The big picture of it all is that Hugo is, in detail and scope, a beautiful piece of filmmaking that illustrates in craft what it can only hint at through dialogue. Scorsese delivers so many details to please the cinephile – from a small but benevolent role for the ever-charismatic Christopher Lee, to a humane and top-form performance from Ben Kingsley that reminds us why he’s such a pleasure to watch, to period costumes and locations that dare the audience to resist the urge to crawl into the picture frame – that the film itself becomes testament to why we love letting the movies, and rhetoric about the movies, carry us away.
The Muppets: A Fresh Serving of Muppetational Spectacle
Just as hate might find the source of its progression in fear, despair might find its roots in nostalgia. No wonder, then, that Hollywood finds such a powerful figure in the aging star wilting without the sunlight of celebrity.
Interview with the Artist Yuyanapaq, Part II
Re “Interview with an Artist. Who Is Yuyanapaq?”
Question — The relationship between music and images is well established. Arguably, the cinema's impact wouldn't be the same without a brawny musical score providing companionship to the imagery. What led you to creating multi-media albums? What is your method for joining music and film together?
Interview with an Artist: Who Is Yuyanapaq?
While waiting outside the International City Theatre in Long Beach earlier this year, I noticed a CD case resting innocuously on one of the concrete picnic tables. Curious, I picked it up and gleaned almost nothing from the abstracted, enigmatic covers other than “Yuyanapaq,” which I assumed was an artist’s name, and “Ccollanan Pachacamac”, which I assumed was the album name, and a track listing. The CD was numbered, indicating that it was a limited edition. Looking around, I didn’t see anyone rushing back to the table breathlessly claiming to have left it behind. So I took it in the belief that it had been deliberately left behind by the artist for a stranger to discover and, hopefully, enjoy…But who is Yuyanapaq?
A Warm Tradition Returns: The 52nd County Holiday Celebration
Thanksgiving is nigh, which means two things: Spending time with family and good food (not necessarily in that order) and the official start of the holiday season. While struggling with the endless barrage of commercials and exhortations to help retailers enjoy a very Merry Spend-mas, those of us looking for genuine sentiment and a warming sense of community need look no further than one of the most endearing traditions: the L.A. County Holiday Celebration, sponsored by the County Board of Supervisors on Christmas Eve, Saturday, Dec. 24, from 3 to 6 p.m.
The Malgrave Incident: A Video Game for People Who Don’t Play Video Games
Building on their expertise with casual games delivered through the internet, Big Fish Games’ first foray into development for the Nintendo Wii console is a successful example of video games not named Angry Birds attracting an audience beyond a niche demographic.
‘The Robber Bridegroom’: Amusing, but a Barn Short of a Hootennany
Based on the 1942 novella by Eudora Welty, which itself is a relatively cheery adaptation of a gruesome tale from the Brothers Grimm, The Robber Bridegroom took on life as a musical in the 1970s with producer Stuart Ostrow’s Musical Theatre Lab.
‘Excuseman’ Only Tortures Readers
In an age saturated by scandals, what we apparently need is a superhero wielding a very large needle to pop the ballooning delusions of celebrity apologetics. Unfortunately, “Excuseman” (aka Chicago trial lawyer Jordan Margolis) is too busy indulging himself to stay focused on his mission to save the world from “insincere apologies for bad behavior from celebrities, politicians and general ne’er-do-wells.”
Steve Jobs, Visionary Merchant of Gadgets
…there’s no denying the genius and vision Jobs brought to an impressive array of endeavours, from popularizing the accessible personal computer through the Apple II – an admitted milestone that stands with the efforts of IBM and Microsoft in transforming information technology – to Pixar’s evolution into the animation powerhouse it is today. Nor can we underestimate his accomplishments in turning flabby, out-of-breath business ventures into roaring successes. Yet for all his genius and impact on the technology and entertainment industries, the value of his iconic legacy is questionable.
Cowboys & Aliens: The Year's Most Underrated Blockbuster?
As tempting as it is to label Cowboys & Aliens a genre mashup, that path leads to confusion – which goes some ways to explaining the mixed reviews and box office performance. Viewed as a seemingly irresolvable chimera, reactions to the film are akin to the befuddlement that the Saturday Night Live’s “It’s Pat!” sketches exploited for laughs, only with less amusement and interpretive acuity. For reference, consider Firefly, a bona fide mashup of two genres that the San Francisco Chronicle’s Tim Goodman, in his review of the cult TV series, described as “alarmingly opposite.” Here we were presented with an aesthetic that jammed together Western and sci-fi tropes, leading to scenes that played out as Westerns with ray-guns and hovering vehicles. Whedon’s blending of visual vocabularies from two strongly defined genres yielded results akin to the Spanglish that comes from the meld of Spanish and English. It worked, albeit very creakily, but the show’s appeal ultimately emerged from the strong storytelling and compelling character archetypes drawn from Western rather than Science Fiction sensibilities.