Sara St. Onge. New City Hall.

Music videos will never be the same as they were in the 90's. Opulent sets, armies of extras...that era is over, about as dead as the compact disc.

Lower budgets have brought at least one advantage to the medium; more artistic freedom. Young directors like Sara St. Onge have been remaking the music video industry in their own image, cutting back the corporate slop of the gay 90's and substituting cleverness for cash.

YouTube Project: Direct 2009 is a short film competition in conjunction with the Sundance Film Festival. This year, two Toronto filmmakers - myself (Jake Kovnat) and Ben Goldenberg - have made it to the top 10. The winner gets sent to Sundance 2009 to screen their film and meet with industry executives and the two runners up get their film distributed on DVDs throughout the festival. Along with this, 1st and 2nd place receive $2500 and 3rd receives $1000. So how are the winners chosen?

The Toronto Film Critics Association have announced their 2008 awards for the year in film and the Best Picture category is definitely something of a surprise. Wendy and Lucy, a film that stars Michelle Williams as a young woman whose life is turned upside-down when her car dies in Oregon, was handed the top honours.



The low budget flick has received positive reviews to date but hasn't yet opened in Toronto and will likely be playing on a limited number of screens when it gets here. It has also been largely ignored by all other film critics and the Golden Globes although it did get a mention as one of the top ten independent films by the National Board of Review.

Canada's top ten films of 2008 were announced today by the Toronto International Film Festival Group. Among those selected were a number directed by Toronto-based talent including Adoration by Atom Egoyan, Heaven on Earth by Deepa Metha and Pontypool by Bruce McDonald.

Sadly I've only seen one of these films so far (Heaven on Earth - comments here) but I'm looking forward to catching some of the others when all the films screen in Toronto during the first week of February.

A full list of the top ten features and shorts are listed on the Top Ten web site.

It's hard to believe that there's never been a non-documentary film with 'Toronto' in the title. But this was one of the motivating forces driving directors David Weaver and Aaron Woodley to create Toronto Stories, which premiered at this year's TIFF and opens this Friday, December 12th at The Royal Cinema.

Speaking with these relatively new directors (both of TIFF fame, David Weaver for Century Hotel and Siblings, Aaron Woodley for Rhinocerous Eyes and upcoming Tennessee,) I was amazed to learn that affiliating a film with Toronto has something of a reputation for disaster. "We were told, if you put Toronto in the title, no one will want to see it. We decided... let's prove them wrong."

Last month the news broke that film guru Reg Hartt may be forced to move Cineforum from his Bathurst street address because the landlord's son has put the building up for sale.

"It's crazy to try to sell it in this market," says Hartt, who started showing films at 463 Bathurst Street, just below College, in 1992. He converted the living room-dining room of his typical Victorian house into a black-walled screening room. No popcorn-sticky stadium seating here: audience members sit on comfy office chairs and are encouraged to bring their own food and drink.