Imagine coming across a homemade tile on a city street or sidewalk bearing the enigmatic, four-line message of “TOYNBEE IDEA IN MOVIE 2001 RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPITER.” Now imagine coming across dozens of such tiles. Starting in 1994 on the East Coast, Justin Duerr did, and wondered what it meant. The more he encountered […]
DVD reviews
Posted inArts & Culture
Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of The Toynbee Tiles
Imagine coming across a homemade tile on a city street or sidewalk bearing the enigmatic, four-line message of “TOYNBEE IDEA IN MOVIE 2001 RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPITER.” Now imagine coming across dozens of such tiles. Starting in 1994 on the East Coast, Justin Duerr did, and wondered what it meant. The more he encountered […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Last Hard Men / Sky Riders
Neither, however, was really all that good. “The Last Hard Men” — snicker, snicker — is an update of the traditional Western, in which Coburn sets himself free of a prison chain gang using a railroad spike so he can exact revenge on a retired lawman (Charlton Heston, gruff as ever and hiding behind one monster […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Last Hard Men / Sky Riders
Neither, however, was really all that good. “The Last Hard Men” — snicker, snicker — is an update of the traditional Western, in which Coburn sets himself free of a prison chain gang using a railroad spike so he can exact revenge on a retired lawman (Charlton Heston, gruff as ever and hiding behind one monster […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Bobby Fischer Against the World
The man was Bobby Fischer, a notoriously private guy who nonetheless became a global superstar in 1972 for unseating Russia’s Boris Spassky for the world championship in chess, so perhaps it’s not so inappropriate that a documentary about his life begin unfolding to the famous funk groove of Isaac Hayes’ “Shaft.” For a brief time, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Bobby Fischer Against the World
The man was Bobby Fischer, a notoriously private guy who nonetheless became a global superstar in 1972 for unseating Russia’s Boris Spassky for the world championship in chess, so perhaps it’s not so inappropriate that a documentary about his life begin unfolding to the famous funk groove of Isaac Hayes’ “Shaft.” For a brief time, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Captain America / Captain America II: Death Too Soon
The bigger question — to me, at least — was, “Hey, what about those two equally terrible but highly amusing made-for-TV movies CBS aired in the late ’70s?” The good people at Shout! Factory must have heard my cries, piggybacking off the summer hit’s home-vid release with a two-fer DVD of 1979’s “Captain America” and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Captain America / Captain America II: Death Too Soon
The bigger question — to me, at least — was, “Hey, what about those two equally terrible but highly amusing made-for-TV movies CBS aired in the late ’70s?” The good people at Shout! Factory must have heard my cries, piggybacking off the summer hit’s home-vid release with a two-fer DVD of 1979’s “Captain America” and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Brevity, thy name is Sundance
In its continued celebration of stories, per Robert Redford’s introductory narration, the Sundance Institute has packaged seven acclaimed short films from its 2011 festival into one feature-length presentation. The results screen Thursday through Sunday at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, and as with many such loosely themed compilations, the results comprise a mixed bag. […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Rise of the Planet of the Apes
And that would be a bad thing, because “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” hoses off any stink Burton left behind. It’s one of the year’s nicest surprises. An origin story to the sci-fi franchise that began on the big screen in 1968, “Rise” draws upon story elements of 1972’s “Conquest of the Planet […]