The Fall's 2011 album, Ersatz GB, was its first for Cherry Red Records and marked a fine return to form for main man Mark E. Smith and what has now become the most stable lineup of the band ever.
Everyone is back again for The Fall's 30th official studio album since forming in Manchester, England 37 years ago, but numerous compilations and live albums boosts that total considerably. Smith's vocal rants are as cryptic as ever, but the consistency of the lineup (Peter Greenway on lead guitar on all tracks but three, where Tim Presley takes over, Keiron Mulling on drums, Dave Spurr on bass and Smith's wife Elena Poulou on keyboards and backing vocals) seems to be reflected in the consistency of the record's quality.
A minute-long instrumental titled "No Respects" opens the album and is brought back again in an extended version with vocals halfway through. Both have a surprising but welcomed '60s surf/garage rock vibe and provide the biggest highlights of a solid album. "Sir William Wray" was released as a limited edition single earlier this year and features more of the jagged post-punk we've come to expect over the years, with synthesizer and shouted backing vocals rounding things out.
I wish "Jam Song" actually was something from Paul Weller and company, as a mod Smith would be pretty amusing. But there's enough enjoyment to be gleaned from "Kinder of Spine," "Hittite Man," "Victrola Time," "Irish," "Jetplanes" and "Loadstones" that longtime Fall fans should be satisfied.
I bought Renegade: The Lives and Tales of Mark E. Smith a few weeks ago, and I'm hopeful that I'll enjoy the autobiography at least as much as Re-Mit, which I like quite a bit.
Black Oak Brewing Company's 10 Bitter Years made the biggest impression in my 19th year of attending Toronto's Festival of Beer.
The double India pale ale has been voted Canada's best imperial IPA, and with good reason. The eight-per cent alcohol ale is double dry-hopped using three types of hops and presents a very well-balanced quaff. The amber beer offers a robust aroma with hints of pineapple and grapefruit that then give way to the ample, though not overpowering, hops. It has a nice body and a slightly malty finish, and it's no wonder that Black Oak has difficulty keeping the small batch brew (which was originally created to celebrate its 10th anniversary) in stock.
I was impressed enough to stick around and sample Black Oak's Dubbel Entendre, a dark brown Belgian-style ale brewed with Belgian candy sugar. I'm generally not a big fan of this style and, while I could tell that this 7.4-per cent beer was well made, it's too sweet for my palate.
Black Oak was also offering a one-off cask while I was at its booth, a 5.2-per cent brew that uses its nut brown ale as its base and is then topped off with Dr. Pepper. I expected more carbonation from the soft drink, but it was as flat as the vague black cherry flavour that it added. Just one keg was made, and that's enough. It's not very good.
I don't mind Creemore Springs' Kellerbier, so I decided to try the seasonal one offered by King Brewery. The unpasteurised beer was a cloudy gold colour, had a non-distinct aroma and lacks the crispness of most European-style lagers. I found little of note to recommend it and will stick with Creemore's version.
Lake of Bays' River Walker Summer Ale features a blend of ginger and lemon. Its bright gold colour and early aroma and taste initially impressed, but you can taste a bit of the alcohol in the six-per cent ale, which you normally don't want in a summer sipper.
Silversmith Brewing Company was established two years ago, but this was my first experience with the two products it had on hand. I started with its Bavarian Breakfast Wheat and, while I could drink any beer for breakfast if pressed, there seemed to be a creaminess to it even though it's just brewed with water, wheat, malt and hops. I'll attribute that to the secondary in-keg fermentation that adds more depth. It's 5.2 per cent alcohol and okay, but there are a lot of other wheat beers that I'd take over this.
Next up was Silversmith's Black Lager, which comes from a German recipe dating back 700 years. The five-per cent brew starts like a stout and ends like a lager owing to its dark, malty character, but its smoky aroma and flavour didn't make a great impression.
Snowman Brewing Co. makes its Pail Ale on Black Oak's premises, and it's gluten-free status is its key selling point. I may have a few problems, but luckily eating gluten isn't one of them. I couldn't envision having to drink a beer as unappealing as this unfiltered, foresty concoction.
Sawdust City One Bourbon One Scotch One Bier was aged for three months in a bourbon barrel. I got notes of vanilla and cherry from this light brown, German lagered ale. It may have been my second favourite beer of the fest after 10 Bitter Years.
Flying Monkey's Matador Imperial Ale was dark amber and slightly cloudy and poured with a decent head. It's aged in a cedar barrel, and you can pick up a lot of cedar in the taste and aroma. It's both complex and distinct and, while I enjoyed the first few mouthfuls, I liked it less the more I drank.
Old Kentucky Bastard is a 10-per cent Imperial Stout from Nickel Brook Brewery. It pours with a nice head and is chocolatey and slightly sweet, and the high alcohol content doesn't overwhelm the other elements. I approve.
Melville's just recently arrived in Canada, and comes to us courtesy of the same people who brew Innis & Gunn. Its Ginger Beer is made with pure, natural stem ginger, but this 4.1-per cent alcohol lager is surprisingly subtle with the amount of ginger you smell and taste. It's definitely the key ingredient, but doesn't have the bite of some ginger beers. A few of these on a summer day would go down just fine.
Melville's Strawberry Craft Lager uses Jubilee strawberries to give it a striking red colour. The fruit comes through much more in the flavour than in the bouquet. I prefer the ginger beer.
I've seen King Heffy Imperial Hefeweizen on the LCBO shelves on my past few visits, but didn't pull the trigger on purchasing one of the large bottles. I was therefore eager to try a sample of this unfiltered, German-syle wheat beer from British Columbia's Howe Sound Brewing, which had a banana and clove aroma. The 7.7-per cent beer would be best served with a lemon wedge, but there were none available. I still doubt if I'll pick up a bottle at the liquor store.
