This Friday, Will Ferrell returns with another cinematic entry of his patented brand of wacko-surrealist comedy. However, this time it’s a little different. Specifically, the movie is entirely in Spanish and subtitled. Casa De Mi Padre might be the first film of Ferrell’s career to possibly qualify for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar and is certainly unlike anything else the comedian has made. The project came out of Ferrell’s love of cheesy Telemundo-style entertainment that he wanted to make his own. So he went to two longtime friends and collaborators in director Matt Piedmont and writer Andrew Steele, whom he first met on Saturday Night Live before bringing them onboard to help turn Funny Or Die into the most popular comedy viral video factory on the internet.

Together the three-headed comedy team whipped up a subtitled love letter to bad filmmaking. It’s a Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace-style concoction of continuity errors, editing mistakes, confused plotting, bad acting, and possibly the worst tiger puppet in film history. It’s all deliberate of course and Ferrell is even surrounded by top tier Mexican acting talent like Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores Perros), Diego Luna (Y Tu Mama Tambien), Pedro Armendariz Jr. (Before Night Falls), and Genesis Rodriguez (Man On A Ledge) delivering some of the most lovably and hilariously cornball performances of their careers. The result is a unique and strange little comedy guaranteed to confuse and delight in equal measure. Dork Shelf got a chance to chat with Casa De Mi Padre’s writer Andrew Steele and director Matt Piedmont to discuss the origins and motivations of their completely insane (in the best possible sense) new movie.

DS: So, where the hell did this idea come from?

Andrew Steele: Obviously, it started in the brain of Will Ferrell who said he wanted to make a Spanish movie. I’m not sure he had any takers for a little while, but we had worked together on Saturday Night Live and when I came out to LA to work on Funny Or Die he brought it up to me again, and I got kind of giddy thinking about what the movie could be. He didn’t really give me a lot of direction, so I just wrote a script and sent it off to him. He’s a friend so this was easy, but it was still one of the most miraculous experiences I’ve ever had in the entertainment industry where he wrote me back, saying “ok this is the next movie I’m doing.” That was exciting.

DS: Were there any specific Mexican films or TV shows you had in mind to reference or parody?

AS: I love classic Mexican cinema stuff from the 40s and 50s, so I watched a lot of that just to get a feel of things. I did watch a lot of telenovela stuff and cheap movies from the 80s, which I think is probably the worst period in Mexican cinema. But to watch how creative these people could be with no budgets was the fun of that. I don’t enjoy watching the kind of film stock it was shot on though.

Matt Piedmont: If it WAS film.

AS: Yeah, if it even was film stock, I think they shot a lot of it on scotch tape. But I watched a lot of that before I even started writing, which helped a lot.

DS: Were there any specific examples of incompetent filmmaking from that treasure trove that found its way into the movie?

AS: There was one scene from a movie that I watched I will never remember the title of because I found it on VHS in a flea market in LA. But, there was this scene where a bunch of drug dealers were unloading a truck full of boxes and the production assistant that day must have only been able to come up with two boxes because they had to keep unloading the same two boxes, which you could clearly see from the marking on the boxes. I didn’t end up using that in the script. I tried to, believe me, but I just loved that moment as a viewer where you’re like, “How do they think they’re getting away with this? No one cares.”

MP: Yeah, and in addition to the cheapness of that kind of stuff, we have a fondness for classic Hollywood Westerns. Even the big budget stuff like The Magnificent Seven they would use cheap soundstages for a big outdoor scene that never quite worked. So there was a lot of homages going on there. There’s the lowbrow and the highbrow. Alejandro Jodorowsky’s trip out films inspired the trip out scenes and of course Peckinpah was important for the shootouts. There are little Easter Eggs in there for film geeks to pick up on that you don’t necessarily need to notice to enjoy the movie, but I think will be fun to pick out.

DS: Were there any actual production mistakes and glitches left in the movie or was all of that stuff fairly planned out?

MP: I don’t want to say. We’re looking forward to reading the “Goofs” section on the movie’s IMDB page. I’m hoping that it will be five pages long. We’re going to say that we intended all of them, but there are ones that I know we didn’t intend that did make it in there and I’d rather not spoil it.

DS: I know that Will Ferrell didn’t speak Spanish before making the movie, but how about you two?

MP: About two years of high school Spanish is all I have.

AS: I have less.

DS: How’d that work then?

AS: Well, it’s funny because I wrote it in a very specific sort of style and it is something that I was a little worried about because if you think of Darkplace and how writerly that show was, imagine translating it into Japanese. I had to sit there with the translator and have those conversations where he’d say, “Well, you wouldn’t say that in Spanish,” and I’d have to come back and say, “Well, you wouldn’t say that in English either.” So, the translator and I basically went through it line-by-line because I was worried that I couldn’t get all of that stylized, weird, bad writing in there and I can’t tell you if it worked because I don’t speak Spanish. But Gael and Diego did get a sense of what we were doing, so I hope it did kind of come off.

MP: I’d like to take a giant pat on the back and pretend it was a miracle, but really for me the only difference between directing in English was that after a take was completed I’d turn to the translator and ask if Will pronounced his words properly. Because the trick was to have him do it all onset without overdubs. But other than that, it was pretty much the same as directing regularly. But I could get lionized if I just take credit for no reason because I have giant ego, so let’s do that.

DS: Did you even consider taking this around to Hollywood studios?

AS: I think that maybe in the very beginning Will’s people somewhere up in the tall buildings sent it out to see if there were any takers. That would have been a blessing and a curse, because if it goes to a big studio there would have been more money and everything, but I think it would be a different movie. I don’t think we would have had the creative freedom to make this weird movie. So, it was sort of nice that we did end up going for a smaller movie. Matt and I like that because it allowed us to be free.

