Ab-Normal Beauty (Tartan) Art of the Devil (Tokyo Shock) Bram Stoker’s Dracula/Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (Sony) Caged Heat (Buena Vista) Dark Water (Buena Vista) Diary of a Mad Black Woman: The Play (Lions Gate) Empire of the Wolves (Sony) 15 Things You’re Not Supposed to See (Xtreme) Happy Here and Now…
Eric Finzi at Perihelion Arts: It’s a pop culture tenet that Charles Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, was a perv whose fascination with little girls appears, to contemporary eyes, to be very Michael Jackson. Maryland painter Eric Finzi explores Carroll’s oddness in a series of epoxy resin paintings based…
“Keeping Shadows: Photography From the Worcester Museum of Art” Photos lie. You knew that. What you probably didn’t know is that photos were lying more than a century before Photoshop became a verb. Photographers were mucking with their images way back in the 19th century when the medium was still…
The myth of the Wild West has mutated over the past half-century. Where once we thrilled to the wholesome exploits of the Lone Ranger, now we wallow in the mesmerizing depravity of HBO’s Deadwood. Film geeks can argue about when it started to change, but by 1992’s Unforgiven, pop culture…
Serenity (Universal) Joss Whedon’s film version of his TV series Firefly came and went like a lightning bug in October; the predicted phenom stuck around the multiplex just long enough to lose millions. But like Firefly, which sold enough boxed sets to warrant a movie, Serenity’s bound to do well…
It’s time to welcome ’06 here in the PHX, but you’ve got no idea where to go. New Year’s Eve is (arguably) the biggest hootenanny of the whole Gregorian calendar, so you definitely don’t want to wind up stuck at home while your friends are out living their champagne wishes…
Restaurants Bars and Clubs Canyon Raceway 9777 West Carefree Highway, Peoria Droppin’ the Ball rave and massive DJ event with five stages hosting more than 25 different turntablists spinning such genres as breakbeats, drum ‘n’ bass, trance, and more. The lineup includes Harmonius, Atomic Mage, Spy vs. Spy, Defcon 4,…
Special Events Bars and Clubs Bada Boom Pasta Room 4151 North Marshall Way, Scottsdale www.badaboomaz.com “A Dinner to Remember” featuring beef tenderloin, Chilean sea bass, and plenty of Italian favorites. 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. Dinners start at $40. Call 480-214-2666. Barcelona Scottsdale 15440 Greenway-Hayden Loop, Scottsdale www.barcelonadining.com Executive chef…
Special Events Restaurants Ain’t Nobody’s Bizness 3031 East Indian School Road www.aintnobodysbizness-az.com New Year’s Eve bash featuring drink specials, giveaways, champagne toast at midnight, and DJ Tsunami spinning hip-hop and dance hits. 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. No cover. Call 602-224-9977. Amsterdam 718 North Central Avenue www.amsterdambar.com New Year’s Eve…
Robert Birmingham (a.k.a. Fun Bobby), 38, towers over the Valley nightclub scene. This 6-foot-6 beer-busting beanstalk is one of the Valley’s “StarTenders” — or celebrity bartenders — famous for his mixology mastery, suds-slinging, and affable nature. He’s seen many an Auld Lang Syne during his 12 years behind the sticker-laden…
Kendon Victor, 41, will help start 2006 off with a bang, or several hundred of them. As head pyrotechnician for Tempe-based Fireworks Productions of Arizona, he’ll coordinate the launching of skyrockets in flight over both Scottsdale and Tempe’s block parties, as well as at various casinos and country clubs Valleywide…
While Alexandria Paveloff recently turned the magic, alcohol-friendly age of 21, don’t expect to see her wasted on New Year’s Eve. This diminutive customer-service representative already knows about the evils of alcohol, including getting thrown in the poky after drunkenly decking a dude several times her size. Breast-laid plans: On…
Steve Sims, 38, doesn’t watch Taxicab Confessions — he never needs to. The former computer programmer turned cabdriver has already seen plenty of explicit and outrageous action in the back seats of the taxis he’s driven for Discount Cab over the past four years, especially on December 31. Lettin’ loose:…
“Agony and beauty for us live side by side,” laments Mameha (Michelle Yeoh), the most successful geisha in Gion. You’ll know how she feels: Memoirs of a Geisha, as directed by Chicago’s Rob Marshall, is beautiful to look at, but when it comes to the dialogue and storytelling, agony just…
Those who will sit around wondering whether Munich is the work of an anti-Israeli or just a self-hating Jew — which is to say, Steven Spielberg, who has been branded both by Israeli officials and newspaper columnists in recent weeks — give the movie and its maker far too much…
The Jerry Lewis chromosome is running amok again inside Jim Carrey, and if you don’t feel like getting clubbed half to death with a slapstick, stay away from Fun With Dick and Jane. On the other hand, if Carrey’s tireless antics — slithering onto nightclub tables, speaking in tongues, and…
It’s impossible to talk about The Ringer, a comedy about someone pretending to be retarded in order to rig the Special Olympics, without mentioning that episode of South Park in which Cartman does the same thing. The Ringer was already in production when that episode was made, and has taken…
The Amazing Race: The Seventh Season (Paramount) Battlestar Galactica: Season 2.0 (Universal) The Biggest Loser: The Workout (Lions Gate) Bob the Butler (First Independent) Cry_Wolf (MCA) ER: The Complete Fourth Season (Warner Bros.) The Exorcism of Emily Rose (Sony) Frankie & Johnny Are Married (MCA) The Great Raid (Miramax) Ice…
It’s a pop culture tenet that Charles Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, was a perv. Carroll, who wrote Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, was a shy, stuttering deacon and lifelong bachelor with an interest in little girls that, to contemporary eyes, appears very Michael…
Jennifer Bartlett at Bentley Projects: If you want to see how a painter’s brain differs from the gray matter of people who don’t know which end of a paintbrush to hold, go see this retrospective of work by the famed California-born artist. In a piece titled Boats, Bartlett places a…
Be he ever so humble — and he really is, as you’ll see — there’s no one quite like William Fucking Reed, host of the Shake! Motherfucking Dance Party. First off, what’s up with the middle moniker? “My parents weren’t very original, I suppose,” he says with a laugh. So…
Sin City: Recut, Extended, Unrated (Buena Vista) Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller’s near frame-for-frame adaptation of Miller’s bone-crunching comics finally gets a rewarding DVD treatment, following a shamefully sparse edition earlier this year. The theatrical cut boasts two commentary tracks (with Quentin Tarantino and Bruce Willis, among others), but there…