Elysian Brewing Company's Immortal IPA is a light copper-coloured ale from Seattle that has a lot of hops up front, but not enough to scare non-hop heads away. It has 6.2-per cent alcohol and was one of my favourites of the festival.
Silver City Brewing Co.'s Whoop Ass Double IPA packs an 8.5-per cent alcohol punch, but it was silly that the server wouldn't let me order one for myself and another for my friend and photographer Jeff, who was standing nearby. I had to order one, deliver it to him, and then come back for mine. It's unfiltered and reddish orange, and offers fruit and grass elements to both the nose and tongue, along with a hint of caramel sweetness.
Last call rolled around, so we made haste and headed for the media lounge to enjoy a couple glasses each of Goose Island's Sofie. I'm a fan both of this Chicago brewery and the saison style, so it's no surprise that I enjoyed this 6.5-per cent Belgian-style farmhouse ale that's aged in wine barrels with citrus peel. It's cloudy gold in colour, sparkling in its body and blends citrus and vanilla flavours.
Should I start counting down the days to the 20th edition of Toronto's Festival of Beer yet?
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| Teen Violence |
The North by Northeast Music Festival returned again last week, which meant a lot of running around Toronto trying to catch as many bands as possible.
Here's what I caught on night four:
After taking a break for a few hours after the afternoon's "Bruise Cruise," I hit the clubs again with a 9 p.m. start at The Painted Lady with a young Kitchener, Ont. quartet called Teen Violence. Hearing one song on the NXNE website was my only familiarity with the group to this point, but after its set I can unequivocally say that it was my best discovery of largely unknown talent at the festival.
Teen Violence displayed a vintage '60s Mod-Britpop sound for most of its set, and midway through it played a song it said was inspired by The Everly Brothers. Not only were they talented, they were troopers, as the drummer played with a broken right foot. If you like short, sharp songs with a frequently forceful jangle, give a listen to Teen Violence. It definitely won't hurt.
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| The Dildoniks |
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| Beach Day |
A relatively new bar called May was just east on Dundas Street West, and I soon found out it had Kensington Watermelon Wheat on tap in addition to hosting The Dildoniks. There was nothing wrong with either the beer or the band, but both left me less fulfilled than I had hoped they would. The Toronto trio started with an instrumental that that would have done Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet proud, and I preferred the other surf-based instrumentals the group played over its songs with lyrics. They had more reverb and seemed to be performed with more energy, and the singer's voice and words were nothing special anyway.
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| French Girls |
There were two bands I was really hoping to see during NXNE since I missed both of them at the South by Southwest Music Festival in March. And wouldn't you know it, they were both playing tonight at 11 p.m.: Shannon and The Clams at Silver Dollar Room and Beach Day at Handlebar. I figured the Silver Dollar might be more crowded, it was farther away, and I'd never been to Handlebar before, so the Kensington Market venue won the competition. And as a bonus, it had Kensington Fish Eye, a decently hopped pale ale that I'd never tried before.
The Hollywood, Fla. trio fronted by sexy singer/guitarist Kimmy Drake, played '60s girl group pop with a garage rock edge that's totally infectious. They write songs about love, shoes, having fun and, on the lead single named after the group, spending a day on the beach. The group's Trip Trap Attack debut album was just released and, if it provides just half of the good vibes that the live show does, it will be an entertaining listen.
I moved south to Queen Street and Hideout for French Girls, a San Francisco quintet making its first Canadian appearance that's located at the point where garage and alternative rock intersect. The music got people dancing and clapping along and, while it had all the elements I usually love, I only ended up being merely satisfied by the revival rock.
I planned to see The Blank Tapes at The Cameron House, but there was a long lineup and I was told I'd have to wait to get in, so I moved a bit west to the Horseshoe Tavern, where I thought there would be an even longer lineup to see Fucked Up. I was somewhat surprised that I was able to walk right in, but the club was packed once the band reached the stage.
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| Fucked Up |
Lead singer Damian Abraham said it was his dream come true to play the Shoe again since his conceptual hardcore punk act's success has moved it on to much larger venues. Not surprisingly, his shirt came off during the first song. The moshing, stage-diving and crowd-surfing that ensued throughout the set came as no shock either, and Abraham high-fived most fans who made it up beside him.
I'm a bigger fan of the singer as a person than I am of Fucked Up and its music, but "The Other Shoe" was a clear musical highlight and watching Abraham carry fans on his shoulders and stage-diving while singing showed his dynamism as a frontman that he's been able to translate into other opportunities beyond the band.
Soupcans was on my list to see at 2 a.m. and, while I didn't have to leave the Horseshoe to see it, I became too engaged in talking with friends at the bar to pay any attention to what was happening on stage. When 3 a.m. rolled around, I figured it was a good time to start the walk home and end my NXNE for another year.
The North by Northeast Music Festival returned again last week, which meant a lot of running around Toronto trying to catch as many bands as possible.
Here's what I caught on day four:
M for Montreal's "Bruise Cruise" has become an NXNE tradition for me over the past two years and, since Saturday was shaping up to be warm and sunny and the talent lineup interested me, I saw no reason not to extend it to a third year.
Captain Matthew Flinders didn't pull out from the dock until about an hour after its scheduled 12:30 p.m. departure time, but there were people to meet, beers to drink and sunshine to enjoy on deck before the music started down below.
