Also: Who Killed The Electric Car? Amid ever-increasing gas prices, this documentary delves into the short life of the GM EV1 electric car -- once all the rage in the mid-1990s and now fallen by the roadside. How could such an efficient, green-friendly vehicle fail to transform our garages and skies? Through interviews with government officials, former GM employees and concerned celebs (such as EV1 driver Mel Gibson), Chris Paine (former EV1 owner) seeks to answer the question.

Monday 27 Jan 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
A Safer Sex Trade
Carolyn Allain's directorial debut offers insight into the complex issue of the sex trade by examining the lives of three women with entirely unique experiences as prostitutes. Scarlett Lake is a highly successful madam with thirty years in the business who opens up the doors to her bawdy house. Jennifer Allan is a former drug addicted 'survival' sex trade worker, who works tirelessly to rescue prostitutes still out on the streets. Simone is an independent escort who has worked her way up from the street and presently offers 'girlfriend experiences' to her clients.

A SAFER SEX TRADE will have its world television premiere on CBC Newsworld¹s The Lens on Tuesday January 23, 2007 at 10PM ET/7PM PT with a repeat screening January 27, 2007 AT 10PM ET/7PM PT. - But here's your chance to see it and join in an interactive discussion with the director, producer and local stake holders in Movie Monday's interactive forum.

Monday 29 Jan 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Fetching Cody
A novel romantic comedy / dramatic treatment of the problems of young people being drawn into life of Vancouver's East side drug world - magical realism, Jim Burns, great, provocative Canadian film.

Monday 5 Feb 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Good Night and Good Luck
George Clooney wrote and directed this simple but riveting telling of broadcaster Edward R Murrow's courageous stand against McCarthy's grandstanding Communist witch hunt of the 1950's. Here's a timely reflection on the misuse of government's authority and the courage it takes to challenge it. A thoughtful and engrossing film that makes history live - and makes you realize the wonderful cinematic possibilities of cigarette smoke. Gorgeously shot in black and white.

Director / star George Clooney had said they opted to use archive footage of Joseph McCarthy instead of using an actor to portray the senator. Clooney had said that when the movie had undergone test screenings, audience members felt that the McCarthy character was overacting a bit, not realizing that it was the actual McCarthy through archive footage.

Monday 12 Feb 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Bon Cop Bad Cop
Lotta blood and violence Pulp Fiction / Fargo like. Lotsa bad language too but, as long as you're good for that, a great detective buddy film. Very Canadian, somewhat corny and completely riveting too - a very fun, invigoration watch!

When a dead body is found straddling the Ontario-Quebec border, police officers from both provinces must join forces to solve the murder. The francophone detective for the Sûreté du Québec is rule-bending, while the anglophone OPP detective is by-the-book. Although both detectives are bilingual, they must resolve their professional and cultural differences as well as their bigotry and prejudices.

Here's film that (finally knocked Porky's off the platform of Canada's top grossing film.

Monday 19 Feb 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Devil And Daniel Johnston
This film takes you on a journey into a creative genius' struggle with life. David Bowie, Tom Waits, Sonic Youth, Beck, Matt Goening, the late Kurt Cobain and an ever-growing cult audience are just some of the fans of Daniel Johnston. An exemplar of brilliance and madness going hand in hand, Johnston is an indie-rock cult figure and cartoonist who has had a life marked by wild fluctuations, numerous downward spirals, and periodic respites from his severe mental illness (he's been diagnosed with manic depression).Director Jeff Feuerzeig won a well-deserved Best Director award at Sundance last year for his long-in-the-making film. It's an illuminating chronicle of Johnston's origins, rise to fame, disastrous breakdowns, paranoid delusions, painful redemption, and eventual elevation to unlikely living legend status. The film artfully melds current footage, vintage performances, home movies, and dozens of recorded audio tapes from Johnston's life.

Monday 26 Feb 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Margarets' Museum
A classic in the Canadian film canon is this 1995 romantic drama set in a Labrador coal mining town. Helena Bonham Carter is brilliant (and surprising after her starring launch Room With A View ) as a 'snot-nosed scrub woman' who has lost family members to the pits. A tall, bag pipe playing Scot arrives in town and goes to work as a dishwasher. Can he resist the only well-paying but dangerous job in town, so they can have a life together? It's about the high price of coal.

