Roger's Blog

This weekend my sisters and two cousins came to visit me in Boston. It was a little Canadian Thanksgiving away from home.

Click here for some pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back in January, Dispatch announced a charity concert in New York City at Madison Square Garden. I bought tickets without any real plans of how I was gonna get there; but I knew I had to make it happen.

This weekend was finally the concert. One show on Saturday turned into three sold out shows when they added a Friday and Sunday show. My sisters and my cousin came along and we made a whole weekend out of it.

On the way to New York we stopped in Scranton, PA. Which, if you watch "The Office", you'll appreciate, otherwise will mean nothing to you. Unfortunately, there is no Dunder-Mifflin in the real Scranton and Michael, Jim, Pam and the others were nowhere to be found. Though we did meet Dwight Schrute.

The concert on Saturday was amazing. They played for 3 hours and the crowd was fantastic. Most of the rest of the weekend was spent eating great food and wandering around Manhattan. I went to probably the biggest used book store I've ever been to and blew my budget for the trip.

Click here for some more pictures.

This weekend I was in DC to meet up with my good friend Matt. I had never been to DC before so we did the site seeing thing. I was a short weekend but good times.

Click here for some pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This past weekend was Ted's wedding in Windsor.

It was a busy week, but a lot of good times hanging out with old friends.

Ted's married... What else is there to say?


Check out the pictures!

 

I can't believe a month has gone by already. Only a few more days here in Hawaii. The family has gone home and I'm left here by myself for a couple more days. I need to soak up all the sun and breathe all the sea air I can to last me until the frozen tundra of Canada melts after I get home.


This week I froze at the top of Mauna Kea at almost 14,000 feet above sea level where the sunset and the stargazing are absolutely breathtaking. I also cooked as I stood next to flowing lava as it oozed its way down a mountainside and into the ocean. Standing on a sea cliff listening to the surf pound and watching new earth being formed as molten rock flows into the ocean is a humbling experience.

It has been an amazing month. A quick stop in Salt Lake for a little more snowboarding and then it's back home to face the real world again.

Click here for some more pictures.

My Favourite Movies of 2006

Ok, so it's a little late to make Oscar predictions. Too much time at the beach I guess. But, like last year, I'm not that concerned with picking the winners. This is more just a list of my favourite films from last year out of those that I've seen.

Again, there are a few that I've been wanting to see that I haven't gotten to yet : The Last King of Scotland, The Queen, Blood Diamond, The Good Shepherd, Letters From Iwo Jima, Pan's Labrynth, and Apocalypto.

Last year Walk the Line was my out and out favourite. This year it has been a little harder to decide. Here's my top three and the rest in no particular order...

1. The Prestige - I saw this in Salt Lake City a few weeks ago and again on the flight to Hawaii. I was impressed. I usually find that most movies that try to twist the plot and keep you guessing come up short. This one delivered the whole way. I would rank it up there with The Sixth Sense and The Usual Suspects for suspense and the "who done it?" factor.
   
   
2. Bobby - This is the most under-rated film of the year in my opinion. It got low box office numbers and fairly mixed reviews. I thought it was great. I love ensemble casts and this movie had a good one. Some might say this leaves you with a shallow plot, but I think this film has a real "day in the life" kind of feel to it. No character steals the show and no one has to because each one gives way to the bigger picture in this film that is not so much about any of the characters as it is about the event and the period. Good performances all around and an emotional last sequence. Maybe you have to be an idealist to like this movie. It's not epic and it will probably not be remembered, but I really enjoyed seeing this film and I will see it again.
   
   
3. The Departed - This came out at the end of my semester when I had no time to see it, though I heard good things right away. I finally saw it a few weeks ago and I was pretty blown away. I've seen three of the five nominees for best picture and this was my pick for that category. This is an extremely grity movie and very crime genre, which is what makes it somewhat suprising that it won best picture. This is Scorsese at his best since Casino and a much more deserving film than Gangs of New York or The Aviator. I was glad to see this win for best adapted screenplay too. Great script and a great cast. This genre has a new generation of actors taking over for Pacino, DeNiro and Pesci and Jack Nicholson keeps things old school.

