn’t in the White House a week before rumours began circulating she was pregnant, despite the fact she’s 45.

Suleman’s comments to interviewer Ann Curry were filled with the kind of narcissistic parenting bromides that would be laughable were they not so deluded: “I’m providing myself to my children,” said the woman who plans to return to school for her master’s degree. “I’m loving them unconditionally, supporting them unconditionally. I’ll stop my life for them and be present for them… And how many parents do that?” The language was eerily similar to that Jolie used on Good Morning America just days earlier discussing how her children are her priority. “I’d say kids first, kids, woman to Brad and then my work internationally,” she said, adding: “But I wake up every day just the happiest mummy… I don’t want to wake up one day and say I had my career that expanded so much longer and I did that many more films and miss out on all those other things in life.”

No wonder Suleman is bewildered. The same media that follows Pitt and Jolie’s peripatetic lives with children in tow, pays the couple millions for photographs of their newborns and speculates feverishly about when their next addition will land, has vilified her as a monster, a drain on the social system and the environment.

Suleman appeared defiant about facing harsher judgment as a single mother, noting that dual parents of children born through IVF are more “acceptable” to society. She has a point. Many have become celebrities in the new hyper-fertile-family reality-show genre: Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, an Arkansas couple with 18 children, star in TLC’s 17 Kids and Counting!; Jon and Kate Goselin, parents of twins and sextuplets, have exploited their fecundity on Jon & Kate Plus 8 and their best-selling book Multiple Blessings; and most recently, Betty and Eric Hayes’s show Twelve at the Table explores the challenges of raising ten children under the age of 12, including one with cerebral palsy.

Suleman had hoped to jump aboard that gravy train. She hired a publicist and was angling for an appearance on Oprah, her own parenting show and the deluge of freebies heaped upon multiple-birth parents since the Dionne quintuplets were born in 1934. When Nkem Chukwu of Houston became the first woman to give birth to octuplets in the U.S. in 1998, her family was given use of a six-bedroom suburban home, a battalion of volunteers helped care for the seven surviving babies, and they received a lifetime supply of Pampers.

Proctor & Gamble isn’t delivering a lifetime supply of anything to Suleman, even though the needs of her children are as great. Nor is Ranjit Hayer about to land any endorsement deals. Aside from the fury that her lifelong desire for motherhood has cost the Alberta health system a bundle, her advanced age has many apoplectic that she will not live to see her children become adults. What is curious, though, is the absence of any mention of her husband’s age. Or maybe not. There’s a socially unquestioned assumption that the mother, not the father, does most of the backbreaking work of child-raising. More, though, it’s assumed that a good mother has to be a young, healthy mother, which is not true. Just as it’s assumed the Hayer twins will suffer as a result of being raised by people old enough to be their grandparents, though that’s far from the worst fate a child can face. Just ask Barack Obama.

What would Gwyneth do?

By Anne Kingston - Friday, January 30, 2009 at 1:30 AM - 9 Comments

Gwyneth Paltrow is on a crusade to enrich your sad, spiritually and materially malnourished life. The first sign of the Oscar winner’s humanitarianism appeared last September with the launch of Goop.com, a website and free weekly newsletter sent to subscribers offering advice on topics as diverse as her bowel-cleansing “detox,” how to copy her daily “uniform,” and her favourite places to stay and eat. Other celebrities, among them Paltrow’s ex-fiancé Brad Pitt, tour refugee camps. Providing a portal into her privileged life is Paltrow’s way of giving back. As she told USA Today: “I just thought if I could affect one woman’s life positively who was trying to do all the things I was doing, and I had one solution that worked for me that might work for her, it was worth it to try and share it.”

