I voted today in the advance poll. I won't say who I voted for, but this was the most difficult time I have ever had in picking a candidate. The established parties are either a travesty or a cipher, and the newer parties are vague about their ambitions. I actually sat in the booth staring at the ballot while I tried to decide where my "X" should go. Ultimately, I followed my instincts and picked the party whose platform seemed most reasonable and attainable. But my sense of discomfort after was unsettling. I have no idea whether I made the right choice, only that I at least didn't make the wrong choice. It's slight consolation.

* * * * *

After months of debating whether we should or not, this morning we purchased a new television. It's a 27-inch RCA flat screen with surround sound, replacing our 13-year-old 20-inch Sony. I had trouble getting the VCR and DVD player to work, and had to abandon my efforts so the girls could check out the TV. Needless to say, they were much impressed. I'll get everything else running tomorrow.

Before buying the TV, we stopped by Rogers and swapped our old digital cable tuner for a new dual tuner PVR (personal video recorded). This allows us to record up to 50 hours worth of programming onto a hard drive. I already successfully tested it this afternoon. You can save programs as long as you like, or delete them automatically after a certain number of days. The rationale behind upgrading (at a cost of $14 a month) was that "24" is starting this week and I'm in school on Monday nights. Regardless of the PVR, Jack is going to be smokin' on our new TV.

I have been interested in doing this for awhile, mainly due to The Movie Network's ridiculous programming. It seems that all the movies I want to watch either run during the day while I'm at work or running around with the kids, or late at night when I'm either asleep or heading in that direction. There is almost never anything on worth watching from 6:00 to 10:00 p.m., which is the range during which I like to watch movies. I also often watch movies from 5:00 to 7:00 a.m. while the girls are still asleep, but TMN starts their new programming day at 6:00, which is too late to avoid being interrupted by the kids. Now, it's under my control.

The other thing this will allow is for me to take advantage of the classic movies on other channels besides TMN, whose scheduling practices are just as bad. The net result is that I will now be able to watch more movies than ever instead of wasting time with second-rate sitcoms and other diversions when my brain is cloudy late at night and I'm not quite ready to sack out.

A day of triumph, indeed.

If it seems like I don't have much to say lately besides commenting on movies I've seen, it's largely because I am buried a lot of the time in reading two large books and thus don't pay much attention to the world around me. First, there's "Girls Lean back Everywhere", which is about obscenity law in the U.S. and Britain over the past hundred years, and, second, "A Short History of the Movies", which isn't that short, for my film class. Let's not even discuss my increasingly irregular Britannica project, which got back on the rails last week and resulted in not a single thing I felt like commenting on. Sometimes it seems to me as if there just isn't anything worth ranting about. As usual, I underestimated the ability of the NDP to rouse me.

My wife belongs to a union, and I will stop right there for now. Suffice it to say I'm not a fan of unions, the rationale for which can wait until another day. This week, she received a mailing from her local executive. The letter started by pointing out that an election was forthcoming. It went on to indicate that the union was not aligned with any particular political party, but that they looked at where the different parties stood on the issues and did an analysis of who would benefit from implementation of their policies, while also noting that they would expose any party whose policies would cause grief for union members and their families. Shockingly, after following this scientific approach to voting, the union had elected to support - gasp! - the NDP.

Maxine is new to union life, and was in fact a bit put off by this. When we were first together over a dozen years ago, she supported the Liberals because that's who her parents supported. Before long, it seemed as if she was aping my allegiances. In recent years, she has formed her own political identity, mainly relating to issues surrounding family and security, and has taken her votes (and actions) in that direction. Although we don't see eye-to-eye on many important issues, I am proud that she has evolved in this way. In this particular situation, she was quite annoyed that the union would attempt to tell her how to vote, especially tossing around phrases like "brothers and sisters" and suggesting that they knew best which party would fight for the things that mattered to working people. Part of the problem with that approach is that Maxine doesn't have the same concerns as other working people, and I suspect those "working people" referred to in the letter don't have the same concerns as each other. It is foolhardy to assume that similar jobs and salaries will unite people in their interests and needs. Maxine works because she loves what she does, likes having her own money and so that we can get ahead a little faster. I don't make a fortune by any stretch of that word, but if she lost her job tomorrow we'd be fine, belts a little tighter, but in no danger at all. If I lost my job, we'd be in trouble. As a result, she can afford to take a bigger worldview than myself, with my tendency to assess the economics of every situation.

