Canadian mystery writer Alan Bradley, who created Flavia de Luce character, dies at 87

Alan Bradley, the Canadian mystery writer whose tales of a precocious 11-year-old super-sleuth earned an international fan base, has died.

He died on Monday at age 87 in the Isle of Man, where he'd lived for more than a decade, said his publisher, Doubleday Canada.

"Alan's extraordinary imagination, generosity of spirit, and wonderful craft as a storyteller brought joy to readers in Canada and around the world for more than fifteen years," said Kristin Cochrane, CEO of Doubleday parent company Penguin Random House Canada.

Bradley's debut novel "The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie" and the character at its centre — kid detective Flavia de Luce — won a devoted fan base.

Made-in-Manitoba action flick Normal tips its hat to neo-westerns

British director Ben Wheatley has always been adventurous in his penchant for traversing genre boundaries, including hardcore horror (The Kill List), the big-budget monster movie (The Meg 2), the cerebral art film (High-Rise), and his own invention, the acid-trip period piece (A Field in England).

Shot-in-Manitoba films ready to screen, stream

This has been a big year for film and TV shot in Winnipeg, with fare such as the comedic gangster film Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice topping the streaming charts when it debuted in March on Hulu/Disney+, with more than 300 million views worldwide.

Smaller indie films, such as Johnny Ma’s The Mother and the Bear, and James McLellan and Alexandre (Sasha) Trudeau’s dramatic feature Hair of the Bear also got long-awaited screen time in the first quarter of the year, as did Rhayne Vermette’s experimental feature Levers.

After the Bob Odenkirk thriller Normal becomes available Tuesday, expect more locally shot fare to come to cinemas, or your TV screen, in the months ahead.

Locally lensed thriller Normal makes most of location

TORONTO — In areas of southern Manitoba, the movie Normal was a big deal when it shot here from October to December 2024.

It was the third film made here with Better Call Saul star Bob Odenkirk, after Nobody (2021) and Nobody 2 (2025), films that helped put the city on the map when it came to hosting big-time action genre offerings. (Director BenDavid Grabinski admitted he realized Winnipeg would be a viable location for his time-travelling hoodlum project Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice, now streaming on Disney+, after seeing Nobody.)

Alas, Normal skirted distribution in Canadian theatres, releasing in stateside cinemas last month following the dubious logic that Canadians wouldn’t be interested in a wintry action movie in which a large percentage of the cast is Canadian.

It was a doubly dubious decision given that the film got a delighted and raucous reception last September when it premièred at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to a very enthusiastic, mostly Canadian crowd of 1,200 at the Royal Alexandra Theatre.

Canadian drama Blue Heron gets meta in layered exploration of mental health

Delicate and devastating, this small Canadian drama starts with a voiceover narrative. A filmmaker (Amy Zimmer) speaks about the unreliability of childhood memory — how certain moments stand out with bright clarity while the larger context can be hazy.

She remembers her troubled older brother through images, through feelings, but as she has become older, she wonders what she might have misunderstood or missed.

Blue Heron, Toronto-based writer- director Sophy Romvari’s semi-autobiographical feature debut, becomes a layered investigation into family narratives and the elusive line between art and life. Excavating an often painful past, Romvari’s work is ambitious and quietly assured, but it maintains a frank humility in the face of difficult, perhaps unanswerable questions.

The film (in English, with some subtitled Hungarian) begins as an extended flashback to the 1990s as a Hungarian-Canadian family of six moves to Vancouver Island hoping for a fresh start.

Hudson Williams said he made himself look ‘ugly’ for this movie shooting in Hamilton, Toronto

TORONTO -  Shane Hollander, is that you?

Some fans might be doing a double-take as photos online show “Heated Rivalry” star Hudson Williams styled for his new movie, “Apparatus.”

The normally red-carpet-ready star isn’t exactly in Hollywood glam for the role, sporting oversized jackets, wrinkled Polos and worn-in sneakers with Velcro straps, as seen in photos shared on social media.

Speaking with Vogue Magazine at last week's MET Gala, the Kelowna-born star spoke about taking a mini-break from shooting the film to get glammed up and “not be ugly” on fashion's biggest night.

Martin Short doc talks about how he handles loss, and if he will ever retire

Netflix's documentary "Marty, Life is Short," ends with a photo of his daughter posing with Catherine O'Hara — a halting way to let the title sink in for the viewer.

It also serves as a reminder of the loss Martin Short has faced over the last seven months: the deaths of his good friends Diane Keaton, Rob and Michele Reiner, Catherine O'Hara and his daughter Katherine Elizabeth Short.

"It's been a nightmare," Short said in an interview with CBS Sunday Morning.

In February, his daughter died by suicide at the age of 42 in her Hollywood Hills home.

Peter Jackson receives honorary Palme D’Or as Cannes flaunts star power despite Hollywood’s retreat

CANNES, France (AP) — The 79th Cannes Film Festival opened Tuesday with politics, artificial intelligence and the shifting priorities of Hollywood taking center stage at the film gathering on the French Riviera.

The festival launched with a tribute to director Peter Jackson, handing the “Lord of the Rings” filmmaker an honorary Palme d’Or. He was introduced by actor Elijah Wood, who played Frodo Baggins in Jackson's fantasy franchise, one of many notable faces on the Cannes red carpet, including Bong Joon Ho, Joan Collins, Heidi Klum and James Franco.

