Dinner for 2 - CHEAP!

Last night I came home after work and made a delicious Prime Rib Roast (bought for $17.04) and spiced to perfection by Rich and me, with Roasted Potatoes ($1.95) and Sauteed Mushrooms ($1.99). A super tasty and amazing Dinner for 2 for under $21 (and I didn't have wine so I saved there too!)

This week's cover of Toronto's NOW Magazine proclaims: Eat Well, Spend Less and features TO's Top Mains Under $15. Hey - I'm doin' it! Mock Duck Curry's got NOTHING on my awesome prime rib!

For more on what haikugirl's been up to, visit: haikugirlmovies

Les Oscars 2009

Hard to believe it's Oscar time again! Going to a fun 1st Birthday party for Matteo tomorrow afternoon then coming home to watch Les Oscars (and all the red carpet action!) Here are my Oscar picks - you can play along at oscars.com

CATEGORY, Who SHOULD WIN, Who WILL WIN
Best Picture, Slumdog Millionaire, Slumdog BETTER win!!
Otherwise, I have no pick
Best Director, Danny Boyle, Danny Boyle
Best Actor, Sean Penn, Mickey Rourke
Best Actress, Anne Hathaway, Kate Winslett (6th nom-ok I get it)
Best Supporting Actor, Heath Ledger, Heath Ledger
Best Supporting Actress, Penelope Cruz, Penelope Cruz
Best Adapted Screenplay, Simon Beaufoy (Slumdog), Slumdog
Best Original Screenplay, In Bruges (hilarious), Mike Leigh (Happy Go Lucky) 6th nom
Best Score, Slumdog, Slumdog, which means
Best Song, should be Jai Ho (been listening to it on my iTouch all day), Peter Gabriel WILL win for Down to Earth, the theme from WALL-E
Best Animated Feature, WALL-E, WALL-E
Best Doc Feature, Man On Wire, Man On Wire (loved it at Hot Docs)
Best Short Film, Manon sur le Bitume (was at CFC Shorts in Toronto)
Best Foreign Language Film, Waltz with Bashir, Waltz with Bashir
(France's The Class is too long and reminds me too much of teaching)
Batman (The Dark Knight) will win for Best Sound, Best SFX
Anything else? Costumes? Art Direction? Wanted will win Sound Editing

Hugh Jackman is getting his dance number overwith at the beginning of the show and sharing the stage with the stars of HSM3 (High School Musical 3) and Mamma Mia.

Not excited for the dancing but definitely excited to see Hugh carry the 3+ hour spectacle. I think he'll be great - I'll be watching the evening (and the fashions) intently.

Would love to hear your pre-Oscar predictions or post-Oscar blather - please post! Kisses to Les Boys and everyone else in Oscarland (or dreaming of being there) xxMM

excitement, drama
haikugirl loves Oscar night
tell me all your picks

DOC Soup and going GREEN

I was so busy in January I had no time to review last month's DOC Soup. The movie was excellent and I was THRILLED to see Hot Docs Director Sean Farnel back at the mic to introduce things and run the Q&A.

Recipes for Disaster is a personal film about a global issue. The Director and his family go on an "oil diet" for a year. They give up petroleum products (i.e. plastic), they give up their car and take public transit (been there, done that) and don't even succumb to buying things WRAPPED in plastic. They had to go to a special warehouse store to find "loo paper" on an industrial-sized roll.

The director's wife is the hero of the movie. She goes along with his idea and together they pass the camera and "document" their lives. The kids stay good-natured. It's the director himself who first feels the urge to cave... Anyway I won't spoil it but if it ever comes to TV (POV?) or your local video store - RENT IT.

Sean had the genius and carbon-neutral idea of connecting with the director for Q&A via SKYPE. BRILLIANT! And very effective, despite a brutal time difference for him in Finland.

This film is a great inspiration for families and government. See it then login to one million acts of green and add all the "green acts" you do everyday. START TODAY - it's amazing the difference we all can make.

one million green acts
the planet and I thank you
together we win!

xx Miss "Working for the Ministry of the Environment now" haikugirl

P.S. This Wednesday's DOC Soup is Milking the Rhino. Looking forward to it.

Of Time and The City

Finally saw Terence Davies' film Of Time and The City, his hommage (elegy?) to his hometown of Liverpool. Had tried to see it at Cinematheque at the AGO on Feb 1st but got there and it was sold out so I went shopping (still a productive afternoon).

Seeing it with Hardish at the Bloor Cinema last Wednesday was interesting. Critics raved about it at TIFF 2008 so I'm glad I got it out of my system but I'm not sending you all out to it right away. It's not a documentary as much as a tone poem, which is how I like to think of Marathon Women (a haiku about running). Except for a long, slow 4-minute pan from the downtown to the docks (for which they credit a DOP), the film is fully 72 minutes of stock archival footage from British Pathe and other sources. Davies narrates in his booming bass voice - think Boris Karloff of The Grinch, only tune up the cynicism, say, to ELEVEN. Every word is drenched with arrogance and disdain, with the faintest touch of longing only when he mentions his mother. To say he pokes fun at the monarchy is weak - he really resents them and the Catholic church and effectively contrasts "Betty Windsor's" lavish coronation ceremony with footage of poor Liverpudlians amidst their rowhouses.

A contemporary of Peter Greenaway, Davies has also made The House of Mirth (with Gillian Anderson) and Distant Voices, Still Lives. He talks about falling in love with cinema, being gay and leaving Liverpool. As the Beatles rise, he rejects rock and roll in favour of classical music and scores the movie with his favourite tracks. When the fireworks appear for Liverpool's 2008 celebration as European City of Culture, it's over. Don't see this unless you've had a large coffee and can adjust the volume levels with a remote. They just laid down the tracks with no consistent level throughout the film and at one point I had to close my ears it was so deafening. This from the woman married audiophile. MMm out of five for the archival effort.

BAFTAs and IDC

BAFTAs will be handed out tonight. Here are the nominees.

Been keeping my head down working on editing projects for my editing course at George Brown. In addition to the class assignment (which I'll post when it's done so you can see it) it has also inspired me to go back through the Marathon Women footage that Tamara and I shot in March 2007. Will post a link to that trailer soon.

IDC 2009 is coming up in a month. haikugirl is signed up again for 5 days of mad filmmaking. On Friday night the Documentary Organization of Canada (DOC) screened the Toronto entries from last year at the NFB. Great to see team haikugirl's Secret Swinging on the big screen and always interesting to see the diversity of the entries.