The part of this mailing that got me was the inclusion of a letter from our local NDP candidate to her sisters and brothers in the union. The letter in question included the statement that the NDP accomplished more for Canadians in 2005 than the Liberals had in the last 12 years in power. These "accomplishments" include reducing tuition fees. This really ticks me off, because, frankly, I am not a big supporter of reduced tuition fees. I certainly want school to be affordable, and there has to be a way to accomplish this. But reducing tuition fees doesn't reduce the cost of education, it simply shifts the burden to the nation's taxpayers. But a lot of people can't or don't want to go to college or university. Why should they be forced to subsidize someone else's pursuit of brains and glory? If a guy who can't get into college ends up working in a convenience store or fast food joint for the rest of his life, should the taxes he pays on his low wage be put towards reducing the cost of his customers' children getting more education than he could ever dream of, thus allowing them to earn more money than he does? And once they earn that salary that superior education grants them entry to, they will likely take advantage of every opportunity to pay as little tax as possible, thus leaving our guy with the same burden of funding their children's education. Nope, it just doesn't make any sense. The beneficiaries of higher education should bear the cost of it. Try floating that idea to a group of college students some time, and let me know how you manage to escape their wrath. If you do.

So, thank you, NDP. Keep it coming.

After disappearing just before Christmas, the "Can you spare some change?" lady is back. I haven't spotted her myself, but heard of her return through others who call her the Looney lady. This is not due to some madness of mind but rather that she apparently approaches them with the more specific "Can you spare a Looney?" pitch. As I've indicated before, this is almost certainly guaranteed to fail, but I wish her luck nonetheless. But where was she over Christmas? I heard there were good deals to Florida. If she's wearing a Mickey Mouse sweat shirt the next time I see her, I'm going to pop a gasket.

Yellow coat dude has not been spotted in over a month. Greener pastures, I guess.

* * * * *

A dozen or so years ago, my mother said she had reached the point where it seemed that every second week she was going to a funeral. Having reached her 50s, many of the parents of her friends, acquaintances and co-workers were starting to die off. Occasionally, the funeral was for a contemporary. My brother Stephen, who despite his world travels is at heart a true Cape Bretoner, always showed an interest in knowing who had passed away, while most of the names my mother would give me were vague shadows in my memory. Having left for university at 18 and with only two extended returns since, both before I was 20, I simply did not feel connected to these passings.

In recent years, the names have become more familiar as my mother bears down on 65. Her generation - the parents of my contemporaries - is now approaching the end. On New Year's Day, one of her close friends died after years of cancer taking her body away one piece at a time. I knew this woman only slightly, but it does bring a little closer to home the fact of our mortality. I used to think a lot about this, which I don't believe most people do. I've always felt that I would live a long time (my genetic line on both sides is awe-inspiring), and thus had a lot of time to screw around before getting serious about professional goals. Well, now I'm 41, and those goals don't seem any closer than they were when I was 21 but I now have 20 years less to accomplish them in. This has a lot to do with my recent recovery of focus, including enrolling in film school.

