Canadian Crossing

Canadian film notebook: 2025 Independent Spirit Awards and Golden Globes nominations

My Old Ass got some love from the Independent Spirit Awards. Megan Park (writer/director) has a Best Screenplay nomination and Maisy Stella has a nomination for Best Breakthrough Performance. We will have a review at some point.

Julian Brave NoiseCat, Emily Kassie — directors of Sugarcane — are nominated for the Truer Than Fiction Award. There are only 3 film nominations in this category. For our American readers, Sugarcane debuts tonight on the National Geographic channel and tomorrow on Disney+ and Hulu.

Sneaking some TV into a film notebook: Enrico Colantoni, heralded on both sides of the border, has a nomination for Best Supporting Performance in a New Scripted Series for English Teacher. Colantoni and his Canadian TV series Allegiance (with Supinder Wraich) head into Season 2 this winter on CBC.

The Independent Spirit Awards, with no inclination to reward films nominated for the Oscars, has an intriguing list of films for its Best International Film category. Here are the films with countries and director.

• All We Imagine as Light (France, India, Netherlands, Luxembourg) Payal Kapadia
• Black Dog (China) Guan Hu
• Flow (Latvia, France, Belgium) Gints Zilbalodis
• Green Border (Poland, France, Czech Republic, Belgium) Agnieszka Holland
• Hard Truths (United Kingdom) Mike Leigh

We saw Green Border a year ago and found the film to be very powerful. Poland picked a less "controversial" film for the Oscars because of its right-wing government. Heartily recommend this film. Flow played at WIFF 24. While we didn't get a chance to see this film, people we talked to really enjoyed the film.

The other 3 films were new to us once this list was announced.

The Golden Globes nominations came out this morning. Here are the noms in the Best Motion Picture – Non-English Language category:

• All We Imagine As Light (USA/France/India)
• Emilia Pérez (France)
• The Girl With The Needle (Poland/Sweden/Denmark)
• I’m Still Here (Brazil)
• The Seed Of The Sacred Fig (USA/Germany)
• Vermiglio (Italy)

The only repeat film on both lists is All We Imagine As Light. We found The Girl With The Needle the engaging and disturbing. Most excellent. The Seed Of The Sacred Fig is way too long with plenty of material to fast forward through in a 2 hour, 37 minute movie. The story is good but needed 90 minutes tops and that is a stretch.

We've heard terrible things about Emilia Pérez even if the film is supposed to be rewarded with nominations. Since the film is on Netflix, we aren't in too much of a rush to watch this right away.

On the Canadian side (none of these are remotely Canadian content), Pamela Anderson got a nomination for The Last Showgirl for Best Performance by a Female Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama. Gabriel LaBelle has a rare moment for a Canadian playing a Canadian character — Lorne Michaels — in Jason Reitman's Saturday Night. LaBelle's nomination is for Best Performance by a Male Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical Or Comedy. Reitman is also Canadian.

Martin Short got a Golden Globe nomination for Only Murders In The Building for Best Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Series – Musical Or Comedy.

Denis Villeneuve's Dune: Part Two is up for Best Motion Picture - Drama but didn't receive a screenplay or directorial nomination.

Canadian film notebook: Upcoming TIFF Top 10 and TFCA finalists

We reported last week that we thought we would see the TIFF Top 10 list at least by Friday. The Toronto International Film Festival has been consistent in its inconsistency on awards. We finally saw the festival reward relatively inexperienced filmmakers after a 4-year absence. Yet the festival didn't do the Rising Stars feature in 2024.

While we would be severely disappointed if TIFF flakes out and doesn't do the TIFF Top 10, we have to go on as if nothing is happening. we will report on this if they send out a list. If the TIFF Top 10 won't happen, that would be a huge loss for recognizing Canadian film.

We have huge vats of faith that the Toronto Film Critics Association will announce on Sunday about its finalists for Best Canadian Film and Best Canadian Documentary for 2024.

We found this video from back in September on TIFF 24. The CTV show Your Morning had Lindsey Deluce interviewing resident film critic Radheyan Simonpillai on Canadian films at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Simonpillai briefly went through the Canadian films at TIFF that also played at Cannes: The Shrouds. Rumours, and Universal Language. Appreciate that Rad spent little time on these titles to give space for other Canadian films of note.

Simonpillai focused on 5 Canadian films. We saw 2 of them: Seeds and You Are Not Alone. Our reviews were mixed on these films: liked the former and confused by the latter (not bad just odd). We were also intrigued about the other 3 films.

Measures for a Funeral with Deragh Campbell was compared to Tar, a high compliment. We would see Campbell in just about anything. Sweet Baby Angel is a Newfoundland film featuring Michaela Kurimsky (Firecrackers). The story sounded quite compelling. Village Keeper is set in Toronto and deals with Black mental health and finding community.

Some Canadian films grab more publicity than others so we appreciate a chance to learn about some films beyond a title and description. We hope you do as well.

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review

A couple of French Canadian film links of note: a list of 12 French Canadian films via Canada Screens and some movies set in Montréal.

We have seen 10 of the 12 films from the first link, all but The Three L’il Pigs 2 | Les 3 p’tits cochons 2 and Le mirage. Most of these films are a good basic introduction to le cinema du Quebecois. 3 of them belong to Xavier Dolan: Mommy, Laurence Anyways, and It’s Only the End of the World. 5 of the 12 were Canada's entries into the Academy Awards in what is now the Best International Feature Film: Gabrielle, Incendies, Monsieur Lazhar, along with the aforementioned Mommy and It's Only the End of the World. Louis Cyr, l'homme le plus fort au monde is more of a historical drama. The list finishes up with 3 well-known Quebecois films: Café de Flore (Jean-Marc Vallée), My Internship in Canada, and Starbuck. The latter 2 star Patrick Huard, whom you might know from Bon Cop, Bad Cop, and was also in Mommy.

The Montréal list is charming with some American films at the bottom of the list. The Whole Nine Yards (2000) was set and filmed in Montréal but didn't make this list. An odd but likable collection of stars: Bruce Willis, the late Matthew Perry (Canadian), the very underrated Amanda Peet, Michael Clarke Duncan, Rosanna Arquette (with a hilarious Quebecois accent), and Natasha Henstridge (Canadian).

The fun of these lists for your humble narrator is finding Canadian films I did not know. Funkytown is one of those films: taking place during the time of disco in Montréal. Didn't realize the city was known for its disco scene.

Canadian film notebook: Santa Barbara film festival has limited Denis Villeneuve retrospective

Came across this intriguing list of classic Canadian films in the LGBT file. The first 5 listed are ones I have little to no knowledge of yet have seen 4 of the last 5 on this list.

The only one of the first 5 we knew something about was La Femme de l’hôtel (1984) from Léa Pool. Those en Anglaise might find the film under the title A Woman in Transit. Consider that this film came 17 years before Lost and Delirious (2001).

We mentioned the retrospectives for Denis Villeneuve and Denys Arcand in a recent Canadian film notebook. Sign us up for a retrospective of Léa Pool's early films.

We are particularly interested in Desire in Motion | Mouvements du désir (1994) followed by Anne Trister (1986).

We have seen Set Me Free | Emporte-moi (1999), Lost and Delirious (2001), Mommy Is at the Hairdresser's | Maman est chez le coiffeur (2008), The Passion of Augustine | La Passion d'Augustine (2015), and Worst Case, We Get Married | Et au pire, on se mariera (2017).

The other films on this BFI list that we have seen are: When Night Is Falling (1995) from Patricia Rozema; C.R.A.Z.Y. (2005) from the late Jean-Marc Vallée; J'ai tué ma mère | I Killed My Mother (2009), the debut from Xavier Dolan; and Vic + Flo Saw a Bear (2013) from Denis Côté. I really enjoyed the latter film but definitely not the ending.

The lone trans film on the list was My Prairie Home (2013) from Chelsea McMullan about trans singer Rae Spoon. We noted 2 films from WIFF 2024 dealing with trans stories that were up for the WIFF Prize in Canadian film: Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story (Michael Mabbott & Lucah Rosenberg-Lee) and Really Happy Someday (J Stevens). We didn't see either one but that was coincidental. We hope to see both films at a later date. Our criticism of Something You Said Last Night didn't stem from a trans character just having a film about a trans character not be so boring.

Our Canadian readers should know that Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story should be available on Crave as of today.

Canadians and Americans can view My Prairie Home through the NFB Web site.

How filmmakers are covering the impact of toxic masculinity

Reese Witherspoon was so iconic for this pic.twitter.com/tj3lZeRJD5

— Women Posting W's (@womenpostingws) December 4, 2024

Regular readers know we love realism in films, at least where realism is an option. Reese Witherspoon has a wonderful take on the lazy use of "What do we do now?" for female characters written by male screenwriters. Witherspoon is absolutely correct that women in real life aren't asking that question. They take charge and I am impressed by that in real life.

