I was a kid the first time I visited Jasper National Park in Alberta. And I spent most of my time looking for the cartoon bear (pictured above), who was supposed to live there. Jasper was a regular in Maclean's magazine and several weekly color comic sections at the time and had spawned a massive line of trinkets and toys as cartoon characters are wont to do these days, but was quite unusual for Canadian icons back then. A couple of years after that first visit of mine, Jasper was inducted as the Park's official mascot and a statue was erected to him. It still stands today, even though most who are photographed hugging it probably have no idea it's more than just a bear. I'm not sure if that's a bad thing, as it may mean those who visit what is, in my opinion, the most beautiful National Park in the country actually spend more time taking in the natural beauty. There are still a couple of months left in the Canada 150 celebration which comes with free admission to all our parks. And if you haven't availed yourself of that fabulous freebie -- well, what's been keeping you. If you can get to Jasper, great. If not -- here's a taste of what's waiting for those who do. Enjoy Your Sunday.
Gord Downie's death this week turned into a national outpouring of grief. We all remembered our favorite "Tragically Hip" song or how'd we'd caught them in a bar one night before they were famous. Every newscast and talk show discussed the local landmarks, arcane hockey moments, regional turns of phrase and national traits mentioned in their lyrics. For a while there it felt like no politician, athlete or kid on the street was without profound thoughts on the Legacy the music would engender and the change in our collective consciousness that would evolve as a result. It made me wonder how much of this was genuine -- given that less than 10% of the country had ever purchased one of the Hip's albums. And far fewer when you consider that the core of any fan base owns all of their favorite band's output. Not that there's anything shabby about selling just over 5 million copies of anything. And God knows there were Summers and camp grounds where the tunes from their 14 albums were everywhere. But given that Shania Twain has already sold more than 8 times as many copies of one album ("Come On Over") alone, how overwrought is this nation going to become when her turn to shake off this mortal coil rolls around? "Bobcaygeon" might choke me up personally whenever I hear it. But millions more were/are just as moved by "Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under". Or are the wakes we hold for our pop stars more media generated than genuine? Yeah, I know it hurts to lose someone who influenced your formative years. But trust me, I was around when Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison died -- and none of them ever made the front page of any newspaper I picked up or garnered more than a moment of the nightly news. The tragedies of their passings didn't dominate the zeitgeist and the word "legacy" never crossed anybody's mind beyond hoping people would be a little more careful about what drugs they took. Still -- like a lot of you I'm sure -- in my sadness, I ventured onto YouTube to re-watch a few of my "Tragically Hip" favorites. And you know how, when you do that, YouTube comes up with a list of other clips you might want to see...? That list included the one I'm attaching below because a couple of things struck me watching it. 1. Every single star participating in it has passed on. Each of them giants in the industry. And... 2. This kind of thing used to turn up on television with regularity -- unprompted by anyone's impending mortality or the need to opine on their context in the grand scheme of things. Perhaps the innocence of "entertainment" being the point of entertainment is one more thing that we've lost. Enjoy Your Sunday...
After the worst forest fire season in recorded history, which scorched an area of British Columbia four times the size of Vancouver and the rest of our urban mainland, the flames are out. Crews that came from across Canada and all over the world to fight the wildfires are going home. Some leave quietly. Others make you wish they'd stay forever. Not just because of their courage and commitment. But because they hold onto something we've lost. Remember when people used to sing at work? And I'm not talking about chain gangs but that sense of community and communal labor that caused all kinds of people to get together in song. As a kid, I remember railroad crews busting out a tune to set the rhythm of their hammers or some cowboy bringing out his guitar at a campfire after the branding was done. When you took your car to a garage, there was always a radio blasting back in the repair bays and one or two of the mechanics joining in. Every police force and fire department had a choir or a band or both. Geez, even coal miners sang between coughing fits as they hacked up a lung. But people don't even turn on a radio at work anymore. Workplaces have become these quiet hives, where even the crappy muzak in the elevator is being replaced by tiny TVs offering stock quotes and snippets from CNN. And those who do their jobs to tunes do it with earbuds, seldom to experience the delight of a shared song. When did work become all about work and lose the joy that made working with other people worthwhile? What follows is a Samoan Crew of Firefighters leaving the woods after killing a wildfire. They're hot and tired. Bruised and sore from the back-breaking labor. But they've got a song in their hearts. This is special. Enjoy Your Sunday.
I've always held that it is a storytelling power of three that makes cinema what it is. Those three story tellers are the writer, the director and the editor.
The writer creates the original story on paper. The director lifts it from the page so it can be retold in the physical world. And finally, the editor uses the captured images and sound to re-tell the story in cinematic form.
No good film story can be realized if one of the three storytellers is missing.
Without a good script, the director's skills can still achieve a level of sound and fury, but the result inevitably signifies nothing. And no matter how well the writer and director have told their tales, without the storytelling skills of an editor, the audience won't be taken on the intended journey.
Whether those story tellers are embodied in one person or many doesn't matter. The story still needs to be told three times to make a movie.
Now -- everybody thinks they can write and those with healthy egos are certain they can direct. But editing is a more mysterious craft to most, practiced in darkened rooms by people who seldom speak about what illusions they can concoct.
One of the easiest ways to understand what editors do is to look at their work through the eyes of a writer and one of the skills writers rely on -- punctuation. The image above is the first half of one of the most famous cuts in cinema history. Or is it just a comma... Enjoy Your Sunday.