When I was young, I wanted to be a boy wonder. As that hope died, I consoled myself by rationalizing that most people don't accomplish much artistically until their 30s. Now that I am in my 40s, I look to people who reached artistic success late in life (Joseph Conrad is always the name that comes to mind). I used to think that my evolving rationalizations were just a way of avoiding the fact that I wasn't good enough to succeed in my goals. I now feel I needed that delay to understand what my goals were. I wanted to make movies when I was a boy, and drifted into other interests, such as my ongoing flirtation with the law, later in life. But film was my first love, and I am encouraged by its return to primacy. That my children are also movie lovers and think my plans are the coolest thing going helps immensely. It should certainly make it easier for all of us to stomach any time lost together while I am continuing in my current career while trying to build a new one.

My hope is to develop a project in which the girls can be involved, both for the sake of togetherness but also so they can be exposed to things that I was denied but would have loved. This is part of the rationalization that put them in dancing. Maxine danced as a child, but there was almost no parental support, either economically or emotionally, and she was never able to pursue her dreams to the limits of her abilities, whatever they may have been. She resolved to expose her children to dance, and to support them wherever this went. The result is the most time- and income-consuming endeavour of our family life outside of necessities, but rewards beyond our dreams. I hope to get the same satisfaction out of sharing my love of movies with them that Maxine gets from dance. They certainly demonstrate the same enthusiasm going in.

On my 40th birthday, I resolved that my 40s would be superior to my 30s. My 30s were years of great personal accomplishments (marriage, fatherhood) and professional advancement, but artistic stagnation. It is heartening to think that, a year and a half later, I can honestly say I'm a better father/husband and my bill-paying career is going better than ever. Here's hoping I don't screw the rest of it up.

I decided I wanted to watch a movie last night (big surprise there), so I essentially forced Maxine out of the room so I could do so. (My wife has the unfortunate habit of talking to me about unrelated matters when I am trying to watch television, be it a movie, sports, sitcom, whatever. I can handle this for anything except "24", which demands close attention, and movies, which I desire to pay close attention to. The result is that I never watch a movie on my own with her in the room. Any time I have tried, she has made me feel - and I am certain this is not intentional - like I was cheating on our time together. Better to push her off to bed so I can cheat in private.) I elected to watch "Big Fish" on TMN, and can say it was the first Tim Burton movie in a long time, including recent reviewings of his Batman flicks, where he didn't annoy the hell out of me. An interesting story that had me a little choked up at the end, fine actors - Albert Finney, Ewan McGregor, Helena Bonham Carter, Steve Buscemi, Danny DeVito (as a werewolf!), and the still-too-gorgeous-for-words-at-(then)54 Jessica Lange - and Burton's fun-but-not-irritating visual style lead to a very enjoyable film.

But that's not what's on my mind today. I often say that I feel like I live in an animal shelter, with two cats, two guinea pigs and a goldfish joining the four of us in our roomy-but-not-enormous three-bedroom apartment. The fish has been very boring since we stopped giving him companions. He was obtained gratis with one other fish and they got along quite well for the week we had them until the other leapt to his death one night. I have since come to the conclusion that he was murdered. Along with buying a cover for the tank that morning, I also bought two other fish to keep the survivor company. Before too long, they were both dead, one of them from a gory-looking gash which we naively assumed was accidental. When their two replacements died under similar circumstances, I concluded we had a killer amongst us. Sure enough, it is not unusual for goldfish to be very territorial and strike out at newcomers. His reward has been two years of solitude. When - if - he expires, he will be replaced by several of his type, which should be more interesting for us to watch.

The cats are a constant under-our-feet and in-our-laps presence, and thus do not starve for attention. But I often feel that the guineas are being neglected in their cage, which should be bigger but we just don't have the space. They are over four years old and were bought from the Toronto Humane Society about 15 months ago after months of begging from Brittany, who almost immediately lost interest in them and turned their care over to me. As time has passed, and with no disrespect intended to my 12-years-old-next-week cat McManus, known as Mac, they have become my favorite pets. I highly recommend guinea pigs to anyone seeking a low maintenance animal with a friendly disposition. They are very affectionate (well, ours are), don't cost a lot to keep (I would estimate $20 to 30 Canadian per month, at the most) and don't require a lot of space. Plus, they are kept safely in their cage and therefore do not try to sleep on your head or start head-butting you at 4:30 a.m. because they're hungry. (Damned cats!)

