She might have been a Midwestern orphan named Mildred Davenport. She may have been the great-granddaughter of the illegitimate son of the King of England. She even could have been a Native American, invited by President Franklin Roosevelt to act as America’s goodwill ambassador to Mexico. The only thing we…
In Victorian England, 40,000 novels were published every year. Of the few that have endured, perhaps none is more worthy of a film adaptation than William Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, if for no other reason than this: It’s a chore to read. Clocking in at 850 pages, with frequent excursions into…
It’s a real credit to Intimate Strangers director Patrice Leconte that even though his film features a couple of ridiculous contrivances to get the plot going, the overall film still feels very true. Leconte has a gift for depicting the quirks of odd relationships; his last film, Man on the…
In We Don’t Live Here Anymore, an overwrought domestic drama about a pair of entangled couples, Peter Krause plays philandering writer Hank Evans, struggling to produce as he propositions female students at the college where he teaches. Blithely pretentious, fretful only over his writing, Hank observes from a distance as…
Oh, Janis. Oh, gorgeous, outrageous, soul-ripping, rockin’ bluesy mama Janis Joplin. She’s a volcano. She’s a tsunami. She’s a fearless, reckless, raging American beauty. Watch her tear open her chest to reveal her hot, pulsing wounds. Watch her rage with burning, glorious light. Watch her smile that sweet Janis smile…
Whatever is worthwhile about The Hunting of the President — a new documentary on the right-wing attack dogs that conspired to bring down Bill Clinton throughout his presidency — the film is plagued by a single, damning problem: It was made by Harry Thomason. Thomason is an über-F.O.B., a very…
In artist John Risseeuw’s works, the subject matter isn’t difficult to decipher. Rather than searching for abstract thought, the viewer needs only to examine the paper on which Risseeuw’s art is printed. In his latest collection, “The Landmine Prints” which shows at downtown’s Burton Barr Central Library beginning Thursday, September…
9/4-9/5 Danny Ochoa has a secret identity he wants to keep on the down low. As a judge for Lowrider Magazine, the 37-year-old isn’t worried about any potential diss he may have dealt at any of the 16 events he visits every year, but he’s been on the receiving end…
Sat 9/4 Leave it to the dog fanciers to try to pooch a good time. Those purebred purists often take a dim view of wiener dog racing, fearing the sport is harmful to the delicate animals. But NASCAR-style crashes are unlikely at the Wiener Dog Nationals on Saturday, September 4,…
Sat 9/4 Despite their supernatural gifts, the prognosticators and fortunetellers gathering at the Psychic Fair on Saturday, September 4, at Two Hawks Leather & Gifts, 8273 West Washington in Peoria, won’t disclose the winning PowerBall numbers or — more important — when the Grim Reaper will visit. “If I ever…
Thu 9/2 At first glance, we assumed that ASU’s Evelyn Smith Music Theatre, 40 East Gammage Parkway in Tempe, was hosting some sort of organic Asian buffet. Turns out that the rice bowls, chopsticks, pods, gourds and chiles on hand will whet our appetites for new music, not chicken teriyaki…
THU 26 For more than a year, Emerg McVay of local band Bionic Jive has hosted the collective elements of spoken word, hip-hop and graffiti art at the Priceless Inn, 5014 South Price Road in Tempe. The weekly set, presented by DJ Element and Dumplarock, continues to fly high, so…
There’s a new movie called Hero. Don’t confuse it with that dusty Dustin Hoffman vehicle, nor with the epic Bollywood musical espionage extravaganza Hero: Love Story of a Spy (though that’s worth a mind-altering look if you can find it). America and India aren’t directly involved here, but huge imperial…
Winner of the Dramatic Audience Award at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, Maria Full of Grace is an uncomfortably realistic look at a 17-year-old Colombian woman who, desperate for a job, agrees to swallow capsules of heroin and transport them to New York. Although a work of fiction, the film…
Those of us who have grown up in the United States may be weary of our country’s claims of freedom and opportunity. Faced with a wobbly quote from our leader attributing terrorism to envy, we might roll our eyes, aware of a reality far darker and more complex. But there…
You know how fear is scary? Well, director E. Elias Merhige is into that, especially in his new serial-killer thriller Suspect Zero. Absent, however, is the dark-comic malevolence the director smartly cultivated in his successful and disquieting Shadow of the Vampire a few years ago, bullied and bulldozed out of…
Hell hath no fury like a wanna-be filmmaker scorned. After being left in financial ruin by a Nashville investment banker nearly 18 years ago, Dan Wilkins dreamed up a multitude of elaborate revenge fantasies to get even with the man who did him wrong, many of which would’ve landed him…
Sat 8/28 Silver-tongued politicos love speaking in glittering generalities, spewing their easily digestible catch phrases like, “I’m reporting for duty,” or, “Moving America forward.” Local activist Jeff Falk has another catch phrase, one that communicates the message behind the “Farewell Party for George W,” on Saturday, August 28, at the…
8/27-9/18 It’s hard not to fall in love with a sweet transsexual Transylvanian whose sole purpose is growing the perfect sex toy. While he (using the pronoun loosely) might be a hero to some, he’s also The Rocky Horror Show’s Dr. Frank-N-Furter, a naughty heathen clad in fishnets and obsessed…
Plenty of Olympic athletes trained in Phoenix for the summer games, and we even managed to send some locals to compete in Athens this month. But the Valley’s truest distinction at the Olympics is the presence of little Gabriela Cruz, one of only a handful of McDonald’s employees from across…
Picture me, just this once, wearing a shiny turban anchored with a big paste jewel. I’m sitting before a tiny, round, velvet-covered table, gazing into a crystal ball. The ball is filled with all kinds of swirling pastel lights and a bunch of purple glitter that occasionally morphs into shapes…
It should go without saying that when one goes to see a movie about giant killer snakes, the main point of the whole endeavor is to watch people get eaten by giant killer snakes. Hardly rocket science, that. But while Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid does feature a…
