reviews

The Dork Shelf Guide to Toronto Black Film Festival 2014

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We take a look at the second annual Toronto Black Film Festival - kicking off Tuesday and running through this Sunday evening - bringing some of the best in Black Cinema to the city, including reviews of several of this year's entries.

This Week at The Bloor: 2/7/14

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This week at The Bloor, entertaining looks at some hard headed intellectual icons that are often talked about in hushed reverential tones: atheist pundits Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins in The Unbelievers and the the late, controversial American writer and wit Gore Vidal in Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia.

More Movies in Brief: 2/3/14

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Playing catch up from last week (still), here are looks at two great Canadian films (Rhymes for Young Ghouls and Three Night Stand), a great documentary (12 O'Clock Boys), and a pair of middling romantic dramadeys (At Middleton and Brightest Star).

This Week at The Bloor: 1/31/14

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This week at The Bloor Cinema, films and stories about children featuring Nina Davenport's First Comes Love and film scholar Mark Cousins' more literally titled A Story of Children and Film

Films in Brief: 1/18/14

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We play a bit of catch up looking at the found footage horror Devil's Due, the animated animal heist flick The Nut Job, Ralph Fiennes look at Charles Dickens The Invisible Woman, a Stephen King retrospective at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, a screening of the Lebanese war drama Zaytoun, the continued popularity of the documentary Nicky's Family, and free return engagements from some films that played the European Union Film Festival last year.

This Week at The Bloor: 1/17/14

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A positively stacked week at The Bloor brings the harrowing and rightfully Academy Award nominated look at the Egyptian revolution, The Square, the poignant look at "Eskimo culture," Arctic Defenders, and a slew of special screenings worth consideration, including classic documentary On the Bowery and the fun look at creativity From Nothing, Something. It's such a good week, we decided to run the column a day early for a change.

Films in Brief: 1/10/14

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Due to our Film Editor being down for the count this week (tearing tendons in his foot and having the flu at the same time), there will sadly be a few reviews missing this week, including the Bloor Cinema column, but he did want to pass along these thoughts for the films he saw but couldn’t write about: I am Divine, Persistence of Vision, Gabrielle, and Ms. 45.

This Week at The Bloor: 1/3/14

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The Bloor Hot Docs Cinema kicks off 2014 with a trio of new films looking at the American educational system (in the perceptive, but flawed and skewed American Promise, extreme marathon runners (in the crowd pleasing Desert Runners), and the plight of the modern honeybee (in the gorgeous looking More than Honey).

This Week at the Bloor 12/23/13

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The Bloor Hot Docs Cinema closes out their programming year with the stunning and thoughtful Expedition to the End of the World and the problematic Maidentrip. We also look at a bunch of special screenings happening over the holiday season, including the quadruple-feature of holiday classics going down today!

Blu-Ray Round-Up: 12/23/13

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We close out the year with a final Blu-Ray column looking at The Great Muppet Caper (one of the greatest comedies of all time), why Bill Murray never cared for Scrooged (even though its awesome), the 50th anniversary of Mary Poppins, and the home video debuts of The Lone Ranger and Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters.

Exit Elena & Soft in the Head Reviews

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The guys behind MDFF return to Double Double Land in Toronto tonight for a free screening of a pair of films from Brooklyn microbudget filmmaker Nathan Silver.

This Week at The Bloor: 12/13/13

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This week at The Bloor brings the dry Israeli history documentary The Prime Ministers: The Pioneers and the exceptional and heartbreaking Blood Brother.

This Week at The Bloor: 12/6/13

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A trio of new films hit The Bloor this week: Jingle Bell Rock is a well made bit of holiday nostalgia. The Italian Character can never quite find an even handed way of showcasing one of the world's best orchestras. And InRealLife is a well made, but oddly fear mongering look at how teenagers approach the internet.