Welcome to Tolonto!

It's only the first night and I'm already shirking my doctor duties by skipping Fightville, in favour of more sleep. I need to rest up for my big weekend of seeing movies that I'm more interested in.

A great opening night was had by all. The Winter Garden Theatre was completely full by the time the obligatory love-in speeches marked the beginning of the 19th annual hot docs festival. My personal favourite was a return appearance by The Honourable Michael Chan, our lovable Minister of Culture and Tourism, who welcomed the audience to Tolonto then thanked us for "not making so much noises" at the end of his speech. You're welcome! I mean, you're welcome. And of course, director Morgan Spurlock was there, wearing a Nascar-esque racing suit plastered with logos of the brands that sponsored his movie. Cute.

POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold was one of those quirky, self reflexive movies that does what it's talking about. It "explored" the issue of product placement, while being completely financed by big companies in exchange for... product placement. I say "explored" because the movie seemed to make its "point" very quickly then began to repeat itself with a series of amusing vignettes about the absurdity of using product placement to finance a movie about product placement. I say "point" because I didn't leave the theatre feeling any differently about product placement, that is, ambivalent. I did enjoy the visit that Spurlock paid to Sao Paulo, Brazil, a city completely devoid of outdoor advertising. I was expecting a serene and peaceful appearance but instead it looked barren and desolate to me. Interesting. While POM Wonderful Presents certainly did not achieve high points for artistic merit, it was amusing and entertaining enough. And any doubts about the power of product placements were assuaged by the excitement of the crowd when we were greeted outdoors by three POM Wonderful girls in costumes handing out adorable little boobie shaped bottles of POM. Thank you POM Wonderful!

Bed time.