Enlighten Up! takes on secular yoga

Q&A with director Kate Churchill

By Amanda Connon-Unda
Culture Editor

When experienced documentary filmmaker Kate Churchill set out on her latest project, Enlighten Up!, she was determined to prove that yoga can transform anyone. Fortunately for her audience, the result was a lot more realistic and less definitive than any kind of film objective can be. Yoga, as it is portrayed, turns out to be something a lot more complex and multifaceted than many yoga enthusiasts may have at first thought.

Churchill began working in TV for the PBS series, Nova, and in 2001 she founded her own company, Nama Productions. From there she went on to produce and direct a reality-based TV special for PBS and another for the National Geographic which went on to win the Genesis Award for Outstanding PBS Documentary. Before diving into documentaries, she also worked at Disney and Universal Pictures in Los Angeles. As such, Enlighten Up! is her first feature documentary.

Enlighten Up! is a very personal film, and yoga, Kate Churchill and Nick Rosen, a skeptical New York-based journalist, are its three main characters.

As film subject and guinea pig, Rosen agrees to immerse himself in an extensive yoga practice and he follows Churchill around the world as he examines the philosophical and practical effects of yoga. Along the way tension rises between Churchill and Rosen. With the meeting of each celebrity yogi, true believer, kook and world-renowned guru Rosen seems to become less trusting of the film’s objective and starts to question what kind transformation can occur.

Churchill’s film rapidly unveils that yoga is a million dollar industry and she is quick to reveal some of the main contrasts between Western society and yoga practice there. A preliminary tour of yoga studios through Boston reveals that many of the yogis and teachers do not even know how old the practice is or why it started. But they are firm believers in yoga’s transformational power and they know it feels good. Still the duo encounters other yogis who say that they see yoga as nothing more than a workout.

The film nicely highlights the visual and spiritual contrast between the East and West, as it takes the pair from overcast Boston, to busy New York, then relaxed Hawaii, and finally to colourful India. Viewers can witness a collective spiritual awareness versus an intense individualism on the other hand. And yet, yoga remains consistently a space in both East and West where people come to find peace and calm the mind.
This film does not find any answer to the initial question about whether yoga can be spiritually transformative, but it does reveal an interesting journey of two personalities coming together in the journey of a lifetime. It also reveals the tenderness of the human heart and psyche and some personally touching details about both Rosen and Churchill’s lives. It turns out that these two seekers have some things in common.

Ryerson Free Press (RFP): Can you explain more about why you wanted to know whether yoga could lead a person to spiritual transformation?
Kate Churchill (KC): Well, in the beginning I would have used the word enlightenment, which could mean spiritual transformation, but what I was intrigued with was more what happens when a person focuses on yoga. I wanted to know what changes? How could one become more aware? What changes could occur by solely focusing on yoga?

RFP: Had you considered going to India for your own spiritual discovery or was it more justifiable while you were making this film?
KC: It was my first trip to India. I’ve working in a lot of different places. …South America. Brazil, Nepal, Alaska , Iceland – while producing and directing For PBS and National Geographic.
So, I had a lot of curiosity about it and when you decide to make a film it behooves you to have curiosity on your subject on all different levels. The film took five years and eventually you may get sick of it. Some of the most peaceful moments of my life happened through intense practice of yoga. I thought ‘Wow – six months and go anywhere in the world and meet teachers,’ and I was really intrigued by the idea.

RFP: It struck me that you and Nick had some things in common – both seeking information (he as a journalist and you as a filmmaker). At what point if ever were you aware of the similar challenges or view points you both shared?
KC: From the outset I was aware of our similarities. If anything our dissimilarities emerged through the journey. Our conflicts were unexpected. I never intended to include that in the film. One reason I picked him was because he was seeking information as a journalist and he was curious about yoga and change. Even though skeptical he still had a level of curiosity that I found quite hopeful.

RFP: What was the most challenging thing about making this film?
KC: It was the editing which took three years.

RFP: There were a few pieces in the film where you mentioned getting tired of yoga. Can you explain what you felt more?
KC: We wanted to shift the focus from Nick to include me as a character in the film. There were three characters: yoga, Nick and me.

Going into the filmmaking process my expectations were so high and that put pressure on Nick. That got him to dig in his heels and to resist. We ended up in a different place. We lost sight of what we were doing. All day long we met amazing yoga teachers and then we would go and interview about it, and I would ask him “How is it going to change you?”

The tension got to be so much and then we just both let go of everything. The point where I say I am tired of yoga – would normally never be included. But, part of it was to show was that we were on the wrong journey. It’s a turning point in the film when we both let go of the other person and the tone of the film shifts and we are two people each on our own journey. That is what ultimately leads both of us to learn a lot.

Enlighten Up! Opens on Friday August 28 at Cumberland 4 Cinemas in Toronto.

Friendly Rich and the Lollipop People’s Dinosaur Power

By Amanda Perri

“What inspires you to create music” I asked Rich, the lead member of Brampton’s own indie rock band Friendly Rich and the Lollipop People. It was a Sunday evening and we were outside on the patio in front of Sneaky Dee’s on College Street. It was a perfect night, and the amount of jittery and exuberant people led me to assume that the moon was full.

