I've
seen plenty of movies in plenty of places. And while, really, I can watch a good
movie anywhere, I do have key favorite places to watch a film. One of them is
the Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, where Tim League and his band of merrymakers ... more
serve up great food and great movies with Texas hospitality (which, roughly,
translates to "generously poured drinks"). Another is the cinema du plage in
Cannes, where the people behind the festival pound pilings into the surf, hang a
screen in front of beach chairs, and screen classics (and not-so-classics) under
the stars on the shore of the ocean. But for purposes of this discussion, one of
the best movie-going experiences of the year is coming up, and that's the
Toronto International Film Festival's Midnight Madness slate.
Held at
the Ryerson University complex (replacing the late, lamented, funky Uptown
theater, a classic trash-palace that's still sorely missed), TIFF's Midnight
Madness block of films offers the best in rock 'n' roll movies, horror
films, science fiction, extreme comedy, martial arts and, when you're really
lucky, combinations of two or more of the above. This year's Midnight Madness
includes "Jennifer's Body," Diablo Cody's first script since "Juno" (and
really, might not an unkind observer note that casting Megan Fox as a hateful
harpy demon with nothing human inside her feel suspiciously like art imitating
life?), but it's also got the high-tech vampire saga "Daybreakers," the Tony
Jaa-led martial arts sequel "Ong Bak 2" and horror maven (and new Canadian
citizen) George A. Romero's new zombie film "Survival of the Dead," a title that
makes no sense if you think about it for even a millisecond. There are even
more films (too many to list here, but I'll be talking about them in my Toronto
reports), but what really makes Midnight Madness amazing is the crowd. These are
not bored dilettantes or distracted stargazers; these are foaming-at-the-mouth
movie lovers, and, yes, my tribe. If you're within a day's drive of Toronto, you
really, really owe it to yourself to check it out. And if you're going to any of
the Midnight Madness screenings, well, I'll be the tall, dorky guy in the
horn-rim glasses, which, really, doesn't narrow it down a damn
bit. Close
