The full colour cover for Zomkeys! Coming soon from Mirror Comics!

I think that I'm fairly knowledgeable about movies, and I try to keep on top of indie releases for possible Mayfair screening consideration at all times. Yet, great stuff always seems to fall by the wayside. I had never heard of The Sapphires before it was picked up to be screened at the Mayfair. Even with Chris O'Dowd front and centre, whom I am a giant fan of thanks to The IT Crowd and Bridesmaid, it had not crossed my radar. The Sapphires could have easily been sappy and contrived, but thanks to a great script and a talented cast and a lot of amazing Motown era music, it is just lovely. I think it may be the dictionary definition of a crowd pleasing motion picture.

The Sapphires screens at the Mayfair for three nights - this evening and Wednesday July 30th at 9:15pm, and Thursday August 1st at 6:30pm.

It's always hard for me to pick favourites or make best of lists, having said that, I'm pretty sure the movie that I would deem best of 2011 was Take Shelter. Writer and director Jeff Nichols is back with Mud, starring Mathew McConaughey in the title role. The movie is about two adventurous and independent boys in Arkansas who form a friendship with a mysterious fugitive in a Huck Finn reminiscent style. I was just as impressed with this effort as I was with Take Shelter, and most critics seem to agree with me that a truck full of awards will soon be coming the films way. I think that this Jeff Nichols is the real deal and a filmmaker with a ton of talent. And yes, most importantly, as per contractually obliged by his rider, McConauhey does indeed go shirtless for a portion of the film.

Mud screens at the Mayfair twice more, tonight and tomorrow (July 29 and July 30) at 9:15pm.

Wrapped up our visit to Fantasia in style with a matinee screening of Ultraman Zero: The Revenge of Belail. This Ultraman film marks the 45th anniversary of the franchise, which at this point comprises of 28 seasons of teevee and 22 films. Nothing quite better then the simple enjoyment of a movie filled with giant robot heroes fighting giant monster villains. Plus there was a part where a guy was crying, then a giant robot flew out of his tear, and then they fought bad guys. I didn't have a grasp at exactly was going on at all times, whether that be from a cultural divide or just because of poor film-making I'm not quite sure, but that did not hinder the enjoyment of this rather insane corner of Japanese cinematic history.

Bushido Man is a no-budget martial arts food themed action comedy. It was extra impressive because it was a genuine no-budget endeavor, in which the director in attendance said that often the crew consisted of just the actors along with the director running a camera. The movie was filled with lots of great action, including quite a few original fight gags and stunts that I've never seen before. It also had one of the best after-the-credits twists that I've ever seen. As an extra bonus, a couple of the actors were on hand for some live martial arts action after the film. Maybe the best part in an over-all greatly memorable screening was that they gave out Japanese candy to the crowd. I'm not quite sure what is in the package titled Corn Potage, but it's mascot and packaging awesomely enough look like something right out of a Simpsons parody of Japanese culture.

Machi Action was another real crowd pleaser, and although heavily intertwined in geek culture, I think would be equally enjoyable to patrons of the cinema who don't normally enjoy giant monsters in their entertainment. Machi Action is a behind the scenes tale of the star of a once greatly popular but now dwindling Saturday morning live-action series the like of Power Rangers. The story of best friends who play a iant space hero and the giant monsters who he battles was funny through-out and had a lot of heart. It was so good that I'm sure that sooner or later Hollywood will remake it instead of just releasing it in its original form.

We're sticking around in Montreal an extra few days to good deed it up and take care of some dog and cat sitting duties. Most importantly, that mans I get to take in a few more Fantasia screenings.

First up was the Japanese horror film The Complex, from the director of The Ring inspiration Ringu. Like many films from this corner of the horror genre, it involved a haunted house story-line and creepy kids. The movie was ok, I've just seen this kind of thing over and over again, so it felt a bit like covered ground and had nothing new or original about it.

