Tribeca Film Festival in Qatar

American film producer, Jane Rosenthal and actor Robert DeNiro founded the TriBeCa Film Festival in 2002, in response to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the loss of vitality in the TriBeCa neighborhood in Manhattan.  

There mission is “to enable the international film community and the general public to experience the power of film by redefining the film festival experience”. 

I love how Ali Jaafar from Variety puts it “Qatar is joining the Middle East film gold rush.” Executives from Qatar Museums Authority, an organization dedicated to developing cultural initiatives in the country have made a deal with Tribeca fest co-founders to launch Tribeca Film Festival Doha in November next year. 

Read Ali Jaafar’s article in Variety

Four Christmases

Last night, I saw the romantic comedy, Four Christmases, starring Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon. Both play a happily unmarried, upscale San Francisco couple and every Christmas they ditch there families for a fun-filled holiday in some exotic location.  But, their flight got cancelled, they had to embark in four christmases.  The film will give you a laugh attack, perfect timing since people are stressed out over the worlds economic uncertainty.  Vaugh is naturally hilarious–I keep forgetting that he makes awesome films. Witherspoon is a delight in this film as well. Vaughn and Witherspoon make a better couple thank with Jennifer Aniston in the Breakup (tho, I did love that movie).  Four Christmases highlights how we fall into relationships so that we can escape from our pasts and our family’s dysfunctions. Tho, we learn that Christmas without a family is never the same.

How Did Rachel Maddow Get So Popular?

When Left is Right

Rachel Maddow always thought she was an outsider. How did she become a star?

By Julia Baird | NEWSWEEK

“Can you believe that sellout, Barack Obama?” says Rachel Maddow, looking around the room. “Let’s hit him from the left!” It’s 1:30 p.m. on Nov. 5, and the six-foot-tall Maddow, wearing her trademark baggy 501 jeans and thick-soled sneakers, has just burst into her staff meeting in a small office at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, home of MSNBC. Her team of political junkies, mostly in their 20s and 30s, perk up, laugh and start talking about how Obama is looking at hiring former Clinton staffers. “Yes!” Maddow responds, beaming. “He’s already triangulating, the bastard.” It’s the day after the election, and Maddow has had two hours of “drunk sleep.” Just a few minutes before, her intense executive producer, Bill Wolff, was giving the staff a pep talk, and a warning: don’t get too cynical too soon. They may be feeling “tired and cranky” because they were up late working and drinking, but “the country is still aglow,” he says. “Holy s–––, Barack Obama is president of the United States. People are almost universally feeling quite proud and quite moved by it and I don’t think we want to be too fast to speed away from that.” When Maddow arrives, she energizes the room. She flops to the floor, alternately lying on her back, throwing a small foam basketball in the air and kneeling to scribble in a notebook. Her ideas are all tough-minded: Who will be in the new cabinet? Who are the Republican bosses now? How will Bush handle his “lameduckitude”?

Finally, Amanpour anchors her own show

I love Christiane Amanpour, the chief international correspondent for CNN, because of her intelligence, class, and of course, being half Persian.  Sometime in 2009, Amanpour will be anchoring a nighly show on CNN International.  

Source: New York Times

Online Piracy Costing Publishers Millions, Study Says (Forbes)

New data tries to put a value on copying and pasting from media sites.

Web publishers struggling with the devastating effects of a collapsing advertising market are also losing millions of dollars thanks to a problem as old as the commercial Internet: piracy.

At least 1.5 times as many people are reading publishers’ stories on third party sites than on the publishers’ own sites, says a new study by Attributor, a California-based start-up that searches the Web for copyrighted content based on extended strings of a story’s text. Linked back or not, that cribbed content leaves publishers saddled with the creation costs but none of the ad revenue for presenting it to a reader.

