Four Corners
Four Corners 1998, NR, 77 min. Directed by James Benning, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring . Benning’s ninth feature begins in the famous tourist spot where New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah meet, but then jumps off into the American desert to become a meditation on landscape, history, and painting. The Chicago Reader…
Scotch and Milk
Scotch and Milk NR, 110 min. Directed by Adam Goldberg, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Adam Goldberg, Nicky Katt, Clea Lewis, Giovanni Ribisi, Cole Hauser, Ajay Naidu, Jimmy Scott, Hubert Selby Jr., Robert Pastorelli. Actor Adam Goldberg (Sgt. Mellish in Saving Private Ryan, Dazed and Confused) makes his debut as a director with…
Today is a Good Day: Remembering Chief Dan George
Today is a Good Day: Remembering Chief Dan George NR, 44 min. Directed by Loretta Todd, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring . This documentary combines family stories, film clips, and re-creations that go inside the life of groundbreaking Native American actor Chief Dan George, who is most famous for his role in Little…
Family Plot
Family Plot 1976, PG, 120 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Barbara Harris, William Devane, Ed Lauter, Katherine Helmond. Universal Hitchcock Series: Hitchcock, in his 54th and final film, creates a decidedly unusual tone, blending comedy and suspense.
Frenzy
Great technique, suspense, and very black humor drive this tale of an innocent man hunted by Scotland Yard for a series of sex murders.
The Man Who Knew Too Much
The Man Who Knew Too Much 1955, NR, 120 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring James Stewart, Doris Day, Daniel Gelin. Universal Hitchcock Series: In 1955, Hitchcock remade his own 1935 movie, complete with its famous climax in Royal Albert Hall. Doris Day sings “Que Sera, Sera.” This is…
Rope
Rope 1948, NR, 80 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring James Stewart, Farley Granger, John Dall. Universal Hitchcock Series: Hitchcock famously experimented in Rope with temporal structure (the film is shot in supposed real time in 10-minute-long takes). It tells the story of two thrill murderers who were based…
Shall We Dance
Shall We Dance 1937, NR, 116 min. Directed by Mark Sandrich, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton. One of the finest Astaire-Rogers pairings, Shall We Dance also features a swell Gershwin score that includes such songs as “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off,” and “They Can’t Take…
Topaz
Topaz 1969, PG, 127 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring John Forsythe, Frederick Stafford, Dany Robin, Michel Piccoli, Philippe Noiret, Roscoe Lee Browne. Universal Hitchcock Series: Based on a Leon Uris novel, Topaz is a political thriller that has the French and the Americans working together to foil a…
Torn Curtain
Torn Curtain 1966, NR, 126 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Paul Newman, Julie Andrews, Lila Kedrova. Universal Hitchcock Series: This Cold War thriller is written by Brian Moore from his own original story; it presents Paul Newman as a defecting scientist and Julie Andrews as his stick-like-glue wife.
The Trouble With Harry
The Trouble With Harry 1955, NR, 99 min. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, Shirley MacLaine, Mildred Natwick, Mildred Dunnock, Jerry Mathers. Universal Hitchcock Series: Hitchcock’s comedic charms shine in this delightful story about a corpse that just won’t stay buried. In the interim, the dead…
Wadd: The John Holmes Story
Wadd: The John Holmes Story NC-17. Directed by , Narrated by , Voices by , Starring . Part of the Austin Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
Regret to Inform
Sonneborn has captured the horror of the Vietnam conflict from an angle as yet unexplored, that of the women left behind. Sonneborn travels to the place of her husband’s death in Vietnam with a film crew to retrace his final days.
