In Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln, Daniel Day-Lewis moves on from acting to alchemy. The two-time Oscar-winner is hardly prolific (he’s made only ten films since collecting that first Academy Award, for My Left Foot, a film now twenty-three years old), but … Continue reading Everything sticks until it goes away
#7 — Annie Hall (Woody Allen, 1977) I’ve loved Annie Hall for a long time, but I don’t think I understood the extent of its specialness until I saw the Woody Allen directorial effort that directly preceded it, 1975’s Love … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 70s — Number Seven
26. “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” by U2 The Joshua Tree, the fifth studio album from U2, was released on March 9, 1987. I think it’s quite far to tag that as the date that everything changed decisively for the Irish quartet. It’s not like they hadn’t enjoyed a taste of success previously, especially back home in the U.K., where they were an established Top 10 act. Even in the presumably tougher-to-crack United States, their previous two studio albums had peaked just outside of the Billboard Top 10, and the single “Pride (In the Name of Love)” … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 26 and 25
This was a week strictly about film for me at Spectrum Culture. My main piece of writing was a review of a new documentary about an ongoing photography project intended to relay easily understandable evidence of the effects of climate change. It’s quite good, which also means it’s highly depressing. I also bookended the latest edition of our ongoing survey of the best comedic performances of each year of each decade. This time getting the privilege of two of the very best acting jobs of the whole decade, comedic or not. Continue reading Spectrum Check
As a general rule, I’m highly suspicious of band reunions. Several years ago, when people were flipping with excitement about the prospect of the Pixies getting back together to play a few dates and maybe–but probably not!–record again, I was entirely unmoved and uninterested. Admittedly, that may stem in part from the fact that I wasn’t nearly as devoted a fan of the band as my college radio brethren during the Pixies’ heyday, but it was also because it was such a transparent attempt to cash in on past success by performers whose respective solo and spin-off careers had pretty … Continue reading One for Friday: The Soft Boys, “I Love Lucy”
Forty-second in a series… (Via) Continue reading Jesus, send some good women to save all your clowns
#8 — All the President’s Men (Alan J. Pakula, 1976) All the President’s Men was released into theaters in the first week of April, 1976, less than two years after Richard Nixon’s resignation from the Office of the President of … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 70s — Number Eight
“Like many slobs, Beard was appreciative of the order that others created without effort, or any that he noticed. In Melissa’s flat, which was spread out over two floors, he was particularly happy. She lived such an uncluttered life at home. There were open perspectives untroubled by furniture. The foot-wide beeswaxed floorboards recovered from a Gascony château shone with dull perfection. There were no loose objects, all the books were on the shelves in the right order, at least until he visited, and the art on the walls was sparse lithographs, mostly of dancers. There was a single statue, a … Continue reading Great Moments in Literature
Three films deep into Daniel Craig’s tenure as James Bond, and the reboot of the character that started with 2006’s Casino Royale is totally complete. In Skyfall there are hints of the character as he was previously conceived–in the brief … Continue reading Buy the sky and sell the sky and bleed the sky and tell the sky
28. “Crazy” by Icehouse So let’s dial back to the way perceptions of bands were shaped circa 1987. For those, like me, who were stuck is relatively small suburban areas, well removed from the major culture centers, there weren’t many ways to find out about new music, especially given the ever-increasingly caution of local radio. This led to the disproportionate influence of MTV, which served as a de facto nationwide radio station back when they were more interested in music videos than reality shows. So the first time I heard of Icehouse was when the video for “Crazy” started getting … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 28 and 27
