So many movies
This was an all-movie, celebrity-free day, so this particular post is for the cinephiles. Late last night I took in The Last King of Scotland, fulfilling one of my cardinal moviegoing rules of Gillian Anderson = yes. (This also holds true for Jodie Foster, Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling, Laura Linney and Holly Hunter.) Anderson, as…
CODE BLUE
According to a report on CBC Radio this morning, until recently you could go into the Quinpool Wendy’s and order a “Code Blue” off the menu–an artery-squeezing 12 patty burger. Apparently this is no longer the case after some greedy gussy used the code to order a 15-patty burger and then proceeded to puke on…
Sarah, dope and short
I’m in between films after a long day yesterday so here’s a quick update in photos. Sarah Polley chatted to a packed house — including Ruthe Stein of the San Fransisco Chronicle and Leah McLaren of the Globe and Mail — about her weep-inducing feature debut, Away From Her. It screens at the Atlantic Film…
Hard Condi
The scene outside the Maritime Museum, where America’s Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice is currently giving a speech: A couple hundred protesters and regular old curious citizens are being watched by nearly as many cops. There are cops on motorcycle and horse, cops with dogs and at least six snipers on three buildings, including the…
BOH polls are still open
This year’s Best of Halifax readers’ survey has been accepting votes since the middle of August, and if you were one of the disgustingly well-organized keeners who voted early then please go about your business. But if you waited until this weekend to vote—when the Monday, September 11 deadline was breathing down your neck—you might…
Letters to the Editor
Dearest Editor,Thank you, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU. It’s about time the North End receives the positive public attention it deserves. It’s refreshing to see the North End in a newspaper, not preceeded by “Another swarming took place in…” This fact is not well known, but the North End was once the prosperous part…
The Art of Being Single
Another one-act, one-woman play written and performed by Laurie Jones who takes time out of her daily life as a lawyer to share The Art of Being Single. Jones is hilarious as she recalls her dating disasters and gives the audience her list characteristics needed in guys she can be with, including No. 1, “Must…
Shut up, Brad
I remember when Brad Pitt broke. It was probably around 1994. I was in Grade 9 and Thelma and Louise had taken its rightful place as my favourite movie. Holly Millea, who is the very best entertainment writer working today, used to appear on The Dini Petty Show to tell Dini what was going on…
Circumference
A tale of a woman’s struggle with body image, Circumference is a dynamite one-woman play written by and starring Amy Salloway. A series of monologues strung together, there’s more content in this play than any other this reviewer has seen combined. That explains the notebook that Salloway references throughout the hour-long performance to keep herself…
Senseless sensibility
Halifax-like weather kept the city at a grumpy boil today. In the morning I crossed the street too early and ended up walking against the flow of the annual Walk for breast cancer, thousands and thousands of people, mostly women, ponchoed out and in high spirits despite the weather and earlyish hour. I took the…
Pretty Pieces
Leigh Ann Bellamy and Mike Sheppard play desperate siblings who feel the world closing in on them in this dramatic piece from Kingston, Ontario-based writer Charles Robertson. Set in a bachelor apartment, an agoraphobic sister passes the time away acting as mother to a child she wishes would love her back. She waits for her…
Divine Mechanics
Written and directed by Jamie Feldman, this satiric play tackles the issue of the reliance on technology as well as the role of a higher being in contemporary society. A great concept geared for laughs, Divine Mechanics only fails with a lack of comedic timing the plot needs to succeed.Andee Morgan effectively portrays the angel…
The Butleress
Some wag once wrote: a farce is a type of play that critics laugh at and then pan. Not in this case. The Butleress is a jolly outing nicely living up to farce’s raison d’etre – to entertain an audience, eliciting laughs using broad humoured comedy, a ridiculous situation or scenario, played by shameless farceurs.…
September rain
Essential festival tools forgotten in Halifax Business cardsLocal band t-shirts (hanging to dry in closet)MP3 playerHeadphones Solutions Sister’s Ipod with permission to replace music“Deluxe” headphones purchased from WestJet ($3 — slightly too big for head)Re-discovery of In-Flight Safety shirt in suitcaseContact info available upon handwritten request The first few days of FFing are such an…
Pussy Star
