Red-Headed Stepchild
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
The overabundance of high-budget comic-book movie adaptations worries me. Every decade or so, a couple of them will hit big (the Tim Burton Batman, the early Spider-Man and X-Men films), and before you know it, studios have the moviegoing public knee-deep in derivative cash-ins designed only to turn a quick buck. Eventually the market becomes so saturated with knock-offs that the bottom falls out, turning jilted fans away from comic-book movies and sending studios fleeing from the genre like it carried a form of financial leprosy. Full story »
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Local CD Review: D.J. Morrison
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
D.J. Morrison is a lovely, fluid guitarist, and he demonstrates his skill all over his new CD, Beautiful World. From gentle acoustic picking to bluesy electric-slide interludes and smooth, stinging leads, Morrison shows that he has the makings of a genuine local guitar hero. Full story »
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Bonus Book Suggestions for Summer Reading
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Thought our Hot Books selection wasn't quite enough? Peruse the bonus list to help fill out your pool-side reading list. Full story »
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WiiWare's Unimpressive Debut
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
In the beginning there was PlayCable, an adapter for the Intellivision console that allowed subscribers to use their newfangled cable connections to temporarily download poorly-rendered ports of games like Q*Bert, which would be lost when the system was powered off. It was simplistic, but 1981 was a simple time. Full story »
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Auteur Weary
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
It used to be that a John Sayles film was not a genre in itself. That is, you could expect certain things from Sayles—excellent scripts, character-driven stories, fine acting, a sensitivity to the mores, class issues, and hypocrisies of particular times and places in the Americas—but you didn’t expect the same thing over and over. Over the past 20 years, however, he has increasingly found his material by cross-sectioning communities in transition, especially in regard to race and class, and handing over the resulting dramas to ensemble casts. Full story »
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The Italian Job
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Career revelations can often come at unexpected times... and in unexpected places. Clarinetist Gary Sperl’s moment of clarity came in a college swimming pool in Wisconsin. Full story »
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The Reapers by John Connolly
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
John Connolly is easily one of the finest practitioners of the supernatural-tinged mystery story, with a series of books featuring the literally and metaphorically haunted P.I. Charlie Parker. Two of the supporting characters in that series now have a book of their own, The Reapers, and though Parker makes an appearance, actual ghosts do not. Full story »
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Theater of Cruelty
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
I have a recurring fear when at the cinema. On screen, the hero gives his “hoo-hah” turnaround speech in Act Three and the assembled athletes, factory workers, or grateful villagers that have thronged about him break into a riot of applause. At this point I discover that I, too, having momentarily forgotten my status, am on my feet, loudly joining the euphoria in an otherwise motionless auditorium. To complete the torture I must then make my choice between hacking through the confusion of knees around me in a bid for the aisle, or sitting back down under the icy deluge of contempt. Full story »
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Short Cuts: Marble City Film Festival
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
It’s 7 p.m. at the Bijou Theatre when the doors are flung open by a brace of lissome volunteers, and the avalanche of filmmakers, film-lovers, and the merely film-curious that will form tonight’s audience tumbles into the lobby. Such hubbub is but a dying echo of the chaos that has, for most, been last Saturday’s leitmotif. Perhaps 30 percent of the torsos here are posing the faintly defensive question that serves as both slogan and premise for the Marble City Film Festival: “Could you make a 3-minute movie—in just 10 hours?” Full story »