Toronto 2008: Celebrity fragrance and festival pirates

The Toronto film festival may be chronologically half way over, PopWatchers, but if we’re counting by the sheer numbers of screenings, stars, roughed-up rock stars and autograph seekers, this year’s Canadian shindig is well into its final turn down the home stretch. Whereas Sunday was a whirlwind of screenings, parties, interviews and fancy dinners, with so many skipping town at the end of the weekend, Monday was all with the low-key — aside from preparing for our upcoming News & Notes festival report in Friday’s magazine, I only took in two screenings: Uncertainty with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and The Hurt Locker with Jeremy Renner (28 Weeks Later) and Guy Pearce. Which means I finally have time in today’s Toronto vlog to talk about something I’ve wanted to discuss since the first day: The difference between the press screenings and the public ones.

Before you click below, though, a quick disclaimer: You may notice at the end I promise one final video blog coming your way tomorrow. That, alas, is a lie. I hadn’t realized our EW.com video mastermind/savant/genius/wunderkind/savior Jason Averett (who knows how to teach these vlogs the language of the interwebs) was heading home tomorrow morning. So instead on Wednesday I’ll be back to the good ole written word for my final reports from the fest. Forthwith, my last vlog — at least, from the wilds of Canadia.