By Mathew Kumar

Urgh, with only a week since TIFF ended, who wants to talk about film again now? Paradoxically, we wanted to talk about TIFF again yesterday, but we’re fickle like that—perhaps now it’s just the realisation that most of our Film Fridays are only going to talk about films that played at this year’s TIFF. Instead we’ll lead with something from last year’s TIFF and probably one of the most welcome releases we can think of in recent memory—Sukiyaki Western Django.
Its release is good for a variety of reasons. First, it’s the first release of a Japanese movie here (outside of Cinematheque) that we can remember—Asian films are so rarely released here—and second, it’s playing at the AMC, which means their claims of playing more independent and foreign features than the usual multiplex may actually be true! We liked Sukiyaki Western Django a lot when we saw it originally at TIFF 2007, calling it a “joyful piece of work that was possibly the most fun we had at the festival.” Apparently roughly half an hour of the film has been chopped out for this release, which considering it’s by Takashii Miike, could possibly turn the largely nonsensical plot into something completely incomprehensible. We often wonder if there’s an entire act missing from Gozu, or something.
It’s not the only Western that played TIFF being released this week—Ed Harris’s Appaloosa was very well received this year, and positive reviews include the one by the Sun‘s Kevin Williamson, who claims the film “may not re-invent the genre, but it’s the most convincing argument [he's] seen in years.”
Also from this year’s TIFF, Ricky Gervais vehicle Ghost Town and Keira Knightley vehicle The Duchess.
Films out this week which weren’t in TIFF: Neil LaBute’s Lakeview Terrace (LaBute was, astonishingly, interviewed by Eye‘s Jason Anderson without being bombarded with questions about his offensively ludicrous remake of The Wicker Man… how did that happen?); I Served The King of England, and CG animation Igor. The Bloor is also showing some screenings of Ingmar Bergman’s Monika, but most of all we can’t forget to mention the release of My Best Friend’s Girl, which manages to beat Ghost Town this week in the “heavily features stars that we’d like to beat to death with a rusty hammer” stakes by starring not only Kate Hudson, but Dane Cook as well! Better luck next time, Kristen Wiig.