MP: For better or for worse, if people start rioting in the streets and hate it, we’re the guys to blame. It’s great to be able to go out into the world and from frame one till the end we stand by it all.

DS: Was it tough to convince actors and crew members of what you had in mind or did people get it pretty quickly?

MP: I think there was some confusion. I mean the funny thing is that whenever you’re making any movie everyone has their own idea of what the movie should be and you have to get them all on the same page. There were a lot of moments like the DP not wanting do certain things, but we knew what we wanted for better or worse. There was nothing major and no hassles, but I’m sure some people were thinking, “What the fuck are you doing?”

AS: I will say that when Pedro Armendariz came on, the first thing he said to me was, “The translation is shit.” Diego and Gael were really helpful with that. They were happy to explain what was going on and within a day he was like, “Oh I see what’s going on.” It was funny to watch that process because he started to trust everyone and was such a joy to work with.

MP: Diego described it by saying he’s not just playing Raul, he’s playing a bad actor playing Raul. When we met Nick Offerman, I think he’s a [professionally] trained actor and we said, “Well, Andrew wrote a script that’s deliberately clunky and now you’re playing a bad actor acting poorly in a film and speaking bad Spanish.” So there were about 20 layers that he had to unlearn as an actor to do that performance.

DS: Did you write this for Diego Luna and Gael Garcia Bernal and was it difficult to get them involved?

AS: They were dream casting. We didn’t think we’d get anyone like that. Our original thought was to go to them and we were lucky. Diego was always in. Gael was a circling lunar thing that I didn’t think we’d be able to touch. But when he said yes, there’s a scene in the bar between them that I especially like that was written specifically because it suddenly dawned on me that these two great actors, who are also friends, were not in a scene together. So that was written intentionally for those two to have fun with.

MP: It was like Heat, that scene between DeNiro and Pacino.

AS: That’s the only scene in Heat that I can watch.

MP: We were worried people would lynch us if we had these two great actors in the movie and never gave them a scene together.

DS: So was the plan always to get good actors to act badly or were you also looking for soap opera actors to deliver their natural wooden performances?

AS: You know, it’s an interesting thing because you want like-minded collaborators. It’s hard to get people on board something like this if they don’t understand what you’re going for. So we needed to find some intelligent or just our kind of intelligent actors. Like Diego and Gael got what we were doing and we wanted to make sure everyone did just so there was no confusion. We did have some soap opera actors in small roles. Well, Genesis Rodriguez is a soap opera actress actually and she got it and understood what she was doing. The big fear was that some actors might ham it up knowing they were in a comedy with Will Ferrell and be too comic-like. We vetted that out during the audition process.

AP: Was it difficult to get The Jim Henson Company to make possibly their worst puppet ever?

AS: Well, thank you.

MP: We’ll take that as a compliment. That was one of those happy things that happens where we were going out of our way to get all analogue, physical effects because we love that stuff. And at some point we discovered a link to the Henson Company. We went in there and basically said, “Can we have a $3 million animatronic tiger for $5?” It was actually a real tiger they had that they were able to re-skin. I’m sure they lost money on the deal.

AS: It was the perfect “the best that we can do” kind of effect.

I’ve got a couple of things to say about The Wicker Man, one of the most unfairly reviled movies of the last decade. A) How “unintentional” do you really think some of the more hilarious scenes in this movie are? Do you really think Nic Cage was wearing a bear suit on set, taking swings at Kathy Bates, and no one was like “this is too much”? Well, if Cage was behaving super seriously, I could see everyone else shutting up and letting it happen, because they trust in Cage. There’s no fault in that.

The film starts with the Cage as a highway cop, picking up a doll thrown from the window of a passing car. He then pulls the car over and gives the doll back to the little girls in the back seat. She throws it again. He walks across the road to pick it up. In the meantime, a semi-truck runs over the stopped car. Cage tries to save the little girl, but it is unsuccessful and she burns to death.

This scene has nothing to do with the rest of the movie. I mean, there’s a bunch of flashbacks to the event whenever Cage gets stressed out, and then he takes drugs to cope, and there’s a suggestion that his narration may not be reliable, perhaps because the trauma from this event has caused him to hallucinate, but in terms of actual narrative, this event his very little relevance. Following this event, the Cage gets an meticulously hand-written letter from his former fiancée, asking him to come to her weird traditionalist community (think Amish, but feminist) in Puget Sound and help search for her missing daughter, whom he didn’t know she had. Cage, following his masculine tendency to be the hero, does so, despite being given several reasons not to.

When Cage gets to the island, he becomes the unwanted guest of a matriarchal community of beekeepers. Every woman refers to the others as sisters, and the men don’t say much at all. He starts searching for the missing girl and it seems everyone is either lying to him about the existence of the girl or intentionally misleading him. The odd thing about the screenplay is that almost all of the revealed plot points lead to squat in the end. Many hacky Hollywood movies have twists, but few are three quarters filled with red herrings. Thus, what we as viewers are left with is the image of Nic Cage attempting to fulfill his role as the masculine hero, recruited by the needy feminine victim. Except what we’re really seeing is a masculine Nic Cage grow uncomfortable in world where his male authority is not pre-assumed, and where his role as a male saviour to a female victim is constantly under question. In all sincerity, I cannot think of another Hollywood movie in the last ten years which challenges gender roles with the same originality as The Wicker Man.