CanadianCrossing.com film coverage

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Let us know if you have an idea or story for a future Canadian film notebook.

photo credit: My Old Ass
video credit: CTV/Your Morning
Twitter capture: @womenpostingws

Canadian film review: Love, Sex and Eating the Bones

I first encountered the work of Sudz Sutherland and Jennifer Holness through Shoot the Messenger on CBC from 2016. The show featured Elyse Levesque and Lyriq Bent that combined journalism and crime solving. I have seen Holness' documentary Subjects of Desire (2021).

I learned about Sutherland's debut feature film, produced by Holness (real life husband and wife), Love, Sex and Eating the Bones and was intrigued. The film had been difficult to find for your humble narrator.

The story features Michael (American actor Hill Harper) and Jasmine (American actor Marlyne Afflack). Michael is a photographer who thinks his work is ready as the world tells him it isn't. He hides behind being a security guard. Michael also hides his intimacy by his porn addiction.

Jasmine hides her intimacy by declaring she is celibate. She is in management yet she doesn't care about surface elements of a potential mate.

Peaches is Jasmine's cousin. She also gets a job at Pornucopia, a video store where Michael is the "best customer." Peaches is really not happy that Jasmine is dating Michael.

Jasmine seems unlikely to be in love with someone like Michael. Her patience at love is rather remarkable, especially for someone who had enough bad experiences with relationships. The movie takes awhile to get to the crux of the matter: his porn addiction gets in the way of their intimacy.

We get that a character with a porn addiction is rare to see on the screen and Sutherland handles the subject in a realistic fashion. The tension between Michael and Peaches is very real and fun to watch on its own merit.

Canadian film review: Subjects of Desire

Sutherland gives depth to his supporting characters: Kai Soremekun has a lot of juicy scenes as Peaches, an actor who takes the job at a porn store to help her acting career. Mark Taylor as Sweets brings a thicker Caribbean accent who is kind of a mama's boy. Karen Robinson as Heather, the hair stylist who also sells trashy lingerie.

A special shout-out to the 2 white characters. We often see the token black characters in an otherwise all-white film. Sutherland gives them small parts and has a little fun with them: Jennifer Baxter as Jasmine's trusted co-worker Trish and Ed Robertson as his trusted co-worker Kennedy. Sutherland uses One Week from the Barenaked Ladies in a scene as a nod to Robertson's day job with the band. Robertson holds his own as an actor.

Strong character development is a reason to see this film, even if you are turned off by the idea of porn being celebrated (up to a point).

Watching Harper in this film reminded us of a similar character in the American film Loving Jezebel (1999) which came out 4 years before Love, Sex and Eating the Bones. Harper is good at getting the audience to root for a flawed character looking for love. While the films are very different, you could put them together in a thematic double feature in your domicile.

The Black Academy will have an awards show on CBC in 2022

A special shout out to Sutherland and the production for showing the Queen Street Bridge on Queen Street East. There is an art piece. The art piece from Eldon Garnet on the bridge has this phrase: "this river I step in is not the river I stand in." A small detail but one way I know this is definitely in Toronto.

Love, Sex and Eating the Bones is an above average, sometimes too over the top look at porn and relationships. Worth even the price of a rental if that is how you see the film.

CanadianCrossing.com film reviews

CanadianCrossing.com film coverage

Love, Sex and Eating the Bones won the Best Canadian First Feature Film award at the 2003 Toronto International Film Festival. The film is available on demand in the United States.

video credit: Media Graveyard
photo credit: Love, Sex and Eating the Bones

Canadian film notebook: Upcoming TIFF Top 10 and TFCA finalists

Save the date! Grab some bubbly and your bestie and join us here on Sunday, Dec. 15 @ noon EST as we announce the winners and runners-up of the #TFCAawards, plus the nominees for the @Rogers Best Canadian Film and Best Canadian Documentary Awards. 🏆 pic.twitter.com/F55AREm1Xd

— Toronto Film Critics 🍿 (@TFCA) October 16, 2024

December is a good time to get a sense of the year 2024 in Canadian films. TIFF should be announcing the Top 10 feature and short Canadian films this week. That will be a separate story. The excitement is wondering how many titles we have already seen. Would imagine that Universal Language and Shepherds, both major TIFF winners in September, will be on the list.

The Toronto Film Critics Association hand out the rest of the winners on December 15 yet only the finalists for Rogers Best Canadian Film, feature and documentary. The TFCA added the latter category last year.

The TFCA will announce those winners on February 24. Something to look forward to knowing before the Academy Awards.

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review

Why New Brunswick is mostly absent from Canadian film landscape

We noted 2 recent films in the 2024 Windsor International Film Festival had ties to New Brunswick, a province that has little representation in the Canadian film landscape. Do I Know You from Somewhere and Drive Back Home were the film titles.

Do I Know You from Somewhere involves a lot of indoor intimate space and is an unconventional film. There is some actual outdoor footage in New Brunswick. This was a thoughtful film and a perspective that was unfamiliar. If New Brunswick had some influence, then we want to see more.

Drive Back Home was a period piece and a road trip film that theoretically spent more time out of New Brunswick than in the province. The film's beginning and ending was in New Brunswick and had a physical place in Stanley, near Fredericton, the provincial capital. Stanley is about 40 km (25 miles) north of Fredericton.

This film takes place in 1970, shortly after New Brunswick enacted its first Official Languages Act on April 18, 1969. The Act set the official languages — English and French — with the idea that those in New Brunswick to receive services in either official language from the provincial government.

This doesn't mean everyone in New Brunswick is bilingual. Weldon (Charlie Creed-Miles) deliberately drives around Montréal to get to Toronto to pick up his brother because he doesn't speak French. The largest city in Quebec in 1970 was quite anglophone as compared to now but that ignorance — c'est normal for that time and place.

Both films are very good in their own ways. Glad to have more films with a New Brunswick presence on the Canadian film landscape.

You can find the Twitter thread to see more answers to this significant question. David Cronenberg and Atom Egoyan are gateway Canadian filmmakers, like casual film fans judge Canada based on more prominent filmmakers. Perhaps Xavier Dolan on the Quebec side of the conversation. Even Guy Maddin for those who know film.

Patricia Rozema and Léa Pool are classic female Canadian filmmakers. Monica Chokri and Molly McGlynn are more recent examples of quality female Canadian filmmakers. 

Canadian film doesn't get much publicity, even as we try and shout from the proverbial rooftops. We tend to focus more on quieter, more invisible films. Our answer fell within 280 characters but that answer sums up our thoughts on Canadian film rather succinctly.

Hopefully, our coverage can expand your perception of Canadian cinema, even within English Canada.

Canadian film notebook: Santa Barbara film festival has limited Denis Villeneuve retrospective

TIFF will have a rare screening of August 32nd on Earth

Canadian film review: August 32nd on Earth

Looking ahead, Villeneuve's ambition remains boundless. While he is committed to completing his "Dune" trilogy with "Messiah," which is set to begin shooting in 2025, he's also open to exploring other genres — even, surprisingly, comedy. When asked if he would ever consider a lighter project, he chuckles. "Funny enough, my first feature was a kind of dark sci-fi rom-com about the end of the world. I was laughing out loud while writing it, but everyone who read it found it depressing. Maybe I'm not the right person for comedy. Maybe Yorgos Lanthimos can make it," he jokes. For now, the screenplay remains tucked away, awaiting the right moment — or perhaps the right director — to bring it to life.

This excerpt from a recent Variety interview with Denis Villeneuve gave us some insight into his forgotten films, especially outside Quebec. 

August 32nd on Earth | Un 32 août sur terre is the "dark sci-fi rom-com about the end of the world" that Villeneuve mentions. Variety doesn't mention the title of the film, which would seem relevant to the conversation. Your humble narrator doesn't think the film is as funny as Villeneuve thinks it is but there is humour to situations. 

Villeneuve has adapted the screenplays for the Dune series of films but otherwise hasn't written a single film from an original idea since Incendies (2010). Enemy (2013) was technically a Canadian film but that is the only Canadian film of his that he didn't write.

Villeneuve wrote and directed August 32nd on Earth | Un 32 août sur terre as well as Maelström (2000), Polytechnique (2009), and Incendies (2010).

On comedy and film, the film where I laughed the most out loud in a theatre as an adult was Dogtooth from Yorgos Lanthimos. Lanthimos, like Villeneuve, is getting a lot of acclaim for films where he is directing, not writing (not counting Villeneuve's adapted screenplays). Lanthimos wrote and directed Dogtooth and The Lobster.

