Tom Ue, a U of T Scarborough graduate (BA, 2009), credits UTSC and Professor Christine Bolus-Reichert, chair of the English Department, for the love of film that led him to edit a new book, World Film Locations: Toronto (Intellect Books/University of Chicago Press, 2014).
“UTSC really shaped my interest in film,” said Ue, a doctoral candidate in English literature at University College London. “My coursework on concepts in literary history, for instance, showed me how, in the processes of thinking and writing about the canon, we are contributing actively to its formation.”
World Film Locations: Toronto is part of a series that pays homage to film-related cities worldwide and it looks at the film industry in Toronto from its beginnings in the 1960s to the current decade. It takes readers on a tour of locations throughout the city that have played a role in various notable movies. The TD Bank Tower on Wellington Street appeared in the 2000 film, American Psycho, for example, and the Upfront Bar and Grill on Front Street East played a part in Good Will Hunting, the Academy Award-winning 1997 film.
“When we mapped out the different sites discussed in the book in preparation for principal photography, we truly appreciated just how expansive Toronto is,” said Ue, who writes a regular column for the journal Film International. “I hope that Torontonians can learn something new about their home from the book, and that international readers will visit Toronto after seeing some of its many facets.”
The TIFF Bell Lightbox will play host to Ue and contributors to World Film Locations: Toronto at a July 6 screening of two films about Yonge Street, a location that is featured in the book. He and the contributors will also be at Word on the Street in Toronto in September. World Film Locations: Toronto will donate some of the profits from the book to the SickKids Foundation.
“I really hope that we can continue some of the conversations about film and the city that we began with World Film Locations: Toronto. It is an especially exciting time for filmgoers, with Robert Pattinson returning to the city to shoot Olivier Assayas’s Idol’s Eye this October,” he said.