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Dru Jeffries

FILM

Can’t Get No Respect

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The Non-Award Winning List

by Dru Jeffries
31.12.2009

Looking back at the films that I’ve covered this year for Rover, not one strikes me as a “best of year” contender, though some of my favourites have been covered by others for the site (A Serious Man and Star Trek, to name only two). With this in mind, the following list presents ten [...]

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MUSIC

From Nü-metal to Nü-arena Rock

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Dredg: The Pariah, the Parrot, the Delusion

by Dru Jeffries
10.08.2009

California’s dredg may be the best band you’ve not yet heard of. The quartet, consisting of vocalist Gavin Hayes, guitarist Mark Engles, bassist Drew Roulette and drummer Dino Campanella, have shown consistent technical growth with every one of their recordings, dating back to their first EP in 1996. But it’s their artistry, on display in [...]

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FILM

Escorts Are People, Too

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THE GIRLFRIEND EXPERIENCE

by Dru Jeffries
08.07.2009

The sexually-savvy people of Montreal will surely already be familiar with “the girlfriend experience,” an arrangement by which a higher-class escort indulges her patron not only with sex, but also with dinner, movies, chit-chat — in short, with actual (fake) human interaction — for a not inconsiderable fee. It’s this tension between the real and [...]

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FILM

Curb Your Nihilism

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WHATEVER WORKS, AMC Forum 22

by Dru Jeffries
01.07.2009

In many ways, Whatever Works is your prototypical Woody Allen comedy. It features (1) a schlubby and neurotic Jewish man who is unlucky with love and lucky with witticisms, (2) a love triangle, (3) direct address to the camera, (4a) references to classic Hollywood films, (4b) a Groucho Marx reference. So far so [...]

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STAGE

A Risky Parable

DOUBT, CENTAUR THEATRE

by Dru Jeffries
06.03.2009

WHEN BOOKS BECOME MOVIES or plays, the temptation to judge the adaptation by its source material is strong, though the actors are normally excluded from comparison. You may judge the veracity of a screen characterization, but don’t, for example, compare Kate Winslet’s performance in Revolutionary Road to the words in Richard Yates’ novel. The Centaur [...]

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FILM

Exploiting Memories of Murder

POLYTECHNIQUE

by Dru Jeffries
09.02.2009

DENIS VILLENUVE IS A PROVOCATEUR. He doesn’t shy away from what some might call sensitive subject matter. Rather, he seems to gravitate toward it, not merely content to show the horrors of the world but insisting on rubbing our faces in them. In Maelström (2000) he thrust viewers directly into a graphic abortion scene that [...]

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FILM

Stripping Away the Artifice

WAITRESSES WANTED (Serveuses demandées)

by Dru Jeffries
21.01.2009

STRIP CLUBS are Montreal’s accidental trademark. Though hardly unique, the sheer quantity is striking. On a certain stretch of Ste-Catherine St., they’re almost wall to wall, selling alcohol and cheap thrills. Yet original portraits of exotic dancers are hard to come by, the pervasive “stripper with a heart of gold” archetype being all too easy [...]

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