Review

Book Review: “The Cool School” — What Does it Mean to be Hip?

October 30, 2013
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In a way, this collection of hip writing, a “literary mixtape,” is the ultimate embodiment of the vision of the Hipster-as-Curator.

Theater Review: Boston Theater Company’s “Romeo & Juliet” — A Romance Rife With Political Scandal

October 29, 2013
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BTC’s experiment, while not without its faults, proffers an admirable model of the sort of creative thinking that more companies should emulate when placing Shakespearean drama in a contemporary American context.

Concert Review: A ‘Cinematic’ Madeleine Peyroux at the Berklee Performance Center

October 28, 2013
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The slow tempos on the whole didn’t hurt the show. People were there to hear Madeleine Peryoux — her voice and delivery, her offbeat arrangements and particular idiosyncratic take on familiar songs.

Film Review: “The Counselor” — Filled with Dark and Troubling Poetry

October 28, 2013
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Cormac McCarthy’s rambling but brilliant screenplay is given vigorous direction by Ridley Scott, whose elegant visual style captures the tense downward spiral of the film’s doomed characters.

Theater Review: “The Power of Duff”? The Same Old Guff

October 27, 2013
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Whenever you hear greeting card bromides intoned with a straight face (it’s usually in scenes set in a hospital) you know that moral fuzziness isn’t far behind.

Book Review: Julian Assange Trades Hopes and Fears With Cyberpunks

October 25, 2013
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Any book in which the fourth sentence is “The world is not sliding, but galloping into a new transnational dystopia” runs the risk of overstating its case from the get-go.

Graphic Novel Review: No One Wins — Gene Luen Yang’s “Boxers & Saints”

October 23, 2013
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Although Gene Yang envisions a similarity between the Boxers (once transformed into their mythological hero aspects) and modern superheroes, BOXERS & SAINTS is far from a simple good vs. evil slugfest.

Book Review: “Lessons from Sarajevo” — Talking About What War Means

October 22, 2013
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In this powerful book, Jim Hicks explores a collection of narratives about the experience of war in many genres and a wide range of media that eschew the sentimental.

Book Review: “The Woman Who Lost Her Soul” — A Lengthy Tale of Innocence Betrayed

October 21, 2013
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Despite his weakness for overwriting, Bob Shacochis has a good and sad story to tell, and he gets through it with a degree of mastery.

Movie Review: “12 Years a Slave” — The First Masterpiece of the New Black Cinema?

October 20, 2013
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With 12 YEARS A SLAVE, Steve McQueen, the brilliant British director of HUNGER and SHAME, has probably created the first masterpiece of the new black cinema.

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