3) Priceless (Hors de prix) - This is a light comedy about a gold digger (Audrey Tautou) who sleeps with a hotel bartender (Gad Elmaleh) because she mistakes him for a rich man. The guy decides that she's just too good to let go, and here begins his quest to win her heart. Yeah, the plot has been done before. Yeah, the movie came out in 2006. But it's potentially an enjoyable film that contrasts with the more serious subject matter of some of the other ones. If you find Audrey Tautou as charming as I do, perhaps this film is worth seeing. You can catch it starting July 4th.

2) Love Songs (Les Chansons d'amour) - I don't usually like musicals, but something about the quirky trailer and the Parisian backdrop makes me want to see this one. It's all about the intricacies of a love triangle, and also what happens when a fourth actor comes into the picture (does that make it a love rectangle?). This film, which has become a bit of a cult favorite in France and Belgium, makes its debut on July 11th.

1) The Last Mistress (Une vieille maîtresse) - Something about steamy 19th-century romance makes for good film. Think The Atonement, but more French (that means that at least the sex scenes should be more exciting!). I'm definitely looking forward to seeing this one - it's been acclaimed at a bunch of movie festivals, and I've generally heard good reviews. It starts July 25th.

Quitting his job, he began to put his plan in motion. He built a tandem bike that can be altered on the road to ride as a single. He consulted maps and planned routes. He put the call out to find a riding partner or two. Then he got hit by a car. A minor setback turned positive; Castellan was not seriously injured, but used his settlement to purchase a camera and the final piece to document the journey fell into place.

The resulting film - Long Road North, directed by Castellan and Ian Hinkle - had it's world premier at the Doxa Film Fest and sold out both screenings. The filmmakers are putting on one more screening this Tuesday, June 24th at the Ridge Theatre as a fundraiser for the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition. Ticket info and an interview with Castellan after the jump...

So why was I jumping at the chance to see his newest film 'Postal' when Only announced the sneak preview? Well, 'cause the thing about Uwe Boll is that he makes statements like the above. By Hollywood standards he's batshit insane; the apex of Uwe-chaos reached during his boxing-ring takedown of five internet critics (you may have heard about it, as it happened here in Vancouver) and subsequent challenges to Michael Bay. After a quick IMDB search, I found out that 'Postal' is Uwe's satirical take on post-9/11 America; staring Dave Foley ('Kids in the Hall', 'Newsradio'), opening with the collapse of the WTC, and boycotted in the States. Um, yes please.

So, although the girlfriend and I were prepared for anything as we stood outside of Granville 7 on Thursday, we were still left pretty damn speechless at the sight of a giant walking penis (photos below), passing out promotional pictures of Osama & Bush holding hands. Soon enough the Only magazine reps showed up to fill us in on the fact that Uwe Boll himself would there for a Q&A. All the raving, politically-incorrect Germanic juice after the jump...

I love a good David Mamet movie. His dialogue and plot twists are always top-notch, putting his signature speech patterns on every character he writes. Witness The Untouchables or Glengarry GlenRoss or The Spanish Prisoner, movies with plots that are not dumbed down for a mass audience. They're full of smart, intellectual characters who speak in rhythms and puzzles, pushing the viewer to use their brain rather than give standard expository dialogue to move the story along and make it easier for a wide audience to digest. Luckily for us, his new film Redbelt opens this week. It stars Chiwetel Ejiofor as a martial-arts instructor who gets forced into participating in a prize bout against his will through a series of typically shady Mamet-esque circumstances. Featuring a supporting cast that includes Joe Mantegna, Emily Mortimer, Ricky Jay and Tim Allen (!) as a washed-up actor, Redbelt has been getting slightly mixed reviews, but for Mamet fans, like myself, that won't stop us from going to see it first weekend.

Ashton Kutcher returns to give more reasons for an assassination attempt in his new film What Happens In Vegas..., starring with his female equivalent Cameron Diaz. It's about two predictably zany people who get drunk and wake up to find out they got married. My question is didn't this already happen in an episode of Friends? I hate to defend that show but you know generic Hollywood comedies are running low on ideas when they start ripping off a 10-year-old episode of Friends.

Spending a lot of the day either searching for plastic or hauling bags around town, surviving off recycling takes a lot of strength, stamina, and - if they're available - auxiliary can-carrying devices, i.e, shopping carts. Murray Siple's Carts of Darkness follows a group of North Van 'binners' who use their shopping carts as more than mere business-aids; turning them into something like scooters crossed with street luges, cruising and racing down North Vancouver hills at 60kph. The extreme-sport escapism is almost as fascinating as the story of the men themselves, a bracket of Vancouver society often glimpsed but rarely seen.

More on this exciting doc, as well as a trailer, after the jump...

Two high-concept comedies open this weekend, the first has Tina Fey making her leading lady debut in Baby Mama, starring as a businesswoman who, when discovering she is infertile, hooks up with a trailer trash-type surrogate mom, Amy Poehler, in order to have her baby. Co-Starring Greg Kinnear, Sigourney Weaver and Steve Martin, it's been getting mixed reviews but fans of Fey and Poehler's work on 30 Rock and SNL should enjoy it nonetheless.

