Just try not to think of Clint Eastwood’s new film as cultural colonialism, and everything will be fine. “Unconquerable” is what that title means, as in “Out of the night that covers me,/Black as the Pit from pole to pole,/I thank whatever gods may be/For my unconquerable soul.” Written in 1875 by the British poet […]
“Doctor Who: The Waters of Mars” Saturday 9pm, BBC America In roughly two weeks the Brits will get to meet the new Dr. Who. We’ll get him in America eventually, a few months after the Christmas/New Year’s two-parter bids adieu to current series star David Tennant and replaces him with Matt Smith, who will play […]
2012 (PG-13, 158 minutes) It’s the end of the world as we know it, and John Cusack feels fine. Playing at Carmike Cinema 6 Armored (PG-13, 88 minutes) In this actioner from the director of Vacancy, Matt Dillon plays an armored truck driver who gets caught up in a big heist. Columbus Short co-stars. Playing […]
What are you working on right now? Right now I’m working on two projects. One is Jefferson, In His Own Words, which is a piece for narrator and orchestra that has been co-commissioned by four orchestras. It’ll premiere in Illinois in March and then it will be performed here in Charlottesville by our wonderful symphony […]
In Brothers, a cadaverously thin Tobey Maguire plays an upright Marine gone missing and presumed dead in Afghanistan, leaving his wife to be looked after by his delinquent kid brother. But the wife is played by Natalie Portman, and the brother is played by Jake Gyllenhaal. So that’s some easy looking, both before and after. […]
“Barbara Walters: 10 Most Fascinating People of 2009” Wednesday 10pm, ABC News maven Barbara Walters unveils her annual list of people she deems “fascinating.” This year’s selections range from the obvious tabloid/pop culture fixations (Kate Gosselin, Adam Lambert) to the curiously still-relevant (Brett Favre, Tyler Perry), to people who don’t know when to shut the […]
2012 (PG-13, 158 minutes) It’s the end of the world as we know it, and John Cusack feels fine. Playing at Carmike Cinema 6 Armored (PG-13, 88 minutes) In this actioner from the director of Vacancy, Matt Dillon plays an armored truck driver who gets caught up in a big heist. Columbus Short co-stars. Playing […]
I’ve got a few projects going on. The newest one is this band called Dzian!
What a mixed blessing that Carey Mulligan’s stardom should begin here, with the transitory pleasure of an awards-season dido, veiled in the nostalgic mist of inevitable Audrey Hepburn associations and other more current modes of media infatuation. Certainly Mulligan wears the burden well, carrying An Education without hoarding it, and giving off enough dimpled radiance […]
“Alice” Sunday 9pm, Syfy Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is super-hot right now, between the anticipated Tim Burton/Johnny Depp flick coming out next year and this mini-series premiering this week on Syfy. Much like last year’s “Tin Man” extrapolated from L. Frank Baum’s Wonderful Wizard of Oz, “Alice” uses many of the themes and […]