by Shanezilla Hnetka
According to the calendar, Thursday, March 20 is the first day of spring. That means the summer blockbuster season is just around the corner. It also marks the end of the 2013 award season — the Academy Awards were held March 2 and the Canadian Screen Awards were just held March 9.
And The Best Picture Is
The Best Picture at the Canadian Screen Awards was Gabrielle. It’s about a woman (Gabrielle Marion-Rivard, who won best actress) with Williams syndrome — a genetic disorder that causes mental disability, heart trouble and an unusual, elf-like facial appearance. Gabrielle was also Canada’s submission for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars but failed to get a nomination. Still, winning Best Picture at the Canadian Screen Awards isn’t too shabby a consolation prize. The other nominees were Le Démantèlement (The Auction), Empire of Dirt, Enemy, The F Word, The Grand Seduction, Maïna and Tom à la ferme (Tom at the Farm). Not too shabby a list.
A highlight of the awards was Tatiana Maslany’s best actress win for the TV show Orphan Black. Congrats to her and her people for that one.
It Ain’t Easy Turning 60 (Or Being Green, For That Matter)
The king of the monsters turns 60 later this year. As with all milestones, various celebrations are planned. The biggest is a great-looking new movie coming out May 16. The next is Universal and Sony releasing a bunch of Godzilla films on Blu-ray. There are 28 movies, 29 if you count the crappy 1998 American version (sorry Steve, I don’t care what you say, that film sucks).
The first problem: over the years, different studios have had video rights to different Godzilla films. That makes it tough to have just one nice Criterion-style box set.
The second problem: the new re-releases appear to just be the dubbed American releases. For a while Sony was releasing both the American cut/dub and the original Japanese version of the films, which is how it should be done. I might be wrong, but until I have a physical copy to prove otherwise, I’m going to assume the new discs are being pumped out for a quick buck.
Sixty years and Godzilla still hasn’t earned enough respect to have his films released uncut and subtitled. What a world.
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Shane Hnetka is a Regina film and comic book nerd. He also writes Dog Blog’s weekly “Sunday Matinee” column at prairiedogmag.com.