Waiting for a leader
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” —President Franklin D. Roosevelt “Contribute cash to a charity of your choice. Call an 800 number.” —President George Bush 2 Every so often, in times of immense crisis, we really do need a national leader to reassure us, tell us we’ll find a…
Letters to the Editor
Perfect park-ing Mr. Bohy, thank you for your fabulous editorial on your trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the proposed rewrite of the National Park Service’s management policies (“Scorpions & Snakes,” Metro Times, Aug. 31). As an advocacy group for the national parks, our organization has been intently monitoring this issue and I…
Stepping into gear
If no-risk cinema has left you hungry for live-and-kicking theater, just what is there to see in the upcoming months? Along with an array of comedy, musicals and status-quo classics, this year’s theater season includes some absurdities. Start your engines with Forgotten: The Murder at the Ford Rouge Plant, a New Labor Jazz Opera, back…
After the revolution
Vince Carducci, Lynn Crawford and Marsha Miro say goodbye to Revolution gallery in Ferndale. Vince Carducci Goodbye Lynn Crawford Home work Marsha Miro Overthrown
Overthrown
They didn’t start a revolution at Revolution. But what they accomplished was pioneering, and distinctive. With each exhibition they organized, Revolution Gallery director Paul Kotula and assistant director Sandra Schemske proved that important contemporary art could be made out of any material and using any process, if the artist had something relevant to say. Twelve…
Comics
This Modern World Red Meat Comix
Detroit’s ballsy ballerina
On a Sunday afternoon, the camp factor is way higher than the drop ceiling at Miss Barbara’s Dance Centre in Birmingham, where choreographer Christopher Leadbitter is getting a dozen dancers ready for their next big show. Crouched in a corner of the room, near a pile of red- and silver-sequined top hats, Leadbitter stuffs his…
The table eclectic
Enjoy casual dining and creative cuisine such as steak, seafood and pasta in a relaxed atmosphere. Extensive wine list. Upstairs balcony dining. Vegetarian friendly.
Head cheese
From within a New York comic book shop, British expat Rob “Bucket” Hingley forged an American revolution. Recruiting several of the retail drones he managed, Hingley formed the first incarnation of the Toasters in 1982, introducing America to ska music. They’ve persisted ever since, riding the wave of at least two ska revivals, while staying…
The Edukators
Set in Berlin, Hans Weingartner’s well-intentioned but hopelessly didactic film asks: in a world where the symbols of political counterculture are sold at Urban Outfitters and ’60s activists now work for corporate middle management how does a modern day revolutionary get taken seriously? The gifted cast is appealing and attractive, but the film is too…
Fired up about smoking
Q: I am a big fan. You often nail it with politics and advice, but I disagree with your answer to Committed To Quitting. First, there are a number of regular guys who post on the Smoke Signals website (www.smokesigs.com) who are married and faithful to nonsmoking women. For many, watching attractive women who smoke…
Elevator to the Gallows
Louis Malle’s 1958 film is convoluted noir with splashes of doomed romanticism, heavily ironic and more entertaining than profound. Because it features French New Wave poster girl Jeanne Moreau and an improvised score by Miles Davis, it’s acquired the patina of a really hip nugget of ’50s Euro-cool. But there’s actually some grindingly slow spots…
Hummer bummer
In light of the frenzied panic over gas prices, we here at Backslash thought we’d tip our hat to a Web site that gives a rigid-digit salute to one of the biggest gas guzzlers out there, the pompous, penis compensatory, SUV-from-Hell, the H2. The site www.fuh2.com collects viewer-submitted photos of Hummer haters flipping off the…
9 Songs
Sexy Brit, Matt (Kieran O’Brien), a glaciologist, flies over the Antarctic and reminisces about the affair that’s just ended with lusty young American Lisa (Margo Stilley). Writer-director Michael Winterbottom tells the tale in detail that is sexually graphic but not really erotic. When the two aren’t going at it, they’re attending performances by the likes…
Goodbye
After 12 years of operation, Revolution gallery in Ferndale will close at the end of this month. Distress is felt throughout the community as one of the city’s most important art venues disappears, leaving a hole in Detroit’s cultural fabric. While there are other art spaces, Revolution will be hard to replace. “Do I wish…
Transporter 2
Even more ridiculous and over the top than the first Transporter, this bigger-budget action sequel provides plenty of laughable thrills for those willing to suspend their disbelief, and plenty of cheeky gay subtext for those willing to search for it.
Home Work
Far from any town, in the middle of fields filled with wheat and berries and corn, is a single-story building. A circular ceramic ring, with metallic spokes connecting to its hub, is on the roof. This structure is wide, wider, even, than the building. It sits on a pedestal. When activated, the wheel spins and…
Sound of Thunder
Time travel always seems to screw everything up in sci-fi movies, and this cheap-looking entry doesn’t bring any surprises to the genre. Aside from a couple of cool beasts and an out-there performance by Ben Kingsley, there’s nothing to recommend it.
Tube time
It’s always convenient when the major trends of a fall television season present themselves in neatly identifiable packages, and such is the case as Tube 2005 approaches. “Reality TV” mania finally, mercifully, seems to have crested. While stalwarts like Survivor (in Guatemala Sept. 15), American Idol and The Amazing Race may roll forever, Martha Stewart’s…
Of barbecue & lynchings
“Animals and humans suffer and die alike … the same pain, the same spilling of blood, the same stench of death, the same arrogant, cruel, and brutal taking of life. We don’t have to be a part of it.” —Dick Gregory I’ve loved animals ever since I was a little kid. Perhaps the most…
Underclassman
Meant as a vehicle to deliver young actor Nick Cannon (Drumline) to headliner status, this lame comedy just limps along like a tricycle with bent rims.