Throughout the film, Nic Cage grows more and more insecure with his ability to, erm, perform. He claims he has authority as a law enforcement officer, but he’s a California officer in Washington. He attempts to intimidate and harass the female residents of the island, but he is ignored. The other men on the island make no attempt to back him up. The heavily YouTubed clips of Nic Cage screaming “How’d it get burned! How’d it get burned!” (among other things) are really a cathartic way for Cage to deal with the emasculation of being on this island. Essentially, the film is one long castration, in which Cage attempts to use his authoritative phallus, but it is removed by a community which does not ascribe to the authority of the phallus. This point is emphasized when Cage barges in on a female populated schoolroom. The teacher, Sister Rose (Molly Parker), asks the class what “man represents” and the response of the children is (hilariously) “Phallic symbol. Phallic symbol.” And you thought it was just a shitty horror movie. You fool.

There’s really no way of knowing what Neil LaBute’s intentions were with this film. Commercial necessity may have had a large or small effect on the final film. LaBute’s previous film, The Shape of Things deals with the same themes; themes regarding the emasculation of  men by strong female figures. Unfortunately, as it comes across in the film, it resembles the paranoia of masculine insecurity. The idea that everything the woman Nic Cage loved did to him is part of one incredibly elaborate prank meant to humiliate him in the most painful way possible – not necessarily by killing him, but by letting him know that every other women is in on the joke. In fact, in this film, they’re all (literally) part of a secret society, and everything his fiancée said to him from the first moment they met was part of this plan. Furthermore, wielding one’s phallus won’t help. Masculine authority is of no help in the midst of castration. In this way, Cage’s performance is fantastic. He turns into a flailing, pathetic, but compulsively watchable figure – a figure that is probably relatable to all the men who have ever really related to Weezer’s Pinkerton (i.e. insecure men who have yet to realize how fucked up Rivers Cuomo’s worldview is).

So, the film may still be a tad misogynist, but at least it’s not dominant ideology misogyny, where the man saves the day in the end, and then gets to bone the women as a reward. It’s a problematized misogyny that hints at something darker; maybe a bit of self-loathing, maybe a self-awareness on the part of formerly Mormon director Neil LaBute. So you may dispute that The Wicker Man is good film. That is your perogative, but please don’t dispute that for all its flaws, it is at least an interesting film.

And yeah, the opening credits are in papyrus font. Deal with it.

Grease, the highest grossing movie-musical of all time, is back on the big screen this February 24-26th at TIFF Bell Lightbox for four “Sing-a-long-a” screenings hosted by comedian Shawn Hitchins.

Sing-a-long-a Grease is the second partnership between TIFF Bell Lightbox and Sing-a-long-a following December’s The Sound of Music screenings. Created by nurses in a seniors residence home, Sing-a-long-a was developed for London’s Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in 1999. The Sing-a-long-a experience is more than just singing along; Every screening begins with a warm-up by a Sing-a-long-a host who lets the audience know when to cheer and/or jeer at the screen, and explains the seemingly random contents of their complimentary goodie bag of “props.” (Think Rocky Horror Picture Show midnight screenings, but much more family friendly.) For the Grease Sing-a-long-a, the host also teaches the audience how to hand jive!

If you attended this past December’s Sing-a-long-a The Sound of Music screenings at the Lightbox, you will be familiar with the structure of the evening and the giddy, infectious enthusiasm of host Shawn Hitchins. Much like December’s sing-alongs, the subtitles during the musical numbers serve no purpose to an audience donning Pink Ladies and T-Birds jackets, but I’m sure they’re useful to the few less-enthusiastic friends and spouses who are brought along. Unfortunately, the Grease screenings do have less props and interaction (read: jeering at the screen,) and Sing-a-long-a does try to make Rizzo out to be a villain, which doesn’t go over very well. But the film itself is more enjoyable and consistent with its musical numbers than The Sound of Music, to be frank. Basically, Nazis don’t take Danny away to join Debate Club, and that yields a more upbeat Sing-a-long-a experience at the Lightbox with your poodle-skirted best friend.

You will never want to sing “Beauty School Dropout” without a paper bag on your head ever again!

Screenings:
Friday, February 24th at 7:00pm
Saturday, February 25th at 1:00pm and 7:00pm
Sunday, February 26th at 7:00pm

Tickets can be purchased in person at the TIFF Bell Lightbox box office or online.

One thing to know about The Fires Of is that the people in this band are some of the friendliest you’ll meet in the scene. They’re eager, but completely genuine, and that’s refreshing these days. (And now they can never try and cross me since I wrote that sentence!) It seeps into their music effortlessly, that they’re just five people having fun and getting their creativity out into the world. By so many of their melodies you’ll be promptly carried out the door by shooting stars, escorted along by the delicate pop-rock they’ve woven.

This week, the Toronto five-piece releases The Noise Around the Mean EP, their second piece of work since last year’s self-titled full-length. It’s wholesome, warm and a nice step-up in their music. Their rock has a blissful touch thanks to the violin, and the dueling vocals of Graeme Donnelly and Lisa Di Diodato complement one another well. From the sweet and catchy Lisa-led “I Can’t Sleep” to the poppy “One Decent Thing” that has Chris Hayward singing “every time I forget music means anything, remind me of how it saved your life in high school,” to “Somebody Tell Me I’m Dreaming,” that has the band exploring their sound, there’s enough on the five song-long EP to keep a listener satisfied and entertained.

In this interview with guitarist Steve Canning, he explains all the growth the band has gone through to get to where they are now musically (and personally, I bet they’d take a challenge of an ultimate frisbee game) and the recording process. He highlights what it’s like in the indie scene here and how to make the most of it, and we find out that they have a pretty impressive general collection of whats on their Dork Shelves.

The Fires Of will celebrate The Noise Around the Mean‘s release on Saturday at Lee’s Palace with The Ruby Spirit and Wendy Versus.

Dork Shelf: How and when did the band start and how did you come to be who you are now?

