Can George Clooney tell a good story? Live from the Toronto International Film Festival

Hardly able to keep my fingers on the key pad as the schedule for today's films gets arranged and re-ordered to shape the day. Creative people fill the sidewalks of Toronto as the film festival shifts into high gear. Directors, actors, producers, and fans have converged to see the films that have the potential become this year's hits. High on the list for today: A new Clooney picture --The Descendants, directed by Alexander Payne of Sideways fame -- and Albert Nobbs, a film co-written by its star Glenn Close. Both films intrigue because they are based on books or screenplays written from unusual perspectives. One describes a man who is heir to a large and valuable tract of land in Hawaii, the other charts the life experience of a woman who has spent her life dressed as a man. Stories like these can be portrayed in  ways that surmount the "star elements" of the films. Can't wait to see what they'll be like.