One of the resons I'm looking forward to Hitoshi Matsumoto's Symbol tonight is that respectable art cinema and I have a long history. It might not seem like it now, but I've done my time with scenes of people smoking and broken televisions and heavy eyeliner and blue filters, repetitive gestures and symbolic colors and abstract animation and the rain. Lonely wheeling seagulls and the failure of communication.

So Symbol's teaser alone makes me laugh. I mean, if your past is riddled with respectable and artsy film, cherubs emerging penis first from the walls of an empty white room should at least seem familiar.

Symbol screens at TIFF on: Thursday September 17, 11:59 pm - RYERSON / Saturday September 19, 12:00 pm - CUMBERLAND 1.