Category: Movies

"Someone's ear is in danger of having hair brushed over it…"

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I learned something this weekend: that there are three indispensable ingredients of a great weekend. These are, in no particular order: beautiful weather, ample time and people with which to share it.

On Friday I did have to go to the office, but it was nice enough outside that I could walk there, and I didn’t stay long. By noon I was home, fed and ready to enjoy the unseasonably warm day. Nellie and I strolled down to the Bier Markt patio for sunshine and beer (me: Erdinger weiss, Weihenstephan weiss, Spaten lager and Delirium Tremens; she: KLB Raspberry Wheat, Big Rock Grasshopper, Okanagan Spring pale and Koningshoeven Tripel) on a lazy Friday afternoon. Nellie had an urge for an Urthel Hop-It so we wandered up to the Beerbistro in search of one; alas, they had none. So we availed ourselves of the rest of their collection (me: Maudite and Trois Pistoles; she: Durham Hop Addict and Koningshoeven Quadrupel) while making dinner reservations at nearby Harlem. We’d been there once last year and liked it and it felt like the right fit on a lazy Good Friday. One ill-advised cocktail later and were into the starter (catfish Lafayette…yum!) and then our mains. My pork hocks were okay, but Nellie wisely got the fried chicken. I didn’t mind that I missed on some of the flavour. The relaxation was tasting delicious enough.

Saturday was the first day in about two months that I haven’t had to go to work, so I celebrated by sleeping in. Despite it being another beautiful day we didn’t really get out and about that much as we were prepping for dinner with T-Bone and The Sof. Well…Nellie did the prepping, I just cleaned up and provided moral support. Anyway, after a great meal (baguette w/ honey, balsamic and goat cheese; sausage-stuffed pasta with pancetta and sage; steak from Cumbrae’s and three kinds of cheese) this is what our table looked like:

Just for the record, that’s:

  • Marie Stuart champagne (which we brought back from France last fall)
  • Nino Franco prosecco
  • Stratus Icewine
  • Z52 Zinfandel
  • Hidden Bench Fume Blanc
  • L’Acadie Alchemy
  • Noval 2001 Port
  • Blanche de Chambly
  • Christofel Nobel
  • Doppel-Hirsch Doppelbock

And yes, in case you’re wondering, Nellie does like to drink her beer from a wine glass toward the end of the evening.

Sunday was, blessedly, another lazy day. A good lie-in, brunch at the Jason George, a nice long talk with my mom who turned 60 (!) today and Zombieland (imdb | rotten tomatoes), which was excellent. Tomorrow it’s back to work, in spite of my best efforts to take a day off, but for the first time this year I feel like I really got my money’s worth out of a weekend.

Oh, and the other ingredient for a perfect weekend? Consecutive shutouts.

http://www.thebiermarkt.com/home.html

"Who would've thought we'd have a black son before we met a Democrat?"

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I read The Blind Side by Michael Lewis (amazon) a while ago, and I remember thinking that when it was made into a movie, they would have two opportunities to mess it up. The first would be finding the right person to play Michael Oher. The second would be finding the right person to play Leigh Anne Tuohy. When I heard they’d cast Sandra Bullock I pretty much gave up hope of it being anything but a disaster.

However, award buzz for Bullock began almost immediately after the movie (imdb | rotten tomatoes) came out and I wondered if she’d prove me wrong. We finally watched it yesterday. And she did. She played it pretty much as I expected her to be played. Likewise, the actor who portrayed Michael Oher (even if he was more baby-faced than Oher) played it pretty much as I’d expected.

Overall the whole thing had more of a predictable, feel-good pattern to it, which isn’t a bad thing, but it’s the kind of thing that keeps a movie from being particularly memorable. If you’ve read Lewis’ books before you might have expected a colder, more analytical view of the events, but Lewis does admit in his book that he knows the Tuohy family, and I suspect that affected how he told the story. It’s an entertaining enough little slice of a day, just don’t expect any surprises.

"Yuens, you guys are my infantry. One of you dies, God gave me another one."