It’s the rare woman, of course, who has Paltrow’s hectic schedule—commuting by private plane between houses in London and the U.S. with her husband, Coldplay front man Chris Martin, and their two young children, balancing an acting career with endorsements for Estée Lauder, Tod’s and South Korean fashion line Bean Pole International, and squeezing in yoga classes and workouts with the trainer she shares with Madonna. Still, Paltrow’s noblesse oblige is such that she finds time to convene her “sages,” among them Deepak Chopra, to discuss surviving family tensions during the holidays, to post a video of butt-reshaping exercises starring her trainer, Tracy Anderson, and to compile a holiday gift guide that includes a US$500 Dean & DeLuca “Small Ultimate Gift Set” with truffled goose foie gras. Just last week, she provided a new twist on the tired book-club trend, with picks from her “most literary-minded” girlfriends, among them Madonna and the model Christy Turlington.
Continue…

The Oscars: Scandalous Omissions

By Brian D. Johnson - Thursday, January 22, 2009 at 5:51 PM - 6 Comments

The Oscar nominations are in, and they are even more boring and predictable than might be expected, which I guess makes them slightly less predictable than expected. For a list of nominees, click on: Oscar’s list. The main event comes down to a David and Goliath clash between two fables: Danny Boyle’s the Little Movie that Could, and David Fincher’s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, a big tedious Hollywood epic about the magic of make-up in which Brad Pitt is reborn as a wizened old man. Benjamin Button, which plods through the decades with the folksy fakery of Forrest Gump, strikes me as the worst movie to make waves this awards season. I found it interminable. But it topped the list of films recognized by the Academy with a total of 13 nominations. Why? Well, the Academy has always adored sweeping epics that use history as a backdrop for fables about the triumph of the human spirit. Or something. And it also likes movies that keep all the motion picture crafts well employed. BB is not just a period epic with lots of elaborate sets, costumes and make-up. It’s about sets, costumes and make-up. Especially make-up. As for Slumdog Millionaire, it came in second with 10 nominations. And its crowd-pleasing appeal is easier to fathom.

Slumdog, a Dickensian melodrama about adorable urchins in the slums of Mumbai, framed by the whimsical conceit of a grown-up street kid eking out redemption on India’s version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. The movie submerges its fairy-tale plot in the vivid, kinetic realism of its location shooting. And Boyle, who does his most vital work since Trainspotting, captures all the colour and beauty and corruption with roaring style.

Continue…

Poor needy pathetic desperate Jen

By Anne Kingston - Thursday, November 20, 2008 at 7:59 AM - 75 Comments

Vogue editor Anna Wintour knows how to sell magazines, which explains the “What Angelina Did Was Very Uncool” line on the cover of the December issue next to Jennifer Aniston’s face. The quote was lifted from an interview in which the former Friends star was asked about Angelina Jolie’s gushing to the magazine in 2007 about falling in love with Brad Pitt while he was still hitched to her. Playing Aniston’s first public comment about Jolie so boldly was a master stroke destined to generate epic buzz.

For Aniston, though, the incident ushered in yet another of the “Poor Jen! Duped again!” moments that have dogged her since her 2005 divorce from Pitt. Not only did Vogue exploit Aniston’s tepid smackdown, making her appear obsessed with the siren who stole her husband, it squared the two women off against one another more subtly. Astute fashionistas were quick to note that the cover image of Aniston posed on a beach in a cleavage-displaying, off-the-shoulder, red Narciso Rodriguez gown echoed the cover shot of Jolie in January 2007 in which she rocked a cleavage-displaying, off-the-shoulder, red Bill Blass against a sandy backdrop. Jolie’s cover line, however, was a more triumphant “Why Her Real Life is More Romantic Than Any Movie.” The disparity continued inside: in 2007, Jolie was shown with Pitt and their numerous children; in the current issue, Aniston is pictured with her dog Norman.

