When you live in downtown Toronto, you quickly become accustomed to the people calendar -- when the streets will be silent, and when they'll be buzzing. It starts when school lets out -- young kids hit the playgrounds while the college kids head home and free up the late-night sidewalks. Every third person is now a tourist, stopping every few feet for pictures or to look at a map. On the weekends, the city often becomes a ghost town, as hordes head up north to cottages. But then it's back to school, often marked by the eager new engineers running around the city painted purple.

And just a few days later, they're joined by slick stars and a million press badges as the Toronto International Film Festival gears up. The stars are out, as are the press, the movie lovers, and the eager onlookers. Teeny boppers buzz like packs of bees around the Four Seasons and other Yorkville haunts for a peek at someone famous. It's movies and fans everywhere.

But reviews don't give you a taste of the city, nor do quick glimpses in films like Chicago and Urban Legend. You can see it retro-style with SCTV, but that city is in the past. The best way to get a taste of Toronto without being here is through Canadian filmmaker Don McKellar. Between the films he's directed and those he's acted in, you can get many tastes of this town, from exotic women to last nights on Earth. In honor of the fest, and of the wonderful T-Dot, I offer you: Childstar and Monkey Warfare.

Sure, you could travel to Sundance in the dead of winter and suffer frostbite for your trouble, or visit any one of dozens of conveniently-located festivals in the US screening independent films. But doesn't it sound more exciting and exotic to hop on a cross-Atlantic overnight flight so you can arrive in Swinging London just as the brand-new Declaration of Independence Film Festival gets underway? (Gotta love the cheekiness of the name, though the logo is a bit abstract for my taste.) Friday, June 1 marks the first day of screenings for the inaugural edition of the fest, which promises "the very best in new independent cinema from the USA and Canada." Many of the films are receiving their International Premiere (i.e., screening for the first time outside their native country) and a number are still awaiting distribution deals in the US, so this looks like a great opportunity for Londoners and stray cinema tourists to catch up.

For a first-time fest, the programmers assembled a very decent line-up. Of the features, Paul Fox's Everything's Gone Green and Jeff Lipsky's Flannel Pajamas have both been released in the US; other titles that I've seen and can recommend include Reg Harkema's Monkey Warfare (an entertaining comedy/drama about aging Canadian bohemians), Daniel Casey's The Death of Michael Smith (intriguing, stylish, sometimes confusing mystery/crime drama), and Matthew Nourse's The Pacific and Eddy (which I haven't seen, but it's "filmmaking haiku" according to Variety). Among the documentaries, Kim enjoyed Darius Goes West: The Roll of His Life when it played at AFI Dallas; the others are less familiar to me, but the subject matter (including musicians, comedians, lottery winners, a civil rights attorney, and real-life Mexican superheroes) is nicely varied. Check out the festival's web site for more details.

Canada's Top Ten is an annual film list that showcases notable Canadian films. More than just a list, the films have screenings in the New Year that include panel discussions and often appearances by the filmmakers themselves. In the past, they've showcased the likes of Spider, Childstar and Where the Truth Lies. In its sixth year, the list is stirring up some complaints, as it has neglected to include the top two box office draws -- Bon Cop, Bad Cop and Silent Hill.

Don Cormody, producer of Silent Hill, sites the exclusion as the divide between the tastes of the critics and the tastes of the general public. We've heard this critique before, but I wonder when the distinction between the cinematic best and the fan favorites will be made? Personally, my favorite films rarely, if ever, are the films I consider the best, because there's a difference between entertainment and cinematic achievement. However, the list throws a fork in that rationale, because it includes Trailer Park Boys The Movie. With that film amongst the ranks, how did they NOT choose the comedy that grossed more? Is TPB a better film?

Detractors aside, the list includes a number of great films and notable Canadian directors. There is Sarah Polley's feature directorial debut Away From Her, Don McKellar's long-time editor Reginald Harkema's latest feature, Monkey Warfare, and best Canadian documentary winner Jennifer Baichwal's Manufactured Landscapes. For a full list of films, plus information on the February screenings, you can visit the Top 10 website.