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Movie Review: Black Power Mixtape 1967–1975 — Scattered, Skewed, But Engaging

October 17, 2011
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This intriguing documentary, made up of first-hand footage about the Black Power movement, will air on WGBH’s Independent Lens this Thursday @ 10 p.m.

Jazz Feature: Exploring the Spirit of John Coltrane’s Music, On the Page and the Concert Stage

October 11, 2011
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Anthony Wallace’s interview on last year’s John Coltrane Memorial Concert, which includes questions about a book on the musician’s spirituality, offers plenty to think about before the 2012 version of the homage to the master musician, which takes place on November 3rd.

Music Review: Regina Carter — A Genius Comes to Rockport

October 11, 2011
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With Reverse Thread, Regina Carter moves beyond conventional boundaries, her music a rich blend of jazz and world music—a cross-cultural exploration of modern and traditional music that expands the boundaries of both genres. Regina Carter. At the Shalin Liu Performance Center, September 24. Her album is Reverse Thread (E1 Entertainment). Carter will be performing in…

Classical Concert Review: Sean Newhouse Conducts the BSO

October 9, 2011
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Despite some interpretive shortcomings, Sean Newhouse, the orchestra’s 30-year-old assistant conductor has solid technique, and a major orchestra whose players, management, and audience believe in him.

Short Fuse Review/Interview: Trotsky’s Revolutionary Life

October 2, 2011
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Joshua Rubenstein’s succinct account of Leon Trotsky’s life rescues the Russian radical from a remoteness, positioning him at a useful distance for contemporary readers

Theater Review: A Fabulous “Candide”

September 22, 2011
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In this delightful production of “Candide,” director Mary Zimmerman imaginatively reworks and mischievously augments the musical. Her deliciously blowzy approach embraces, with charming lyrical fervor, the sheer preposterousness of Voltaire’s sardonic fable.

Theater Review: “The Lady With All the Answers” Makes for Predictable Drama

September 15, 2011
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“The Lady With All the Answers” presents the columnist Ann Landers as a person who just might write a letter to Ann herself. Her faith in herself and her work is unquestioned, even as her own life takes a bump or two. Well, really, only one bump.

Book Review: An Invaluable Testament to When Movies and Criticism Mattered

September 8, 2011
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What drives serious writing about film? “When Movies Mattered” suggests an answer: it helps for a critic to take a side, not as consumer advocate, hipster crank, or box office predictor, but as a passionate advocate for standards, often taking on the role of separating overpraised films from the unfairly neglected.

Short Fuse Book Review: “The Eichmann Trial” — Monster & Nonentity

September 7, 2011
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Author Deborah Lipstadt’s decision to confront a Holocaust denier in court prepared her, as little else might have, to appreciate and convey the vastly greater complexity and historical import of the Eichmann trial.

Movie Review: Daytime in Paris — A Far Better Movie

September 7, 2011
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The Hedghog’s steady, slow pacing—so rare in any film today—captures the rhythms of haut bourgeois life in Paris and draws out the nuances of how people change and are changed by relationships everywhere. The Hedgehog (Le herisson). Directed by Mona Achache. At the Kendall Square Cinema, West Newton Cinema, and other screens throughout New England.…

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