Rich replied: “I used to play the classical guitar, and it just kind of went wrong,” he said. Wrong? Well, that depends on how you look at it.

Friendly Rich, born Richard Marsella, was passionate about creating music ever since he was a young boy. He completed his masters degree in music at the University of Toronto and since 1994, Friendly Rich has been recording music on his own record label called The Pumpkin Pie Corporation.

His music has been featured in several eclectic genres. He has produced music for MTV’s The Tom Green show and his music was used for the hit Russian children’s TV series The King Stanlislav Show. Rich also founded and directed the Brampton Indie Arts festival in 2000, a place where both young and old can come out to show off their own unique style. Rich said the festival was a place “for underdog suburban basement rage bands who just want to make music and a chance to play on stage.”

In 2005 he got together with his orchestra “The Lollipop People” and they toured Germany after signing a deal with Hazelwood Records. They have also produced nine full-length CDs. Their latest record is titled Dinosaur Power. Rich says his involvement with Hazelwood records happened on a whim. “I wrote a letter to them through a radio station that I used to work for… I didn’t really know what to expect, but they wrote back saying they really liked our sound,” said Rich. His advice to young Canadian artists based on his own experience is “Take chances.”

His own band follows this advice. Friendly Rich and the Lollipop People is composed of twelve musicians mixing instruments of all types together. Amongst the instruments are a harpsichord, bassoon, and banjo. Together, the sound they create blends classical influences like Verdi with a twist, anything from video games to children’s cartoons. If that doesn’t get your attention (which it will) it might be what they’re singing about, which ranges from topics like Canadian boxing legend George Chuvalo, to libraries and miscarriage. Through their ability and willingness to mix the foundations of music with pure fun, Friendly Rich and The Lollipop People produce a sound that is catchy yet sophisticated, and truly unique. Not to mention, their live show, like no other.

It turns out that the moon really wasn’t full, it was simply Friendly Rich being, well Friendly Rich. After watching his show, you certainly see that he takes his exuberance with him when he performs. Just talking to him and a few of the Lollipop People, I learned that they like to diversify the topics of conversation.  Talking about his music led to brief conversations about clay animated pornography, foul juice, and librarians. Rich’s performance is quite the same – picture animated characters in vintage suits, perhaps, making music, making you laugh, or making you feel very disturbed. Fearless would be a good word here. Rich has no problem inviting an old man to dance with him on stage. Rich has invited those on stage who light a certain body part on fire, or brought along a blender, and who knows what else. Rich’s self-proclaimed “weirdo art” has absolutely no boundaries.
Wrong? Sounds about right to me.

Electrifying folk-pop with Au Revoir Simone

Q & A with Heather D’Angelo

By Adriana Rolston

The electric folk-pop all-women power trio known as Au Revoir Simone has been making sweet music together for six years. Upon first listen to their latest studio album it becomes clear that their instrument of choice – the keyboard – is their unifying forte. Working together, the trio has been steering their own ship of dreamy synth-laden melodies, even while they’ve managed to helm their own record label called Our Secret Record Company.

The ladies from this Brooklyn band, Erika Forster (on keyboard and vocals), Annie Hart (also on keyboard and vocals) and Heather D’Angelo (on drum machine, keyboard and vocals) are currently touring in Europe after the release in May of their newest album, Still Night, Still Light. They’re working on a new music video with a director whose name they would not reveal and will be touring a lot more.

This year alone the band’s album went on to garner much acclaim, from the likes of The Observer who said it was “An unassuming delight,” to The Times who said the album’s “charms multiply with every listen.” And, CBC Radio’s national arts program, Q, said the album was full of “melody laden loveliness.” In July the band also made an interview spot on BBC 6’s The Hub with George Lamb in London, England.
In between shows during their busy last month, D’Angelo, the blogger of the band, was able to thoughtfully answer some of our questions.

Ryerson Free Press: How would you describe the sound of Still Night, Still Light?
Heather D’Angelo: It’s hard to describe the sound for this album. The three of us don’t really think that way–we speak more abstractly, and more in visual terms. We throw out words and images instead of stringing together full explanations. Some of those words included: stillness, introspection, dreaming, meditating, and hope. I think our producer, Thom Monahan, played a big part in shaping the sound of this album. We listened to a lot of Suicide to better understand how beautiful minimalism could be; how simple beats can be so much more compelling than complicated ones; and how the feeling of space can sound so much more full than layers. By stripping our sound down we came up with something more full and warm sounding than we had been able to achieve on previous recordings.

RFP: Have you introduced any new instruments to your latest album?
HD: We played a shruti box as well as a myriad of keyboards we hadn’t played with before. We experimented with lots of different sounds.

RFP: Why did you choose the keyboard as your instrument of choice?
HD: I’ve been interested in the piano since I was a kid, but never really played until we started this band. I liked the keyboard because it was percussive and easy. I remember the first song I heard that really inspired me to learn how to play was Richard Marx’s Wherever You Go, which is kind of (completely) embarrassing. But it had a gorgeous piano melody!

