Dramedy captures 20-something angst, confusion

Wooed by wood, Cedarella founder takes pride in handcrafted designs

Marina Bulan is the founder of Cedarella, a two-year-old venture that turns out eye-catching wood products such as jewelry, kitchen decor, children’s toys and, most recently, metre-high outdoor planters that double as home street-number indicators.

Ahead of immigrating to Winnipeg a decade ago from their native Russia, Bulan and her partner thought it would be prudent to conduct some research on their soon-to-be new home, a city they knew next to nothing about.

Imagine their surprise as they were viewing the 2007 surrealist film My Winnipeg, which comically blends historical facts about our burg with what Winnipeg-born writer/director Guy Maddin has termed “mystical hypothesizing.”

(For instance, there is no proof that, as reported in the award-winning flick, Winnipeg is the sleepwalking capital of the world, and that residents keep keys to their former abodes on their person in the event they turn up there during a bout of somnambulism.)

Five Things: PM Carney explains why Canada left the U.S. negotiating table

OTTAWA - Canada is preparing to hit the U.S. with dollar-for-dollar tariffs in response to new 50 per cent duties on $28 billion worth of Canadian products that took effect when talks between the two nations collapsed as negotiations neared the finish line. 

Prime Minister Mark Carney was quiet publicly during the final days of negotiations, but now has now explained his rationale for telling the Canadian negotiating team, led by Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc and chief negotiator Janice Charette, to leave the table.

Restrictions on further trade deals

"The U.S. Introduced at the last hours, in the last hours, efforts to restrict our ability to have other trade deals. You heard me say a moment ago, what we've accomplished in the past year, 20 new deals, economic and security partnerships, the prospect of doubling our market access because we believe in free trade. We're the partner of choice in many respects for countries around the world and the Americans wanted to restrict that. They had language that what they wanted to restrict that, unacceptable," Carney said during a press conference on Parliament Hill.

Dramedy Mile End Kicks captures 20-something angst, confusion

Canadian writer-director Chandler Levack is becoming an auteur of spiky, self-aware, semi-autobiographical nostalgia.

Her 2022 feature debut I Like Movies related the awkward coming-of-age story of a teenage video store clerk in Burlington, Ont., in 2003.

In this deliberately loose dramedy, which debuted at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Levack sets her wayback machine to the summer of 2011 in Montreal. Grace (Euphoria’s Barbie Ferreira), a 24-year-old music critic, has just got off the bus, determined to do important work, have sex and possibly learn French.

Low rents on cool apartments in the neighbourhood of Mile End are drawing young artists, writers and musicians from all over Canada, Grace explains in an article she’s writing about the city’s indie music scene.

Quick quotes: Here’s what people are saying about the Canada-U.S. trade negotiations

OTTAWA - The United States imposed 50 per cent tariffs on billions of dollars worth of Canadian exports Saturday, after the two countries failed to reach a new trade deal before an extended deadline imposed by President Donald Trump earlier in the week.

In response, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Canada will retaliate with matching dollar-for-dollar tariffs. Carney also suspended talks with the United States and summoned his negotiators back to Ottawa.

Here's what people are saying in response: 

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Executive exodus continues at Shared Health with three recent departures

Manitoba’s provincial health authority is looking for its fourth chief financial officer since 2023 and additional replacements after the recent departures of three executives.

Roadside giants towering symbols of Canada’s quirkiness

Could you imagine a Canada without Mr. PG repping Prince George, B.C.? Or the Big Nickel in Sudbury? Or, my personal favourite, Happy Rock in Gladstone?

Earlier this summer, CBC’s Cost of Living looked at the economics of these giant roadside attractions — of which there are more than 1,500 in Canada — and the cost of keeping them.

Some are falling into disrepair — this is why public art funding is necessary, by the way, not just for construction, but maintenance — and some towns are weighing whether or not that money is better spent elsewhere.

The main character of the story: Tyra the Tyrannosaurus, the rather literal symbol of Drumheller, Alta., a.k.a. the Dinosaur Capital of the World since 2000, who could be facing extinction after the lease agreement between the town and the Drumheller and District Chamber of Commerce ends in 2029.