Book of Life
Book of Life 1998, NR, 63 min. Directed by Hal Hartley, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Martin Donovan, P.J. Harvey, Thomas Jay Ryan, Miho Nikaido. Take this, Bill Gates: Jesus Christ uses a PowerBook. At least, in Hal Hartley’s new, short (63 minutes) film, he does. Moreover, he keeps on his desktop The…
Bowfinger
Bowfinger 1999, PG-13, 96 min. Directed by Frank Oz, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy, Heather Graham, Christine Baranski, Robert Downey Jr.. With oceanic chutzpah compensating for eyedropper rations of talent and funding, Z-list director Bobby Bowfinger (Martin) sets out to make a movie starring action superstar Kit Ramsey (Murphy)…
Teaching Mrs. Tingle
Teaching Mrs. Tingle 1999, PG-13, 96 min. Directed by Kevin Williamson, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Molly Ringwald, Jeffrey Tambor, Vivica A. Fox, Michael McKean, Marisa Coughlan, Barry Watson, Helen Mirren, Katie Holmes. The scribe who with Scream reinvented the slasher film for the Nineties also created with Dawson’s Creek teens who are…
Illuminata
Illuminata 1998, R, 111 min. Directed by John Turturro, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring John Turturro, Katherine Borowitz, Christopher Walken, Susan Sarandon, Beverly D’Angelo, Bill Irwin, Rufus Sewell, Georgina Cates, Ben Gazzara. “It’s a slender curtain between theatre and life,” blurts Celemene (Sarandon), as she flops to the floor and clutches Tuccio’s (Turturro)…
Mr. Smarty Pants Knows
Xylem is basically sclerenchyma. Sure, it contains some parenchyma, but the rest is sclerenchyma. Richard Burton used to reach over to Elizabeth Taylor during off-camera moments, take her breasts in his hands, and squeeze them like antique car horns, making “Honk! Honk!” noises. In England, fire trucks are called “appliances.” Youth in Tehran are selling…
Use Only as Directed
Back in the day — to be precise, back in 1994 when the city first formed the Citizens Planning Committee, whose report is the Magna Carta of Austin’s neighborhood ascendancy — we still considered “planning” to be about land use and related issues. After the city had failed to implement Austin Tomorrow (the city’s now-25-year-old…
When the Long Night Comes
“When the longnight comes, return to the end of the beginning.” illustration by Jason Stout One of the dead materialized during a night of ritual and asked that this message be spoken, privately, to the captain of Babylon 5. I hit pause, reversed the tape, listened again, and again. I had heard what I needed…
Neighborhood Planning: COA Style
Smart Growth’s Urban Core The “urban core” defined in the city’s Smart Growth plan corresponds to the boundaries of the city’s urban watersheds, comprised of the following creeks: Johnson, Shoal, Waller, Boggy, Tannehill, and Fort north of Town Lake, and Bouldin, Blunn, and Harper’s Branch on the south side. Neighborhood Planning Program This program of…
Hill Country Grape Harvest
Though the weather this year was somewhat less than congenial for growing grapes, all the Hill Country vintners we contacted were very optimistic about their respective harvests. Becker Vineyards general manager Jim Brown reported a “better-than-expected” quantity of the temperamental viogner grapes, which is great news to those of us who enjoy that varietal. At…
Where Are They Now?
The current shift away from Smart Growth rhetoric may just be a reaction to how promiscuously we tossed the label around in 1998. Here’s what happened to some of the key Smart Growth initiatives: Land Development Code Revision Dead as we knew it. We have a rewritten and “simplified” LDC, and a flurry of new…
Automat
The new weekly Chronicle feature “Automat” offers readers the opportunity to sample tasty, bite-sized restaurant listings compiled from new and previous reviews, guides, and poll results. This week’s entries were compiled by Chronicle food editor Virginia B. Wood. When you need quick, reliable information about Austin eateries, check here in the print edition or look…
Coming of Age
Dawn Cooper and Cyndy Kirkland of Reel Women inside the Alamo Drafthouse, one of the venues for the “Women Make Movies” Film Festival this weekend. photograph by Jana Birchum Here’s a question, and now, be honest: When was the last time you saw a film directed by a woman? With the exception of a few…
Food-o-File
The dog days of summer usually bring momentum to a stop, but this month people and things are movin’ and shakin’ despite the heat. The Texas Chili Parlor (1409 Lavaca, 472-2828) has been closed recently for kitchen repairs and a fresh coat of paint. When the venerable downtown watering hole reopens, it will have new…
Reel Women Presents: Women Make Movies
Friday, August 20 5:30pm: Catered reception for filmmakers (GSD&M) 8pm: “Your Name in Cellulite” (Gail Noonan), “24 Girls,” and “Black Kites” (Jo Andres) with filmmakers Andres and Noonan in atten-dance for Q&A afterward (Texas Union Theatre) Saturday, August 21 1pm: Panel discussion with visiting filmmakers Andres and Noonan, plus local filmmakersAnne Lewis and Nancy Schiesari,…
