Film Review: Life Itself

Your life itself deserves better than this trite, facile disaster

Abby (Olivia Wilde) and Will (Oscar Isaac) are so very much in love. Too bad they’re in a Dan Fogelman drama.

I’m trying to come up with one kind thing to say about Life Itself, the new movie from writer/director Dan Fogelman, creator of television’s weep-inducing phenom This is Us, and all I can come up with is, boy, Oscar Isaac sure is nice to look at. When one of the film’s characters proclaims outright, “This is some deep philosophical shit,” you know you’re in trouble. Fogelman commits the cardinal screenwriting sin of telling (and over and over and over, mind you) rather than showing, and the result is a cringe-inducing, treacly, overwrought mess of a picture that even This is Us fans will do well to avoid.

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Show Review: Future Islands, Ed Schrader’s Music Beat at Gundlach Bundschu Winery, 9/14/18

All Photos by Tiffany Black Darquea

If you haven’t had the opportunity to acquaint yourself with the picturesque Gundlach Bundschu Winery in Sonoma, you ought to.

The venue’s main stage is a cozy, dark, and ambient-lit renovated barn. However, that wasn’t the setting for Friday’s show. Future Islands and ESMB played to a steep grassy hillside of wine sipping mid 30’s and 40’s hill bouncers.

Gundlach’s second stage features exquisite views of sprawling vineyard property. It is intimate but comfortably open and spacious for moving about during the show.

The opener, Ed Schrader’s Music Beat (ESMB), sauntered out anxiously, compensating with awkward stand up and 90s references. But the folks on the hill stood to attention when ESMB drilled forward at a fast pace into their avant garde post-punk set. Continue reading “Show Review: Future Islands, Ed Schrader’s Music Beat at Gundlach Bundschu Winery, 9/14/18”

Show Review: Korn: Follow the Leader 20 Years! at The Masonic, 9/12/18

Photos and review by: Alan Ralph @ConcertGoingPro

For the whole month of October in 2015, KoRn embarked on their 20th Anniversary tour and performed their debut album in its entirety. The local show at Fox Theater in Oakland was the final show of that tour, on the night before Halloween, and for which the band dressed appropriately for the occasion. It doesn’t get much better than that, and this show was one of their best.

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Film Review: A Simple Favor

Feig’s Favor to you: A twisty, stylish picture with a sly sense of humor

Suburban moms Stephanie (Anna Kendrick, l.) and Emily (Blake Lively) become fast friends over martinis.

“Secrets are like margarine: easy to spread; bad for the heart,” muses perky mommy vlogger Stephanie (Anna Kendrick) in director Paul Feig’s new film A Simple Favor, and does that ever prove to be a prophetic understatement. Feig, best known for helming the comedies Bridesmaids and The Heat, brings a breezy, stylized light touch to the film adaptation of Darcey Bell’s 2017 debut mystery thriller of the same name. The result is a mostly successful mash up of black comedy and icy noir that, despite similarities to better films, still manages to be a wickedly fun good time.

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Theater Review: Ubuntu Theater Project Gets Ambitious with the Premiere of Philip Kan Gotanda’s New Play Pool of Unknown Wonders

L to R: Mergherita Ventura (Sophie), Peter Strielstra (Gorkys), and Sharon Shao (Karma). Photo Courtesy of Simone Finney, 2018.

Ubuntu Theater Project starts off it’s season collaborating with acclaimed Bay Area playwright Philip Kan Gotanda in the premiere of Pool of Unknown Wonders: Undertow of the Soul. It’s a conceptual piece: abstract and non-linear. Multiple characters play different roles in each other’s lives, so it can be a test of focus. As they overlap, the stories seem to intersect; it’s clear there’s one destination, but how they got on that bus is the mystery about to unfold. Continue reading “Theater Review: Ubuntu Theater Project Gets Ambitious with the Premiere of Philip Kan Gotanda’s New Play Pool of Unknown Wonders“

Theater Review: Danville Village Theatre Knocks Out Arthur Miller’s All My Sons

Christian Phillips (Joe), Nick Mandracchia (Frank), and Susan Trishel Monson (Sue) harbor family secrets old and new. Photo courtesy of John Carter, 2018.

