2006 Family”?friendly movies often get a bum rap, and deservedly so, for being exercises in blandness. Consequently, an exceptional family flick like “Akeelah and the Bee” is cause for real celebration. Keke Palmer portrays Akeelah, an 11″?year”?old girl growing up in the hardscrabble environs of South Central Los Angeles. Burdened with being smart and witty, […]
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Hard Candy
2006 With a premise taken straight from “Dateline NBC” (handsome 32-year-old guy ensnares uncomfortably mature 14-year-old girl via sexually suggestive Internet chats), director David Slade’s ickily effective “Hard Candy” can’t sustain the nerve-fraying tension of its early scenes, falling prey to blustery, breathless monologues as the film’s climax drags on. Despite its collapse in the […]
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ATL
2006 Amid the journey from rap and hip-hop to the red carpet and Hollywood, one of the more promising personalities to make the switch is Tip Harris, better known in music circles as T.I. The Atlanta rapper stars in “ATL,” an engaging coming-of-age picture that successfully manages to rejuvenate a shopworn formula. Harris plays […]
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The Maid
2005 Billed as Singapore’s first “homegrown” horror movie, “The Maid” is an intriguing blend of ghost movie staples with superior acting and a fascinating background which will be unknown to most Western viewers. A pretty Filipina (Alessandra de Rossi) arrives in Singapore on the first day of the seventh month of the Chinese calendar, […]
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The Notorious Bettie Page
2006 Nearly 50 years since her radiant smile and razor-sharp bangs last graced a girlie mag, Bettie Page still holds an inexorable mystique over popular culture. Her “naughty but nice” persona “? the Fifties pin”?up queen was as comfortable projecting sunny sexiness as she was posing in bondage garb “? is at the heart […]
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John Mayer-Continuum
Columbia . Those who continue to dismiss John Mayer as an acoustic heartthrob are missing the bigger picture’ he’s still capable of penning a wrenching ballad, but his scope of vision encompasses so much more than making high school girls cry. “Continuum,” Mayer’s third and most accomplished effort to date, is a superb artistic statement […]
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OutKast-Idlewild
Jive “Hey Ya!” was probably the worst thing that could’ve happened to OutKast.The mega-enormo 2003 single catapulted the Atlanta duo’ Andre 3000 and Big Boi’ from avant hip-hopsters creating intense masterpieces to a mainstream pop act; in short, a pair of artists once comfortably under the radar were now undone by their own ambitious achievement. […]
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Devo 2.0-Self Titled
Disney The signs were there when Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo began composing for children’s films like “The Rugrats Movie.” It should come as no surprise that something like “Devo 2.0” would eventually arise. Devo 2.0, a group of 10- to 13-year-olds, sings the Devo classics and a couple of new tracks by Mothersbaugh and fellow […]
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Justin Timberlake-FutureSex/LoveSounds
Jive Few artists have invested more energy in freeing themselves from their past than Justin Timberlake; his fierce determination to demolish his pretty-boy pop image is, at times, awe-inspiring’ having successfully stepped out on his own with 2002’s “Justified,” Timberlake spent the intervening years jet-setting, holding court with Cameron Diaz and remaining one of the […]
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Thee Emergency-Can You Dig It?
Blue Disguise If high-octane garage rock mixed with R&B is your thing, Seattle’s Thee Emergency is a must-hear band. Unlike many post-punk bands, Thee Emergency’s latest, “Can You Dig It?,” is not filled with lyrically lacking tripe set to crunching guitars and infectious hooks. To be certain, the band knows how to rock out, […]