AltWeeklies Wire
1960s Period Piece 'An Education' Gets Good Marks, as Does Star Carey Mulligannew
Danish director Lone Scherfig's movie is something of a deceptively packaged Oscar-season bonbon -- a seemingly benign, classily directed year-I-became-a-woman nostalgia trip that conceals a surprisingly tart, morally ambiguous center.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
10-09-2009 |
Reviews
The Secret Lives of Queer Leading Mennew
How Howard Bragman, Hollywood's coming-out guru, helps gay actors tell the truth. Bragman's parents were "tolerant and accepting" when he came out in his 20s; Proposition 8 was "extremely painful"; gays and lesbians need to "call people on their shit."
L.A. Weekly |
Patrick Range McDonald |
10-09-2009 |
Movies
A Year Late, L.A. Tries to Uninvite its Unvetted Pot Shopsnew
The Los Angeles City Council now faces one of its potentially most expensive legal battles ever, a war over medical pot that could draw in shady drug dealers, serious medical-marijuana activists, gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown -- and even U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.
L.A. Weekly |
Daniel Heimpel |
09-25-2009 |
Drugs
'Disgrace' Faces the Facts of Post-Apartheid South Africanew
This film adaptation of J.M. Coetzee's brilliant 1999 novel looks the chaos and hatred of postapartheid South Africa squarely in the face, probing the terrible fallout from white denial and pride without patronizing blacks by caricaturing them as noble victims.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
09-25-2009 |
Reviews
Audrey Tautou Flexes Her Acting Muscles as Fashion Icon Coco Chanelnew
Her new movie, Coco Before Chanel, is an elegant little black dress of a movie, simple but complex. At the center is Tautou as young Gabrielle Chanel, before the revolutionary menswear-inspired haute couture, before the fully articulated philosophy of pared down, practical luxury.
L.A. Weekly |
Gendy Alimurung |
09-25-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Michael Moore Sells the Same Old Shtick in 'Capitalism'new
I wish that more of the contradictions of late capitalism had made it into this scattershot, lazy slice of agitprop, which recycles Moore's usual slice-and-dice job on corporations, while bobbing a curtsey to the current crisis.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
09-24-2009 |
Reviews
'Crude' Dives into the Toxic Battle Between Big Oil and Dying Natives in Ecuadornew
Joe Berlinger's remarkable documentary recounts an infuriating litany of South American exploitation, backroom glad-handing and bureaucratic dead ends that has, among other collateral damages, created a Rhode Island-sized "death zone" of toxic pollution in the middle of the Ecuadorian Amazon.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
09-18-2009 |
Reviews
Foster Youths in L.A.: A Before-and-After Storynew
L.A. is home to the largest foster-care agency in the U.S., with many of its 7,000 employees fighting valiantly to try to fix the system and the lives of children caught in it. But with John, on a brisk night on a corner frequented by former foster youths now homeless, you notice only the system's failings.
L.A. Weekly |
Daniel Heimpel |
09-11-2009 |
Children & Families
It's a Battle of Thingamabob vs. Machine in '9'new
WALL-E would never get out alive in director Shane Acker's postapocalyptic hellscape.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
09-11-2009 |
Reviews
Chris Fuller on His Microbudget 'Loren Cass'new
An autodidact whose words tumble out in a slurry stream, Fuller carries himself with such intense conviction that, when he tells you Loren Cass is a project he's been working toward his entire life, you believe him.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
09-11-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Chris Fuller, Loren Cass
Jonathan Gold's 99 Essential L.A. Restaurantsnew
Between a tweet and a truck: This year especially, an essential L.A. restaurant may not even be a restaurant at all -- it may be a tweet telling you which street corner to hang around at, or a cart parked in the same location from the hours of 11 to 2.
L.A. Weekly |
Jonathan Gold |
08-28-2009 |
Food+Drink
'Inglourious Basterds' Brings Late-Career Glory to Christoph Waltznew
It's a familiar part of the Tarantino mythos -- the director plucks a faded star from the brink of obscurity and restores him or her to their former glory. Only, unlike John Travolta, Pam Grier and others before him, Waltz was never that kind of star in the first place.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
08-21-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tarantino Picks His 20 Favorite Flicks of the Past 17 Yearsnew
When Ella Taylor asked me to rename my top five films of all time, I rattled off the obvious titles. She then asked, “Any since the last 17 years?”
L.A. Weekly |
Quentin Tarantino |
08-21-2009 |
Movies
Quentin Tarantino Serves Up Hitler's Head in 'Inglourious Basterds'new
Inglourious Basterds has next to nothing to do with Jews, Nazis or World War II, though Winston Churchill has a funny cameo and Joseph Goebbels a minor, if crucial, role as a twisted auteur of nationalist cinema. It's a highly entertaining, graphically bloody and woozily romantic romp.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
08-21-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Guitar Heroes Talk Axes, Licks and Other Euphemisms in 'It Might Get Loud'new
This compelling documentary explores the inspirations, techniques and creative processes of three of the music world's best-known living axmen, each chosen to represent different generations and sonic approaches.
L.A. Weekly |
Lina Lecaro |
08-14-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
