Checking in with John Milliken Thompson
What were you doing when we called? I was actually correcting a blog that I’ve been working on, a guest post about my novel for a book reviewer. They just […]
In with the new
“Ringer” Tuesday 9pm, CW Buffy is back! Well, not really, but Sarah Michelle Gellar returns to TV with this new thriller about identical twin sisters in trouble. Recently sober Bridget […]
Play catch
Contagion is named for the film’s most developed character. That might seem unfair to the human actors, who play their parts—Marion Cotillard an epidemiologist, Matt Damon a paragon of endurance, […]
Minding her beeswax
To be a sculptor or a painter these days means living and dying by the photographs on your website. Martha Saunders, who has painted with beeswax for the last decade, often jokes about switching to a medium that's easier to photograph than encaustic, but she is quick to credit photographer Scott Smith with bringing her work to life online.
Payback
When I found out what The Debt was really about, I greeted it with a sense of relief. Here’s what this movie is not: some hectoring documentary about Congress figuring […]
Trendsetters and jumpers
“Pawn 90210” Wednesday 10pm, E! Pawn-store shows are big right now, between “Hardcore Pawn” and “Pawn Stars.” E! never met a trend it didn’t want to cash in on, so […]
Checking in with Tate Pray
"I just started a series of paintings. They’re shape paintings based on the negative space shapes of Sol LeWitt’s sculptures—they’re just shapes. Conceptually, I think I started cutting them out and putting them in my notebook maybe about a year ago. I’m basically just living with it to see if I want to move forward. I think it’s in keeping with what I’ve been doing, basically trying to find an avenue into painting through sculpture."
The DNA of Blues
Martin Scorsese once said that the Malian guitarist Ali Farka Touré’s music constituted “the DNA of blues.” That puts Vieux Farka Touré next in line, not only as Ali’s son, […]
Where art thou?
Its ending reportedly tampered with since Sundance, the indie-scented dysfunctional-family comedy Our Idiot Brother winds up flattering its complacent middle-class audience, but not for any real reason—there’s no medicine going down with this sugar. To try and imagine what the Weinstein Company might have worried about is to find oneself quoting the movie’s own doofus parolee hero: “You know what? You know what? Wow.”
Boldly Going
“Star Trek: The Next Generation” Friday 8am-8pm, Saturday 1-6am, SyFy It’s Labor Day weekend, which means two things: Summer is officially over, and there’s nothing on TV until the new […]