Grand River Film Festival By Bus, Part 2

Last time in my downtown adventure to get a haircut, I left off just having discovered the Children's Museum downtown and picked up an excellent (hand-pressed!) Americano from Exhibit Cafe and Lounge. From here, it was time to go hunt down the GIG Music Hall, since I'd never even noticed it before while downtown.

I had just turned around to head down King and I saw the Walper Hotel, where the Grand River Film Festival's Indie Lounge is taking place on Saturday. It's right across the street, which makes sense as the Indie Lounge is being held at both the Walper and the Children's Museum this Saturday and Sunday.

I probably won't be attending the Indie Lounge, but I was curious, so I decided to get up close and personal with the Walper. I don't know if this is where the Indie Lounge is taking place or not, but if anything says "indie film workshops" then this is it.

I took a right on Queen and got this shot of the front entrance, which does a little more justice to the venue. Since the GRFF is supposedly having Departures director Yojiro Takita attending parts of the Indie Lounge, I'd imagine they probably won't be having it in the reno-in-progress lounge.

From the Walper, I turned around and headed west on Queen St. to Duke St.

At Duke, you can take a left and head down to Ontario St. The GIG is located at 137 Ontario Street North, so I was getting pretty close!

Along the way I passed by the parking garage on Duke. I think this is the one that connects right into the back of the Children's Museum through this convoluted system, the way I got into the Andy Warhol exhibit in the winter. I think it was three bucks for the afternoon.

At Duke and Ontario, I turned right and walked up Ontario St. I still couldn't see the GIG and it was getting kind of cold, so I was a little concerned. I still needed to get my hair cut!

A little further up and there it is! It's basically invisible to the naked eye until you are right on top of the sign at the Ontario Tower. No wonder I'd never seen it before.

Even worse is when you finally get up there, there's no indication that there is any kind of venue inside other than the little "Gig Music Hall" sign, just this ominous set of stairs. If you go down the stairs though...

At the end of the tunnel there is a bright light. That's the GIG. If you look inside, you can see it actually looks like a pretty good venue! I tried to snap some pictures but it was way too dark inside.

That was the end of my adventure. It is surprisingly convenient and surprisingly enjoyable to walk around downtown after taking the GRT. In fact, because I hate parking downtown so much I might even give it another go when I see Departures at the Gig on Saturday. There's no way though, that I'm going to take the GRT to Cambridge. Just no way.

I made it to Diverse Barbershop with just enough time to spare and got a solid haircut.

Indie Lounge @ Grand River Film Festival

Since the GRFF can't get ahold of a 35 mm projector this year, most of their screenings are constrained to movies that are already out on DVD (Pontypool, Krabat, An American Crime, etc.). While this isn't stopping me from attending given that most of the films are screening somewhere in Kitchener (at the GIG or the Children's Museum), it definitely gives the Fest a second-hand feeling that founder Ken Nakamura is frustrated by.

One of the ways that Ken and the GRFF coordinators are trying to compensate for the low-intensity film selection is with workshops and other points of interest, such as their Indie Lounge, an ambiguous fashion party following Every Little Step, and their SHORT Shorts competition.

The Indie Lounge seems to be the most engaging of these events, although I'll be the first to admit that my cinematical abilities lay completely in the realm of "watching." Spread over the upcoming weekend at the Walper Hotel and the Children's Museum in Kitchener, the Indie Lounge is an outreach to those interested in the filming process, with workshops spanning digital lens discussion, fight scene choreography and editing. The roster for the event includes action stuntman/choreographer Simon Fon (winner of the "Best Action Sequence - Martial Arts Short" award at the US Action on Film International Film Festival) and "award winning editors who have worked on shows such as The Eleventh Hour, The Line, Dead Like Me, This is Wonderland."

The simultaneously weirdest and coolest part of the Indie Lounge (in my non-filmmaking opinion) are the live stunt demos that are open the public on Sunday at noon. From their website, it looks like they're going to have Randy Butcher light himself on fire, and Blair Johannes do a free fall from the top of the Children's Museum.


I'm not sure what the attendance rates are going to be for the Indie Lounge in particular, but I think that it's a clever side-step around the lack of film presence that also provides a much-needed attempt to engage the growing art scene in Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge. If nothing else it will hopefully inspire some local indie film makers, especially given that the two-day workshop is available to students for only $35, which includes lunch (if you register before Thursday) and coffee on both days. Passes are available for those of us in an older demographic for $60.