Steve Canning: Graeme’s very official answer: “We had our first jams and practices in February 2008, and it was really just a group of ultimate Frisbee players getting together with the hope of one day putting on a giant show for our friends. Chris and I had a bunch of songs we wanted to perform and Lisa was immediately brought in to add her wonderful voice and sense of harmony. Peyton and I had played together a lot around campfires, and the violin added a slightly “different” element to the band. The band needed a lead guitarist and Steve had been itching to get back to playing music. He was used to playing much heavier music, but once he turned down the distortion, he brought a brilliant sense of lyrical melody to his lead lines. Larry was a much-needed keyboardist and brought a fourth voice to the harmonies. Finally, Greg cemented it all together with his experience and genuine musicianship.  Since then, Larry has parted ways with the band to make his millions (fingers crossed) and Chris is tackling a solo project (to be released this year?). Now, the smaller five-some has a tighter sound, but still manages to hit the noisy chaos of the larger band when appropriate.”

DS: What was the recording like for this EP?

SC: Unlike the first album, which was recorded in small sessions over about 14 months in the producer’s basement, the majority of the EP was recorded over a hectic five days in a wonderful converted barn recording studio in Acton, Ontario. Over the first two days, we bashed out the bed tracks for 11 songs, and for the last three days, it was a rush to get the final versions of the five as heard on this EP. This forced us to economize our sound a bit, and to spend a lot of time constructing the few parts we’d be able to record.  There was a wonderful camaraderie because we were all stuck in a barn together for five days and I think that sense of community comes through on the EP.

The Noise Around the Mean by The Fires Of

DS: What did you take away from it?

SC: I think we learned that we’re a real band.  We spent more time considering the sounds and tones of our instruments and voices and the emotions we wanted to convey to try to achieve what we heard for the songs in our minds. I’m not sure we had that kind of vision when we did our debut self-titled full-length.

DS: What is the EP about?

SC: Unintentionally, the songs on the EP all kind of stem from a very introspective place whether it’s about losing someone, regretting something, pondering your impact on the world or coming to grips with what reality has presented to you. These are the events and emotions that end up shaping you as a person and showing you who you really are and what the world really means to you. From that we get The Noise Around The Mean. Life has a certain normalcy to it but it’s those oscillations and fluctuations that really make you LIVE. It’s also our contention that from those places come a lot of great pieces of art. On a more serious note, we almost called the EP “The Sleep EP” but threw out that idea because Greg pointed out it might be received as “The Sleepy Pee.”

DS: How is it different from your album?

SC: The self-titled album was a learning experience for a lot of the band, who hadn’t recorded before.  As we were recording those songs, we would discover we needed to write a guitar “part” here or a keyboard “part” there, and it was all a bit on-the-fly.  Since then, we’ve all put more thought into our different instrument components and how they fit together on the recorded track, versus what we can play live. We have also played together live much more than we had prior to recording the first album, and with this EP we were trying to achieve a better representation of our live sound. I feel like that’s something a lot of bands end up chasing in their careers, and I can see why.

The Fires Of: Wood & Wires Session from Adrian Vieni (Wood & Wires) on Vimeo.

DS: What’s next for The Fires Of?

SC: Those six bed tracks from the prior session are burning a hole in our hard drives, along with four or five new songs we’re itching to get down, so we’re hoping to continue recording after this. It’s an amazing craft to learn and something we have a lot of fun doing. Also, if we can get our act together, we’d love to do a tour to support the two recordings we’ve let loose into the world.

DS: What’s your favourite venue to play at?

SC: While we love the intimacy of The Silver Dollar, nothing can really compare to playing Lee’s Palace. We are excited to be playing there for our fourth time (!) this Saturday.

DS: What’s it like being a musician in Toronto?

SC: Being a musician in an indie scene feels like going to a party you where you don’t know anyone. You’re an insecure teenager. You can’t help but think everyone else is cooler than you and that they all know what an imposter you are.  It’s funny because in the scene no one really knows what your day job is, how you got there, etc. We’re all treating our music as art and as a career when we’re spending time on it. It’s like a superhero convention where no one wants to reveal their alter egos. Aside from all of that posturing, the best thing about being a musician in Toronto is the other musicians. Connecting with other people who aren’t getting responses to their emails, who just can’t land a gig at the Horseshoe or who are also in-fighting about set lengths and how much the cover should be really helps to keep you keeping on.

DS: What other local music do you like?

SC: Our two favourite local acts are The Ruby Spirit and Graydon James & The Young Novelists. Two bands we love as bands and people. You can’t get much better than these two bands in my humble opinion. Great song writing. Great people. I should also put The Fast Romantics on this list. They give me a new appreciation for Elvis Costello and Blur.

DS: What’s on your Dork Shelf (music, books, movies, games)?

SC: We’re a pretty dorky band. Our Dork Shelves are ever expanding and impossible to catalogue. Right now Graeme is reading The Children of the Sky by Vernor Vinge and Blindsight by Peter Watt. He is also a movie junkie and is enjoying shiny new Blu-rays of the Short Films of Buster Keaton and Krzysztof Kieslowski’s Three Colours Trilogy. Steve is a fantasy nerd and has multiple versions of The Lord of the Rings (both the books and the movies) and is making his way through George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire and Steven Erikson’s Malazan: Book of the Fallen. Lisa was gracious enough to be honest about the fact that Christmas Eve on Sesame Street is on permanent display on her Dork Shelf. Greg has been consumed by the live version of Radiohead’s The King of Limbs for weeks now and it’s all we can talk about at band practice. Peyton is also about to release a children’s book with his brother Hilary called The Pirate Girl’s Treasure  – it’s an origami adventure!

DS: What else should we know about The Fires Of?

