movies

Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival is North America's largest documentary festival. Each year, the festival presents a selection of more than 100 cutting-edge documentaries from Canada and around the globe. Through its industry programmes, the Festival also provides a full range of professional development, marketing, and networking opportunities for documentary professionals. Below are the remaining (April 23-27)show times and locations for documentaries related to love and relationships. Happy viewing!

By Jonathan Rotsztain

During the past few months, I’ve shouted at you, letting y’all know what shows to see, where, and when. Over the weekend, the thought dawned on me that perhaps my particular- and oft peculiar- taste is not exactly in sync with LoveInToronto.com’s general readership, nor should it be. Music is the universal language, but it is also deeply personal and highly individual. With that logic in mind, I present to you my primer on how to find out about shows and buy tickets for anything and everything that our multicultural, cosmopolitan metropolis has to offer.

Is your singing voice a different octave than your speaking voice? Perhaps you are 'Bass Baritone'? I'm not sure but I think Paul Potts is a Bass Baritone. What exactly is a BASS BARITONE VOICE? Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division had a Bass Baritone voice. That is to say his singing voice shared certain qualities of both the baritone and the bass. You can really hear those qualities in the hit song: Love will tear us apart, again.

AT THE CINEMA
With Ron Boyer

***** Pan's Labyrinth (2006). If you're curious, but haven't seen it yet, now is the time to enjoy one of the truly outstanding films of the last year, recently released on DVD. Directed by Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro (No, not Benicio del Toro, the actor-the other one!), Pan's Labyrinth was my favorite film last year. Nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Film, Pan's Labyrinth lost out to the equally brilliant and socially-relevant drama The Lives of Others, arguably the two most important films of 2006.

AT THE CINEMA with Ron Boyer

*** Ten Canoes. In this visually beautiful but wandering story-within-a-story by filmmakers Rolf de Heer and Peter Djigirr, we are introduced to the fascinating and magical world of an exotic and primitive people, the Yolngu Aborigines of Australia’s Northern Territories. Part anthropological field work and part epic ancient legend, the parallel storylines begin a millennia ago (about the time William the Conqueror invaded England), then use that time as a point of departure to visit the primordial past, the mythical Paleolithic “dreamtime” of the Aborigines. The twin stories unfold as an ancient aboriginal leader relates a much more ancient legend of his people, a parable of how a tribal leader in a similar position to his own once addressed the difficult moral and social problem confronting him, with the fate of the tribe hanging in the balance.

**Warning** there are references to the movie in this review.
Rating:  3/5

There's a lot to say about this movie as Michael Moore tells the tale about the diminished American health care system.  The system, according to Moore, is in dire need of assistance which is crippled by its health insurance companies across the nation.  It seems like you're no better off being with health care insurance than without; with numerous examples of people being denied by the system.  Why?  Because it's all about saving money.  But this doesn't just stop at health care, an intuitive viewer would also realize that the message about saving money would also be true for any other industry which deals with similar claims - like car insurance!

By Effie Star

AT THE MOVIES with Ron Boyer

“AWAY FROM HER”. Directed by Sarah Polley. Co-starring Julie Christie and Gordon Pinsent. Supporting roles by Michael Murphy and Olympia Dukakis.

Not long ago I had the pleasure of attending the Toronto screening for Sarah Polley’s directorial debut, “Away From Her”, based on “The Bear Came Over the Mountain, a short story by author Alice Munro. Now playing at local theatres, the film is the feature   debut of Canadian actress-turned-director Polley, a former child actress best known for starring roles in film’s like Atom Egoyan’s “The Sweet Hereafter”. Here, as director, she tells a sad love story with a twist: a husband and wife who’ve passionately loved each other deeply since their youth are inevitably torn apart late in life by the devastating onset of Alzheimers.