You can head over and check out the Indie Lounge blog for some behind-the-scenes information and an interview with one of the SHORT Short finalists, and if Twitter is your thing (like it is mine... sometimes), you can follow them here.

Grand River Film Festival By Bus, Part 1

On Tuesday I needed a haircut, which meant a trip to Diverse Barber Shop (60 Frederick St, great cuts for men) in downtown Kitchener. Since my car is out of commission, I decided to make an adventure out of it and take the bus. I was going to be walking around downtown anyway, so I figured I'd stop by the Waterloo Regional Children's Museum and GIG Music Hall, since I'm going to the Grand River Film Festival screening of Departures at the GIG next week, and might end up grabbing some tickets for whatever's screening at the Children's Museum as well. I actually went to the Children's Museum this past winter to check out their Andy Warhol exhibit (surprisingly good), but the GIG might as well have been on Mars.

The bus stop is pretty close to my house, so I headed down the street and waited for the Number 12 (Conestoga Mall/Fairview Mall). I think I was only waiting for around 10 minutes or so. The bus kind of sneaks up on you here and I was the only one waiting at the stop, so I didn't get a good picture. The fare was $2.25 one way, which is kind of expensive.

I took the 12 down past the universities, to King and University. It was pretty busy there, lots of students as usual. This was the only picture I was able to take because just as I got off the 12, the 7 pulled up and I had to run down the street to catch it. The last time I'd taken the GRT was in 2002 during my undergrad, and it was awful, so I was pleasantly surprised by the timeliness of the buses. The 7 driver even stopped for me because I was running to catch it, which was also a nice surprise.

King St. from the bus. The 7 goes straight down King St. to the Kitchener bus station, so my primitive plan was to eventually get off at the terminal and wander around.

Uptown Waterloo from my seat. Around this point in the trip things started getting noticeably more upscale. I remember when the only thing worth(?) going to Uptown Waterloo for was the Liquidation World in Waterloo Town Square.

Along the way, we passed by my favourite grocery in Kitchener (Korean And Japanese Grocery‎, 510 King St W) so I had to take a picture. I come here about once a month to stock up on fish balls and Ujinotsuyu brand tokuyo genmaicha. I don't know if you can find that tea anywhere else in the Waterloo region. It is quite honestly amazing.

Anyway. My original plan was to take the 7 right to the bus terminal, but it ended up stopping on King in front of City Hall so I jumped out. It was cold but sunny out, and there were a surprising number of not-sketchy people walking around. Usually I drive downtown and try to park on the side streets, avoiding King St. as much as possible.

There was something going on at Kitchener City hall, perhaps the filming of a made-for-TV-movie.

 From City Hall, I turned right and started walking down King Street.

 I walked by this building as I was meandering down King. If you can't read the text, this is an art gallery project for (I think) the University of Waterloo to showcase their visual arts program. It was empty, but was opening soon with a free event! Nice!

 Keep on walking down King and you will walk past the Center for the Performing Arts. Right beside it is the Children's Museum, which is actually easy to walk right past if you aren't paying attention. The only real identification is the huge "Watelroo Regional Children's Museum" sign, but it's tough to see if you're on the same side of the street.

Children's Museum found!

As an aside, the cafe beside the Children's Museum, Exhibit Cafe and Lounge, has a mean Americano. I stopped in briefly and the atmosphere was great, but I was too intimidated to take pictures and disturb people.

I went to go inside the Children's Museum and take some pictures, but they were closed. I think they close at 4:00 pm on weekdays. So, I took a creepy stalker/burglar shot for posterity.

Americano in hand, I set off to find the GIG...

In The Loop @ Princess Cinema

My ancient car has been letting out increasingly potent death rattles, occupying my recent attentions with concerns of the mechanical rather than the cinematical. However, on Tuesday I was able to drop in to the Princess Cinema in Waterloo with a couple of friends to watch In The Loop before it was cut from my favourite KW movie venue.