Available to stream for free on https://t.co/WP8hpIZzxA and the #NFB Films app, Alanis Obomsawin's KANEHSATAKE, 270 YEARS OF RESISTANCE and Zacharias Kunuk's ATANARJUAT: THE FAST RUNNER are among @TIME's list of 22 essential #Indigenous films! 🧡 https://t.co/OsjYFKQzq1

— National Film Board of Canada (@thenfb) November 11, 2024

Not too surprising that Canada has a heavy influence in Time magazine's list of 22 essential Indigenous films. Canada makes a lot of good ones, way more than the United States. We don't generally recommend a film because of its Indigenous content. We like good films, some of which has Indigenous content.

Your humble narrator has seen Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance (1993); Smoke Signals (1998); Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001); Rhymes for Young Ghouls (2013); Sami Blood (2016); Blood Quantum (2019); The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open (2019); Beans (2020); and Night Raiders (2021). All but Sami Blood are Canadian. Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers is Sami on her father's side.

CanadianCrossing.com film coverage

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We have some good news in reference to Hot Docs. After a lot of uncertainty, there will be programming at the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema as of December 4. The Hot Docs Festival will run from April 24-May 4 in 2025.

We hope to find out at the end of the week about the TIFF Top 10 of 2024. That will be another story when the lists arrive.

Twitter captures: @TFCA; @thenfb
photo credit: Do I Know You from Somewhere; @SophyRomvari

Progressive Conservatives get a supermajority in Nova Scotia

Tim Houston and the Progressive Conservatives couldn't have dreamed of a better scenario in calling a snap election in Nova Scotia. The party won re-election last night with 42 ridings (at press time) of the 55-seat legislature in Halifax. That is significantly higher that the 31 seats won in 2021 and 34 seats when the writ was dropped.

Claudia Chender and the New Democratic Party had a good evening, mostly at the expense of the Liberal Party. The NDP went from 6 seats to 9 seats and will form the official opposition. The NDP was in charge of the government from 2009-2013 with Darrell Dexter as premier and in opposition from 2003-2009.

The Liberals won 27 seats in 2017 and formed government. The party had a rough night, going from 17 seats (2021 election) to 14 seats (writ drop) to 3 seats. A party needs 2 seats to be an officially recognized party. Zach Churchill, the Liberal leader, lost his own riding in Yarmouth. "In life, you can lose, and the most important thing is you get back up, and how you get back up," Churchill said in his post-election speech.

Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin made Nova Scotia history being the first MLA to be elected twice as an independent. McCrossin started out with the PCs when first elected in 2007.

The Progressive Conservatives now have a supermajority with more than 37 seats. This will make passing legislation even easier.

Nova Scotia politics are crazy. Provincial liberals used to be a power house and are reduced to rubble. The province also loves to throw out a government, so watch the same thing happen to the PCs next election.

— Eric Bell (@eric_bellMB) November 27, 2024

The trend had theoretically been change. British Columbia still has the NDP but without a significant majority. New Brunswick flipped to the Liberals but mostly due to self-inflicted wounds by then-premier Blaine Higgs.

The NDP made gains in Saskatchewan but not nearly enough to take power. Nova Scotia — despite problems with food costs, health care, housing, and the problems all Canadians have — decided to give the Progressive Conservatives more power.

Ontario is ruminating about a snap election of its own.

4 women, reporting live from NDP HQ for the Nova Scotia election. #vote pic.twitter.com/g79VpxUbxU

— Blair Rhodes (@CBCBlairRhodes) November 26, 2024

Iain Rankin won the Timberlea-Prospect riding for the Liberals last night, 1 of 2-3 Liberals seats in the legislature. Rankin was premier in Nova Scotia from February 23 to August 31 in 2021 and opposition leader from August 31, 2021 until July 9, 2022.

Rankin has been in the Nova Scotia legislature since 2013. Usually, a premier, even one as a caretaker, disappears from the political landscape once out of power. Churchill became Liberal leader in 2022, succeeding Rankin.

Rankin is 41 and still around in Halifax. The party needs a new leader, mostly because Churchill doesn't have a seat. Will be curious as to the direction of the Liberal Party in Nova Scotia.

2024 Nova Scotia election preview

Nova Scotia goes Progressive Conservative for the first time since 2009

CanadianCrossing.com Nova Scotia coverage

Early voting was down compared to 2021. Elections Nova Scotia said 64,000 votes were cast compared to 75,367 at the same point in 2021. The Canada Post strike could be one factor. 

2024 Canadian politics preview

CanadianCrossing.com Canadian politics coverage

Snap elections usually work out well for the incumbent government. They do pay a price often in the following election. When we revisit Nova Scotia in 2028, if the opposition parties have strong enough leadership, we will be curious about the new direction in this Atlantic Canada province.

photo credit: CBC News
Twitter captures: @eric_bellMB; @CBCBlairRhodes

How filmmakers are covering the impact of toxic masculinity

Years ago, I wrote a marketing column for Marketing News on companies targeting angry white males. There was a Bud Light commercial where there is a Ladies Night special on the basic brew.

That commercial could likely run today, especially with the rise in toxic masculinity. The "your body, my choice" approach is beyond misogynistic.

I couldn't help think about toxic masculinity while watching 2 French Canadian films during the WIFF Prize in Canadian Film contest in the 2024 Windsor International Film Festival. Both films felt similar is that there were about singular women deep in the woods. Turns out both films deal with toxic masculinity.

Let's start with Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse. Nina (Nahéma Ricci) is a sex worker who is headed to a different kind of plot. There is a showdown just off the road in a remote setting. Nina ends up in this guy's truck. He tells her that he could take her to this gathering of men who want to hunt in the woods. She has plenty of opportunity to bail but she goes along.

The men challenge her. They would probably call it teasing but they are clearly going really far in a short period of time. Nina is determined to hold her own. Theoretically, being a female sex worker means you run into a lot of masculinity. I might be freaked out but perhaps she isn't.

Annick Blanc give us an intriguing dynamic. A woman surrounded by toxic masculinity. Except. Blanc doesn't go in that direction. Instead of seeing what is outside the toxic masculinity pool, we get to swim in the pool throughout most of the film.

To our surprise, Nina's presence is almost ignored. The guys go on almost as if she isn't there. Nina is not in danger the way we think she might.

I don't want to give away too much. We have noted that the game changer isn't as impressive as we had hoped. What made me uncomfortable through most of the film was the idea that there was little to no break from the toxic masculinity. Blanc speaks to the idea of this before the film is over but not fast enough for some viewers.

Lucy Grizzli Sophie seems like an innocent adventure in the woods. Sophie (Catherine-Anne Toupin) is running away from something. Comes upon a remote bed and breakfast setup. Martin (Guillaume Cyr) is very polite, pointing out his Aunt Louise (Lise Roy) decides who can stay. Sophie doesn't seem concerned about this hurdle.

We discover why Sophie has gone into hiding, how she is being chased metaphorically online and by phone (involving changes to video games). Martin is a beaten down man who is subservient to Louise. Sophie encounters toxic masculinity but that isn't physically in her face. We don't want to give away anything too significant.

Martin is an example of where appearances are deceiving. He is a different example of a similar problem. Code switching. How women talk with each other versus how they talk to men. The toxic masculinity in Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse is the men away from the women they love. Nina being a sex worker or even attractive doesn't change their behavior. Martin changes his behavior depending on the audience.

There is the female cashier in the village in the Lucy Grizzli Sophie saga. Her current boyfriend breaks up with her because of a video online where she is topless. She doesn't know how the video got online.

Sophie has great empathy for her fellow female in being shamed online: Sophie with words and threats and the cashier with nudity.

Lucy Grizzli Sophie is not bathing in toxic masculinity like we see in Hunting Daze yet we definitely are a part of what is happening.

👨‍👦 Newfoundland filmmaker explores raising son in era of toxic masculinity in latest #documentary. More via @CBCNews → https://t.co/pPjIhKAEL0

🎦 See SONS on November 12 at the Fogo Island Inn, Nov 20 at the Clarenville Twin Cinemas and Nov 21 at the Garrick Threatre in… pic.twitter.com/Mvp84B72gJ

— National Film Board of Canada (@thenfb) November 12, 2024

Both films were written and directed by women. Annick Blanc wrote and directed Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse. Catherine-Anne Toupin wrote the original play La Meute and adapted the screenplay directed by Anne Émond. This definitely helps in the presentation in ways that a male writer and director would perhaps be too biased.

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review: French

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review: Documentaries

Sophie Dupuis has had a lot of masculinity, toxic and otherwise, in her 3 films: Chien de Garde, Underground | Souterrain, and Solo. A rare female writer/director who has very little empathy to women in her films.