SC: We’re just a bunch of normal people trying to play some music for you. That’s the thing you realize when you go out there and try and do this. Everyone’s human. Everyone’s just trying to do what they love doing.

You can hear more from The Fires Of on their official SoundCloud page here.

Beauty and the Beast returns to the big screen this weekend (with a 3-D retrofitting) just a shade over 20 years after its initial release and several years after an extended cut of the film made the rounds. The film – which was one of my fondest childhood movie going experiences – holds up nicely in a thematic sense, with as much love for cinematic craft as Hugo and The Artist, but while the 3-D does add to the film, the HD transfer makes a case that maybe not all hand drawn animated films should be toyed with.

The “tale as old as time, and song as old as rhyme” remains the same, as the heroine Belle (voiced by Paige O’ Hara) takes the place of her inventor father after he is captured by a fearsome and selfish beast (Robbie Benson), who just so happened to be a handsome prince cursed by an enchantress. Together in his enchanted castle full of singing and dancing bric-a-brac, Belle helps Beast learn the true nature of love and caring for someone more than he cares for himself.

Despite being the first ever animated film to be nominated for best picture at the Academy Awards, the story to Beauty and the Beast was always structurally unsound. Belle’s transformation from headstrong women, to withering captive, to somewhat sunny optimist still comes full circle, but the character transitions aren’t handled very well, with motivations tied more to plot conventions and storybook moralizing than logical behaviour. Then again, this is ostensibly a children’s film.

That’s all comparatively small potatoes when one approaches the film as more of a historical artifact. From the opening musical number where Belle speaks of her humdrum existence in a provincial French hamlet, Beauty and the Beast strikes a tone of pure joy for the written word. Belle’s bookish ways are looked down upon by a French upper class that thinks a woman couldn’t possibly learn anything from them. It’s a sequence equally literary and cinematic, and a subtle dig at French cinematic sensibilities towards film criticism with the classic line “How can you read this? There’s no pictures!”

Compare this feeling with The Artist, which for all its greatness is a simple story about one man and not saying so much about cinema other than displaying how the rises and falls of celebrity culture are entirely cyclical. Even moreso, compare Disney’s sense of spectacle to Scorsese’s raging polemic disguised as a family film. Disney’s writing staff lucked into a subtler and less headache inducing defence of the cinematic art form in a five minute musical number than Hugo could hammer into someone’s head in over two hours. Coming fresh off a year that many of my colleagues deemed as being too nostalgic for its own good with regards to past masterworks and auteurs, it feels wholly fitting that the best case is made by a 21 year old film.

But enough about subtext, back to the film itself and its new transfer. Reverting back to the original theatrical release and excising the deleted musical number that found its way into the extended cut from a few years back, the backgrounds of the film remain as gorgeous as ever and the sound mix is clear as day. The 3-D makes the combination of hand painted scenery come to life in new and exciting ways, and the HD makes the colours all the more vibrant, but those added dimensions also raise an interesting point.

In scenes where characters are shown in extreme close up, the modern technological advances act as a disservice to the film. With increased picture clarity, the imperfections of hand drawn animation are brought to the forefront. Every pencil stroke and jerky movement is literally in the viewers face and in HD. While I found an odd sense of comfort in being able to visually see the effort that went into making the film, I could also see how some people would say that it now looks cheap by comparison. It leads to a very interesting thing to think about.

While the film was made during the interim between hand drawn and computer animation (which are married seamlessly in the Busby Berkely styled “Be Our Guest” and the titular ballroom dance number), one has to wonder if audiences have not become spoiled by computer animation designed to delete any and all imperfections tied to the use of a decidedly less steady human hand. Does the computer give humanity to something that isn’t there or does the human holding the ink impart some of themselves onto what could be seen by modern audiences as an imperfect creation? Have we been spoiled by the proliferation of computer animation and in about 15 years will we be able to have the same appreciation for these films we once did?

Despite all of this thinking about how the film pertains to modern cinema, I was still taken back to the first day I saw it. The press screening of this version just so happened to be the 20th anniversary of my seeing it for the first time on a snow day from school at the movie theatre I remembered from my youth. It was quite possibly the first time that I looked at a film from a critical perspective. The issues I had with the plot at the age of eight are still roughly the same problems I have now, but as a work of pure cinematic spectacle it might be even more relevant to my tastes as an adult.

Side note: The film is preceded by a short sequel to the movie Tangled. It’s well worth showing up for and serves as proof that Disney has gotten its mojo back when it comes to making short films again.

The law of diminishing returns that often applies to film franchises seemingly doesn’t apply to the Mission: Impossible series. After an okay, but incomprehensible first film, a dreadful second film, and a fun, but needlessly convoluted third film, director Brad Bird (previously known for animated work on The Incredibles and The Iron Giant) comes to the now aging series of spy thrillers to deliver a no-nonsense action film that strays from the elaborate plotting of previous entries in favour of a more straightforward and delightfully boneheaded approach. Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol quite possibly represents the kinds of movies this franchise should’ve been from the start.

Impossible Mission Force veteran Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) starts of this entry being broken out of a Russian gulag to help track down a terrorist, code named Cobalt (Michael Nyqvist, original star of the Swedish Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series), who is hell-bent on acquiring Russian nuclear missile codes. After an effort by Hunt and his team (Paula Patton, Simon Pegg) to stop him turns out to be a setup, the IMF are disavowed by their government and forced to work off the grid with the help of a pencil pushing analyst (Jeremy Renner).

Of course, not everything is what it seems, but this is truly the first Mission: Impossible plotline that can be distilled into a single paragraph. The streamlined storytelling on display here counts for quite a lot. While the previous films awkwardly tried to combine brains and spectacle, Ghost Protocol simply sets out a scenario, adds requisite spy thriller twists and character developments, and moves from point A to point B in a no bullshit manner. It’s not reinventing the wheel in any way, but it allows the audience to shut just enough of their brain off to have a good time watching the film instead of stressing them out over nitpicky details the other films would demand people remembered.