The other big comedy is the sequel to one of the biggest stoner comedies ever, Harold & Kumar: Escape from Guantanamo Bay. Kal Penn and John Cho return in the title roles, this time running from government agents after trying to sneak a bong onboard their flight to Amsterdam. Neil Patrick Harris returns as himself and former Daily Show correspondent Rob Corddry makes an appearance. It's been said that if you enjoyed the first movie, there would be no reason not to enjoy this one.

If you're a big Freaks And Geeks fan like myself, you might be interested in this weekend's new film Forgetting Sarah Marshall, which F&G vet Jason Segel wrote and stars in, along with Kristen Bell, Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd. Produced by Judd Apatow, Forgetting Sarah Marshall tells the tale of a man who devastation after a messy break-up leads him to a tropical resort, only to find his ex and her new beau are staying at the same place. It's been netting surprisingly good reviews and if you like Jason Segel it's pretty much a no-brainer.

Opening in Vancouver this week is Smart People, starring Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Thomas Haden Church and, Juno herself, Ellen Page. If an actor grows a beard and wears a brown sport coat, a la Robin Williams, they must be portraying someone in a respectable profession playing against type and, coincidentally, Quaid plays a widowed professor who falls for one of his former students, played by Parker. Church plays an art house goofball, just like the one in Sideways, and Page plays a sassy, ahead-of-her-years teenager, just the like the one in Juno, but you know the old saying, if it worked once...

From writer/director/star Nadine Labaki comes the acclaimed comedy Caramel, opening in Vancouver on Friday. In Caramel, a Beirut beauty salon serves as a microcosm of modern society, following the lives of five women of varying generations. Screened at the Cannes Directors' Fortnight in 2007, the film has generated sparkling reviews from around the globe and can be seen in an exclusive engagement at Fifth Avenue Cinemas.

Has it really been 18 years since the last Rolling Stones Imax spectacular? It's nice to know that, even at ninety years old, Mick Jagger has enough energy to keep making Imax concert films. This one might be pretty good, as the director is none other than Martin Scorsese. But a collaboration with Christina Aguilera?? Yikes. Shine A Light starts Friday at The CN Imax Theatre.

No I'm not recounting the hour-by-hour of my easter weekend mushroom trip (I wish my mind was that creative...) Rather, those are the brief plot synopses of four films screening as part of Terminal Cinema's inaugural celebration of local underground film. I talked a bit last week about the state of local movie-making when I highlighted Paul & Ben's festival, and coming right on the heels of that great event is another needed antidote to the Hollywood-blues, and another opportunity to support some truly local art.

Aside from the surreal sounding short films listed above, the event will include thirteen productions in a variety of styles; from documentary to comedy to animated & experimental. What unites them is their bond to Vancouver and their existence outside the mainstream; representating the best of our city's independent scene. Terminal Cinema: Underground Film in Vancouver will screen at the Pacific Cinematheque at 7:30 on Tuesday, April 1st, and entry is free...

Before we move onto the films playing this week, I must urge every filmgoer to see The Counterfeiters, which is still playing at Tinseltown. I saw it last weekend and it's incredible. Telling the true story of how the Nazis forced Holocaust concentration camp prisoners into making them millions of dollars in counterfeit money, the film won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film and it truly deserved it. All the performances are fantastic and it's very realistic. Make sure to catch it before it leaves the theatres.

What is open to debate, however, is how much this Vancouver-based production of foreign entertainment impedes on the success of our local artists; arguably drawing attention away from fostering our own creative talent. Many have gone as far as labeling the film industry the Vancouver film service industry; waiters to hungry Hollywood 'creatives' looking for a cheap ocean shot.

Just because the local media has an obsession over reporting the latest sightings of Jennifer Aniston and Jessica Alba doesn't mean there aren't a host of local artists producing great films in the city. From VFS to Emily Carr, this town is home to some of Canada's best film programs and some of our nation's strongest developing talent. On Friday night, Paul FitzZaland and Benjamin Asa Smith will do their part to highlight the best in local cinema as they present the 2008 Paul & Ben Film Festival. Now in its third year running, the Granville Island fest will feature fifteen short films, paying respect to some top Canadian creativity (and future Hollywood highrollers?) More after the jump...

Hollywood is one of the worst offenders; if we aren't fawning over the waif-like Keira Knightley or Nicole Kidman, we're gabbing with friends about how much we admire Christian Bale or Renee Zellweger for dropping/gaining 70 pounds between movies. The modern movie theatre has become, to a large extent, a breeding ground for depression, perception issues, and eating disorders.

In a small break in programming from Canada's Top Ten, the Pacific Cinematheque offers an antidote to cinema-inspired anorexia as they screen THIN, the recent, highly praised American documentary which follows the lives of four women with anorexia nervosa. Admission is by donation only, and will be followed up by a post-screening discussion with Dr. Samantha Keller of St. Paul's Hospital. If you've dealt with disordered eating yourself, have a loved one who has, or are simply intrigued by its all too pertinent subject matter, the film is bound to be compelling, and is only showing on Wednesday night at 7:30. More after the jump...