I’d like you to close your eyes for a moment and think of the nerdiest concert you can imagine. What do you see when you do this? Apocalyptica Plays Metallica by Four Cellos? The Fair Maidens Play Iron Maiden by Four Ukuleles? Queensryche doing Operation Mindcrime AND Operation Mindcrime 2? Well, my fellow music nerds, I am here to report that I have a concert nerdier than my wildest dreams, and it was wonderful.
Joseph Cotton shows absolutely no respect for his suit.
Let me say right here, at the outset of this double review, that I had no intention of deliberately pairing Too Much Johnson and Oddsac together for any comedic purposes. Yes, it’s very easy to “put too much Johnson into the oddsac” or snickeringly flippant to say something like “too much Johnson, the story of oddsac’s life.” Nope, not having it. You can’t pin it on me. Sure, accuse me of being wildly naive, but when I looked through the film offerings when the Noisepop 2018 schedule was released, I picked these two purely for what I thought was their cinematic possibilities. Too bad the best things about these two offerings are the many jokes that can be made from their titles.
This week marks the beginning of one of California’s favorite film festivals, San Jose’s Cinequest. Running from 2/27 – 3/11 in a series of South Bay venues, this year Cinequest will present 229 feature and short films, including 74 world premieres over its two-week span. And you know what else? Nic Cage is going to be there.
Film critics Carrie and Chris on who will – and who should – win the 90th Academy Awards
The 90th Academy Awards air this Sunday, March 4th on ABC at 5:00 pm PST (pre-show festivities start well before, if you want to weigh in on Oscar fashions). Spinning Platters film critics Carrie Kahn and Chris Piper share their predictions – and hopes – for the major categories, and discuss their reasoning for six of the biggest categories in the podcast below. Will there be another Moonlight/La La Land fiasco? Tune in on Sunday to find out – and to see how we – and you – do on the big night!
I’ll start by telling you that I have The Album Leaf’s emblem tattooed on the inside of my right wrist. Let’s just say, my love for their music runs deep, and my respect for them as musicians is significant. I’ve been able to see them perform live several times over the years, each time special and important to me – and Friday night’s show was everything I wanted. From the opening acts until the last note of “Lights” at the end of the evening, it was intimate, emotionally powerful, and beautifully passionate.
Beginning the evening was Indy Nyles, with a compact-but-complex set up on a table in front of the stage. It was an interesting dynamic to be on the same level as the performer, with no barrier to audience members seeing every cord connected, each individual button and key selected. I was impressed with his ability to capture the audience’s attention, forming a quiet energy while building and layering the arcs of his music.
Game Night doesn’t exactly go as planned for Max (Jason Bateman) and Annie (Rachel McAdams).
The writing/directing team of actor John Francis Daley (who played Sweets in the long-running and slightly addictive Bones) and Jonathan Goldstein made their directorial debut three years ago with the poorly received Vacation remake. They fared better with two pictures they wrote but didn’t direct: Horrible Bosses (2011) and Horrible Bosses 2 (2014); this reviewer isn’t at all embarrassed to admit that she laughed so hard during the first Horrible Bosses that she nearly hyperventilated. With Game Night, the team’s second feature directing project, Daley and Goldstein do the opposite, though, and only direct, leaving the script to screenwriter Mark Perez. That may explain why this film, which also similarly stars affable everyman Jason Bateman, doesn’t reach the comedic heights of those prior two films. But this new collaboration has resulted in a pleasant and highly amusing comedy with a sensational cast, and it yields enough genuine laughs to recommend it. Continue reading “Film Review: Game Night“
Last night’s performances were raw, emotional, and beautiful. You know that feeling you get when someone chooses to open up to you, sharing a personal experience that may have hurt them deeply, but also helped shape them into who they are? All of the performers chose to open themselves up to a room full of strangers, connecting us to each other with emotive lyrics and personal stories of the human heart – both in their song lyrics, and in the backstories while introducing the next song. Continue reading “Noise Pop Review: Amy Shark, BOWER, MILCK at The Independent, 2/21/18”
I walked into Mezzanine as the DJ played My Neck, My Back, and I saw the smallish crowd of early arrivals start to dance to the familiar song. The DJ transitioned to other fun, nostalgia-inducing songs, the crowd grew, and energy started to fill the room.
No. Not a “Bro” marathon. More like a hip music marathon?
Noise Pop is upon us again… Also known as that week where Bay Area music fans marathon as many shows as they can in a single week. And, well, not all of us can be in multiple places at once, so let’s try to limit our Noise Pop anxiety a bit!
The Sundance Film Festival ran from January 18th to 28th this year; over 120 films were shown in ten days. For the fourth year in a row, I was on the (often snowy) ground, knocking out almost 20 films in five days in order to bring you the Best of the Fest. I present here the ten best films I saw – five features, four documentaries, and one special screening. Keep your eyes out for these during the coming year, as they are well worth your time and money. And if you’d like to know all the films that took home awards this year, you can see the winners here.
TOP FIVE FEATURE FILMS
1.) Search (USA 2017, 101 min. Directed by Aneesh Chaganty. Category: Next)
Worried father David Kim (John Cho) uses the Internet to search for his missing daughter.
The word innovative doesn’t even come close to doing filmmaker Aneesh Chaganty’s first feature film justice. Using a narrative that unfolds completely on a computer screen (via video chats, texts, emails, Internet searches, and news videos), Chaganty immerses us in the story of recently widowed dad David (John Cho, excellent as always) and his desperate search for his missing teenage daughter Margot (Michelle La). Debra Messing, cast against type, is terrific as the San Jose police detective heading the investigation. Filled with red herrings and twists and turns you’ll never see coming, Chaganty and co-writer Sev Ohanian’s South Bay-set mystery is as imaginative as their method of telling it. Both a celebration and a critique of our increasing reliance on technology, the brilliantly executed Search is my hands-down favorite film of the Festival. Sony Pictures acquired the picture for five million dollars in one of the Festival’s biggest buys, so a wide release will be forthcoming. The film also deservedly won both an audience award and the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize. Don’t miss this one. Continue reading “Film Feature: The Best of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival”
