“The cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake,” Alfred Hitchcock once said, and if that’s true — and who are we to dispute the Master? — then summertime is when we gorge (unhealthily, most of the time, on ear-splitting smash-’em-ups and nerd-filled sex comedies). This…
One of the longest running musicals on Broadway, Rent succeeded because it was a true rock opera, based on one of the most beloved classical operas of all time, Puccini’s La Bohème. Fast-forwarded in time to the struggling, AIDS-haunted arts community camped out on New York’s Lower East Side during…
Swallow Hill’s Shady Grove Picnic Series at Four Mile Historic Park is surely one of those hidden gems of summer: It’s laid-back and easy, cheap for families and full of great music and musicians, most of them also hidden gems and many of them locals. The music begins at 6:30…
In the 1960s, the two biggest contemporary art movements, pop art and minimalism, were ideological opposites — well, except in certain works from Andy Warhol’s “Elvis” series. Pop was content-driven, riffing off everyday subject matter, while minimalism was purely about form. So it’s interesting that today’s post-pop and post-minimalism are…
Curiouser. Singer Gallery director Simon Zalkind is one of the top curators in town, and one of the secrets to his success is presenting artists whose efforts are worthwhile but who for some reason rarely exhibit their work. That’s what’s happening now with the unusual show Curiouser: A Dozen Years…
Partway through The Squabble, I did something I’ve never done before in all my years of faithful and happy attendance at Buntport: I glanced at my watch to see how much longer we had to go. Based on Nikolai Gogol’s “The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich,”…
First of all, Up is not a movie about a cranky old coot who, with the help of a roly-poly Boy Scout, finds his inner child during a series of magical adventures experienced from the front porch of a dilapidated manse held aloft by hundreds of helium-filled balloons. Such, of…
Nuri Bilge Ceylan, the auteur behind Three Monkeys, didn’t win the best-director bauble at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival for his hyperkinetic visuals and mastery of the smash cut. On his latest, he tends to set his camera in place and allow it to stare pitilessly at his subjects for…
Bus Stop. A snowstorm has closed the road ahead, and a bus is stranded outside a diner, where worldly-wise owner Grace supervises her high-school-aged waitress, Elma. Among those requiring doughnuts and coffee or bacon and eggs are driver Carl, who is Grace’s occasional lover, and disgraced philosophy professor Gerald Lyman…
The name “Kennedy” presents a heavy burden — and a load of possibilities. For decades, various members of the family have maintained an admirable balance between celebrity and relevancy, using that name to propel and promote humanitarian projects. Such is the case with Kerry and Robert Kennedy Jr., two of…
It’s got to be tough being a teen in Nederland. Sure, the quirky little town is a cool place to visit for Frozen Dead Guy Days or the July 4th fireworks display, but what does a fifteen-year-old living there do for fun? Well, thanks to the work of dedicated volunteers,…
If you love classic cars and the culture that surrounds them, it’s time to slick back your pompadour, gas up the dinosaur (leaded gas only, of course) and head out for the tenth annual Cruisin’ the Lanes Night. This is your chance to hang with other lovers of classic cars,…
Touring can take a toll on even the most loyal devotee of the rock-and-roll lifestyle. The endless string of hotel rooms, cramped stages and unappreciative crowds, the excesses of substances and sex — they’re all enough to drive anyone a little bit crazy. That’s the central theme of 200 Motels,…
Bonny Lhotka, Boulder photographer extraordinaire, was an early proponent of having computers help create her art. In 1992, she began using a Macintosh to alter and produce her unusual images, typically based on subjects found in nature. A few years later, along with Dorothy Krause and Karen Schminke, she founded…
My husband sometimes watches those World War II history shows. And I have to admit, there’s something downright awe-inspiring about seeing all that heavy equipment on the screen: sinister U-boats and magnificent aircraft carriers in the sea, and in the air, the dashing Banshees and Tigercats and Dominators. But the…
I have a thing for Swiss Army knives. Don’t you? It’s so neat the way everything folds up in a practical ballet of metal and blades — so functional. And the look of the knife, with its bright red enameled veneer, is just so sharp. Plus, the Swiss Army knife…
Some hundred works from the artist’s own collection will go on display at the Colorado Springs Fine Art Center when The Baroque World of Fernando Botero, a touring exhibition, opens with a reception May 29 from 5 to 8 p.m. And when CSFAC spokesman Charlie Snyder says this will be…
Flip Orley first saw hypnotism as a tool for a lovesick tween who wanted to invite a girl to a dance. The impressionable lad found a disreputable tome on how to pick up girls with hypnosis that was, he notes, “not well written or very accurate.” But you know how…
If you’re free-associating, likely the last thing you’d come up with when presented with the word “Loveland” is the term “pop art.” Until now. Because on May 30, the Loveland Museum/Gallery at 503 North Lincoln Avenue will unveil a blockbuster entitled Wayne Thiebaud: 70 Years of Painting, dedicated to the…
The story of how world-class violinist MinTze Wu, who’s delicately wielded her instrument to play classical and folk fiddle music from her native Taiwan to the wild shores of Newfoundland, ended up living in Lyons a couple of years ago must be a whopper. But more important is what she’s…
Nuri Bilge Ceylan, the auteur behind Three Monkeys, didn’t win the best-director bauble at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival for his hyperkinetic visuals and mastery of the smash cut. On his latest, he tends to set his camera in place and allow it to stare pitilessly at his subjects for…
Cinema Q, the Denver Film Society’s series focusing on GLBT movies, got its start after Keith Garcia, DFS programming manager, kept getting comments about a lack of good gay films. “I was like, ‘Actually, no, there’s lots of it, it’s just that it’s not being programmed,’” he remembers. “I got…
