Plot aside — way aside, as it’s almost a non-issue in a film that telegraphs its final scenes during its opening moments — Bandits is really about only one thing: Billy Bob Thornton and Bruce Willis’ bald heads. As Joe Blake (Willis) and Terry Collins (Thornton), two bank-robbing fugitives in…
Ed Ellis and Bob Kubota, who do card tricks, do them in the same way that Vincent van Gogh, who did paintings, did sunflowers: masterfully. They pull cards out of the air and link rubber bands with the same elegance and verve that van Gogh brought to his brush; with…
Just as the rest of the country is harvesting the last of summer’s abundance and preparing for winter, our local farmers swing into high gear. Celebrate the off-kilter Arizona growing season with a visit to one of the Valley’s local farmers’ markets. What makes a farmers’ market better than the…
Long before the economy took its most recent nosedive, the state of the contemporary art scene in the Valley of the Sun could be labeled as pretty abysmal. Only a handful of decent contemporary galleries still open their doors, especially ones willing or financially able to show the work of…
T he truest test of any great piece of theater — or any drama whose title is routinely appended with a superlative, has been produced for years on Broadway to great critical acclaim, or been handed any kind of trophy — is to release it for public performance. Dropped onto…
Before he was editor in chief at Marvel Comics–which, by all rights, makes him the man who tells Spider-Man what he can do with himself and the X-Men where to go–Joe Quesada illustrated a comic book titled Ash. The title did not last long; there was, perhaps, little market for…
This may be a strange time to release a thriller about the dangers of corrupt law enforcement, but Training Day — with no explosions, no cheap thrills, no international conspiracies — is about as distant from current East Coast realities as possible. Still, that doesn’t mean that it qualifies as…
Serendipity already feels archaic, like some dusty relic that’s been unearthed from an antique store attic and polished off for display. It reeks of quaint and cute, from its gauzy panoramas of Manhattan at Christmastime to its tattered plot of lovers bound by destiny to its scenes of travelers casually…
It’s generally considered a violation of the unwritten code of film criticism to reveal anything that happens more than halfway into a movie, let alone near the end. But these are unusual circumstances, and anyone attending Stephen Frears’ new film Liam this weekend should really be forewarned. If you think…
Broadway’s Tony Awards — a celebration of New York theater’s best — is not the first place you’d look for controversy. But the award of the coveted Best Musical for 2000 to Susan Stroman’s Contact stirred up some serious debate: Some critics claimed that Contact, which won four Tonys (not…
Arizona cowboy Cody Hancock rides bulls. It’s something that he loves to do and that his father did before him. It’s also how he makes a living. When Hancock, a national champion, is asked why he’s riding in the Justin Boots Bucking Thunder Tour, he says, a little too quickly:…
Rene Balcer, like you and everyone you know, can’t stop talking about what we now refer to simply as The Attack. We may resume our lives, fall back into our routine until it again feels mundane and comforting, but sooner or later, The Attack becomes the only topic of conversation…
“Stories and Souvenirs,” an exhibition of documentary and portrait photography now lining the walls of ASU’s Northlight Gallery, inspires confidence that classic film-based photography, as practiced by camera masters in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s, still survives and thrives, despite the world’s present predisposition to All Things Deeply Digital.Located in…
The cynic may notice only how Hearts in Atlantis plays like a Stephen King best-of compilation, a reheating of familiar stories and favorite themes. At times, it feels so much like Stand by Me — with its nostalgic, flashback tale of cherubs and bullies accompanied by sad and weary narration…
Combine teenage angst with suburban emptiness and you’ve got a movie formula with an appreciable advantage over some other current movie formulas — particularly in the eyes of those who believe the American family has disintegrated and most of us are headed for eternal damnation. This is not to say…
Fred Ho, a kick-ass composer and baritone saxophonist, is also a formidable political activist against racism. A New Yorker, he was in San Francisco on September 10, giving a benefit concert for the Jericho Amnesty Movement. He flew home late that night, just in time to wake up to the…
On Oscar night, do you ever wonder why you’ve rarely heard of, much less seen, any of the nominees for Best Foreign Film? Let’s be frank. Phoenix is not a hotbed of international cinema. But this weekend, the first Scottsdale International Film Festival provides an opportunity to catch up with…
As soon as you walk in the door, you can tell that Cowtown Skateboards is run by a bunch of skateboard-loving purists. What gives us that notion? Ah, could it be the unavoidable wall-o-boards, covered from floor to ceiling in colorful, shiny new decks? Everything else in the store is…
Parents can get a bite in edgewise at Chevys because the kids will be happily occupied with an assortment of activities. Chevys goes beyond the standard crayons-and-placemat handouts, throwing in a ball of raw tortilla dough (sometimes the crayons are stuck in it) that doubles as Play-Doh when the placemat…
Never having another kid’s birthday party at home, even if the stains did come out of the rug after the umpteenth cleaning? Looking for something more memorable and, God forbid, more meaningful than cardboard pizza and head-splitting video games at the usual locales? For little ones 10 and older, this…
This wonderful store with the awkward name (most patrons just call it “Piggy” and leave it at that) has the funkiest, hippest collection of clothes for the preschool and grade-school set. Grown women have been heard requesting some of the more fashion-forward girls’ items in grown-up sizes, but the real…
