haikugirl's final TIFF selections

Okay people,
After a concall with Pavlina yesterday (and based on her discussion with Alison) the first choice for the group pick is now Stranger Than Fiction on Sat Sept 9 at 6pm at The Elgin. Babel on Sun at 11:30am (Brad looks so sad) will be the second choice for the rest of the group if we don't get our Sat night pick. Ivana and Antonio - I will see you at both Saturday screenings and at Babel on Sunday (we may need to schedule a nap!)

R and I are only going to 3 movies together this year. Besides the group pick on Sat night, we are going to try for Volver Sat morning at 9:30am and Calgarian Gary Burns' Radiant City on Tuesday at 8:45pm.

I think this year's programmers are on Ritalin because the lineup includes a lot of guns and wars (remember 2001???)

Pavlina - I plan to leave work early Thurs Sept 7 to RUSH for The Pervert's Guide to Cinema at the ROM (Wanna come? Remember Le Fantome d'Henri Langlois??) This one sounds like a 2 hour rant by a guy who looks like the streetperson in Huff with musings on cinema from Hitchcock to The Matrix - and directed by Sophie Fiennes, sister of Ralph and Joseph. The perfect way to gear up for the fest - n'est-ce pas?

That concludes this broadcast till we can pick up our picks on Labour Day Monday.

Thanks Pavlina for filling in our orders - we owe you the first martini on Saturday!!!!

TIFF Schedule is LIVE!

Browsed the TIFF Official Film Schedule and I think the scheduling gods have smiled upon us this year. We knew about our 6pm VISA picks (which are quite good) but somehow the gods don't want me to see The Last Kiss at this year's fest because they did their best to put it up against every other movie I'm already planning to see. Not to worry - Zach Braff will be in theatres soon enough (and I did see the original Italian version of the film at TIFF 2001.)

We know from past experience that if we want to see stars, we'd better plan to attend the film's first screening at the festival. We are planning for Babel on Sunday morning at 11:30am after its 9:30pm GALA at Roy Thomson Hall the night before. We have seen stars in the daytime at the Elgin (Dogville, Punch Drunk Love) so I guess we'll see if Brad gets out of bed in time.

Saturday night's VISA screening of Stranger Than Fiction looks funny and brings a lot of star power including Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman and Maggie Gyllenhaal, all of whom are mentioned in the TIFF news release of stars coming to the festival. Guess we'll have to see what box we're in to know what our final picks are. The Fountain on Tuesday at 6 is a backup but Hugh Jackman isn't expected and the last time I saw him in a sci-fi historical thing was Van Helsing (one of the top 10 WORST moview of all time) so this one may bite too.

Scroll down to the 6pm VISA Screening post Aug 26 to check out other trailers I've found online and tell me which movies you'd be picking. Others I'm hoping to see this year are The Wind That Shakes the Barley (Palme d'or at Cannes), Manufactured Landscapes, Radiant City (the latest from Calgarian Gary Burns) and The Banquet or Paris je t'aime.

Festival Schedule
second guessing programmers
always a crap shoot

haikugirl joins Your Blogs @ TIFF 2006

haikugirl @ TIFF
posting reviews on my blog
come back and comment!

Signed up today to be a member of the Your Blogs community at TIFF 2006. Participating bloggers must agree that their blogs will "contain a substantial portion of content" related to TIFF 2006 and agree to grant TIFFG and its subsidiaries "a perpetual, royalty-free, transferable, irrevocable right to reproduce and/or quote from the original content" on my blog. Pretty heavy stuff - should I be checking with my lawyers later? Still, my nightly movie reviews during the fest - and my patented 5-M movie rating system and brilliant haiku - are sure to meet those criteria and attract visitors. I welcome reader feedback and comments - please bookmark the TIFF link at the button above or my blog address http://www.haikugirl.blogspot.com and visit often during the fest!

Googled the movies in the 6:00pm VISA Screening Room lineup (see previous post) and am even more thrilled with the programmers' selection. Bravo! We're in for a great range of films and lots of visiting stars - my fellow filmgoers will be pleased.

Now if only we can be in a good box when we submit our selections for our 10-coupon books next Thursday to round out our viewing choices. The complete schedule comes out August 29th and we will be studying it carefully to make the best possible picks.

Check out my TIFF 2005 reviews in the September 2005 archive and be sure to scroll down to see my red carpet photos of Johnny Depp and Keanu! TIFF 2006 is 14th FilmFest and you can read my hommage to the festival through the years at MM's TIFF Flashbacks.
Note: Flash Player 5 or higher is required to view that site.

Talk to you online at www.haikugirl.blogspot.com!

