Established in 1994, Trillium Village Collectors Club is one of Canada's oldest Department 56 collector clubs.  We are based in Toronto but have club members all over the province of Ontario.

The objective of our club is to provide a meeting place for club members to share the joy and excitement of their hobbies and to share display ideas featuring their favourite collectibles.  All collectors and retailers of Department 56 Village and Holiday products are welcome to join the club.  Club membership also includes an informative newsletter mailed physically or electronically to each club member every other month.  Membership form is available for download on the "About Us" page.

Trillium Village Collectors Club is a not-for-profit organization.  Although we appreciate support from our retailer members, the club is not affiliated with any Department 56 retailers.

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November 24, 2017

The Dickens Connection


charles dickensThis past weekend, we went to see the movie “Murder on the Orient Express”, based on a classic novel of the same name penned by the famous bestselling murder mystery writer Agatha Christie.  It is a good whodunit kind of story with a little bit of twists and turns all taken place within the confines of a stuck passenger train.  The movie features beautiful sceneries (CGI or not) and an impressive cast of actors and actresses like Kenneth Branagh (who is the director of the movie AND plays the protagonist Hercule Poirot, “the greatest detective in the world”), Penélope Cruz, Johnny Depp, Michelle Pfeiffer, Judi Dench, Daisy Ridley, etc.  Unfortunately, the movie critics were not too crazy about this version of the movie and most still preferred an earlier 1974 star-studded version with Albert Finney (as Poirot), Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, Sean Connery, John Gielgud, Vanessa Redgrave, etc.  Ms Bergman even won an Oscar in a supporting role in that movie.  

Because he wanted to take a break from solving crimes, Poirot decided to ride the Orient Express back to London.  In the movie, you can see that he enjoys his leisure time by reading the novel “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens.  I did a little bit of research online with the help of Google and found out that Charles Dickens was indeed Agatha Christie’s favourite author.  When she was a small child, Agatha’s mother used to read to her Dickens’ “Bleak House”.  In the early 1960s, Agatha Christie even wrote a screen treatment of “Bleak House” for MGM so that it could be made into a movie.   For some reason, that project never happened.

Speaking of Charles Dickens, it must be because the Christmas season is fast approaching as he is featured prominently in another Hollywood movie.   This one is called “The Man Who Invented Christmas” starring Dan Stevens (as Charles Dickens) and fellow Canadian Christopher Plummer.   It is a semi biographical story depicting the journey Charles Dickens took to write his iconic book, “A Christmas Carol”, a timeless novel that forever redefines the Christmas holiday, and how he created many of the book’s memorable characters such as Ebenezer Scrooge and Tiny Tim.

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