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Can TIFF 2020 dodge a viral bullet?

This is the time of year when the Toronto International Film Festival normally begins its summer-long reveal of plans for its big cinema...

A coronavirus cough gives Oscar the chills

We’re all familiar with the cautionary adage about not giving an inch to a slippery person or group, lest they respond by taking a mile....

With cinemas shuttered by the coronavirus pandemic, there is light at the end of the projection tunn

Like many people during these locked-down days, I’ve been having anxiety dreams — more like nightmares — that interrupt my sleep. They...

Triumphant movies for these troubled times

"Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" (Twentieth Century Fox) On that awful day of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, when we were all...

Movies my dad would have loved

My dear ol’ dad, John Peter Howell, used to tell me about an unwritten rule in the Royal Air Force, where he served as an aircraft...

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Movies I Can't Live Without

Toronto Star movie critic 𝗣𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗛𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹 has written a book about his 25 most-loved films, with highly personal reviews from "Apocalypse Now" to "The Wizard of Oz." Here's a sample of his review of "2001: A Space Odyssey," his all-time favourite:

"It was billed as The Ultimate Trip and the hyperbole was justified, then as now.

Stanley Kubrick's space opus still seems like the future, 56 years after its release and 23 years after its significant title year. It never gets old and I never tire of seeing it, even after 50-plus viewings ...." 🌓