AltWeeklies Wire
'How Markets Fail: The Logic of Economic Calamites,' Reviewednew
When the financial tailspin of 2008 forced Alan Greenspan to confess that he was mistaken about the unshakable rationality and self-correcting nature of the economy, it was as if a Roman Catholic cardinal publicly doubted the divinity of Christ.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
02-26-2010 |
Nonfiction
Mel Gibson Crosses the Line in 'Edge of Darkness'new
In the pair of emotionally contradictory images that open Mel Gibson’s Edge of Darkness, swollen corpses surfacing on a moonlit river are followed without pause by grainy home video of a little girl playing in the surf.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
01-29-2010 |
Reviews
Tags: Edge of Darkness, Martin Campbell
Eric Blowtorch: The Jamaican Connectionnew
A prolific recording artist always willing to share the microphone with guest stars, Eric Blowtorch’s musical endeavors have been more a vocation in the traditional sense than a career. He has reached a new height on his latest album with his band the Welders, The Alphabet.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
12-11-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Milwaukee Marched for Justicenew
Anyone living in Milwaukee in the '60s and old enough to be aware will recall a time of sharp tension. This story is recounted with lucid scholarship in The Selma of the North: Civil Rights Insurgency in Milwaukee.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
05-15-2009 |
Nonfiction
Animals in Art: Surveying American Wildlifenew
Some people have dismissed wildlife art as sentimental kitsch fit only for hotel lobbies or illustrating bird-watcher's handbooks. David J. Wagner might just change that perception with American Wildlife Art, a magisterial volume lavishly illustrated with more than 300 pictures, most in color.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
02-13-2009 |
Nonfiction
Spike Lee Remembers Balck Braverynew
Lee has been fighting World War II long before the release of his latest film, Miracle at St. Anna. His campaign began with a salvo at Clint Eastwood for excluding black faces from Flags of Our Fathers and perpetuating the assumption that blacks contributed little to the U.S. victory.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
10-03-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Spike Lee, Miracle at St. Anna
'Outsourced': A Comedy of Job Lossnew
Outsourced is a bright comedy about greedy American corporations, low-wage Indian workers, cultural incomprehension and the bonds that can form across all barriers by people of good will-especially, but not only, if they fall in love.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
09-05-2008 |
Reviews
Son of Hamlet?new
Hamlet 2 is not among the funniest of satires, though it does have its amusing moments.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
08-29-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Peter Cattaneo, Hamlet 2
Vicky and Cristina Abroadnew
For the fourth in a series of films made outside of his beloved New York, Woody Allen moves from Great Britain to sunnier climes. Set in Spain, Vicky Cristina Barcelona is an ocean away from his mature Manhattan comedies geographically, but emotionally it might as well be just across the Hudson.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
08-22-2008 |
Reviews
'Before the Rains' Explores Love, Lust and Empirenew
Before the Rains is a carefully recreated and opulent period drama that explores the psychology of individuals grappling, and losing their grip, with the historical conditions of their time.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
06-13-2008 |
Reviews
Mariachi Los Camperos de Nati Cano Show Soulnew
That the mariachi genre has become associated with a tourist brochure image of Mexico is unfortunate.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
05-09-2008 |
Reviews
A Demi Moore Thrillernew
Flawless is a suspenseful period thriller populated by characters whose potential was curbed by a world that gave them few chances.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
04-25-2008 |
Reviews
George Clooney's Football Folliesnew
With its speak-easies and patina of easy Roaring Twenties corruption, its bungling cops and daring hijinks, romantic rivalry and slinky moments of seduction, Leatherheads delivers two solid hours of old-fashioned entertainment.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
04-18-2008 |
Reviews
'Smart People' is All Brains, No Heartnew
Smart People is about what can happen when the mind is divorced from the heart and spirit.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
04-11-2008 |
Reviews
How to Murder Your Wifenew
Sachs keeps the love-trianlge story in swift forward motion with moments of knife's edge suspense and surprises within surprises.
Shepherd Express |
David Luhrssen |
04-04-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Ira Sachs, Married Life
