Horns and Halos
It’s not easy to get away with badmouthing a president in public. Filmmakers Michael Galinsky and Suki Hawley follow J.T. Hatfield and his publisher’s struggle to get Hatfield’s unauthorized 1999 biography of George W. Bush back in print. It’s a good look at a story the mainstream media was loath to touch.
To air is human
This just in: The saga of ads masquerading as news continues at WWJ Newsradio 950. (This News Hit, incidentally, is facilitated by phone interviews made possible by the good folks at SBC! And let’s not forget Executone, the phone set that demands to be answered!) You’ll recall that WWJ recently began regularly airing “mentions” of…
Alex and Emma
Rob Reiner’s latest invites comparison to his directorial breakout into romantic comedy, When Harry Met Sally, but accepting that invitation mostly makes a date with disappointment. The main problem here is that Reiner and company seem to draw this comic love-in by the numbers.
Justice delayed
Arnetta Grable has been waiting a long time for closure. Her son, Lamar, was fatally shot in 1996 at age 20 by the infamous Detroit cop Eugene Brown. Brown, who blasted away at suspects nine times during his first seven years on the job, also shot and killed two others and wounded a third during…
Musician interrupted
Faruq Z. Bey and the Northwoods Improvisers perform June 28 at Kerrytown Concert House, 415 N. Fourth Ave., Ann Arbor. Call 734-769-2999. W. Kim Heron is Metro Times managing editor. Send comments to wkheron@metrotimes.com.
Guilt and innocence
After a day and a half of deliberations, a U.S. District Court jury last week found two City of Detroit employees, Leroy Barnes and Garry Spann, not guilty of helping a vendor bilk millions from the city. The jury found another worker, Alberta Butler, guilty of like charges. Butler, an accounts payable clerk, was found…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Buddhism’s holiest objects are ringsel, pearly deposits left behind by dead saints who’ve been cremated. I recently visited a collection of them at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, Calif. A pamphlet there said, “The ringsel are of unimaginable benefit for Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike. Their power does not depend on…
Rose-colored slum
If you squint your eyes enough you can almost envision a storybook setting for the house standing silently at 503 Ashland St. in Detroit. Rosebushes still grow along the fence in heavy bloom and the only real signs of neglect and abandonment come from the blatantly boarded windows, crumbling porch, thick overgrowth of a now-wild…
My brother the voyeur
Q: I am a 20-year-old female college student who is still living at home. I have a brother who is 15 years old who is starting to discover the opposite sex. That’s all fine and good, except a few days ago I was using his computer and I discovered his badly hidden porn stash on…
When you don’t have anything nice to say…
If you’re looking for flowery sentiments for your loved ones, don’t bother surfing to garagecards.com. The anti-Hallmark card company is based out of Minnesota, but offers a wide range of messages on their site and through their mail-order catalog. Garage Cards also offers magnets, mugs and t-shirts – all emblazoned with their witty, original declarations…
From Superman to superbland?
Our comic-book fanatics dig deep and ask hard questions about the new superhero movies….
Abandoned Shelter of the Week
If you squint your eyes enough you can almost envision a storybook setting for the house standing silently at 503 Ashland St. in Detroit. Rosebushes still grow along the fence in heavy bloom and the only real signs of neglect and abandonment come from the blatantly boarded windows, crumbling porch, thick overgrowth of a now-wild…
Honky-tonk grande dame
Loretta Lynn and Jack White on country’s favorite daughter….
Fancy in Ferndale
If you’re in the know about metropolitan nightlife then chances are you’ve heard of the Bosco, the trendy bar lurking behind frosted glass windows in downtown Ferndale. Open for not quite two years, the spot’s so stylish that even the lack of signage isn’t keeping patrons away. On a Friday night, the place is packed…
Hat check
At 110 years old, Henry the Hatter is one of Detroit’s oldest continuously operated businesses. Its founder, Henry Komorofsky, was already a boxing commissioner and Detroit school board member when he opened Henry the Hatter in its original location on Gratiot in 1893. The shop focused on repairing silk and top hats. Unsure of his…
Fight the victim culture
Everyone who cares about Detroit has a secret fantasy about the city. For years, I’ve waited for a black leader who would inspire the boys n’ the hood to beat Whitey at his own game by working hard, taking responsibility for their actions, rebuilding the neighborhoods, etc., and thereby making society’s hypocrisy plain. Today, no…
Bop to basics
For the record, the first draft of this article connected six decades of dots between the insights of bebop and those characters who decipher the computer code of faux reality in the Matrix movies. That draft also digressed to a Pablo Neruda poem about a hard-working confectioner. And it missed the essence of what pianist…
Letters to the Editor
Getting things straight I was pleased to read of the personal commitment and courage of the four Detroit-area defendants who were among the group who attempted to bring forth an indictment of our almost-elected president on March 18, only hours before the start of the combined United States/UK military aggression in Iraq (News Hits, Metro…
Dazed and confused
Ontario marijuana regulations a mind-bending morass….
June 25-July 1, 2003
26 THU • MUSIC Venus Ball — It seems that Detroit just can’t get enough femme rock. Local double-X-chromosomed talents will be coming together for another installment of the Venus Ball, and all you need to bring are your double ears. Headlined by rocker Liz Larin, and featuring acts such as Eightfold Path, Radiocraft and…
Rage and smash
Geezer: HH 1/2 / Weezer: HH 1/2
When news came of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon director Ang Lee working on the Hulk adaptation, a lot of fans were intrigued. Well, the Hulk seems to have added Lee and Marvel Comics creator (on board as executive producer) Stan Lee’s best intentions to his smash-’em-up hit list.
Grammar for dog days
With school out for summer, Dog Playing Poker feels an urgent need to do its part in keeping our kids literate over the lazy months. Come to think of it, their parents’ grammar and spelling skills could use a tune-up, too — as can be gleaned from a quick look at our nation’s church bulletins,…
The Passage
He’s not Orson Welles, but at 21, local filmmaker Daniel Casey-VanHout has made a pretty damn good movie. Premiering Thursday at the Main Art Theatre, it looks pro with solid acting, real-looking squibs bursting with real-looking blood, a solid musical score and a couple tight tracks from local rapper-producer Hush.
Floating worlds
White and levitated, sculpture meets architecture at the Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center this weekend. Filling the airways with geometric clouds (pictured), Vincent Sansalone sets a luminous tone Saturday at BBAC’s “Summer Solstice: A Celebration of Light.” And that’s just for starters, as the Cranbrook Academy of Art architecture alum stretches an opaque roof above proceedings…
Whale Rider
This film, a potentially big crowd-pleaser, can be seen as an antidote to Lee Tamahori’s 1994 film, Once Were Warriors, which was a grim depiction of dislocated Maoris, New Zealand’s aborigines. Few things are as satisfying as seeing someone overcome nearly insurmountable odds, even if it takes a little mumbo jumbo to lift them over…
Fags go on X speed; yet another Detroit label
Hey, Mom The indie rock A-cup set can breath a sigh of relief: The hook-extensive Eric Weir and the Tiny Steps are burping up a proper release. Back in the Zoot Coffee days of yore, then-high-schooler Weir and a company of hormone-driven pop geeks operated as Spindle and were an integral part of Detroit’s ephemeral…
