Kekexili comes out of the Chinese neo-realist tradition. But unlike recent films like Blind Shaft or The World, Kekexili feels a lot more commercially-minded. Maybe it is the minimal but effective string score. Maybe it’s the shot of desperate men on a wild goose chase disappearing right before our eyes like magic. Maybe it is […]
When you’re one of the greatest pianists in the world at the moment, you can play to one of the great venues in the world, UCLA’s Royce Hall, and expect to get a few curtain calls. Well, all Yundi Li got was one at Thursday night’s concert during which he played an encore of a rather […]
Friends With Money is wonderful little film that is about conversations in cars, kitchens, restaurants, living rooms, and shops. It is about how money and happiness are not the same and how friendships can transcend class. It is about how open-ended all of our lives are with no one answer or goal that can be […]
The new film Thank You For Smoking is a film about talking. Our main character, Nick Naylor, tells us that his job is to talk. And he does that pretty much throughout the entire film, never letting anyone do any thinking on their own. The beauty of this talking though is that he flatters you […]
After the first three months of 2006, I guess it’s time to report the best of the first quarter of 2006. Or is that a bit to compulsive? Oh well.
Music
1. The Knife - Silent Shout (although I’ve now heard this many times as it has lost its novelty, it definitely fulfills the Bjork-Northern European electronica […]