So last night, while watching the movie, I took each of them out one at a time for some serious cuddling. After a somewhat stressful day at work, it relaxed me completely to hear their pleased snorts and giggles. Maxine says they are definitely my pets by the way they respond when they hear me speak any time I arrive home. Part of this is probably just that they associate my presence with food - seriously, 90% of their energy appears devoted to filling and emptying their stomachs - but I don't mind. It's just nice to be appreciated.

Guinea pigs live about eight years or so, and Maxine has resolved that there will be others in our future. She also states there will be no more cats after Mac and his running mate Ohana (who is only three) leave us. I can't say I agree with this, to say nothing of my hope to get a beagle when we have a house in the near future. But I have no problem with more guinea pigs. They're just too sweet not to have around.

* * * * *

Although the federal election is almost two weeks away, I have to vote this weekend at an advance poll owing to my presence in school on election day evening. I have complete distaste for the Liberals, do not trust the Conservatives and have expressed in this space my loathing for Jack Layton and general disdain for the NDP. This has me leaning towards the Green Party. While many would consider this a wasted vote, this is only if the only purpose of voting is to put someone in power today. Given the vapidity of the leadership and agendas of our three main national parties, to say nothing of the corruption of the Liberals - corruption which the Conservatives and NDP would gladly replicate if given the opportunity, as both have done in the past whenever granted power - it seems the best choice is to try to develop an alternative. I don't know yet whether the Greens are the best way to pursue this, and certainly intend to investigate what exactly they stand for in the next few days. But a vote for the Green Party may help push them towards greater funding from the public purse, as all political parties of some determined size receive, as well as help them to sustain previous growth and thus gain more attention for their agenda. In this way, they will have the opportunity to grow and become a presence on the national political scene. Seen from this perspective, even a vote today for a losing Green Party candidate could be a small step in effecting the change needed to eventually elect a Green to parliament, and whatever may follow. If I elect to vote Green (whose leader is running in my riding) or even for the candidate from the Progressive Canadians (comprised of, it appears, holdovers from the old PC party who rejected the alliance with Reform that resulted in the present-day Conservatives), I will see my vote through this lens.

In the end, I think the best-case scenario for the long-term health of the country is for the Liberals to be destoyed in the election, forcing them to clean up their act and bring in fresh blood and new ideas. The Conservatives should win a minority that is strong enough that they can govern with help - most likely, sadly, from the Bloc - but not so strong that they can push their right-wing social agenda. The NDP should win just enough seats to keep everyone else honest, as long as none of those seats are filled by the copious asses of Jack or Olivia. Eventually, the Conservatives will be forced by the more radical elements in the party to start altering social policy, leading to an in-party revolt by the old PC wing and the party's defeat, just in time for a revived Liberal Party to assume their rightful place in Ottawa, led by someone young, dynamic and, most importantly, honest. Sure, it's a pipe dream. But the alternatives - more Martin! a Conservative majority! the Bloc in long-term control of Parliament! - are simply too frightening to consider for any Canadian who believes in the rights of each of us to pursue his or her own bliss free of government intrusion.

Last night, I did something that I have wanted to do for a long time: I started film school. Anyone who knows me or who has read this blog knows that I love movies. My earliest career goal that mattered was to write and direct films, but that faded into nothingness when it came into battle with my more practical side. There have been brief flirtations over the years - a film course in college more than 20 years ago, some screenwriting courses five years ago - but, as usual, there was no staying power to these actions. I allowed other things to get in the way, and abandoned my dream.

So, what's different this time? Well, several things. First, cost. The courses for the program I am in cost $225 to $250 per. Other programs I looked at had some courses that cost over $1,000. Second, time. These are all evening courses, while other programs were either full time or required at least an occasional full-time commitment, extremely difficult for any father who cares about his children to manage. Third, me. I have reached a point where I am comfortable enough that I can do this and not be afraid of failing.