Postscripts
“As a result of their growing significance as arbiters and gatekeepers … agents have in effect supplanted the roles once played by the legendary figures (Alfred Knopf as publisher, Maxwell Perkins as editor),” John F. Baker writes in Literary Agents: A Writer’s Introduction (Macmillan, $14.95 paper), a thorough, surprising book that should be required reading…
Little Bombay
9626 N. Lamar #195, 339-0808 Tue-Sun 11:30am-9:30pm I probably would have passed this restaurant a thousand times were it not for a hot tip from a concerned Indian food lover. But upon hearing word that a new Indian restaurant had opened — one that served good, cheap, South Indian-style street food — I rushed out…
Scanlines
D: Charles Laughton (1955) with Lillian Gish, Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, Billy Chapin, Peter Graves, Sally Jane Bruce. Night of The Hunter Charles Laughton enjoyed a lengthy and illustrious acting career on stage and screen, but only served as director for one film. Night of the Hunter did so poorly at the box office and…
Articulations
The South Bank continues to inch its way toward reality. If you cruise down Barton Springs Road, you can see the headquarters for Austin Lyric Opera really taking shape. The dilapidated facade of the former Barton Springs Bar & Grill building has been shored up with new concrete blocks, and the girder frame of the…
Server Error
My name is Meredithand I’ll be your waitress today. God help us all. What I’ll actually be today is sweaty and bewildered, in my little green hat with the unidentifiable smear on the brim. I’ll be praying that all the pens didn’t roll away the last time my apron fell off, leaving me unable to…
Short Cuts
by Marjorie Baumgarten Everywhere you look this week, movies are bursting forth. I guess the forces of the universedecided that if the middle of August was a good enough time to send all the Austin kids back to school and declare it the end of summer then it was also a good enough time for…
Exhibitionism
State Theater, August 13 In the entertainment world right now, Latino comedy is hotter than Austin asphalt in August. Headliners like Carlos Mencia and George Lopez are playing across the country to packed houses, and many of the cable networks are focusing on a large crop of talented performers who are getting noticed at numerous…
Dancing About Architecture
There was confusion and more than a little concern in the Chronicle offices on Monday morning, as several editors checked their voicemail to find a message from the Associated Press inquiring as to whether blues baroness Lou Ann Barton had died. A reporter from the AP’s Dallas office urgently requested a return call regarding said…
Let Your Love Light Shine
John Turturro always makes a strong impression in whatever film he appears. Whether playing the mind-warped title character in Barton Fink or the hapless pizza purveyor caught in a race riot in Do the Right Thing, the weaselly gangster begging for his life to be spared in Miller’s Crossing or the middle-class nebbish in Box…
Inside the Spinning, Whirling World
In 1997-98, Dr. Joni L. Jones of the UT Speech Communications Department received a Fulbright fellowship to study the Yoruba fertility deity Oshun in Nigeria. She recorded and practiced the voices, rhythms, and physical and vocal languages of the people in the community. She draws upon this kind of field work for her own performances…
Daniel Johnston
Rejected Unknown (newimprovedmusic) It’s a novel concept: Artist records album, label passes on album, new label signs artist, new label apparently goes under, producer tires of waiting for third label to come along and presses album himself. This background is worth mentioning, because though it doesn’t affect the content of Daniel Johnston’s first album since…
TV Eye
Assignment E! With Leeza Gibbons premieres Sunday with Hollywood’s Obsession With Youth (8/22, 7pm, E!). It is the first in a quarterly series dealing with behind-the-scenes Hollywood. Actresses Drew Barrymore, Cybill Shepherd, Christine Lahti, and others discuss how aging has impacted their careers. In addition, Riley Weston, the 32-year-old writer who successfully passed herself off…
Off the Bookshelf
by Mark Baker Simon and Schuster, $24 hard Mark Baker is the Brothers Grimm of the law enforcement world. Having gone after the stories of cops and bad guys (in books entitled, unsurprisingly, Cops and Bad Guys), his latest book plumbs the splendors of prosecuting. And there are splendors here, the story of the man…
Black Elvis
The most useful feature at KoolKeith.net is the “Persona” page, a cataloging of rapper Keith Thornton’s ever-shifting roster of aliases and alter-egos. Since beginning his career with the seminal Ultramagnetic MC’s in 1987, Thornton has employed at least 16 different aliases, and at KoolKeith.net, each one features a photo and thumbnail bio. For instance, Dr.…
Cleaner Than a Handshake, Cleaner Than a Kiss
