Rex Reed has had it with the new generation of supposedly brilliant young filmmakers, a “group of anarchists that includes Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, Spike Jonze, freaky Todd Solondz and the dismally overrated non-writer Charlie Kaufman, who wins critical praise for writing incoherent movies about why he can’t write coherent movies.” The movies made by such arrogant youngsters are something of the Hollywood equivalent of the Washington politician who gets branded early on as a whiz kid, and spends the rest of his career insisting that he’s the smartest one in the room, rather than actually doing anything to justify the label.
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Merce at 85
“For more than 50 years the American choreographer Merce Cunningham has clung to the opposite of the notion that inspires all civilisation: holding that decisions made by chance may be just as fine as those driven by logic and feeling… Randomness, one feels, ought to result in ugliness – isn’t that what civilisation implies? Yet what Cunningham edits from this time-consuming procedure is extraordinarily graceful, even classical-looking.” At the age of 85, Cunningham is now physically infirm, and yet his mind appears to be as busy as ever, and he continues to be one of the dance world’s great inspirations to young up-and-comers.
Imagine All The People, Investing Too Much In A Song
John Lennon’s counterculture, anti-consumerist anthem, Imagine, has already had its message bastardized by any number of commercial enterprises, and now, a new sneaker sporting lines from the song is selling for $60 a pair. But maybe the problem isn’t the money-grubbing marketers, but the song itself, which has always been more commercial pablum than true protest: “it rewards its listeners for piously imagining a better world rather than doing anything concrete to improve it. A form of emotional vanity, Imagine allows us to congratulate ourselves for simply having a conscience. No wonder it’s become pop’s favourite comfort blanket, invariably reached for in troubled times.”
If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Make Up A New Law
A new California law will require file-swappers in the state to register a legitimate e-mail address, or be charged with a misdemeanor. Critics are already charging that the law is merely an attempt to sidestep the intricacies of copyright law, and charge file-swappers with a newly invented crime. But the bill’s passage is a major victory for entertainment industry lobbyists, who plan to use the win as a springboard to launch similar efforts in other states.
The Arts, Delivered Fresh In Under An Hour
The Arts Council of Wales has rolled out a £2 million proposal to fund Welsh arts organizations outside the capital city of Cardiff. The stated goal of the plan is to ensure that no resident of Wales lives more than 45 minutes from what it calls “top-class” arts experiences.
The New Voice of Saturday Afternoons
Opera is a tradition-bound enterprise, and there may be no more traditional radio audience than the 10 million fans who tune in each Saturday for live broadcasts of New York’s Metropolitan Opera. So the retirement of Peter Allen, the Voice of The Met for the last 29 years, has caused no small amount of hand-wringing. This week, the Met introduced its new voice: Margaret Juntwait, a classical music host at WNYC radio.
Emory To Become Home To Danowski Collection
The largest English-language poetry collection ever amassed by an individual collector has been donated to Atlanta’s Emory University. The collection of Raymond Danowski comprises “some 60,000 volumes and tens of thousands more of periodicals, posters, recordings and other items devoted to 20th-century poetry in the English language.”
The Real Story Of The Iraq Museum Looting
“Everyone knows about the looting of Iraq’s museums during last year’s war. What almost no one knows is that most of the museums’ holdings had been stolen and sold years before—and not by mobs of Iraqis off the street… The earlier looting was carried out so systematically, and on such a large scale, that it dwarfs the thefts that occurred after the fall of Baghdad. Moreover, the April looting may have occurred in part because it would provide cover for the prior thefts.”
The Worst-Reviewed Opera Ever (Take Two)
It isn’t often that a production of a Mozart opera can inspire critics to foam at the mouth, and yet, the English National Opera managed it three years ago with Claixto Bieito’s mounting of Don Giovanni. “A crude, anti-musical farrago”, a “coke-fuelled fellatio fest”, and a “new nadir in the vulgar abuse of a masterpiece” were but a few of the barbs hurled ENO’s way. So what does a company do after such a spectacular critical failure? Bring it back for an encore, apparently, and the reviews (“I should sooner poke my eyes out and sell my children into slavery than sit though it again”) aren’t looking any better the second time around.
Sometimes, The World Just Gets Too Close
Back in 2000, artist Tom Muller set out to bring the world closer together by creating World Passports which could be ordered from any of several “world embassies” around the world. While completely useless in traditional border-crossing situations, Muller describes the passports as sending “a holistic kind of message, but using bureaucratic attitudes and ways to get there.” Unfortunately for the artist, purchasing passport-making equipment turned out to be a great way to attract the attention of the world’s law enforcement agencies in the months after the 9/11 attacks.