Hi, Kent Williams here. I kinda sorta talked to Melody about doing a Weekender post, but we didn’t really get beyond the ‘sure why not?’ planning stage, so I’m operating here on the principle that it’s easier to apologize than ask permission. Anyhoo… The Mill Thursday: Monroe Crossing. A Bluegrass outfit that tours nationally and […]
Movies
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Talking Movies: The Dude Still Abides
In the 10 years since the release of The Big Lebowski, a few things happened. Cell phones overtook our public spaces. The internet colonized our private time. George W. Bush won once in the popular vote and twice in the electoral college. On a single morning, terrorists brought down the twin towers, destroyed part of […]
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Appaloosa Movie review
Appaloosa Narrative, 108 min Directed by Ed Harris Once upon a time in the American cinema, the western was king. Between the silent era and the late 1970’s, the U.S. film industry churned out thousands of western movies, most of them toward the end of that time starring Clint Eastwood. Not so today, when fans […]
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Righteous Kill Movie Review
Righteous Kill Drama, 101 min Directed by Jon Avnet The buddy cop film has been a staple of the American cinema since at least the 1970’s, and it’s been tooled for everything from suspense to comedy to straight action, but rarely has it actually been about friendship. That makes Righteous Kill, the new cop drama […]
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Movie Review: Edge of Heaven
The Edge of Heaven (Auf der anderen Seite) Directed by Fatih Akin October 3-5, Bijou There is an old poem by Horace that celebrates simple country living; its surprise ending is that the whole thing turns out to be the pitch of a city dweller trying to sell some rural property. During the Olympics, there […]
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50 Years of Obsession With Vertigo
Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo is celebrating this fall its 50th anniversary as an object of obsession for movie lovers. This year also marks the less-auspicious 15th anniversary of when I became obsessed with it in the commons room of a college dorm. Though I squirmed right off the filthy couch at the final scene, when a […]
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Iowa City Weekender: August 28-31
[update: we mistakenly listed the Amana Beer Festival on Saturday. The event actually takes place on Sunday] First a plug…LV works tirelessly to bring you weekend goodies every Wednesday. If you like what you read, send it on to a friend and help us build our community. (Or point them to www.littlevillagemag.com to sign up […]
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Iowa City Weekender: August 21-24
If you’re a student, you’ll probably attend at least one event at the University of Iowa Welcome Week. And there’s plenty of fun to be had–from the President’s Block Party to Chuck Klosterman at the Englert courtesy of the UI Lecture Series next Wednesday. But, there are also, plenty of non-University events this weekend to […]
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Landlocked Film Festival
Editor’s Note: A summer full of festivals winds down this week with the second annual Landlocked Film Festival. This year, Iowa City’s umbrella organization Summer of the Arts wove Landlocked into the fold, giving the fledgling festival a bigger profile than last year’s inaugural event. In our August issue, we previewed two Iowa Film Festivals, […]
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Movie Review: What I See When I Close My Eyes
What I See When I Close My Eyes Documentary, 29 min Directed by Leslie Hope Landlocked: Saturday, August 23, 12:30pm as part of the kid-friendly program. The Khmer Rouge just cannot catch a break. Every director since Roland Joffe has wanted to portray them as the Asian equivalent of the Third Reich, despite the fact […]
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Monster Camp Movie Review
Monster Camp Documentary, 90 min Directed by Cullen Hoback Hardacre: Friday, August 1, 6:00pm For all the types of two types of people in this world, this documentary highlights possibly the most psychologically fascinating. 1) Those who escape their lives by socially acceptable methods (alcohol, affairs and pornography, to name a few) and 2) those […]
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This American Gothic Movie Review
This American Gothic Documentary, 63 min Directed by Sasha Waters Freyer Hardacre: Saturday, August 2, 1:25pm; Landlocked: Friday, August 22, 5:30pm In the director’s statement for This American Gothic—a documentary about Grant Wood’s painting and the people of Eldon, Iowa, where the austere house with the lavish window still stands—Sasha Waters Freyer says that she […]