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| Fat Tony |
Fat Tony, a Houston rapper who performed with a vocal partner but no musicians, sounded okay and could put together decent rhymes. But it wasn't my thing so I went back up top to take in some views as the 575-passenger ship moved east from Harbourfront past residential islands to the north and Leslie Spit to the south. A military plane flew low overhead and I later saw it land at nearby Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, which I didn't know hosted such aircraft.
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| We Are Wolves |
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| Odonis Odonis |
We Are Wolves, a Montreal trio that made my personal Polaris Music Prize long list for its 2013 album La Mort Pop Club, came on at 2:20 p.m. Lead singer/guitarist Alexander Ortiz, keyboardist Vincent Levesque and stand-up drummer Antonin Marquis' post-punk, primitive electro-rock has both crunch and texture in its minimalist approach. Some songs are more aggressive, while others are more danceable and keyboard-focussed. There was no doubt what end of the spectrum the group's final number, a largely faithful cover of Black Sabbath's "Paranoid," fell on.
Captain Matthew Flinders sailed around the Toronto islands and continued about as far west as the Boulevard Club before circling back east and, while it was beautiful on deck, it was time to head back inside at 3 p.m. for Odonis Odonis. The Toronto trio's lo-fi punk rock set didn't hold a lot back and, though I didn't know anything about the band going in, I liked it. So did other cruisers, as Odonis Odonis prompted the most dancing of anyone so far -- including some mild moshing.
We were just docking when Mikal Cronin hit the stage at 3:50 p.m. I'd seen the guitarist and his three bandmates on Thursday night at Silver Dollar Room but, since this was one of the most hyped acts of the festival and friends are totally into it, I had no issues with trying these rockers on for size again. "Situation," a fine piece of power pop, got things started. "Am I Wrong" and "Apathy" kept the momentum going and inspired moshing and one brave (or stupid) crowd-surfer who was repeatedly battered against the low ceiling.
NXNE staff told Cronin to shut things down, but the band gave the crowd one more song: a cover of Wreckless Eric's "Whole Wide World" that was sped up considerably in places and featured a lot more guitar-jamming than the original. I hope Eric Goulden is making some decent royalties from all the interpretations of his 1977 classic that seem to have emerged over the past few years. He deserves them.
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| Mikal Cronin |
I disembarked and walked home along the shore of Lake Ontario, stopping to buy two beers from Keith's new hops series of beers along the way. The first one made the jaunt more pleasant and the second provided fuel for hitting the clubs later in the evening after taking a break to make dinner.
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| The Danks |
The North by Northeast Music Festival returned again last week, which meant a lot of running around Toronto trying to catch as many bands as possible.
Here's what I caught on night three:
Playing baseball kept me out of the clubs until midnight and, just as I had the night before with Invasions, I elected to give a band that didn't knock me out three months earlier at the Canadian Music Festival a second chance.
The Danks were plagued by lead singer/guitarist Brohan Moore's voice problems in March and, while it still seemed a bit scratchy at certain moments, it was much improved this time. The Charlottetown, P.E.I. pop-rock quartet just released its sophomore album, Gank, and its set was logically heavy with new material, including "Sycamore," "Summer Lovin'" and "Not News." "Die Young" and "What We're Doing" represented 2009's fine Are You Afraid of The Danks well, and the group again covered the Pixies' "Alec Eiffel."
These guys have a definite knack for incorporating catchy hooks into short, snappy songs. And this set was much more energetic than the last one I saw, which was probably helped by a larger and more receptive audience. Don't be afraid of The Danks. Their music is well worth checking out.
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| Blowfly |
A cult legend who I'd heard of but never heard before drew me to the Horseshoe at 1 a.m. for a performance that's still leaving me a bit puzzled. Clarence Reid was a straight-ahead soul singer/songwriter who had some success in the '60s before he adapted his Blowfly alter-ego in 1971. He started wearing bizarre costumes, performing sexually explicit songs and laid a legitimate claim to being the first rapper.
On this night Blowfly strolled on to the stage in a sparkly gold outfit with a BF insignia on the front similar to a Superman get-up, complete with a blue cape. A matching gold and blue mask was soon thrown aside as his six-piece band (complete with saxophone, trumpet and trombone) fired him up for "Funky Party." That turned out to be his cleanest number, as he followed up with songs that included the lyrics "doing it like a dog," "you've got to fuck the boss" and "I fuck everything because everything is you," as well as song titles including "Rapp Dirty," "Pussy Hell" and "Incredible Fulk."
Blowfly's original songs were augmented by parodies of Sam Cooke's "Chain Gang" ("that's the sound of the men butt-fucking on the chain gang"), Sam & Dave's "Soul Man" (which became "Hole Man"), Michael Jackson's "Ben" (with lyrics about the sexual misadventures of members of the Jackson family) and "Beat It," and The Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go?" ("you've got to let me know, should I fuck that big fat ho?").
I admit that I chuckled along to a lot of the songs before realizing that, if Blowfly wasn't 74 years old, I'd be criticizing him as a homophobic, misogynistic pig with freakily long fingers and fingernails instead of cutting him some slack and writing his schtick off to being a dirty old man. I've probably seen Andre Williams a dozen times and, while he's another septuagenarian who still fancies himself a ladies man, he does it with more class and his innuendos don't beat you over the head like Blowfly's blunt words do.
The other thing that I felt was a bit strange was that I had passed several black people standing outside various showcase venues while on my way to the Horseshoe, but I didn't spot any at all in the crowd of approximately 300 people who came to see a performer who plays soul, funk and rap.
Another act followed Blowfly on to the stage at 2 a.m., but I couldn't pay attention as I talked to friends about what we'd just witnessed.
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| Invasions |
The North by Northeast Music Festival returned again last week, which meant a lot of running around Toronto trying to catch as many bands as possible.