Across the River on the other hand was a horror movie at it's best. If you went into the movie blind, you might think it was going to be a simple character piece about an ecologist working in the woods. Then there's some creepy sounds from the surrounding forest...then the leftovers of a dead boar are found...and then things get really scary. There are great shots of wild animals being spooked by the aforementioned creepy sounds, made for great cinema, but I think might qualify as animal cruelty. Once the climax starts rolling, I spent the whole time wide eyed with hands gripping my seat. My girlfriend spent most of the time with her eyes closed. This for a low budget project with little in the way of dialog, no real special effects, and the performance of a single actor carrying most of the connection the audience has to the movie. Some don't enjoy or understand why people like horror movies. It's movies like Across the River that I point to for the legitimacy of horror film-making, and how they can be some of the most impressive examples of a piece of work entertaining and effecting its audience. It will also make you want to avoid camping for a while.

I didn't get my copy of Deadpool #1 signed by it's co-writer, but it was none-the-less great to see Comedians of Comedy alum Brian Posehn perform tonight at Just for Laughs. I've been a fan of his for a very long time, from News Radio through Mission Hill through the Sarah Silverman Program. He was waring a Warriors shirt and topped off the show with a Star Wars rant. Not hard to guess that his comedy stylings are in my wheel-house of interest and enjoyment.

After that we bolted over to the Fantasia Fest to get in line for the sold out screening of The Machine. Luckily our industry badges afforded us entry anyhow...there's no money in owning an indie rep theatre, but you at least get to see a lot of free movies. I especially love getting to see awesome movies that you can't see anywhere else yet. The Machine was very impressive Blade Runner-esque sci-fi about evil corporations, obsessed scientists and the birth of cyborgs and artificial intelligence. It is another example of a low budget movie getting it right, and expertly so, in a genre that the mainstream so often drops the ball on. The filmmakers are still chasing distribution, but keep the title on your radar. Hopefully it will find a distribution home and we can grab it to screen at the Mayfair sometime soon. It cost about 200 times less then a Transformers movie, and was easily 200 times better then anything Michael Bay has ever been a part of.

Watched the season finale of Orange is the New Black on the Netflix. We're all on the same page that Netflix is awesome and all of these original programs they're putting out are awesome right? Ok...good. On the off chance that you haven't binge watched through this great new series yet (like everyone else I know has done), go do so right now.

A stand-up comedy filled evening beginning with The Meltdown with Jonah and Kumail. The Meltdown is the flagship comedy showcase spun out of Nerdist Enterprises that happens on a weekly basis at Meltdown Comics in LA. Meltdown Comics is high on my list of places on this planet that I want to visit, and I love the Nerdist, so I was glad to partake in this road-show version. One of their special guests was the hilarious Ron Funches, who ended the show with his trademark move of throwing a bunch of Skittles at the audience. I sadly did not catch one to keep as a souvenir forever and ever.

Then we headed to another hidden club to see 30 Rock alum Judah Frielander. All of the 'Off JFL' locations are true and old fashioned tiny comedy clubs, meaning that many are up a long flight of sketchy stairs and that everyone is packed into a make-shift space that I'm relatively sure is a fire hazard to all in attendance. Danger aside, it does make for perfect surroundings for comedy. Judah Frielander was great, easily proving that he is indeed the World Champion of everything.

Tonight at Fantasia we watched Bounty Killer, a really impressive low budget mash-up genre of an indie movie. Things opens up with an insanely violent guns a blazing action scene, and the pace doesn't let up for the 90 minutes that follow. The world of Bounty Killer is part comic book, part video game, part exploitation, part grindhouse, and all post apocalyptic crowd pleasing action and excitement. It always amazes me how much better low budget genre efforts are than similar big budget movies of a similar style.

Making the evening even more enjoyable, we followed up a very fun movie by attending Just for Laughs for a dose of Maria Bamford stand-up. Maria's mix of dark autobiographical stories, mocking of her family members and wide ranging impersonation talents make her one of the best stand-up's working today. We sat front row and got some interaction into her performance. Which I think means that we are now a part of show business. If you haven't seen the documentary Comdians of Comedy (which is on the Netflix), go watch that as a good jumping on point to her hilarity.

