I’m impressed by anyone who spends years to make a feature film and achieves their vision, but more than often, the end result is unsuccessful as a narrative. The Texas-lensed drama “Between Heaven and Hell” is another example “? its heart is in the right place, but the amateurish talent can’t pull it off. As […]
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Posted inArts & Culture
The Disappearance of Alice Creed
Gemma Arterton delivers such a brave performance in “The Disappearance of Alice Creed” that she deserves to have “Bond girl” stricken from ever appearing before her name again. The Brit thriller marks the feature debut of writer/director J. Blakeson. What he’s cooked up could almost work on the Broadway stage, as it efficiently utilizes three […]
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Shawnee Museum gives back to its community with “A Promise of Home”
Museum of Art has hosted a regional exhibit featuring local artists within a 35-mile radius of Shawnee. Last year, however, Donna Merkt, curator of education, saw a need to get the museum more active in the community. “After three years of the show, we wanted to do something different,” Merkt said. “I wanted the museum […]
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Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman
s still a relevant audience for it.” Brian Hearn, OKCMOA film curator, agreed, and “Visual Acoustics” will play a special engagement at 5:30 p.m. Friday at the museum, 415 Couch. The documentary’s director, Eric Bricker, will be in attendance to introduce his work and answer questions following the screening. Narrated by Dustin Hoffman, the film […]
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Unstoppable
With “Unstoppable,” Tony Scott (“The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3”), a director to whose hyperbolic stylings I am generally immune, and screenwriter Mark Bomback (“Race to Witch Mountain”) have returned to the basics of action filmmaking and concocted a movie that rips along with the speed and power of a runaway train because it’s […]
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Skyline
Some reviews are respectful examinations of a movie’s successes and failures. Others are simply death panels. Guess which kind this is? Brothers Colin and Greg Strause (“Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem”), a pair of crackerjack effects wizards, really want “Skyline” to be the foundation on which a popular franchise can be constructed … and they come […]
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Emerging artists converge for a group show at Mainsite that arrives with much imagination, but no true theme
Gloss and Grime through Dec. 4 Mainsite Contemporary Art 122 E. Main, Norman mainsite-art.com 292-8095 Getting a read on what Mainsite Contemporary Art’s “Gloss and Grime” group show is all about is not easy. Even David Crismon, who helped organize it, called the exhibition a “jambalaya” of artwork, but that’s exactly what he wanted: talented […]
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The Agony and the Ecstasy of Phil Spector
Phil Spector has some crazy ideas. For instance, the legendary music producer known for the “Wall of Sound” approach can’t understand why, every day he shows up for court to be tried for the 2003 murder of actress Lana Clarkson, that the judge has to mention someone died. What’s that all about? And why is […]
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Doctor Who: The Complete Fifth Series
For years, friends have cajoled me to watch the BBC’s current reboot of “Doctor Who.” Because I don’t have BBC America on my cable lineup, I had to make do with what they could show me, which amounted to maybe two episodes, but I liked what I saw. The show’s fifth season “? now available […]
Posted inMusic
Elvis Presley’ Viva Elvis: The Album
That Elvis Presley, he sure is a workhorse! Some three decades and then some following his death, he’s the subject of “Viva Elvis,” a Cirque du Soleil stage show that brings his music … well, if not into the 21st century, then certainly to new heights of spectacle. This 12-tracker is the companion album, and […]