Frédérik Sisa

You don’t have shop on Rodeo Drive, read Vogue, or obsessively follow what’s strutting down Parisian catwalks to enjoy thefrontpageonline.com’s new fashion blog. The Fashionoclast, is, after all, not about trends but about fashion in the day-to-day. Costume designer extraordinaire Aqua Catlin and I have been exploring the world of personal style by seeking out the fun, the unique, and the chic – come see what you’ve been missing!

With the State Controller Issuing IOUs instead of checks (http://cbs5.com/local/california.budget.IOU.2.924701.html) on account of the money well being dry, it’s an understatement to say that the California budget has gone far beyond critical. I’m talking nuclear meltdown. With a recent budget proposal by Democrats shot down by Republicans, it’s unclear how, exactly, the eminence grise of the legislature will lead us out from the shadow of the valley of debt.

Moon is the sort of rare, thoughtful science fiction drama that Danny Boyle’s Sunshine aspired to be before degrading into a glossy, modernized analogue to Paul Anderson’s schlocky horror-trash Event Horizon. There’s no such demeaning collapse here. The film is a refreshing master class in science fiction cinema that stays true to its function as an existential, science-driven think-piece.

As the American Medical Assn. waffles on the so-called “public option,” which for some reason is made to sound ominously like “nuclear option,” and Republicans dig trenches so deep, one thing has become clear: There’s a lot of philosophical cowardice around here. All those free enterprisers, all those who want to shrink government and keep it out of healthcare or financial regulation or anything of public interest – cowards. If they were truly brave in their political philosophy they would be anarchists.

The Hollywood answer to problems in filmmaking often rests on the time-honoured tradition of throwing money around. Independents, however, for whom even the price of a shoestring can seem daunting, have to rely on a more precious commodity: creative, lateral thinking.

Democracy Now had a headline blurb (http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/12/headlines#4) explaining that Sen. Max Baucus, chair of the Senate Finance Committee, would oppose public healthcare in any form. “It’s not going to be public,” he said.  “We won’t call it public, but it will be tough enough to keep insurance companies’ feet to the fire.” It sounds like a Republican talking point – oppose any option other than private, corporate, for-profit healthcare – but it really begs the question: since when has “public” become a dirty word?

The score, which includes some of playwright Sir Noel Coward’s own compositions as well as pieces from the Cole Porter songbook, is a rollicking jazz confection that swings through the film with all the carefree abandon of 1920s glamour. It’s the soundtrack (complete with an orchestra assembled specifically for the film) to the golden age of movie eras, itself an easy subject for the camera to fall in love with.

There’s an extraordinary piece of film footage in the documentary biography “An Unreasonable Man” in which Ralph Nader, legitimate ticket in hand, attempts to attend a 2000 Presidential debate as an audience member only to be denied access. Despite reasonably asking if it isn’t a misuse of taxpayer money for the Massachusetts State Police to be involved in excluding a Presidential candidate for political reasons from what is a private event – and, of course, it is a misuse – he is threatened with arrest. Nader, with great dignity, leaves on his own terms. But the point is clear.

It must be difficult to be the standard-bearer of animated films that transcend whatever prejudices are associated with mere cartoonery to create, quite simply, good cinema. But not merely good; although many Pixar films deserve to be ranked as classics, last year’s “Wall*E” planted the bright flag of excellence at the pinnacle of Pixar’s accomplishments. After that kind of success, the question of what next (?) ticks away like an unexploded time bomb.

One of Shakespeare’s later plays gets the fresh air treatment at the Theatricum Botanicum, an outdoor amphitheatre tucked away in Topanga Canyon like the key to a chastity belt. And what a venue it is, with a stage surrounded by woodsy paths that give the actors the opportunity to enjoy off-stage freedom of movement and defined by a versatile set.