“I've never figured out why I'm getting a Palme d'Or. I'm not a Palme d'Or sorta guy,” said the shaggy haired New Zealand filmmaker.

Jackson was then serenaded with a rendition of the song “Get Back,” a nod to his lauded 2021 documentary about The Beatles. The director sat stage right mouthing the lyrics.

TV that brings you home, whether you like it or not

Divorce is hard. Divorce with children is monstrous. For Paula (Tatiana Maslany, Orphan Black), newly divorced from Karl (Jake Johnson, New Girl), those challenges pale after she witnesses what she thinks is a crime and falls down a rabbit hole of violence, blackmail, possibly murder and … youth soccer?

Cineplex CEO applauds longer theatrical windows for new releases, downplays sale talk

TORONTO - Movie watchers might be disappointed they'll be waiting longer to see some new releases from the comfort of their own couches, but for Canada's largest cinema chain, it's reason for applause.

Cineplex Inc. CEO Ellis Jacob said Monday that he was pleased with Netflix's recent promise to release its latest Narnia film with a 49-day exclusive theatrical window in 2027. 

The Netflix pledge came as other prominent studios have also committed to debuting dozens of their movies in theatres or extending their theatrical windows to at least 45 days, something Jacob sees as a win for moviegoers and cinemas alike.

"It actually takes away the confusion for the guest who's coming to our theatre because now they know that that movie is not going to be online for a much longer period of time," Jacob said in an interview.

Movie review: Talking-sheep comedy pokes affectionate fun at mystery genre

There’s a certain kind of little British film that wants very much to be sweet and charming.

It’s a tricky genre. When it’s forced, sweetness can easily become sugary, charming can tip over into twee.

This all-ages talking-sheep comedy-mystery gets it right. With a lot of Babe sincerity and a smidge of Knives Out self-awareness, The Sheep Detectives is cosy but never complacent.

Using a deft blend of live-action and CGI animation, the story starts with George (Hugh Jackman), a shepherd who tends his flock just outside Denbrook, a picture-perfect village with thatched roofs, half-timbered walls and a mossy churchyard.

Movie Review: Billie Eilish and James Cameron make concert movie magic with ‘Hit Me Hard and Soft’

NEW YORK (AP) — Billie Eilish is levitating. Or so it seems. When the pop star first emerges on screen in the mouthful “Billie Eilish — Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D),” she is suspended above a cube built of LED screens, surrounded by a sold-out crowd of over 23,000 fans in the center of the U.K.'s largest arena — Manchester's Co-op Live. She launches into the midtempo “Chihiro,” a house experiment from her latest album, and the 3D magic begins. In the contemporary pop music landscape, Eilish is a rulebreaker — and so is this work.

The new concert film, co-directed by Eilish and three-time Academy Award winner James Cameron, was his idea. Cameron emailed Eilish's mother, Maggie Baird — a friend of his wife via their shared interest in plant-based diets and environmentalism — and suggested they shoot Eilish's “Hit Me Hard and Soft” tour in 3D.

It is new territory for Cameron, in some ways, and old hat in others. His production company has done a number of concert films, including one with Eilish's musical hero Justin Bieber, but Cameron hasn't sat in the director's chair of a project like this one. A 3D concert film also brings up a number of technical challenges — a passion of Cameron's, as anyone who has seen the blockbuster “Avatar” franchise could attest to — and as a fellow outlier of industry, the pairing succeeds.

Eilish, too, is no stranger to film: She's the subject of the 2021 documentary, “Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry,” and a concert film released that same year, “Happier Than Ever: A Love Letter to Los Angeles.” This, however, is her first time co-directing a feature. And where “The World's a Little Blurry” served as a composite of her come-up and various successes, “Hit Me Hard and Soft” is dedicated to the concert film format while pushing its boundaries.

Winning filmmaker Sidney Phommarath honoured for her work

After screening her latest documentary at last weekend’s FascinAsian Film Festival, Winnipeg’s Sidney Phommarath has received the Erin Hembrador Emerging Filmmaker Award.

Hembrador, who died in 2022 at 33, was a rising star in the local and national film scene, earning a pair of best-of-fest honours at FascinAsian for her short films Mansanas and Container, the latter of which was co-directed with Winnipeg’s Quan Luong.

Phommarath, a Laotian-Canadian filmmaker, is the fourth recipient of the award, presented and funded by Hembrador’s family, the Winnipeg Film Group and Frank Digital, where Hembrador worked starting in 2019.

A film graduate of the University of Winnipeg who specializes in human rights narratives, Phommarath’s latest documentary is Dear Nya, which showcases her visit to her ancestral homeland of Laos.

Human stories the beating heart of Jewish Film Festival

The 25th edition of the Winnipeg International Jewish Film Festival began last night at the Berney Theatre with a sold-out screening of Fantasy Life, a movie about a nervous manny who falls for his psychiatrist’s daughter-in-law while caring for her three daughters.

The opening-night screening is one example of the kaleidoscopic potential offered by the entry point of global Jewish cinema, a subgenre that at its best manages to be both highly specific and broadly universal, just like any other religious, ethnic or cultural filmography.

“Even though the films we show come through a Jewish lens or from a Jewish angle, at their very base, they’re always human stories,” says film festival producer Karen Burshtein, who selected the films for the annual event, which runs to May 23 at the Asper Jewish Community Campus.

“Everyone — regardless of background — can connect to these stories, which are about everything from the immigrant experience to the plight of the dispossessed to a family’s experience with divorce.”