With the plot out of the way, Bird gets the chance to really shine as a first time live action feature director. The film is made with such a steady hand that one would be hard pressed to tell it was made by someone having their first go at an action film. The action tends to drag slightly in the expository scenes necessary to move the plot along, but once the film gets to the gloriously shot set pieces, Bird’s authorial voice and past successes are evident on screen.

The majority of the action sequences – shot in IMAX, which really is the only way to watch the film to truly get the full effect and scope of the production – are handily the best in the series. Shots looking down the side of the world’s tallest building in Dubai are intense and almost vertigo inducing. A fight sequence in an automated car park feels like a demented cousin to the climactic scene in Pixar’s Monsters Inc. where the heroes are constantly going in and out of doors in midair. It’s a simply stunning looking movie.

With all the flash and style the film has, there’s not a lot of room for the cast, but damned if they don’t perform their jobs effectively. Nyqvist is sufficiently slimy and creepy. Patton is tough, sexy, and not merely used as one-note eye candy. Pegg gets a beefed up role from the last film and puts his comedic zeal to great use. Renner, whom it’s rumoured will be taking over the series in the near future, gets to play the tightly wound tough guy with a secret. Even Cruise gets to give Hunt a different slant by matching the tone of the film around him by dialing back his natural charisma and portraying Ethan as a picture of lethal efficiency.

Is it anything special? For action film buffs it certainly is. Does it change the nature of action filmmaking? Hardly. Does it matter what “Ghost Protocol” even means? Not in the slightest. Is it fun? Loads. Is it the best of the franchise? Absolutely.

Location OCAD University Great Hall, 100 McCaul Street – Free event

The Toronto Independent Game Development Jam (TOJam) is a free, annual game-making event open to the public. For the last 5 years, they’ve gathered together the craziest game makers in the world for a 3-day, around-the-clock game making binge. TOJam attracts a mix of hobbyists, students, and professionals. For some, it’s an opportunity to try new ideas, for others it’s a chance to focus. TOJam #6 was held May 13 – 15, 2011.

TOJam Arcade will feature a curated exhibition of a minimum of 10 games from TOJam in a cool and entertainment focused space where people can easily flow from one screen to the next.

In addition to the Arcade, a launch event that features all TOJam #6 games will take place on October 28 in the OCAD University Great Hall.

Digifest showcases digital media creativity in Toronto, bringing together academic, industry and the public to experience the convergence of interactive & mobile media, gaming, art and design, architecture, simulation and more. Digifest will celebrate the latest achievements in visualization, simulation and interaction in many fields, inspiring and connecting all involved.

Digifest has been renewed and updated by the School of Design at George Brown College in partnership with the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts, the Toronto International Film Festival Group (TIFF), Applied Arts Inc., Meet The Media Guru (Italy), TOJam, Gamercamp, OCAD University, Ryerson University, Seneca College and various media and venue partners.

Innovation Days
(Wednesday October 26 – Thursday October 27, daytime)

This exciting portion of Digifest will showcase results of industry/school research partnerships to a crowd made up of industry members, academics and students. The content will be selected by Digifest and its academic partners. Each morning / afternoon will be devoted to one of the four Digifest streams: play, touch, build, watch.

Talks will be delivered by industry “thought leaders” followed by shorter presentations from various innovators in related fields.

Tiff Nexus Innovation Day
(Friday October 28)

TIFF.nexus is the connection of the existing and emerging media sectors of Film, Gaming and New Media, designed as a catalyst for collaboration between them. This innovation day will feature emerging technology talks and presentations as well as the results of the 2011 Gaming Peripherals Jam – putting game developers together with hardware hackers to innovate in areas of interface – which will be showcased in an evening reception at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. More info here.

Meet The Media Guru
(Wednesday October 26 – Friday October 28, evening)

Meet The Media Guru (MMG) is a Social Network and an Open Community of Digital Culture that organizes local Events in Italy to meet the world famous protagonists of Innovation. Digifest is bringing MMG events to Ontario by making them a key component of the DF schedule. These evening speaker events will bring innovators from across the globe for thought-provoking presentations that will inspire and challenge attendees.

Exhibits and Activities
(Saturday October 29 – Sunday October 30)

The Digifest weekend activities will feature an array of exhibits, interactive displays, presentations and more, with many free events open to the general public. Events include:

- TOJam Arcade: featuring a day of talks by local game makers and industry thinkers, exclusive in-progress demos, and an arcade installation of over 20 games from www.TOjam.ca.
- Art by Gamercamp exhibition, displaying digital art and design installations.
- Ziris™ wall: an on-going display of Digifest Ziris™ competition entries to be featured on the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts Ziris™ wall throughout the week and into the weekend.
- 1st Person: A game industry meet and greet trade show
- An epic Halloween party

Plus lots more exciting installations and interactive displays across the city! Stay tuned for more information.

More information here.
Facebook event page here.

This week’s instalment of Boardwalk Empire brought us a heaping portion of the old ultra-violence that we so cherish. It’s Veteran’s Day in Atlantic City, a city “built to help people forget” says Nucky in his speech to the throngs gathered to commemorate the occassion, “but today is for remembering.” Is it ever. Nothing in this episode seems to be forgotten or forgiven – every past slight is remembered and every debt paid for.