It's tough for me to really categorize In The Loop beyond saying that it's a British political comedy, which admittedly might be enough for a lot of folks to decide it's worth watching. The film for the most part centers on Toby, the communications assistant to British MP and cabinet minister of unknown portfolio Simon Foster (Tom Hollander). Toby transfers over from the Ministry of Agriculture just as Foster, a non-player in the British parliament, becomes an unwilling figurehead for a proposed American-British war in the Middle East due to a botched television interview in which he proclaims that "war is unforeseeable." Foster is essentially a communication assistant's worst nightmare, and the film's plot is driven by his frantic attempts to avoid been labeled as a "hawk" while simultaneously attempting to bolster his career profile by participating in the political process of war planning.

Anna Chlumsky as Liza Weld, assistant to the US Assistant Secretary of State

The film also features Sopranos star James Gandolfini as an American general trying to avoid a pointless war, and a grown-up Anna Chlumsky (My Girl) as the assistant to the US Assistant Secretary of State.

The big thing about this movie for me is that none of the characters are particularly likable. Foster, for example, is a bumbling opportunist who is out of touch with his constituents, and Toby is hilariously inept, not only at his job but at life in general. General Miller (Gandolfini), in trying to avert another war might be viewed one of the "good" guys, but as a character he is as manipulative as he is crude and uncharismatic. There are no characters in this movie who you can ever really get on board with 100%, as even the ones who don't seem all bad deserve scorn due their ineptitude or their awful, petty personalities.  In this sense it's kind of like watching from a distance as a  bunch of your coworkers fumble around their jobs, which to me is where the movie really shines. These are "real" people in the political process, and you aren't supposed to like them or the spectacle that they are engaged in, even if at times you pity or empathise with them.

In The Loop's Malcom Tucker, played by Peter Capaldi

Ironically, perhaps the only character I "liked" in this movie was Malcolm Tucker (Peter Capaldi), the unrelentingly vicious advisor to the PM who's continuous stream of profanity and misogyny establish him as perhaps one of the only authentic characters in the film. Malcom's job consists entirely of bullying Foster et al. into doing what Malcom wants done in the most rude and insulting manner possible, and yet you can't help but appreciate him because he is actually good at what he does. Unlike the other characters in the film, Malcom doesn't try and mumble or sidestep his way through tough situations.

I had a great time with this film, it was a nice change of pace from the political dramas it satirizes in which there are good guys campaigning for the "right" policies and the bad guys who stand in there way.

Not to give anything away, but there is no happy ending. In fact, the ending is comically depressing.

Yōjirō Takita Attending Grand River Film Festival This Year

I just noticed via Twitter that it looks like Yōjirō Takita, the director of Departures, is going to be attending the Grand River Film Festival this year. For those of you who, like me, weren't following the Academy Awards this year, Departures won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.

Departures director Yōjirō Takita

I haven't seen Departures, so I was planning on attending the matinee showing on the 24th with some friends. According to the GRFF press release, Takita will be there for the screening to answer audience questions after the show (via an interpreter), which is pretty cool. I've been to a couple of movie premiers in Toronto with after-movie director Q&A, and it's always been pretty great. Being in direct interaction with the audience tends to make for discussion that is much more candid than the carefully composed and pre-prepped interviews with the media. Given the off-beat feel for this movie I've gotten from reviews and the trailer, I think Takita should have some pretty interesting stories to tell. Takita will also be attending the Closing Gala on Saturday the 24th, and some portions of the GRFF's Indie Lounge.

There's a rather sheer crevasse of opinion separating blog reviews and the metacritic / rottentomato scores for Departures, a rift which seems caused by differing levels of appreciation for quirky slice-of-life dramas. To be honest, I love quiet slice-of-life dramas where you go away from the film feeling that maybe the world isn't as bad as it seems. I get a little overloaded with the continual bombardment of dramas that seem hell-bent on grinding their way to catharsis through a non-stop barrage of pity and fear, so when a movie like Departures comes along I end up getting a little excited to not be... excited.

Pontypool Radio Drama!

I neglected in my previous installment to mention that Pontypool originally sprang forth into this world as a book-turned-CBC radio drama written by Tony Burgess, who will be attending the Grand River Film Festival Opening Night Gala.

Funnily enough, you can still listen to the radio-drama on BBC, but I couldn't find anything from CBC (how typical). The movie cast is all there, and at just under an hour the radio-drama trims some of the fat from the movie script.

