I hear Disney is taking some of their titles off store shelves and putting them “in the vault”. In a matter of weeks, titles such as The Chronicles of Narnia, Bambi: Special Edition, and Lady and the Tramp: 50th Anniversary Edition will become unavailable (until a time of Disney’s choosing when they will naturally be re-released to much fanfare). It’s really no more transparent a marketing ploy than the other strategies used to boost DVD sales. There are the themed box sets for those wishing to focus on specific types of episodes (ie. The Star Trek Fan Collective: Borg, X-Files Mythology: Colonization, Fat Actress: The Aired Episodes), those special limited edition re-releases that come out about a month after a title’s initial release (Now with assistant editor’s commentary!), and who wouldn’t want to conserve a little shelf space by upgrading to those new repackaged slim packs? While some may decry Disney’s actions as a shameless money grab designed to generate an artificial demand by draining the market of a specific product, I personally feel they’re not going far enough. Yes, by all means, do us all a favor and take The Chronicles of Narnia off the market. Forget the vault because that implies it is being put away for safe keeping and may, once again, see the light of day. Better to gather up all available copies and bury them in a toxic landfill. And provided there’s still room, might I suggest some other studios make their own contributions with the likes of: Poseidon, Silent Hill, and The Wicker Man. And while I realize it wasn’t a 2006 release, Moulin Rouge is an evergreen model of terrible scripting and embarrassingly over-the-top performances that should find a home in said hell-pit.

Thankfully, dinner tonight left a much better taste in my mouth than that initial screening of Moulin Rouge. We ate at Le Gourmand,a quaint little restaurant located inside a 150 year old stone house in Pointe Claire. We were six, so I was able to snap a nice variety of pics. Our starters: an excellent Maple-smoked salmon, atypically-shaped gnocchi in a sharp-tasting cheese sauce that didn’t go over as well, coconut shrimp, an incredible chicken liver mousse with caramelized onions, and mussels in a Pernod sauce. A fine spinach and watercress salad delayed the arrival of our main courses: my very good sushi-grade tuna dish (done rare, naturally), Fondy’s highlight breaded veal cutlet, a salmon dish I don’t recall, my sister’s chicken dish, another salmon dish I don’t recall, and a very good veal scallopini. For dessert: a key lime pie I enjoyed that others felt wasn’t tangy enough, a good creme brulee, a phenomenal warm chocolate torte topped with premium vanilla ice cream that I was forced to share with the table (in part because I had ordered three desserts), premium vanilla ice cream with home made caramel sauce, Fondy’s much-loved profiterole, a surprisingly tasty coconut-lemon pie, and a dark chocolate espresso pot.