Results tagged “italian”

Well, we've listed the films that are showing at this week's NXNE festival, but we haven't particularly shown any opinion about which you should go and see. Until now! Our pick, above all, is Agile, Mobile, Hostile: A Year in the Life of Andre Williams, which plays the NFB Cinema at 1:15 p.m. this Saturday. Tim Perlich at NOW complains, "[directors] Matthies and Todd are unable to put [Williams's] sad current state in proper historical perspective," but we're still interested to see a film about Williams's current life. For a quick introduction to his work (and for some historical perspective), you couldn't do much better than checking out his song "Jail Bait." Pretty amazing—or amazingly offensive, depending on your point of view!

Toronto-based Naked News (NSFW, duh), which already broadcasts both an English and Japanese version, will soon also be available in Spanish, Italian and Korean. That's right. While other newsrooms are cutting back, laying off correspondents, and eliminating foreign bureaus, Naked News is (insert your pun of choice here).

In order to help raise funds for their excellent Toronto Upstairs exhibition (on now, until October 25), Art @ Liberty and the Side Space Gallery on St. Clair West invite you to eat your words.

Last night, the seats of Harbourfront Centre's studio theatre were packed with a mix of middle-aged art aficionados and well-coiffed hip, young homos all dying to see Francesco Vezzoli give a lecture and screen his notorious Trailer for a Remake of Gore Vidal's Caligula. Vezzoli is an Italian artist known for his work in video and embroidery (yes, embroidery) who set the art world ablaze a couple of years ago with his re-imagining of the infamous, semi-pornographic swords and sandals schlock-fest that actually was written by Gore Vidal. Vezzoli's trailer for an imaginary remake features Vidal as himself, as well as a ridiculously A-list cast, including original Caligula star Helen Mirren, Milla Jovovich, Justine Bateman, Karen Black, Gerard Butler, Benicio Del Torro and Michelle Phillips of The Mamas and The Papas fame. The title role is played by both Vezzoli himself and Courtney Love and the costumes are designed by Donatella Versace.

Reader Cy Goldsbie (yes, relation) sent us the above photos of a box that popped up in St. Clair station over the weekend. Marked "DEPOSIT PUBLIC CONSULTATION SURVEY HERE," the box is at the "end of the southbound platform tucked into the alcove of the non-working elevator." (In other words, they're about as conspicuous as what Joe Clark calls the TTC's "intentionally hidden online complaints form.")

Eight months after Torontoist, Reading Toronto, Spacing, and BlogTO all banded together to solicit reader comments to improve the TTC's website and after Adam Giambrone agreed to re-open the Request for Proposal (RFP) to allow for "a more ambitious and exciting project," there has finally been some news to report of late. Last week, Adam Giambrone told Torontoist that the website would launch sometime in the fall, and would definitely feature everyone's top request––a trip planner. Yesterday, in the process of a godammed-extensive breakdown of his grievances, transit nut Joe Clark synthesized some details about the way that the TTC wants its new website to run. Plausibility aside, the TTC's wishlist for it's site designer gives us a look––albeit a very incomplete one––into the general idea of what we'll get come fall when the TTC's website fills our hearts with joy and delight.

Where can you find popcorn lovers and peaceniks together? At a politically conscious film fest—in a park, no less!

Ask Torontonians for an example of Toronto food and you will have an array of different answers. One astute response may be that Toronto specializes in having everything and having it available at your doorstep.

Tut tut tut. We’re all very disappointed in you, John Krasinski, for your decision to star in License to Wed. Sure, you’ve been working so hard to build up your hipster cred—interviewing the Shins, playing on stage with Ben Gibbard, but I’m afraid we might have to revoke your hipster privileges.

Recently, Torontoist has probably been playing too many videogames. Not that that’s a problem, per se, but when you’ve become such an adrenaline junkie that you’re absent-mindedly tapping a non-existent "A" button to get past this bothersomely long “cut-scene” you’ve been watching only to remember that you’re actually watching The Omen, you have to admit that you’ve probably got a problem, and should probably cool off with some of Pedro Costa's longest films, showing at Cinematheque Ontario this week.

This evening (Tuesday), the kings and queens of Kensington migrate a little bit south and west to bring us their third annual Streets Are For Picnics! event. With more than a little help from the TTC, the pedestrians and cyclists of Toronto will reclaim the stretch of Dundas at Ossington, colonizing it with games and music, picnic blankets and baskets. The festivities will then be capped off with a street screening of the movie that resulted when Frankenweenie's director, Phil Hartman's writing partner, and Oingo Boingo's frontman decided to remake an Italian neorealist classic: Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure.

Cinematheque Ontario’s summer season begins tonight, and we’ve got one pair of tickets to give away to their opening night screening, the celebrated silent film classic Sunrise: A Tale of Two Humans, argued to be one of the greatest films ever made by countless critics. It’s tonight at Jackman Hall at 6:30 p.m., so if you can make it and you’re randomly selected from the people who email us at contests@torontoist.com, we’ll notify you by 4:30 p.m. today that you’re the winner. (The contest is now closed. Thanks to all who entered.)

“You can try to take away my coffees and my creams. Go ahead. I’m still here. I’m still going to get re-elected." Councillors Giorgio Mammoliti and Paul Ainslie scrapped it out yesterday in city hall over free coffee. The delicious roasted bean elixir is offered free to city councillors and costs taxpayers $20,000 per year.