Aniston’s Vogue appearance is part of a publicity blitz for her two new movies, Marley & Me, which opens on Dec. 25, and He’s Just Not That Into You, which arrives in February. Neither role, it’s safe to say, will eclipse the one she currently plays in the cultural imagination—that of the archetypal Wronged Wife subject to an endless loop of “Jen Is Devastated!” “Jen Is Furious!” “Jen Gets Revenge!” bogus theorizing. Since her divorce, America’s Sweetheart has morphed into America’s Spinster. The unmarried, childless Aniston has become the tabloids’ Miss Havisham, portrayed as lonely, needy and locked in the past. The website Dlisted.com recently advertised a US$19.95 “Boyfriend Arm Pillow” thus: “Now, every time the Jennifer Aniston in your life calls you, wanting to whine for hours about how they are so f–king lonely and their cats are even giving them the side-eye, you can simply say, ‘Aniston in my life, go canoodle with the Boyfriend Arm Pillow I got you for Christmas.’ ” Celebrity gossip site PerezHilton.com refers to her cruelly as “Maniston.”

Her alleged tribulations sell big time. “We can’t get enough of her,” says Dina Sansing, entertainment director at US Weekly, where every issue features at least one Aniston photo or story. She’s No. 2 on the “Most Valuable Celebrity Faces” of 2008 list in terms of newsstand sales, according to Forbes. (In a rare case of tabloids imitating life, “Poor Jen!” was knocked off her No. 1 perch this year by Jolie.) Women relate to her, says Sansing, a bond that dates back to 1994 when Aniston entered homes as flaky, likeable Rachel Green. Female fans flocked to copy Aniston’s haircut, known as “The Rachel.” And now they rally to share her pain—as well as a schadenfreude thrill.

Aniston’s position atop the tabloid pantheon was cemented with her union with Pitt, whom she met Hollywood cute in 1998 through their mutual agent. The merger of America’s Sweetheart and the World’s Sexiest Man in 2000 was a lavish event that featured a 40-person gospel choir and fireworks over the Pacific. They were the king and queen of the Hollywood prom, with matching tans and blond streaks. When they split Aniston was poised for post-Friends career breakout; initially she was the one blamed for being unwilling to “have Brad’s babies,” to employ tabloid lexicon. When Jolie’s involvement became known, Aniston became the object of sympathy, and pity. After all, what chance did the Girl Next Door have against the Girl From the Next Galaxy? The New Yorker film critic Anthony Lane summed up perception of Jolie’s snaring of Pitt: “She took one look at the world’s most widely desired man and scooped him up with no more ado than a Parisian grande dame tucking a chihuahua into her clutch bag.”

The scandal was likened to Eddie Fisher leaving Debbie Reynolds for Elizabeth Taylor in the ’60s. But back then there wasn’t a celebrity media complex ready to pounce on Reynolds’ every humiliation, real or imagined. For the wounded Aniston, the salt poured down, beginning with an arty 60-page photo spread in the June 2005 W titled “Domestic Bliss,” in which Pitt and Jolie presided over a band of little blond Brads.

Aniston shot back with a tearful Vanity Fair interview in which she admitted to being hurt and lonely and denied rumours that she didn’t want children: “That really pissed me off. I’ve never in my life said I didn’t want to have children. I did and I do and I will!”

Photo Gallery: Toronto Film Festival 2008

By Jeff Harris - Monday, September 15, 2008 at 12:18 PM - 0 Comments

Brad Pitt was the paparazzi money shot at the Toronto International Film Festival for the third year in a row. Who noticed that his movie Burn After Reading was entirely skippable? The real stars of the festival were Ben Kingsley and Rose McGowan from the powerful Fifty Dead Men Walking, and Freida Pinto from the stunning Slumdog Millionaire.

Click here for exclusive photo gallery.