RFP: What kinds of things inspire you?
HD:  Science, discovery, innovative music, and the company of my boyfriend.

RFP: How have your lives changed since you started your own record company?
HD:  There are more emails to answer! It’s nice to have the freedom to be able to do anything we want with our music, and the control to work with who want to work with, release whatever we want, tour whenever we want. We don’t have to answer to anyone but ourselves.

RFP: What is your favourite thing about touring?
HD:  What I imagine most people would like about touring: Seeing new places, meeting new people. It’s not a bad life.

RFP: What is your most hilarious memory of touring?
HD:  There are many hilarious memories from touring, too many to name. And most of the things that seem hilarious to me now were actually pretty horrible when they were happening.

RFP: How has your fanbase changed over the years?
HD: It hasn’t! We continue to have the nicest, sweetest fans ever. We’re so lucky.

RFP: If you could use the power of your music to change one thing what would it be?
HD: I’d like to see more girls getting into music. And science too, but that’s another thing.

RFP: What sort of stigmas, if any, do you face being an all woman group?
HD:  I didn’t think there were any until I read somewhere online that we obviously must have someone telling us what to do because we’re too helpless to have figured out all this stuff by ourselves. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. We’ve co-produced all of our albums, and we’ve hired everyone from video directors, website designers, press agents and CD manufacturers, to name a few. There isn’t even one aspect of this band that we don’t have our hands in. The three of us make all the decisions as a group and we’ve worked our asses off to build our band, our record label and our aesthetic from the ground up… We don’t face any external pressures. Any changes in our band have been a result of our own desire to grow.

RFP: What would you be doing if you weren’t making music together?
HD: I’m getting my second undergraduate degree, so I’d be in school. I’ll be returning in the spring and I’m looking forward to it.

After Dark Film Festival

In only its third year, Toronto’s After Dark Film Festival wrapped up eight nights of new horror, sci-fi, action and cult cinema last month. The festival attracted over 9,000 viewers to Bloor Cinema.
Max Arambulo reviews two films from this year’s Toronto After Dark Film Festival (www.torontoafterdark.com).

The Children

The Children is a vicious little British film that follows several young families to rural England for their Christmas celebrations. The parents are good-looking thirty-somethings, each of their grown-up conversations – sex, work, drink – interrupted by an acting-up toddler. One-by-one, the children contract a strange virus that makes them murderous towards adults, i.e. their parents.

In this context, a simple Christmas dinner scene, each child crying and picking up stray forks and butter knives, is tense and portentous. Here, the young actors are just kids being kids. It’s this naturalism that makes each instance of escalating violence – a mother shoved off an icy jungle gym, a pencil crayon through the eye – truly scary.

Horror movies don’t often explore patricide, matricide, and infanticide. These are true taboos. The film, however, doesn’t cross the line. We only get to see the violence in quick, close-up glimpses before a quick cut away. As a result, The Children isn’t just a simple exploitation film, but an allegory about the emotional brutality that exists side-by-side with love in every parent-child relationship.

Black Dynamite

Michael Jai White is a macho Black action star working in the Will Smith era, where a last man on earth sheds tears for his dead dog. Hollywood isn’t as macho as it used to be. White is an anachronism, best known for playing a sociopathic boxer (HBO’s Tyson) and a soldier-turned-undead superhero (Spawn). He’s a modern-day Fred Williamson, but with a black belt and a sour disposition. Too bad, for him, that they don’t make blaxploitation films like they used to.

So White made his own, penning the script for and starring as the titular character in Black Dynamite. Black Dynamite is, director Scott Sanders explained to the Toronto After Dark festival audience, “a powder keg of black fury and if you choose to lose, light the fuse.” When his brother is killed during a drug deal gone wrong, Black Dynamite vows vengeance. But, the murder is just a small part of a conspiracy that leads all the way to the White House. A conspiracy to circulate tainted malt liquor that shrinks the penises of America’s Black men.

With its ludicrous plot, a clever mash-up of a hundred blaxploitation films, and ham-it-up performances, the film plays less as a straight action film and more as a tongue-in-cheek homage. Everything that’s exaggerated and larger-than-life in the genre is playfully stretched to absurdity. Think Black Belt Jones is an ass kicker? Black Dynamite kicks through chain-locked apartment doors, sending old women flying. You think Dolemite satisfies the ladies? Black Dynamite puts them to sleep by the half-dozen.

Despite the comedy, Sanders and White clearly love the source material. Formally, with its grainy film and bass-line driven soundtrack, the film is a replica of those 70s classics. Of course, the genre isn’t really about formal achievements. They’re about swag. Think Pam Grier in Coffy and Richard Roundtree in Shaft. A blaxploitation film is only as good as its lead actor is bad. And if Michael Jai White is anything, with his deadpan delivery (“I thought I told you honkies from the CIA that Black Dynamite was out of the game”) and beady-eyed stare, he’s a bad mutha.

