The United States, though special for many reasons (the invention of rap-rock being just one of the litany), is not known as a cultural mecca. We’re in no way culturally bereft; it’s just that we lack the centuries of honed tradition and societal cohesiveness to really back up our cultural…

Hollywood can do a lot of things with special effects these days: Alien ships fly across the sky with no strings attached, dogs talk and Tom Cruise is tall. Not surprisingly, movies with a big special effects budget tend to be lacking in other areas, like script and character development…

Funny runs through the blood of the Sedaris family like corny flows through the Osmonds. Through the immensely popular works by David Sedaris, many of us are aware of the antics of the family, as their dirty laundry has been aired time and time again in Sedaris’ short stories, essays…

I find it fascinating that once Oprah declared environmentalism suitable for the masses the way she did with literacy, it suddenly became cool to talk about your carbon footprint and recycling programs over dinner. It’s really too bad Oprah didn’t clear her couch of polygamists and diet gurus 20 years…

One of the best day trips this metroplex has to offer Dallas residents is to Fort Worth on the Trinity Rail Express, a few short bus connections (or a ride from a Fort Worth-based friend) and a stop at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. Once there, you can…

You get the feeling that back in the day, Liza Minnelli was the girl to party with. Not the bland, vapid Lindsay Lohan-type, but the kind of girl Perez Hilton would have lived and died for—the cerebral, storied partier: the girl with issues, with an undeniable image, with questionable taste…

Canadians—our mild-mannered neighbors to the north—are so irreverent. I did a Google search on Canadian comedians and the words “groundbreaking” and “irreverent” popped up on nearly every result. British comedy is bawdy and dry, American comedy has its moments (Dane Cook excepted), but the Canucks have the market on irreverent…

The Wedding Singer is not a guilty pleasure for me. I don’t feel the least bit bad about counting it among my all-time favorite films. Sure, I know there are better acted films out there, and I’m fully aware that Adam Sandler is not really a subtle, nuanced performer, but…

There’s a scene in The Magnificent Seven that sticks with you. It’s an ambush scene, where the heroes of the movie fall into a trap that nobody sees coming, and it’s so flawlessly executed on film that you feel every bit as surprised and taken off guard as the characters…

Igor Malijevsky is a jack of all trades. And not one of those “master of none” types, either. He’s a true Renaissance man; a recognized artist, photographer, writer, poet, theoretical physicist and philosopher. Being good at so many different things gives you options when you get fed up with one,…

Matt Foley has been reincarnated. Chris Farley’s beloved motivational speaker has emerged from the van down by the river and found a fresh reinterpretation via Ed Forman, an equally greasy and disheveled looking guy who hosts his own live (non-televised) talk show. Forman, the alter-ego of comedian Aaron Ross, brings…

Ah, Run Lola Run—the movie responsible for the sale of thousands of bottles of Manic Panic Pillarbox Red dye. More importantly, though, the film was a groundbreaker in the genre of “real time” entertainment, paving the way for 24 and other clock-ticking, heart-pounding action-adventure stories. Granted, Jack Bauer has never…

More than two years later, it still stuns. The gravity of the situation in New Orleans can be revealed to us, brought back to the forefront of our thoughts, in any number of ways: an Anthony Bourdain special, a Spike Lee documentary, a newspaper series, an art exhibit. Yet, it…

The Counterfeiters may be a Holocaust movie by virtue of its setting and plot, but it actually reads as a morality tale that is truly food for thought in this age of twisted ethics and “every man for himself”-style schadenfreude. The film features a group of miscreants in a concentration…

I have, on occasion, been accused of being a music snob. Sure, I’ve spent most of the last five years on a crusade for a rare Bedhead 7-inch. And maybe I choked up when I heard that My Bloody Valentine was reuniting (whatever that means). However, I really consider myself…

I have, on occasion, been accused of being a music snob. Sure, I’ve spent most of the last five years on a crusade for a rare Bedhead 7-inch. And maybe I choked up when I heard that My Bloody Valentine was reuniting (whatever that means). However, I really consider myself…

The British birthright brings with it a love of bland food and sugary sweets, twee Scottish pop outfits, frothy beer, gory serial killer dramas and tacky Brit-coms. And no Brit-com is tackier than the gloriously politically incorrect Are You Being Served?, a celebration of double entendre, lewdness and general lascivious…

If you were one of the brave few who sat through all 12 hours’ worth of Best Picture nominees at your local AMC theater, I salute you and your numb ass. In the interest of being able to tell everyone at your Oscar party that you’ve seen them all, and…

Let’s just say that you’re the President of the United States. It’s a stressful job and your limited experience as a project manager for a software company has ill prepared you for managing a nation’s budget and hobnobbing with foreign diplomats. You’re facing a record budget shortfall and something’s gotta…

I just spent half an hour reading Wikipedia to refresh my memory on Persephone, Greek goddess of the underworld. Too bad this is about Persepolis, which has nothing to do with Greece. At least I feel smarter. Luckily, having a little bit of working knowledge of the burgeoning graphic novel…

There’s a scene in any good documentary of Janis Joplin where she returns with a camera crew to her home town of Port Arthur, Texas, to attend her high school reunion. She’s decked out in full Janis regalia: feather boas, beads, frizzy hair…the whole nine yards. Janis does a few…

There aren’t a lot of past and present members of the Bush administration that I care to know anything about. Maybe I’d like to know where Condoleezza Rice got those kickin’ shoes she was sporting on Meet the Press the other day. Or perhaps I’d like to know if Dick…