It’s 6:30 PM in Times Square. Lights are whirring in billboards advertising banks and beers and Broadway; the snaking news marquee flashes headlines and stock market numbers; a photographer is snapping wedding photos on the corner; drag queens are strolling past in terrifyingly tall stilettos; tourists gawk from double-decker tour buses. And in the midst of all of this, there is a poetry reading about to start. (more…)
THE ART OF THE STEAL
Dr. Albert Barnes, founder of the Barnes Foundation.
The automobile industry in Flint. A former US Secretary of Defense. The National Spelling Bee. A man who lives with Grizzly bears. A collection of paintings? Though they may not sound like much, each are the synopses of some of the most fascinating documentaries produced in the last 25 years. The last of which, referring to the controversial displacement of Dr. Albert Barnes’ historic collection of Post-Impressionist paintings from his country home at the private Barnes Foundation – where his will stipulates the collection was always to stay – to a public museum in Philadelphia, is a bare-bones summary of Don Argott’s ingenious documentary “The Art of the Steal”. (more…)
Courtesy of IFC Films
Shots in Police, Adjective seem to go on forever. They never simply cut away, but they remain there for a purpose. That’s because writer-director Corneliu Porumboiu hides things in shadows. His slight camera movements work like a detective to get you to notice subtle details. You are the detective as much as Cristi, the protagonist is. (more…)
KANIKOSEN
A story about a crab-fishing boat laced with a Marxist agenda sounds almost too odd to be true, in the best way possible. Sadly, “Kanikosen”, adapted by Sabu (real name – Hiroyuki Tanaka) from a Manga comic based on a recently popularized 1920’s Proletarian novel, the title of which translates to “The Crab Canning Ship”, never lives up to its premise. In fact, the very otherworldly nature of said premise leads to the film’s fatal flaw – a nearly incoherent tone.
THE WIZARD OF OZ
After the slightly disappointing opener in “Wild Grass”, leave it to one of the most magical films in cinema history, “The Wizard of Oz” to revitalize spirits on this, the first day of the New York Film Festival.
Hazelnuts rank high on the list of delicious yet difficult to describe foods, joining truffles in the exalted pantheon of sophisticated products redolent of earth. What do the black truffle, a variety of fungus, and the hazelnut, a fruit of the Corylus plant, more commonly known as the hazel tree, have in common? Both possess elusive flavors that elicit thoughts of summer’s end and the approach of winter. For instance, the taste of hazelnut includes fruity overtones, toasted brioche, vanilla, caramel, and muskiness on the back of the palate. When that specific aroma combination blossoms in the mouth, the lucky gourmand feels a heady hit of pure autumn rupturing throughout his or her skull. For example, I eat a hazelnut and smell dead leaves crumbling in dry October air, the pages of a musty book, coffee and woodsmoke on an early November morning, and the sour perfume of dying flowers in September. (more…)