Music Reviews

Why? – Eskimo Snow
Weirdo, pseudo-hip-hop bands goes pop, sacrifices nothing

Rating: A-

I came across Why? last year when their album Alopecia alienated me so much that I nearly gave up on the album. I nearly consigned it to my laptop’s recycle bin, where it would never be heard again. But I didn’t. There was something that called me back to it. It was partly the laid-back, cool timbre of Yoni Wolf’s distinct voice. It was partly the infectiousness of his subtle melodies, but mostly, it was the shocking honesty that Wolf imbued his lyrics with. His lyrics had so much sincerely that you believed that he really was the depraved characters his lyrics detailed so thoroughly. Eskimo Snow is far more accessible than Alopecia; there is less of Wolf’s sing-speak rapping and more upbeat, melodic songs, but most importantly, Wolf remains genuine and aloof, bonding with the listener through his engaging and convincing first-person narratives. Musically, the album is simultaneously epic and understated. The songs are arranged sparsely, never being overcrowded by too many ideas, meaning that Wolf’s voice can take centre stage even when the songs’ baroque instrumentation reaches epic pinnacles, such as on album highlight “Against Me.” However, it is perhaps during the ballad “This Blackest Purse” that Wolf himself encapsulates the beauty of Eskimo Snow most aptly. He puts the “sharpened steel of truth in every word,” even when he’s only speaking at an “intimate decibel,” only enough for the listener to hear what he’s saying.

Nothing new except disappointment from indie stalwarts
Yo La Tengo – Popular Songs

Rating: C+

“Branching out” is hard to do when you’ve been a band for longer than a decade. So it’s safe to say that after twenty years, Yo La Tengo have musically speaking turned over every leaf (pardon the pun) they’re ever going to. Popular Songs finds Yo La Tengo continuing from where 2006’s I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass left off, with its relative muscularity, decreased eccentricity, and higher fidelity than their previous output. Though whether or not these can be considered accolades is debatable, as a large portion of Yo La Tengo’s success can be attributed to the spontaneity found on prior releases. This same musical charm is largely absent from their more recent catalogue, Popular Songs. New listeners will find plenty to enjoy here, as even at their worst, Yo La Tengo can still write a decent pop song. However, casual listeners and even long-time fans may be put off by the lack of ideas and quirkiness that once defined the band; I’d be surprised to see even the most hardcore devotee stick around for the last three songs which, at a whopping 37 minutes of mostly jamming, account for over half of the entire album’s length. Popular Songs is a collection of fey melodies that lack the passion, musical focus, and complexity to differentiate them from the mushy pile of twee bands that Yo La Tengo themselves inspired.

Emotionless self-indulgent bootlegs from Jack White of the White Stripes
Dead Weather – Horehound

Rating: C-

The popular phrase goes that you can either see the glass at half full or half empty. But even if you think it’s half full, you’ve admitted that only 50 percent of your glass is full, and that’s pretty pathetic. If water was effort and commitment, saying the Dead Weather’s glass was half full would be an overstatement. Advocates will boast that the album was written and recorded in just less than three weeks, but that should hardly come as a surprise: the songs are meandering, lazy and emotionless, half-baked quasi-songs that sound like they were recorded by the White Stripes while drunk. Even the lyrics feel tacked-on and meaningless (“I like to grab you by the hair and drag you down to the devil”), products of spontaneity that might have been fun to participate in but to listen to are alienating and boring to anybody but the most dedicated Jack White fan. The White Stripes are successful because of the passion and dedication to their music that Jack and Meg White show. Horehound, by contrast, feels emotionless and self-indulgent, as if Jack were saying that even when noodling around with friends in his spare time he’s worth recording. It wasn’t, and unless you’re the head of the Jack White fan club, you probably won’t think it was, either.

The Dodos: On song writing, touring and democracy

By Stephen Carlick

It took San Francisco trio the Dodos only three years of existence before their second full-length record, Visiter, blew up in 2008, hitting top ten lists in publications across North America. Their third record, Time to Die, will be released on September 15, almost exactly a month before the Dodos roll through Toronto on their 2009 tour. On October 17, you can catch them at Lee’s Palace. In the meantime Dodos singer, Meric Long spoke with the Ryerson Free Press about how the band started, the recording of their new album, and what the future holds for the Dodos.

Ryerson Free Press (RFP): Can you pinpoint the moment you knew that you wanted to pursue music?
Meric Long (ML): I had a this high school band and we were this weird jazz funk instrumental thing. We had a sax player for a singer and we basically performed at a pep rally in front of the entire school, and afterwards…..people were nice to me and I was like “okay I guess I should keep doing this.”

RFP:  So last year, when Visiter came out, did you feel kind of vindicated, like “Wow we’re really getting somewhere here, this is coming out like I hoped it would”?
ML: The only vindication is that after being told that you can’t play music for a living, you’ve gotten to the point where you’re making a living off of it and you’re still doing what you love and staying true to what you’re doing. It just felt like a mixture of being lucky and vindicated - Being able to silence the doubters by saying “Haha, I had a feeling I’d win the lottery.”