Monday 5 Mar 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Neil Young: Heart Of Gold
Neil Young arrived in Nashville, just before brain surgery to repair an aneurysm, and wrote a bunch of new material. This concert was kind of a Goodbye to friends and fans if he didn't make it. Jonathan Demme beautifully captured the first live performance of those songs plus a bunch of "old gold" from Young's long career. It's a gentle summation of a life of song: long shots, sweet music, good musical friends supporting his vision. We'll add some flashbacks to Neil's wilder performance days.

Monday 12 Mar 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Skate Girl
Maybe you've seen Dog Town And Z-Boys, the classic skateboard genesis flic, but what about the girls? Susanne Tabata, Vancouver filmmaker of the terrific Westcoast surfer film 49 Degrees, has chronicled the girls' story with all the falls and scrapes and other dangers, pioneering this sport that has been dominated by males. Local skate/surf shop, Coastline, will be adding a presence and a pack of goodies and a skate deck to give away at the presentation.

Monday 19 Mar 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Monster In A Box
The beloved Spalding Gray works out his stuff, the stuff that eventually killed him, in one of his famous, brilliant monologues. The monster is an autobiographically based book the writing of which has haunted him for years.

Monday 26 Mar 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
His Girl Friday
For 1940, wonderful old fashioned fast-talking screwball comedy. The editor of a major Chicago newspaper is about to lose his ace reporter and former wife to an insurance salesman, but not without a fight! The crafty editor uses every trick in his fedora to get 'His Girl' to write one last big story - about murderer Earl Williams and an inept sheriff. Complications ensue. From a newly restored DVD version.

Monday 2 Apr 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Happy Feet
Into the world of the Emperor Penguins, who find their soul mates through song, a penguin is born who cannot sing. But he can tap dance something fierce!

Monday 9 Apr 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Moscow On The Hudson
In 1984 Vladimir Ivanoff, a typical Russian, is working in the Moscow circus playing saxophone. When the Moscow circus goes to New York Vladimir declares his defection to defect. With the help of local authorities he is able to remain in New York. As Vladimir tries to make it in New York, he is constantly haunted by his decision. Did he make a right choice by leaving his native land; was the freedom he searched worth everything he sacrificed?

Monday 16 Apr 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Remembering Arthur
Remembering Arthur is as much about the man behind the lens as what he put in front of it. Filtered through the memories of such longtime Lipsett confidantes as Judith Sandiford, filmmaker Tanya Tree, artist Christopher Nutter, animator Ryan Larkin and NFB producers Colin Low and Donald Brittain, Remembering Arthur is an intimate portrait of a visionary, his body of work and the troubled last years of his life. Although Limpett's movies are exhilarating, it's the personal interviews that elevate Remembering Arthur beyond a normal biography. Sandiford recalls the early years, when she and Lipsett would comb Montreal second-hand stores for odd items to fuel his imagination; Low remembers the excitement generated by his early films.

Jonathan Culp Filmmaker, visiting from Toronto, with his short film Death Mask and feature doc, Remembering Arthur.

Monday 23 Apr 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Citizen Sam
Sam Sullivan was a local curiosity, the quadriplegic city councilor in a pinstripe suit, with a pipe dream of leading his shattered right wing party back to power. Citizen Sam goes deep inside Sullivan's mayoral campaign to tell the remarkable story behind his raise from obscurity.

With unprecedented access, director Joe Moulins blends the rough and tumble of the campaign with intimate moments from Sullivan's daily life. A brutally frank and funny video diary counts down the days to the election. From war room to bedroom, Citizen Sam is an unflinching portrait of the one-of-a-kind politician who has become the face of Vancouver on the international stage.

Monday 30 Apr 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Reds
This movie tells the true story of John Reed, a radical American journalist around the time of World War I. He soon meets Louise Bryant, a respectable married woman, who dumps her husband for Reed and becomes an important feminist and radical in her own right. After involvement with labor and political disputes in the US, they go to Russia in time for the October Revolution in 1917, when the Communists seized power. Inspired, they return to the US, hoping to lead a similar revolution. A particularly fascinating aspect of the movie is the inclusion of interviews with "witnesses", the real-life surviving participants in the events of the movie.