We also should mention Russians at War. There is quite a bit of machismo: literally Russian soldiers in the act of war. That masculinity is presented without context.

Your humble narrator is not drawn to toxic masculinity, especially in heavy doses, on the screen. Yet, like a lot of subject matter, you have to get by what makes you uncomfortable. I was definitely uncomfortable through these 2 films, mostly through Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse.

Both are good films even if they are a bit too much to swallow. The only thing worse than toxic masculinity on the screen is toxic masculinity in real life.

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review

2024 Windsor International Film Festival preview

CanadianCrossing.com film reviews

CanadianCrossing.com film coverage

You could be forgiven if you don't want to think about toxic masculinity in film or real life. If you had invited me to watch these films and I knew what they were about, I might have run in the opposite direction. Yet I feel like I learned a lot from these films, even if I was uncomfortable at times.

Lise Roy, who played Aunt Louise in the play La Meute and film Lucy Grizzli Sophie. Roy led the Q&A after the screening I saw. I noticed a young woman come in just as the Q&A was about to start. Roy encouraged young women to speak about their reactions to the film. As much as I can be a show-off, I knew when not to raise my hand. The young woman near me asked her question. You can't get this kind of context in most screenings, especially streaming.

Lucy Grizzli Sophie is playing on Crave in Canada. Hopefully, both films will have U.S. distribution at some point. Try to see the film with someone who is more affected by toxic masculinity and then have a solid discussion. Sometimes, that can be the listening part.

Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person wins 2023 WIFF Prize in Canadian Film

Dealing with films about suicide that could be triggering

I wrote a similar story on films dealing with suicide after I encountered a family member choosing suicide in 2023. Not even film is going to have a Hallmark mentality. Some films are very real in the topics and plots. I can handle a fictional account of either subject a lot better than a documentary dealing with that topic. The one mentioned in the NFB tweet feels kinder and gentler on the topic.

video credit: Bud Light
photo credits: Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse; Lucy Grizzli Sophie
Twitter capture: @thenfb

Canadian TV notebook: Children Ruin Everything Season 4 comes to The CW this week

When we said the fall didn't have a lot of Canadian TV on the horizon, we did not factor in that Season 4 of Children Ruin Everything would start on The CW in the 2024 calendar year.

The U.S. network is starting out with back-to-back episodes on Black Friday at 9 pm Eastern.

Season 4 started on CTV on October 17. Kelly Fyffe-Marshall directed the first 2 episodes of Season 4.

There are 16 episodes in Season 4 of the CTV comedy.

The one spoiler that isn't really a spoiler is that the father (Aaron Abrams) has grown a beard.

You can catch up on previous seasons through CTV.ca or Crave in Canada and The CW in the United States.

American friends! 🇺🇸 Children Ruin Everything Season 4 is coming your way in just two weeks!

Catch back-to-back episodes Friday, November 29th starting at 9/8c on @thecw! pic.twitter.com/QnLRnDTKCr

— Children Ruin Everything (@childrenruin_tv) November 15, 2024

The CW is running the first 8 episodes in blocks of 2 episodes each on Fridays, lasting until December 20. The remaining 8 episodes will air at some point on CTV and The CW.

Canadian TV notebook: Murder in a Small Town debuts September 24 on Global and Fox

Murder in a Small Town is a decent show. Sure there is way too much crime for this small area of the Sunshine Coast in British Columbia. The two leads have been doing this dance of building a relationship but having that go quite poorly. The idea that Cassandra Lee (Kristin Kreuk) would be running around busy with library issues and that relationship and have a quiet, out of the way drink with a guy who looks creepy and was there to get revenge against Karl Alberg (Rossif Sutherland).

The supporting characters are actually interesting and well developed for a TV drama. Corporal Edwina Yen (Mya Lowe) is a good cop yet she sought out a complaining citizen about a traffic interaction with Constable Andy Kendrick (Fritzy-Klevans Destine). Cpl. Yen made the complaint go away, though the audience saw that the male officer was being creepy. A bit too realistic, sadly.

Sergeant Sid Sokolowski (Aaron Douglas) does a little bit of everything. Sid is the name Alberg calls out most often. Isabella Harbud (Savonna Spracklin) does a lot of observing but doesn't say much.

Though her best friend Zoe Strachan (Stana Katic) the one from the diner, is slowly disappearing from the TV landscape.

The show has also introduced Alberg's daughter, living at home because she smoked pot at the old school. What? This odd subplot might be part of the overall pattern, yet this feels more like a producer's note than a part of the creative process.

The drama runs on Fox and Global on Tuesday nights at 8 pm Eastern. The season finale (8 episodes) airs November 26.

Mike Bullard recently passed away at the relatively young age of 67. What is remarkable in the Canadian TV landscape is the lack of late-night shows. Bullard managed to have 2 late-night talk shows: Open Mike with Mike Bullard from 1997-2003 on CTV and The Mike Bullard Show from 2003-2004 on Global. Bullard won two Gemini awards for the CTV show.

There was a significant issue later in his career.

Canada desperately needs a late-night national TV show. Imagine if CTV had a late-night talk show that would appear on Crave the next day.

George Stroumboulopoulos had a late-night talk show on CBC. Thanks to Rogers Sportsnet hiring Stroumboulopoulos to host Hockey Night in Canada a decade ago, somehow Canada hasn't launched one since.

CBC should grab Shelved if CTV cancelled that show

The idea of a cultural test to determine truly Canadian content

While we are partial, in theory, to CBC in developing Canadian TV shows, the present and future may indeed be Crave. Underbelly, currently in production for Crave, features Stephen Amell, Hamza Haq, Tamara Podemski, and English actor Minnie Driver.

We watched a lot of Canadian films on Crave so we didn't have too much time for Canadian TV shows. We watched a few minutes of the opening episode for Don't Even, but not enough to give any analysis.

We wouldn't tell you how to spend your media money but CBC Gem and Crave in Canada will give you a lot of good Canadian TV. I noted that in meeting Don McKellar in Windsor that he promoted his new project The Sympathizer (Crave in Canada and Max in the United States). I don't know how "Canadian" it is, something that is less obvious in television.

CanadianCrossing.com Canadian TV coverage

Bob McKeown is retiring from The Fifth Estate with CBC News. McKeown hosted the investigative program for 31 years with his final appearance coming on November 29 with The Fifth Estate: 50 Years of Truth (9 pm/9:30 NT).

There is a lot to appreciate in McKeown's TV journalism career. You don't find too many TV journalists who graduated from Yale University (1971) and serving as a freelance sports commentator while playing for his hometown Ottawa Rough Riders of the CFL. McKeown even won a Grey Cup and was an all-star.

CanadianCrossing.com television coverage

No Letterkenny on Christmas Day (Canada) and Boxing Day (United States). I would settle for Run the Burbs Season 3 under the tree. Either Hulu or The CW. Or have Hulu give me the $ to buy Season 3 of the CBC show. CBC Gem is an option in Canada for this show.

video credit: New Metric Media
Twitter capture: @childrenruin_tv
photo credit: Murder in a Small Town

NHL notebook: Kenzie Lalonde is the first female play by play person for TSN

If Sparty had whispered to this three-year-old girl that one day she would wake up on a Tuesday morning and call play-by-play for the Ottawa Senators, she wouldn’t have believed him.

I am incredibly excited to be in the booth tonight for my first @Senators game on @TSN_Sports pic.twitter.com/OeZ4f4vqh4

— Kenzie Lalonde (@KenzieTSN) November 12, 2024

Kenzie Lalonde will be in the rotation to call Ottawa Senators games this season on TSN5. Lalonde made her NHL debut on November 12. Lalonde is the first woman to call a NHL game on TSN.

Lalonde has called quite a bit of women's hockey for TSN. She also serves as the home host on Montréal Canadiens games on TSN2 and the Montréal Alouettes of the CFL.

We had thought Lalonde could be in the mix for Senators games before Matt Cullen was hired.

There is no surprise that Lalonde is getting this opportunity. We congratulate Lalonde, TSN, and the Senators for making this happen.

Leah Hextall was the first woman to call a NHL game in either the United States or Canada. Hextall, along with Cassie Campbell-Pascall, were on the call on International Women's Day on March 8, 2020. Hextall has since called NHL games on ESPN. 

The Winnipeg Jets lost their second game of the season on November 14. The Edmonton Oilers lost their second game on October 12, 4 days into the season on the way to a 3-game losing streak. The Jets were 15-1 at their apex this season, the fastest team to 15 wins in NHL history.

They say in hockey that you can lose a shot in the playoffs with a slow start but you can't guarantee the playoffs early in the season. The Jets look like a genius right now hiring Scott Arniel to replace the retired Rick Bowness as head coach.