It’s the play that put Arthur Miller on the map; though not one of his more famous plays, such as The Crucible or Death of a Salesman, it’s in a similar vein nevertheless. Miller explores the human condition — a very male-centric one, but along with it, he questions the patriarchy and the capitalist structures that cloak the American dream. All My Sons knocks you out, delivering punch after punch of pure family drama. Continue reading “Theater Review: Danville Village Theatre Knocks Out Arthur Miller’s All My Sons“

Show Review: The Final U.S. Slayer Show! (of this Leg of the Tour)

Photos and review by: Alan Ralph @ConcertGoingPro

January 22, 2018. Slayer announced their “farewell” tour. After over 35 years of yelling “Die By the Sword”, singer and bass player Tom Araya wants to scream no more. As much as the fans would want Slayer to keep performing forever, Tom and the only other original member, guitar player Kerry King, deserve to go out on top and begin collecting their 401k. Gary Holt, the 2nd guitar player, will always have his primary band Exodus, and certainly bands will be lining up for drummer Paul Bostaph’s services once he becomes available again. In the meanwhile, though, according to a press release issued the morning after The. Final. U.S. Slayer. Show., this “farewell” tour still has another year to go!

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Show Review: Melvins, Boris, We Are The Asteroid at Echoplex 08/16/2018

It’s gonna get loud…

Melvins-12

It’s been a good bit of time since I’ve made it out to a show at one of my favorite venues in Los Angeles: Echoplex. While the lightning has never been the greatest for photography, the atmosphere and sound mixes have always made up for it and I’ve consistently had the most fun at pretty much every show I’ve seen behind their doors. Though, I’ll definitely admit that it’s sometimes hard to decipher their door times from show starting times and in this case I misread and ended up arriving FAR earlier than I ever have, but that’s just me griping. Even being in line about an hour and a half before opening couldn’t wreck my spirits. I was about to thrust myself into the noisiest room in Los Angeles. I was about to see Boris and the Melvins.

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Film Review: Juliet, Naked

It’s only rock and roll, but I like it

Rose Byrne and Ethan Hawke in JULIET, NAKED. Photo credit: Alex Bailey. Courtesy of Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions
Rose Byrne and Ethan Hawke star in Juliet, Naked.

What fun it is to have heroes who live perfect romantic lives in our imaginations. How satisfying is it to cherry-pick snippets of their lives, served to us on podcasts or through fawning interview pieces, which invite us to a front row seat to learn of their creative process, or the inspirations that led them to their best works, works which come to us like a pristine seashell discovered on a summertime beach.

We willfully crowd-out hazy moments of doubt, when we wonder about what it must have been like to live with, or love, or even just share extended lengths of time with our heroes. It’s too easy to drift lazily back to the film, or the novel, or the album, and back to our mental fanboy scrapbook.

Juliet, Naked, the implausible but devastatingly charming new film from Jesse Peretz, efficiently manages to show us the artist as both outwardly alluring and inwardly shattered, and sketches a portrait that convinces us to have sympathy for how the creative life can leave so much wreckage, and so many casualties, and yet produce compelling beauty and truth. Continue reading “Film Review: Juliet, Naked“

Film Review: The Wife

Close’s powerhouse performance elevates marital melodrama 

Joan (Glenn Close) reacts as her husband Joe (Jonathan Pryce) receives some good news.

What sacrifices are acceptable for the sake of art? For marriage? Swedish director Björn Runge explores these questions in his new film The Wife, which, if nothing else, may become the film most remembered for netting six-time Academy Award nominee Glenn Close her first Oscar. Close’s performance is the best reason to see the picture, which manages to thoughtfully present serious themes while teetering on the edge of melodrama.

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