Sunday 6 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The "O" Tapes workshop
Chris Arnold*, director of *The **O** Tapes*, documentary, tells the successful struggle to overcome silent censorship, in a talk entitled: "Presenting Enlightened Sex ...to a Mainstream Audience" Chris Arnold recounts the five years of trials and triumphs producing this documentary about female orgasm, then selling it in Bush country, where sexual ignorance is bliss. The engagement is co-sponsored by *Movie Monday*, Victoria's most independent showcase for presenting films.

Monday 7 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Pursuit Of Happyness
A struggling salesman in little needed medical bone density scanners while his wife toiled in double shifts to support the family including their young son, Christopher. In the face of this difficult life, Chris has the desperate inspiration to try for a stockbroker internship where one in twenty has a chance of a lucrative full time career. Even when his wife leaves him because of this choice, Chris clings to this dream with his son even when the odds become more daunting by the day. Together, father and son struggle through homelessness, jail time, tax seizure and the overall punishing despair in a quest that would make Gardner a respected millionaire.

Monday 14 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
When Billy Broke His Head and Other Tales of Wonder
I'm pleased to present, in collaboration with UVic's Disability Institute, this brilliant doc and have Billy himself call in from his home in Minneapolis to talk about this Guggenheim and Sundance Award-winning film, and his life since the 1994 wrap of the film.

When Billy Golfus, an award-winning radio journalist, became brain injured in a motor scooter accident, he became one of the forty-three million Americans with disabilities - the nation's largest and most invisible minority. But this video, as he says, "ain't exactly your inspirational cripple story." It's a documentary with attitude, which will entertain, enlighten, and even enrage its viewers.

We'll be joined in conversation with Billy by "live" guest Sol Mogerman, a friend of mine who has recovered well from a brain injury. Sol had an auto accident-induced stroke 20+ years ago but is now an author and registered clinical counsellor working with people with head injuries and other disabilities. Amazingly Sol has recently recovered much of his ability to play guitar, a talent that he thought for 20 years was lost to him.

Monday 21 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The Queen
The Queen is an intimate behind the scenes glimpse at the interaction between HM Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Tony Blair during their struggle, following the death of Diana, to reach a compromise between what was a private tragedy for the Royal family and the public's demand for an overt display of mourning.

Saturday 26 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Senseless
Senseless takes an educational, entertaining and enlightening look at what it's like to live with a dual sensory impairment known as Usher syndrome. Through dialogues with four people in different stages of the condition, the film explores the misconceptions and subtleties of coping with this disability. Usher syndrome is a rare condition involving moderate to severe hearing loss from birth, combined with a degenerative eye disease known as retinitis pigmentosa (RP). The condition affects 4 out of 100,000 people, and is the leading cause of deaf-blindness.

Filmmaker Bio: Carrie Moffatt independently produced, filmed and edited this documentary as a student in the Applied Communication Program two-year diploma at Camosun College. She also has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Victoria in Political Science and Environmental Studies. She has won several awards, including a MuchMoreMusic broadcast scholarship, and a National Film Board scholarship to attend a four-day Media that Matters conference at Hollyhock on Cortes Island to speak to media professionals about disability and the media. Carrie was diagnosed with hearing loss at age two, and later with Usher syndrome and RP at age 24.

Deaf-blindness: Note that any degree of hearing loss combined with any degree of vision loss which interferes with communication and acquiring information is considered deaf-blind even though a person may still have some useful vision and hearing.

Monday 28 May 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Plagues & Pleasures of the Salton Sea
Here's a colourful look at how a beautiful idea can go terribly wrong - but how people adapt to and interpret the new reality. A cast of bizarre characters surround this once promising vacation mecca, "California's Riviera" turned sewer by an engineering error. A chilling reminder to look after our beautiful part of the world.

Monday 4 Jun 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Methadonia
A very personal and thoughtful look at the realities of drug addiction. Filmed in NYC by a MM favourite filmmaker, Michel Negroponte (Jupiter's Wife), over 2 years, it follows a handful of long-time addicts through their histories, their current challenges, and a peer support/mentoring process run by a tough love former addict with "a heart of gold". Besides describing vividly the addict's struggles it looks hard at the pros and cons of methadone treatment.