6pm VISA Screening Room Schedule

Okay FilmFest friends.
Here are links to trailers and info on some of the films in the 6pm VISA Screening Schedule at "the beautiful and historic" Elgin Theatre. We can still try for Babel on Sunday Sept 10 at 11:30am but may want to consider one of these others as the "group pick" (or a back-up this year) or we might find something else (like The Last Kiss) once the complete schedule comes out on August 29th:

Friday Sept 8 - Brand Upon the Brain! (Guy Maddin - Director of The Saddest Music in the World)
Saturday Sept 9 - Stranger than Fiction (Marc Forster - Director of Finding Neverland and (coming soon) The Kite Runner) Starring Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Queen Latifah, Emma Thompson
Sunday Sept 10 - Catch a Fire (Phillip Noyce) Starring Tim Robbins and Derek Luke
Monday Sept 11 - The Namesake (Mira Nair - Director of Monsoon Wedding)
Tuesday Sept 12 - The Fountain (Darren Aronofsky - Director of Pi and Requiem for a Dream) Starring Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz and Ellen Burstyn (who was nominated for an Oscar in Requiem)
Wednesday Sept 13 - Golden Door (Emanuele Crialese)
Thursday Sept 14 - Snow Cake (Marc Evans) Starring Alan Rickman, Sigourney Weaver and Carrie-Anne Moss
Friday Sept 15 - Kabul Express (Kabir Khan)

8 films + extra choices + full-time work
= an exhausting, exhilarating 10 days in Toronto!

TIFF - The Heat is On!

Just exchanged emails with my FilmFest gang. We are pleased with our 6:00pm VISA Screening Room lineup (but I'm still disappointed so many of the movies I want are Gala Presentations at Roy Thomson Hall - I'm not paying $50 a movie to see stars from the 2nd balcony).

We need to try for a group pick and Babel on Sunday at 11:30 stands out as a great choice. I want to take the Monday off to see For Your Consideration - the new Christopher Guest film with his cast of hilarious regulars. I am also interested in The Wind That Shakes the Barley by Ken Loach since it won the Palme d'Or at Cannes this year. I can't believe I'll see Guy Maddin at TIFF on the first Friday night!! (used to loathe him, now I think he's marginally acceptable.)

VIVE LE FESTIVAL!

Mon blogue

Surfing on a saturday morning I discovered evene.fr and an online tribute to Bernard Rapp, a French TV host (and author and filmmaker). Interesting to read about his life.

Speaking of "son amour pour le 7e art" (le film) - I am getting excited to see the final list of films at TIFF 2006 which is announced this Tuesday, August 22. Seems the latest News Releases only mention the Galas, of which Volver by Almodovar is one. Guess he's gone mainstream because we always saw his stuff in the VISA screening room. Hopefully they'll have some great, edgy films in this year's lineup. Anything must be better than Snakes on a Plane.

Saw World Trade Center
Human story worth seeing
Stone was respectful

TIFF 2006 - the Buzz has begun

I've been checking out the News Releases on the TIFF 2006 website at bell.ca/filmfest. One GALA All the King's Men features an INCREDIBLE CAST of stars, including Sean Penn, Jude Law, Kate Winslet, Patricia Clarkson, James Gandolfini, Mark Ruffalo, and Sir Anthony Hopkins. Unfortunately, we won't be seeing that this year since A) GALA tickets are almost $40 - I'd rather see a play or live music and wait to see the film in the theatre) and B) the last film we saw with Sean Penn (The Assassination of Richard Nixon) was pretty slow and dull, saved only by his appearance before the screening - only rent it if you can't sleep because it would be more effective than Ambien.

I'm also excited about the Talent Lab - TIFF invites leading filmmakers (Paul Haggis and Mary Harron are coming this year) to share their expertise and stories with up and coming filmmakers esspecially selected for the program. Talk about a dream come true! One of the lucky directors is Lara Fitzgerald - I know her sister Justine through David Chemla who used to room with her and went with her to Law School at McGill.

Another interesting GALA is Dixie Chicks - Shut Up And Sing - a documentary of the Dixie Chicks after the lead singer's remark about George Bush on the eve of the Iraq war. I bet they'll come to the screening - it's the first time a documentary has been screened as a GALA in 14 years.

Guy Maddin is screening his latest silent film Brand Upon the Brain! this year with orchestral accompaniment. Likely in the 9:30 VISA series and we switched to the 6:00 VISA sreenings this year. Now that we have a new time slot we will need to stake our claim to our regular seats on the right hand side of the Elgin near the front - the perfect spot to see the stars walk by as they come offstage.

I am still on tap to do my annual Learning Lunch presentation at work for my former Ministry of Finance colleagues. It's always a lot of fun to eat lunch and talk movies for an hour and give them tips on how to buy last minute tickets. I have started preparing my presentation and have to finish while I'm away in Winnipeg because that's the week the schedule comes out.

To prep for the SJR Reunion, Anne Gregory came over Thursday night and we spent the evening scanning old photos from "back in the day". I need to get that montage ready, but first - another coffee!

high school reunion
lots to do before the day
better book my flight