The team has a quality core, including Mark Scheifele, Nikolaj Ehlers, Josh Morrissey on defence, the most underrated scorer in Kyle Connor, and the best U.S. born current goalie in Connor Hellebuyck.

The astute Winnipeg crowd recently greeted Dallas goaltender Jake Oettinger by chanting "U.S. backup" meaning for the 4 Nations Face-Off in February.

Winnipeg has had successful regular season performances yet has struggled in the NHL playoffs of late. The Jets had home-ice advantage this spring but lost to Colorado in 5 games.

The healthy start has sparked a nearly 16% attendance increase at Canada Life Centre. That game with Dallas was moved up from Hockey Night in Canada to accommodate the Winnipeg Blue Bombers home West Division final against the Saskatchewan Roughriders.

While we would like a Canadian team to win the Stanley Cup, we have a soft spot for Winnipeg because the team (1.0 and 2.0) has never been to the Stanley Cup finals. Toronto, Montréal, Calgary, and Edmonton have won the Cup (though the Maple Leafs last win and appearance was in 1967). Vancouver and Ottawa have been in the finals: Senators once (2007) and Canucks (1982, 1994, 2011) thrice.

Still a long way to go but nice going with a solid start.

Regina is the 14th Canadian city – and second in Saskatchewan – to play host to a regular-season NHL game (indoors or outdoors). #NHLStats #HeritageClassic pic.twitter.com/jTyissSQWl

— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) October 27, 2019

The NHL brought up an intriguing statistic in the wake of the 2019 Heritage Classic: which Canadian cities had hosted a NHL regular season game. At the time, we asked the NHL Public Relations via Twitter for help on the missing city, since we came up with 13 cities. No one got back to us.

• Winnipeg, Montréal, Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, Kanata, Vancouver — current Canadian cities with a NHL franchise
• Quebec City — Canadian city with a previous NHL franchise
• Ottawa — early NHL days and the 2017 NHL 100 Classic
• Saskatoon, Hamilton, Halifax — Canadian cities that hosted NHL games from 1992-1994
• Regina — 2019 Heritage Classic host

We know from the cryptic clue that the missing city is not in Saskatchewan. Can't say I gave up but didn't think we would find out the answer.

Turns out the missing Canadian city is … Windsor, Ontario. Border Cities Arena, later Windsor Arena, hosted the Detroit Cougars in the 1926-1927 season (one "home" game was at Madison Square Garden). Olympia Stadium opened in the fall of 1927. The Montréal Maroons played a Chicago "home" game in Windsor on March 2, 1929.

The amusing part is that Windsor Arena, former home of the Windsor Spitfires, is a building I know quite well as a local landmark during my film festival visits. The old barn sits at the northeast corner of McDougall Street and Wyandotte Street East in downtown Windsor. I stayed very close to there in 2022-2023 during stays for the Windsor International Film Festival.

Somehow, I figured that the one of the teams involved had to be Canadian, besides the Montréal Maroons road game in Windsor in 1929.

Sometimes, a city hosted games under atypical scenarios. Le Colisee de Quebec in Quebec City hosted 5 Philadelphia Flyers "home" games in March 1968 after a snowstorm damaged the Flyers home arena. Maybe when the next NHL commissioner arrives, we can think about neutral-site regular season games: The early 1990s experiment brought 8 games to Hamilton; 6 to Saskatoon; and 3 to Halifax.

NHL notebook: First look at Monday Night Hockey on Prime Video Canada

NHL Network is going out of its way to not pick up the Amazon Prime Video feed on Monday night games involving Canadian teams, specifically October 21 and November 4. The U.S. channel didn't have an issue with Sportsnet carrying the Hometown Hockey or the Monday Night Hockey games. When that channel doesn't pick up the Prime Video game, those outside any blackout area can watch that feed on ESPN+.

The NHL Network is usually scared of carrying all-Canadian matchups. The rare exception has been Montréal-Toronto. The U.S. channel on November 9 picked up Ottawa-Boston over Montréal-Toronto.

Couldn't figure out the logic until I realized that this was Ottawa goaltender Linus Ullmark's return to Boston. Oops. A potential rant squashed.

John Garrett spent last Saturday night on Rogers Sportsnet in the Miami suburbs so Garrett is still doing the semi-retired thing. Even if Garrett is "old," he can still dance analysis circles around Louie DeBrusk.

We don't remember, and aren't going to look up, whether Ray Ferraro ever worked for NBC. We definitely know Ferraro has worked for ABC. Ferraro has worked twice on CBC this fall, both involving Vancouver home games: October 26 with Pittsburgh and November 16 with Chicago.

Those games were simulcast on Citytv Western affiliates in Calgary, Edmonton, and Vancouver, so over the air just not national across Citytv.

My son is 9. Loves hockey. We live in Boise, Idaho. 340 miles to SLC. 495 miles to Seattle. 621 miles to Vegas. 816 miles to Denver. We are blacked out from all of their home games! He can’t watch McKinnon, Eichel, or Makar. Wake up @nhl. Grow the game. @spittinchiclets #Joke

— DeLetty (@GrahamDeLaet) November 14, 2024

Baseball and hockey are similar in that teams take on huge tracts of land as their "territory." The Los Angeles area has 2 teams, both of whom are subject to blackout. Those residents have an option to watch the games. People in Boise do not. In other words, if you can't get the regional sports network to watch a team, you shouldn't be blacked out from watching the games (the tweet says home games but all the non-national games are blacked out).

Boise is about 640 miles from Vancouver and 890 miles from Calgary. This frustrated NHL fan could watch Vancouver and Calgary games on ESPN+ with no blackouts, unless those teams are playing Seattle, Las Vegas, Utah, and Colorado. Ugh.

Buffalo Sabres in southern Ontario and Detroit Red Wings in the Windsor area have huge disconnects. There was an effort to get the Sabres games with Bell Media in southern Ontario but that only lasted 3 seasons (2013-2016). Windsor residents can watch the NFL Lions via their local Fox and CBS outlets but MLB, NBA, and NHL games are trapped on the poorly named FanDuel Sports Network Detroit (the Bally Sports outlets flipped to the unfortunate name recently).

The distance is in the 10s of miles instead of the hundreds for this NHL hungry fan in Boise.

Our Canadian friends have different issues in terms of outlets and coverage. Living in the States means you can watch more Canadian teams in action, outside of local blackouts and U.S. national games, via ESPN+ than those living in Canada.

Canadian television stations theoretically have the capability of multiple subchannels, such as we see in the United States, yet there isn't a need (desire?) to do so. If you know why they don't, let us know in the comments.

2024-2025 NHL preview: Cutting back significantly on our NHL coverage

2024 NHL preseason schedule

Chicago NHL fans have a different dilemma this season. Older type fans remember the days when a Hawks home stand meant the team disappeared from the planet. Dollar Bill Wirtz implemented home TV blackouts for decades, regardless of sellouts.

The Chicago (NHL) coverage flipped in October from NBC Sports Chicago to the new Chicago Sports Network (CHSN), along with the White Sox (MLB) and Bulls (NBA). Some Chicago area viewers do have access to the games but many don't.

The new sports outlet is on WJYS 62.2 and 62.3 via an antenna but not on Xfinity in Chicago. A lot of fans can't access those channels via an antenna. Not everyone lives in a house with an antenna on a roof. Reportedly, the technology behind the signals and the way the signals are compressed, those with older TVs (as in purchases before the COVID-19 pandemic) can't receive the signals even with an antenna. From the CHSN Wikipedia page: "The subchannels for CHSN via WJYS require an ATSC tuner that supports MPEG-4 video codec."

Some are reporting an odd dynamic where they can hear the audio of the TV feed but not the video. We haven't heard these issues with other NHL teams using compression signal issues from subchannels, just in Chicago. The guy in Boise would greatly benefit from NHL TV deals on subchannels in Boise to watch those 4 NHL teams.

We are excited about the move with some teams to an over-the-air solution for NHL fans. The channels generally picked are accessible to the vast majority of the market. Just because a subchannel is used shouldn't be a deterrent. We should note that cable companies theoretically (sports or not) are supposed to carry all the over-the-air channels in the market.

CHSN is available in South Bend, IN on 16.2 and 16.4 (WNDU). That should be easier for those in South Bend to get that signal unless the same compression signal issues are in force. Anecdotally, I can't even get the 62.1 WJYS signal since the NHL season started, much less 62.2 and 62.3.

The negotiation has been along the lines of CHSN wanting the basic tier (will never happen) and Xfinity wanting the channels on a higher tier than what NBC Sports Chicago had. NBC Sports Chicago was on a secondary tier (Xfinity had a 30% ownership share in NBC Sports Chicago). A higher tier would mean a lot of fans could have access but not the money to afford to watch.