Saturday 9 Jun 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Unrepentant
Kevin Annett, (the protagonist, ex-United Church Minister, and co-producer), will present the Victoria premiere at our venue. Really tough topic and indepth treatment. Hard to watch but important and quite shocking revelations. R

Here's one to watch with your thinking cap on. It presents this historical story from one perspective, the protagonist, Kevin Annett's. Based on his book and produced by him and filmmaker Louie Lawless, who will both be at the screening, it presents, unfettered, a version of the truth that in the film goes unchallenged by other points of view.

Monday 11 June 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Charlotte's Web
Wilbur the pig is scared of the end of the season, because he knows that come that time, he will end up on the dinner table. He hatches a plan with Charlotte, a spider that lives in his pen, to ensure that this will never happen. Voices as diverse as Julia Roberts, Steve Buscemi, John Cleese lend themselves to this delightful live-action family film.

Monday 18 June 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
History Boys
"This smash stage hit made its way to the screen with its original cast intact. Veteran character actor Richard Griffiths stars as an rotund, eccentric teacher whose odd but effective methods are challenged by an intense newcomer whose only goal is to prepare his boys for university ‹ even if it means learning by rote. "The History Boys offers food for thought‹which makes it a rare bird among modern movies." - Maltin

Monday 25 June 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
So Much So Fast
"A black-humoured cliffhanger of romance, guerrilla science and the redefinition of time, So Much So Fast unfolds like a nonfiction novel. Stephen Heywood finds out he has ALS, a neurodegenerative disease. His brother Jamie becomes obsessed with finding a cure. And the woman who's falling in love with Stephen has a decision to make." efilmcritic.com

This film really knocked me out when I saw it at VIFF last September. Here's a guy who, at 29, finds out he has a nasty disease. "He did what any young man might do in such a situation: He bought a motorcycle, got married, had a baby, and decided to cure the disease with the help of a younger brother." VIFF

Monday 2 July 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The Journals Of Knud Rasmussen
I hardly ever show a film I haven't seen but I'm so keen to see this new feature from the top of the world we're just going to do it. It'll be a slice. By the makers of ATANARJUAT: The Fast Runner.

A portrayal of the lives of the last great Inuit shaman, Avva, and his beautiful and headstrong daughter, Apak. Based on the journals of 1920s Danish ethnographer Knud Rasmussen. more and even more

"This cerebral, beautiful narrative, presented in an unusual and disturbing documentary style, takes us back in time to witness the repudiation of spirit helpers and the old ways." - Raymond Massey

"Epic scope and emotional intimacy are masterfully merged to create an overwhelming experience that, as with all myth, affects both subconsciously and directly." - Marguerite Pigott

Monday 9 Jul 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Facing the Demons
Facing the Demons documents the effort to create an extraordinary event - a "conference" between those responsible for a terrible murder, and the family and friends of the victim. Restorative justice is gaining attention as a method of healing and reconciliation. Conferences such as the one documented in this film can help criminals confront the enormity of their actions, perhaps preventing them from relapsing on the outside. For victims and their families, it can be a way of helping to end the ordeal. Capturing on film the emotionally charged confrontation between a murderer and his victim's family, Facing the Demons takes us through the entire process to bring about such communication.

"Powerful and deeply moving... A very vivid rendering of the complexities and pain flowing out a real crime when put through the lens of a restorative justice effort." Educational Media Reviews Online

Our guest is a world leader in the restorative justice practice. He says, "I was attracted by the idea that you show films at your local psych hospital and given the nature of the film 'Facing the Demons', there could be some very interesting and challenging issues arise in our conversation. Bear in mind that I have [over the last 17 years] facilitated restorative conferences for a range of serious crimes and incidents - many involving death, suicide, sexual abuse, and rape and so on. Many of those folk who participate have had a long history of involvement with counselors, psychologists and psychiatrists. Apart from being a cop for nearly 30 years, I also graduated with a social welfare degree in the late 1980's [majoring in psychology]. My experience reveals there is a lot of questionable practice happening that I think frankly offers very little."