Here's what I caught on night two:
A streetcar delay made me arrive late at Yonge Dundas Square for Social Distortion's 9 p.m. set, but luckily I got there just in time to hear "Story of My Life," which has always been one of my favourites from the band. I was pleasantly surprised by the large size of the crowd, considering it was cool and raining, and the performance didn't seem to be dampened -- even though Social D isn't what it was when I first saw the band about 20 years ago. Lead singer/guitarist Mike Ness was dressed all in black except for red suspenders and I realized, with a Citytv video screen behind the stage offering the cue to get me thinking, that Ness is starting to resemble Moses Znaimer -- if the television pioneer was covered in tattoos.
Social Distortion continued to mine its rich catalogue of roots-influenced punk rock with songs including "Cold Feelings," "Crown of Thorns" and the always great "Ball and Chain" before ending the set with "Misery Loves Company" from Ness' 1999 solo debut, Cheating At Solitaire.
The group emerged back on stage after a short break with Ness wearing a fedora as he launched into "Reach For The Sky," "It Coulda Been Me" and "Winners and Losers" before concluding -- as Social Distortion has every time I've seen it -- with a scorching cover of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire."
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| Mikal Cronin |
I walked west on Dundas Street West and scored a bargain by snagging four pizza slices for a buck each, which I ate en route to The Silver Dollar Room, where I arrived for the second half of Invasions' 11 p.m. set. I saw this Toronto surf-garage rock band during Canadian Music Festival in March and, while I wasn't completely sold, I said I'd give it another chance. There seemed to be more energy, from both the band and the audience, this time. The trumpet also stood out more, which was a plus. But the group's cover of The Kinks' "Dead End Street" left me lukewarm once again. My friend Matzoh Ball described Invasions as "Glee doing a tribute to Calexico," which I laughed at but can't verify since I've never watched Glee.
Mikal Cronin was the main reason I was at The Silver Dollar, however, as he launched a three-night residency at the club. The place was packed and the front of the stage was full of moshing and crowd-surfing by those excited to witness the San Francisco-based singer/guitarist's brand of lo-fi rock and roll. "Apathy" and "Change" were my personal highlights of the short but explosive set. I'd meant to see Cronin at the South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas in March, and friends who saw him there or elsewhere have raved about his performances. Perhaps that set my expectations too high because, as much as I enjoyed Cronin and his three bandmates, I didn't find it mind-blowing.
Toronto's Pow Wows had their work cut out for them to try and elicit the same response from the now much smaller Silver Dollar audience, and the trio's unexceptional garage-psych rock wasn't up to the task and sent me on my way home before it finished.
The North by Northeast Music Festival returned again last week, which meant a lot of running around Toronto trying to catch as many bands as possible.
Here's what I caught on night one:
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| Star & Micey |
Star & Micey is an act I tried to see in Austin during the South by Southwest Music Festival in March but didn't, so I was happy to get another chance at NXNE. The Memphis, Tenn. quartet arrived late and didn't start until 25 minutes after its scheduled 8 p.m. start time, but made up for it with an effervescent performance of fun and easy-to-listen-to, guitar-driven pop-rock songs. The group topped things off by parading through the venue and standing on the bar while playing its final song. It was worth the short wait to hear.
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| S.M. |
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| The Mouthbreathers |
Star & Micey's late finish altered my scheduling, so I rerouted to Kensington Market and the small Detour Bar to see S.M. -- and it wasn't because we share the same initials. The Sarnia, Ont. trio had an audience four times its size when I arrived part-way through its set of lo-fi rock. The vocals were somewhat atonal and the musicianship wasn't exemplary, but I stayed for the duration because I had to finish my Stigl tallboy and there was nothing else in the neighbourhood that I had on my list to see for the time slot.
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| Samantha Martin |
I moved around the corner to The Boat for The Mouthbreathers, a quartet from Sackville, N.B. fronted by a singer/guitarist who was celebrating her 23rd birthday. The performance was reminiscent of the slacker guitar rock you'd hear more commonly in the early '90s. It was far from exceptional, but pretty good, well-paced and improved as the set went on. An Eric's Trip song was thrown in for good measure as a nod to a musical influence from the band's home province.
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| The Normals |
I had a small window to grab a bite to eat and still make it to Supermarket at 11 p.m. for Toronto's Samantha Martin and The Haggard. Martin plays guitar and was backed by an electric guitarist, bassist, drummer and two female harmony singers. I was pleasantly surprised that her brand of blues incorporated soul, rockabilly and even reggae, and Martin's powerful voice matched the repertoire well. That passionate delivery was in full effect for an energetic, set-closing performance of Ike and Tina Turner's "River Deep - Mountain High."
Montreal's The Normals formed in 1977 and only lasted a year, but the old school punks are back together. While the trio's brand of punk may be a bit formulaic, I enjoyed what I heard and the set improved as the guys warmed up. "I Don't Want To Go To Work" was a sentiment that most people in attendance probably shared the next morning, and a cover of The Buzzcocks' "What Do I Get" ended my time at Cherry Cola's Rock n' Rolla Cabaret & Lounge on a high note.
The last stop of my night was at 1 a.m. at Hideout, where I was surprised to find that the Boston Bruins and Chicago Blackhawks were playing a third overtime of their National Hockey League final. But I was more interested in a group from Mexico City named Los Oxidados, which played a very fun set of instrumentals from the schools of surf, garage and spaghetti western. All three members wearing black eye masks was also a nice touch. While the music moved my feet, the sexy belly dancer who took centre stage throughout the set made something else move below my waist. It was a great way to cap off a good, if not great, night of music.