The Chicago NHL team has Connor Bedard on the ice and Rick Ball and Darren Pang, one of the best announcing teams in a U.S. market. A lot of Chicago NHL fans can't watch them. Ball left Calgary for this mess. Even if I could get the signal, I would write these words for those who can't watch.

We get that this is a transition time in the world of covering sports and a decade from now will have a dramatically different perspective.

We will update this situation on a future NHL notebook.

Edmonton Oilers fell short of the dream of winning the Stanley Cup

Connor McDavid became the 4th fastest NHL player to 1,000 points (goals and assists). McDavid accomplished the feat in game number 659. The 3 fastest are Wayne Gretzky (424), Mario Lemieux (513), and Mike Bossy (656). McDavid, 27, is the 4th youngest player ever to reach 1,000 points. There are now 99 NHL players to reach 1,000 points.

His teammate Leon Draisaitl factored in on 446 of McDavid's first 1,001 career points.

CanadianCrossing.com NHL coverage

Elliotte Friedman reported on the 32 Thoughts column that in terms of upcoming Canadian media rights, the NHL triggered a 60-day window to negotiate with Rogers that begins on January 1.

The NHL notebooks are a way for us to cover the league in ways where we feel more comfortable these days.

photo credits: NHL; @NHLJets
Twitter captures: @PR_NHL; @GrahamDeLaet

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review

The 2024 Windsor International Film Festival was a grand 11-day celebration of Canadian film. Felt like I saw a lot more Canadian film in the 2024 version. The titles may not have been as exciting as those last year yet some very strong Canadian films.

The chase for the 2024 WIFF Prize in Canadian Film shifted away from French-speaking Canadian films, going from 7 to 3, comparing to last year. 2 of the films had very different languages in Farsi and Arabic.

We divided our film reviews into English, French (and other), and Documentaries at the bottom of this page. Any other language films fall into the French file, such as Korean in The Mother and the Bear. We even have French-language documentaries. There were 2 documentaries on the WIFF Prize in Canadian Film list in 2024.

Who Do I Belong To wins 2024 WIFF Prize in Canadian Film

Drama Who Do I Belong To? directed by Meryam Joobeur wins the $25,000 WIFF Prize in Canadian Film at @WindsorFilmFest. Producer Annick Blanc accepts the award. #WIFF24 pic.twitter.com/pPpQn2GWFE

— POV Magazine (@POVmagazine) October 27, 2024

Your humble narrator didn't get a chance to see the 2024 WIFF Prize in Canadian film winner. The judges made a bold choice in the 2024 winner in picking 1 of the 2 films that were not visibly Canadian. The 2023 WIFF Prize in Canadian film winner was a clever film that definitely was visibly Canadian. This may be the Canadian film I think about the most, which makes the choice wonderful in my book.

I do hope to get to the 3 films I wasn't able to see at WIFF 2024.

We had high hopes for Do I Know You from Somewhere and Can I Get a Witness. The former was an interesting film experiment while the latter film brought me to tears in a good way. The Players and Tell Me Why Things Are So Beautiful were very pleasant surprises. There may be something to seeing a film at 9 am.

Sharp Corner delivered on what it set out to do. Singing Back the Buffalo will make you care about the animal even if you never thought about the buffalo.

While Shepherds | Bergers was a way better film than Solo (in terms of Best Canadian Film at the Toronto International Film Festival), the story was even less visibly Canadian than Solo. Frustrating to watch Canadian films that don't reflect Canadian society be placed on a higher pedestal as a result.

Canadian film review: Finding Don McKellar

Twitch City is where my love for Canada started

Last year's celebrity sighting was briefly waving to Maxime Giroux and seeing Atom Egoyan off in the distance. This year, I got to meet Lise Roy, a veteran Quebec actor. Roy was in Lucy Grizzli Sophie. I knew I recognized her from films. We agreed that Tom at the Farm was one of them. I remembered later and told her I saw her in Endorphine, a bizarre and good film where Roy, Sophie Nelisse, and Mylène Mackay (who was in 2 films in the 2024 festival) play incarnations of the same character.

I found out on site that Don McKellar was the jury president for the WIFF Prize in Canadian Film. I really wanted to meet him but would go to no great lengths to meet him. In between films on that Saturday, I ran into McKellar in the lobby of the Capitol Theatre in Windsor.

I totally went fan boy into how much I appreciated and enjoyed his work. McKellar told me after a few accolades that I wasn't bluffing. He did tell me to check out his latest work The Sympathizer. I appreciate that about an artist.

Real life, outside this film festival, is a struggle. This was a nice boost that I hope carries me back into reality. It was an absolute honour.

2024 Windsor International Film Festival preview

2024 TIFF wrapup

2023 WIFF Canadian films in review

CanadianCrossing.com film reviews

CanadianCrossing.com film coverage

Sugarcane runs next month on the National Geographic channel and will be on Hulu. We didn't get a chance to see the Indigenous documentaries Beyond Extinction and Wilfred Buck. We hope to see them at some point.

We rarely talk about missed opportunities. 299 Queen Street West was the closing night film last year. An unwritten rule is if there is a chance a film may never get out, watch it in the moment. We gambled and lost since Crave never released the film due to music licensing issues. That will be harder to find even than Inconvenient Indian.

The Tragically Hip: No Dress Rehearsal is a 4-part series available on Prime Video in Canada and the United States.

The producers of Intercepted pulled the film from the festival over the appearance of Russians at War. We talked about that last week.

We didn't get a chance to see Who By Fire from Philippe Lesage. The film is rather long and other reviewers weren't wild about the film. Maybe at some point down the road.

Local films Thundersnake and Vampire Zombies … from Space! were pretty good for the parts we saw. Unfortunately, due to circumstances, we were unable to finish either film.

photos credit: me
Twitter capture: @POVmagazine

Overview English French Documentaries

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review: English

The strength of the English language Canadian film lineup in 2024 was outside the WIFF Prize in Canadian Film category, as we only saw 2 of the 3 titles. Some very pleasant surprises from films we knew little about. None of them were particularly bad.

Players, The Emily (Stefani Kimber) is a teenage girl who is excited about trying out for an avant garde theatre troupe in Toronto in the summer of 1994. Emily is even happier after she gets accepted. She has some emotional holes in her life and fills them up with the love of theatre. She soon finds herself immersed in this world, including smoking and later drinking. The director Reinhardt (Eric Johnson) wants to take the show and Emily to Montréal. Marley (Jess Salgueiro) is one of the veteran actors who take a shine to Emily and protects her. Then Marley leaves the troupe. Is Emily more vulnerable? Sarah Galea-Davis takes us intimately into this space and weaves a compelling story. You feel like Galea-Davis or someone she knows truly has lived this story. Kimber is amazing as a young actor who has to carry this film. The #MeToo element may be difficult for some to watch but the message is powerful and entertaining.

Shook This film paints Scarborough as being light years from downtown Toronto, especially if you miss the last TTC train of the night and have to take the blue night bus. Our main character Ashish (Saamer Usmani) is a writer who had a good novella but is struggling with a short story. He meets a barista Claire (Amy Forsyth) who makes the moves on Ashish. He is also struggling with his estranged father being diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease. Amar Wala had done documentaries and this is his feature film debut. Wala gives Ashish real friends and they have lives outside of Ashish. Too often we see men struggle alone in films without much support. Ashish and Claire struggle to be on the same page, in part because Ashish is stuck in the many facets that is his world in the moment. A very quiet, delightful mature film.

Darkest Miriam Miriam is a librarian at the Allan Gardens branch of the Toronto Public Library. Miriam shakes books hoping to find secret notes on the inside. She love reading stories to children. The stories that she tells about her father changes over time. Miriam meets a man, a taxi driver as they share lunch outside of the library branch. They date. She deals with odd interactions within the library and gets strange notes. This is a dark film as the title implies. Miriam is not as dark but her world certainly is. When she is with her boyfriend, the lighting is very dim. An odd sort of film but you find yourself wanting to know more about Miriam.

Do I Know You From Somewhere? This film plays with relationships where we start out with Benny and Olive, who meet at a wedding. They are in a cabin. Olive is searching for something but doesn't know what. Soon other things and people disappear and letters end up on the refrigerator, spelling out something from a different plane. Who is Ada? Cece? What about Cece's wagon. Those expecting a linear presentation will be severely disappointed. Enjoyed the film for what it was trying to do but you could feel incomplete after watching the film. One of 2 films in the festival (Drive Me Home) set in New Brunswick. I liked the film overall but can easily see why others many not have the patience to follow along. The film is shockingly short but fit the time needed to tell the story.

