The Soldier is a John le Carré style cold-war spy story shot as a mood thick procedural punctuated by moments of hyper-violence (Featuring James Bond). It's as if Soderbergh made an action film in the early eighties and Sam Peckinpah shot the second unit. For a long...
Cancon Fun: Dreamland – A History of Early Canadian Movies 1895-1939 (1974)
A few months ago, I was surprised to read there was a 1974 documentary called Dreamland: A History of Early Canadian Movies 1895-1939. "Wow," I thought to myself "There was enough Canadian Cinema during that time to warrant a whole documentary?" No, not really. Canada...
Physical Media Forever: The Soultangler (1987)
“I always fast forward this part” - The Director of The Soultangler watching his own film. When I was a burgeoning cinephile, I wanted everything to be an extension of THE EVIL DEAD, DAWN OF THE DEAD or DEAD ALIVE. The movies didn’t have to look expensive, but they...
You’re Dumb If You Don’t Love Ready Player One
****SPOILERS AHEAD, BUT COME ON, THERE ARE NO SURPRISES IN THIS FILM**** This movie was made for me. It has a scene where a Gundam fights Mecha Godzilla with the Iron Giant! I LOVE ALL THOSE THINGS How can I hate it? Well... Ready Player One has three great...
Physical Media Forever: Class of 1999 (Blu-Ray)
Total Running Time Of Bonus Features: 80 minutes In the exploitation classic Class of 1984, the teachers have to deal with crazy punk kids who want them dead. In the video era gem, Class of 1999, the punk kids are the ones have to deal with the crazy teachers, who...
The Best Canadian Films of 2017
It's always frustrating to read a THE BEST FILMS OF ____ list, get excited about a film I've never heard of, and then discover that its only played at a few festivals and there are no immediate plans for its release. The reality of today’s media-choked world is that...
The Complete List of Best Canadian Film Winners from the Canadian Film Awards, Genie Awards and Canadian Screen Awards
The Canadian Screen Awards (A.K.A "The Canadian Film Awards AKA "The Genies" AKA "The Canadian Oscars) are Canada's most prestigious cinematic award ceremony. Because I like making lists, I've collected all the Best Picture winners on one page to a illustrate a...
#96 – Living Large on Poverty Row With Orson Welles, The Bowery Boys and Roy Rogers
We visit the magical time of Poverty Row studios with a discussion of Hitler's Madman, The Scar, Macbeth, The Golden Stallion and The Ghost Chasers. For more information on the retrospective visit: newsite.theroyal.to/movies We have a PATREON! Join for five dollars a...
Why The Hell Don’t We Watch Canadian Cinema?
I set out to make a list of important Canadian films that have never been properly released (which you can read below after this preamble), but there was one question that kept popping up in mind as I did it, one that I couldn't help but obsess over every time...
The Ultimate List of Canadian Film Books
You ready to experience the wild world of Canadian Cinema in the most exciting form of all?! Book form?! I don’t simply mean tomes about Cronenberg and Egoyan. I’m talking about stuff like the memoir by the director of Alien Thunder, the history of STUDIO D: the...