The 2017 remake of the manga classic is marvelous to behold, but not especially filling emotionally. Went to see Ghost in the Shell the other day. In IMAX. IMAX 3-D, to be precise. Initial impressions: 1) It’s just fucking gorgeous. The designers have studied the classics, from Blade Runner on down, and they create a world that does justice to the
Read moreI’m currently reading Christopher Moore’s 2006 novel, A Dirty Job, and am nearing what I expect to be a slam-bang, fun-filled, rollicking climax. I picked it up because I thought Lamb, the story of Jesus Christ’s life as told by his best friend Levi, who is called Biff, was one of the funniest things I’d ever read. If you haven’t run across
Read moreOur real photographer, the estimable Lisa Wright, is on vacation, so I ventured out last night, new camera in hand, to see if I could capture something vaguely interesting for our readers. As luck would have it, they were showing A Star is Born, the 1937 classic starring Janet Gaynor, on the lawn in front of the old Elitch Gardens
Read moreWatch the two TED talks below. The question, which represents 100% of your final grade, follows. First, Nick Hanauer in 2012.
Read moreThe uncanny valley is a hypothesis in the field of robotic and 3D computer animation, which holds that when human replicas look and act almost, but not perfectly, like actual human beings, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers. The “valley” in question is a dip in a proposed graph of the positivity of human reaction as a
Read moreAmerican propagandists and PR hacks have developed remarkably innovative ways of making words lie. Back in the ’80s we had “freedom fighters,” which was the way we described death squads who were friendly to America. “Pro-life” can be used to describe those who bomb clinics and murder physicians. “Enhanced interrogation,” of course, means “torture.” And so on. In some cases
Read moreMy colleague Michael Sheehan recent offered a tip of the cap to a local staging of Frost/Nixon, which starred our old friend Stuart O’Steen. If anything, Mike was understated in his praise of the show and O’Steen’s performance. Anytime the big-city Denver Post says nice things about a community theater production up in the hinterlands of Longmont you know something special
Read moreEvery movie has a soundtrack. And let’s be honest – most of them are as unmemorable as … well, as the movies themselves. At its best, though, the music captures the spiritual essence of the auteur‘s vision, interacting with the film in ways that are simply transcendent. One plus one equals infinity, and it’s impossible to ever conceive of song
Read moreTen years ago, at the turn of the millennium, Nostraslammy took a stab at predicting the 21st Century, with a promise to check back every ten years to see how the prognostications were turning out. Odds are good I won’t be able to do a review every ten years until 2100, but I figure I’m probably good through 2030, at
Read morePulitzer- and Emmy-winner William Henry‘s famous polemic, In Defense of Elitism (1994), argues that societies can be ranked along a spectrum with “egalitarianism” on one end and “elitism” on the other. He concludes that America, to its detriment, has slid too far in the direction of egalitarianism, and in the process that it has abandoned the elitist impulse that made
Read moreLet’s begin with a quick trivia question. What legislator’s Top 20 donor list includes the following? Blackstone Group (Financial Services) Bain Capital FPL Group (Energy) DLA Piper (Corporate law firm, representing Global 1,000 and Fortune 500 companies) Kindred Healthcare Beacon Capital Partners Comcast Corp Brownstein, Hyatt et al (Corporate law firm) Venable LLP (Corporate law firm) Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Read moreHorror of the “gothic” variety that occupied so much of the conversation between Byron and the Shelleys (these would be the conversations that ultimately gave rise to Frankenstein) has traditionally traded in some easily recognizable tropes. Among the most common are your haunted places. Swamps and moors are always a little scary. Graveyards and crypts, of course. Transylvania. And then
Read moreWhen we think about Halloween and art, we sort of automatically think of film. And why not. We have a decades-long library of movies designed to scare the pants off us. But there are some bands out there working the shadows with their music, as well. While it’s unfair to dismiss so many talented artists as Halloween acts – because
Read moreWell, ArtsWeek sure has been fun, huh? Great posts, great reviews and interviews, great photography – makes you wish it happened more often, doesn’t it? Well, there’s no rule that says it can’t. So let’s do it again, and this week, in honor of Samhain (that’s “Halloween” to most of you), let’s focus on the darkness that lies within us
Read moreDavid Carradine is dead at 73. Thanks for the memories…
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lullaby pit 