The Couch Potato Report - April 4th, 2009
This week The Couch Potato Report peels a documentary about a Canadian tragedy, and three films that were Oscar's Best Picture.
I have some very entertaining, heartwarming and fun releases to tell you about this week, but we begin with something a bit more serious...a documentary about a tragic part of Canadian history.
Air India Flight 182.
That crash happened on June 22, 1985.
The bombing was the result of a Vancouver-based conspiracy whose members were under investigation by Canadian Intelligence in the months leading up to the explosion.
The documentary film AIR INDIA 182 is based on court transcipts, wire taps, declassified CSIS intelligence reports, and interviews with family members of the victims.
Those interviews give this film overwhelming emotion, and are very moving.
This is a very thorough documentary, so there are many unsettling stories and images of the crash and victims in AIR INDIA 182, so you shouldn't search it out if you have a weak disposition.
But if you ever wanted to know about the events that ocurred leading up to this disaster, which remains the largest mass murder in modern Canadian history, then this documentary somes highly recommended.
And may all the victims of Air India flight 182 continue to rest in peace.
From a moving and very interesting documentary about a tragic event in Canadian history, let me now switch gears completely.
The Academy Award winning Best Picture SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is up next this week, in fact, I actually now have three films that won the Academy's Best Picture statuette coming up for you!
I will get to the ones from 1951 and 1958 in a moment, but right now, let me rave about the one that took the top prize this year, back on February 22nd.
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is about a teenager named Jamal, who grew up in the slums, and becomes a contestant on the Indian version of the game show "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?"
The film starts off with his arrest under suspicion of cheating, and it is during his interrogation that we flashback to events from his life...event sthat all explain how he knows the answers.
Now I have met and spoken with people who didn't care for the film because it features too many instances of coincidence, and I have disagreed with them all, ususally stating that coincidences happen in films all the time, even in the classics.
At it's core, SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is a love story...and for me, that is why I liked it when I first saw it, and when I saw it for a second time, a third and even a fourth.
And you know what, even after that fourth time, it still put a smile on my face.
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE beat The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Milk and The Reader to win Best Picture...and I wholeheartedly agree with the Academy's choice!
Back in 1951, the Academy named An American in Paris the Best Picture. It beat Decision Before Dawn, A Place in the Sun, Quo Vadis and A Streetcar Named Desire.
And now AN AMERICAN IN PARIS has debuted on Blu-ray, and it looks and sounds spectacular!!
AN AMERICAN IN PARIS is a musical that stars Gene Kelly as Jerry Mulligan, a struggling American painter in Paris, who is discovered by an influential heiress with an interest in more than Jerry's art.
Unfortunately for her, Jerry falls for someone else.
AN AMERICAN IN PARIS has romance, singing, fantastic costumes, and so much dancing that there is even an 18 minute ballet at the end. It is a true classic!! I am not sure if it deserved to win Best Picture in 1951...but I sure do enjoy the film everytime I see it.
I usually also enjoy the film that won Best Picture in 1958, and it too is now available on Blu-ray, and it too looks spectacular!!
In 1958, Gigi beat Auntie Mame, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Defiant Ones and Separate Tables to be named Best Picture, classics one and all!!
GIGI stars Louis Jourdan as a rich playboy who has become friends with a youthful courtesan-in-training, played by the always radiant Leslie Caron.
The two enjoy a platonic friendship, full of singing and dancing, but it may not stay platonic for long.
GIGI won Nine Academy Awards back in 1958, and in 2009 I highly recommend the new Blu-ray version, which is full of special features and a great retrospective look back.
It also includes some great songs!
None of those best picture winners are dogs, they are all great films.
I must admit, before I watched it, I expected that I would have called this next film a dog, with my tongue placed fully in my cheek...but....somehow...I liked it.
I didn't think I would, but I did...in fact, at times I loved it.
Yes, I am about to give a positive review to the Owen Wilson, Jennifer Anniston film MARLEY & ME.
MARLEY & ME is a movie that can be divided into two equal halves.
The first half, is full of cute puppies and slap stick humor, which is good for younger viewers, and the second half is the story of how marriage and having a family isn't easy, a story that might appeal to the more mature viewers and especially parents.
MARLEY & ME is sappy and for a while it relies too much on how cute the dog is....but then it becomes funny and the characters grow into real people, and not just movie people...and I liked it...somehow!
I honestly didn't think I would, but I did...and thus, I have no problems recommending it!
I also have no problems suggesting these next two releases to you...especially if you saw the WATCHMEN film in theatres, or love the Graphic Novel.
WATCHMEN: THE COMPLETE MOTION COMIC and WATCHMEN: TALES OF THE BLACK FREIGHTER are two great titles that supplement the recently released film, and help bring the graphic novel to life.