Monday 16 Jul 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The Matador
"A hit man and a salesman walk into a bar..." This is an off-beat, dark, comedy/drama that I thoroughly enjoyed. How could you become sympathetic with a cold blooded killer-for-hire? A regular family guy, Greg Kinnear, briefly meets a very good but lonely hit man brilliantly played by Pierce Brosnan. When this "facilitator of fatalities" shows up in a life crisis on the compassionate and intrigued salesman and his wife get swept up in his world. 14a language and some violence, sexual content.

Monday 23 Jul 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The Weather Underground
Outraged by the Vietnam War and racism in America, the organization waged a low-level war against the U.S. government through much of the 1970's, bombing the Capitol building, breaking Timothy Leary out of prison, and evading one of the largest FBI manhunts in history. How did American citizens come to adopt terrorist tactics against their own country? Looking back at their years underground, the former members paint a compelling portrait of troubled times, revolutionary times, and the forces that drove their resistance.

Monday 30 Jul 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Bridge To Terabithia
Based on the beloved book, this live action fantasy-adventure follows a couple of grade 7 kids, who are struggling with bullies at school and for attention at home, as they get to know each other and a half-imagined world where they reign supreme. Wonderfully acted, this is one of those films you watch closely as you just don't have any idea where it's going to take you.

Monday 6 Aug 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Forgotten Silver
In 1995, director Peter Jackson (The Lord Of The Rings and King Kong) paid a visit to his mother¹s next-door neighbor and made a shocking discovery that would change the course of film history forever. Here, Jackson would begin the search to unravel the astonishing legacy of Colin McKenzie, the greatest unknown cinema genius of all time.

Through archive photos, rare film footage and interviews with such experts as critic Leonard Maltin, producer Harvey Weinstein and actor Sam Neill, Jackson and co-director Costa Botes uncover the trials, triumphs and tragedies behind this pioneer¹s brilliant life and career. These startling achievements include McKenzie¹s invention of the steampowered projector, movie sound, color film and pornography, as well as the monumental discovery and restoration of the massive biblical epic that would ultimately destroy him. Nearly 70 years later, his tale can finally be told: This is the truly remarkable ­ though not entirely true ­ story of Forgotten Silver. read more

Plus a 'making of' by NFB: "Buster Keaton Rides Again" (1965, 55 min) a look at Buster on the set of the 1964 NFB film Railrodder, his 87th film, and his remarkable career and many insights into his stubbornly comic work style. B & W and finally - The Railrodder (NFB, 1965, 25 min), Buster Keaton. 25min Color! It is a slapstick cross-country travelogue cross-Canada on a sidecar - with no dialogue.

Thursday 9 Aug 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Disarm
In their independent documentary film Disarm, filmmakers Mary Wareham (Next Step Productions) and Brian Liu (Toolbox DC) present a contemporary and provocative view of the forces challenging the achievement of a landmine-free world. Looking beyond mines, Disarm offers a contemporary, intelligent and critical investigation into how weapons systems, war, and the way it is waged are being redefined in the twenty-first century with devastating consequences.

Monday 13 Aug 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The Paper
This 1994 comedy/drama by Ron Howard (Apollo 13) portrays the hub of city paper. The pressure cooker newsroom combo of "type A" personalities the need get the jump on the competition, balanced against deadlines and ethics. The Paper vacilates wildly between humour and poigniant drama. Micheal Keaton is at his Beetle Juice best, with great performances by Robert Duvall, Marisa Tomei, Glen Close, Randy Quaid, even Spalding Gray.

We'll have a couple of local seasoned newspaper men, Patrick Blennerhassett and Keith Norbury, of the News Group, with us to share some of their battle stories!

Keith Norbury has been the editor of the Victoria News for three years. Previous to that he was the editor of the Goldstream News Gazette for 12 years and he has been an editorial employee for Black Press for 21 years and published his first article in 1976. Norbury and his staff recently won the 2007 Ma Murray Community Newspaper Award and the 2006 General Excellence Award from the Canadian Community Newspaper Association.