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| Los Oxidados |
Selling body organs is illegal in most countries, but thousands of people around the world buy and sell the most sought-after organ -- the kidney -- on the black market each year.
Tales From The Organ Trade, directed by Ric Esther Bienstock and narrated by Canadian film director David Cronenberg, had its North American premiere last week at Toronto's Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival. It features people who buy, sell and perform the operations that transfer kidneys from donor to recipient and presents multiple views that shows the moral dilemma involved in this underground practice. After all, 182 people around the globe die from kidney failure in the 82 minutes this documentary plays out -- many of them while on long waiting lists to obtain a legally donated kidney.
Forty-four-year-old Filipino kidney seller Joboy in Manilla lives in a crawl space with no electricity underneath someone else's shack and says the $2,500 he can make for his kidney -- more than he can earn in a year from working as an unskilled labourer -- will go towards fixing his house for his wife and two sons. Eddieboy, a rival potential donor who says he earns $2.50 per week, is coached by organ broker Diane (who's already sold one of her own kidneys) on what to say when he's questioned by authorities on why he's donating a kidney. He's ultimately chosen by a doctor and recipient since he's half of Joboy's age.
A small town five hours outside of Manilla is a hotbed for black market kidney donors, so much so that they've even formed support a group. Some of them say they weren't paid all they were promised for their kidneys because brokers got some of the money, but all claim to have sold them willingly.
One donor shows signs of kidney disease and his remaining kidney is failing rapidly, however, just like the one he donated to a person he'll never meet probably is. It apparently isn't uncommon for people who've received black market kidneys to receive infections from them.
On the other side of the world, we meet two people in Toronto and one in Denver who desperately need new kidneys to enable them to live a normal life.
Mary Jo Vradis has been living on dialysis via a machine in her bedroom which she needs to use for eight hours every second day while she's been waiting for a kidney transplant for six years. Her mother's been on dialysis for 18 years and it's taken a major physical toll on her, and her brother started dialysis three years ago. There's an increased mortality rate for people on dialysis, so it's heartening when the film's epilogue informs us that Mary Jo eventually received a kidney from a cadaver after waiting for nine years.
Walter Rassbach needs a transplant in the next year or two or will likely die within eight years. He's been on a transplant list for two years and, since his daughter doesn't want to donate her kidney, he seriously considers going the black market route even though he admits that it's unfair to take advantage of people's poverty in this way. But a woman he's never met agrees to donate a kidney to him for free just because she wants to help someone live a better life. Such altruistic donors, we're told, are said to be one in a million.
Raul Fain mortgaged his house and went to Kosovo, where he paid $100,000 for a black market kidney transplant that has given him a new lease on life. He has no qualms about it and, when the filmmakers track down his donor, she says she has no regrets either.
Dr. Yusuf Sonmez, who has performed more than 2,000 black market kidney transplants, was driven out of Turkey and went to Kosovo for his operations. He faces numerous charges, but has returned to Turkey (which won't extradite him to Kosovo) and stopped his surgeries.
Prosecutors are still after him, however, just like they are with Israel's Zaki Shapira, who does his first on-camera interview in this film. The respected surgeon has done more than 3,600 kidney transplants, about 850 of which are considered illegal, and like Sonmez was jailed in Turkey for a few months before being released. He's now retired and claims that performing black market transplants is more moral than standing by and letting people, who could go on to relatively normal lives with donated kidneys, die.
As a person who's been living with one (thankfully healthy, so far) kidney all my life and may eventually need dialysis or a transplant, Tales From The Organ Trade made me think about what I'd do if faced with a similar situation. And at this point, I can't give a definitive answer.
But even if you don't have a vested interest, this film will open your eyes to a subject that's quite likely to have a bearing on someone you know. So even if it's for purely empathetic reasons only, Tales From The Organ Trade is worth seeing.
Serious Beatles fans know who Brian Epstein was. But unless you were a member of the Fab Four's fan club, or have read extensively about the band, you probably couldn't identify Freda Kelly -- even though she was a member of the group's inner circle for 11 years and long outlasted its first manager.
Kelly quit school at age 16 and joined a typing pool. A short time later she was taken to Liverpool, England's Cavern to see The Beatles, where she became an instant fan and went on to see them there almost 200 times. It wasn't long before she was asked to become the head of the band's fan club, making her the envy of young women worldwide.
But she was content to remain in the background, avoid the spotlight and stay loyal to the the four band members and its manager, Epstein. She didn't succumb to bribe offers from newspapers looking for inside scoops back in the day, didn't cash in by writing a tell-all book after the break-up, and didn't fatten her bank account by selling all of her valuable Beatles memorabilia. She gave most of it to fans in 1974 and now keeps just a few boxes of items near and dear to her in her attic.
Kelly also turned down film offers in the past, but finally took up an offer from director Ryan White. He had an inside track since his uncle was a friend of Kelly's as a member of Beatles contemporaries The Merseybeats, and she wanted to leave something for her grandson to know about the exciting life she led in the 1960s.
The resulting documentary, Good Ol' Freda, had its international premiere last week at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Film Festival. The film's title comes from George Harrison giving Kelly a shout-out in The Beatles' 1963 Christmas message, and it features interviews with Billy Kinsley from The Merseybeats, members of The Fourmost, Beatles press officer Tony Barrow and Paul McCartney's stepmother Angie, among others.
But it's Kelly's warmth, modesty and honesty that make her the true star of the show -- outshining even Ringo Starr's appearance where he sings her praises during the closing credits.
Kelly isn't one to kiss and tell, as she says. But while she says she never dated any of The Beatles, there's a hint that something might have gone on with at least one of them since she said she had a crush on each one of them at various times. She says that McCartney was the nicest, Lennon was a "man of many moods," Harrison didn't come across as "the quiet Beatle" with her and that original drummer Pete Best was shy and handsome.
