Top Fifty Films of the 50s — Number Thirty-Three
#33 — Clash by Night (Fritz Lang, 1952) By the time Fritz Lang sat in the director’s chair for Clash by Night, he’d been a filmmaker for some thirty-five years. In his early sixties, he was also going through something of … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 50s — Number Thirty-Three
That Championship Season: The Ben Stiller Show, Season One
Lorne Michaels has said that everyone’s favorite era of Saturday Night Live is whichever one was taking place while they were in high school. That may very well be true. Similarly, I think it may be possible that everyone’s favorite … Continue reading That Championship Season: The Ben Stiller Show, Season One
Gordon Willis, 1931-2014
Gordon Willis was nominated for the Best Cinematography Academy Award twice. Only twice. It’s unbelievable, and it stands as one of the greatest injustices in the overstuffed annals of egregious omissions of the august award-giving body. Let’s illustrate the extent of the oversight further: from 1972 to 1974, Willis was the cinematographer on four different Best Picture nominees, three of which actually claimed the top prize, and though his category often went in rough lockstep with Best Picture Willis wasn’t among the competitors once during this span. To make it even more clear, practically ever obituary and remembrance cites his … Continue reading Gordon Willis, 1931-2014
College Countdown, The First CMJ Album Chart, 12
12. Sea Level, On the Edge The Allman Brothers Band was one of those groups that felt like they were fractiously apart more than they were together, practicing a brand of precarious camaraderie befitting their familial nature. When the band experienced their first formal break-up in the mid-nineteeen-seventies, several members were already poised to do their own thing. Sea Level was a clear, supported offshoot of the Allman Brothers Band, opening shows for the southern rock icons in 1975 and 1976. In the latter year, it became the main thing going as the tension between Gregg Allman and his bandmates … Continue reading College Countdown, The First CMJ Album Chart, 12
From the Archive: King Kong
So…modern remakes of giant monster movie classics seem to be on my mind for some reason. This review was written for my former digital space This is when I was still deeply enamored with the idea of building hyperlinks into the reviews, an inclination that, I’ll admit, I haven’t fully shaken. Or maybe haven’t shaken at all. As it turns out, I and my partner in all things saw this movie on a trip to New York City, where we walked within view of the Empire State Building on the way to our next stop. It added some resonance to … Continue reading From the Archive: King Kong
One for Friday: Marshall Crenshaw, “You’re My Favorite Waste of Time”
It always seemed that Marshall Crenshaw was genetically engineered to be a cult hero. Even though his very first single, the utterly wonderful “Someday, Someway,” made it into the Billboard Top 40, it was hardly a thunderous success, peaking at #36. That seems simultaneously appropriate and a little tragic. Crenshaw created songs that were made for the radio, albeit maybe a different era than the one he was in. This was the early nineteen-eighties, when new wave was ascendent, punk was morphing from broad-ranging alternative to almost myopic jackhammer anger, and electronic was still trying to find its footing in … Continue reading One for Friday: Marshall Crenshaw, “You’re My Favorite Waste of Time”
The New Releases Shelf: I Never Learn
(Picture credit.) Pop music is always at its truest when it’s speaking about heartbreak. When tougher guitars and a racing, drum-driven backbeat start infringing and the music tips over more clearly into rock ‘n’ roll there are other aspects of … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf: I Never Learn
Top Fifty Films of the 50s — Number Thirty-Four
#34 — The Asphalt Jungle (John Huston, 1950) It’s all right there in the name of the film: the promise of soot and grit and anger, the heat of savagery played out on pavement, the hardness of untamed wild disguised … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 50s — Number Thirty-Four
My Writers: Bill Watterson
I operate under the belief that I saw the very first Calvin and Hobbes comic strip when it appeared in the newspaper. I have a vague memory of being in one of my high school classrooms, a social studies course where the teacher had the daily newspapers and a bevy of weekly current affairs magazines delivered and on display, actively encouraging us to peruse them while others were completing assignments. (He also regularly made us watch C-SPAN, which is a sort of torture for adrenaline-fueled, hormone-addled teenagers, as well as forced us to sit through entire Mark Russell comedy specials, … Continue reading My Writers: Bill Watterson
Great Moments in Literature
“Paul Espeseth, who was no longer taking the antidepressant Celexa, braced himself for a cataclysm at SeaWorld.” –Jonathan Lethem, “Pending Vegan,” 2014 “THE BEAST’S SCALES ARE CUTTING EDGES THAT WELT HIS FLESH, TEARING HIS UNIFORM INTO BLOODIED TATTERS! THE MONSTROUS TAIL LASHES IN DEADLY FRENZY, WHIPPING THE WATER TO FOAM, FRAGMENTING ITS REFLECTIONS–AND STRANGELY, IN THAT MOMENT, THEY ARE IMAGES THAT HAVE A STABBING CLARITY THE MIRROR-PERFECT FIGURE LACKED! PAIN BIRTHS INSANITY WITHIN HIS MIND…AND DESPERATION IS THE MID-WIFE. HIS BOOTS PURPOSEFULLY GOUGE INTO THE YIELDING, SALIVATING MOUTH, AND ITS TONGUE BULGES BENEATH AND AROUND HIS HEELS! HOLD ON! PLEASE, … Continue reading Great Moments in Literature
Coffee for Two 