Thursday, February 9 2012
ReelAbilities Day 1: ‘Body and Soul’ and ‘Defining Beauty’
Body and Soul and Defining Beauty: Ms. Wheelchair America both feature admirable subjects who have "overcome obstacles," and also take refreshingly unconventional approaches to these subjects.
‘Portlandia’: The Tour: 18 January 2012 - Chicago
Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein were not out to throw a big production, nor re-enact characters and sketches. Instead they were onstage as Fred and Carrie, real people with a knack for casual conversational comedy looking to hang out.
The Evolving Anthropological Tone of Star Wars in “Dawn of the Jedi”
When examining a work whose mythology is an expansive as Star Wars, it almost becomes a historiographical investigation as opposed to a literary one.
Sharon Van Etten: Tramp
The way we heal is a huge part of the sweet exhaustion of Tramp, but it is a double-edged affair.
Dierks Bentley: Home
It leaves you with the impression that Bentley has made something special here -- not just his most consistent album and 2012’s first great country album, but even more.
Lawrence Ball: Method Music
Math whiz Lawrence Ball adds another baby step of progress for Pete Townshend's "Lifehouse" project.
The Devil’s Blood: The Thousandfold Epicentre
While heckles are raised when terms like "vintage" and "retro" are tossed about, the Devil's Blood has undeniably evoked the electrifying rush of '60s and '70s occult rock. What other sprits they have invoked along the way, well, that's a whole other story.
‘The Odditorium’: by Someone Whose Short Fiction Should be Well Known
These stories are told with thick, evocative language that speaks of viscera and flowers and poetry and violence, from times distant and more recent, ringing individual and unique.
Seijun Suzuki’s Classic New-Wave Gangster Films: ‘Tokyo Drifter’ and ‘Branded to Kill’
Fans of classic yakuza films and Japanese new-wave cinema have reason to celebrate today with Criterion’s release of Seijun Suzuki’s 1966 Tokyo Drifter, and his…
Orchestra of Spheres: Nonagonic Now
Orchestra of Spheres should be recognized for its willingness to take chances and experiment with instrument-construction and sound in general. Unfortunately, the band’s ratio of hits to misses on this album is right about 50/50.
‘United Red Army’: Revolutionaries Lost Without a Map
This ambitious three-hour-plus examination of Japan's notorious radical left-wing militant group loses its way in the narrative fog.
National Disasters: Michael Lewis’s ‘Boomerang’
Michael Lewis explores the global economic crisis through the eyes of a financial disaster tourist -- and brings back a collection of exotic stereotypes about the people and places that he visited.
Wednesday, February 8 2012
The Old 97’s: 28 January 2012 - Charlottesville, VA
The Old 97's use two decades of experience to make being professional feel like anything but that.
‘Miners’ Hymns’: Labor and Poetry
Beautifully and evocatively, Bill Morrison's film traces the changes of fortune for the mines and miners, the industry and communities of Northern England.
Mark Lanegan Band: Blues Funeral
After eight years spent growling for others, Mark Lanegan returns with his most musically diverse album to date.
Die Antwoord: Ten$ion
Die Antwoord may be strange and engrossing, but are they making good music? Yes and no.
Detective Inspector Malcolm Fox Returns in ‘The Impossible Dead’
Ian Rankin's dialogue rings true; a sense of life as actually lived, and the lessons to be learned — or not — from history, all framed in an engrossing story never told hurriedly, but always well-paced.
