"Finding Vivian Maier"

My daughter, a certified lunatic, wants to feed the world. When I arrived at Eli's birthday party, there were at least 14 children under the age of 12 rampaging through a sprinkler in the backyard, with their assorted adults sitting about, and more arriving all the time. And she fed them all and continued to do so all day - salads, hamburgers, treats. An amazing birthday cake made by one of Eli's dad's sisters. Fun. Exhausting.

Some of the multitudes.

Some of the birthday cake.

These people, believe it or not, are closely genetically linked.

Had just got home when the phone rang - Anne-Marie and Jim were off to see the movie "Tru Love" starring dear friend Kate Trotter at the LGBT film festival, did I want to come? I remembered Kate telling me how much she enjoyed making this film, so off we went, down to TIFF in the heart of downtown. But - it was sold out. We saved the day - "Finding Vivian Maier" was on at the same time, and we dashed in. I'd been planning to see it and was happy to have the chance, even if Kate Trotter isn't in it.

It's a very good documentary, much more than I'd expected - about a strange solitary spinster who worked as a nanny and housekeeper and took many thousands of photographs with her Rolleiflex, most of them brilliant. She was a great artist, completely unrecognized in her time until some of her work was bought in a random lot at auction after her death, and her story gradually came to light. The film is a detective story, the filmmaker piecing together, clue by clue, her strange, haunted, obsessive life. The mystery of human personality. Highly recommended.

And that's enough excitement for today.