RFP: That’s interesting you should mention that – there seems to be a lyrical bent on the album. You question the establishment and talk about doing what seems right, even when it isn’t socially acceptable. Is that something you were thinking about when you were recording Time to Die?
ML: Yeah, I would say so, although I didn’t feel as desperate writing this record (as I did with other albums). Since I’d achieved some success with Visiter, I felt like there was a huge weight lifted, and there was more freedom. I could say what I wanted to say.

RFP: That shows on the record. It feels looser than Visiter, like you’ve given yourself more space to let the songs play out.
ML: Yeah… there wasn’t such hastiness in writing this record and so there isn’t such a feeling of hastiness to the songs. They aren’t necessarily slower, but they feel mellower and more natural.

RFP: Was the sound on the album affected by (producer) Phil Ek (Built to Spill, the Shins, etc.) at all?
ML: It was both a challenge and a learning experience. We knew for a long time (since 2007) that we were going to be doing this record with him. We gathered from his records and people that have worked with him that we couldn’t record another album like Visiter with him. We needed to come in more prepared than we had in the past, with finished songs rather than with song ideas that we could flesh out in the studio. This time we came in with songs we were happy with that just needed a little polish.

RFP:  Which is sort of Phil Ek’s area of expertise…
ML: Yeah, you don’t write an experimental album with Phil Ek. We were sort of intimidated, which was good for us because it forced us to step up musically. I had never focused so much on singing as I did before recording with him.

RFP:  So now that Time to Die is done, are you looking forward to touring, or to maybe writing more songs… Maybe you’ve even thought about the next record?
ML: Yeah, I mean… we haven’t played the songs too many times yet, since we’ve only done a handful of festivals over the summer. So I’m very excited to start touring because we have a headlining club tour where we can develop the songs for a live setting. Even in our few summer shows, we’ve gone from just playing the songs and trying to get through them to really performing them and giving them new life.
On top of that I’m also excited about getting some new material into the set, because in our latest rehearsals we’ve been writing new songs and figuring out how to use this new third person (Keaton Snider, added to the band in spring of 2009). He’s a great musician, and now (post-Time to Die) we’re doing even more with percussion. We are really excited about the possibilities of what’s happening musically right now between the three of us. We said “this tour let’s not be lazy, let’s write and play new material so that by the end of the tour, we have a whole new record’s worth that we could record right away.”

RFP: So does that mean the next record will be the product of a more democratic song-writing process?
ML: Yeah, Keaton will be a part of the process. He picked up a lot of technical rhythms and skills from his classes at the music conservatory, so I feel like he’ll be integral to the next batch of songs. So yeah, I guess it’ll be more of a democracy.

Canada slams door on vulnerable refugees

New visa policy hurts Roma asylum seekers
Alexandra Bosanac

A policy requiring visitors to Canada from the Czech Republic and Mexico to carry tourist visas went into effect on July 14, causing an international uproar in the Roma community. The Roma, who are of eastern European descent and make up the largest minority group in Europe, face widespread discrimination in the Czech Republic, according to the Roma Rights Network (RRN).

The visa policy has evolved into a very contentious policy issue. In August, Amnesty International sent a letter to Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, urging the federal government to drop the tourist visa requirement.

Paul St. Clair, Executive Director of the Roma Community Centre (RCC) in Toronto, says that the Roma live separately from the Czech; demarcated by their appearance, their own set of traditions and their history, they reside in squalid living conditions in modernized Czech cities. They are frequently described as a “social problem” and are blamed for their own marginalization.

William Bila, vice-president of the RCC, recalls a recent incident of ethnic violence where a Molotov cocktail was thrown into a family’s house, burning several family members. No one has been prosecuted for the crime and it is assumed that the perpetrators will evade prosecution, since many such crimes emanate from the authorities themselves.

The Immigration Revue Board of Canada says that most refugee claims originate from the Czech Republic and Mexico, and that targeting the two countries is essential to repairing what Minister Kenney calls a “soft” immigration system, which allows many “bogus” claimants to enter Canada.
The number of refugee claims from the Czech Republic went up to about 800 people in 2008 from less than a hundred a year earlier. The total rose to 1,000 people in the first four months of 2009. There are approximately 300,000 Roma citizens in the Czech Republic.

“For Roma who do not pass as white, unemployment is over 80 to 90 per cent, when the national average is closer to 10 per cent. Many are forced into schools for the [developmentally delayed], hindering their chances for future employment by receiving a sub-standard education. Access to public services like medical care and housing are also hindered. A cycle of poverty was created by the Czechs when they actively recruited Roma to come live in the Sudetenland in the 1940s from Slovakia,” says Bila.

This is also not the first time Canada imposed visa requirements for Czechs. The Liberals under Jean Chrétien removed and then re-introduced visa requirements for Czech travelers in the 1990s. The Liberals made similar claims about so-called “bogus” refugees.

Bila argues that the visa policy grants an unfair advantage to Canada: the Czech Republic, being part of the EU, lacks the agency to impose similar restrictions on Canadian travelers.

Activists and critics oppose the policy because it singles out the Czech Republic and Mexico, which, as Dáša van der Horst, head of the Czech branch of Amnesty International, says, “makes various states unequal within the same system.”