Before video, and way before DVDs, dirty ol’ men and chronic sexual adolescents over voting age, bent on keeping their hand in with the “love connection”, frequented sleazy movie theatres known as Porno Palaces. Every movie had its “dramatic” moments before its inevitable bump and grunt, passion-free finale. Ohh, the mental anguish there had to…
Burke be Frontin’
Since Hans Boggild announced his departure earlier this year, Eastern Front Theatre has been on the hunt for a new artistic producer. The role was filled this week with a familiar face—Scott Burke, the writer-director best known for his work with Ship’s Company Theatre, where he was AP for six years. “Eastern Front holds a…
End of the Knives’ lives
Halifax’s dance-punk fiasco Sharp Like Knives is calling it a day. Drummer Adam Seward will soon move up to Toronto, so the band plans to send him off in style with three final shows on September 8 (NSCAD Lounge), 9 (Speakeasy) and 14 (Pavilion). “It’s been a good three, three-and-a-half years,” says frontman Paul Hammond.…
Ad report card
Check out Slate’s ad report card, a weekly feature that does a pretty good job of commenting on the most interesting or offensive or mudane TV ads of the moment. And, it usually features video. Which is good. Video is cool. <a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2143810/" target="_blank" Here’s their take on those frumpy-PC vs. hipster funky Mac ads…
Noodles of fun
There’s some good news for all those people who drunkenly amble their way up Pizza Corner looking for a quick late-night fix—there will soon be a new, healthier alternative to pizza and donairs. Noodle Nook will definitely be opening its doors beside Sicilian Pizza this month, according to its owner, Ron Lovett. Lovett says the…
Bio’s second coming
Remember 2004? What a year. Paul Martin was our prime minister, Pluto was still a planet…such an innocent time. Here at home, Metro Transit announced that they were planning to convert their entire bus fleet over to biodisel fuel. Back then, those crazy 04’ers with the city’s Real Property and Asset Management released a statement…
Foreign exchange
To the editor, Recently, the government of Canada announced that international students would be able to work off campus, an initiative that was well accepted by post secondary education institutions and students across the country. This development will help many Canadian institutions in their recruitment drives by attracting and retaining international students, positively reflecting the…
Picture-perfect
To The Coast, Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I loved your new photographer’s pictures in the Back to School Guide. Jamie Smith has mad skillz! Great work, Jamie! By Mary Webber
Half measures
To the editor, Recently I was talking to a friend of mine who works at one of Halifax’s halfway houses. These shelters give our city’s down-and- out a chance to get back on their feet. I was appalled, however, when he told me that although paint donation is needed for several of the city’s halfway…
A show of arms
To the editor, Once again the annual air show is underway and is being advertised as something appealing to the family. Fast machines are sexy and cool and extreme engineering is fascinating to almost everyone. There’s also a defense industry flea market with booze-fueled parties to keep defense contract participants on good terms. It’s probably…
Winning isn’t everything
Although I truly love The Coast’s Best Of Halifax survey, I find it annoying when people campaign for the beloved winner’s plaque. Just the other day, I had a hairdresser, massage therapist and aerobics instructor ask me to vote for them: “Don’t forget to go to thecoast.ca and vote for me! And ask everyone else…
Age of compliments
To the editor, It was really nice to be back in your pages (Letterhead, August 31), even if it was as the topic of a rather weird letter to the editor. Would you please pass along to its author, David Smith of Bedford, how flattered I was to learn he thinks I’m not old enough to…
Rose Cousins
Last night was Rose Cousins’ CD release at the James Dunn Theatre. If you weren’t there, well, I feel sorry for you. Beautiful songs, incredible harmonies with her sister (here from PEI), Meaghan Smith, Jill Barber, back up from the Inflight Guys, plus a sweet finale with 15 Halifax musicians–many of whom were PEI natives…
The Wicker Man
It takes a combination of audacity and stupidity to want to remake The Wicker Man. Robin Hardy’s 1973 thriller is note-perfect, largely because nothing quite approaches its unsettling tone. The Wicker Man almost looks like something PBS broadcast in the middle of the afternoon when you were a kid, but its happy Scottish fields are…
Hollywood babylon
“There’s no sacrifice too great for a chance at immortality,” growls Dixon Steele, the screenwriter suspected of murder in Nicholas Ray’s under-acknowledged classic In a Lonely Place. In this line, the character nails the ethos of the Los Angeles movie industry crime story, the Hollywood film noir, if you will. It’s a slippery, exclusive little…
FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
It’s time to get your ass in gear, Gemini, says Rob Brezsny.