I listen to the Judge John Hodgman podcast on a regular basis, and enjoy it very much. The premise of the show is that people bring a case before the fake Judge, and he uses all of his comedic wisdom to rule as to which side of the debate is correct. One of the mainstays of the court is that you can't force someone to like something that thy do not like. It stuns me how many times couples and friends and family members seem to want to force their taste in movies onto one another (either via podcast debate or in real life examples I've been told of). I never get why when two people are going to watch something, both can't be pleased with how they are spending their time. Especially in this day and age where the world is at your fingertips and it's pretty easy to have a wide selection of entertainment options.

So, when my girlfriend and I are at the Fantasia Film Fest, I give her full warning that sometimes they program some pretty insane stuff. She's not exactly the biggest horror fan in the world. When she saw The Blair Witch Project for the first time, a couple Halloween's ago at the Mayfair, she nearly broke my arm from grabbing it in a state of fright. If she didn't want to join me for a potentially disturbing and terrifying cinematic experience, I would totally understand.

She cowboy'd up though, and bravely decided to join me for the Korean anthology that was simply titled Horror Stories. I texted this info to a friend of ours who I attended many a Fantasia screening in the past. He said that it was nice to have known her before her brain was forever damaged by exposure to the genre at hand. Luckily she got off the hook relatively easily. There was the traditional Korean scary ghost ladies, and some zombies and serial killers...but in comparison to other films I've seen from the country, it was rather tame.

Next up genres switched over to a Spanish drama Magic Magic, featuring Juno Temple and Michael Cera. On the surface it begins as a simple story of a young woman travelling from America to visit her cousin in Chile. Things start getting uncomfortable right away thanks to our central character's cousin abandoning her to weird friends as they make their way to a secluded cottage. Things continue to delve into hypnotism and nightmares and confusion and a general descent in madness. Not quite a horror film, but none the less it had lots of scary moments and a well played horrifying climax.

The biggest surprise of the night was the Imperial Theatre. Everyone always teases me that we should open up a Mayfair in Montreal. Evidently there already is one there, it just goes unused most of the time. It holds some 900 seats, has a chandelier and is covered in fancy design never changed from the 1920's. Sad that it sits sadly empty most the time, but nice to see so many movie fans getting to partake in its glory during the festival.

Excited to be heading to Montreal tomorrow to attend this years installment of the Fantasia International Film Festival. I would love if I could have been able to attend every day of the event that runs from July 18th to August 7th, but taking that much time away is a little difficult. I'm sure that I will see some great genre movies throughout the week though, even with the extra distraction of catching some Just for Laughs stand-up while in the city. If you live in Montreal or are visiting for any amount of time over this period, be sure to check it out.

Are you ready to be angry at the people that run the world and frustrated at the state that society and the environment is in? Then the new documentary Greedy Lying Bastards is perfect documentary for you. Join us at the Mayfair tonight at 9:00pm, tomorrow at 8:30pm, Wednesday July 24th at 9:00pm and Thursday July 25th at 9:30pm. Unless you work for Fox News, or run an oil company, or are possibly Lex Luthor, get ready to be informed, educated and furious.

Run from the evil scary monkey! Mirror Comics released this here terrifying teaser image from the upcoming comic book one-shot Zomkeys. This horrifying little critter comes from a book written by me, drawn by Barb Felix and coloured by Brianna Parker. It will be out in time for Halloween, and you can be sure that I will be talking about it endlessly in hopes of convincing you to buy a copy or two or fifty for your comic book collection.

Tomorrow night (Friday July 19th at 7:30pm) the Rideau Valley Roller Girls invade city hall for an inter-league exhibition game happening outside on the front lawn of city hall. This will mark the first ever outdoors roller derby game in the history of our fine city, and best of all is that it's absolutely free. Th mayor himself will even be on hand to start the game and blow the first whistle.