Bila and other Roma activists stress that the visa policy will not be an effective measure to distinguish bogus refugee claims from legitimate ones, despite the minister’s claims. For them, this policy is akin to using a blunt instrument for a precision job.

A fair course of action, says Bila, would require Canada to apply more pressure on the Czech government to deal with persecution of Roma.

“[This] is a rather cowardly approach.  It is clear there are issues of security in Mexico and in the Czech Republic that are not being addressed. These governments need to do a better job protecting their own citizens so that they don’t feel the need to flee to Canada. Canada should be asking, ‘What are you doing to address this?’ publicly.”

To lessen the backlog of refugee claims, the Harper government wants to lower the number of refugees to a level where claimants can be properly vetted, singling out desirable candidates. Bila thinks the visa requirement will not change anything, except reduce the number of people coming to Canada to claim asylum.

Minister Kenney defends the policy, stating that the current intake of refugees from the Czech Republic is financially untenable in the long-term and that the financial cost of handling the asylum claims was “spiraling”—it costs the Canadian government about $29,000 to shelter and care for a single asylum seeker. Reports are now emerging of over-crowding in shelters in southern-Ontario cities like London, where there are many pockets of Roma refugees.

St. Clair contends that the Canadian government overlooks its own sloppiness on processing these claims, which contributes to the waste of public funds.

Minister Kenney’s argument also perpetuates the unfounded claim that the economic value of refugees is extremely limited.

“Look at the Czech citizens who came here in 1996 and 1997. How well have they integrated? How many are on welfare? How many have good jobs, pay taxes and are setting a good example? It is because of their success that a second wave has come,” says Bila.

“The numbers are down from 46,000 claims per year on average for the past decade to about 36,000 this year. Canada still has a labour shortage, despite the current recession. Complaining about foreigners during a time of recession is just populist xenophobia with no economic basis for argument.”

Tough financial times can foster narratives in the media and in the political arena that have isolationist overtones. Anonymous internet commentators, like one on the Globe and Mail’s website, have written myopic slogans like “Canada is not a homeless shelter.” Bila believes that the Harper government is seizing the opportunity to win votes from a shaken middle-class and that refugees are simply a convenient scapegoat.

“The Harper government has acted as a charity by accepting refugees from the Czech Republic and Mexico without reprimanding the governments of these countries for failing to do their jobs. We are giving charity to the Czech and Mexican governments, letting them get away with dumping their problems on us. It is not Canada’s job to fix these countries’ problems. What is wrong with this statement is that it does not force other players with clout on the world stage to do something to help Canada address this injustice.”

For more information, visit the Roma Rights Network:
www.romarights.net

Comic-Con’s 40th Anniversary

By Jessica Finch

Every year in San Diego, California, thousands of comic fans, film lovers and gamers flock to one of the city’s biggest events: Comic-Con. The convention celebrates everything from books to television, and gives attendees the inside scoop on their favorite media. For first time Comic-Coners the event can prove overwhelming as masses of people and extremely long lines may disorient those unfamiliar with the San Diego Convention Centre.

Even with the Comic-Con guidebook, given out on the first night of the event, getting to specific film panels or finding that piece of Star Trek memorabilia in the exhibition hall can be tough. The film/tv panels and exhibition hall are, without a doubt, the most popular parts of the Con. At the panels, directors and cast discuss the inner workings of their film or tv series and present clips to tantalize fans. While in the exhibition hall, high priced sci-fi toys, t-shirts and comics from a range of artists can be found. Comic-Con is four days of nerdish mayhem, bringing enthusiasts from around the world together to share their love of sci-fi.

The event has come a long way since its start in the basement of San Diego’s U.S. Grant Hotel back in 1970. Slight changes have been made over the years, but the Con’s level of quality remains consistent, particularly in the panels.

Each film or tv series panel at the Con gives attendees a first hand look at footage from the upcoming projects, but also allows audience feedback via mediated Q&A. The film Twilight was, by far, the most popular panel at the con. Presented in a large hall, that was full to bursting, people got a chance to see a preview of New Moon, the next film in the Twilight saga, and fawn unabashedly over the series’ star Robert Pattinson.

Apart from Twilight mania, one of the most intriguing panels was for Terry Gilliam’s film The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus. The film is a fantastical journey into the world of Dr. Parnassus, an old man who runs a traveling side show and sells his daughter’s soul for immortality.

On hand to discuss the film were director Terry Gilliam and cast member, Verne Troyer, of Austin Powers fame. The film also stars Christopher Plummer, Colin Farrell and Heath Ledger, in his last performance.  As Gilliam described, Heath’s interest in this film was his own, “We didn’t write it with Heath in mind, [Heath] was working on the Joker at the time, but he [read the script], and asked ‘can I play [the character] Tony?’” Gilliam and Ledger had worked together on 2005’s The Brothers Grimm, so they were already familiar with each other’s on set style; “[Heath] was an exceptional actor…he was very old, he always seemed wise beyond his years” states Gilliam.