Harper Gov’t not renewing its program to monitor the world’s fresh water

Haper government wants out of a Canada led United Nations program that monitors freshwater around the world.  Environment Canada spokesman John Carey says they system to track water quality in 100 countries is no longer a priority.  Carey says Ottawa won’t renew a trust fund worth 1.5 million dollars for the United Nations program.  Water experts say they’re shocked Canada would abandon a program it has led for 30 years, just as water quality is emerging as a critical issue.  University of Ottawa professor Errol Mendes says it’s the latest snub by the Conservatives of international efforts once led by Canada.  The Global Environment Monitoring System collect data from 2,700 tracking stations around the globe.  

(Source: The Canadian Press)

NBC axes high-profile TV shows (AP)

NEW YORK – Add Christian Slater and Brooke Shields to the list of actors with TV failures on their records.
NBC is pulling the plug on `My Own Worst Enemy’ and `Lipstick Jungle,’ two of its more high-profile young series.
The word comes from two network executives who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly about the decision.
The network will not order new episodes of either series when their current orders – nine in the case of `My Own Worst Enemy’ and 13 for `Lipstick Jungle’ – run out, the executives said.
`My Own Worst Enemy’ was given a big promotional pitch by NBC.
The psychological thriller stars Slater as a man who has two separate identities and lives, and slowly comes to learn about the situation.
(The Associated Press)

Eco-Designer’s at VFW

On Friday November 7th, Vancouver Fashion Week decided to have an Eco-themed collection, attracting local Eco-Designers.  According to Wikipedia, an ecodesign is an “approach to design of a product with special consideration for the environmental impacts of the product during its whole lifecycle.”  

Below are the list of Eco-Designers at VFW:
-Elroy; Barbara Gregusova; Adhesif; Lav & Kush; In Harmony; Artifaax by Denise Brillon; Leona Klien

Here is a new and cool web-magazine on eco-desigers called, Eco Fashion World.

Vancouver Fashion Week Nov 5 – 9th

I had the opportunity to attend most of Vancouver Fashion Week and I must say that I was pleasantly surprised.  Tho, my expectations were pretty low.  Leading up to the date, the event was extremely disorganized and most of the planning was held to the last minute.  I actually believed that the entire event would be cancelled.  At times, I forget that this is Vancouver’s 8th year doing a fashion week.  you think after doing this for almost a decade, the production timeline would run a little ahead of schedule. Why no big sponsor?  Toronto has L’oreal; New York, Miami, and LA have Mercedez-Benz.  Why isn’t Vancouver lucrative enough for a sponsor to help the city out?  Does Vancouver have a niche? What’s the Vancouver fashion scene?  Raised in Vancouver, I still haven’t figured it out.  And maybe the west coast fashion scene will always stuggle, since most love the comfort of Lululemon? 

Vancouver Fashion Week started with an opening gala at Birks (on West Hastings).  Great location for an event. But, what does a Gala mean? Is wearing jeans, ok?  when i think gala, i think stilettos, fancy dresses and suits.  I saw a few dresses, mostly hoo chee mamma clubbing wear, and jean-casual.  OK, if we were in Toronto, there would never be a confusion about what to wear at a gala.  Nonetheless, Mayor Sam Sullivan was there for the ribbon cutting ceremony, and declared the start of Vancouver Fashion Week. (And he was dressed appropriately, in his suit).   
Tara Parker Tait, co-founder of VitaminV.ca and Steven Schelling, Fashion Editor of WestEnder, did a fabulous job of hosting the event.  Message to Birks, thanks for the crappy gift bag for guests.  I mean, putting your catalogue in a gift bag, is cheap.  Not to mention a huge paper waste.  If you have nothing to offer your guests, then don’t try, because that’s insulting.

REMEMBRANCE DAY in Canada


A moving moment in today’s Remembrance Day ceremony in Ottawa featured John Babcock, the only surviving Canadian who was in uniform during the First World War.  The 108 year old, passed a torch of remembrance, marking the line from In Flanders Fields:  ”To you, from failing hands, we throw the torch, be yours to hold it high.”  Hundreds surrounded the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier where they quietly laid their poppies as a show of respect.  The ceremony in Ottawa was just one of many held across the country.