Can I Get A Witness? Ann Marie Fleming dazzled us with Window Horses: The Poetic Persian Epiphany of Rosie Ming in 2016. The idea of a fable in a world that settled climate change but people had to die at 50 was tremendously intriguing. Kiah (Keira Jang) is starting her first day as a witness along with seasoned witness Daniel (Joel Oulette). Ellie (Sandra Oh, the main voice in Window Horses) is going through stuff in her home as she wishes her daughter good luck in her new career. Kiah and Daniel go along on bicycles since there are no more cars. The older people have varied reactions to the necessity of their demise. Fleming uses drawings to supplement the live action footage. Kiah draws the events since photography is too unsettling in this world. Your humble narrator saw parallels to Last Night, the Don McKellar (1998) featuring Oh. There are a handful of films that bring on a lot of tears and this film made me cry more than any film in recent memory. Tears of joy for such a beautiful telling of a story. Thoughtful, very meaningful, and a simple delight to watch. I will find this film and see it 2, maybe 3 times.

Sweetland A very dark and laid-back film based on plans to gather everyone out of a rural Newfounland fishing village. One man is reluctant to leave everything he knows. Eventually, he agrees to leave but he finds himself as the last one left in the town. He wanders around the deserted village for awhile. You need to be in a mood to absorb all that you see. A little hard to follow until you realize some of these details aren't that important. More of a feeling in watching this film. As unofficially required of a Newfoundland film, Mary Walsh and Andy Jones have small roles. Watch this on a cloudy day or a very dark night.

Kaniehtiio Horn channelled her rage into Seeds, her directorial debut (Q with Tom Power)

Seeds Kaniehtiio Horn has a lot to do in this film: actor (her day job) as well as writer/director (her feature length debut). Ziggy is a young Mohawk woman who becomes an influencer for a seed company. She is interrupted when she has to go back to help out family on the reservation. Her fellow reservation people tell her she is a sellout. Soon she discovers a more sinister element at work once she is on the reservation. Horn uses Graham Greene as himself as an elder providing Ziggy advice from some plane of existence. This film is a message film about not having corporate control and protection over food production. There are elements of a horror film at times but not a true horror film. A reasonably clever plot point, Horn as an actor carries out her own creative process. Your humble narrator is biased because we are fans of Horn. Still, the film is a nice debut with something to say without being preachy.

40 Acres The Freemans are a Black and Indigenous family defending their farmland in Canada in a post-apocalyptic world where food is scarce. Hailey (Danielle Deadwyler) and her partner Galen (Michael Greyeyes) are in charge. Hailey is not very trusting, which is mostly good in the world where they are. There is a lot of shooting and killing in this film. Reminded me at times of the Jeff Barnaby film Blood Quantum, which featured Greyeyes. R.T. Thorne is definitely aware of food and history and wars involving food. Besides the 40 Acres title, there is a reference to the spice wars, where thousands, if not millions, died over the trade of spices. If you can get past the violence, your eyes will be open in a good way to a strong presentation of an intriguing plot.

Aberdeen Aberdeen (Gail Maurice) has been through a lot. Generational trauma with residential schools. Massive flooding forced her off of the reservation and stuck in Winnipeg hotels for 4 years. She gets kicked out of the hotel and is living on the streets. The search for her missing IDs — in part due to police harassment — is a metaphor for deeper pain. Her daughter (Darla Contois, Little Bird) is strung out on drugs. Aberdeen finds out her grandkids are in foster care, but she isn't in a position to take care of them herself. A trip back to the reservation and a meeting with an old friend Grace (Jennifer Podemski) helps her attitude a bit. Ryan Cooper and Eva Thomas, in their directorial debut, bring us a hard film to absorb but resist the temptation to stop watching. This is worth the depressive feeling you get part way through the film.

Drive Back Home This film has a lot going for it: opposites in brothers, road trip, period piece (1970), a film set in New Brunswick, being hidden and gay, English-French language divide. A elderly mother insists her son in Stanley, New Brunswick pick up his brother in Toronto and drive him back. The Toronto man is caught essentially being a homosexual. The condition for release is if a relative would come pick you up. The script is realistic and the dynamics between the brothers is fascinating. English actor Alan Cumming wears the hidden persona well, all the way down to his bad hairpiece. An important film that happens to be entertaining.

WIFF Prize in Canadian Film

Paying for It Sook-Yin Lee knows this story all too well, the telling of Chester Brown's (Dan Beirne) graphic novel. After they break up in real life, he decides to pay for sex instead of dealing with the emotional element of relationships. Sonny (Emily Lê) is Lee's alter ego and struggles with actual relationships. Brown has actual cartoonist friends and they are real characters in this drama. The film is rather realistic about the aspects of paying for sex. Beirne/Brown is naked often on screen, all tastefully done yet in context of reality. While the film may seem to be about sex, the story is really about the different directions of human relationships. You don't feel like Lee put her ego into this excursion, reflecting a reasonably objective presentation of material she knows quite well. There is an intimacy to this film yet also exposes the lack of intimacy in the interactions with the sex workers. Not a film for the kids, but a first date or second date film to get the conversation going about the dynamic of relationships.

Sharp Corner Jason Buxton waited 12 years to deliver a second feature, a rather unusual tale from rural Nova Scotia (his home province). Josh (American actor Ben Foster) and Rachel (Cobie Smulders) find the perfect home for them and their son. Turns out their new home is a magnet for car crashes. This horrifies Rachel, who is also concerned for her son. Josh has a very different reactions to the car crashes. He builds intimacy with the victims, such as stealing the phone from a dying man and uploading that content to his work computer. The spiral of Josh is the key path of the film. Rachel and her son get out of the house. She makes selling the house part of the divorce deal, which hampers his increased desire, on some level, to stay in the house. This film delivers what it promises, which is a lot of what you want from a film. This isn't quite a horror film but does have some of its qualities, more of a psychological drama.

We didn't get a chance to watch Really Happy Someday from J Stevens.

photo credit: 40 Acres
video credit: PÖFF | Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival

Overview English French Documentaries

2024 WIFF Canadian films in review: French

There was very little middle ground for French (and other languages) speaking Canadian films: very good and not so good. We had 3 strong French-speaking Canadian films up for the WIFF Prize in Canadian Film. Mylène Mackay was in 2 films.

Shepherds | Bergers A very pretty take on the French Alps as a Montréal copywriter abandons that world for a live of herding flocks of sheep. He gets teased for being Canadian yet we have no sense of who this person was before this adventure. Our protagonist happens to meet a female bureaucrat who leaves her world for sheep herding. The scenery in the French Alps was fun to view in a large theatre setting. The film is decent enough, a good first-date film (mostly). The major confusion was why this would be considered the Best Canadian Feature Film at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. The film is likely the best of the last 4 winners but that is a very low bar. Sophie Deraspe made a more consistent film than Antigone but a lighter one.

All Stirred Up! | Tous toqués! English Canada doesn't make broad comedies like le cinema de Quebec does. Julie LeBreton plays a tough border guard who ends up confiscating the tools and food of an arrogant chef, who didn't even cross the border. The twisted premise has her daughter, who gets picked on, entering a cooking contest. The chef gets drafted into helping the daughter (logic not needed in this film). The story is cute about the obsession of cooking, especially by children, and the need to win at all costs. Advisory: there will be truffles and lots of them. The story is entertaining enough and LeBreton helps that out. A film for the whole family that the adults can handle.

Sisters and Neighbours | Nos belles-sœurs This is the movie version of a long-time Quebecois musical (Les Belles-sœurs from Michel Tremblay) about a housewife who is the envy of the neighbourhood by winning 1 million golden stamps. Unfortunately for her, she needs help from the aforementioned sisters and neighbours. The songs and dialogue go deep into what women's lives were about in this bygone era. I asked a French Canadian friend if she knew most of the women involved and she did. I recognised a couple of the husbands. A light-hearted, amusing story that definitely survives the Bechdel Test.

1995 This is the 4th installment of the Ricardo Trogi saga about years and the impact on his world as seen through the eyes of Quebec actor Jean-Carl Boucher, who has played Trogi. He almost gives up on being a filmmaker when he gets a shot at a reality show where people travel around the world to make short films. The Trogi films are very broad in its comedy and this one follows that pattern. The breakdown of getting a new camera through customs in Cairo is genius, insane, very real, and way too much of the film. The finally, very serious film is really good, almost too good given the character. Trogi has created this awkward, somehow lovable character over this time and we don't figure he will stop now. A fan more of 1987 and 1991 (there is also 1981), 1995 will satisfy fans of the ongoing saga.

