Yo’ Mama…

When Y Tu Mamá También debuted on American screens in 2002, nobody had big expectations for the Mexican film with the funny title that translates “And Your Mother Too.” Once buzz leaked that the road movie about two teenage boys and an older woman featured lots of sex, beautiful cinematography,…

Nowhere Man

The brain is a beguiling thing. One evening, you’re talking to a friend on the phone. Sometime later, you find yourself in a subway car, passing through an urban landscape. You don’t recognize the buildings, the neighborhood or the city. Don’t know why you’re on the train. Don’t even know…

It’s a Crime

Given Inside Man’s bullpen (director Spike Lee, stars Denzel Washington and Jodie Foster), moment in political history and advertising, you could be forgiven for anticipating some kind of socially relevant, perhaps even politically volatile dramatic smash-up–something with teeth, ambition, a functioning cerebrum and a lusty relationship with reality. But those…

Suspended Sentence

As scientific advances have made forensic DNA matching a reality, a new field has emerged in criminal justice: exoneration. In cases where relevant biological evidence has been preserved, innocent inmates who’ve been serving time for decades suddenly have cause for hope. If a prisoner can manage to get legal help,…

Bland Illusion

There probably aren’t that many movie stars capable of retaining their charisma after a stroke has rendered them nigh-incoherent. But based on Illusion, Kirk Douglas doesn’t seem to have lost a step. He still has that intensity he always had, and even though he’s at the stage of his career…

Jingle Hell

It can’t be easy making films about war. It’s so inherently dramatic that, as a setting for art, it’s overdetermined; it drips with meaning even before the first scenes are set. And so much has been said already: War is hell. War is noble. War is surreal. War is absurd,…

Capsule Reviews

Evan Daniel Lintermans’ Mountain Paintings Lintermans’ space-age paintings of Mount McKinley augur a nimble and brainy future for the new gallery Road Agent. If small quantities are a mark of high quality, then this show receives high marks for good stuff. Six acrylic-on-Plexiglas paintings hang on the walls of Road…

Capsule Reviews

Macbeth Theatre Britain revs up the spooky old Scottish play with speed, sex and S&M-inspired costumes. Steve Pounders plays the ambitious Thane of Cawdor, determined to murder his way to the top job as king of Scotland. Down go Macduff, Duncan and several more rivals, stabbed, poisoned and otherwise offed…

Lay On, MacBuff

Who knew Macbeth could be so hot? Theatre Britain, that plucky little company so skilled at staging farces and Christmas pantos for the kiddies, now brings forth Shakespeare’s bloodiest play in a production at the Trinity River Arts Center that strips away everything that isn’t absolutely necessary. That includes the…

Masked and Misunderstood

What’s sooo terribly unsettling about a burn victim who can really blow a tune who prefers to keep to himself (sort of) and live under an opera house? Nothing…until he has to go and turn completely illogical. After all, who wouldn’t fashion a pasty, nightmare-inducing mask to cover up those…

A Head of Art

When I think of art, I immediately think “loin, fatback, shank, strip and sparerib.” You know, overall slaughter. OK, maybe not normally, but it’s hard not to when looking at Mirka Hokkanen’s Manipulated, hanging through April 2 at the Continental Gallery of Deep Ellum’s Continental Lofts building, 3311 Elm St…

Queen of the Castle

An argument can be made that no female writer has been more influential than newspaper columnist Heloise, “every housewife’s friend.” The uses of vinegar and the best stain removers! Organization tips and getting burned food out of a pan! Daughter Poncé took up the mantle of Queen of Household Tips…

Swords and Swashes

I don’t know why I never saw The Three Musketeers. Something with Charlie Sheen, Kiefer Sutherland and Chris O’Donnell in tights has got to be good, especially if they’re playing swashbuckling swordsmen named Aramis, Athos and D’Artagnan respectively, and especially if, according to IMDB, “jokes and stunts are the expected…

Plano: Prim And Bookish

I’m a lot of things, but I ain’t frontin’. I don’t try to be sumpin’ I’m not. I ain’t got nothin’ to hide…unlike the City of Plano. Our northerly suburban neighbors would have you believe not only that they know how to read but that they celebrate the activity to…

Bloomin’ Sunday

With such a mild winter this year, it’s hard to imagine seasons at all. You always hear that Texas weather can change on the turn of a dime, but in reality it just goes from muggy to hot and back again. Before the dreaded summer arrives and the muggy disappears,…

Da Bombay!

With Wilonsky being the movie guy here, the rest of us cinemaniacs just stand in his shadow. I’m not even sure who the other movie buffs are, but ‘’m going to go ahead and stake my claim as the second go-to (yet unofficial) movie guy around here. I might be…

Marchin’ On

We’ve never heard of World Theatre Day, but if we had to come up with a parade commemorating a “holiday,” we couldn’t do any better than the upcoming Masked March on Main. Featuring a G-rated, if creepy, blend of masked performers, puppets and children, the Masked March is a part…

A French Tickler

If you’ve never heard of Audrey Tautou, you will after May 19 when the screen adaptation of The Da Vinci Code debuts. The French ingénue will hopefully muster enough charm to distract you from the slicked-back reptilian mullet on top of Tom Hanks’ head. If you want to be able…

Late Night CONTACT

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, for more than 38 years, the crisis prevention organization CONTACT has taken thousands of phone calls to help callers deal with “loneliness, anxiety, relationship problems, domestic violence, depression and suicide.””These are problems with which even a casual viewer…

Waiter, Waiter!

Who wouldn’t like to boss around celebrity chef Stephan Pyles? He and more than two dozen local celebrities will be dishing out food and fun at the 12th Annual Celebrity Waiter Gala benefiting the Child Abuse Prevention Center. Thrill to former Oakland Raider and Heisman Trophy winner Tim Brown dashing…

Not So Junky

Each March, the Fort Worth Symphony League hosts one of the biggest and best garage sales around. Yeah, the violinists and French horns cough up some second-hand treasures, but because donations are collected throughout the community, there’s plenty of quality junk like antiques, books, housewares, electronics, tools, home décor and…

Ringo-Less Rails

There are all kinds of things that pop up in my everyday life to remind me that of the 50 percent of the Beatles left on Earth, 50 percent of that 50 percent are lame. I’m looking at you, Ringo. Paul’s the only thing I have left—and what is he…