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Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

“A LITTLE HELP”: Widowhood and womanhood

Posted in Uncategorized on July 26, 2011| 1 Comment »

Daniel Yelsky and Jenna Fischer in "A Little Help"

“A LITTLE HELP”  My rating: C+ (Now playing at area theaters)

115 minutes | MPAA rating: R

I’ve a soft spot for Jenna Fischer, whose girl-next-door blend of beauty and non-threatening sexuality has helped keep TV’s “The Office” percolating nicely for several seasons.

Fischer gets a rare leading role in “A Little Help,” a dour comedy about a recent widow trying without much success to get her life back on track. This low-keyed affair from writer/director Michael J. Weithorn, alternately sad and a bit absurd, is perfectly watchable without really making a big impression.

Laura (Fischer) is a wife, mother and dental hygienist who suspects her husband Bob (Chris O’Donnell) is having a fling with his secretary. All she really knows for sure is that she and Bob haven’t had sex in months and she’s feeling a bit frantic. (more…)

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NEWSPAPER DAYS: First assignment

Posted in Reveries, Uncategorized, tagged , on July 11, 2011| 18 Comments »

The Kansas City Star, 18th and Grand, KCMO

On a sunny June day in 1969 I climbed the steps of the Kansas City Star building, passed the bronze relief portrait of founder William Rockhill Nelson that still watches over the front door, and began my career as a newspaperman.

Actually it was only a summer internship, but those three months at The Star provided a crash course in practical journalism, allowed me to show what I could do and paved the way for a full-time gig when I graduated from college a year later.

Up in the second floor newsroom I reported to Don T. Jones, the daytime assignment editor of The Times, then The Star’s morning edition (the two papers merged many years ago).

Don T., as he was universally known, is best described as a chain-smoking bantam rooster. (more…)

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“HORRIBLE BOSSES” : Workin’ for the man

Posted in Uncategorized on July 8, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis and Jason Bateman in "Horrible Bosses"

“HORRIBLE BOSSES”  My rating: C+ 

100 minutes | MPAA rating: R

It may not be a comedy for the ages, but “Horrible Bosses” certainly resonates in the here and now.

The premise of this extremely rude effort from director Seth Gordon finds three buddies trapped in jobs with miserable bosses and, given the current dearth of employment opportunities, unable to escape.

Their answer: Murder. They agree to knock off each other’s bosses.

That’s a bit extreme, but then so is everything about this movie, which takes Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day and basically casts them as modern versions of the Three Stooges, nice dopes who mess up everything they touch and then react in a childlike frenzy of shoving, slapping and punching. (more…)

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Book Review: Sleight of hand

Posted in Uncategorized on July 6, 2011| Leave a Comment »

“THE MAGICIAN AND THE CARDSHARP”  (Owl Books)

Karl Johnson’s breezy nonfiction read — just out in paperback — offers a multitude of attractions.

For anyone who’s ever been fascinated by magic, it’s a detailed look into the world of professional illusionists and sleight-of-hand artists.

For card players it’s replete with possibilities for cheating.

For general readers it’s a real-life detective story.

And for residents of this neck of the woods — Kansas City and environs — it’s a yarn set in our own back yard.

Johnson’s principlal subject is Dai Vernon, a Canadian who became New  York high society’s premiere performer of close-up magic, established himself as the dean of North American magicians, and who spent the last 30 years of his life (he died in 1992 at age 98) as the in-house attraction of Los Angeles’ famed Magic Castle, training young magicians and putting on amazing shows for a delighted public.

(more…)

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NEWSPAPER DAYS: The flying Underwood

Posted in Reveries, Uncategorized, tagged , , on July 4, 2011| 4 Comments »

Jim Fisher never looked to me like a newspaperman.

He looked like a Kansas rancher.

While most career journalists are prone to corpulence (too many donuts, too much time sitting at a keyboard), Jim was as lean as the Marlborough Man…with whom he shared a love of tobacco.