But after Starr replaced Best behind the kit, Kelly would visit his mother Elsie once a week and they became good friends. In fact, it was Elsie who persuaded Epstein to give Kelly a raise. Harrison's father taught Kelly how to ballroom dance and she became the link with The Beatles' family members in Liverpool when the band was touring. She says she felt like she was a member of all the families.
But all good things must come to an end and, even though The Beatles had split up a couple of years earlier, she kept her position as the band's secretary at Apple Records until 1972 -- by which time she was married with a son and had a daughter on the way and wasn't having the fun she used to -- when she heeded Harrison's advice and wound The Beatles fan club down. But, ever devoted, she answered fan club letters on her own time for the next three years.
As proof that Kelly never profited much from the Beatles' phenomenal success, she still works as a secretary in a law office -- and remains a dedicated Beatles fan.
Even though several books and films have been made about The Beatles, Good Ol' Freda manages to offer some fresh insights into the band and, perhaps more importantly, introduces viewers to a sweet woman who just might end up with a fan club of her own.
Swashbuckling ain't what it used to be.
The men who star as the titular characters in The Last Black Sea Pirates will never be confused with Johnny Depp. But if your taste in heartthrobs runs towards slovenly drifters, drunkards and ex-convicts, the 72 minutes you'll spend with this bumbling band of treasure hunters will fly right by.
Leader Captain Jack The Whale, who has lived with several dogs and cats in a decrepit trailer on a secluded Black Sea beach in Bulgaria for 25 years, is quite content to keep his men supplied with booze and smokes as long as they do the grunt work of digging to try and find large stashes of gold allegedly buried in Karadere by rogue 19th century Ottoman naval commander Vulchan. After all, Captain Jack is a leader -- not a labourer.
They've searched for years, but have much more success at catching fish than discovering gold. But what they're best at is being drunk and hapless, and their relationships go through highs and lows as their frustration increases -- especially after it's announced that the area they've been searching is going to be developed into a tourist resort. The pirates vow to fight the development by violent means, though construction is delayed so they can keep using their dynamite to blast for gold while their dubious plans to sabotage villas and cabanas are put on hold.
But this documentary (which the writer and director admit has some scripted scenes) doesn't just focus on the quest for riches. Hard-drinking pirate Ilko is in love with fellow lush Zone, who dreams of being his bride and using their share of the elusive loot to finance a grand wedding. This tragi-comic couple's ups and downs somewhat mirror the fractious friendships among Captain Jack's motley crew members and provide a neat parallel.
I don't want to give away too much, and I learned more than what's in the movie since the director and writer talked to the audience after its North American premiere at the Scotiabank Theatre on Wednesday night. So, while Captain Jack The Whale may lack the charm of Captain Jack Sparrow, his oddly endearing men make The Last Black Sea Pirates a film worth seeking out.
The Last Black Sea Pirates will have its final showing of the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival at 9 p.m. on May 4 at TIFF Bell Lightbox 1.
Ryuichi runs a rather unusual company called I Want To Cheer You Up Ltd., but this Japanese man seems like he could use a lot more cheering up than his clients.
Ryuichi stands in to impersonate husbands, brothers and friends for Tokyo citizens who believe they need his services -- or those of the more than 20 people he employs to fill similar roles. His job is unique enough that he's asked to appear on a television show similar to (for those of you old enough to remember) What's My Line?, where he describes his profession while his face is blurred so his cover isn't ruined.
We soon learn, however, that Ryuichi's occupation is even a mystery to his wife and two sons. The wife says she never asks about his work, but finds different uniforms when she does laundry -- a byproduct of him having to take other jobs to make ends meet since I Want To Cheer You Up isn't as lucrative as he'd like and he finds himself in financial trouble.
When Ryuichi isn't away from home, the 44-year-old mostly sleeps on a mattress on the floor in his son's former bedroom -- since the boy now sleeps in a bed with his mother. And when Ryuichi is awake, he blocks out his family to focus on his website to try and build his business. His wife admits there's tension between them because they don't have meaningful conversations.
While Ryuichi claims that his focus is on making other people happy, it's at the expense of his family's happiness. For a man who earns part of his (meagre) living from impersonating husbands, he's doing a poor job of playing a real one.
Ryuichi dotes on his dog while complaining that his wife takes good care of their home, but not of him, and that she has a negative attitude. She concedes that she doesn't know if she'll stay with him after their sons leave for college in seven years.
One moment, Ryuichi shows us travel brochures and talks of his dream of taking his wife and kids on a Hawaiian vacation. The next moment, he confesses that he thinks of killing himself every day.
Ryuichi comes clean near the end of the movie and tells his wife about I Want To Cheer You Up and the financial distress they're facing. She thinks it's strange, which he expected, but says she doesn't care what he does. She just doesn't want to be part of it.
Getting this weight off his shoulders seems to lighten Ryuichi up emotionally and it appears that he's adopted a more positive outlook -- though things remain far from idyllic at home.
I went into Rent A Family Inc. expecting a quirky, relatively lighthearted documentary about an occupation and ways of life unique to Japanese culture (companies like I Want To Cheer You Up are apparently becoming more common). What I came away from was actually a pretty depressing film about a lonely man and a far from happy home.
I would have preferred the movie I anticipated.
Rent A Family Inc. will have its final showing of the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival at 1 p.m. on May 5 at Scotiabank Theatre.
