The much-anticipated (snicker) sequel to the Fantastic Four starring Jessica Alba is filming all over town and has transformed an alley near my office, on Thurlow between Hastings and Melville, into little Hong Kong or little Shanghai or something, for part of the shoot:

I walked by tonight on my way home from seeing Stephen Frears' The Queen, and it was snowing pretty hard. Does it snow in little Hong Kong or little Shanghai? Or in any Chinese urban landscape for that matter? I'm not sure. I need some edumacatin' on this. All I know is that this used to be a nondescript alley that led into an underground parking lot and now it's got red floaty things in the air and a whole lotta neon. I just feel bad for the poor Paramount schmuck who scheduled a shoot in Vancouver and then ran into uncontrollable rain, a boil water advisory, and now, snow.

I'd stay and write a review of The Queen, which was amazing and I think fair to both HRH and Tony Blair in portraying the challenges that surrounded Princess Diana's death, but, um, Hugh Laurie is on SNL tonight and he's too cute in that unshaven Englishman-pretending-to-be-a-disgruntled-American way for me to miss...