The 4th of July holiday meant a little bit light week at Spectrum Culture, but I still had a few words go up. On the film side, I reviewed the new film from André Téchiné, the acclaimed French director of Wild Reeds and several others. It always feels a little uncomfortable to take shots at a director with a highly valued history, but the movie was plainly lacking. It was a labor to get through.

I also wrote about Fiona Apple for the second straight week, offering up a brief assessment of her new outing in our survey of the best albums from the first half of 2012. While we didn’t rank them in the feature, the list was determined by all the music writers submitting their current top five lists and then compiling the top vote-getters. For what it’s worth, my current pick for the best album of the year didn’t make the cut.