The Dark Knight Returnsby Frank Miller There was a time when Frank Miller was the coolest. No, not the 80s. I’m talking about the mid aughts. Graphic novels began their ascension into cool and adult, the Sin City movie came out and was well received or at least unique, and Frank Miller got a black check of sorts. We all had Frank Miller fever! I had it too! That all quickly vanished when Miller was given a chance to make...
North By Northwest I’ve watched a lot of Hitchcock and Cary Grant movies, and maybe, just maybe, North by Northwest is the best execution of the two. It might be the best Grant or Hitchcock movie period! Look, Notorious is ridiculously overrated and Birds might just be ridiculous. The great thing about North by Northwest is that it strikes a perfect balance of mystery, suspense, humor, and romance. Thornhill is a perfect character in an almost Lebowski-style fashion: an...
Twisters Look, I understand a popcorn movie can only do so much, but you gotta give me something to work with, OK? You gotta give me SOMETHING interesting or new to keep me invested in the plot or the characters or ANYTHING, for that matter. Instead, Twisters is just a middling piece of mediocrity that spins around and around instead of going anywhere. Remember in the 90s when everyone had Twister FEVER? Well, according to Twisters it’s still going...
The Wild RobotCollector’s Edition Boy, this is a tough one to write. Wild Robot is full of things you want from a good movie. It has an interesting plot, cool designs, it’s fun AND funny, has vibrant characters, robots (ok, maybe that one’s just for me) and it’s full of coziness. It’s also full of great performances from the cast. Lupita Nyong’o is able to bring heart to a character who’s supposed to be all brains, and...
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice I’ve always known about Beetlejuice but I never sat down and actually got to know it. That changed last year when I watched (or rewatched? I can’t remember) the first movie and truly hung out with it for a coffee. What struck me was its personality: it was fun going back to a time when Tim Burton was (arguably) more creative and where all this stuff was fresh. The first Beetlejuice is just perfectly cast and as engaging...
Joker: Folie a Deux Does anyone with brains actually like the first Joker movie? I remember watching it, being compelled by Juaquin Phoenix’s performance but just found the whole thing to be equal parts awkward and inelegant. It’s basically a movie about a guy, down on his luck, who snaps and takes matters into his own hands by resorting to violence. It’s a reflection on the audience on whether Joker’s acts were misguided or admirable. I don’t know if Todd...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Here Comes Our Wave LP by The Black Pacific. Now six years after the release of Never Gonna Die, it really doesn’t seem like Pennywise plans on putting out a new album anytime soon – which is a terrible shame. Since they started in 1988, Pennywise was often regarded as the hard-grinding skate punk band seated comfortably at the punk rock head table alongside NOFX, Offspring, Green Day and Bad Religion...
X Smoke & Fiction (Fat Possum Records)Smoke & Fiction was one of the most important records of 2024. How? Let me count the ways. For one it was, just plainly on the surface, a record that did many things and did them well. Compared to both rock and punk music it sounded fresh, yet undeniably familiar. It also managed to be both fun and urgent, and musically it was catchy as hell. Blame that on guitarist Billy Zoom’s rockabilly tendencies...
The Hilken Mancini Band I wasn’t expecting to have drinks with Hilken Mancini two days before Thanksgiving, but there we were. I’m not name-dropping, it happens. We were there because she insisted on meeting me in person to give me a copy of her excellent new record by the Hilken Mancini Band. She’s still looking for a better name, by the way, if you happen to have one. And she was giving me a copy because I needed to review...
BeatKodak Center, Rochester NYOctober 19, 2024I saw King Crimson in 1981 on the Discipline tour and, to this day, it ranks as the best concert I have ever seen. (Followed by a close second place of Crimson in 2021.) So I was eager to see this version of that tour and snatched up tickets as fast as I could, when they became available. If you’re not familiar, Beat consists of Adrian Belew (guitar and lead vocals) and Tony Levin (bass)...