Tell Me Why These Things Are So Beautiful | Dis-moi pourquoi ces choses sont si belles Marie-Victorin Kirouac (Alexandre Goyette) and Marcelle Gauvreau (Mylène Mackay) are like-minded souls who have cheated death and are botanists. Their relationship remains platonic because he is a clergyman. There is an incredible intimacy, a lot of this being verbal. I want to see this film to make notes on the dialogue. Porquoi? C'est difficile to explain. You have to watch to see for yourself. I feared this would be a boring, period piece of "will they, won't they." Thank goodness we get a meaningful film from writer/director Lyne Charlebois. I used to predict whether films would get released in the States. This one not so likely, which is a shame because a meaningful film such as this one deserves a larger audience.

Bonjour Tristesse The line I whispered to my friend while watching this: "I want to be this rich but I don't want to be this boring." There is more to this remake of the 1958 film but not much. Spoiled kid Cécile (American actor Lily McInerny) likes her father's girlfriend Elsa (French actor Nailia Harzoune). The father pushes Elsa aside for an old family friend, Anne (American actor Chloë Sevigny). Cécile and Anne don't like each other. Watching this film made me want to watch the Jean Seberg version from 1958. Harzoune, who is perfectly cast, and Sevigny, who is poorly cast, are the only ones fighting to make that film better. Durga Chew-Bose had one good scene: a non-verbal shot of the 3 women — Cécile, Elsa, and Anne — eating apples. This is a 4-country co-production so blame the other countries for this disappointing effort.

Evergreen$ The introduction to the premise is brief, which is thankful. A young male loser in Quebec gets into quick debt and needs a way to make fast money. He finds about selling Christmas trees in New York City. He goes with a friend but the friend is caught at the border. The New York City situation doesn't go terribly well, but he meets some good people along the way. He even meets a female partner who has her own dreams. This film feels a New York City film with splashes of Quebec. A good film to get a sense of the underground economy. You almost wish the debt wasn't hanging over his head. I had low expectations for this film and this story got to me.

Ababooned | Ababouiné This is a fictional film with enough real moments to feel like a documentary. This film shows us the impact of the Catholic Church before the Quiet Revolution in Faubourg à m'lasse district in Montréal. Radio station wars. Baseball (Montréal Royals). Standing up to authority. Protest. The divide between church and state, especially in education. Éric Bruneau, whom you might remember from Coroner, plays a priest so horrible that he reminded me of a cross between Doug Neidermeyer of Animal House and current federal opposition leader Pierre Poilievre. A very strong portrayal of a scary character. Remy Girard is beautifully cast as the cardinal with all the eccentricities one would have in that era. There are kids in this film and some rather adult themes, so keep that in mind with little ones in watching this film. You will ride several roller coasters in this film yet the trip is worth the watch.

Blue Sky Jo | La petite et le vieux Hélène is a young girl who decides to go by the name Jo after a superhero she sees on TV. She is lost in the middle of several girls in her family in the Limoilou neighbourhood of Quebec City. Searching for independence, she starts a newspaper delivery route and befriends an older man Roger, an elderly neighbour with a past to her parents. There is a battle over baseball hats and loyalties between the Montréal Expos and the New York Yankees. This gets tied back to The Old Man and the Sea. This is a movie about a kid as opposed to a kids movie. Still, Jo is an enchanting character who has to carry the film and does so well. The film is based from the Marie-Renée Lavoie 2010 novel La petite et le vieux. Was good to see a story about a girl that age handled with maturity and still be entertaining.

You'll Never Know | Tu ne sauras jamais This is the film you thought would be made when we were trapped in the depths of the pandemic. The old man is trapped in his room in a nursing home wanting to see his love, who is elsewhere in the home. Robin Aubert gives us an interesting premise. Aubert presents a world of isolation. The problem is that the old man's life is boring and we are bored watching it. The opening 7-minute shot of a bare wall produced a verbal reaction within the theatre that was likely not what Aubert intended. Let's say that Aubert chose to spend way more time in the room than theoretically why we are there: the chase for his love. If that part of the story is what draws you to this film, fast forward through most of the film. Film students will have an appreciation for Aubert's efforts, but this does not translate for the overall audience.

Hidden Woman, The | La Femme cachée A Montréal couple have a daughter. The woman is pregnant and everything is great … until they find out they are having a boy. Then she confesses to her husband that she has this family she has kept secret. By the way, they are in France but not the cool part of France. While you figure out quickly that all of this is tied to her having a boy, the film takes its sweet time making us wait. Halima (French actor Nailia Harzoune) works her way slowly through a maze of relatives. Sylvain (Antoine Bertrand) plays the husband who keeps getting shocked but comes back for more. The gender reversal in this dynamic is the most exciting part of the film. If Sylvain had taken his young daughter to the beach and had a boring time, that would have been more interesting than what we saw in this film.

Little Jesus We get a decent premise of a father, who went through a divorce, wanting to believe that his son can perform miracles. Antoine Bertrand plays the father. He isn't a believer but is intrigued by the idea of his son being one. That is about the extent of the interesting part of the film. Bertrand has to carry the film and there isn't much there in terms of the script. If you need a French-Canadian film that is sort of cute and not likely plausible, you have a pick for the night.

You Are Not Alone | Vous n'êtes pas seuls There is romance, a bit, and definitely science fiction in this film. Léo, a pizza delivery man, loves working the night shift to not think about love. Ultimately, he falls in love with Rita, a singer. Meanwhile, an alien in human form is chasing after Léo. The alien is also craving the fire. These dual movies sort of co-exist within this film. The science fiction part was hard to follow and there wasn't enough of the romance part. There was a message in this film but we had a difficult time finding what this was.

Mother And The Bear, The The plot of the film involves a young woman of Korean descent who slips and falls on ice in Winnipeg. Her mother comes from Korea to take care of her daughter. She discovers that she doesn't really know her daughter. She searches for a man for her daughter, not realizing her daughter's partner is hidden from her mother's knowledge. The film is cute in that the mother meets a Korean man who runs a restaurant in Winnipeg. The film is pleasant but not challenging in a lot of ways. Johnny Ma, whom you might remember from his debut Old Stone (2016), brings us a mild, fish out of water story that is pleasant and forgettable to a point.

WIFF Prize in Canadian Film

Universal Language We covered this film in an earlier review.

Canadian film review: Universal Language

Hunting Daze | Jour de chasse Toxic masculinity dominates this film as well as Lucy Grizzli Sophie. We will explore the overall topic in film soon. Annick Blanc puts us in the woods with sex worker Nina (Nahéma Ricci, the lead in Antigone) at a men's hunting gathering. Nina seems capable of handling herself with a group of men oozing in toxic masculinity. A newcomer comes into the group. The impression is that this is a game-changer. Blanc mostly gives us the different mechanisms of that toxic masculinity like a tornado where we can't escape. I left this film feeling very dissatisfied initially. After a few days, I felt a bit better about this film but recognise some flaws within. This film at times feels like a documentary on toxic masculine men. Might be worth watching it once if the topic doesn't trigger you but you won't want to watch the film twice.

Lucy Grizzli Sophie Toxic masculinity is portrayed online in this film also set in the woods. Sophie (Catherine-Anne Toupin) is definitely running away from something where she takes refuge in a rural bed and breakfast. Louise (Lise Roy) runs the place but Sophie interacts mostly with Louise's nephew Martin (Guillaume Cyr). We see flashbacks to what Sophie is running away from, as in toxic masculinity online. The film is a psychological drama as we try to figure out the pieces in the puzzle. We don't want to say too much but this film is definitely worth watching in terms of the content and presentation. Also intriguing to work with a film with 3 primary characters. Toupin wrote the original play La Meute and adapted the screenplay directed by Anne Émond. This is significant because this was the first film Émond has directed but not written.

On Earth As in Heaven | Sur la terre comme au ciel Clara and Sarah live in a restrictive Christian cult just outside of Montréal. Sarah runs away from the cult headed for Montréal. Clara, armed with Sarah's secret notebook, goes to Montréal to find her sister. Their Aunt Louise (Édith Cochrane) didn't follow her sister to the cult. Clara finds Louise and asks to stay there while she finds her sister. We see Louise as a flawed character. Clara is a fish out of water. Some aspects she conquers with ease yet potato chips confuse her. When you recognise that the film is more about Clara finding herself instead of Sarah, the more you will enjoy the film. While we find some structural issues with the film from Nathalie Saint-Pierre, the story is overall enjoyable. Montréal makes for a wonderful co-star.

We didn't get a chance to see Who Do I Belong To from Meryam Joobeur. The film's language is Arabic, not French. We include films in languages other than English — that aren't documentaries — in this column.

photo credit: Lucy Grizzli Sophie
video credit: WIFF

Overview English French Documentaries