One of the greatest things about Guy Maddin is that his accomplishments come out of creativity and a spot-on eye, rather than money and flashy technology. Give the man an old camera, a few actors, and some weird props, and he can make a film that's not only engaging, but also visually stunning. He knows how to make the least become the most, and with the release of My Winnipeg, he's now inspiring others to do the same.

Jam! reports that UK filmmakers are getting a change to get their Maddin on. Both newbie and experienced filmmakers are getting the chance to submit 3-minute odes to their hometown, and Guy says "anything's eligible." Considering the lap-linked Winnipeg, it's not surprising that the doors are wide open...

Anyhow, the online contest is going to give out 1,500 pounds to the winner and a roundtrip flight to ... dum dum dum ... WINNIPEG! Sure, they also get their film screened and included on the UK's DVD release of My Winnipeg. But who cares when you can head to the snowy wonderland? I'm hoping the winner at least gets to choose the season.

If you want more information, head here.

"Winnipeg... Winnipeg... Winnipeg... Snowing, sleepwalking Winnipeg..." When Guy Maddin's My Winnipeg premiered at TIFF, you got a review, then came the exclusive and awesome poster, and then the trailer. Now Cinematical is happy to share the exclusive clip above. If you remember the picture attached to the review, well, this is more of the same -- those knights on a great white chessboard. Or, to be more specific, the frozen-in-the-lake horse heads after the fire of Whittier Park. It's strange, unsettling, and weirdly funny.

A "docu-fantasia" goodbye letter, My Winnipeg is a pseudo documentary where real facts about Winnipeg are intermingled with Guy Maddin's vision of his past, as the fictional Guy, played by Darcy Fehr, heads out of town. Dead dads under rugs, a Golden Boy pageant scandal, sleepwalkers, demolition, a strange and eerie mother played by Ann Savage -- all are present in My Winnipeg, and all of it is damned funny.

The film is now playing in theaters.

I've pretty much taken any opportunity I could get to praise Guy Maddin, and this is no exception. I've reviewed the film from TIFF. I've shared the exclusive poster. And now, you can check out the trailer for My Winnipeg above.

If you're a Maddin fan, a simple text description is enough to begin imagining what the filmmaker would create with his ode to the cold city of Winnipeg, but the trailer is still so very sweet. It offers quick blips to a lot of the film's most memorable moments -- from train rides, to Mom's knowledge of the back seat, to man pageants, to to the other wonders of snowy, sleepwalking Winnipeg. The only thing that's missing is Guy Maddin offering a live narration. If only we could bottle him up and let him out to perform the film whenever we'd want to see it.

Go see it. How can you resist the above? The film is schedule to hit theaters June 13.

Cinematical has just received this super-awesome poster for Guy Maddin's latest film and docu-fantasia, My Winnipeg (click on the image to enlarge). After sad music and branded brains, Guy was asked to make a doc about his hometown. Of course, for Maddin that meant a blending of documentary and fantasy. Grabbing Darcy Fehr, who also played "Guy Maddin" in Cowards Bend the Knee, and B-movie star Ann Savage (who plays his mother), Guy put his fictional self into his documentary and journeyed through a snowy world of strange public stories and even stranger private stories -- there's rug-straightening, Eatons issues, fires, hockey, and more.

My Winnipeg was one of my favorite films from TIFF last year, and I implore you to give it a chance. Guy Maddin knows how to find the humor in every situation, and present it in a way that is unique, stunning, enjoyable, and inspiring.

Unfortunately, I don't have a release date to share, although the film's website says that it will open at the IFC Center on June 13, as well as On Demand, before rolling out to more cities in the following weeks.