Gilliam said that making this film was certainly a struggle, but with careful maneuvering and a re-write of Heath’s ‘Tony’ character, the film was pulled out of its slump. The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus will be in theatres later this year, but the sneak peek gave great insight into the project and the weird mind behind it.
Meanwhile in the exhibition hall, comic book artists pedal their latest creations to the teeming masses. Comic-Con for the novice fan is an experience in itself, but being a comic book writer at the convention is slightly different. For Ben Paddon, web comic writer and first time con exhibitor, the event was the chance of a lifetime.

“I love it, [the Con] is great for networking,” he explained. At his small booth near the commemorative t-shirt stand, Paddon talked with interested readers and flipped through his space-themed comic called Jump Start. Currently readers can go to his site www.jump-leads.com for the comic, but Paddon said he hopes to break into TV, with a sitcom that he and a friend are currently writing. And Comic-Coners who plan to attend the convention in 2010, may see Paddon at another booth again, next year with more witty material.

As an exhibitor, he doesn’t get time to explore the rest of the convention, but from his booth he made a keen observation about the crowds, “Whoever said geeks are unattractive has never been to a comic convention, because there are some good looking women wearing tight costumes [here], good looking men too.”

For those who do plan on going back in July 2010, be prepared. Explore the Con’s website prior to the trip. Prices for next year have already gone up, but, no matter the cost, there will always be immense crowds at this event. Many attendees dress up as their favorite super heroes, so be sure to bring a camera. Comic-con in San Diego is quite an experience, but there is also a similar convention occurring annually in Toronto. The Fan Expo is just as fun and exciting as its San Diego counterpart.

For information on Comic-Con in San Diego visit www.comic-con.org, or for Toronto dates and info: www.hobbystar.com/fanexpo.

Cameron Bailey reveals how TIFF connects with audiences

Toronto International Film Festival takes place from September 10 – 19

By Angela Walcott

Cameron Bailey started programming for the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) back in 1990 and today, as the co-director of TIFF he is at the fore of deciding what audiences will see at the annual festival.  Cameron has to narrow down the film selection from 3000 entries to 300 finalists.

His work is especially significant since TIFF attracts audiences that bring millions of dollars to the city each year. And Torontonians get so see their city as the backdrop to Hollywood stars and filmmakers. Apart from this, Bailey and the team at TIFF provide both veteran filmmakers and up-and-coming talent a place where stories can be told in new ways.

The film selection process involves 21 programmers that fan out across the world. Programmers must keep their ear to the ground and track films while they are in production. With the tracking list, programmers attend major festivals in cities from Dubai to Asia. But it isn’t until the Cannes Film Festival that things begin to heat up.

After a 10-year run, TIFF continues to evolve. Thanks to emerging technologies, TIFF fans can keep abreast of behind-the-scenes activities via Cameron Bailey’s Twitter updates. A peak at Bailey’s twitter page reveals the hectic rigor of his job, minute-by-minute, leading up to festival day.

With more than 300 films screening at this year’s festival, it is still too early to tell which films will be crowd favorites. In one tweet, Bailey mentioned Phantom Pain, The Disappearance of Alice Creed and Les Derniers Jours du Monde as some of the must see films among this year’s line-up.

The Antichrist is one of the most controversial films in this year’s line-up. It’s the story of a woman who comes to terms with the loss of her baby. In an effort to help her recover her psychologist husband takes her to a secluded cabin to deal with her grief. Bailey examined this film from the critical eye of a film reviewer and as the TIFF co-director.

“It is a tough film to watch, but it is audacious film-making,” explained Bailey. “It is a personal vision that reflects the director’s own fears. He is a great artist who is digging deep. It is daring of him to explore male/female relationships and religion as well,” said Bailey.

The global economic decline has had a direct impact on TIFF this year, particularly when it came to securing sponsors. Audiences are also spending less, and in response the festival is offering many freebies including free screening events at Yonge-Dundas Square. The economy was also the subject of several films, in particular Michael Moore’s documentary which analyzes the horrors of capitalism. On the other side, Up in the Air, a film by Jason Reichman, shows the values of corporate America and the affects on the soul.

Bailey said that TIFF is all about connecting with the audience. “It is what sets TIFF apart from other festivals around the world.” Toronto is the only festival in a big city where the audience is key. It was the audience who awarded the best film prize to Slumdog Millionaire last year and it went on to win several Academy awards. Film is about escapism from a world of oppression and disappointment. The success of the festival comes from the power of filmmakers who dare to express their ideas and as Bailey so aptly puts it, “films will get people talking.”

How safe is the food we eat?

By Kaitlin Fowlie

As we press forth into a world of advancing chemicals, it is not enough to be diligent about reading food labels. Secrecy in the marketing and labelling of food is highly detrimental to public health, and being a conscious consumer might not be enough to avoid the synthetic chemicals that permeate so much of what we eat. In reality, an entire economy has been built on the existence of this invisible world that so often leaves the consumer in the dark.

