A rough cut of male nudity in mainstream cinema By T.T. Stern-Enzi As an audience member of a certain age (and gender), I can remember being titillated by my first glimpse of onscreen nudity in “Porky’s” back in the early 1980s, which paved the way for a string of teenage fantasies dominated by the objectification [...]
Top 10 films of the year By T.T. Stern-Enzi Every year’s top 10 list feels a bit incomplete due to the nature of the release schedule in the Midwest. Studios frantically scramble to offer screenings or screeners for critics to consider films that may not play in their markets until early the following year, if [...]
Local film critic turned professional secret Santa this holiday By T.T. Stern-Enzi The prestigious awards season has dropped an early bounty on a number of films that have already come and gone from area theaters. The Hollywood Foreign Press (“The Golden Globes”), the New York Film Critics and the swelling ranks of other city and [...]
The latest tale of Narnia struggles to find its way By T.T. Stern-Enzi Rating: PG Grade: B- As with the “Harry Potter” series, I feel it is best to open with an admission. I have never read any of the C.S. Lewis books, although I have more than a dim awareness of the Christian allegorical [...]
Natalie Portman takes flight in this psychological thriller By T.T. Stern-Enzi Rating: R Grade: A+ Natalie Portman is all grown up and the proof is in her searing portrayal of the innocent perfectionist Nina in Darren Aronofsky’s intense exploration into the dark heart of a rising ballerina. As Nina, Portman embraces, to the fullest, the [...]
New espionage thriller charts a different European adventure By T.T. Stern-Enzi Milo Weaver, a CIA black-ops field agent known as a “Tourist” in the trade, is a late-30-something man without a home base or colleagues he can really trust, who meets an American (an actual tourist) while in the middle of a mission. Six years [...]
Stieg Larsson’s millennium trilogy stings to the very end By T.T. Stern-Enzi Rating: R Grade: A- Lisbeth Salander (Noomi Rapace), the heroine of Stieg Larsson’s best-selling series of thrillers, recuperates from near fatal wounds, inflicted in the previous installment (“The Girl Who Played With Fire”) by her father, Alexander Zalachenko (Georgi Staykov), Sweden’s prized Soviet [...]
Director of “Chekhov for Children” revisits her past and finds Chekhovian parallels in the present By T.T.Stern-Enzi During the late 1970s, Philip Lopate (“Being with Children,” a memoir based on his teaching career), challenged a group of fifth and sixth graders in New York City at PS 75 in his writing program (part of the [...]
The classic tale of Rapunzel gets a new spin By T.T.Stern-Enzi Rating: PG Grade: B+ A handsome rogue gets rehabilitated. A trapped princess regains her freedom and her throne. Swashes get buckled. Derrying gets done. A wicked enchantress reverts back to her ugly roots. And there’s a little song and dance thrown into the mix that [...]
Danny Boyle emerges from the slums with another million-dollar extravaganza By T.T. Stern-Enzi Rating: R Grade: A As is the case with large-scale events like a film festival (in this case the Toronto International Film Festival) with simultaneous segments and thousands of participants spread out over several locations, things can go horribly awry. A series of [...]
High Fructose Corn Syrup By Megan Garrison The FDA recently rejected a bid to officially change the name of high [...]
Walker was Victorious in Wisconsin Because His Reforms Worked By David H. Landon The folks at MSNBC had a bad [...]
It Takes More than a Tweet By Rana Odeh The victory of Republican Governor Scott Walker over Milwaukee Democrat Mayor [...]
What are the Consequences of Recall Election in Wisconsin? Last Tuesday, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) prevailed in an unusual [...]
Obama’s Support of Same Sex Marriage Will Cost Him Swing States By David H. Landon By Election Day, the President’s [...]
President Obama Announces Support of Same-Sex Marriage Most pundits believe that this Presidential election will be decided on the issue [...]
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