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Last night I recovered from my long movie-watching drought (I watched a single new movie in the month of February: Couples Retreat, which we shall never mention again) with a couple of dark ones.

I’m glad I didn’t go in to Observe And Report (imdb | rotten tomatoes) thinking it was a typically goofy Seth Rogen vehicle. That shit was dark. Bizarre, awkwardly funny and, uh…yeah, dark. I can’t quite figure out if it was terrible or brilliant, but Jody Hill is quickly creating a signature style. Like a funny car crash. With dicks.

Polytechnique (imdb | rotten tomatoes) was a whole other kind of dark. It could hardly be otherwise, given the subject matter, I suppose. There could be nothing pleasant about that film, but it was at least pleasing, if I can use that word, to see how well the story was handled. I was on edge the entire 77 minutes. The black and white cinematography served as a reminder for the binary world Marc Lepine saw, and as a stark companion to his cold attack. The film portrayed that well, as it probably actually happened, instead of applying dramatic flourishes signaling the coming violence. There was no swelling music, no artistic preamble. There were no rousing speeches or heroic stands. There was just shock, shooting and aftermath.

That should have been a bingo.

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Last night I won my Oscar pool when The Hurt Locker (imdb | rotten tomatoes) was named best picture. I wasn’t picking with my heart, mind you, I simply played the odds and picked the film which had won the Producer’s, Director’s and Writer’s Guild award. Only eight times has a film won all three of those awards, and seven of those eight films went on to win the best picture Oscar.

However, as I said, I didn’t pick what I wanted to win, I picked what I thought would win. It’s not that I disliked The Hurt Locker, but after a second viewing Friday night I could confirm what I felt upon first seeing it some 18 months ago: that it was good, but not great. That it had some terrific moments, but that it also veered into a tone-deaf section (which at the time I called “the John Wayne factor”) and glossed over the psychological impacts. That it just didn’t rock me back the way Slumdog or No Country did.

True, there were few other films which could have legitimately challenged for the best picture title. Up was a sure thing in the animated feature category. The Blind Side, An Education, District 9 and Up In The Air were too light. A Serious Man was too obscure and Precious was too not. And Avatar…no way. Stunning as it was to watch, there’s no way that thing should be feted as a standout film. It should just win every technical award up for grabs.

That leaves the film I think should have won it all: Inglourious Basterds. From eight nominations it took one award — Christoph Waltz, a no-brainer for best supporting actor — but in my opinion it got robbed on original screenplay. I don’t think they were ever really in it for best picture though. Maybe the academy doesn’t consider Tarantino a worthy Oscar winner, or maybe they just didn’t want a remade/re-imagined film to win the big prize. Or maybe it just didn’t have the votes. Whatever the case I wish they’d reconsidered. I found it far more epic, inventive, entertaining and memorable than The Hurt Locker, and would’ve liked to see the Bear Jew climb onstage and take his victory.

The best films of 2009

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Bearing in mind that I have not yet seen The Fantastic Mr. Fox, The White Ribbon, The Informant, Precious, The Road, A Serious Man, A Single Man, Big Fan, An Education, Food Inc., Invictus, Where The Wild Things Are or Zombieland (all of which would probably merit consideration for this list) and bearing in mind that I saw this year’s critical darling The Hurt Locker at last year’s TIFF (and was underwhelmed at the time, probably because I’d just watched the unmatched Iraq war story Generation Kill), here are my ten favourite films of 2009:

#10: Adventureland. I typically don’t enjoy movies about the 80s, but then they mock the 80s I’m fully on board. I could also watch Jesse Eisenberg all day and not get tired of it…he’s like a less-emo, more-nerd Michael Cera. Kristen Stewart is quite charming when she’s not fawning over a douche-y vampire. Ultimately, though, what made this movie was the script and the details which the writer must have pulled from his own past…what other reason would one have for writing the part of the former best friend who constantly bag-tags the main character?