The 1990s is surely to be a decade of change � new technologies, new markets, new challenges, and new concepts replacing old ways. Overnight package delivery, anywhere in the nation? Americans preferring Hondas to Cadillacs? MCI long-distance sold through Amway? Many notions that were previously thought to be ridiculous or impossible are now fact, simply…
Steel Magnolia
Lady Bird Johnson hasalways recalled that her black nurse Alice Tittle gave her her nickname when she was two years old, because she was, Tittle said, “‘purty as a lady bird.'” Jan Jarboe Russell, a contributing editor at Texas Monthly who has recently published Lady Bird: A Biography of Mrs. Johnson (Scribner, $26 hard), doesn’t…
Not-So-Primal Therapy
Julian Lennon spoke so frankly about his life, music, and family in a New York City recording studio this past June that the interview bordered on therapy. Then, two hours into the session, the 36-year-old pioneer of rock’s next generation — who had been smiling and smoking throughout the conversation — suddenly stopped smiling. After…
Public Notice
Who doesn’t like breasts? Everything’s coming up boobies this week! We don’t know what it is, what’s in the air … but Breasts is our inadvertent theme for this week’s Public Notice. Look, you can stop reading now if this is the sort of thing that makes you queasy or bristly or flinchy. We can’t…
Book Reviews
L.A. Requiem by Robert Crais Doubleday, $23.95 hard Writers who change risk alienating their readers, who often simply want more of the same. But there are great rewards to be found in writers who have the skill and tenacity to truly grow and don’t sacrifice their unique voice on the altar of change for the…
Live Shots
Backyard, August 6 First off, I don’t dance. Aside from occasionally twisting like Chubby Checker with a slipped disc, my efforts at dancing resemble a trained bear shambling around with two left feet and fallen arches. BR5-49 almost made me cut loose, though (footloose). The Nashville combo paid their dues on Music City’s Lower Broadway…
For God and Country
Regular readers of the Chronicle may have said upon seeing this week’s cover, “Hey, wait a minute! Wasn’t there a feature on this Daniel Johnston guy just a few months ago?” Indeed there was, in our big South by Southwest 99 issue [Vol. 18 No. 29] — to commemorate the impending release of his Rejected…
About AIDS
Lots of data over the years confirm that when any pregnant woman smokes she damages her unborn child. Now an article in the Journal of AIDS & Human Retrovirology indicates that if Mom is HIV-infected, the chance of her transmitting HIV to her fetus is substantially increased if she smokes. A non-smoking HIV-positive woman who…
Round One
� When last we left the City Council, it was wrestling over a measure to eliminate a set of annexation incentives in the Drinking Water Protection Zone on the outskirts of the city limits. The impervious cover restrictions are back on the agenda today. Specifically, the new ordinance would decrease the amount of impervious cover…
Coach’s Corner
I’m hard pressed to find a group with a smaller public constituency than major-league umpires and PGA golf pros. The KGB maybe. Yet both groups have loudly placed themselves on the exact wrong side of highly controversial issues. I’m not exactly certain at what point Big League umpires decided they were part of the show.…
War of Words
Spotting the propaganda is the easy part; any layman reading with a critical eye can do that. More difficult is to know when Oppel is just flat-out getting things wrong. That takes a more knowledgeable observer. One such person is journalist Ken Martin, who has been covering city politics for nearly two decades, formerly as…
Day Trips
Johnson City’s fortunes have been tied to the Johnson family for most of its 120-year history. The small town’s historic preservation board would like to use the upcoming birthday celebration for the former president as a reminder to local residents and visitors of the town’s place in history. Historic Review Board members Elaine Lockhart, Bill…
Water/Wasterwater 101
Over the last two months, as Rich Oppel has put the “bully” back in “bully pulpit,” inquiring minds have wanted to know: What is he talking about? We don’t mean the philosophical argument about enviros, growth, and affordability, which is simply Oppel preaching to the Williamson County choir, in un-genteel tones that sound like “passion”…
Page Two
It isn’t a place to go after a late-night bite at an upscale restaurant to wile away the hours dancing to reggae, so Steamboat doesn’t have the across-the-board cachet of Liberty Lunch. Steamboat is a rock club. It’s where you go when it’s time to go fast and then a little faster. I don’t mean…
Naked City
Is bad boy developer Gary Bradley a man to be trusted? Not if you count the times he’s spearheaded various Austin-bashing shenanigans at the Lege. This time around, though, Bradley says he’s ready to play nice if the city agrees to sell wholesale water/wastewater service to his Spillar Ranch, a 1,000-plus acre expanse just south…
