If you wanted to fill a syllabus teaching the classics of Hollywood cinema, you could do worse than the selections for TIFF's Dreaming in Technicolor. You get the cream of the crop of popular classics with The Wizard of Oz (June 27), Meet Me in St. Louis (June 21), The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Godfather scattered throughout the summer. Still yet, there's even more to hi-light in this love letter to the three-strip process.
I'm going to give a tip of the cap to the cinematographers spotlighted in this bill. Technicolor conjures scale films and old Hollywood grandeur, but some of the best camera ops of the day could make the visuals "pop" with colour but also use it to accentuate mood and character.
Be on the look out for the films shot by Jack Cardiff for the Archers (the nickname for the dynamic duo of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger) which include the gorgeous Black Narcissus (July 7) and The Red Shoes (July 11). Cardiff also went with John Huston, Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn to "the Congo" to shoot The African Queen (August 2). Christopher Challis, who shot Powell and Pressburger's The Tales of Hoffmann (July 12), also worked under Cardiff for the Archers.
Also be sure to check out the films Russell Metty shot for 50s melodrama kingpin Douglas Sirk. All That Heaven Allows (June 30) and Magnificent Obsession (July 18 – featuring a "master class" with Guy Maddin no less) can creak a little with purple dialogue and plotting but make up for it by being some of the most beautiful films ever shot in colour.
Lastly, be sure to see Nicholas Ray's underseen Bigger Than Life, a much better film, in my view at least, than Rebel Without a Cause. There's work by Hitchcock, Ozu, Hawks and Renoir as well in this stacked summer programme starting tonight at 6:30 p.m. with Singin' in the Rain.
Female Eye Film Festival 2015
The 13th running of FeFF began June 16 but finishes up this weekend on June 21. Its mission is to give a platform to women who direct independent shorts, features and documentaries. Tonight you can catch the Canadian doc Food Fighters, which looks at Fresh City Farms and is directed by Paula Kaston, at The Royal starting at 5 p.m.
There's also a number of short films running all evening leading up to a late night horror feature called A Sideways Light.
There's plenty going on Saturday and Sunday including international shorts, a script reading series, director's round-table and a closing night screening of The Anniversary from director Valerie Buhagiar at 6 p.m. (also at The Royal). Check out full listings here.
Ealing Studios
A quick note that TIFF is also kicking off a tribute to the great Ealing Studios which produced some of the England's finest comedy in the mid-20th century. If the best black comedy ever made is, generally speaking, Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb then Ealing's Kind Hearts and Coronets slots in right behind it. As you may well know, it's about an amoral schemer (Dennis Price) trying to knock off all the relations that stand in the way of his gaining a duchy and the riches that go with it. Alec Guinness does a marvellous job camping it up in eight different roles.
Catch the digital restoration June 21 at 1 p.m. More on this tribute to come.
Toronto Screengrab of the Week
Last week was a toughie. Really who knows The Time Traveller's Wife that well? This week is a much more famous film directed by Norman Jewison. A hint: Cher walks into this shop.
