The Mad Men are back in town!

Perfect Getaway - /* red snapper */

Outstanding.

(500) Days of Summer - /* please please let me get what I want */

This is not a love story where boy gets girl. This is not a love song.

A boy growing up listening to "sad British music".

The Smiths and Belle and Sebastian lend instant cool - and wearing a Joy Division t-shirt for overkill. Does it get any better? Add a PiL poster and Pixies for good measure.

Bandslam - /* I would do anything for you */

Bandslam turns out to be surprisingly good - with funny and touching moments that ring with sincerity.

The catchy songs, the never give up spirit provide the backdrop for the infectious fun to come. Add able acting and singer / performance from one part of High School Musical Vanessa Hudgens and one part of Aly and AJ and Phil of the Future Aly Michalka - plus both playing tough and cute to boot doesn't hurt.

Director and writer Todd Graff [who also directed Camp] seems to try too hard to mesh everything together with lots of backstory and how one geeky guy from Cincinnati can land in the realm of two cute girls from diversely different social classes.

Bandslam starts out with loner type Will Burton with a fascination with David Bowie to whom he writes long messages via the Net which form a narrative through the film. At his old school in Cincinatti he's the outsider and weakling who gets bullied, the world of students is prototypical Breakfast Club / 10 Things I Hate About You student divisions by clique. His life can only get better after he movies with his mother {Lisa Kudrow} from Ohio to her new job and life in New Jersey.

DEAR TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Dear anyone nice at TIFF09:

We have been going to the Toronto International Film Festival ever since the days of the director of Julie Ormond's gala at the Elgin not naming her new movie not as "Fatal Extraction". (Name that film) Or having a sensual Bad Timing of it, too.

We remember running OUT OF theatres and having our backpack burst open on the way to The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford or lining up at the Uptown trying to get last minute rushtickets to Heaven or Secretary or enduring Lukas Moodysson and Catherine Breillat at their best or worst. Or freezing after hours outside the Uptown to see Kate Beckinsale at the Midnight Madness viewing of Underworld, then all the geeks afterwards questioning Les Wiseman heavily on his new vampire mythos... Or better still lining up at the University just to get a glimpse of the fuss of what was Devil in the Flesh.

In the days of this current climate, our pocketbook is not going to be able to encompass the cost of this year's passes. So if we could prevail upon you to keep the streak alive - and send us one ticket or if you feel generous enough - one pass - and we promise to review what we see as ably as we can.

Thank you for your consideration.

Yours truly,


email me!



an inveterate film fan and TIFF goer as time ticks down

HELLO READER!

Dear Reader!

We're back in the fold again. Just absorbing life and more movies and coming back into the writing again.

Hope you have all been fun exploring your local cinemas or watching the latest out on release at your local cinemas or on the blu-ray tv.

It's been a task trying to keep up and digest it all - and the one caveat of life is I don't want what I can't have.

The job at hand at the moment is trying to write one review per day - the review may not necessarily be a movie, but it will be of something true.

Have fun and let me know if you're out there.

Orphan - who's babysitting?

Public Enemies Michael Mann less than intriguing

For all that Michael Mann is he has helmed what should have been an action packed romp through Depression 1930s into a less than compelling hunt for Public Enemy Number One. Instead he aims for an investigation into the character traits that makes these larger than life characters into a search into their foibles and flaws. It seems Johnny Depp or should we say John Dillinger's character flaw was a deep worship of the Cubs and Clark Gable movies.

Taking Pelham 123 New York melodrama

Star Trek boldly goes back to the beginning and the future

Whatever Works works! Woody Allen nostalgic return

Away We Go an enjoyable roadtrip through marriage

Angels and Demons plunges into the heart of darkness

Up up and away - curmudgeonly charming

Moon is illuminating and confusing

GI Joe action packed

Amy Adams leads Julie and Julia through appetizing fare

It's like butter. Melts in your mouth and tastes so good. sinfully rich in tapestry, be braced to be seduced by the mouthwatering concoctions on the screen. After all, it's the double whammy of Julia Child played whimsically by the one and only Meryl whatshername and her modern day disciple Julie Powell as portrayed by the cute as a button Amy Adams. Director / writer of the screenplay Norah Ephron meshes the two memoirs of Julia Child and Julie Powell into this one movie, a celebration of Julia Child's life in France and Julie Powell's achievement of cooking every recipe in Julia Child's book within the timeframe of one year.

Transformers 2 transformative

Michael Bay unleashes the hounds of hell or the dogs or war or should we say the cars of the apocalypse.

The Autobots are back at it against the ultimate of Demonoids and the humans are caught in a war not of their choosing.

While Sam Witwicky gets caught up in the action dragging foxy girlfriend Mikaela Barnes back into the action