A funny thing happened to photography on the way to the 21st century: It went from being degraded as an inferior way to convey aesthetic concepts to one of the most significant aspects of contemporary visual culture. The medium provides the foundation not only for a wide array of photo-based…
A lot of people make Denver what it is, but few have changed the face of the city the way architect Cabell Childress did (“Mind Over Matter,” August 5, 2004). Born in Virginia in 1932, Childress earned a degree in architectural engineering at Georgia Tech in 1954. After graduation he…
Breaking the Mold. In 2003, Connecticut collector Virginia Vogel Mattern donated some 300 pieces of contemporary American Indian art to the Denver Art Museum. For one of the special shows inaugurating the new Frederic C. Hamilton Building, Native Arts curator Nancy Blomberg has selected over a hundred works for the…
Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut (Warner Bros.) At long last, Richard Donner’s much-whispered-about “original version” of Superman II sees the light of day, and it quickly joins the ranks of the reconstructed Touch of Evil, Apocalypse Now, and Blade Runner as films made superior in the recutting and retelling…
By now, you’ve probably heard about Bully. It’s the game that was supposed to finally ruin America’s youth. Crusading lawyer Jack Thompson, the self-appointed schoolmarm of the videogame industry, called it a “Columbine simulator” and tried to block stores from selling it. Lou Dobbs — who hasn’t seen a videogame…
The Ant Bully (Warner Bros.) Criminal Minds: The First Season (Paramount) Dane Cook: Vicious Circle (HBO) The Ellen DeGeneres Show: DVD-licious (Warner Bros.) Foo Fighters: Skin and Bones (RCA) Hot Wheels Accelerators: The Ultimate Race (Warner Bros.) Joan of Arcadia: The Second Season (Paramount) Jamie Kennedy’s Blowin’ Up (Paramount) Little…
How’s this for some serious personal style? The self-appointed Disco Bicuits — Francois Palloux, Justin Cochran, Jason Barzel and Jerome Hermelin of Le Central — got down with their badselves during the annual Turkey Trot race to benefit the Food Bank of the Rockies. And while Cat doesn’t normally go…
Denver finally made an appearance on the super-groovy site The Cool Hunter: Roaming the Globe So You’re in the Know. So what got us there? The Hamilton building? The new Clyfford Still museum? The Lab at Belmar? Or maybe some of our local designers? Nope. Denver Water. That’s what got…
Once again, it’s the season to cheer about stupid lights turning on at Downtown Denver’s Grand Illumination. Sorry if I sound, well, bitter. As a waiter for a private dinner club, I once had to serve champagne and hors d’oeuvre in the rain — in a tuxedo shirt, no less…
This year, it’s Nathaniel Merrill’s turn: The founder of Opera Colorado is being honored today at the Tesoro Foundation’s annual Farolito Lighting at the Fort restaurant, which each year draws attention to a different community member in the celebration of light, carols and pinecones. The farolitos — tiny lanterns based…
As fans of Denver’s 9th and Lincoln Orchestra know, this is one big band that’s not likely to break into “Cherokee” during its monthly gigs at Dazzle. A conglomeration of musicians from such progressive bands and ensembles as the Czars, Hamster Theater and the Future Jazz Project — as well…
The Nutcracker has got to be the most-performed holiday production in the history of mankind. In the Denver/Boulder area alone this year, ballet aficionados can enjoy no fewer than seven — yes, seven — different Nutcrackers, each affiliated with a different ballet/dance company, including a one-night-only performance by the Moscow…
It was love that made Carson Williams do it. When he and his wife moved to a new house on a quiet cul-de-sac in Mason, Ohio, nine years ago, she asked him to put up some Christmas lights. “For the first few years, I just made them blink. Then I…
Why, yes, I have been working out. Sweet of you to notice. I’ve gotta say, though, it’s not all glitter and hot pants. Some days I just don’t have the motivation to sweat nicotine residue all over the treadmill, screw with the seat settings on the weight machines and restrain…
“We never put anybody on stage unless they’re a home run,” asserts Carol Givan, co-owner of Castle Rock’s Theatre of Dreams Arts and Events Center. She’s that proud of tonight’s performers, the Handsome Little Devils, featuring real-life brothers “Handsome” Mike and “Devil” Dan. After touring Japan, Europe, Mexico, Canada and…
Reading was a daily, integral part of my secular Jewish education, no matter what I read. The Earth for Sam, Misty of Chincoteague, Robin Hood, the beautiful advertisements in the New Yorker — all were part of my rite of passage. Our walls were lined with books, and that’s the…
If you like to do your holiday shopping in July, then you’ll be stoked to pre-game your winter theater, too. Beat out the slackers tonight at the Denver Performing Arts Complex for special engagements of A Christmas Carol and Season’s Greetings. Even sans Muppets, the musical adaptation of the classic…
Okay, so Jerry Bruckheimer and Tony Scott were asking for it by naming their latest mega-production Déjà Vu. These dudes aren’t exactly paragons of innovation, unless taking rhetorical hysteria to awesome new heights counts. As the opening credits roll — by which of course I mean roll, zip, flicker, fade,…
The first few minutes of Tenacious D in “The Pick of Destiny” are something to behold: a four-minute rock opera cranked to eleven. A doughy young boy with dirty-mop locks (Nacho Libre’s Troy Gentile, once more playing li’l Jack Black) laments his tragic plight: He’s stuck in Kickapoo with “a…
Solemn, flashy and flabbergasting, The Fountain — adapted by Darren Aronofsky from his own graphic novel — should really be called “The Shpritz.” The premise is lachrymose, the sets are clammy and the metaphysics all wet. The screen is awash in spiraling nebulae and misty points of light, with the…
For progressives lifted, however temporarily, by the swell of a turning tide, Bobby can be seen clearly for what it is — an Airport movie with the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy as the central calamity and an all-star cast deployed like multiple George Kennedys. Juggling some 22 main characters…
The nifty premise of Unknown owes a large debt of gratitude to the twin brain-teasers Memento and The Usual Suspects, but first-time screenwriter Matthew Waynee and music-video/commercial director Simon Brand will need a tad more experience before achieving the atmospheric intensity or narrative dexterity of those two films. Five battered…