From the day I first met Jim in the city room of the Kansas City Star until my last sighting of him more than a decade ago, his looks hardly ever changed.

He always had a four-day growth of chin stubble (I never understood this…at some point wouldn’t it either turn into an actual beard or be cut back to baby-bottom smoothness?). His hair was trimmed close…not quite Marine D.I. close, but getting there.

His wardrobe never varied: Well-worn blue jeans, a wrinkled shirt (more…)

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Our ex-dog

Posted in Reveries, Uncategorized, tagged , , on June 23, 2011| 2 Comments »

(This piece has nothing to do with movies. Occasionally I feel the need to write about something different. Enjoy.)

Some years ago, my wife Ellen came home from her job at the Kansas City Art Institute with a wriggling bundle of joy.

It was a puppy given to her by one of the students (kids were always trying to balance their studies with pet ownership and failing), who said it was a black Lab.

Our daughter named him Josh.

Josh was loyal, loving, dumb and destructive in ways that only an energetic, tail-wagging Labrador retriever can be.  Also, it turned out that while there might have been a black Lab in his family tree, there was a lot more Great Dane. This was one big dog. (more…)

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New DVDs: Fran, Rooster and a poor man’s “Rear Window”

Posted in Uncategorized on June 13, 2011| 1 Comment »

“PUBLIC SPEAKING” (May 24)

God bless Martin Scorsese. When he’s not making a big Hollywood movie, he’s out there churning out interesting documentaries.

“Public Speaking” is a profile of humorist and essayist Fran Lebowitz. It’s not a conventional biography; anything we learn about her origins and literary history arrives as part of several extended conversations or, more accurately, monologues delivered by the delightfully ascerbic Lebowitz.

I love her because she’s an elitist. She claims that NYC was ruined when city fathers decided to sell it to Middle America as a tourist destination. As a result, she complains, the streets of Manhattan are awash in “hillbillies.”

(more…)

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OPINION: Jeff City? Who needs ’em?

Posted in KC Film Scene, Local film, Uncategorized on June 12, 2011| 3 Comments »

JUNE  12:

It’s been a crappy weekend for Missouri’s filmmaking community.

After months of buttonholing state legislators to make the case that the film industry is good for the Show Me State, advocates for Missouri moviemaking have received hugely discouraging news.

Gov. Jay Nixon has eliminated the Missouri Film Office, which legislators had voted to continue funding to the tune of $200,000 a year.

Among other things the film office, headed by Jerry Jones, scouts film locations for out-of-state producers and acts as a liaison between filmmakers and local talent, vendors and movie professionals.
But as of July 1 the office will cease to exist.

(more…)

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KC Gayfest…just around the corner

Posted in KC Film Scene, Uncategorized, tagged , on June 10, 2011| Leave a Comment »

One of the summer’s most anticipated films, a documentary about a homegrown C&W star and the story behind Hollywood’s first openly gay feature film are among the attractions of this year’s Kansas City Gay & Lesbian Film Festival scheduled for June 24-30 at the Tivoli in Westport.

But even before the fest gets underway, it’s offering a teaser. “Going Down in La-La Land,” based on the hit novel about a young actor who finds himself a star in the adult entertainment world, will be shown June 16 at the Screenland Armour Theatre in North Kansas City. It’s a benefit for GSP.

For tickets, trailers of all the films and more detailed information visit http://www.kcgayfilmfest.com and www.castromovienights.org.

Here’s the schedule for this year’s Gay Fest:

FRIDAY, JUNE 24

Christopher Plummer and Ewan McGregor in "Beginners"

6:30 p.m.:  “BEGINNERS” — Inspired by his own father’s late-in-life coming out, Mike Mills’ celebrated film centers on a son (Ewan McGregor) dealing with his newly widowed — and liberated — father (Christopher Plummer).

(more…)

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