TALES OF THE BLACK FREIGHTER features an animated short film that is well done, and was very interesting to watch, and it also features a fake documentary on the book UNDER THE HOOD which is featured in the original WATCHMEN comics.
The BLACK FREIGHTER animation will eventually be included in a Director's Cut of the WATCHMEN film, but for now it is a fun stand alone, and THE COMPLETE MOTION COMIC takes all of Dave Gibbons comic Panels from the novel and brings them to life. There is no new animation...the items and characters in the panels just move around...but... they move.
Sadly, there is only one narrator, so even the Silk Spectres are male, but it was still very cool to watch.
I have two more titles to get to this week, and I will start with SEVEN POUNDS...the latest film starring Will Smith.
Will Smith is an engaging actor and whether he is doing drama - in ALI or THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS - out out and out action - in MEN IN BLACK, INDEPENDANCE DAY or BAD BOYS I am a fan of his work.
But I am not a fan of SEVEN POUNDS.
In it Will plays a man with a fateful secret who is trying to help change the lives of seven strangers, but it is utterly predictable, full of pure melodrama and it takes itself way too seriously. Sure, when the film ended, and all of it's secrets were revealed, that was rewarding...but I lost interest in it several times along the way.
If you love Will Smith and feel the need to see everything he is in, perhaps that is a reason to sit through SEVEN POUNDS...otherwise....SKIP IT!!!
The man has done better, and I trust that he will do better again!
Finally this week, is some very funny, not politically correct stand-up comedy from the man who created the classic BBC shows THE OFFICE and EXTRAS.
This is RICKY GERVAIS - OUT OF ENGLAND - THE STAND-UP SPECIAL.
No, not all of it is riotous, and much of it will offend, but if that doesn't bother you, then look for this one in stores or online because it is hilarious!!
Offensive...but hilarious!!
RICKY GERVAIS - OUT OF ENGLAND - THE STAND-UP SPECIAL and the tragic Canadian documentary AIR INDIA 182 ARE BOTH available now on DVD.
The useless SEVEN POUNDS, the great supplements WATCHMEN: THE COMPLETE MOTION COMIC and WATCHMEN: TALES OF THE BLACK FREIGHTER, the surprisingly entertaining MARLEY & ME, AN AMERICAN IN PARIS - the Best Picture winner from 1951, GIGI - the Best Picture winner from 1958 and this year's Academy Award winner for Best Picture - SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE - are all available now on DVD and in High Definition on Blu-ray!
Coming up on the next Couch Potato Report
Canadian Jim Carrey tries to be funny again in YES MAN.
Canadian Keanu Reeves appears in two sci-fi films: THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL and THE MATRIX; and the BLU-RAY BEACON shines a light on the modern day classic THE PRINCESS BRIDE.
I'm Dan Reynish. I'll have more on those, and some other releases, in seven days.
For now, that's this week's COUCH POTATO REPORT.
Enjoy the movies and I'll see you back here next time on The Couch!
Genies struggle to focus Canadian eyes on homegrown films
The Genie Awards, hosted by comedian Dave Foley of Kids in the Hall fame, are to be handed out in Ottawa Saturday night.
A festival devoted to screening Genie-nominated movies around the national capital region and the four-year-old Reel Canada program that brings Canadian films to high school students have run this week, in advance of the awards.
Both focus attention on what seems to be an uphill battle, trying to get English Canada to watch homegrown movies.
"In some ways we were inspired by the struggle in the '70s to get CanLit into high schools and how hard people fought to make that happen," Jack Blum, executive director of Reel Canada told CBC News. Now in its fourth year, Reel Canada has screened nearly 200 Canadian films to almost 20,000 students across Ontario and in Vancouver, beginning with films like The Red Violin and Away from Her.
"We have a wonderful body of work and it was time kids were introduced to these movies," Blum said.
Actor and former Genie winner for scriptwriting Don McKellar says it is essential that young people be exposed to Canadian film.
"People have to be aware at [an] early age. It's like learning language — there's Canadian language for film. It's exciting, it reflects their culture, experience, it will make huge difference," he said.
Benoît Pilon's Ce Qu'il Faut pour Vivre (The Necessities of Life) goes into the Genie Awards this Saturday with eight nominations and a best picture win at Quebec's Jutra Awards.
The film about an Inuit hunter confined to a Quebec sanatorium in the 1950s has earned star Natar Ungalaaq a best actor nomination and a best director nomination for Pilon.
Bernard Émond is competing for a best screenwriter Genie for his script, which details the cultural dislocation of the sick man and his tender relationship with an Inuit boy, who also has been wrenched from his family to recover from TB.
