Randall Wallace is a curious guy. Raised in Tennessee and schooled at Duke, he put himself through a year of divinity school by teaching karate, wrote songs for a while in Nashville, and managed shows at Opryland. Then he kicked into high gear by writing the script for Mel Gibson's...
A few steps from the metal turnstile gates that spin you from one country to another, the banter begins. The narrow calle that visitors are funneled into as they make their way into Mexico is lined with farmacias. Men in white coats stand outside and shout over one another to...
8/12-8/31 Jen and Scott Sanders, owners of the Paper Heart, 750 Grand Avenue, pride themselves on providing something for everyone. So any pop-cultural pimp worth his or her weight in Hot Topic gear will find something of interest at the joint, be it Argentinean tango lessons or alt-rock shows. Similar...
THU 9 Sure, the Bard charmed our pants off (along with fair Gwyneth's) when he was Shakespeare in Love, but -- let's face it -- most of the time, he was Shakespeare in a Homicidal Mindset. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern -- just two of the casualties in the blood bath that...
You know how fear is scary? Well, director E. Elias Merhige is into that, especially in his new serial-killer thriller Suspect Zero. Absent, however, is the dark-comic malevolence the director smartly cultivated in his successful and disquieting Shadow of the Vampire a few years ago, bullied and bulldozed out of...
THU 12 The Invincible Czars -- an Austin quartet with a thing for mixing buzzing guitars with accordions and horns -- buzz into town Thursday, August 12, for a show at the Emerald Lounge, 1514 North Seventh Avenue. The Czars play a mean set of "indie-riffic-mathrockery to Eastern-European folk idioms,"...
". . . Welcome back to Entertainment Tonight, I'm Mary Hart! It's been an up-and-down year for Hollywood's famed Coppola family, and no one knows that better than Robert Carmine, actor and lead singer of the alternative-pop group Rooney, and son of Rocky co-star Talia Shire, whose brother, of course,...
Deep in the dangerous wasteland of America, far removed from civilization, there exists a community driven by fear, sworn to isolationism. They loathe outsiders, whom they regard as terrifying monsters. They make up strange rituals to guard themselves against the vast world beyond their borders. And while they may feast...
America's Heart & Soul, the debut feature from commercial director Louis Schwartzberg, is being depicted in some quarters as the antidote to Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, mostly because it's a documentary, being released around the same time, about the USA. For more simplistic minds who equate anti-Bush sentiment with hatred...
All you need to know about Spider-Man 2 is revealed in the opening credits, in which comic-book artist Alex Ross recaps the 2002 original in lovingly, lavishly painted panels. Spidey and Mary Jane Watson are once again entangled in that now-iconic upside-down kiss; nutty Norman Osborn, out of Green Goblin...
So let's get this straight: You're a much-loved comedian who just did a low-budget, multi-award-winning film with an acclaimed up-and-coming director. In recent years, thanks in part to your work with the younger, edgier filmmaking set, you're starting to be taken seriously as an actor. You even managed to score...
Sat 5/22 Carlos Urtubey, a baritone of Colombian descent, tells the story of one of the zarzuela duets (lyric Spanish theater) he'll perform -- "Canta Mendigo Errante" -- on Saturday, May 22, at the Phoenix Center for the Arts. "That song is about a Gypsy who sings to try to...
Sun 5/9 Despite their five-game win streak, as well as a likely berth in the Arena Football League playoffs, the Arizona Rattlers will play what may be their final home game of the season at America West Arena on Sunday, May 9, against their Western Division rivals, the San Jose...
As a proud sponsor of the Colin Farrell media blitz, Intermission opens on the lad's salable mug, basically sporting the same buzz-cut 'n' tats look from his punky cameo in Veronica Guerin. It's a cunning editorial move, pushing the product from the get-go, yet it gets interesting as Farrell's dumb...
Here's a subject with which no one should ever have to grapple: Is this new version of The Punisher, starring Thomas Jane as the comic-book assassin, better than the 1989 adaptation with Dolph Lundgren? They both offer slight variations on a tale first told in a 1974 Spider-Man comic, where...
Gordon McGuire reaches into the back of his mother's fridge and pulls out the front part of his right foot. After eight months in formaldehyde, the skin on the body part is ghostly white. The piece of foot is the size and shape of a turkey wing. The skin is...
The good news first: I've recently had the pleasure of eating at the hippest new sushi joint in the Valley, with maki rolls so innovative, and yet professionally prepared, that I'd almost be willing to move upstairs from the place so that I could get my daily fix. Now the...
Sun 2/29 Face it -- the invite to Sunday's 76th Academy Awards wasn't lost in the mail. So instead of spending a king's ransom on Vera Wang couture or an Armani tux in hopes of sneaking in, better go with Plan B. The Oscar Night America Gala at the Ritz-Carlton...
In the beginning, there was The Evil Dead, and Stephen King looked down upon it and saw that it was good. Then God said, "Let there be Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn, that the message of writer-director Sam Raimi be spread across the land!" So it was written, so...
Oh dear. Angelina Jolie's made another bad film. Is it too soon to give up on her yet? There's no denying that Angelina's sexy as hell. The tattoos, the knife collection, the exhibitionist streak, the bisexual vibe she gives off . . . totally hot, no question. Given her work...
Robby Hammock remembers his every glorious hop, skip and jump into the arms of Randy Johnson after the Perfect Game last month. "I know I looked like Mini-Me out there on the mound, but I was so flippin' excited," says Hammock, the unlikely starting catcher of the Arizona Diamondbacks and...
"Michael Caine is a revelation!" declares the Jeffrey Lyons quote currently appearing on ads for The Statement. Lyons is right, but not in the way you might expect. Indeed, Caine's performance here is revelatory -- who knew he could be this boring? Insufferable, yes -- Oscar aside, his mangled "American"...