Patrick Blennerhassett has been a senior reporter for the Victoria News for two and a half years. He is a Langara Journalism Grad where he was the editor-in-chief of the award-winning Langara Journalism Review. He has also worked for the Kamloops Daily News on both a full-time and freelance level and recently won a 2007 Jack Webster Fellowship Award.

Monday 20 Aug 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Monkey Warfare
Dan (Don McKellar) and Linda (Tracy Wright) are bohemians who survive by scavenging from garbage and trawling yard sales for items they can sell over the internet. Their precarious yet comfortable routine is thrown into hilarious confusion when an attractive and mysterious young radical, enters their world and threatens their complacent lifestyle. Susan soon learns however, that she is not the only one with secrets.

Monday 27 Aug 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Psychedelic Pioneers
The story of The Psychedelic Pioneers is part leading edge medical research and part utopian idealism. Three gifted psychiatrists, in combination with an extraordinarily powerful drug, resulted in one of the most fascinating and controversial periods in Canadian history.

Before LSD burst on the scene as fuel for wild psychedelic trips, it had an amazing, yet little known history. A surprising part of that history was written in a remote corner of the Canadian Prairies. Over a span of fifteen years, from when the drug was first administered in 1952 until it was banned and made illegal in 1967, the use of LSD ranged from leading edge psychiatric research into schizophrenia and alcoholism to volunteer testing on the general public.

Monday 10 Sep 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Shut Up and Sing
Time again to look at the aftermath of 9-11... Here's a sparky little doc that follows the fortunes of the hottest band in America when, at a London concert, one of the members uttered the words, "We're ashamed that the president is from Texas". In a country that purports freedom of expression, the band received an extreme backlash, plummeting popularity, even death threats. This is the story of how the band survived, and thrived, through that time.

Monday 17 Sep 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Miss Potter
I don't know about you but I grew up with Peter Rabbit on the bottom of my porridge bowl. Here's a biopic, starring Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor, that looks at Potter's sudden massive popularity, a whimsical look at her creative process, and relationship to her characters, and her private life that included class barriers and a lost love.

Monday 24 Sep 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Away From Her
Writer-director Sarah Polley's feature film debut is an adaptation of one of her favorite short stories, Alice Munro's "The Bear Came Over the Mountain". It was adapted specifically for Julie Christie, who she coaxed from near retirement, and co-stars our own Gordon Pinsent. The story deals with a couple in their Sixties coping with the wife's Alzheimers disease.

We'll have folks with us from the local branch of the Alzheimers Society to ground the story in real experiences and to hook people up with an invaluable resource for people going through the losses and stresses of Alz and dementia.

Monday 1 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Lives of Others
Captain Wiesler is a wiretapping expert with the Stasi (East German Secret Police) in the mid-eighties. His subjects, a playwright with views against the totalitarian state and his actress companion, start to challenge his beliefs through his overheard conversations. An engrossing human drama that won the Best Foreign Film Oscar this year.

Monday 8 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Hot Fuzz
Somewhat of a departure for MM - but this film is FUN! A remarkably sweet comedy action flick by the makers of Shaun Of The Dead. Big cops, small town, considerable violence.

Monday 15 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Shameless: The Art Of Disability
Special guests in attendance! * Award-winning director Bonnie Sherr Klein returned to filmmaking after a catastrophic stroke changed her life in 1987. From this unique perspective, she brings the audience into her new world of disability culture. Art, activism and disability are the starting point in what
David Roche
Geoff McMurchy unfolds as a funny and intimate portrait of five surprising individuals, including Klein herself. Humourist David Roche is working on taking his one-man show, The Church of 80% Sincerity, to New York (and Victoria - twice). Writer, scholar and activist Catherine Frazee pushes her limits with a full schedule of teaching and speaking engagements. Dancer, choreographer and impresario Geoff McMurchy is organizes kickstART2, an international festival of disability art - Victoria 2008. Sculptor and writer Persimmon Blackbridge is creating mixed-media portraits from each character's 'meaningful junk'.

Monday 22 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Alexei and The Spring
The village of Budische, on the border of Belarus and Russia, is no longer on the map. After the Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster 21 years ago all the inhabitants were ordered to leave. But 55 elders and one younger, slightly disabled man, Alexei, elected to stay. Miraculously the spring that is the heart of their community was completely free of the radiation that has polluted the countryside. This film, by a Japanese filmmaker, Masaru Motohashi, follows them through a year of their almost 19th Century existence. I found it a beautiful meditation on a tantalizingly wholesome, simple way of life that persists in the ashes of a high tech nightmare.

