Star Trek: Into Darkness came out this weekend, and like any good Trekkie, I was eager to see the film. And although I came away from doing so feeling satisfied, there was one thing that stuck in my craw.
A couple of years ago I saw ex-Bikini Kill singer Kathleen Hanna speak in New York City, right before she donated her musical archives to New York University’s Fales Library. I was struck by her acerbic wit, her ‘I don’t give a fuck’ attitude.
While I was a teenager during the grunge and Riot Grrrl era, for some reason I was (at the time) more drawn to hyper-masculine, testosterone-saturated grunge and metal bands and was not that interested in what was happening on the other side of the scene. As Hanna’s talk was intriguing, I took the opportunity to check out The Punk Singer, part of the Hot Docs Festival in Toronto.
About 10 minutes into the documentary, I knew that I had made a colossal mistake.
Pepper Potts (Gwenyth Paltrow) and a conveniently sexy fire in Iron Man 3.
Shane Black’s Iron Man 3 has rolled into theaters and conquered box office receipts. After the alien attack on New York during The Avengers, Tony Stark is not doing well. While suffering from insomnia and anxiety attacks, an Asian-played-by-white-guy terrorist named the Mandarin has stepped up to inflict damage on American civilians.
Watching Baz Luhrmann’s new film The Great Gatsby feels like chugging an entire bottle of cheap champagne: A giddy, fantastic, sugar rush soon turns to a morose headache.
You know Nancy Stole as a horrible person. She's performed under the nickname Mink Stole in sixty films, but her morally corrupt roles in John Waters' outrageous films are the ones that burn themselves into your brain.
On August 16, 2006, a group of young, gay black women were hanging out in New York City's West Village when a man approached and started harassing them. The man, Dwayne Buckle, followed the women, saying things like "I'll fuck you straight." They tried to ignore him and walk away, but he pursued, grabbing at his crotch and continuing to hurl insults. Finally they confronted him and a fight broke out. One of the women had hair pulled out, another was choked by Buckle on the ground. Two passerbys came over to stop Buckle, who ended up being stabbed and spent five days in the hospital.
Things are shaky and spooky in Vanessa Renwick’s short films. Watching her films, I’m never really sure where I am or why I’m there or what will happen, but I’m compelled to go along for the ride. Renwick, now 51, shot many of her tiny films on hand-held film cameras in late eighties and early nineties, drawing on her own wildly varied life experiences for subject matter.
So I saw Jurassic Park 3-D last night. I know. It was $17. That’s ridiculous. But if there’s one movie from my childhood worth revisiting on the big, three-dimensional screen, it’s Jurassic Park. This was actually the very first movie I remember seeing on the big screen when I was a kid and I clearly remembered all the famous dino scenes—the dilophosaurus melting Newman’s face, the T-Rex eating the lawyer, the “clever girl.” But I had forgotten one major element of the film: Dr. Ellie Sattler is the best!
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