Beginners is Mike Mills’s semi-autobiographical tale, following the life of a 30-something designer named Oliver (Ewan McGregor) who begins dating someone new (Mélanie Laurent) following his father (Christopher Plummer) coming out as a gay man. We regularly flash back to Oliver’s childhood and memories of his mother, and so get three separate timelines punctuated by […]
Oxford Theatre
Posted inArts + Music
The Oxford Theatre reno
Haliwood Insider has learned that The Oxford Theatre (6408 Quinpool Road, 422-2022) is in the midst of a face-lift that will give the Quinpool Road cinema a fresh coat of paint. The job should take about a month. No word if any changes will be made to the interior. Right now, the charming Woody Allen […]
Posted inArts + Music
Midnight In Paris nostalgic joy
Writer-director Woody Allen continues to make a movie every year, and his 2011 effort is a winner. Owen Wilson is Californian screenwriter and frustrated novelist Gil, visiting the City of Light with his fiance Inez (Rachel McAdams). Enraptured by the city, one night Gil goes for a stroll and gets into a car with Scott […]
Posted inArts + Music
Buy in to The Greatest Movie Ever Sold
Seven years after adopting a McDonald’s-only diet for Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock once again puts himself at the centre of his documentary action. This time, Spurlock’s credibility, rather than his health, is on the line, in a movie about product placement in movies that follows Spurlock in his quest to fund the movie entirely […]
Posted inArts + Music
The Conspirator a stirring history lesson
The first third of Robert Redford’s historical drama is a static civics lesson about the principles of due process and the importance of maintaining the rule of law in times of war. Just when you’re thinking about ducking out of class, though, a wave of emotional momentum comes along, shaking the dust off the textbooks. […]
Posted inArts + Music
A gothic, beautiful Jane Eyre
Cary Joji Fukunaga’s Jane Eyre is a riveting adaptation of the Charlotte Brontë novel. Jane (Mia Wasikowska), a strong-willed governess, falls in love with her boss—the lecherous-turned-lovable Mr. Rochester (Michael Fassbender)—who owns the haunted Thornfield Manor. Fukunaga tastefully alters the book’s plot and reconstructs the story in a suspenseful, non-linear fashion, using flashbacks to summarize […]
Posted inArts + Music
Hobo With A Shotgun opens in local cinemas
Let’s see if we’ve got this straight: Monday night Hobo With A Shotgun director Jason Eisener was in Montreal for a screening of his new film. Tuesday he was in Toronto. Wednesday he was here for the invite-only screening at the Oxford for crew and the local film biz folks. Thursday he was in Boston […]
Posted inArts + Music
Hobo With A Shotgun premiere at the Oxford
[image-1] I was thrilled to be a part of the excitement last night, having visited set last year, interviewed director Jason Eisener and producer Rob Cotterill on a few occasions, plus doing the cover story in today’s issue of The Coast. Today it feels like all Haligonians have a bit of our own blood in this thing. Knowing that it would be a popular show—and it said right on the ticket that admittance wasn’t a guarantee—I made sure to show up by 6:30pm for the 7pm screening. However, that wasn’t nearly early enough. The screening organizers, Film Nova Scotia, had
Posted inArts + Music
Incendies wins big at the Genies
Congratulations to Denis Villeneuve for his film Incendies (which showed first in Halifax at the Atlantic Film Festival back in September) having won eight awards last night at the 31st Annual Genie Awards, which took place in Ottawa. A lot of the attention around the awards this year was about how no one watches them, […]
Posted inBest of Halifax
Best Movie Theatre
Seventy-four years old and still the favourite cinema in town, so kudos to Empire Theatres for giving the place a facelift this summer, with fresh paint perking up the facade. Known primarily as an art house, it’s the perfect room to watch a new Woody Allen picture (Midnight in Paris did gangbusters there this summer) […]
Posted inArts + Music
AFF Gala (or as Gavin Crawford put it, GAY-la) Screening and Party.
Well, I liked Score: A Hockey Musical more than my esteemed colleague Matt Semansky did in his review in the paper this week. I found it sweet and a bit silly and, well, perverse. I mean, who is the audience for this? Have Don Cherry fans been crying out long and hard for that Rock […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Empire Theatre Ticket Prices Go Up and Down
With Iron Man 2 opening wide last week, the summer blockbuster season has begun in local cinemas and across North America. In the next few weeks we can expect a deluge of marketing to prep us all for that new take on Robin Hood, a second Sex & The City movie and more Shrek than […]