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| Romeo Dallaire |
Canadian general Romeo Dallaire witnessed the slaughter of 800,000 people in 100 days when he was the United Nations force commander in Rwanda in 1994. Something like that stays with you, and he's now embarked on a global mission to eradicate the use of child soldiers -- who played such a big role in that genocide.
Dallaire's return to the war-torn region of Africa is chronicled in a book and new documentary that was shot last spring and is making its Canadian premiere this week: Fight Like Soldiers Die Like Children.
There are an estimated 250,000 child soldiers fighting in 30 conflicts around the world, and Dallaire says: "If we can make them cry as a child again, I would think that they'd want to get rid of the weapon and not want to play real life soldier anymore."
Children who are kidnapped and used as soldiers, slaves and bush wives are all too common in parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda, Uganda and Sudan. And while the Joseph Kony-led Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) is the most notable exploiter, there are many other militias using similarly despicable tactics since child soldiers are relatively easy to corral and they offer an upper hand to those who use them.
Dallaire visited several camps and talked to UN representatives, rebel commanders and, most importantly, former child soldiers and bush wives who were taken against their will but lucky enough to eventually escape. Shocking, however, is the estimated 25-per cent recidivism rate since many of these kids often have no better alternative awaiting them in their home villages since they're often mistrusted and viewed as bandits.
Fight Like Soldiers Die Like Children shows what's being done to try and stop kids from being used as tools of war, and features some poignant stories from people who've been on the front lines in one way or another. It also illustrates how some community groups are arming themselves and being trained to defend against rebel attacks, and we're introduced to a father and the two children he rescued from the LRA after they were kidnapped.
Dallaire admits that it will take years to achieve his goal, if it's ever to be attained, but one of the best sequences in the film is when two teens who fought each other in the bush for opposing sides become friends once they get out of it and are taken by helicopter to an ex-combatants' camp in DRC before they're reunited with their families.
Scenes like this leave some room for optimism, as did a conversation I had last year with a lovely young woman named Grace Acan who was kidnapped by the LRA and spent eight years in virtual enslavement as the bush wife a despotic commander before escaping. She's now getting a university education and using her horrifying experiences to try and promote the rights of children.
Dallaire has a fairly high profile through his past experiences and a previous Emmy Award-winning documentary he made with Fight Like Soldiers Die Like Children director Patrick Reed: Shake Hands With The Devil: The Journey of Romeo Dallaire.
The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative is a global partnership committed to ending the use and recruitment of child soldiers worldwide by researching practical solutions, advocating for policy change and conducting comprehensive, prevention-oriented training. It works with military, police and peacekeeping forces and equips first responders and humanitarian agencies with the necessary tools and training to demobilize child soldiers and protect children at risk of recruitment. It aims to end this crime against humanity community-by-community and country-by-country once and for all.
Hopefully this film can mobilize more support for the initiative and others working toward similar goals.
Fight Like Soldiers Die Like Children will be screened in Toronto as part of the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival at 2 p.m. on April 29 at Hart House and at 5:30 p.m. on May 5 at TIFF Bell Lightbox. It will play more widely in major cities across Canada starting on various dates next month.
You can watch a trailer of the film here.
While North America's attention has been focused on the Boston Marathon bombings and the subsequent manhunt for the Tsarnaev brothers who are allegedly responsible for them over the past two weeks, a Dutch documentary titled Wrong Time Wrong Place examines victims of the much more deadly domestic terrorism attacks launched by Anders Breivik in Norway on July 22, 2011.
Breivik, a far right extremist, killed 77 people when he set off a bomb in the centre of Oslo and then went on a shooting spree on the island of Utoya. The 80-minute Wrong Time Wrong Place features interviews with survivors and loved ones of those who weren't so lucky to escape his wrath, and all of their tales are poignant.
Harald, who had recently lost a son to a base-jumping accident, describes what he went through during and after the bomb blast that rocked his office building. It left him almost blind, but he says he would have been beside Breivik's car bomb when it exploded and would have been killed if he'd gone to his office five minutes earlier.
A young, pregnant Ugandan woman named Ritah who now lives at a Dutch refugee camp describes her excitement about visiting a Labour Party youth camp at Utoya and the fun she had there before escaping death by hiding from Breivik in a bathroom stall. She still dreams of the faces of girls killed on the island and questions why she survived while others didn't. She named her son Michael after an angel who she believes helped save her.
The parents of a young woman named Tamta from the country of Georgia blame themselves for letting her go to Norway, and her mother talks of a prophecy which foretold her daughter's death. They talk of how she always refused to take swimming lessons, and believe she might have survived like some others who dove into the water to get away if she only knew how to swim. She was Breivik's final victim before his arrest and was shot twice from behind by the water's edge.
Tamta's friend Natia invited her to Utoya with her, and they saw it as a chance to go abroad and take on a challenge. She questions why she survived and Tamta didn't as she revisits the massacre scene and concludes that it was "by pure chance."
A young Norwegian man named Hakon was waiting for the ferry to Utoya when he saw a van pull up and a man in a police uniform with guns (which turned out to be Breivik in disguise) get out to board the ferry. He admits that he joked about checking his police ID, and says he was only on the island for a few minutes before the shooting began. He invited Ritah and another young woman named Hajon to hide with him in the toilet stall.
Finally, a Norwegian man named Halvor went base-jumping on that fateful day instead of going to work, avoiding the misfortune of his two colleagues who were killed in the bombing.
Ritah speaks accented English, while the other interview subjects communicate in their native tongues, so you have to pay close attention to the subtitles to appreciate the sad and moving tales they tell. While so much attention is deservedly focused on the perpetrators of horrific acts, it's also enlightening to hear from those who were impacted by them and how their lives will be affected until they draw their last breath.
