CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER (2014, directed by Anthony & Joe Russo, 136 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC The sequel to Captain America: The First Avenger is the ninth in the “Marvel Cinematic Universe” franchise and to paraphrase classic rock titans Foreigner, it feels like the ninth time. Directed by TV directors/feature film failures The Russo Brothers (of the Owen Wilson vehicle You, Me and Dupree) Cap’s latest adventure, subtitled The Winter Soldier, hits all the expected marks of an $170 million profit-reaper but its shameless calculations do little to break this entry out of the increasingly […]
Q&A: With Documentary Filmmaker Sam Green, Inventor Of The Love Song Of Buckminster Fuller
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Since 1997, filmmaker Sam Green has been making thought-provoking, rigorously reported and eminently entertaining documentaries about, in his words, “the outer contours of human experience.” Be it the rainbow-wigged, Bible-thumping kidnapper (currently serving three life sentences) of 1997’s The Rainbow Man/John 3:16 or the utopian dreamers turned bomb-throwing revolutionaries by the murderous insanity of the Vietnam War in The Weather Underground, or the miraculous Guinness Book human oddities living lives of quiet desperation in 2014’s The Measure Of All Things. The Love Song Of R. Buckminster Fuller, which gets its Philly premiere tonight during two sold […]
INCOMING: The Love Song Of Buckminster Fuller
Bringing indie rock to its waterfront stage for the very first time, FringeArts announces an exciting addition to its spring 2014 calendar: the documentary film The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller, directed and live-narrated by Academy Award-nominated director Sam Green; and accompanied by a score performed live on stage by legendary Hoboken band Yo La Tengo. FringeArts will host two showings of the The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller on First Friday, April 4, at 7 and 9 p.m. Tickets are on sale at fringearts.com. The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller traces the career of the titular 20th-century futurist, […]
LISTEN: The Flaming Side Of The Moon
THE FLAMING LIPS new digital release, FLAMING SIDE OF THE MOON is live now in digital form. Designed as an immersive companion piece to the original 1973 album, DARK SIDE OF THE MOON, listeners are encouraged to listen to the new LIPS album while listening to DARK SIDE at the same time. FLAMING SIDE OF THE MOON was also carefully crafted to sync up perfectly with the 1939 film, THE WIZARD OF OZ. For ideal listening conditions, fans are encouraged to seek out the original Alan Parsons’ engineered quadraphonic LP mix of DARK SIDE, but it will work with the album on any format. Available now through all participating digital outlets. […]
CINEMA: Enemy Of The State
ENEMY (2013, directed by Denis Villeneuve, 90 minutes, Canada) NYMPHOMANIAC: VOLUME ONE (2013, directed by Lars Von Trier, 118 minutes, Denmark) THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL (2014, directed by Wes Anderson, 99 minutes) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Denis Villeneuve’s new thriller Enemy is an irritating new film, which is both a function and a fault of its design. Shot in a urine-hued filter and played with a humorless hush, Enemy is meant to get under your skin. I don’t mind a film getting under my skin as long as it knows what it is doing under there. Director Villeneuve […]
CINEMA: Satyricon
NYMPHOMANIAC VOLUME I & II (2014, dir. by Lars Von Trier, 241 minutes) DAVID EDELSTEIN: Lars von Trier’s latest provocation is an episodic sexual epic called Nymphomaniac, which comes in two two-hour parts, or “volumes,” though it’s basically one movie sliced in half. The thinking must have been, “Who wants four hours of hardcore sex and philosophizing?,” and if you say, “Me, me!,” I suggest seeing both back to back: It’s an art-house orgy! Should you see it at all? I recommend it guardedly. It’s dumb, but in a bold, ambitious way movies mostly aren’t these days, especially when […]
CINEMA: Welcome To The Hotel Andersonia