Processed food companies have fostered a belief that is generally accepted. This belief promotes synthetics as harmless, even superior to the products of nature traditionally relied on to nourish and heal us. Synthetics have become an all encompassing part of our world to the point that a visitor from the past might liken our state of life to a chemistry experiment in which we humans are guinea pigs. Our innovations are becoming more and more advanced every day, and they may end up killing us.

Back in 1935, only one case of cancer was reported among the Inuit of Alaska over the course of the previous 50 years. From this date until the 1970s, their cancer rate swelled until it was enough to rival that of Americans and Canadians. The significant change in cancer rates among the Inuit occurred alongside the adoption of a processed food diet. The Western world, which has consumed a diet of primarily processed foods since the birth of Heinz and Campbell’s companies in 1900, also continues to see a rise in cancer rates.

About 171,000 new cases of cancer and 75,300 deaths from cancer are estimated to occur in Canada this year. This figure represents an increase of 4,600 newly diagnosed cases and 1,500 more deaths than 2008. The explosive rates of this deadly disease aren’t the only statistics on the rise. Diabetes, endometriosis, and early signs of puberty are among the escalating conditions thought to be toxic reactions to diet.

Industry leaders haven’t made it easy for us to determine which food additives are harmful. In the United States, up to 99 per cent of ingredients in any product can be exempt from labels on the basis of trade secrecy laws if they are classified as “inert” (non active) or “other”. This goes for household cleaning products, pesticides, cosmetics, food and drinks. Usually inert additives lend themselves to prolonging the shelf life of products, making it easier to apply, etc. Fragrances, for example, would be an example of an inert ingredient.

When it comes to food packaging, what is made evident to consumers on the surface is the fact that our diet pop has only one calorie, is sugar free, and is deliciously refreshing. This might sound appealing to someone who has never Googled aspartame, the artificial sweetener connected with birth defects, depression, chronic fatigue, brain tumours and epilepsy—so the product won’t make you fat, but it might give you cancer.

The popularity of this sweetener, used in a variety of chewing gum, cereals, and drinks increased alongside a 10 per cent increase of brain cancer among Americans. Safe alternatives to this sweetener do exist, but unfortunately, the US-based Food and Drug Administration (FDA) doesn’t want any part of it. A natural, calorie-free sweetener called Stevia, used in South Africa since the 1970s, and widely tested in labs in Japan, hasn’t displayed any reason to be deemed unfit for human consumption. Still, it was banned by the FDA in 1994. The potential for competition between Stevia and Aspartame was suppressed by the FDA perhaps to maintain market monopolies.

The food industry, like any other competitive market, is driven by economic principles. The path of least resistance often involves synthesized foods. This fact is evident in any average grocery store, where an estimated 70 per cent of the processed foods contain at least one genetically engineered ingredient that has never been tested for harm, and labels say nothing about those additives. Ingredients may be protected from imitation by competitors simply by not listing them on the label as a way to hide their special chemical ingredients from view.

But even if all ingredients were listed, how would consumers know which chemicals are safe? Furthermore, how would we know how the chemicals would react with the ones already inside us? The safety of a food additive isn’t something we can personally check. It requires an extensive scientific process.

The conditions that make life in the Western world so profitable for the food industry are evident in the cycle of inadequate nutrition and synthetic solutions. It starts with a weakening of the immune system, combined with the employment of synthetic chemical additives designed to “remedy” the problem. Marketing a disease is the best way to market a drug—in the form of an antioxidant rich tea to cleanse our systems, or omega3 induced eggs to make us stronger. The list of fortified foods on the market is too extensive to even begin to name. The technological advancements of our culture are incredibly effective at helping us feel better in the short term, but we fail when it comes to attacking the root cause of illness.

“Fortified” foods exist in abundance, with the aim of boosting up the body with the vitamins it needs. But enriched white bread, for example, using flour that has been robbed of over 20 nutrients in the refinement process, can call itself enriched when manufacturers throw a few of them back in afterwards. In truth, processed foods like white bread begin losing essential nutrients right from the soil the moment they are sprayed with pesticides.

Synthetic vitamin supplements in the form of are also a popular way of attaining the essential nutrients. But do our bodies notice the difference between a synthesized vitamin and a naturally occurring one? Synthetic vitamin C is primarily ascorbic acid, made from cornstarch, corn sugar and volatile acids mixed and fermented. There is more to a vitamin than just these substances. In addition to ascorbic acid, real Vitamin C must contain a series of naturally occurring compounds like bioflavonoids (pigments), tannins, rutin, and others. The body is designed to absorb the compounds of the natural vitamin, and it does respond more actively to it.

The nutritional information on any packaged food label reveals our technical perception of food. We have broken it down entirely into numbers and percentages. But food is much more than the sum of its nutrient parts, and a diet is more than the sum of its nutrient foods. Our preoccupation with breaking up chemical compounds demonstrates the fact that our food ideology ignores any attempt at holistic health. Regardless of calories, daily activity, how much or how little we eat, we can’t consume chemicals if we want to be healthy. And we can’t rely solely on the FDA or the government to protect us. The modern Western food industry has engineered a cycle of poor health that, if we are not careful, could be the end of us.

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