Murderball is a gem of a little film, one that’s at very least worth renting in its inevitable DVD release. It’s also one of the most over-hyped indies of the season. It won a couple of awards at Sundance — the Audience Choice prize and another for editing — and…
It should come as no surprise that the hero and heroine of the new Michael Bay action extravaganza are clones. Exact copies of other people. You don’t get to be a Hollywood hitmeister like Bay — 200 Zillion Tickets Sold! — without indulging in formulas, and the characters Star Wars…
Gregg Araki likes to shock. That’s no secret to anyone who has followed the director’s career, but a cartoonish layer of unreality has usually kept the polymorphous sexual pairings and graphic violence somewhat at a distance. There’s a little bit of that in Mysterious Skin, but mostly it stays grounded…
Going to the theater this summer has been like stepping into a time machine where your fondest childhood memories are retooled by cynics and sadists. Bewitched, Herbie: Fully Loaded, last week’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and now Bad News Bears are meant to be gobbled like comfort food by…
When rocker turned director Rob Zombie’s House of 1000 Corpses was released in 2003, after years of bouncing around between studios afraid to put their name on a movie about a cartoonishly murderous family, it was anticipated as a hard-core gore fest. Instead, it was a plotless mess, with decent…
MTV Films made a wise purchase in picking up Hustle & Flow at Sundance: The soundtrack is killer. Rapping over music composed by Three 6 Mafia and Al Kapone, star Terrence Dashon Howard has the skills. The rest of the songs heard on-screen, most of which fall into the uniquely…
Matt Ringel, creator of the Nesquik Game Riot, the country’s largest touring expo for video gamers, drops a challenge to the disgruntled loser of last year’s battle against Matt Leto, a.k.a. “Zyos,” the reigning world Halo champ: Bring it! As the event rolls into the Valley for its third visit…
Before punk bands had their own summer festivals, punk bands were just that: a group of punks who had to load their own equipment, drive their own vans, and finance their own one-take records. Witness the spirit of punk before the cash cows started to moo, when Modified Arts hosts…
WED 6/27Alex Garcia is not a revolutionary. The founder of the Phoenix fashion school Instituto de Modelos Merge has no intention of shifting the balance of sociopolitical power or causing any sort of world domination movement. He simply wants to give an artistic voice to the culture that surrounds him…
7/22-7/23The auto-racing set has dominated motor sports in recent years, but the left-turn crowd has nothing on the daredevils on display at the IFMA Freestyle Motocross tour. As if the death-defying tricks the sport is known for weren’t enough, this year’s tour has incorporated elements from the Extreme Sport Bike…
THU 7/21Once upon a time nearly a century ago, something known as burlesque became the variety show of choice in America. And while its musical revues and vaudevillian comedy were certainly a draw, the genre made its mint as the birthplace of the modern-day striptease. Fast forward to 2005, and…
THU 7/21Bob Log III once described his music as “poo-party, tit-clapping, techno blues.” But the 35-year-old bluesbilly, who sings through an old telephone glued to the front of a motorcycle helmet, spouts “Mom” similes these days. “I’m just trying to sound like your mama calling up with some recipes for…
“Super Heroics” by Mark Newport at Arizona State University Art Museum: Fiber artist and ASU professor Mark Newport pokes fun at traditional gender roles by using the feminine art of knitting to make manly superhero costumes. His empty Daredevil and Spiderman suits hang flaccidly from the museum walls, waiting for…
THU 21 You’ve probably met those condescending old farts who always say crap like, “I was doing this before you were born.” Wouldn’t it be great to say, “Yeah, well, I was doing this before I was born, too”? Ferret out your former incarnations on Thursday, July 21, when Glendale…
If Vince Vaughn puts any effort into what he’s doing, it doesn’t show, which is perhaps one of the benefits of always appearing to be hung over. The man probably has to check the bags under his eyes at the airport, and he’s about as in shape as a toddler’s…
Phoenix artist Hector Ruiz fires a shot right between the eyes of American values in his “La Realidad (Reality)” exhibition at the Heard Museum. The show, which addresses Mexican-American identity, border issues, race, misogyny, capitalism and the injustices of the global economy, is notable because it’s a highly politicized exhibition…
Most of us spend our 20s trying to understand the mix of parental influence, pop culture, personality and irrevocable decisions that put us on our current path in life. Figuring out how and why you became the person you are is the most basic puzzle one can try to solve…
Roald Dahl’s inner child was evidently a contrary lad — precocious, dark-minded, contemptuous of adult supervision, and fueled by a sense of justice that often proceeded via cruel whim. In Dahl’s twisty children’s stories, villains throw kids out of windows, beautiful women turn out to be hideous witches in disguise,…
Me and You and Everyone We Know, the new film from writer/director/performance artist Miranda July, walked off with prizes at both the Sundance and Cannes film festivals. An audience and critical favorite, it follows an ensemble cast of characters, each of whom is longing to connect with another human being…
Movies based on comic books have become dime-a-dozen events — appropriate given that the cover price of these titles was 10 cents when they debuted decades ago. It wasn’t so long ago Warner Bros. teased the release of Richard Donner’s Superman by insisting, “You’ll believe a man can fly”; now,…
Critics of Phoenix’s downtown art scene love to bitch about how its plethora of painters, mixed-media masters and other creative types have forgone imagination and simply mailed it in. As much as scenesters would hate to admit it, it looks like those pugnacious pundits are correct, at least when it…
As a professional ghost hunter, Christopher Moon says he’s been scratched, pushed, beaten, and suffered third-degree burns courtesy of some seething spirits who refuse to cross over to the other side. Obviously, this guy can’t take a hint. On Saturday, July 16, the Valley native — and owner of Colorado-based…