The film has been a critical darling, but has had nowhere near the box office legs of another best picture nominee, Passchendaele, Paul Gross's story of a Canadian soldier in one of the First World War's most tragic battles.
Passchendaele has already won the Golden Reel award, running for more than 15 weeks in some parts of Canada and earning $4.4 million.
It was a rare box office success for an English Canadian film. Domestic films suffer from inadequate distribution and lack the big-budget promotional hype that accompanies films out of Hollywood.
As always, the Genies attempt to focus attention on some rare gems of Canadian cinemas. This year's best picture nominees include Amal, the story of an auto-rickshaw driver in Delhi who inherits a rich man's estate.
The Hindi-language film directed by Richi Mehta won a dozen awards on the film festival circuit, but is little known by Canadian moviegoers.
Tout est Parfait, the French-language film about teen suicide, just opened in English Canada and Normal, Carl Bessai's film about the fallout from a car accident, has come and gone almost without notice, despite being a best-picture nominee.
Lesser known films among nominees
The best actor and actress categories also highlight some little known films, though this year's crop has drawn criticism for centring on well known names.
Well-knowns include Paul Gross, nominated for Passchendaele, and Christopher Plummer (for Emotional Arithmetic), but a surprise nominee was Aaron Poole in low budget film This Beautiful City.
Poole lost 37 pounds and had a dentist remove a crown in his mouth to play a recovering drug addict in the film, about five characters in Toronto's west end whose lives become interconnected after a woman falls from her balcony.
"Johnny's struggling to rid himself of his addiction and at the same time sustain the love he has for [his girlfriend] Pretty," said Poole, who also acted as producer for the film.
"It's hard to do that, he's sucked back into the world of drugs, he self-medicates his schizophrenia and the combination of those three things is difficult to manage."
Also nominated is Ungalaaq's moving performance in The Necessities of Life, which struck especially close to home for the actor because his grandfather had suffered in the same TB epidemic.
Well-known actresses Ellen Burstyn in The Stone Angel, Susan Sarandon in Emotional Arithmetic have nominations but the awards also focus attention on Quebec's outstanding Isabelle Blais and Bollywood actress Preity Zinta.
Part of the Genie Awards ceremony will be broadcast Saturday at 9 p.m. on Global.
Woody Allen takes Manhattan again
LAS VEGAS - Woody Allen is back on familiar ground with his latest movie, the first shot in his beloved New York City after four made in Europe.
And for "Whatever Works," Allen has found a suitable mouthpiece for his cynical humour in Larry David, star of "Curb Your Enthusiasm."
The film received a warm reception and a lot of laughs at a screening Thursday at ShoWest, an annual convention of theatre owners. "Whatever Works" opens the Tribeca Film Festival on April 22 in advance of its theatrical debut in June.
Allen had shot most of his films in New York before doing three straight in London - "Match Point," "Scoop" and "Cassandra's Dream" - then making last year's "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" in Spain, which featured Allen's frequent collaborator, Scarlett Johansson.
Patricia Clarkson, who had a small role in "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" and takes on a key part in "Whatever Works," said the New York shoot was a pleasure - since she lives there, too.
"It was so nice to be shooting with Woody Allen in New York. It was divine," said Clarkson, who introduced "Whatever Works" to the ShoWest crowd. "There were a couple of days I walked to work. It was beautiful.
"He was definitely on his own turf," Clarkson said. "When we were shooting in Barcelona, it was like shooting with Mick Jagger. I mean, the streets were lined wherever we went for Scarlett and for Woody. It was like they were rock stars. In New York, the crowds gather, but I think because it's Woody, they're actually respectful of him."
"Whatever Works" casts David as a brilliant, misanthropic physicist whose dour outlook drives him to failed suicide attempts. After splitting with his worldly wife and giving up his teaching job, he becomes a cranky chess instructor in a May-December relationship with a naive southern beauty (Evan Rachel Wood), whose mother (Clarkson) schemes to split them up.
David delivers nicely as the sort of eccentric New Yorker that Allen has played himself in past films. But David is more than a stand-in for Allen, Clarkson said.
"They are kissing cousins. They are kindred spirits, absolutely," Clarkson said. "But Larry David is very different in the film. He's very different than he is on 'Curb Your Enthusiasm.' People think he's absolutely that person on 'Curb Your Enthusiasm,' but he's a different man, and he's different in the Woody Allen film.
"It's Larry's own DNA mixed with Woody's writing. Those are two powerful DNAs mixing. It's inspired."
Saskatchewan Declares 'Corner Gas Day'
REGINA - The Saskatchewan government is declaring April 13 "Corner Gas Day" to coincide with the airing of the sitcom's final episode.
The popular CTV show, shot in rural southern Saskatchewan, wrapped up production of its sixth and last season earlier this year.