But, most important, is that this is the age of the garage filmmaker. We've all heard of garage bands, who take a DIY aesthetic and some computer equipment and ride them to success in the music business. With the rise of digital cinema, aspiring filmmakers can do the same. Once you have your computer and a camcorder, the cost of making a film, assuming a healthy corps of volunteers, can be virtually nothing. All it requires is a commitment of your time. The result won't rival "King Kong" for production values, but it will still be a feature film, either as a stand-alone accomplishment to be proud of, or as a calling card to raise money for a bigger picture or to try and get someone to hire you to make their film. Either way, it will be yours, the same way that garage bands don't need a music label to get their sounds into the world.

At first, I was going to take my courses at Ryerson University. The cost of these courses to obtain my certificate would be roughly $10,000 at current rates, at the end of which I would have a short film. Then I read a blurb from Dov Simens, the mastermind behind the two-day film school, where he says that it makes no sense to make a short film as a calling card when you can make a feature. Plus, Ryerson seems more interested in film than digital video, which I have concluded is the most practical way to try and get a filmmaking career off the ground. So instead of Ryerson, I enrolled in George Brown College. The total cost of my courses will be less than $3,000, and the remaining $7,000 will be more than enough to make a digital movie. If you don't believe that, check out "Primer", made for roughly $6,000 US on film, and a bloody good movie at any price.

The program consists of six core courses - History of the Cinema, Write Your Own Screenplay, Producing and Directing an Independent Digital Movie, Digital Cinematography, Digital Video Editing and Video Project - and two electives, of which I intend to take Production Design and Storyboarding and Directing Actors for the Screen. I took the screenwriting course five years ago, so credit #2 is History of the Cinema, which ran last night from 6:30 to 9:30. There are roughly two dozen people in my class, which I would break down into three groups: people seeking a career in film, people just there out of interest, and people who are there out of interest and thinking about a career or people seeking a career but too shy to admit it. I, of course, am in the first group.

Class one dealt with the early days of cinema, from the scientific developments leading ultimately to the first moving pictures to the films of the Lumiere Brothers and Georges Melies. We watched several Lumiere pieces and Melies' "A Trip to the Moon". The teacher, Gil Gauvreau, has a lengthy background in movies, including studying at the UCLA film school and working in American television in the 1970s on such shows as "Columbo". He's a nice guy who genuinely loves movies, and that enthusiam comes across naturally. As for my fellow students, at least two of them have already completed their first feature. One woman showed up and immediately began passing out flyers inviting us to buy tickets to a fundraiser at which her movie was to be shown. She also had DVDs of the film with her should we wish to buy it. Reading the promotional materials, I am certain that I would consider it crap, since it's the kind of movie I would never choose to watch based on past viewings of similar flicks. (It's a slapstick comedy/slasher movie.) At the same time, there is a strange fascination that makes me want to see it. It's a movie. And she made it, with her friends and anyone else she could coerce into giving up a few Sundays. And there is a market for that kind of film. The desire to be in her next film is overwhelming, just so I can see what she does and hopefully learn from it. If she doesn't irritate the hell out of me by her classroom comments, I just may approach her.

Anyway, it's obviously early, but I am extremely hopeful about the experience to follow. Wish me luck.

Although I like to offer my opinion on films, I am by no means qualified to be a "critic", by which I mean that other than a single film criticism course taken 23 years ago I have had no formal training in the language and aesthetics of cinema. What I have done is watched a lot of movies, read a fair number of reviews and critical analyses, and thought about and discussed with others what exactly makes a film worthwhile. As a result, I can safely say that I have a developed view of what I appreciate and value in movies and what I do not, and I approach every movie I see through this perspective. It is unconscious and I am not sure I could articulate what it is, but it is no less present every time I take my seat in the dark or in front of my TV.

