Rebel, rebel
From James Dean’s anguish to the controversial L.I.E. … Talking about screen teens, their troubles and desperate solutions.
Black Stars
On his third album as a leader, 26-year-old pianist Jason Moran teams up with 77-year-old saxophonist Sam Rivers and it’s a perfect combination. Moran is a deep-focus player, one who pays attention to both the foreground and backdrop of his solos, the most chordally piquant keyboardist to come along since the young Herbie Hancock. Rivers,…
Really keeping America free
There’s something far scarier than Osama bin Laden, worse even than the sight of the twin towers collapsing — it’s the threat to Americans’ freedom.
Love and Theft
When I first heard Bob Dylan’s extraordinary new album Love and Theft, I remembered something a friend once said: “Dylan is the greatest white blues singer who ever lived.” This friend is a serious music critic. So I thought carefully before responding. “You might be right,” I replied, “But he’s much more than that.” I…
Business as usual?
Meditations on September 11 and the karmic consequences of our country’s culture of violence….
Return of Dragon
Sisqó’s introduction as the lead vocalist of Dru Hill marked him as a standout singer with his big voice in a small body. That group’s self-titled first album became an instant classic among the hardcore R&B crowd. The popcorn sexuality of last year’s “Thong Song” from his first solo LP took him to another audience…
The real deal
The autobiography (where it’s been and where it’s going) … And why we love reading about others’ private lives.
Lost on Long Island
At first, L.I.E. seems like a less hyper version of Larry Clark’s Kids (1995) — the suburban version — with its perverse young boys idling through an essentially adultless world. But when Brian Cox as an ambivalent pedophile is on the screen, you feel it getting close to some uncomfortable truth.
Beats, wenches and Union-izing
Dodging the blahs with an electrifying audio-visual happening at the Magic Stick … Tight corsets and bratty kids at the Renaissance Festival’s last huzzah … & An old-new party house for art-diva Niagara.
Innocence
This story of two lovers renewing their relationship after almost 50 years is by world-class Australian filmmaker Paul Cox. Both sweet and unseemly, it manages against all odds to avoid rank sentimentality. Charles Tingwell and Julia Blake, both hovering around 70, make an appealing couple.
Questions of war
The urge to bomb the heck out of Osama bin Laden and Afghanistan is understandable. The problem is, brute force won’t work and nothing is ever that simple.
Zoolander
Though it’s not the brightest satire to ever hit the big screen, this flick does manage to throw some critically humorous light on the brave new pop world born of the collision of the arts and fashion. Even when the story sags and the gags misfire, Ben Stiller and company’s characters remain true and on-target.
Rumble on the left
Hitchens, Chomsky and who to blame …. a collection of observations regarding the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 and their aftermath.
Don’t Say a Word
Director Gary Fleder (Kiss the Girls) doesn’t need to say a word: He fashions Andrew Klavan’s novel into a richly colored moving picture book of suspenseful, but two-dimensional, melodrama that makes strange bedfellows of ruthless crime and simplistic psychiatry. Even a stylish Michael Douglas thriller needs more than visual artistry.
We’re here, talk to us
Metro Times readers should know their opinions and feedback are part of a welcome dialogue.
Liam
Director Stephen Frears (My Beautiful Laundrette, The Snapper, High Fidelity) does a superb job of presenting a very precise slice of life here, a decidedly low-key look at the specifics of the working class slipping inexorably into poverty while trying to hold on to faith and family.
Pleasant surprises
Believe the hype about Scott Allen (and the larger subset, Red Shirt Brigade) … Limos and on-stage hairstyling at Detektive Riot’s rock-star extravaganza … Audra, Blair and friends sing for ‘DET … & lots more local music news.
Hearts in Atlantis
This coming-of-age tale based on two Stephen King stories contains little of the page-turning drive of his most compelling work. This doesn’t stop director Scott Hicks (Snow Falling on Cedars) from encapsulating the nuances of a specific time and place. Anthony Hopkins anchors it all with his authoritative solidity.
Two hot tamales
Q: My co-worker and I are having an extramarital affair at work. We sit next to each other and think of the time we will share at lunch. We are both married women with children and can’t seem to leave each other alone. She suggested bringing our husbands into it, but we are not sure…
Making the team
orming new bonds through an old sport — aches and all….
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): If at any time in the coming week you find yourself fantasizing that you were Franz Kafka in a past life or snacking on crunchy, chocolate-covered grasshoppers or driving a mud-spattered Ford Pinto station wagon through the streets of Belfast looking for an apartment where you’ve heard there’s a Buddhist orgy…
Kwame’s cop-out
Gil Hill knows police procedure, but Kilpatrick fails to do homework….
Terminal questions
Who really wants an expanded freight facility in southwest Detroit?
Goings-on
Worthwhile events this weekend: Honoring human rights and the city’s Hispanic elders….
Unleash the sounds
Ann Arbor’s AMG Edgefest is back, with music from all sorts of other fringes, more cuttingly beautiful than ever.
Justice concealed
The court decides that citizens can’t see the city’s police shooting report. What are they trying to hide?
Letters to the Editor
Uncivil actions I read your comprehensive coverage of the tragic events from cover to cover, but I question several quotes in Curt Guyette’s lengthy article ("Our nightmare," Metro Times, Sept. 19-25). Jeffery Sommers, a history professor in Georgia, claims our bombing of Iraq killed 100,000 children, then goes on to describe Arab anti-Semitic and anti-Israel…
Show me the (soft) money
Kwame Kilpatrick adamantly denies campaign funding misuse….
If he were a rich man
Transcendental troubadour Jonathan Richman would still champion the little things, with all the humor and seriousness his fans have come to love.
Slaveships and Radiowaves
In the age of shiny-slick consumable products, anything that isn’t shiny-slick seems to always be given the last seat in the house with a crappy view and gum stuck to the cushion. Blair’s latest release, Slaveships and Radiowaves, is this sort of underdog. Solidly noteworthy, it was probably made for next to nothing, judging by…
Cool eyes
An insightful documentary takes a look at how photographer William Claxton captured the soulful look of sound.
Owls
One of the better ideas to have come from the hardcore scene is that no matter what you have to express, if you’re gonna be heard, you’re gonna have to scream. When a band expresses the most fragile of emotions through frantic howling, anger and joy can happen at the same time. Never had screams…