#9: District 9. The first of a surprising amount of sci-fi on my list. Though I couldn’t really get myself to like the main character (even though I think I was supposed to), I loved the backstory, the sharp take on racism and the amazing special effects.

#8: Valhalla Rising. I didn’t like this film so much as I just couldn’t shake it from my mind after seeing it at TIFF. I’m not sure it will ever show in a North American theatre, a mainstream one at least. It was a combination of mindbendingly art-house and savagely violent. Seriously, there were psycho-religious themes running rampant through the whole thing, interrupted by things like, oh, say…the protagonist disemboweling a man with his bare hands. For example.

#7: Star Trek. I normally don’t like J.J. Abrams’ stuff, but I will give him this: brother, you have major-league stones. This had the potential to backfire on Abrams HUGE…rebooting one of the most passionately (and bizarrely?) beloved franchises of all time, but he pulled it off with a movie that was both entertaining and slyly immune to criticism of changing the original storyline. It’s a good sign if an action movie feels shorter than its running time, and this one felt much shorter.

#6: Leslie, My Name Is Evil. Uh…not sure how to describe this one. Another TIFF entry, and one of the weirder ones at that. Very campy, very dark and very much about a point in American history…Charlie Manson, Vietnam…the 60s in general, really. Completely over the top sometimes, while almost not bold enough at others, it was certainly memorable. A scene set perfectly to “Black Grease” by the Black Angels was simultaneously disgusting and beautiful. Maybe that’s a good description of the era director Reg Harkema was trying to capture.

#5: Up In The Air. Sharp writing, well-timed subject matter, three exceptionally strong lead performances and my omnipresent desire to be George Clooney made this one pretty damn entertaining.

#4: 500 Days Of Summer. Speaking of sharp writing, I think this one pretty much took the witty award for 2009. Probably took the soundtrack award too. It starred two of my favourite actors, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel, as well as one of my favourite things to look at, Zooey Deschanel. I will likely buy this, and watch it repeatedly.

#3: Avatar. I don’t want to buy into the hype. Because, really, this was not a good movie. Sure it was entertaining, but it had an over-familiar plot, substandard dialogue and was predictable from start to finish. So what’s it doing here? My god, man, did you not see it? It was fucking spectacular. Look, was it the kind of film that would typically be considered art? No, of course not. Did it change our perception of art when it comes to film? Probably. The Jazz Singer wasn’t a great movie either, but it changed film for good.

#2: The Cove. I typically favour real-life over fiction in film just as I do in print, and The Cove was the class of the docs I saw this year. It actually played out more as a thriller that you’re spying on than as a standard documentary, but as an animal lover the subject matter was heartwrenching. There were parts I had real trouble watching, but I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. It deserved its win at Sundance, and its win at Hot Docs. It’ll deserve the Oscar too.

#1: Inglourious Basterds. It’s frustrating, really. The way Tarantino just flaunts such blatant genius by creating half a dozen indelible characters, and as many unforgettable scenes, in every movie he makes, using only dialog. I loved the movie my first time out, but as is usually the case with Tarantino films I found I enjoyed it much more the second time, even though I knew what would happen. Maybe because I knew what would happen, and found myself excited at moving from one great scene to another. Plus all the little familiar inside touches, like Harvey Keitel playing a voice on the end of the phone for ten seconds.

Sorry, cats

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

I know, I know, this blog is a ghost town lately. Too much time at work, both for me and my brain. Not a lot of other time or processing happening. In fact, today was the first chance I’ve had to just relax. We went to the market, picked up some wine and snacks and watched two movies: Adventureland (imdb | rotten tomatoes) and Trouble The Water (imdb | rotten tomatoes).

We even sold our old futon, finally. We were glad to see it go to some kids who’ve just moved here. Hopefully it lasts as long for them as it did for us. That futon was pretty much the first piece of furniture we bought when we got our first place in Toronto, and it’s served us well over the years. Twelve years later and it’s still completely solid. We need the space and there’s just no earthly reason for us to still have a futon anymore, but we still felt a little sad to see it go.