Though you’ll have to hold your herrerasaurs for the long-awaited (and belated) revamping of the Royal Ontario Museum, this weekend the ROM opened a new exhibition on the ancient Peruvian Sicán culture. Ancient Peru Unearthed: Golden Treasures of a Lost Civilization explores the lesser known pre-Incan society via artefacts from a recent major dig at the Batán Grande archaeological site.

Photo by MonkeyfacedRatfink from Flickr. Toronto has been called a city of neighbourhoods: The Beach, Yorkville, Chinatown, Little Italy, Greektown, The Annex; all have their defining characteristics that make them appealing to locals as well as visitors. And when it comes down to it, most of these areas are well-defined by the intersection of two major streets. College Street is more often celebrated, but Little Italy has got nothing on Corso Italia. If you...

Torontoist has never seen an Alejandro Jodorowsky film! Should we be ashamed to admit that? Possibly. We are, however, not ashamed to say we love that crazy guy anyway. Who couldn’t love a guy who killed three hundred rabbits with karate chops for a scene in his most well known work (and occasionally screened by Reg Hartt’s Cineforum) El Topo? Torontoist suspect we’ve lost everyone who likes rabbits. Okay then, how about his plan to film Dune with Salvador Dali as the Emperor? No? Come on! Be honest. Lynch’s version was rubbish.

You may have already heard about the stellar line-up of bands going on for this year's Wintercity, but there's much more to this festival than an eclectic mix of tunes.

Yesterday, Jorge Garbajosa was named the Rookie of the Month for the NBA’s Eastern Conference, and he has been leading NBA.com’s unofficial Rookie of the Year Race for the past month. Garbajosa, however, is not a typical rookie; he doesn’t look like one and he doesn’t play like one.

Jagshemash!

Below, we've picked five "must see" events from Nuit Blanche's Zone A -- art events happening in and around Yorkville. All of the events we've picked run for the full 12 hours, so you can visit them at any point in the night.

Council is dealing with the fallout of the landfill deal. The Star found data that the city could've bought land at the Green Lane landfill site for much cheaper last year but did nothing. Jane Pitfield realises a day after the vote that she voted the wrong way and ended up supporting the mayor.

We know it's hot out there. It's so hot that last night was on record as the hottest night in Toronto ever. According to electricity companies we were just shy of the power record yesterday so keep up the good work everyone, don't do stupid things like blast your air conditioner and open your windows. Heck, try to avoid the A/C all together.

Guardian columnist Timothy Garton Ash argues in his latest column that he wants Canada to join the European Union and that he came to this conclusion after seeing the multicultural and happy World Cup celebrations here in Toronto.

This Torontoist is slowly becoming a sports fan (as if.) After watching 1.5 Stanley Cup games, (my first hockey games ever,) and with plans to go to a baseball game, I'm a changed man. The plans are to see at least one game of each sport... Yes, even the CFL.

This mid-week ushers in the Toronto Italian Film Festival at the Bloor Cinema. In its eigth year, the festival seems to get better every year, with a nice diversity of films to check out. This year, they are featuring a "De Sica Trilogy:" three generations of De Sica filmmakers. This includes Multi-Award winner Vittorio De Sica, son Christian De Sica and grandson Brando De Sica with a Canadian film premier. Christian De Sica was involved in some of the biggest grossing comedies ever to come out of Italy.

A subculture that began in working class London in the early part of the 1960s, the Mods took the hippy movement, looked it straight in the eye and sighed with utter disappointment. The Mods were a highly stylized bunch being the dedicated followers of fashion that they were, with their short-cropped hair, drainpipe trousers and riding about on their Italian scooters. (Oh, the girls looked similarly stylish). And why are we droning on about this? Well for one, the Mods have such a fabulous presence and a resurgence is due any minute now, but also, the Mod is the muse behind this year's DigiFest. "Today, Mod - short for modification - involves the rejection of digital and material conformity and is a unique form of self-expression in an era defined by replication and regulation. Because of the potential for individualistic expression, Mods have the potential to outshine and outperform the original, manufactured products."

So, we’ve been busy enough with Hot Docs to almost forget that they, you know, are releasing films which aren’t documentaries this week (madness!) Indeed, craziness of craziness, they’re even holding other festivals this week! So we’d feel terrible if we forgot to mention the Toronto Jewish Film Festival, opening tomorrow night with a showing of Jesus is Magic, Sarah Silverman’s concert film which, to our memory, did rather well as a Midnight Madness showing at TIFF 2005. An unusual choice for the fest, however! All thoughts of her ethnicity aside, do we (that’s Torontoist) actually like Sarah Silverman? We can’t tell. She was in Mr. Show, okay, so she gets a million points for that. But her solo shtick (“I’m sexy and say horrible things!”) is a bit… I mean, yawn, right? I guess if you found The Aristocrats funny this might float your boat.

Toronto doctor Gino Bucchino will be representing Italian ex-pats in the Italian parliament after winning a tight election. He'll be representing all of North America.

For those interested in 'it'-specific events, this Tall Poppy is for you. The Boat, the venerable 'It' club in Kensington Market, is the site of an increasingly popular monthly dance party called Zoi Zoi, the venerable 'It' DJ night in Toronto. If that wasn't enough 'It's, resident DJ Mimi plays what has become the 'It' music of the day - French language pop. We're using the 'It' phrase so much because we've never actually been able to get in to the packed Zoi Zoi nights, and thus knew sh-'It' about them. Luckily the redoubtable DJ Mimi was nice enough to help us with the translation.