What to watch: Matthias and Maxime
Gabriel D’Almeida Freitas and Xavier Dolan star in Dolan's film "Matthias and Maxime" 
After eight feature films, can we still call filmmaker Xavier Dolan Canada’s wunderkind? He is only 31 still. You can now watch Dolan’s latest feature, 2019’s Matthias and Maxime, on Mubi. Friends since childhood, Matthias (Gabriel D’Almeida Freitas) and Maxime (Dolan) share an on-screen kiss that awakens unstated desires. The film has been celebrated for Dolan’s sensitive performance as a shy, vulnerable bartender, and also stars Dolan’s go-to mother figure, actress Anne Dorval. As Max’s mother this time out, the New York Times calls her “a harpy in a housecoat, wheedling for money and hurling hard objects.” Matthias and Maxime is streaming now on Mubi.
What to listen to: Good Music to Avert the Collapse of American Democracy
This compilation is made up entirely of previously unreleased recordings from a mind-boggling array of artists—from R.E.M. and Death Cab for Cutie to Tegan and Sara. The album features never-before-heard songs, covers (like Laura Jane Grace & The Devouring Mothers’ interpretation of Gord Downie’s “Vancouver Divorce”), remixes, live recordings and unreleased demos (like Beverly Glenn-Copeland’s 1977 studio recording of “Dream On”). The collection will be available for only 24 hours on Bandcamp this Friday, Sept. 4. One hundred percent of the net proceeds from the album’s sales will go to Fair Fight, a voters rights organization that promotes fair elections in the U.S. through voter education, election reform and combating voter suppression. Good Music To Avert The Collapse Of American Democracy is on sale Sept. 4 on Bandcamp.
What to read: Zom-Fam by Kama La Mackerel
Kama La Mackerel is a Montreal-based Mauritian-Canadian multidisciplinary artist, educator, community-arts facilitator and literary translator. Based on a performance work, this is their debut poetry collection. Set on the island of Mauritius, Zom-Fam (meaning “man-woman” or “transgender” in Mauritian Creole) tells of the coming-of-age of a gender-creative child growing up in the ’80s and ’90s as they seek vocabularies for loving and honouring their queer/trans self amid the legacy of colonial silences. Zom-Fam by Kama La Mackerel is published by Metonymy, an independent Montreal-based queer press, and will be released on Sept. 10.
What to look at: Henry Miller Fine Art Summer 2020 Catalogue
"Cages" by Michael Murfin. Credit: Courtesy henrymillerfineart.co.uk/
Henry Miller Fine Art is an East London gallery devoted to the male form, and based in the home of the gallerist. Though closed to the general public because of COVID-19, the gallery has recently begun to host open-house events by appointment only. The interactive catalogue for the gallery’s summer exhibition is viewable online, featuring art by Ian Cook, Duncan Grant, Sabrina van den Heuvel, Michael Murfin, Francis Plummer and Patrick Sarfati, among many others. Check out the Summer 2020 Catalogue here.
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