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014, directed by Wes Anderson, 99 minutes, USA) BY JONATHAN VALANIA There are, I am increasingly convinced, but two kinds of people in this world: people who hate Wes Anderson films and human beings. Before we go further I should make it clear that I am of the opinion that Wes Anderson only makes two kinds of movies: great, and really great. That Wes Anderson is the two-word answer to the increasingly asked question: What good is a liberal arts education? There are times in this country’s history when we’ve had to take stock and […]
EARLY WORD: New Jarmusch Flick Comes ‘Alive’
To launch the new Jim Jarmusch film, Only Lovers Left Alive, which hits cinemas on 11th April and stars Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston, Cinema Paradiso Events are holding an exclusive preview experience on Tuesday April 1st in New York. The evening will start off at 7pm sharp with a screening of Jim Jarmusch’s crypto-vampire love story at the Sunshine Cinema, followed by live performances at Santos Party House where musicians from the film’s soundtrack – White Hills, Jozef Van Wissem, Yasmine Hamdan, Zola Jesus and Jim Jarmusch’s band SQÜRL – will all play live. Guests are encouraged to wear […]
THE LIFE ACOUSTIC: Meet Randall Poster, The Man Who Makes Wes Anderson Soundtracks Sing
EDITOR’S NOTE: This was first published in issue #104 of MAGNET MAGAZINE. BY JONATHAN VALANIA How’s this sound for a dream job description: Sit around all day rolling doobies with Wes Anderson, reading script pages as he pecks them out on a vintage Smith-Corona and then firing up your iPod for the perfect vintage Kinks b-side/deep-cut mid-60’s Stones track/David Bowie song sung in Portuguese to go with each scene. Must have and impeccable ear, a kaleidoscopic mind and an encyclopedic record collection epic in its scope and unknowable vastness. Some time travel required. The bit about smoking doobies and […]
INCOMING: Something Wicked This Way Comes
Say what you want about her authenticity (whatever that means), her name, her lips, or how, by her own admission, her “pussy tastes like Pepsi,” love her or hater, she is coming to the Skyline Stage @ The Mann Center on May 11th. Resistance is futile. Tickets go on-sale Friday, March 14 at 10am via Ticketmaster.com, 800.745.3000, AEGLive.com, MannCenter.org, or the Mann box office. PHAWKER: Tell me something nobody knows about Lana Del Rey. Why do you think she is such a polarizing figure? WOODKID: You’re definitely fishing for the bold headline of this interview!?Lana has an incredible knowledge […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See A Special VIP Advance Screening Of Wes Anderson’s Grand Budapest Hotel
To mark the highly anticipated release of The Grand Budapest Hotel in select theaters on March 14th, this is officially WES ANDERSON WEEK on Phawker. We’ll have soundtrack and film score Sound Clouds to share, an in-depth interview about all things Wes Anderson from award-winning New York Magazine critic Matt Zoller Seitz, author of The Wes Anderson Collection AND we’re giving away 40 tickets to a special VIP advance screening tomorrow night, Tuesday March 11th, 7:30 pm at the Ritz 5! Because what’s the point of seeing a Wes Anderson movie if you can’t see it before everyone else […]
CINEMA: There Will Be Blood
300: RISE OF AN EMPIRE (2014, directed by Noam Murro, 102 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC It is surprising that it has taken seven years to mount a sequel to Zach Snyder’s left field hit 300, but who would have predicted a sequel at all when all 300 title characters died in the first film? Gerald Butler, the original film’s star may only be seen fleetingly amongst the corpses at the opening of 300: Rise of an Empire but the ancient battlescapes return as more impossibly musclebound soldiers — wearing little more than Speedos, beards and sandals […]
CINEMA: Gone With Wind
THE WIND RISES (2013, directed by Hayao Miyazaki, 126 minutes, Japan) TIM’S VERMEER (2014, directed by Teller, 80 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Hayao Miyazaki, the wildly imaginative Japanese animator, who has been compared to Walt Disney and Steven Spielberg, has announced with great fanfare that his latest film, a biography of Japanese airplane designer Jiro Horikoshi will be his swan song. Miyazaki has since back-pedaled a bit about retirement (“I might make something short, so nothing has changed really,” he told Variety) but The Wind Rises does have the scent of an autumnal valedictory of a […]