Saturday 27 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
My Own Private Etobicoke
It is the premiere of the new DVD version of her performance of My Own Private Etobicoke which Eufemia Fantetti will present in person with an interactive Q&A period following. It's a terrific example of great theatre being born from painful personal experience.

My Own Private Etobicoke is a personal account of surviving a childhood rife with secrets, superstition and schizophrenia - all on a steady diet of sugar. The play is a compelling and humorous monologue about growing up in a house where chaos was a constant companion; a story of living with schizophrenia as a family member and ultimately surmounting shame and stigma. Every family has a secret; this was ours.

"My father believes he's married the devil's minion, my mother shops like she's married to Onassis and my name rhymes with a disease. Life is good." Info on Eufemia & reviews of the film.

This is the first of a series of MM's SATURDAY LIVE! events made possible by funding from the 2006 Michael Miller Memorial Ride.

Monday 29 Oct 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Cracked Not Broken
Cracked Not Broken opens a disturbing window on the life of Lisa, a 37-year-old crack-cocaine addict and estranged mother of one who prostitutes herself to fuel her costly drug habit. Although she grew up in an upper middle-class family, went to the right schools and had the right friends, something went terribly wrong. Filmed almost entirely in the Toronto hotel room she lives in and works out of, Cracked Not Broken portrays a highly intelligent, vivacious, articulate and hyperactive woman juggling cell phone and drug paraphernalia with equal dexterity while talking with incredible frankness to filmmaker Paul Perrier* - the husband of one of Lisa's oldest friends - about the struggles of being in "the game" and her quest for redemption. Cracked Not Broken chronicles Lisa's faltering steps toward recovery and her early efforts to educate others about the illness of addiction.

Monday 5 Nov 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Unspeakable
Stuttering is as old as human speech. The biblical Moses stuttered. Winston Churchill, Marilyn Monroe, King George VI and James Earl Jones were also afflicted with the disorder - yet it remains a medical enigma. Unspeakable examines the nature, history and treatment of a speech impediment that affects about 1% of the world's population. John Paskievich, the film's director, is a person who stutters. He also narrates and is an active participant in the film. His story and the stories of others in the film are poignant, funny, angry and courageous, providing eloquent testimony to what it means to live imprisoned in what the poet W.H. Auden called "the tower of stutter." According to Paskievich, "the film is a call for liberation, not from stuttering, but from the ignorance and stigma that surround it."

Monday 12 Nov 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Radiant City
Gary Burns and Jim Brown peer into the windows - and lives - of those who call suburbia home. Suburban communities are examined and criticized by experts like University of Toronto's Mark Kingwell and author James Howard Kunstler. The legacy of the suburbs is traced from the rise of the automobile to the arrival of the "new urbanists," who look to pre-war models for designing future communities. Yet Radiant City is more than a critical dissertation on the suburbs. Burns lends the movie his witty, satirical edge, crafting a film that's informative, insightful and hilarious. Cinematographer Patrick McLaughlin provides a vivid backdrop for Burns's humour and Brown's journalism, while Joey Santiago of The Pixies gives the film an added urgency with a grinding rock soundtrack. Like the identical streetscapes of a housing division, Radiant City hides secrets behind its glossy exterior that, once revealed, change not only how we view the 'burbs, but also the movie we've just seen.

Monday 19 Nov 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
A Healing River
A Healing River takes is a thought provoking look at the issues of trauma, recovery and the psychology of restorative process. It then challenges us all to take an active role in creating safer and healthier communities. The film includes interviews with some of North America's leading thinkers and most experienced practitioners in the restorative justice movement. With filmmakers and special guests.

It will test your doubt/belief in restorative justice to see Warren Glowatski, who is serving time for his part in the Virk murder speaking candidly about his healing journey. There are video segments of his interviews on the site. He and others doing time were involved in interviews, logging and editing the film!

Saturday 24 Nov 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Cracking Up
Saturday Live!
An evening with David Granirer.

