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Film Oscar-nominated short animations: Dimanche

Posted by J.R. Jones on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 11:00 AM

All this week I'll be reviewing the Oscar nominees for best short animation, which open Friday at Landmark's Century Centre. Check back this time tomorrow for the next installment.

Presented by the National Film Board of Canada, Patrick Doyon's Dimanche shows another artist working quite agreeably with two dimensions. his flattened characters and perspectives contributing to the movie's gently sardonic gags. A little boy who lives by a train track flattens a coin under a locomotive and is then dragged to church by his parents, trailed by a trio of eyeless black crows whose constant cawing turns them into a goofy dark chorus. Luigi Allemano's score is witty throughout, like the sweet waltz with piano, tuba, and violin that emerges from the family's car radio as they continue on to the grandparents' house and cuts off when the car runs over a dog (to the crows' jubilation). You can check out a trailer for the film after the jump.

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Paranormal / Architecture / Film I can't hear you, I'm having an "experience"

Posted by Kevin Warwick on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 10:04 AM

Shutterstock

I don't have a car. It's dreary and cold. I want to go to the movies.

But with the Logan Theatre still out of commission, the closest alternative within walking distance to my apartment is the Regal City North 14. That's fine, mainstream first-runs are fine and dandy—I'll never be too highbrow to watch Kate Beckinsale trudge through another Underworld or check out a trio of angsty teens wield alien-gifted telekinetic powers. I'm just happy to be entertained—using my brain isn't as important to me as it once was.

So understandably, I made it a short-term goal to marvel at Liam Neeson battling blood-thirsty wolves in the barren Alaskan landscape.

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Media / News Bites Do newspapers think we can't see who's missing?

Posted by Michael Miner on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 9:01 AM

Conscientious editor dreams of the days raw copy

Conscientious editor dreams of the day's raw copy

I gave the Monday Trib a stare
And met the man who wasn’t there.
He wasn’t there again today.
I wish, I wish, he’d go away.

His absence haunts the Tribune, and a lot of other papers too. He (or, very definitely, she) is remembered as an editor. Not the lofty editor who designs and leads the great campaigns that win the coveted prizes. And not the obsessive who can lecture an hour about the comma. I'm speaking of the minions who once formed the protective layer of surly common sense that insulated a newspaper's daily report from the reporters' illogic, muddled language, and failure to think through what they were trying to write about.

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Soul Week / Music / Post No Bills Soul music: not just dusties

Posted by Peter Margasak on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 8:00 AM

Ronald Isley

The death of Don Cornelius last week has prompted a great deal of nostalgia for Soul Train and the wonderful performances that were a regular part of the show. But when it was actually on the air, the program had little time for nostalgia—it very much existed in the present. So rather than troll through great old clips, let’s celebrate the spirit of the show by looking at new soul music. We can ease into things by talking about some still-active artists who were scoring hits a decade and a half before Soul Train even went on the air: the seemingly eternal Isley Brothers, who appeared on the show many times.

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Music / Performing Arts Tonight: CSO, Muti, and Mason Bates

Posted by Deanna Isaacs on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 4:01 PM

Todd Rosenberg

Tonight's the last chance (this season, in Orchestra Hall) to hear Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra take on resident-composer and sometime-DJ Mason Bates's brand-new, electro-infused symphony, Alternative Energy, which includes sounds from Fermilab and junked auto parts, and was the hot item at CSO concerts last week. Word at midafternoon was that seats are available; $20 senior and $15 student rush tickets go on sale at the box office at 5 PM, the concert's at 7:30. Also on the program: Honegger and Franck.

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Crickets / Music Q&A with Craig Finn

Posted by Miles Raymer on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 3:43 PM

Mark Seliger

Through eight years and five albums the Hold Steady have earned themselves a reputation as the go-to act for big, broad rock anthems and life affirmation via power chords. Recently front man Craig Finn used some downtime between Hold Steady endeavors to record a solo album, Clear Hearts, Full Eyes (Vagrant), that's considerably more subdued and introspective than anything he's done with either the Hold Steady or his previous band, Lifter Puller. Finn's first solo tour comes to the Empty Bottle tonight. Last Thursday, the day after the first show of the tour, he and I talked on the phone. Hit the jump to see our conversation.

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Soul Week / Music The five worst covers of "The Tracks of My Tears"

Posted by Tal Rosenberg on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 2:32 PM

Crimfants/Wikimedia Commons

In order to research this post (about my five favorite versions of Smokey Robinson & the Miracles’ “The Tracks of My Tears”) I had to make sure that my favorite covers were in fact the best ones. Which means I had to cross-check them against every available, YouTube-existing version of the song. Which means I repeatedly contemplated suicide.

In the process of being horrified by a song I previously thought to be infallible, I realized something important about the Motown sound: Everyone loves it. That means every no-talent bucket of contagious hate has to produce a rendition of a classic Motown song. As a result, the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay have an inexorable soundtrack for their stay.

Here are the five worst covers of “The Tracks of My Tears.” Proceed with caution.

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Music / Post No Bills Diego Amador opens this year's Chicago Flamenco Festival

Posted by Peter Margasak on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 1:50 PM

Diego Amador

On Thursday evening the Chicago Flamenco Festival kicks off with a performance by Diego Amador's trio at Instituto Cervantes. His group, which also includes drummer Israel Varela and bassist Julián Heredia, will play again at the same time and same venue on Friday night. He hails from Sevilla—he's part of a big flamenco family—and he started out playing the guitar. When he first began performing professionally, though, it was on the drums, as a member of Pata Negra, a popular flamenco-rock group and a key part of the nuevo flamenco movement during the 80s. Amador emerged as a solo artist in the mid-90s, by which time he'd moved out from behind the drums, playing mainly piano rather than guitar.

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Twitter

ChicagoFilmie: I can't hear you, I'm having an "experience": I don't have a car. It's dreary and cold.... [ Read more ] [ Subscribe... http://t.co/Ur1ZfNRy
11:14 am on Wednesday, February 8 retweet
RiverNorthDance: Great preview from the Chicago Reader! A fantastic insight into composer Josephine Lee of the Chicago Children's... http://t.co/ZsDYhOur
11:03 am on Wednesday, February 8 retweet
Chicago_Reader: @czerkas03se Sorry bout that! Enjoy.
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Chicago_Reader: Here's the correct link for that Dan Savage kinky ingrate piece: http://t.co/wVJ8WHlz
10:44 am on Wednesday, February 8 retweet

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