The rest:

• Little Miss Sunshine - Almost made it into my top three. This is a great film with a great original screenplay that was a deserving winner. Funny the whole way and both cute and somewhat edgy (something that's hard to get right). I loved Steve Carell as the suicidal Proust scholar. I just found out he's playing Maxwell Smart in a new Get Smart coming out in 2008. Can't think of anyone better.
  
  
• Stranger Than Fiction - Another one that almost made my top three. As I'm writing this, I'm really thinking that there are more ties on my list than hard and fast rankings. I love that Will Ferrell do hilarious movies like Old School and Anchor Man and then step up and knock it out of the park in a more complex and nuanced role while being just as funny. Great supporting cast with Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson and Queen Latifah.
  
  
• Click - Another good one from Adam Sandler. Not as good as Spanglish, but very good none the less. His new one, Reign Over Me, with Don Cheadle looks very good too. I'm looking forward to seeing that one.
  
  
• The Pursuit of Happyness - I'm a sucker for these "feel good" movies when they can make it happen and this one did. No real suprises here in terms of the plot, the trailer lays it all out for you. Not quite "stand up and cheer", but worth watching.
  
  
• Cars - I haven't seen Happy Feet but I think Cars should have won for best animated feature. Probably my favourite animated film since Toy Story 2. I loved the song "Our Town" too, but best song was a tough category this year.
  
  
• The Break-Up - I think I'm the only one I know who really liked this movie. Everyone says it's awkward because it's like you're sitting in on a real break-up. I can see that, but I thought it was hilarious. Vince Vaughn is the best he's been since Old School
  
  
• Akelah and the Bee - Another "feel good" movie that hits all the right notes.

My Biggest disappointments of 2006 were Babel and The Da Vinci Code. By disappointments I don't mean that these were the worst movies, only that I had expected them to be better than they were. For The Da Vinci Code, I read the novel and liked it a lot. And I love Ron Howard's movies and I would watch Tom Hanks in just about anything. But for some reason I found this movie really boring. I actually fell asleep watching it and never finished it. Babel did not live up the the hype for me. I thought it was pretty mediocre. It seemed like it was trying to cash in on the success of Crash and Syriana, both of which were much better films in my opinion.

Click here for a few pictures so far.

Well, here I am in Utah. Not specifically for the film festival, though that has been fun. The reason I'm here is because I just finished up my degree at the University of Waterloo and sent off my applications for grad school in the fall. I figured it was time for a break. So here I am visiting my family in Salt Lake City for three weeks to decompress. The days are just packed! Reading, snowboarding, movies, just sitting around drinking tea--this is the life. I've got a stack of books that I just never managed to get to during school. It has been a very nice time away.

I've gotten to see two premiers at Sundance in Park City. The first was a film called Longford starring Jim Broadbent and Samantha Morton, which will be on HBO in February. The screenplay was written by Peter Morgan who was just nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay for "The Queen". This was an amazing movie based on the infamous English Moors Muders. Lord Longford was a British politician and Christian who visited prisoners throughout his life. The movie tells the story of his experiences visiting one of the most notorious criminals in recent British history who challenges his ideas about forgivness and redemption.

The second film I saw was King of California with Michael Douglas and Evan Rachel Wood. This was a really great, creative movie about the reunion of a father and daughter. As the story unfolds, it paints an intersting picture of Southern California, past and present. I'm not sure when this one will be released in theatres.

Both films were premiers and were attended by the directors, producers and cast, which was pretty cool. They had question and answer sessions after the screenings.

I think I will continue my one year old tradition of writing about my favourite films of the year before the Oscars. So stay tuned.

I'm here in Salt Lake for another week, then it's off to Hawaii (yes, Hawaii) for a month (yes, a month).

I haven't posted anything new here in a while, mainly because I'm at home in Waterloo doing school this term and most of what I post on here is travel stuff and interesting news. But for the sake of putting up something new, here's a site worth checking out. Beginning in September, Derek Webb has been giving away free copies of his latest album "Mockingbird" through his website, www.freederekwebb.com. This is a great album from one of my favourite artists and you can check it out for free. I think this is a cool throw-back to Keith Green that says there's something to music and art beyond making money.