The series about life in a small prairie town called Dog River has been described as the most successful Canadian comedy ever made.
The show has snagged numerous Gemini awards and airs in syndication in countries around the world, including the United States.
Premier Brad Wall plans to sign a proclamation at the legislature in Regina this Monday.
Also present will be the show's star and creator, Saskatchewan-born Brent Butt.
Boston doesn't want Jay Leno show
The first great NBC-affiliate battle over the new primetime Jay Leno show is poised to take place in Boston -- the host's hometown.
WHDH-TV, Boston's Peacock affiliate, announced via its website Thursday that it plans to launch an hour-long 10 p.m. newscast in the fall.
That would pre-empt Leno's new, still-untitled 10 p.m. series. NBC swiftly responded, warning WHDH that such a move would make them in breach of their pact with the net -- and that the Peacock wouldn't hesitate to yank the station's affiliation.
"WHDH's move is a flagrant violation of the terms of their contract with NBC," John Eck, NBC TV Network president, said in a statement. "If they persist, we will strip WHDH of its NBC affiliation. We have a number of other strong options in the Boston market, including using our existing broadcast license to launch an NBC-owned and operated station."
Insiders said NBC is already looking at contingencies in Boston should WHDH go ahead with its plans -- including turning its Telemundo station in the market, WNEU (Channel 60), into an NBC outlet.
Sunbeam chief Ed Ansin, who owns WHDH, told the Boston Globe that he decided to replace Leno with news because "it fundamentally is a better financial plan for us."
"We don't think the Leno show is going to be effective in primetime," Ansin said. "It will be detrimental to our 11 o'clock (newscast). It will be very adverse to our finances."
Ansin told the paper that WHDH had asked for permission to push Leno to 11 p.m., but the network said no. Instead, he has no plans to run Leno at all, and will continue to air an 11 p.m. newscast leading into "The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien" at 11:35.
Ansin also claimed that WHDH held a clause in its affiliation contract that would allow the station to dump the 10 p.m. Leno show -- an assertion that NBC also vehemently denied.
"That is absolutely wrong," said NBC general counsel Rick Cotton. "It is clear that WHDH is contractually required to air NBC programming as scheduled by the network."
The radical move by WHDH comes as several affils nervously wait to see how NBC's primetime Leno series evolves and ultimately impacts their business.
The Peacock affils have been conducting a study to see how viewers actually watch "The Tonight Show" -- and how there might be ways to produce and schedule Leno's new show in order to help out affiliates. NBC has also put a task force in place to work with the stations on the launch.
"We've been engaged in an open dialogue with NBC about the format of the show, and we're looking forward to working with Jay and the entire team," said NBC affiliate board chairman Michael Fiorile, who's also vice chairman of the Dispatch Group.
This isn't the first time NBC has faced the possibility of having to replace a major affiliate in a top market. After failing to come to terms in 2001 with its long-time San Francisco outlet KRON, NBC wound up affiliating with (and later purchasing) San Jose-based KNTV.
Like KNTV, which only covered part of San Francisco, WNEU only reaches a portion of the Boston market. But the Peacock has other options in Boston as well, including WSBK, a one-time superstation that is now an independent owned and operated by CBS.
Effects company denies leaking 'Wolverine' online
LOS ANGELES – An Australian visual effects company that worked on "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" said Thursday it was not responsible for leaking a full-length work print online.
The company's name — Rising Sun Pictures — appears in a caption dated March 2 a few minutes into the high-quality leaked copy of the 20th Century Fox superhero movie.
"As we worked on individual sequences within the film, neither Rising Sun Pictures or its staff members have ever been in possession of a full-length version, so it would have been impossible for the movie to have been leaked from here," Rising Sun Pictures chairman and co-founder Tony Clark said in a statement posted on the company's Web site Thursday.
The "prequel, which focuses on the beginnings of Hugh Jackman's clawed Marvel superhero Wolverine, is not scheduled for release until May 1, but the leaked version began appearing online Tuesday evening. Fox said in a statement Wednesday that it had the original file removed, but copies quickly propagated and continue to appear on several file-sharing Web sites.
According to Rising Sun Pictures' Web site, the visual effects company had been tasked with producing "a number of key effects sequences" in "Wolverine." Rising Sun Pictures is also working on the upcoming "Terminator Salvation" film and had previously created effects for "Watchmen," "Australia," "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" and "Get Smart."
Fox vowed Wednesday that the source of the "stolen, incomplete and early version" of the movie would be prosecuted and said the FBI and MPAA are investigating the leak. The studio also insisted that the version of "Wolverine" posted online had been forensically marked and "was without many effects, had missing and unedited scenes and temporary sound and music."