Now relaxo-day is coming to a close, and tomorrow it’s back to work. Anybody out there have a time-delaying machine? Anybody? Anybody?

"We are not swans. We are sharks."

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I’m always conflicted about the Reuben sandwich. It always seems like a good idea, all the rye bread and corned beef and swiss cheese, and then all of a sudden…sauerkraut. Ugh…whose #@&% idea was that?!? It doesn’t ruin the whole experience. It just dampens the rest of the tasty flavours.

The past few days have been like a Reuben. On Wednesday we saw Up In The Air (imdb | rotten tomatoes) which was excellent, and deserves all the hype. George Clooney, Anna Kendrick and Vera Farmiga (my girlfriend du jour) were all great in their roles. Highly recommended, if you haven’t seen it yet.

On New Year’s Eve we returned to Nota Bene for dinner, as we were so impressed by our first visit (about a year ag0). Two things went wrong before we even got there: I finally succumbed to this cold I’ve been fighting off for weeks, and we had FAR too big a lunch at Terroni. Still, I was excited to go. Last time we both enjoyed all three of our courses and the service was outstanding. This time…well, I can’t be sure if things have gone downhill, or if it was just down to being New Year’s Eve. My lobster bisque was just okay and my main (pulled suckling pig) should have been better than it was, even after I realized I was eating blood sausage with it. Nellie’s starter was good (it was the same pasta she had last time) but her chicken was…well, a giant slab of chicken. The molten chocolate cake & Grand Marnier ice cream we had for dessert was solid, if unremarkable. Really, though, the thing that shocked me the most was the difference in service. From the start we felt we were being rushed…asked for our orders when we’d barely sat down, drinks showing up when the last ones were less than half drunk, and so on. We asked for a recommendation from the sommelier; whoever we got wasn’t the sommelier, but someone who seemed to know less about wine than we did. Merlot? Yeah, no, we don’t want merlot, thanks. What pissed us off the most was this: since we had a fair amount of wine to go with the chocolate dessert we ordered glasses of dessert wine for after that final course. Instead, they bought the dessert wine while we still had half our dessert and nearly a full glass of pinot each. I get it, it was New Year’s Eve and they were trying to turn over the table, but it’s not the kind of treatment I’d expect from Nota Bene.

On New Year’s Day (happy 2010, by the way!) I dragged my sick ass out of the condo because there was no way I’d miss the chance to see Avatar (imdb | rotten tomatoes) in IMAX/3D.  Wow…it was worth the hour standing in line. It took me a while to adjust to the 3D glasses, but my god. Just incredible. Seeing little plants floating in front of me, feeling vertigo as the camera looked down off a cliff, getting nearly airsick as we flew through a canyon. The movie itself wasn’t anything special or new, but if that movie doesn’t win every single visual effect Oscar, then something is drastically wrong.

We spent the rest of yesterday (and today, so far) sitting on the couch and watching movies (Lions For Lambs and The Watchmen) and playing Mario Kart Wii.

Pretty good couple of days. Too bad about the stupid sauerkraut.

On the first four days of Christmas…

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Here’s what we’ve been up to in the four days since we left you:

On boxing day we enjoyed the main part of Nellie’s gift to me: gold seats at the Air Canada Centre for the Montreal Canadiens / Toronto Maple Leafs game. We were eleven rows from the ice, right at one of the blue lines, and had a great view of the ice. I was actually surprised by the number of Montreal fans in attendance…I’d say maybe 20% of the fans were cheering for the Habs. It was amazing for me to be that close to the ice — in my previous visits to Canadiens games (both in Montreal) I’d been in the nosebleeds — and to see and hear everything. It was also nice to see my team win for a change (the Habs won 3-2 in overtime) as the first two games I saw were losses. Nellie had fun too, eating a hot dog and drinking beer and making eyes at Carey Price. It was a blast, and an experience I was worried I’d never get to have in Toronto. Top-notch Christmas gift, baby!

.:.