What are the most anticipated movies at this year's Tribeca Film Festival? And has that (relatively) young festival in fact found a voice yet? And what does Tribeca's premiering Baby Mama and Speed Racer at this year's fest say about the uneasy relationship between high art and big headlines in New York's media world? Plus, what the end of New Line Cinema says about the state of the industry, and can Warner Brothers market The Dark Knight while still honoring Heath Ledger? Joining us this week on The Rocchi Review to talk about Tribeca and summer entertainment is film critic David Fear of Time Out New York as we discuss all of the above and more ... Cinematical's podcast content now has even better sound quality, and is now in iTunes; you can subscribe at this link. Also, you can listen directly here at Cinematical by clicking below:



As ever, you can download the entire podcast right here -- and those of you with RSS Podcast readers can find all of Cinematical's podcast content at this link.

In the midst of Sundance Deals and mainstream news, here are some indie bites:

• While it won't be competing, Jam! reports that Guy Maddin's wonderful film My Winnipeg will screen on the opening night of Berlinale's International Forum of New Cinema program. (Check out my TIFF review here.) Personally, I wish it could compete and then take over the world, but I realize that Maddin hasn't gotten enough recognition yet. (He's seriously one of the most accessible filmmakers of strange fare out there. Go check him out if you haven't already.) While Winnipeg isn't competing, another production with Canadian roots is -- Amos Kollek's Restless.
• Meanwhile, Til Schweiger continues to face problems. After ticking people off with his risque all-ages comedy, now Variety reports that he's quit the German Film Academy in protest. Why? Because Keinohrhasen, the movie that's been making waves, wasn't considered for a German film award. The Academy claims they didn't register in time, and that should it get registered, it could be eligible in 2009. I guess that wasn't good enough for Schweiger.
• Remember that movie ban in China? Well, now Variety reports that The Water Horse will be the first foreign film to screen to bust through the ban, over the previously announced Atonement. The latter is screening on February 22, but Horse nabbed itself a February 16 screen date. Will this "blackout" continue? Is it all just a farce? Stay tuned!

If there's one thing that can be said about Isabella Rossellini, other than praising her talents, is that she knows how to pick interesting filmmakers to collaborate with. She was put on the map for her work in David Lynch's Blue Velvet, and now she's been spending a lot of time with Canada's Guy Maddin. She starred in The Saddest Music in the World, and he helped her make an excellent short, doc film about her father Roberto called My Dad is 100 Years Old. Now she's continuing to make shorts, and Variety reports that she will open Berlin International Film Festival's 38th Forum sidebar with Maddin -- just a year after they screened the Roberto tribute there.

On the second day of the festival, Guy will screen My Winnipeg, his snowy homage to his hometown that I reviewed during TIFF, while Rossellini will contrast his black and white humor with her international premiere of Green Porno, which is looking to be the next step in the actress' sexy filmmaking. Her directorial debut, Oh La La, dealt with cities, sex, and symphonies, whereas this short film is a "collection of three one-minute shorts that explore the mating behaviour of insects." I wonder if that will include the decapitating mating rituals of preying mantises?

If you can't make your way to Berlin to see her take on sexin' insects, or you want to see her in something much more mainstream, you can head to your local theater and see her in The Accidental Husband -- that romcom with Uma Thurman and Jeffrey Dean Morgan -- this March.

One of my favorite times of the year is seeing what will pop on for Canada's Top Ten. Every year, Cinematheque Ontario releases the films they believe are the country's top 10 of the year, and tops off great selections with panel events with filmmakers and stars. It's the series that introduced me to Guy Maddin, while letting me relish quintessential Canadian talent like Sarah Polley and Calum Keith Rennie. Being outside of the big-studio system, the 10 are also pretty diverse, interesting, and challenging. In the last few years alone, they've screened the likes of Away from Her, C.R.A.Z.Y., Ryan, The Saddest Music in the World, Ararat, and Ginger Snaps.