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): When I was 19, a masked gunman pumped a load of buckshot into my hip after a student demonstration. To this day, I have 43 pieces of metal in my body. What kind of metal? That’s an important question. Until I find out the answer, I can never get an MRI.…
Blogging through disaster
Saturday, August 27, 11:05 p.m. Hmm. This could actually be a nasty storm. Hindsight has never had such painful and ironic 20/20, especially given the circumstances of this post, made in this blog: www.livejournal.com/~interdictor. At the time, “interdictor” was Michael Barnett, a New Orleans resident and former military dude who worked for the domain…
Revisiting Rwanda
Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Roméo Dallaire As a companion piece to the recent Hotel Rwanda, Peter Raymont’s documentary about Rwanda’s 1994 genocide offers the power of brutal truth over the polite artistry of fiction. As played by Nick Nolte, Dallaire was a supporting player in Hotel, a cynically gruff peacekeeper. The…
Media Blackout
Hey Lady! The Love Network presents the MB48th annual Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon! • Bobby Love — Rare Herbs (Funky Delicacies) :: The freakalicious flute king of New Orleans funk is back on track to cream the scene clean with this musky collection of vintage tracks from 1974 that’ll have your gal dropping down…
The $20,000 question
Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick may lose more than $20,000 from his campaign war chest because it came from a political action committee that, having failed for more than a year to supply state-required documentation of its activities, is now under review by the secretary of state for operating illegally. But it’s entirely possible that the…
Au Revoir Les Enfants
Au Revoir Les Enfants Though American audiences may find it difficult to surrender to the film’s unhurried pace and lack of narrative thrust, this compelling and heartfelt examination of shattered innocence offers a feast of understated rewards. Set in a Catholic Boarding School in 1944 France it tells the tragic friendship of two schoolboys and…
Rock vs. School: Because a waste is a terrible thing to mind
As America sends its children back to school for another year, “rocker Tommy Lee” is taking higher education to a new low on reality TV. But Lee’s presence at the University of Nebraska has one unforeseen benefit for students that doesn’t involve stealing Danishes from the camera crew’s buffet table. Among the courses Lee will…
Our back pages
It always sounds a bit odd when book publishers assign seasons to their reading lists, as though an enjoyable “summer read” would be any less satisfying in the winter. Of course, it’s also a functional way to divide their year into four parts, and the third begins now. These are selections worth considering from the…
Slick as Lincoln
Come on Feel the Illinoise, the second in Sufjan Stevens’ planned 50-LP homage to each state in the union, is a sprawling, creepy, weepy, sweet, frustratingly long but oddly beautiful confessional journey through the Prairie State. Within its 74 minutes it contains songs about UFO sightings, Mary Todd, Indian wars, union struggles, the day honoring…
Am I sick if sex grosses me out?
Q: How can I tell if I’m asexual? Is it a legitimate orientation or am I just a seething ball of neuroses? Sex does nothing for me. I can’t orgasm (even when I attempt masturbation), so my husband doesn’t go there. That’s fine by me. I hate my people-parts; I find them utterly icky. At…
Take back the day
With the devastation down South, it’s hard to think about oneself right now. But a lot of good can come from a great venting session. And this week’s Aggro-Culture event, hosted by the quirky activist organization Upside Down Culture, is a prime place to purge – and get some perspective. “What happened on September 11th…
Lurker of Chalice
Lurker of Chalice is a side project of Wrest, who’s probably best known outside of the black metal underground for his Burzum-like alter ego Leviathan. That stuff’s relentlessly bleak, its drum work spitting like a storm of acid rain. But with Lurker of Chalice, Wrest proves curious about the textures inside that darkness. He doesn’t…
Let it begin
Feist is crazy. In September alone she’ll sashay through Detroit, Philly and New York City, Osaka, Tokyo and Sydney. There’s a quick pirouette in Melbourne, but she’s back in her native Canada before you know it, making the kids in Saskatoon blush. Then it’s back to the United States, where she tours with old pals…
Letters to the Editor
Re: Kelly McDowell’s review of Leo Braudy’s book, From Chivalry to Terrorism ("Aries Rising," Metro Times, Aug. 10): Great review; interesting topic. Congrats, Metro Times, on maintaining balanced and thoughtful coverage of current events and politics in an era of manufactured alliances and for-profit information manipulation. Keep it up. Nice work Ms. McDowell. –Jack Lupo,…
Smartening up rap
Rappers age in dog years, or so it seems. It’s not like rock, where Social Security recipients from Link Wray to the Rolling Stones cross the country year after year. Where are Slick Rick, Rakim and Big Daddy Kane? There just isn’t the same sense of tradition and nostalgia in rap’s audience. “A lot of…
Night and Day
Wednesday • 7 The English Beat MUSIC The English Beat was one of the first bands since Booker T. & the MG’s to unabashedly challenge pop music’s unspoken racial divide. Their punk/ska/reggae sound was among the best music to come out of the early ’80s, and their songs are as listenable today as they were…