The ceremony itself goes off without a hitch, Nucky pays tribute to his nemesis, the Commodore, who is incapacitated by his stroke and unable to attend the festivities. Nucky then calls Jimmy to the podium, to Jimmy’s surprise. It’s a challenge, and one that Jimmy handles ably despite his shaky nerves. “You think I don’t know how to play this game?” Jimmy asks his ‘father’, “I don’t even think you know the rules.”

But Jimmy does know the rules, he downplays his own acts of heroism, captures the ghastliness of the war, and pays tribute to the reasons for the soldier’s sacrifice: mothers, son, wives and America.” It’s not the first time we’ve seen Jimmy demonstrate his political savvy (I’m thinking of his conversation with Rothstein a few weeks back), but it’s the first time Nucky has; as the look on his face, and his continued obsession with Jimmy in the country club dressing room reveals.

With the Commodore in a vegetative state, Jimmy has assumed control over the “political coup” against Nucky, but his financial backers, Eli and the Ward Bosses are skeptical about the young buck’s leadership. In a meeting with the old men, including the guy with the facial hair (who I only this episode realized is played by Dominic Chianese, famous for his portrayal of Uncle June in The Sopranos), they appear to be very worried about their investment. “You’re trying to diddle the wrong men,” they tell him when he won’t own up to the Commodore’s ailment.

Jackson Parkhurst is the financial backer who is the most hostile towards Jimmy. A veteran of the wars against the Sioux, he brags of his exploits to the group, who have clearly heard every word a million times. He also boasts of his war profiteering, something not likely to endear him to a veteran like Darmody.

When Jimmy grows tired of the threats and whining from the old men, he points out that they don’t scare him, quipping, “oh yeah, you’re going to throw me out of your yacht club?” Parkhurst responds by striking Jimmy across the face with his cane and admonishing his lack of “respect.” Jimmy withdraws with a panicked Eli, who Jimmy doesn’t even attempt to pacify. It seems as if the coup leaders are fragmenting in a hurry…

The icky relationship between Jimmy and his mother Gillian is re-visited again shortly thereafter. It’s been clear that the incestuous undertones of their relationship would be a major theme of the season since Gillian told Jimmy’s wife about how she used to kiss baby Jimmy’s “winky” while changing him (I’m still not over that quote). In this scene Gillian cleans her son’s injury, dotes on him, touches his face in a way that makes me squirm, and advises Jimmy that he’s not to be “disrespected” and he has to “make that clear.”

In effect, Gillian has indirectly ordered the murder of Jackson Parkhurst (a man she probably used to dance for, and perhaps service), and is now in effect the “real leader” of the coup. In contrast to Gillian and Jimmy’s all encompassing openness, in a scene later in the episode, Jimmy tells his wife that he hurt his head on a car door. She is, as she suspects, not the main woman in Jimmy’s life.

On Nucky’s return from golfing with the Attorney General, he is greeted by Margaret whose first line to her husband is, “where’s Owen?!” She is worried, of course, because Eli has come to visit and she knows what that could (and does) lead to, but it also provides some fuel for fire for those viewers who believe that Margaret has something of a crush on the sexually explosive Irishman.

Eli reveals that the Commodore is “out of the game”, and that he “knows who is going to testify” against his brother. None of this information is valuable to Nucky, who has “just played golf with the Attorney General of the United States,” but Eli nonetheless pleads for forgiveness. Instead, Nucky calls him a “scared child,” and requires his brother to “kiss my fucking shoes you piece of shit” which Eli can’t abide. A fist fight ensues and Eli probably would’ve murdered Nucky then and there had Margaret not come along with an unloaded rifle and broken up the fisticuffs.

Eli’s utility may be realized yet, as we see from Nucky’s conversation with the Attorney General later that evening that the AG can’t make any guarantees about their plan to have the charges against Nucky dropped. The Attorney General presents a prosecutor, a flamboyant fellow named Chip, and once the deal is done, they expect to be entertained. Nucky sends in his girls, but his face is resentful throughout, and one suspects that the role of “pimp” is not one Nucky particularly cherishes.

The action then cuts to brother Eli, who is proper wasted and fixing something or other with one of his many children. “Your pops can fix anything”, he assures the youngster, not quite believing his own words as he takes a massive glug from his flask. When he is visited by one of the Ward Bosses named George, he is agitated, cornered and drunk.

George suspects that something is afoot with the Commodore and demands to go see him. Eli tries to protect the status of the Commodore, but he’s drunk and not particularly savvy, and gives the game up. He then freaks out and hits George in the neck with a wrench, which, he clearly didn’t wholly intend to do. Once it’s apparent that George is going to die, however, Eli viciously (and graphically) beats in George’s face with the wrench. Great stuff.

Now let’s get to the major side plot of the episode – Richard Harrow’s walk in the woods. Harrow skips the Veteran’s Day parade, and our fist glimpse at him occurs while Jimmy is reading the names of the fallen veterans of Atlantic City. A few names continue to be read off while the visual transfers to Harrow, himself “among the fallen” despite the fact that he technically “lives on.”

Harrow leaves his flat and his collage book of idyllic domestic settings and goes out to the Jersey Bush about 30 miles outside of Atlantic City. He has his gun ostensibly to go hunting, but in reality, Harrow considers himself “dead inside,” and is looking to formally end it all.

Harrow finds a suitable log, removes his prosthetic face and begins a last meal of brie and apples. We’ve heard Jimmy tell Richard not to be embarrassed to eat in front of his family before, and seeing this “last meal” we finally know why. Merely taking a drink from a flask looks painful and laborious for Harrow.

Richard lies back, puts his rifle in his mouth and looks at the grey sky, he is about to end when a dog approaches, growls at him and steals his prosthetic. It is striking that Richard, who was considering ending it all then and there would be so upset about the loss of his fake half face, which, presumably he’d have little need for once he blew the rest of his face off. Instead, Richard chases after the dog (his deux ex machina object) while yelling: “I need that mask!”

