Film
by Justin Marble Beeswax, directed by Andrew Bujalski, showing at Coolidge Corner Theatre. Boston native Andrew Bujalski’s third feature film, “Beeswax,” does not reel off the trials and tribulations of superheroes, pirates, serial killers, or giant transforming robots. There’s no killer shark, no Godzilla, no guns, and no aliens. Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts do…
Read MoreBy Caldwell Titcomb There are those who have proclaimed that Christopher Plummer is the greatest classical actor in North America. There is certainly no gainsaying that he has for some time been in the tiny group at the top of the acting profession. Now as he nears the age of 80 he has brought forth…
Read MoreBy Harvey Blume The Baader Meinhof Complex (Der Baader Meinhof Komplex) Directed by Uli Edel At Kendall Square and Coolidge Corner Cinemas There are some things the German Red Army Faction — the RAF, or Baader Meinhof Gang — had in common with ultra-militant elements of the American New Left, as I knew and participated…
Read MoreBy Harvey Blume Let me tell you why I heartily dislike and contemn Quentin Tarantino’s “The Inglorious Basterds.”
Read MoreTHE THOMASHEVSKYS: MUSIC AND MEMORIES OF A LIFE IN THE YIDDISH THEATER. Written and hosted by Michael Tilson Thomas. Directed by Patricia Birch, with members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. by Helen Epstein I’m a fan of the serious introspective kind of memoir, that tries to wrest meaning from existential and emotional chaos.…
Read Moreby Helen Epstein Go here for information about a live-chat, scheduled for August 23rd, with Helen Epstein on “The Art of Narrative Writing.” Despite what the NYTimes thinks Meryl Streep cooks up a storm in “Julie and Julia.” I usually trust the Times‘ A. O. Scott on movies, but this time I don’t share his…
Read MoreJames Toback’s new documentary about boxer Mike Tyson explores a demonic urgency that fattens on the destruction of others. By Harvey Blume At the end of “Tyson,” James Toback’s documentary about him, the ex-heavyweight champ, now 43 years old, breathes heavily and falls silent. He seems talked out, and is certainly, by his own admission,…
Read MoreBy Gary Schwartz Director Paul Thomas Anderson is no Upton Sinclair. Half an hour into Paul Thomas Anderson’s film There Will be Blood, shown on Dutch television the other night, I told Loekie how intensely happy I was that the film existed. A few months ago I read the book on which the film is…
Read MoreBy Bill Marx “Boston is adrift in the brave new competition among big American cities vying for tourist dollars.” Maureen Dezell, WBUR Maureen made that charge back in July 2006 in an article that turned out to be one of the last posts on the late WBUR Arts Online. Now that the quote, along with…
Read Moreby Bill Marx A recent study in Editor & Publisher delivers the lowdown; with its circulation down about 20% in four years, The Boston Globe is in free fall. Two major investors in The New York Times, which owns the Globe, are “challenging the company’s investment decisions, including its commitment to the struggling newspaper industry…
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Music Review: The Beatles are Still Here, There, and Everywhere