One thing I have noticed is that when there is a critical consensus that a film is good, I tend to agree. It doesn't necessarily work the other way, which is enough to reassure me that I have not been brainwashed into accepting the critics' opinions blindly. And there are certainly exceptions, a recent one being the well-received but purely dreadful "Being Julia", featuring Annette Bening's desperate grasp for an Oscar and Jeremy Irons sitting wondering why he's still in such crap so many years after winning his little gold statue. But I have learned that I can put reasonable trust in the critics when trying to determine whether a particular film is worth my time and money.

Which brings me to "Brokeback Mountain", the "gay cowboy" movie that is the darling of the 2005 critical year. Looking at the critical response, it seems the subject matter is the only thing preventing the Academy from making New Zealanders of everyone who worked on the film. It is extremely well-acted, including an at first unrecognizable Randy Quaid, but of course the raves must go to Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal and Michele Williams. Nothing in Ledger's career suggested he was capable of such work, playing a man whose every word is dragged out of him and thus carries greater depth and meaning. Likewise his current life partner Williams, playing his scorned wife. For my money, Gyllenhaal comes off a little too eager to play tortured, but so too his character is in better touch than Ledger's with the urges that drive him. Without giving away any of the story, I would suggest that Gyllenhaal's Jack Twist self-identifies as gay but is married as a cover (to a very brittle woman) so he can safely pursue his true desires, while Ledger's Ennis Del Mar is in denial of his true self and thus identifies as a straight man who happens to love another man. Thus ends my stab at pop psychology.

There is a real power to this love story, no matter how uncomfortable it may be to some viewers. Yet my response to the film is that I was never really bored, but never really interested either. Why does this movie leave me so cold? Some might say it's because I am not interested in seeing two men love each other onscreen. It certainly isn't my first choice - now two women, ala "Wild Things", is more up my alley - but I don't see that as the problem. For me, the trouble with "Brokeback Mountain" is that the story is told with the same reserve with which Jack and Ennis must behave in public. A great love story has heat, and there is none here. (I would be curious to know whether gay men feel differently.) Maybe that's a problem with a mainstream film - there is simply no audience for a film that shows two men in a romance with the depth of passion of Scarlett and Rhett in "Gone With the Wind", to use a film to which some critics have referred in their reviews. I don't know if I want to see that movie either. The straight man in me obviously would have some comfort issues seeing such a movie. But the film fan just wants a powerful experience in the cinema. If the gay "Gone with the Wind" is ever made, I will have to make that decision. For now, "Brokeback Mountain" is the best that Hollywood can offer - a film that really shouldn't offend any highly-developed sensibility, but doesn't aim for the heart - or groin - the way a great romance should.

In contrast, I watched "The Sea Inside" on TMN this weekend, spread out in three sessions over 18 hours. Surprisingly, this is no way diminished for me this film's power. Although the story of a quadriplegic man's desire to kill himself, it is without bravura courtroom scenes, dynamic speeches, raging at the world. Yet it is gripping from the opening frames, beautifully shot, magnificently acted (especially by Javier Bardem in the lead). A gentle study in desire, both thwarted and realized, seen in closeup. The most stunning sequence is when Ramon (Bardem) reviews with his lawyer a series of photographs taken many years ago when he still could walk. Some photos are only glimpsed, others lingered over, and we quickly learn who Ramon was and what he valued, and see how distant it is from his present. Yet we also get a sense of what he is made of, and why his resolve to die is so great. It is a perfect illustration of the power of visual storytelling, emotional but without pretense. Ramon's inevitable end, and the effect it has on others, cannot be denied. Yet this film is not a weepy, it is a tribute to the power of the human spirit, even when that power seeks to destroy itself, and a film well worth watching.

Finally, I watched "Hitch" with Nicole. Will Smith is relaxed and fun, Kevin James funny, Eva Mendes gorgeous. There are better ways to waste two hours, but not many, and a good time was had by all.