If circumstances and coincidences were just slightly different for most of these people, that last breath would have already been taken.
I had a great time travelling throughout southern Mexico for two weeks late last year, but you wouldn't catch me dead in the United States border city of Juarez. And that's because too many people are already turning up dead there.
Police in this city of 1.5 million people across the Rio Grande River from El Paso, Texas processed an already high 320 murders in 2007. Then the Mexican government launched a drug war against the cartels and those numbers increased to 1,623 homicides in 2008, 2,754 in 2009 and 3,622 in 2010, compared to just five in El Paso.
The violence involved in these killings -- including torture, disfigurement and beheadings -- makes the law-abiding people of Juarez fearful and the economic health of the already poor city has declined significantly. Narco Cultura looks at the harsh realities of Juarez through the eyes of a crime scene investigator named Richi.
While that in itself would make a compelling documentary, director Shaul Schwarz also profiles Los Angeles singer Edgar Quintero and his band, BuKnas de Culiacan. Quintero sings narco corridos -- songs that glorify the gangsters and their drug-dealing, mass-killing ways -- which have become very popular in the U.S. and several Spanish-speaking countries as well as Mexico.
Much of the music, based on Mexico's accordion-driven norteno mixed with other popular genres, is often catchy and danceable. But the lyrics, often about real people and events, are repulsive. Here's a typical example from BuKnas de Culiacan, which performs with a group member carrying a bazooka, while audience members happily sing along:
"With an AK-47 and a bazooka on my shoulder/Cross my path and I'll chop your head off/We're bloodthirsty, crazy, and we like to kill/We are the best at kidnapping/Our gang always travels in a caravan/With bulletproof vests, ready to execute/I'm number one, code name 'M1'/I'm backed up by El Chapo/My name is Manuel Torres Felix sending greetings from Culiacan."
The top-selling narco singer, El Komander, makes $45,000 per show playing in large venues and is sought for steady bookings across Mexico and the U.S. Mexican action movies based on narco corridos, with singers as their stars, are available in major American chain stores. These guys are, to borrow a cliche, "living like rock stars."
This film deserves kudos for effectively juxtaposing the adulation received by narco singers against the lack of recognition given to investigators who risk their lives daily while trying to solve and stop drug murders.
But where the movie suffers somewhat is in ignoring how narco singers and musicians have also become victims as well as chroniclers in the wars between the vicious cartels. Dozens have been executed. If you're singing the praises of one gang, that makes you the enemy of another. And these grudges are deadly.
That topic could make an interesting documentary on its own. But Narco Cultura opens eyes in depicting ways of life that, thankfully, are virtually unknown in Canada.
The Manor seems like a bit of an odd choice to open the 20th edition of the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.
Sure, it's Canadian and a world premiere, but I would have expected the curators to come up with something with a bigger impact to commemorate this milestone year. The Manor touches on several societal issues, but it leaves little lasting impression at the end of its 78 minutes.
The film is based around the dysfunctional Cohen family and its business, a Guelph, Ont. strip joint and low-budget, 32-room hotel that in better days was the home of early 20th century beer barons of the Sleeman family. Thirty-something director Shawney Cohen says (though far from boastfully) at the beginning of the film that his father bought him a lap dance for his 13th birthday and he's been on the fence about the place ever since he was a kid -- even though he's worked as a manager there for years.
The father, Roger, is a cigar-smoking, 400-pound Israeli immigrant who realizes his weight his negatively affecting his health. But instead of dieting or trying to exercise, he opts for stomach reduction surgery (shown briefly in graphic detail) which eventually gets him down to a far from svelte 300 pounds.
But it's hard to lose weight when your wife is constantly pushing large trays of food your way, even though Brenda weighs a mere 85 pounds and finally admits that she has an eating disorder toward the end of the film after her frail body can't withstand a fall and she breaks a hip.
Shawney's younger brother Sammy started working at The Manor right out of high school. He seems to enjoy the lifestyle and invites a stripper to move in with him in his parents' basement -- breaking two of his father's rules: you're not supposed to date staff or non-Jews. Sammy breaks up with her, even though she seems to be the most well-adjusted person on the screen, before the film is over.
Two other non-family members also play supporting roles, and they have their own problems.
Bobby is Roger's assistant and has been in and out of prison all his life. He admits to his boss that he's selling drugs and then he's jailed for assaulting his ex-wife. We learn at the end that the charges were dropped and he was released after a year, but he no longer works at The Manor.
Then there's Susan, the hotel manager who also lives there, who's rushed to hospital after what we're told is either a suicide attempt or drug overdose. Roger clears all of her stuff from her room the next day, but she's allowed to move back in a few weeks later after she recovers.
Roger is very anti-drug and converts the hotel to a halfway house for addicts and homeless people called Sue's Inn Support Centre. Meanwhile, he's shown insulting an overweight peeler that he's watching on a security camera at the club.
Business isn't as good as it used to be, which further stresses Roger and -- although the family seems to live comfortably in a large rural home with a gated driveway and backyard pond -- he refuses to pay for Brenda's counselling once she finally admits she needs help.
Brenda attends one session, but doesn't return for more, citing a lack of funds. Roger admits that he's grown apart from his wife because of The Manor, and Sammy says he resents his old man for treating her "like a piece of shit."
While The Manor is still going, Roger shows Shawney his plans to redevelop it into a condominium complex as the movie nears completion.
The film was shot over two years and, while real life seldom ties plot lines together neatly, The Manor leaves the viewer hanging in too many places without a resolution to any of them. That's the documentary's downfall. It leaves you wanting to know more, but not enough to warrant a sequel.
I wish the Cohens, Bobby and Susan well. They need all the support they can get.
