The first of the University of Colorado Film Studies program’s Goldfarb and Grillo Awards — students will win $12,000 this academic year — will be presented this week at the fall Student Awards Showcase. The prizes, in the words of the presenters, “are designed to encourage excellence in filmmaking and…
“We come back to Denver in triumph,” says Maggie Renzi, the producer of Silver City, John Sayles’s new movie that premieres here on September 10. “We pulled off something pretty miraculous. We started to shoot a movie last September, and we’re coming back with it in September.” Not only that,…
Thursday, September 9 Remember the torch-lighting ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, in 1998? Then you no doubt saw and heard the city’s thundering Matsukawa Kyougaku Taiko Drummers, a hometown ensemble dedicated to preserving an art that’s been around for hundreds of years. And although some say the…
I know that September 11 belongs to the entire country, that everyone in some way has a connection to the events: a brother, an aunt, a friend who was there, who saw it, who died in it. But I still somehow feel very personal about it — possessive, in fact…
FRI, 9/10 Kids love to journey back to that colorful age when mummies, animal gods and pyramids were part of a kingdom along the Nile — and for many, the appeal of those ancient times doesn’t fade away with adulthood. With today’s arrival of The Quest for Immortality: Treasures of…
SAT, 9/11 Fifteen-year-old Coloradan Zipei Feng is The Bride of the Go world, slaying twenty competitors at a time in the 4,000-year-old Eastern board game. It’s a complex, mentally challenging match — though certainly not as bloody as the encounters in Kill Bill Vol. 1. In China, promising Go players…
FRI, 9/10 Denver artist Tracy Weil is a fun-loving guy, and his River North neighborhood gallery/studio/house, weilworks, is just the place to have fun. “It’s my Barbie Dream House,” Weil says without irony. Sure — if Barbie’s house was a quirky, neo-modern space with an exhibition tower and a see-through…
SAT, 9/11 It’s a time-proven formula: Pop plus dumb equals ka-ching. So how did Burt Bacharach, one of the most successful pop composers of the twentieth century, end up with a body of sophisticated, intelligent hits? Maybe it’s because his songs — including dozens of classics such as “Walk on…
The adage about too many artists spoiling the installation is exemplified by a collaborative piece — done by several of the co-op’s members and by faculty from Metro — on view in the front space at Edge Gallery (3658 Navajo Street, 303-477-7173). Thank goodness John Davenport’s compelling solo, 1+1=1: More…
Dots, Blobs and Angels. Denver’s Museum of Contemporary Art is presenting an enormous solo that is dedicated to the late David Rigsby, an artist who played a big part in the local art scene in the ’70s and ’80s. The exhibit was organized by director Cydney Payton, who installed it…
For its 2nd Annual Summer One-Act Festival, Miners Alley has put together two one-acts about the dramatic process itself. They’re witty, playful and fun to watch, and they work well with each other. The first, Hidden in This Picture, is by Aaron Sorkin, screenwriter for such movies as The American…
OpenStage Theatre & Company in Fort Collins always walks a thin line between professional and community theater, and this production of The Play’s the Thing falls definitively on the community side. The script is by Ferenc Molnar, a Hungarian author best known for the bittersweet Liliom, which, in the hands…
Cabaret. Cabaret is grim and distressing, and there’s not a hint of redemption anywhere in it. Quite the contrary. But this is a bloody good production, the kind of production that could — and should — attract all kinds of people who might never think of setting foot in a…
In Victorian England, thousands of novels were published every year. Of the few that have endured, perhaps none is more worthy of a film adaptation than Vanity Fair, if for no other reason than this: It’s a chore to read. Clocking in at 850 pages, with frequent excursions into unrelated…
There’s a new movie called Hero. Don’t confuse it with that dusty Dustin Hoffman vehicle, nor with the epic Bollywood musical-espionage extravaganza Hero: Love Story of a Spy (though that’s worth a mind-altering look if you can find it). America and India aren’t directly involved here, but huge imperial issues…
This October, Hollywood will once again reveal its gift for scavengery (not a word, but should be) when it releases The Grudge, a Sarah Michelle Geller/Bill Pullman vehicle designed to scare us right out of our underwear. In the meantime, why not catch the incredibly chilling Japanese film that inspired…
It was Ginger Rogers’s mother who ultimately screwed Dalton Trumbo. Until she got in on the action, things were going swimmingly for the Colorado-born author of the famous anti-war book Johnny Got His Gun. As a successful Hollywood screenwriter, Trumbo lived on a ranch in California and enjoyed the freedom…
Thursday, September 2 Hip-hop artist and activist KRS-One (an acronym for Knowledge Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone) wants to spread the word: The former teen runaway, who self-educated in public libraries before morphing into a star and lecturer, has a lot to say about hip-hop culture, politics, global issues and…
These are the images we’ve seen over and over again, the indelibles, some in black and white, some in color, and all supremely indicative of the times they record. The 128 photographs included in Capture the Moment: The Pulitzer Prize Photographs don’t just tell stories; they immerse us in the…
“Park Hill Loves Spinelli’s Market. Thank you Jerry and Mary Ellen…from your customers, neighbors and friends,” reads a sign on the wall near the front of Spinelli’s Market, 4621 East 23rd Avenue. Dozens of hand-written notes adorn the poster — messy scribbles thanking the Spinellis for their invaluable community grocery…
FRI, 9/3 Irish expatriates must yearn for many features of their homeland: the fierce winds and breathtaking beauty of the Cliffs of Moher; the eloquent storytelling of their countrymen; the sweeping fields of endless green; that midget who danced for Guinness at the pub. But a group of Irish nationals…
FRI, 9/3 If the title New World My Eye sounds a tad polemical, don’t be daunted: The group exhibit debuting today at the Chicano Humanities and Arts Council may cast a critical Chicano eye on the dominant American culture, but it’s intended to educate rather than to incite conflict. With…
