#16 — The Last Emperor (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1987) The Last Emperor almost certainly won the Best Picture Oscar because of its bigness. Its impressive scope, in terms of individual scenes bustling with extras and spectacular feats of art direction as … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Sixteen
One of the things I find most entertaining about Steven Soderbergh’s directorial career is the way so many of his films seem like they had their genesis as some sort of bar bet. “Bet you can’t make a big, glossy, … Continue reading A different disease in another translation, though you don’t understand the familiar sensation
5. XTC, Oranges & Lemons Perhaps befitting a band that had a colossally strong affection for the era of the Beatles built on densely layered psychedlia, XTC played their last tour date in the spring of 1982. While the Fab … Continue reading College Countdown: 90FM’s Top 90 of 1989, 5
I employed a lot of methods to try to keep up with new music once I’d graduated from my college radio station to “the real world,” which, I assure you, was, if anything, less real than the noncommercial broadcast outlet that I’d left. It was in the days before a countless number of online purveyors typed out everything any living soul could possibly want to know about every band out there so I relied on magazines, newspaper articles (this is band when the Chicago Tribune was actually a genuine newspaper) and what little I could glean from the fairly rare … Continue reading One for Friday: Rocket From the Crypt, “Lipstick”
“Anyway, the fascinating thing was that I read in National Geographic that there are more people alive now than have died in all of human history. In other words, if everyone wanted to play Hamlet at once, they couldn’t, because there aren’t enough skulls!” –Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, 2005 “GUESS I’M JEST GONNA HAFTA SNEAK UP BEHIND ‘IM WHILE HIS BACK IS TURNED–AN’ CLOBBER ‘IM A GOOD ONE! THIS SORT’A MOVE AINT EXAC’LY KOSHER IN THE SUPER-HERO’S HANDBOOK–BUT I CAN TURN IN MY GOOD CONDUCT MEDAL—AFTER I SAVE THE FLIPPIN’ WORLD!” –Len Wein, MARVEL FEATURE, Vol. … Continue reading Great Moments in Literature
#17 — This is Spinal Tap (Rob Reiner, 1984) Is there a better compliment for a satirical film than the adoring embrace of those who serve as the target of the comedy? From practically the moment of its release, This is Spinal Tap, Rob Reiner’s mock documentary about a ragged British heavy metal band and their concert tour marked by mounting indignities, was a favorite of the musicians who could reasonably consider themselves the real-world equivalents of the characters in the film. It may not quite have been required viewing on tour buses, but there were always plenty of people toiling … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Seventeen
Bend your brain back to the scintillating, swingin’ sixties when Marvel was moving major muscles to make their monthly mags manifestly mandatory. The proof was in the panels, but there was a scintilla of selling that had to happen, usually … Continue reading Mighty Marvel Checklist HyperboleCheck: Daredevil #36
These posts are about the songs that can accurately claim to crossed the key line of chart success, becoming Top 40 hits on Billboard, but just barely. Every song featured in this series peaked at number 40. There aren’t many other figures in popular music whose decline from pretty cool to comically insipid is so clear and stark. The first Top 40 single that Kenny Rogers sang on was “Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In),” which made it all the way to #5 in 1967. That was with his first truly successful band, the First … Continue reading Top 40 Smash Taps: “Buy Me a Rose”
6. The Replacements, Don’t Tell a Soul Earlier this week, in writing about the DC Comics relaunch that had an uncommonly prominent place in the ongoing mass media conversation, Tom Spurgeon noted, “no one does consumer entitlement like a comics … Continue reading College Countdown: 90FM’s Top 90 of 1989, 6
This week, my Spectrum movie review duties absolutely gave me the chance to see a fine film that I probably wouldn’t have gotten to otherwise. I’m pleased as can be that John Sayles still gets to make movies, and clearly make them in exactly the fashion he pleases, but it’s been all too easy to let his most recent offerings go by as inconsequential. Beyond the growing unlikelihood that he’ll ever again make a film that crosses over enough to become necessary viewing for those who want to engage in spirited debates over the current state of cinema, there’s a … Continue reading Spectrum Check
