THU 22Master chef Stephen Stromberg whips out his magic pan on Thursday, September 22, for the final installment in “Cooking & Cocktails” at Latitude 30, a gratis summer series of culinary demonstrations and tastings at the swank eatery, which is named after the imaginary line that bisects the heart of…
After Sex (New Yorker Video) Ben-Hur: Four-Disc Collector’s Edition (Warner Bros.) Candlemass: The Curse of Candlemass (Navarre) Carlito’s Way: Ultimate Edition (Universal) Escaflowne: The Movie — Ultimate Edition (Bandai Entertainment) Everybody Loves Raymond: The Complete Fourth Season (HBO Home Video) Fever Pitch (20th Century Fox) Happily Ever After (Kino International)…
Michael Eastman’s unpopulated photographs of empty streetscapes and seedy interiors occupy the same desolate ward as Edward Hopper’s diner and Walker Evans’ still lifes. Boarded-up theaters, abandoned houses and shabby rooms tell of entropy, imploding communities, empty dreams, and a center that cannot hold. You know the drill. That’s why…
Da Ali G Show: Da Compleet Second Seazon (HBO Home Video) Sacha Baron Cohen’s inching closer to Tom Green territory; come this time next year, his HBO show is likely to be on the pop-culture junk pile. Which isn’t to say this double-disc set doesn’t hold up — it’s just…
It’s nearly as difficult to get an interview with one of the 500-plus New Orleans evacuees housed at Veterans’ Memorial Coliseum as it is to get timely rescue assistance from FEMA. A dozen phone calls to flacks from various agencies in search of an audience with someone — anyone –…
If you’re a character in a movie, and the rain is coming down so heavily that you cannot see out your car’s windshield, for the love of God, don’t drive! Mack-truck drivers interpret such conditions as carte blanche to be reckless and will assume that honking their horn provides ample…
A rich family returns to their nice home after a vacation, but something isn’t quite right. The place has been . . . burgled? No, not quite. The stereo that’s missing — it’s in the fridge. The chairs have been stacked into a tower. And there’s a note attached: “Your…
Andrew Niccol’s first two films as writer-director, 1997’s Gattaca and 2002’s S1m0ne, were hollow, sterile sci-fi masquerading as earnest satire: The former told of a near future in which parents could genetically engineer perfect children; the latter proffered an actress who became the most famous and beloved movie star in…
Yes, that could be Vince Vaughn standing behind you in line at your local Fry’s. The actor may be one of Hollywood’s hottest residents, but he’s a frequent visitor to Phoenix. “Phoenix is like a second home for me,” the actor tells New Times via phone from Chicago, where he’s…
What do cockroaches and ’50s kitsch have in common? They just keep coming back. At first glance, Paul Wilson’s hand-cut prints appear to be family photos from the era of Hula-Hoops and sock hops. Doting housewife Dottie Kimble serves a pitcher of fresh lemonade to a gaggle of teenage boys…
SAT 9/17In the ’60s, there were love beads and hippies. Today, the “make love, not war” mentality lives on through Kandee Kids — ravers with beaded bracelets and positive vibes. On Saturday, September 17, the Gaia of all raves, Earthdance 2005, heads to a Tucson desert locale so secret you…
FRI 9/16The Prince of Motherfucking Darkness: That’s the literary epithet that author John Gilmore has earned after a lifetime spent excavating the noirish underbelly of human existence. From his grim account of Charles Schmid, the homicidal “Pied Piper of Tucson,” in Cold-Blooded, to his mortician-like dissection of Charles Manson’s psyche…
9/16-9/17While most kids long to be baseball stars or astronauts, Darrell Hammond was a comedian born. He started impersonating family members when he was 5, and he’s blossomed into Saturday Night Live’s resident impressionist, specializing in letter-perfect portrayals of political and entertainment figures such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Sean…
9/16-9/17Ah, there’s nothing so sublime as leaning back on a bleacher with a cool drink and a hot dog, a freshening breeze in your face, and watching pitchers pitch and hitters hit. And while slow-pitch softball may not be on a par with pro baseball, it is in a league…
The Arizona Print Group and Writers Bloc team up for “Urban Legends,” an exhibition of prose, poetry and prints about those apocryphal stories that float around the culture and illuminate our fears by their very silliness. You know the ones: poisoned ATM deposit envelopes, the escaped serial killer with a…
Nelson Garcia at the Chocolate Factory: You can feel the throb of the tropics in Phoenix artist Nelson Garcia’s surreal abstractions. Vivid colors undulate and biomorphic shapes seem to quiver with life in paintings and prints that show what his native Cuba feels like. The cigars, the heat, the humidity,…
THU 15 The sidewalks are still sizzling, and we survived another Hump Day. Now it’s time to chill out and mellow down, and we can think of no better way than mixing, mingling, nibbling and imbibing at Scottsdale’s sleek and sassy SIX Lounge, 7316 East Stetson Drive. On Thursday, September…
You don’t need to mow down a Wal-Mart employee or kidnap a teenager and force her into prostitution to make headlines in Phoenix. Just ask Jose Avila, a Valley wiseacre who’s made news (not to mention the rounds of network talk shows) thanks to his super-thrifty approach to home furnishing…
I was baffled when Nearly Naked Theatre announced earlier this year that it planned to open its season with Scott McPherson’s Marvin’s Room. McPherson’s dramedy tells a story that, despite some gallows humor and a better-than-competent script, isn’t more challenging than your average Lifetime Movie of the Week. The play’s…
The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which is based on a true story the same way Harry Potter and Star Wars movies are, is the latest — though certainly not the last — movie of this bloody (awful) year trying to scare the money right out of your wallet. It has…
The Man isn’t so much a movie as a parody of one, the kind of thing people in movies about the movie business pitch as outrageous, inept ideas when a director’s going for the cheap and quick giggle. Only in movies like The Player or Bowfinger or Christopher Guest’s The…
Fans of the last two Miramax films from Swedish director Lasse Hallström — Chocolat and The Shipping News — may be happy to know that he has stuck to the exact same formula for his latest, An Unfinished Life. Like its predecessors, this is the tale of an itinerant single…
