AltWeeklies Wire
From Iraq to Iowanew
With a little help from Kartemquin Films, Usama Alshaibi documents the Arab-American experience.
Chicago Reader |
Ed M. Koziarski |
08-09-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Usama Alshaibi, Kartemquin Films
Chris Rock in a Hard Placenew
The comedian faces a classic African-American dilemma.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
04-26-2010 |
Reviews
Do Government Subsidies for Film Production Create a 'Race to the Bottom'?new
Especially now, when so many traditional jobs have been lost, "everybody wants to be Hollywood east," Cornell University professor Susan Christopherson says. It's "sexy meets desperation." More than 40 states are actively vying for movie production business, upping the ante on subsidies in what she calls a "race to the bottom."
Chicago Reader |
Deanna Isaacs |
11-30-2009 |
Movies
The Bad Lieutenant Gone Wildnew
When I first read about Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, it was described as a sequel to Abel Ferrara's 1992 cult favorite about a drug- and gambling-addicted police detective in New York City. When I next read about it, it was described as a remake. Now that I've seen it, I can report that it's neither.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
11-23-2009 |
Reviews
How Exactly is Diablo Cody's Update of the Rape-Revenge Shocker 'Feminist'?new
In the earlier rape-revenge movies, patriarchy was an evil to be overcome. In Jennifer's Body, on the other hand, an opening voice-over tells us that "hell is a teenaged girl"—or more precisely, the friendships between teenage girls. Cody claims that's feminist, but I must confess, I don't see it.
Chicago Reader |
Noah Berlatsky |
09-28-2009 |
Reviews
'The Baader Meinhof Complex' Reveals a Journalist Who Went Over the Edgenew
The most complex character in the movie, the one who provides the viewer with an entry point into this hothouse of violent fanatics, is herself a journalist -- Ulrike Meinhof, a columnist for the left-wing magazine Konkret who stunned her family and colleagues in May 1970 by throwing in with a cadre of self-styled revolutionaries.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
09-14-2009 |
Reviews
Two Chicago Filmmakers Adapt Tom Frank's 'What's the Matter With Kansas?'new
Joe Winston and his wife, Laura Cohen, optioned the rights to Thomas Frank's best-selling book and began to ponder how they might turn the book into a documentary. "It's a brilliant book," says Cohen, but "there are no characters with arcs, and there's not really a plot."
Chicago Reader |
Andrea Gronvall |
09-01-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Jonathan Leyser Works to Finish the First Documentary on the Entire Life of William Burroughsnew
The 24-year-old is nearly finished with an ambitious assessment of perhaps the greatest literary outlaw of the 20th century.
Chicago Reader |
Ed M. Koziarski |
08-31-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
'You, the Living': Everything's Funnier With Weltanschauungnew
Perspective is what separates the brilliant You, the Living, a Swedish import, from the mediocre The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, which Paramount snuck into theaters last week without any timely press screenings.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
08-24-2009 |
Reviews
The World's War, One Man's Battlenew
In Masaki Kobayashi's ten-hour World War II epic, the first casualty is compassion.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
05-18-2009 |
Reviews
'Harvard Beats Yale 29-29': For a Moment, Football Was the Worldnew
Forty years later, players remember the Harvard-Yale game of 1968 in the context of a nation in turmoil.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
02-23-2009 |
Reviews
Tags: football, College, history, documentary, 1960s, Harvard, Harvard Beats Yale 29-29, Kevin Rafferty, Yale
Family, for Better or for Worse: Abdellatif Kechiche's 'The Secret of the Grain'new
Abdellatif Kechiche’s third feature is the slow-building saga of an Arab clan in the south of France.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
01-26-2009 |
Reviews
Gus Van Sant's 'Milk' is Itself a Political Actnew
Milk hits theaters amid a renewed debate over the place of homosexuals in American life. Whether the cause will help the film is anyone's guess, but there seems little doubt that the film will help the cause.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
12-02-2008 |
Reviews
In 'Let the Right One In,' the Suburban Setting is Part of the Scarenew
The juxtaposition of vampire lore and mundane reality is especially powerful in this Swedish import. Set in a dank suburb of Stockholm, it proves once again that horror stories can be even more frightening when exposed to a little daylight.
Chicago Reader |
J.R. Jones |
11-24-2008 |
Reviews
'Torchwood' Gives Fan Fiction its Headnew
The BBC sci-fi show isn't so much a TV series as a fangirl's wet dream. Where shows like Star Trek and Buffy merely inspired fan fiction, Torchwood gives the impression of having been inspired by it.
Chicago Reader |
Noah Berlatsky |
10-06-2008 |
TV
