Not content as one of the world’s foremost cartoonists (don’t call her a graphic novelist—she loathes that designation), Marjane Satrapi has now made the leap into directing movies, starting with an animated adaptation of her highly acclaimed Persepolis. This modestly budgeted film is a brilliant hybrid of black-and-white and color, fable and memoir, at turns … Read more
Every day, a hundred thousand people travel through the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, lugging an astonishing quantity of stuff. They leave for vacations, board connecting flights, and come home from business trips. About 5,000 times a year, they leave things behind. They leave cell phones and carry-ons. They leave prayer rugs and acupuncture instruments and snow … Read more
Darfur, Minnesota, population 137, doesn’t have a newspaper or a café, but news still gets around. Ask at the bank, and they’ll show you the town’s hundred-year anniversary publication, which lists the history and members of every club, business, and family who’s been here since 1903. And if there’s important news for everyone in town, … Read more
Echo Bodine, a south Minneapolis psychic, sees it in people’s auras. She sees it in the number of angels and spiritual guides hovering around the living (“So many!”). She sees it in the number of calamities and catastrophes, and the number of people laid off, divorced, and dying. According to Bodine these signs all point … Read more
That first hit made my brain tingle. And so, a few days later, I found myself reaching again for the can of enriched oxygen—just a few huffs before heading to the gym. Normally, those initial minutes of exercise are somewhat skull-rattling. On this occasion, however, I bounced along the cushioned surface of a gentle high, … Read more
Larry Berle is perhaps the friendliest guy on the planet. He seems to know everyone I know, plus most everyone else, too. He accomplishes this in a couple of ways. He gets you to introduce all your friends to him, and then he actually remembers their names, what they do, where their kids go to … Read more
BUSINESS On the other hand, we recommend that you call Duluth “Paris.”A New York marketing research firm hired by Meet Minneapolis, the Minneapolis Convention and Visitors Association, to help with a branding campaign for Minneapolis and St. Paul came up with the suggestion that Minneapolis and St. Paul refer to themselves in their marketing materials … Read more
Years ago, comedian Bill Murray was talking with the press about great careers, longevity, and what really defines success. Murray had had several hits at the time, made good money, was considered for practically every big-budget comedy script in town, and by any Hollywood standard was the envy of his peers. "But I want to … Read more
I work out at the Y five or six times a week, so I see a lot of naked women. There are very elderly ones who stand crookedly in the shower, bones protruding, washing their thinning, silver hair. Others have bodies so wrinkled, the folds of skin fall like ripples from their shoulders to their … Read more