Review

Book Review: The Unwavering Gaze — Fabritius and Donna Tartt’s “The Goldfinch”

January 23, 2014
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In Donna Tartt’s much-lauded third novel, Fabritius’ painting “The Goldfinch” and the fleeting nature of, well, everything comes together for a brief and shining moment.

TV Review: HBO’s “Looking” — Gay Life as Sweet and Sincerely Humanist

January 22, 2014
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Without being preachy, HBO’s “Looking” offers a fine lesson that being totally out of the closet, as are all the many characters, can lead to a cool cool (and also hot hot) existence.

Film Review: “The Genius of Marian” — A Deeply Moving Look at the Devastation of Alzheimer’s Disease

January 21, 2014
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“The Genius of Marian,” the new documentary from directors Banker White and Anita Fitch, depicts the bitter process of absorbing disaster, with White’s mother as the subject.

Book Review: Art Historian Bernard Berenson — Reinvention as the American Dream

January 19, 2014
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Cohen devotes little space to Bernard Berenson’s art historical methodology, now largely superseded by modern approaches. She relates Berenson’s less admirable qualities without judging them.

Concert Review: The Pixies at the Orpheum

January 19, 2014
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The past weekend’s Orpheum show — sold out for weeks beforehand, and drawing an impressive range of multi-generational hipsters — wasn’t the same old thing for The Pixies.

Film Review: “The Invisible Woman” — The Elusive Story of Boz’s Babe

January 17, 2014
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We do feel Charles Dickens’s heart tenderly beating, swept away by Nelly Ternan’s poised beauty, and it’s touching in an almost Chekhovian way, his being smitten by a love which can only bring sorrow.

Fuse Book Review: “Country of Ash” — Another Essential Holocaust Memoir

January 16, 2014
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We become increasingly aware that we are in the mind of a doctor who has taught himself to observe carefully, who has an amazingly strong will to survive, and who chooses not to waste precious time and energy on anger or revenge.

Theater Review: SpeakEasy Stage Company’s Vibrant “Color Purple”

January 16, 2014
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The singing in the SpeakEasy Stage Company production is strong throughout; it’s easy to get caught up in the sheer pleasure of such a variety of voices.

Jazz CD Review / Appreciation: Jane Ira Bloom’s “Sixteen Sunsets” – Jazz Mastery, Undiluted

January 14, 2014
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In nearly 78 minutes of intensely concentrated playing, Jane Ira Bloom’s album offers some of the greatest ballad performances I have ever heard.

Rock Album Review: Bruce Springsteen’s “High Hopes”

January 14, 2014
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Bruce Springsteen’s “High Hopes” is a collection of covers, reinventions, and new recordings of odds and ends that have been kicking around for the past decade-plus.

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