Now it's time for this year's selections, and along with the features released yesterday in a press statement, the collection includes short films -- all of which will screen from January 25-February 5 at Cinematheque Ontario. Without further ado, here are the lucky films:

Features

L' Âge des ténèbres -- Denys Arcand
Amal -- Richie Mehta
Continental, un film sans fusil (Continental, a Film Without Guns) -- Stéphane LaFleur
Eastern Promises -- David Cronenberg | TIFF Review
Fugitive Pieces -- Jeremy Podeswa
My Winnipeg -- Guy Maddin | TIFF Review
A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman -- Peter Raymont | TIFF Review
The Tracey Fragments -- Bruce McDonald | Berlinale Review, Cannes Review
Up the Yangtze -- Yung Chang
Young People F*cking -- Marin Gero | TIFF Review

Shorts

Code 13 -- Mathieu L. Denis, The Colony -- Jeff Barnaby, Dust Bowl Ha! Ha! -- Sebastien Pilote, Farmer's Requiem -- Ramses Madina, Les Grands -- Chloe Leriche, I Have Seen the Future -- Cam Christiansen, I Met the Walrus -- Josh Raskin, Madame Tutli-Putli -- Chris Lavis, Maciek Szczerbowski, Pool -- Chris Chong Chan Fui, Terminus -- Trevor Cawood

Panels will include the likes of Bruce McDonald, Richie Mehta, Robert Lantos, David Weaver, and Jamie Travis.

The Toronto International Film Festival drew to a close last night, but before that happened, awards were handed out. As reported by indieWIRE, the People's Choice Award went to David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises. The film, which opened this weekend in the US in limited engagements, has been widely, though not unanimously, praised. Our own Ryan Stewart concluded: "As it stands, Eastern Promises is entertaining and dramatically satisfying to an extent, but it won't bring in nearly as much box-office borscht as Cronenberg's superior previous film." Runners-up were the comedy Juno and the doc Body of War.

The prize for Best Canadian Feature Film was awarded to Guy Maddin's My Winnipeg. As I noted yesterday, the film has been picked up for US distribution by IFC Entertainment. Monika Bartyzel called it "a thoroughly funny and engaging journey that informs through entertainment, rather than verbose exposition." The Best Canadian First Feature Film went to Stéphane Lafleur's Continental, un film sans fusil. The festival's description sounds intriguing: "The disappearance of [a] businessman triggers unexpected, elliptical relationships among four solitary characters desperately searching for companionship." Chris Chong Chan Fui's Pool won for Best Canadian Short Film.

A vote of the 1,000 member festival press corps determined the winner of the Discovery Award: Israel Cárdenas and Laura Amelia Guzmán's adventure-filled drama Cochochi, from Mexico. Another Mexican film, Rodrigo Plá's La Zona, won the FIPRESCI Prize, determined by an international jury of critics that included Scott Foundas of the LA Weekly. Anahí Berneri's Encarnacion, from Argentina, captured the Artistic Innovation Award. The complete list of winners is available at the festival's site.

Ordinarily I wouldn't think that a "surreal documentary ... on Winnipeg that is all set in the course of a narrated goodbye to the city" (in the words of our own Monika Bartyzel) would be a likely acquisition target, but I'm happy to be proved wrong. Guy Maddin's My Winnipeg has been picked up by IFC Entertainment, according to Brian Brooks at indieWIRE. While IFC has claimed US rights, Maximum Films has secured distribution in Canada.

Guy Maddin continues to follow his own path as a filmmaker. In her review, Monika wrote: "If you're not into experimental and fantastical filmmaking, you might not like My Winnipeg, but it would be a terrible waste. Maddin has done something that is sorely lacking in documentary film -- he's used his humor to create a thoroughly funny and engaging journey that informs through entertainment, rather than verbose exposition."

Maddin's last film, Brand Upon the Brain!, played selected theatrical engagements with an orchestra, live foley artists, a narrator and a singer. This time around, Maddin stood on stage for each TIFF screening of My Winnipeg and provided live narration.Monika's not the only one who enjoyed it -- so did Todd Brown at Twitch, Jason McBride at Toronto Life and Eric at Moviepie Musings, among others. And all of the reviews agree that it's a very funny film. Here's hoping that IFC won't delay too long in making it available to the rest of us -- with or without Guy Maddin in person to narrate. SCREENING ALERT: The film plays once more tonight in Toronto.