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The real difference between the U.S. and Canada?

From Steven Rea's "On Movies Online" www.philly.com/philly/blogs/onmovies/ Never mind health care, here's the real difference between the United States and Canada: Driving into the country from the States side of Niagara Falls, you pull up to the customs officer's booth; he asks you the purpose of your visit, and when you say yo

nolead begins Inquirer movie critic Steven Rea reports from the Toronto Film Festival.

The real difference between the U.S. and Canada?

From Steven Rea's "On Movies Online"

www.philly.com/philly/blogs/onmovies/

Never mind health care, here's the real difference between the United States and Canada: Driving into the country from the States side of Niagara Falls, you pull up to the customs officer's booth; he asks you the purpose of your visit, and when you say you're covering the Toronto Film Festival, his next question is, "What's your favorite movie?" And then he tells you his (Raiders of the Lost Ark), and then he wants to know what's up with James Cameron's Avatar because he'd heard that it's going to revolutionize the moviegoing experience.

And then: What are you looking forward to seeing in Toronto? Are there going to be a lot of stars?

Somehow I can't picture the Homeland Security dude on my return through New York asking me if the new Pedro Almodóvar is as good as All About My Mother.

Speaking of which, Broken Embraces, with Almodóvar muse Penélope Cruz as a woman leading (at least) a double life, and her relationship with a blind screenwriter (Lluís Homar) who has his own secret past, isn't perfection after all. But this moody, labyrinthine soap opera is never less than compelling.

Forget Jennifer's Body, though. A self-consciously hip horror thing with Megan Fox striking various teen-seductress poses as she gnashes and gnaws her way through Devil's Kettle High, this might have felt fresh 15 years ago. Then again, maybe not. Amanda Seyfried, as the kinda nerdy good girl and Jennifer's improbable best friend, voice-overs the tale, directed by Girlfight's Karyn Kusama, from an arch script full of pseudo-cool teen patter from Diablo Cody of Juno fame. . . .

Brian De Palma spotted walking from one screening to another, and then later out in Yorkville, sitting on a rock in a pocket park in his trademark safari jacket, adjusting his iPod. DePalma is one of the fest's annual fixtures.

nolead begins

Serious, man - Toronto fest is no laughing matter

Let's see - 271 movies in 10 days, that's 27.1 movies a day. Which means that most Toronto Film Festival-goers are going to have wildly divergent takes (and tickets) as they queue up with their underlined schedules. . . .

And so far, my festival has been a grim one - thematically, that is. With the exception of the happily loopy, sort-of-true The Men Who Stare at Goats and its tale of secret paranormal military ops and New Age army dudes (including a Dude-like Jeff Bridges), I've seen nothing but doom, death, and depression.

Sure, the Coen Brothers' A Serious Man - drawn from Joel and Ethan's experiences growing up in 1960s suburban Minnesota - is laced with typical Coensian irony and close-up absurdity. But the film's protagonist, a physics professor played by Michael Stuhlbarg, has the luck of Job: His wife wants a divorce; his brother, a jobless social misfit, has moved into the family house; the tenure committee has been receiving unfavorable, anonymous letters; and a foreign student is threatening to sue. . . .

Consider Up in the Air, Jason Reitman's adaptation of the Walter Kirn novel about a guy who fires people for a living (George Clooney). This dark, quiet comedy achieves levels of documentary-like pathos with a series of talking-head "interviews" with everyday Joes (and Jills) who have just been laid off, let go, made redundant. . . . Or The Road, the postapocalyptic tale of a father and son (Viggo Mortensen and the Australian Kodi Smit-McPhee) slogging across gray, dangerous landscapes looking for food and safe haven. John Hillcoat's adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel is bleak, powerful stuff. . . .

Sick parenting moment on Yorkville Avenue, as a father and his toddler daughter negotiate the sidewalk near the Four Seasons and the crowd of celebrity-gawkers: "Want to try your sunglasses on so you can look like a movie star?"