Worthington, Minnesota native O’Brien is best known as one of the more insightful writers to emerge out of the Vietnam War, chronicling the ongoing cost of the conflict in books like The Things They Carried , In the Lake of the Woods , and Going After Cacciato , which won the National Book Award in … Read more
Talented though he is, Dave Eggers was also the most overhyped author of 2000. For a while there you couldn’t go more than 10 minutes without hearing how the brilliant young memoirist of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was shaking up the staid world of publishing. That has toned down, thankfully, but Eggers is … Read more
Talk about enlightened self-interest. This benefit, for 11-year-old Hendrix Johnson who suffers from a rare brain disease called Rasmussen’s Encephalitis, is a treasure trove of goodies. Paul Metsa and the Butanes, among others, provide the music. But dig the raffle and the silent auction—tickets to huge upcoming concerts like Cher’s farewell tour and Joe Cocker, … Read more
In the 19th century they called this a Chautauqua—a small group of professors or other assorted eggheads traveling the country to give lectures, spread wisdom, and just generally drop science. What this means to you is, grab the kids and get ready to fill your brain all the way to the top, because the Smithsonian … Read more
We’re not sure why Hollywood continues to be obsessed with Bret Easton Ellis, whose star rose and fell in the 80s, and we’re not convinced that his novels are the “scabrously hilarious” social commentaries we’re told they are. Seems to us that most of his books have an essentially voyeuristic appeal. American Psycho was less … Read more
To answer the question “Is there anything more bizarre than a breezy sitcom set in a Nazi prison camp?” you need only look at the life and death of Bob Crane. When he wasn’t duping Klink and Schultz as Col. Hogan, he indulged in pornography—not just consuming it, but directing and starring in his own … Read more
Ah, the good old days (the 80s), when a throwaway, no-brainer sketch on SCTV or SNL could be stretched into a credible and hilarious full-length feature film. Of course, they’re still doing it—Adam Sandler, believe it or not, is one of the highest paid “actors” on the planet. But we have a special place in … Read more
This is undoubtedly the film that put Jim Jarmusch into your consciousness in the late 80s, and it may have been your first introduction to the “art film” as a legitimate big-house screening. At the very least, it would have introduced you to Roberto Begnini, a formerly hilarious Italian comedian who imploded under the pressure … Read more
Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune’s artistic partnership was one of cinema’s most rewarding. The dozen-plus movies they made together from 1948 to 1965 were some of the most influential of the period, and this quartet— The Seven Samurai , The Hidden Fortress , Yojimbo and its sequel Sanjuro —comprise the bulk of the two men’s … Read more
The weakness of most commercial photographers who try to do artistic work is that they simply don’t have the time to pull it off. Accustomed to working fast and clean, on assignment for big bucks, successful commercial photogs like Shawn Michienzi run the real risk of falling into auto-focus formulas. They have a hard time … Read more