Way back when, I wrote the music column for my friend Christine Renaud’s express and upfront magazines, dedicated to “art, entertainment & life” in Prince Edward County. This review is very typical of my style at the time (or lack thereof!). I really can’t be arsed to edit it. Remember
Continue readingTag: review
Yappa Ding Ding: What Makes a Great Superhero Movie?
A few hours ago I plunked myself down in a movie theater, 3D glasses on nose, popcorn and diet coke to hand, ready to watch an action movie that got 93% on Rotten Tomatoes – The Avengers. And I was bored. The movie was packed with great actors doing fine
Continue readingPaulitical Satire: The Avengers Movie Review – #FF – Follow-Friday
The Avengers – A great movie worth seeing! So, I’m going to write this blog in two sections, and then post it all Friday morning. Some of it is being written on my way to my special advanced screening (yup, advanced….like at 7pm! thanks twitter!) and some of it will
Continue readingmark a rayner | scribblings, squibs & sundry monkey joys: The Fellowship of the Ring
Not to be confused with the movie, the book version of The Fellowship of the Ring includes several scenes with the mysterious, and quite possibly brain damaged, Tom Bombadil. On the positive side, Tom saves the hapless hobbits twice: first … Continue reading →
Continue readingPaulitical Satire: Newspaper Wars – The Grid vs. Now Magazine
Now and The Grid face off in the newspaper wars So, when I first got to Toronto there were mainly two weekly publications, both publishing on Thursday, that went after the “twenty to thirty something” cohort of readers. They were “Now Magazine” and “Eye Weekly“. Now, there were MANY other
Continue readingPaulitical Satire: #FF – Music Review – Bahamas "Barchords"
So, we’ve been doing a lot of politics lately, budget season tends to do that to me, but I promised diversity of content, and dammit, I will deliver!I’ve decided that reviewing albums is a perfectly fun and reasonable thing to do together, so I’ve picked a reasonably new Canadian release
Continue readingArt Threat: Thomas Waugh flirts with fantasy while fucking reality – An analysis of Out/Lines and Lust Unearthed
[Forward: When I saw that Arsenal Pulp Press had these two books on hand I immediately thought of Tyler. A thoughtful writer, Tyler had the pleasure of meeting Thomas Waugh last summer, and I knew he’d have an interesting perspective on both Out/Lines and Lust Unearthed. He certainly delivered. The
Continue readingYappa Ding Ding: Robert Lepage Wrecked the Ring Cycle
He had help. CostumesThroughout, the costumes were an unfortunate distraction. They didn’t enhance the characterization or help to set a tone or place. They were unflattering. Poor Waltraud Meier, who played a thrilling Waltraute in Gotterdammerung, had a bodice about three inches too low for her age, and the typically
Continue readingCanada II: Canada’s Access to Information Act
Let’s get some information out concerning the access to information process currently available in Canada. For those looking for intimate legal details here is the Access to Information Act itself. The forms to fill out are available online from the Treasury Board of Canada’s web site: Access to Information Request
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: The Year In Dirty Energy: Fracking
Earthjustice-Fracking.jpg The practice of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) has taken center stage this year as one of the most important environmental threats facing North America (and increasingly in other parts of the world). Thanks to inadequate state oversight and Dick Cheney's hamstringing of EPA oversight with the Halliburton Loophole, fracking has
Continue readingThings Are Good: Guest Post: Review of an Artobiography
After reading Tina Collen’s book Storm of the I: An Artobiography
(Art Review Press, 2009), I am left with a delightful and very real sense of the value of simplicity.
Collen’s creative memoir takes us from her childhood and youth in New York and her relationship with her family, to her life in Aspen with her […]
Art Threat: Politics play prominently at the 54th Venice Biennale
Water is the political motif for a significant number of works and death stalks the corridors of the Venice Biennale.
Continue readingknitnut.net: A fan of The Fan
We went to see The Fan in Strathcona Park last night. It’s Odyssey Theatre’s 25th anniversary production.
The Fan is a big fat rollicking farce with lots of big, over-the-top personalities, humour and movement. It’s about romance, rivalries and rumours in a tiny Italian village in the 18th century.
This was a terrific way to spend […]
Continue readingArt Threat: Hot Docs 19 begins – Toronto festival brings another round of quality documentary
A first look at some promising political offerings from this year’s Hot Docs program.
Continue readingbastard.logic: Unintended Consequences, Redux
by matttbastard (Photo: Paul Keller, Flickr) Jane Mayer on the sudden prominence of ex-W speechwriter (and current Hiatt-approved pro-torture propagandist*) Marc Thiessen and why those who don’t pop wood for enhanced interrogation [sic] should be wary: The publication of “Courting Disaster” suggests that Obama’s avowed … Continue reading →