If somebody can find a podcast version of this, let me know.

The streaming version can be found here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/arts/2009/06/090617_pontypool_audio.shtml

Pontypool

The Grand River Film Festival this year is opening with Pontypool, the Canadian psychological horror that debuted in theatres last September. I thought this something of a bizarre choice for an opener given the cannibalistic nature of the subject material, but on further reflection it seems right at home nestled amidst the morbid cornucopia of films offered by the festival this year, films such as Krabat and An American Crime. Pontypool has received a great deal of international press, mostly due to it's popular dubbing as the "smart zombie film."

I actually saw Pontypool back in July after hearing about it on CBC Radio Edmonton (you can download the segment here). The movie is set in the small Ontario town of Pontypool, where radio personality Grant Mazzy (Stephen McHattie) is slumming as an early-morning DJ for 660 CLSY: The Beacon, after being fired from several big-city gigs. Starting the day like any other, Grant, his producer Sydney Briar (Lisa Houle), and their technician Laurel Ann (Georgina Reilly) begin receiving reports from their traffic reporter that a violent mob has gathered around a local doctor's practice.

The reports become progressively more disturbing, with descriptions of rioters who have stripped naked and appear to be killing and eating other townsfolk. Mazzy and Briar are convinced this all just a War of The Worlds-esque joke until a military transmission interrupts their broadcast to warn residents to stay indoors and "avoid the English language." Elements of the English language, they discover, have become virulent, affecting low-level functions in the brain and turning people into what are essentially living zombies. Any fans of Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash" will be right at home with the idea.

 Pontypool's Grant Mazzy, played by Stephen McHattie

Pontypool is directed by Bruce McDonald, the Canadian director who won Best Canadian Feature Film at the 1989 TIFF for Roadkill, and who's 2007 The Tracey Fragments, featuring Canadian film darling Ellen Page (who also stars in An American Crime), was nominated for a plethora of Genies. As an aside I thought The Tracey Fragments was pretty solid, even if at times it was, to quote a friend, "a little too post-modern."

Pontypool instilled in me a sense of unease and even a little paranoia from the get-go. The movie relies heavily on close-up camera work and tends to have only a single character as a focal point, making for an experience as intimate as it is claustrophobic. McDonald never provides the viewer with a chance to sit back, take it all in and put the pieces together. As viewers we're put into a visual environment that mirrors the uncertainty and confinement of the film's characters. The result is something pleasantly unsettling that does not rely on excessive gore or cheap scares to frighten the audience, and I found it a really quite refreshing change of pace from the flagging formulas followed by recent horror films.

Pontypool actually played against my expectations of genre to add a further level of anxiety to the movie. I spent most of the movie cringing at every static-filled call-in and abrupt camera shift, waiting to hear a live caller being gruesomely dismembered or to see a flood of infected people burst into the church in "Dawn of The Dead" fashion. Without giving too much away, my expectations for convention were pleasantly foiled.

The only major disappointment in Pontypool may be that, for a movie continually praised for being "smart," towards the end I felt that it tried to be too smart for its own good. At a certain key part a new character shows up at the church by coming through an open window (seriously) with what seems to be the exclusive purpose of explaining what is going on. The explanation offered is a weird mixture of metaphysics and linguistic buzzwords that seem as implausible as they are abrupt. Explanation given, the character departs through a window out into the street (really) and is never heard from again. I can't lie when I say it pained me to have an hour of enjoyable creepiness ruined by that heavy-handed interlude, and it really kind of killed the end of the movie for me. That being said, the first hour of enjoyable creepiness is absolutely worth seeing the movie for alone. Ending be damned, Pontypool is just an enjoyable, refreshing piece of psychological horror.

Pontypool is showing at the Grand River Film Festival on Thursday, October 22nd at 7:30pm for the Opening Gala (tickets are $90) at the Cambridge Galaxy Cinema. If you decide to fork out the ninety bucks, according to the GRFF webiste you'll also have, among other things, the opportunity to meet Tony Burgess, who wrote the script for the movie as well as the book, "Pontypool Changes Everything," that the film is based on.

If you don't want to shell out a hundred bucks to see Pontypool on Thursday night, it's also showing on Saturday, October 24th at the Gig Music Hall in Kitchener for a more affordable $7.