Brad Pitt is neglected by the media while the Coens cop to their 'inner knucklehead'

By Brian D. Johnson - Saturday, September 6, 2008 at 7:32 PM - 3 Comments

The press conference this morning for the Coen brothers’ Burn After Reading was almost as strange as a Coen brothers movie. It was roomful of studio-selected journalists, rather than an all-access TIFF press conference, so that may account for the unusual decorum. There were still about 50 of us there. Brad Pitt walked into the room as if he owned, looking very dapper in a silver vest, joshing and joking with the assembled media. He sat on a stage beside the Coen brothers, with Tilda Swinton and John Malkovich sitting at either end. And guess what? With perhaps the biggest movie star on the planet sitting up there, available, most of the questions were directed at the two nerdy siblings who made the movie. There was not a single personal question about Angelina and the twins, never mind Jennifer Aniston, whose concurrent presence at TIFF has fostered all manner of speculative nonsense in the media about a Brad-Jennifer reunion. The closest anyone came was a query about the possibility of Brad and Angelina working together again, to which Brad quipped, “Angie and I are working together every day, I can guarantee it.”

The Coens maintained their reputation for not saying anything of substance when questioned by journalists. But they at least tried to explain it’s not because they’re patronizing snobs, but because Continue…

Beyond the buzz around Brad

By Brian D. Johnson - Friday, September 5, 2008 at 1:31 PM - 2 Comments

Hitting the keyboard for a quick update on an insane day. In the course of few hours, my schedule of on-on-one interview schedule includes Ricky Gervais, Renee Zellweger, Spike Lee and John Malkovich. So far I’ve just done Gervais who was utterly charming, even when I interrupted his seamless flow of wit with an asthmatic coughing spasm. “Bronchial asthma,” I gasped, grabbing a water bottle. “Don’t worry. It’s not contagious.” Offering to thump me on the back, which wasn’t necessary, Gervais filled the awkward interlude with an anecdote tabout how he was choking once in a restaurant and a friend shouted, “I don’t know the Heimlich manoever!”—as if to absolve himself in advance of any responsibility if Gervais choked to death.

two dudes in black t-shirts

A quick update on movies at TIFF. So far my favorite, hands down, is Jonathan Demme’s Rachel Getting Married. I’m not alone in this. But everyone seems surprised that Anne Hathaway is so darkly brilliant as the acerbic heroine, a woman who goes straight from rehab to her sister’s wedding, where she creates havoc. “I didn’t think she had it in her” is the line I’m hearing a lot as Oscar buzz builds around her performance. I don’t know. I’ve always liked Anne Hathaway, whether in Brokeback Mountain or in Get Smart. And the movie itself, which has a hurtling, train-wreck energy—Monsoon Wedding meets Celebration—is exhilarating. Continue…

Photo Gallery: Toronto Film Festival 2007

By Jeff Harris - Friday, September 14, 2007 at 5:23 PM - 0 Comments

The stars just seem to shine brighter north of the border. Exclusive pictures of celebrities on the red carpet and in their own habitat (aka hotel rooms) at the 2007 Toronto Film Festival. Check out Matt Damon, Jennifer Garner, George Clooney and Brad Pitt — erm, with an itchy nose.

Click here for exclusive photo gallery.

Video Gallery: Toronto Film Festival 2006

By Jeff Harris - Wednesday, September 13, 2006 at 12:03 PM - 0 Comments

The 2006 festival gallery is choc-o-bloc full of celebrities, including British talent James McAvoy, and everyone’s favourite “Khasakstani” tourist, Borat. Entourage star Adrien Grenier tells us about schmoozing at the fest over wine. And the ever-ambitious autograph hound gets to share a moment with Pierce Brosnan.

Click here for exclusive video coverage.

Photo Gallery: Toronto Film Festival 2006

By Jeff Harris - Tuesday, September 12, 2006 at 1:51 PM - 0 Comments

Juilette Binoche epitomized the “blonde bombshell” look at Breaking and Entering
premiere, along with co-star Jude Law — who had an impish grin for festival paparrazzi. The Dixie Chicks came to town with a hot documentary that followed the backlash after their dig at President George Bush. From Ashton Kutcher to Zach Braff, see all the celebs that invaded Toronto this past September.

Click here for exclusive photo gallery.