Then if that weren't enough roller derby excitement for your weekend, Saturday July 20th at 5:30pm brings a double header of bouts to the Barbara Ann Scott Arena, located at 2250 Torquay Avenue. Tickets are a mere $15 at the door to see the RVRG Slaughter Daughters take on Toronto's Bay Street Bruisers and the RVRG Riot Squad battle London's Timber Rollers. What other sport is on now? Baseball? Pfft...roller derby could beat up baseball with both arms tied behind its back.

This Saturday July 20th there is no better way to spend your afternoon than at the Mayfair for some time travelling adventure with the Back to the Future Trilogy: Back to the Future at 11:30am, Back to the Future II at 1:45pm and Back to the Future III at 4:00pm. We even have a flux capacitor on hand in the lobby just in case we manage to get the theatre up to 88 miles per hour.

I've long been in the favour of more stylized or cartoon-y looking comic books vs photo-realism art work. It's not a brand new release, but I just read the Spider-Woman: Agent of SWORD collection, and I was greatly reminded of this. At first glance, Alex Maleev's artwork is very pretty. The more I look at it though, the more I think it looks lifeless, posed and traced. I find that the characters seem like they are cut and paste in front of photographic cityscape backgrounds or plunked into locations like a sticker into a colouring book page location. I find it all very distracting as I read through the story.

Since this Spider-Woman work is accomplished with directing models into poses and many of the backgrounds are digital references, it might have a sense of realism, but it lacks life and soul. I guess I'm a traditionalist. I like a comic book that looks like a comic book and not stills from a live action movie. Also, I kinda just noticed how blatantly offensive the triangles on her costume are.

Tonight I got to point a follow-spotlight towards living legend BB King on the final night of Blues Fest. Such an amazing gig gets me a bit emotional and choked up because Mr King was my dad's favourite musician of all time.

I went to see Mr King perform once with my dad, well over twenty years ago, and my dad got to see him again in Ottawa one time while I was out at school in Vancouver. He phoned me after the concert as excited as a kid on Christmas morn. He had overheard someone with a backstage pass saying that they were leaving, struck up a conversation, was kindly given the pass, and got to go met BB King. He got to have an actual conversation with his hero, and was given a bunch of personalized autographed pictures (the one written to me I of course still have framed).

My dad isn't with us anymore, but I smile at the thought that if he were I would have got him into the show tonight and h would have been ecstatic. And that while I was working, he probably would have wandered off, gotten himself back stage, and met up with his hero BB King again.

The last couple of night, the Mayfair has screened the Ottawa premiere A Band Called Death, the new documentary from Drafthouse Films. We've had a fine run of quality music themed doc's, they seem to be a real fan favourite with our patrons. Over the past few years we've had great numbers come out for such titles as It Might Get Loud, The White Strips Under Great White Northern Lights, Shut Up and Play the Hits, and Searching for Sugar Man. A Band Called Death is a worthy addition to that impressive collection of rock n roll doc's.

The movie tells the tale of three teenage brothers in the early 1970's who formed a spare bedroom garage-band. They annoyed the neighbours, played a few small-time local gigs, and even pressed a single in hopes of getting their music heard and signed to a record label. Their hopes of professional musicianship, fame and fortune hit a wall when the leader of the band refused to change their band's name from Death.

What follows is a decades long truth-stranger-than-fiction epic about the punk band legends that never were that is all at once heart-breaking, hilarious, inspirational, and filled with great real-life characters. Even if you aren't a fan of punk music, I cannot recommend this movie enough.

If you are in Ottawa, please join us at the Mayfair on Wednesday July 17th or Thursday July 18th at 9:15pm for A Band Called Death. If not, search out the film which will be making it's rounds and if you are lucky be playing soon at a theatre near you. Be ready to become a fan of a band called Death.

The cover for a new Spidey mini-series drawn by my friend Marco Rudy hit the interwebs today. For those who hate the current Superior Spidey story-arc, not to worry...this story is a good ole' fashioned Peter Parker adventure. It guarantees to look awesome.

One last Weezer post. I'm operating the follow-spotlight on the far left. A great way to watch your favourite band. I even got paid!