David will entertain you with his stand-up comedy act on the lighter side of mental health and talk about his Stand Up For Mental Health program. We'll show Cracking Up and David will do a book signing for his book The Happy Neurotic: How Fear and Angst Can Lead To Happiness and Success.

Cracking Up is a life-affirming CBC documentary about people with mental illness who embark on a quirky quest to become stand up comics. The film follows 11 courageous people who suffer from mental illness as they pursue a year of stand up comedy. Part fun and part therapy, the course, entitled Stand Up For Mental Health is the brainchild of Vancouver counselor, stand-up comic, and author of The Happy Neurotic: How Fear and Angst Can Lead To Happiness and Success David Granirer. "It's like 'The Full Monty' except people want us to keep our clothes on", he says.

Monday 26 Nov 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Ratatouille
It's tough to have aspirations to work in the best restaurant kitchens in the world - and to be a rat. Remy is a young rat in the French countryside who arrives in Paris, only to find out that his cooking idol is dead. When he makes an unusual alliance with a restaurant's new garbage boy, the culinary and personal adventures begin despite Remy's family's skepticism and the rat-hating world of humans. Delightfully realized! G warning: lots of rats in the kitchen.

Monday 3 Dec 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Talk To Me
Based on a true story, this is the unlikely tale of Petey Greene, who started out in 'the projects' and after a life of crime and serious prison time, became the influential, hip DJ voice on WOL radio in Washington DC. He was an integral part of the rise of the Black movement in the 60's.

We'll talk about the real story, which, as usual, is more amazing than the Hollywood package. R for funky bad language throughout.

Monday 10 Dec 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
The US vs. John Lennon
This doc will be a reminder, around the anniversary 27 years ago, of John Lennon's untimely death, of his valor and no-retreat mindset. John's amazing career is described but also the cat and mouse game, pitting his fame and eccentric peace activities against a paranoid regime - and the paranoia that regime in turn created in his life. With songs such as "Imagine," "Give Peace A Chance", "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" and "Revolution" and the infamous Bed-In, Lennon challenged the government-of-the-time's oppressive behavior - a scenario similar to today's.

Monday 17 Dec 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Hairspray
The 1988 John Waters "nicest" comedy that'll take you Boomers right back to "Club Six" days, (or whatever your city's after-school dance party show was - I always wanted to be one of those cool camera operators) and back to when TV was B&W, hair was high, good ole' doo wop tunes were plentiful, and life was simple (was it ever simple?).

A chubby teen whose dreams of becoming a dancer lead her to a newfound popularity. Great fun. Pg

Trivia: Director John Waters appears as the psychiatrist with the spinning hypno wheel to 'save' poor Penny Pingleton.

On YouTube watch Jonathan Ross's 1988 Incredibly Strange Film Show highlighting the films of John Waters and Divine, with footage of the 1988 Baltimore Premiere of Hairspray and interviews with Waters, Divine (aka Glenn Milstead) and his mother. Sadly Divine died a few days later.

Monday 22 Dec 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Stuart Saves His Family
An all time favourite; funny and wise, and starring Al Franken (author of, among other politically astute books, "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and other observations" - GVPL Call Number: 973.929 FRA) as the sweet-but-bound-to-a-crazy-family-and-addicted-to-support-group Stuart Smalley. You might enjoy a read of 'I'm Good Enough, I'm Smart Enough and Doggone It, People Like Me: Daily Affirmations' By Stuart Smalley (aka Al Franken) to prepare yourself for your own New Year of personal growth and this film treat. Stuart Saves His Family even has a boffo Christmassy conclusion!

Monday 22 Dec 2007 alphabetical list  chronological list
Wattstax This
"Black Woodstock" lined up all the hot Black entertainers of the time, including Isaac Hayes and the Staple Singers, to rebuild the down-trodden Watts neighbourhood's a sense of Black Pride. The film also features commentary segments by many African Americans who muse on how things have been and how they've changed in Watts since the riots that tore the city apart seven years earlier. Richard Pryor, at the top of his game, glues it together with his biting comedy riffs. Watch for a lovely example of crowd control, both impressive and hilarious, when the audience began to storm the field.