Richard eventually comes upon the dog’s owners, a couple of bush-men named Glenmore and Pete who hunt “tree rat” (squirrel) and drink extremely strong homemade liquor, which, they share with Richard once he confirms he’s not a revenue agent. They talk about flying horses that they’ve seen in Atlantic city, and Glenmore admonishes Pete for going home to spend the night as opposed to roughing it, “you’re getting soft.”

Eventually the talk turns to the dog, who Glenmore refers to as “an old soldier, he just keeps on fighting,” This interests Harrow who asks Glenmore “what is he fighting for?” The response: “you’ll have to ask him.” Glenmore gives Richard a speech about “what these woods is for,” and apparently the woods are not for “foolishness” but instead “they’re for living,” and Richard, now saved, goes on his way to rendezvous with Jimmy.

Jimmy and Richard’s conversation is the proper end to Richard’s soul-searching subplot. “Where were you today?” Jimmy asks. “Went for a walk”, Harrow responds. “I should have gone with you” says Jimmy. At the end of the day, Jimmy’s affection for Harrow isn’t an act, it’s very real. In contrast to Jimmy’s regard for Eli, whom he wouldn’t so much as offer a word of reassurance to earlier in the episode, Jimmy brushes Richard’s face when Richard asks him, “Would you fight for me?” The answer: “Down to the last bullet.”

So they go to work, which, tonight at least involves scalping Mr. Parkhurst. When Parkhurst sees Richard he asks him, “who are you?” Harrows response: “a soldier.” And so his emotional arc is complete, Harrow has come to terms with who he is, he may never have the idyllic domestic life he craves, but he’s not wholly “dead inside”, rather, he’s “an old soldier who just keeps on fighting.” By the way, how hard was that scalping to watch? I’d venture so far as to say that it was a more brutal scalping than anything the Basterds got up to. When you beat Tarantino for gruesomeness, and you’re a cable series, you’re doing something right.

Parkhurst’s screams echo the maid, Katie’s screams. Except she isn’t getting scalped, she’s just getting freaky with Mr. Sleator in the maids quarters at Nucky’s place. They wake Margaret, who checks on the children before encountering her promiscuous, well endowed maid. She asks Katie if she heard anything, but Katie plays the innocent, though the look on Margaret’s face makes plain that she knows what’s up, and she is probably pretty jealous.

The episode closes with a wickedly stark shot of Eli burying George against the edge of a cornfield, illuminated by the lights of his car.

Want to take your trivia know-how into the year 3000?

“You Guessed It! You Can’t Unguess It!” Futurama Trivia is interesting if true! And it is true! 3 rounds of mathematically flawless, alien eye-popping trivia backed by the viewing of three different classic Futurama episodes – and you don’t even need a $300 Nixon tax rebate to participate because it’s free. Sound too good to be true, like two meals in one week? Prepare to be surprised!

WHERE: Melody Bar, The Gladstone Hotel – 1214 Queen Street West.

WHEN: 8:00pm, September 27, 2011

HOW IT WORKS: In classic pub trivia style, ‘You Guessed It! You Can’t Unguess It!’ is three rounds of challenging questions about Futurama Volumes 1-4. Form a team of up to 6 friends and write down your answers on provided sheets; at the end of each round, you swap your sheet with another team just like in grade 6, and mark ‘em. Then hand them in and enjoy an episode on the big screen! And did we mention prizes?

Special thanks to WOO-HOO!: Classic Simpsons Trivia for helping to organize this most natural progression. They are our big brother out of neither revenge, spite, malice nor boredom.

Invite your friends! It’s fun for the whole family! (except grandma & grandpa)

Futurama Trivia Facebook event page here.

Follow Futurama Trivia on Twitter @FuturamaTrivia

Gil Alkabetz Retrospective & Workshop (Click to enlarge)

An evening with the creator of many award-winning short animated films, presented by the Toronto Animated Image Society in partnership with Goethe Institut and the National Film Board of Canada.

Best known for his animation in the award-winning film, RUN LOLA RUN, Alkabetz joins us from Stuttgart, Germany, to present his retrospective and to discuss ideas of storytelling.

Films will be shown on its original format of 35mm.

Admission:
$10 TAIS & NFB Members
$15 General

Tickets can be purchased online at: www.tais.ca

Star Trek Day TO, a Nerd Mafia collaborative extravaganza that celebrates everything Star Trek, will be hosted at the Toronto Underground Cinema on October 02, 2011.

Why Star Trek? Star Trek represents a hopeful vision of the future — a future that promotes collaboration, inclusiveness and responsibility. Celebrating Star Trek not only honours the ground-breaking work the franchise has already done, it also shows our commitment to internalizing these values and making them reality.

This fun-filled event will cater both to the casual fan and the hardcore Trekker with trivia, a costume contest, musical performances, comedy, the screening of Star Trek feature films and a 19+ after party for mature Star Trek fans.

Tickets are available for pre-order on Brown Paper Tickets: https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/185549.

Tickets are also available in person at the Silver Snail.

Daytime Programming:
* Star Trek 101 – an introduction to Star Trek, for those new to the franchise.
* Star Trek Geek Off – trivia contest
* Costume Contest (categories TBA)
* MOVIE: Wrath of Khan
* MOVIE: Star Trek (2009)

Evening Programming:
* Comedy by Nerdy Little Secret, featuring Gavin Stephens
* Music by Nerds with Guitars
* Burlesque by The Cinnamon Hearts and Nerd Girl Pinups
(Additional acts TBA)

Additional sponsors: Polaris, FutureCon

Official Star Trek Day TO website here.
Facebook Event Page here.