Beautiful Feet

I asked Tracy Groot, author of Madman (which is next on my To Read list), if I could share her review on Facebook about Risen (2016, dir. Kevin Reynolds). Here it is, followed by my own thoughts on the movie. Dear Readers, Writers, Storymakers, and Film Buffs, File this one under: Risen, indeed. Went to an advance screening of Risen last night. (Won tickets.) It's a film about a Roman tribune tasked with the investigation of a certain resurrection. Had rational expectations with names like Joseph Fiennes and Tom Felton--our own Draco Malfoy--in the offing. But I wasn't sure about Kevin Reynolds. He'd directed a fave, Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, but that was what, 25 years ago? Who was this guy now? Was he still good, or did some Christian power producers hire a reasonably credible name to helm a get-‘em-saved agenda? I feared it, because dang, I love a good movie but I’m hyper-sensitive to agenda. Too often I’ve seen craftsmanship sacrificed in favor of missi...

Photo credit: Julien Lambert CanStage's presentation of  Cold Blood was the much-anticipated follow-up (but not prequel or epilogue, they point out) to last year's Kiss and Cry , created by  Michele Anne De Mey, Jaco Van Dormael and the Collectif Kiss & Cry, with text by Thomas Gunzig. While some reviews found it not as satisfying as the fi rst, I disagree, with one exception. Cold Blood is  very different than the other, and that is a good thing. While I loved last year's, this one was more disparate because its text was on a theme, whereas last year's was a theme along a narrative, and more linear. This week covered the topic of death but with humour, and there was more variation in the scenes: contrary to promotional material, there are more than just fingers and miniatures, including some surprises. Add music ranging from Bowie to Arvo Part and clever filming ideas, and you have a very satisfying show--and it's perfect for those with timely short at...

It just worked out that four works I encountered recently — in a movie, a foreign film, a video and a novel — all dealt with various aspects of death. Surprisingly, none of it was depressing. Book cover design by Kelly Blair; image from www.goodreads.com Well, okay, some people find the apocalypse depressing, but I LOVE it. Especially when it's presented as well as in  The Road or Station Eleven. The Dog Stars  was recommended by a fellow editor when I put out a social-media call for apocalyptic-read recommendations. Peter Heller's first fiction book takes place in the next few decades after a pandemic has killed most of the population and left many of the survivors with The Blood Disease, an auto-immune system threat. The protagonist is tortured by an act in his past, let alone trying to survive a new agricultural production system, murderous gangs and loss. But despite his flaws, we cheer and cry with Hig all along. Best of all, the book manages to have a satisfying e...

The only connection I could make between the two works I’d like to recommend this week is that both have blue covers... Photo In the better-late-than-never category, I found a CD called Trinity Requiem with music composed by Robert Moran. It was commissioned to commemorate the tenth anniversary of 9/11 and features a youth choir from, poignantly, Trinity Wall Street Church, and the recording includes, serendipitously, a siren left unedited at the beginning of the Offertory. There are three other good pieces on the CD (Seven Sounds Unseen, Notturno in Weiss and Requiem for a Requiem), but the eponymous composition is exactly what this minimalist likes. My only disappointment was that I couldn’t find a photo credit for the cover image, which is Turrell -ish. (Which means utterly beautiful and sublime, all you millennials who’d never heard of him before Drake’s “Hotline Bling.”) My other blue cover is on Nancy Horan’s Under the Wide and Starry Sky (Ballantine, 2013). This...

I have seen several pieces on screen lately that deal with using our heads. However, each discussed the head in conjunction with other factors.     Brit TV series, River , lives up to its acclaim. A one-off mini-series of six episodes, it managed to grip me immediately in its treatment of how grief not only affects the heart but also the head. Stellan Skarsgård and Nicola Walker are police officers in this crime drama but in the name of spoilers, I won’t say much more. Other sympathetic performances come from actors like Lesley Manville, but I didn’t really buy Georgina Rich as a police psychologist, at least in the way she chose to/the director asked her to act it. Anyway, the takeaway is that you can’t always use your head in exclusion of the contributions of the heart, either personally or sometimes even professionally. Encouraging symbiosis between the two can facilitate redemption, serenity or at least a sense of acceptance.           ...

Review:  Exodus: Gods and Kings  (dir. Ridley Scott, 2014) December 12, 2014  by  Peter T. Chattaway   Originally posted here   Early on in  Exodus: Gods and Kings , there’s a scene in which Moses, who is still an Egyptian prince oblivious to his Hebrew heritage, confronts an Egyptian viceroy named Hegep, who is supposed to be building a new city for the Pharaoh but seems to have diverted some of the funds towards his own luxurious lifestyle. Hegep tries to deflect Moses’ attention by pointing to the troublesome Hebrew slaves, and says he needs more resources to deal with them. As proof of how rebellious these Hebrews are, Hegep says, “Do you know what ‘Israelite’ means in their own language? ‘He who fights with God’.” An annoyed Moses replies, “‘He who  wrestles  with God’. There’s a difference.” It’s a key distinction, and one that applies just as much to Ridley Scott’s film. Scott, whose self-identification over the years has waver...

 Scaffolding at construction site, Queen’s Quay, Toronto.  Photograph by David Allan Barker ©2015. I'm the proud new owner of a great image by my friend, David Allan Barker, a Torontonian  writer and photographer . I like his eye and enjoy his view of TO; it's hard to see the city with fresh eyes when you're born and bred here but David has a humorous and often wry take on us and our environs. Check out his equally refreshing poetry and prose !

 http://www.theborgcollectives.com/ If you believe imdb.com's trivia page:  Kevin Spacey read the script and agreed to voice Gerty but when the film was finished and only if he liked it. Having loved it, he recorded his lines in half a day.  And that's how good this movie is.  Moon (2009, dir. Duncan Jones) is about Sam Bell's three-year contract to work alone on the moon for a company, Lunar Industries, that harvests Helium 3 as the main energy source for earth. The film has some of the feel of 2001: A Space Odyssey : Gerty is a kinder, gentler HAL; the credit graphics and some of the set type is groovy; there's lovely classical music. But there is also humour: the lunar rover has fuzzy dice in the front window and has the sign "Please Drive Carefully"; inside the station, Sam turns off his room lights with 'the Clapper'. The art direction is excellent and there are lots of in jokes if you know your science fiction canon. You don't f...

The hardest thing about writing [reviews] is being smart about books.            Neil Peart, creator of Bubba's Book Club , on CBC's The Next Chapter (5/1/15 Encore) 'Ain't it the truth? Ain't it the truth?' said Bert Lahr's Cowardly Lion. My first section involves concern, but only thematically: Advance Reader Copy.  Cover art by Sammy Yuen If this excellent book does not get adapted into a movie, I'll be very surprised. I do tend to talk up great books, and perhaps avoid negative reviews, mostly because I feel it is important to boost our writers and other artists in a time of government undersupport and book publishing changes. I was eagerly anticipating reviewing Mark Alpert’s novel, The Six , and did it ever über-deliver! There’re lots of YA fantasy novels being published these days, but this one stands out for several reasons. First, while sci-fi in genre, it accomplishes something currently rare: it's believable. As A...