On the Saturday December 9, 2023 edition of the Richard Crouse Show we meet Salah Bachir, author of a new memoir, “First to the Leave the Party: My Life with Ordinary People Who Happen to Be Famous,” available now wherever fine books are sold.
Salah is a Canadian business executive, entrepreneur, publisher, art collector, fundraiser, and philanthropist, who has raised millions of dollars for charity… and says the only autograph worth having is on a cheque. He is a pioneer in consumer video, the founding president and chair of Famous Players Media, and later the president of Cineplex Media and creator of the Scene program, which I know you’ve all used… It is a storied career, which he covers in the book in 54 short chapters about the people he has met and befriended over the years… chapters like: Elizabeth Taylor Tries on My Pearls; Eartha Kitt is Not For Sale; Wooing Gregory Peck; Harvey Milk Sets Me Free and Keith Haring Does New York.
Then we meet Academy Award-winning filmmaker Errol Morris. “The Pigeon Tunnel,” his latest film, now streaming on Apple TV+, is a look at the extraordinary life of David Cornwell a.k.a. prolific author John le Carré. Through a retelling of his life, Cornwell examines the very essence of truth, and how memory and manipulation play a part in how we shape our world and our perceptions. It is a greart movie and Morris is an interesting man, you’ll want to stick around for that one…
We’ll also meet actor and author R.H. Thomson. You know him from his film and television work as Matthew Cuthbert in Anne With An E, in the movie Chloe directed by Atom Egoyan and as Marshall McLuhan in The Message by Jason Sherman. Today we’ll talk about his new book, In “By the Ghost Light,” he looks at his family history and relatives who fought in World War I and World War II, as a starting point to examine war and its aftermath.
Each week on the nationally syndicated Richard Crouse Show, Canada’s most recognized movie critic brings together some of the most interesting and opinionated people from the movies, television and music to put a fresh spin on news from the world of lifestyle and pop-culture. Tune into this show to hear in-depth interviews with actors and directors, to find out what’s going on behind the scenes of your favourite shows and movies and get a new take on current trends. Recent guests include Chris Pratt, Elvis Costello, Baz Luhrmann, Martin Freeman, David Cronenberg, Mayim Bialik, The Kids in the Hall and many more!
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“Stellar,” a new film starring Elle-Máija Tailfeathers and Braeden Clarke, now on VOD and streaming on Crave, is about making a connection as a storm—or is it the end of the world?—brews outside.
Set in a Northern Ontario dive bar, the story revolves around two Indigenous strangers, She (Tailfeathers) and He (Clarke), as a storm rages outside. They meet, make a connection, unperturbed by the weather. They get to know one another, trading stories in Ojibwe and English, of lost loves, community and their deepest held feelings, as the bartender (Rossif Sutherland) grows agitated by the unsettling thunder and lightening.
Others come and go, including two Aunties (Billy Merasty and Tina Keeper) who ask if He and She know their way home, metaphorically. Then there’s a windbag professor (R.H. Thomson), in love with the sound of his own voice, who proclaims, “Knowledge is out foundation.”
“Your knowledge. Not required,” He replies.
Outside, the erupting storm is portrayed as another passing apocalypse in the timeline of Indigenous life. He and She are the calm in the face of the storm, resilient with an eye to the future. “I feel like the weather outside,” She says, “changing, challenging.” They are connected to nature, to their heritage, and to one another.
Strong visuals tell “Stellar’s” tale. Anishinaabe director Darlene Naponse blends the lyrical beauty of the love story inside the bar with cut-a-ways of the pollution and waste that mar the world beyond the bar’s walls. Her experimental, figurative treatment of the material creates a powerful, poetic allegory of Indigenous strength amid the storm of life, wrapped in a touching love story.
Mystical and metaphorical, “Stellar” is experimental in its storytelling, but hypnotic in its effect.
No one will accuse “Clara” director/co-writer Akash Sherman of playing it safe. For his debut feature the twenty-something filmmaker essays no less a topic than the existence of life in outer space.
Suits star Patrick J. Adams is Dr. Isaac Bruno, a university professor placed on sabbatical when his obsession to find life on other planets gets in the way of him doing his job. Time off is no remedy for his fixation and he continues his search with the help of a co-worker Dr. Charlie Durant (Ennis Esmer ) and a research assistant named Clara (Troian Bellisario).
Bruno is a facts and figures guy, a pragmatist who studies the data looking for connections, desperate to fill the hole left in his heart by the death of his child by finding new life in the universe.
Clara is more abstract, a believer in the randomness of the universe beyond the numbers and maps. The push and pull between their approaches makes for a rocky relationship but her spiritualism may hold the roadmap for Isaac’s quest.
Austere, low-key and yet ambitious, “Clara” is about the power of loss and discovery. Add in a big dollop of spirituality and you have a movie that isn’t quite sci fi even though it spends much of its time ruminating on speculative themes. It’s solemn and often feels overwrought, asking question after question without offering much in the way of insight or true emotion.
Director Sherman shows an undeniable eye for composition and atmosphere. It’s in the storytelling that “Clara” wobbles. The push-and-pull between objectivity and intuition is interesting but overplayed to the point of exhaustion. The climax reaches for the stars, offering a hopeful note, that will strike some as poetic, others as the very definition of schmaltz.
On the Saturday December 9, 2023 edition of the Richard Crouse Show we meet Salah Bachir, author of a new memoir, “First to the Leave the Party: My Life with Ordinary People Who Happen to Be Famous,” available now wherever fine books are sold.
