Chris Barsanti's Blog, page 155
February 10, 2015
New in Theaters: ‘Ballet 422′
Justin Peck directs his dancers in ‘Ballet 422′ (Magnolia Pictures)
In the new documentaryBallet 422, one of New York City Ballet’s dancers is given the opportunity to choreograph the company’s 422nd original ballet. Only he also has to dance a different program the night that his ballet premieres, and he’s got just two months to pull it all together.
Ballet 422 is playing now in limited release. My review is atFilm Racket:
There is no such thing as a permanent piece of art. Paper yellows, paint...
February 8, 2015
On TV: ‘The Jinx’
‘The Jinx': Kathleen and Robert Durst (HBO Films)
Tonight, HBO is premiering the first episode in its six-part true-crime documentaryThe Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst. It’s a stranger-than-fiction tale from director Andrew Jarecki (Capturing the Friedmans) who first tried to tackle the curious case of Durst with 2010’s fictional filmAll Good Things, where Ryan Gosling played Durst, heir to a massive Manhattan real-estate fortune, who was accused of killing his first wife Kathleen,...
Writer’s Corner: Just Like Baseball
(c. 1924, Library of Congress)
Forget plotting or sounding out your dialogue. Half the time, the greatest struggle with writing is the fight to just keep going. To that end, anything can potentially help.
Greta Gerwig, who’s adding a sideline of screenwriting to her acting career, gavethis advice to the New York Times Magazine:
I have gotten into baseball recently, and whenever I have trouble writing, I think about the pace of baseball. It’s slow. You strike out a lot, even if you’re great. It’s...
Writer’s Desk: Just Like Baseball
(c. 1924, Library of Congress)
Forget plotting or sounding out your dialogue. Half the time, the greatest struggle with writing is the fight to just keep going. To that end, anything can potentially help.
Greta Gerwig, who’s adding a sideline of screenwriting to her acting career, gavethis advice to the New York Times Magazine:
I have gotten into baseball recently, and whenever I have trouble writing, I think about the pace of baseball. It’s slow. You strike out a lot, even if you’re great. It’s...
February 7, 2015
New in Theaters: ‘Jupiter Ascending’
‘Jupiter Ascending': Check it out, hover boots! (Warner Bros.)
A preposterously silly and overbudgeted space opera from the Wachowskis, whoseCloud Atlas was one of the more exciting sci-fi/fantasies of recent memory,Jupiter Ascending would seem to have it all: Laser battles, baroque outer-space architeture, Eddie Redmayne in full camp mode, Channing Tatum with wolf ears. Disappointingly, such is not the case.
After a poorly-considered surprise screening at Sundance (wrong crowd), Jupiter Ascend...
February 6, 2015
Department of Weekend Reading: February 6, 2015
Associated Press starts using robot journalists … but at least it’s only for financial stories.
In Donetsk, even shellfire can’t stop the circus from performing.
Here’s what it was like for one person who grew up unvaccinated.
An oral history of Chipotle.
A lost cassette tape and the unreliability of memory; Or, Fugazi was awesome live.
White men wearing Google Glass.
Finally, a book cover that judges you.
Print and read: If Silicon Valley is really such a meritocracy, why is the “savagely misogynis...
February 5, 2015
New in Theaters: ‘Mad as Hell’
Cenk Uygur getting ready for his closeup in ‘Mad as Hell’ (Oscilloscope Laboratories)
Never heard ofCenk Uygur? Well, at one point, his two-fisted shouter of a program was the most watched news-ish program on the Internet. Then, a few years back, when MSNBC was looking for new faces, they tried him out. Things didn’t work out so well.
Mad as Hell, the documentary about Uygur’s unusual rise to media sort-of stardom, opens this week in limited release. My review is atFilm Journal International:
Ce...
February 4, 2015
Department of Health: ‘Star Wars’ and Vaccines
(U.S. National Library Of Medicine)
In the late-1970s, a couple decades before measles was declared officially eliminated in the United States—and before Rand Paul and the rest ofthe anti-science crowd got busy bringing it back—the government felt it needed some help convincing parents to give their children the measles vaccine that had been first introduced in 1968.
What better allies in the fight against easily-stoppable communicable diseases than a couple of droids from a galaxy far, far awa...
February 3, 2015
Department of Media: 2014’s Best Magazine Stories
(Library of Congress)
The winners of the 2015 Magazine Awards (the rather unfortunately named Ellies) have been announced. The New Yorker took home a few as usual, and Vogue won for publication of the year.
More interestingly, awards are also given out for best individual articles; here are some links:
Public Interest: “Why Women Aren’t Welcome on the Internet” (Amanda Hess, Pacific Standard)
Reporting: “Inside the Iron Closet: What It’s Like to Be Gay in Putin’s Russia” (Jeff Sharlet, GQ)
Video:...
February 1, 2015
Writer’s Corner: Hitting Your Word Count
Some writers can work anywhere, in any circumstances, with any implements, on a schedule that only their muse is herself fully comprehending. The rest of us need to set goals.
Take Graham Greene. According to legend, he wrote 500 words a day, no more and no less. Take this recollection from writer and editorMichael Korda, who was introduced to Greene while cruising on a private yacht in the Antibes in 1950 (as one does):
An early riser, [Greene]appeared on deck at first light, found a seat in t...
