The artistic worth of tattoos has always been up for debate. While there are some people who don’t even consider it a form of art, others think of it as the ultimate form of self-expression, both for the artist and the human canvas. There used to be a time when…
Our training regimen for the Summer Sizzler is intense. We start with two plates at the Sizzler salad bar to prime our stomach, and then we hit the buffet to pile on steak and shrimp. Our current max is four full buffet plates in one night, which might not seem…
Just think about all the reasons you deserve to be polished and pampered and treated like a queen (or king): You unloaded the dishwasher, you listen to your kids shriek daily without killing them, you finished your thesis and even bought a few early Christmas presents. You’ve been good. So…
Being the movie nerd I am, I am always stung by the fact I have yet to see the 1927 film Wings. It’s the bane of my film buff existence that the first movie to win the Best Picture Oscar has escaped my viewing pleasure, with no thanks to my…
Are you tired of watching your Days of Thunder laserdisc, wondering when you’ll get your chance to drive recklessly fast and loose? When you fly, do you often feel the need, the need for speed? Have you been doing “The Hippy Hippy Shake” when you make your Cocktails? Has your…
It’s already time for another dreaded school supply shopping spree. Your kids will beg for crap like a One Tree Hill binder and lunchbox kit, and your stomach will turn when you wonder how you’ll afford so many supplies. Luckily, this year’s Kids Fest helps underprivileged kids and parents with…
This weekend’s Body, Mind & Spirit Expo appears harmless enough, but make no mistake—this is no NBC-5/Telemundo Health Fit Expo. Despite being billed as focusing on “natural health, personal growth, [and] metaphysics,” a closer examination of the event and its exhibitors reveals a deeper, darker truth. Vibrational medicine? Past-life readings?…
Judging by the amount of people that take pictures of themselves with cell phones or cameras trained on their reflection in a mirror, the self-portrait is more popular than ever. Started in Northern Europe as a genre born of convenience, finance and ego, it has become a staple in art,…
Twenty years ago, the AIDS epidemic was just beginning to capture the attention of the American public, some five years after the first reported U.S. cases. It was around this time that playwright Larry Kramer premiered The Normal Heart, one of the first theatrical productions to tackle the issue. The…
Every time I go to the circus I think, “Damn, this dancing elephant would be a lot more entertaining if someone was playing some top-40 hip-hop and rowdy gentlemen were throwing dollar bills at the pachyderm.” Meeting me halfway is the UniverSoul Circus, an Atlanta-based all-minority circus that adds a…
You don’t need Lindsay Wagner telling you that getting enough good, restful sleep is important. Duh, Sleep Number Queen, we know that. We know that to rejuvenate the cells, the mind and spirit, a person needs a certain amount of sleep. And comfortable, uninterrupted sleep is best, of course. Now,…
The Creative Arts Theatre & School is warming up a chestnut with The Emperor’s Invisible Clothes, a lighthearted take on the Hans Christian Andersen tale of an emperor conned by swindlers into buying a nonexistent suit of clothes that are “invisible” only to the stupid. It’s a nice cautionary tale…
I have an issue with Dane Cook’s Tourgasm. I find the show, HBO’s documentary series following four comedians—Dane Cook, Gary Gulman, Jay Davis and Robert Kelly—on tour to be a completely unsuccessful rip-off of Comedy Central’s Comedians of Comedy. Why? Well, hmm. Maybe because Comedians was a documentary series following…
Cat vs. pelican might not sound like as good of a death match as time-honored hypothetical adversaries bear vs. gorilla or pirate vs. ninja. After all, cats eat birds, and pelicans aren’t exactly the most agile bird in the world. If the cat in question is a lion, the odds…
Comedian Gary Owen is apparently down with the brothers. The only white host of BET’s Comicview (I assume he got the job with one of his really lame gay jokes, like the one where Barney has sex with Arnold Schwarzenegger), he’s also had bit parts in Eddie Murphy’s Daddy Day…
Two weeks ago a colleague insisted that Superman Returns isn’t the remake of the 1978 original, as I wrote, but a reinterpretation–its melancholy flip side. Where the Christopher Reeve model was pop art and a cool breeze, the Brandon Routh version is heavy and solemn, weighed down by the burden…
It would be a mighty sweet thing to see M. Night Shyamalan as the great redemptive storyteller he clearly thinks he is–or as he portrays himself in those American Express commercials. Genuine yarn-spinning, even as a doomed ambition, is virtually extinct in American movies; what had been the system’s priority…
In the latest extravaganza from executive producers Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemeckis, millions of dollars and long hours in the digital animation studios have produced…a photorealistic, computer-animated, generic American suburb! Location costs must be getting pretty damn expensive nowadays. As Monster House begins, we follow a leaf slowly descending on…
That devil, always messing with the details, like a naughty kitten who won’t be deterred from pawing a flower arrangement. With the slightest curious swipe of the paw, the whole thing comes crashing down. It’s much like what happened during the first weekend of this year’s Festival of Independent Theatres,…
The Italian architect Renzo Piano designs jewel-box buildings. High levels of invention in the realm of engineering–from the ferro-cement ceiling louvers of The Menil Collection in Houston to the glass-sheathed earthquake-proof tower, the Maison Hermès, in Tokyo–do not so much belie the precious quality of his projects as constitute it…
Edison Force (Sony) Gritty cop stuff must write itself — just make sure everyone’s tough, corrupt, and talking like they stole Mickey Spillane’s thesaurus. Then cast Justin Timberlake. Screech! Employing the talented (at music) popster as a crusading journalist isn’t this lame flick’s worst flaw — merely the one you’ll…
The history of football videogames is one of adding layer upon layer of complexity. Tecmo Bowl, the first great football game, had just four plays to choose from. Fast-forward to the latest Madden, and it’s more like 400. The logical result of this evolution is Electronic Arts’ NFL Head Coach,…