SAVAGE LOVE
Dan Savage is hardly ever tongue-in-cheek (no, not like that).
Dogs of war
Who says you can’t fight city hall? Jerry Reddick, aka the Dawgfather, has been battling Halifax Regional Municipality for six years over the right to sell cheap eats outside Dal’s Student Union Building. On Tuesday, the self-styled black pugilist won another round when Regional Council overruled city staff and voted to “grandfather the Dawgfather.” That…
Froshing option
If traditional images of frosh week—excessive drinking, ridiculous rituals, young co-ed herds in identical t-shirts—make you cringe, NSPIRG insists you’re not alone. This year the student-based Nova Scotia Public Interest Research Group, a social and environmental justice organization, is holding its own Alternative Orientation for first-year students at Halifax universities. Billed as “a radically different…
No dumping
With thousands of students returning to their south end neighbourhood, September is usually the busy season for businesses around the intersection of Barrington and Inglis Streets. But this year, business is crappy. A lone customer eats at Jessy’s Pizza Friday afternoon, as exasperated owner Roger Hammam surveys the torn-up street in front of his business.…
A brief history
Forget the term “unmentionables.” Underwear speaks volumes. Take fashion—a few years ago thongs were the thing and the more bling the better. Now they’re so when-Paris-and-Nicole-were-pals ago and everything in the lingerie department is low rise, boy-cut and made from organic fabrics. You just can’t wear a high-cut thong under low-slung jeans and not expect…
The great north end
The complex personality and tumultuous history of Halifax’s north end have made it an ideal muse for the many filmmakers, artists, poets and authors who live there. This Saturday, during the Go North! event—when north-enders invite the rest of the city to tour over 45 local artist studios, galleries, homes and businesses—two of the scheduled…
Taking it to the street
Sonia Edworthy likes tours—earlier this summer, she led teenagers on a “gentrification tour” of Halifax’s north end, for example. That attraction is why she’s back at it coordinating Eyelevel Gallery’s Go North! tour of artists’ studios and galleries this Saturday. It’s the first of two days of events—Sunday is the North End Street Festival on…
Plays of the week
3 Dogs BarkingSeptember 9 at the Khyber Turret, 1588 Barrington, 9:45pm, $9 This charged drama is set in a dingy Newfoundland police interview room undergoing renovations (and thereby missing an evidence-recording video camera). The issue at hand is the true nature of a murder confession offered up by a minor league repeat offender of public…
The burning question
Salsa—no other condiment conjures up images of a good time like salsa. A veritable party in your mouth, the perfect salsa is a marriage of tomatoes, chopped fresh cilantro and garlic, and jalapeno or Serrano peppers. Fresh salsa is simple and easy to make, but most of us still head to the supermarket when we…
Collective class
It’s early September, and by all accounts The Hourglass Class should be no more. When the band formed four months ago to perform a last-minute show, it was with the assumption that its lifespan would be limited, due to several members’ intentions to leave the city in the fall. When the show was a success…