December 27th was actually our anniversary. Typically we’d go out to dinner to celebrate, but it being Sunday everything was closed. We hung out with CBGB for a little bit and generally just took it easy.

.:.

Yesterday we thought we’d get out of the house and see what all this Avatar fuss is about, so we walked in the freezing-ass cold to the Scotiabank to buy tickets. Little did we know that tickets to the IMAX screenings had been sold out for days. Bah, forget it. We cut back across King Street and decided to stop in at the beerbistro so that the afternoon wasn’t a complete loss. I had a Tilburg’s Dutch Brown Ale and a Maudite, while Nellie had a Durham Hop Addict and an Urthel Hop-It, which I think is her new best friend. We went to movie plan B at home, watching Defiance (imdb | rotten tomatoes) on the PVR (it was okay…given the subject matter it probably should have been a little more engaging than it was). Then we got ready for dinner.

Much like North 44, Scaramouche is such a quintessentially Toronto restaurant we couldn’t hardly believe we hadn’t yet tried it. An anniversary seemed like an ideal time for such an adventure, and it was settled. First, the room: pleasant, if a little dull & dated, and while we were seated at the window to appreciate the famous view, the evening’s snow squalls made it difficult to see much. Second, the service: a little off, to be honest. Our server was efficient enough but not exactly friendly, and somewhere between dessert and the bill he just disappeared. We never saw him again, and after several minutes of waiting we finally got someone else’s attention and they tag-teamed our bill, etc. So that was weird. Third: the food, and this — most importantly — was the best part. I had warm duck salad, venison wrapped & roasted in smoked bacon and coconut cream pie for dessert. Nellie had butter poached lobster, a grilled kerr farms filet mignon and her dessert was three kinds of cheese. We had various glasses of wine before dinner and with our apps, but the real star of the evening was the 2006 Petite Sirah/Zinfandel/Mourvèdre ‘Phantom’ Bogle. Excellent without the food and downright superb with it, neither of us wanted to finish the bottle, but we couldn’t help ourselves. Nellie’s port and my Calvados with dessert were good, but I know we were both thinking about that wine. Oh, and the restaurant did make a nice final flourish with our dessert plates:

scaramouche dessert

.:.

Today was a bit more pedestrian: grand plans of shopping withered on the vine when we realized it was -20 with the wind chill, so we opted instead for leftovers, chocolate, napping and more movie-watching. Today the PVR served up the Warner Herzog documentary Encounters At The End Of The World (imdb | rotten tomatoes). Really, I could watch anything by that man and be happy, but from a strictly mechanical sense it did precisely what documentaries are supposed to do: answer some questions and raise still others.

Tonight the plan (well…my plan) is to watch Canada’s junior team play the Slovaks, and then tomorrow it’s back to work for a bit. In other words: wow, it’s been a relaxing vacation.

"Jesus Christ, Powell, he could be a f*cking bartender for all we know!"

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Chrtistmas feels different this year. Maybe it’s because there’s not been any snow in Toronto (until today, but apparently it’ll be gone by tomorrow afternoon), or maybe it’s because all I’ve been able to think about lately is work, or maybe it’s because I’ve not been on a flight to NS and then relaxing on the family farm.

But today after I got home from work, it started to feel a little more like Christmas. Different Christmas. We have our own little traditions, like watching Die Hard (for me) and Love Actually (for her), eating loads of delicious food from Cumbrae’s and About Cheese and Moroco and drinking the bottle of wine I got Nellie last year. It doesn’t replace all the other things that feel like Christmas…it just adds to them.

In that, I suppose I’m lucky. There are a lot of people who have bad memories of Christmas, or no memories of it at all. That surplus of good fortune, not to mention the fact that we’re both happy, healthy and gainfully employed, prompted and allowed me to try to do a little bit to help some of the people who aren’t so lucky. And I figure that should be a Christmas tradition too.

Whatever you might be celebrating, wherever you’re celebrating it, I hope it’s a happy one. And I hope the peanut butter balls there are as good as the one I’m eating right now. Cheers, everybody.