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If New Orleans is a state of mind, this double bill should transport you straight to the land of beads and gumbo … or, if you want to be literal and up-to-date about things, bulldozers and grandstanding. Cajun and zydeco represent two distinctly different moods and sounds of the south, but share a common gift … Read more

In a dizzying five-year spell in the 1940s, Preston Sturges created seven classic madcap comedies, leaving his indelible mark on the history of American cinema. Walker Art Center and Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board bring two of his best to the big, temporary screen in Loring Park as part of their popular Summer Music and … Read more

This film proves what many of us have long heard as apocryphal rumor: The “automobile of the future”—the one that could slow the destruction of the ozone layer and temper the tensions between oil-producing and -consuming nations—actually did exist, right in the U.S. In the 90s, General Motors created the EV-1, a fast, efficient electric … Read more

What do you get when you pair director Richard Linklater with the work of writer Philip K. Dick? A paranoid sci-fi vehicle that could have been called Dazed and Confused 2. Using the much-heralded “interpolated rotoscoping” (which involves doing animation over live-action footage), A Scanner Darkly is the strange story of Fred, a drug dealer … Read more

A couple of years ago, a man at the airport asked us if it would be possible to see the Frank Gehry-designed Weisman Museum during his ninety-minute layover. We cringed in shame; given the sorry state of our mass transit system, ninety minutes would never get him there and back, much less offer time to … Read more

Temple Grandin’s unlikely route to celebrity followed the path of cows to the slaughterhouse. Grandin has an exceptionally visual form of autism; her mind allows her to review memories and observations in a detailed, cinematic mode. She also believes that she thinks the way animals do. Grandin used both these skills to design a chute … Read more

Charles Darwin’s two-hundredth birthday is coming up, and in celebration comes a flurry of books about his life and work. This biography is an absorbing exploration of the life of a man who never allowed himself to be blinded by that which consumed his life—science. Quammen, a nature and travel journalist, who wrote Outside magazine’s … Read more

Gautam Malkani has been called a male Zadie Smith and a Muslim Irvine Welsh, but the six-figure advance this debut novel reportedly earned him should temper any pique these burdensome labels may raise for the Financial Times reporter-turned-novelist. His tale about London’s “Rude Boys,” a breed of young Muslim men jockeying for respect in their … Read more

Judy Blume wrote books about teenagers who felt like freaks in their changing bodies; Francesca Lia Block writes about the kids who truly are freaks, and proud of it. Block writes for adults with the same hazy sense of unreality and suspension of propriety as she did in Weetzie Bat, her story of an adventurous … Read more

Whether it’s sunny or sleeting, any day is a nice day to drive to Hudson for a brick-oven-fired pizza. With thin, chewy, Neapolitan-style crust, fresh-pulled mozzarella, and San Marzano tomatoes, every Brick’s pie has the sassy personality of Pulcinella, the beak-nosed Commedia dell’arte character. Smartly grilled paninis and a round of satisfying salads fill out … Read more