Album Review: Soundtrack For 'Inside Llewyn Davis' Is Folky Gold Mine.

 

First the Coen Brothers, Joel and Ethan, brought in a sweeping new audience for bluegrass and traditional American roots music with the Grammy-winning soundtrack for "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" Thirteen years later, and working again with T-Bone Burnett, comes the movie and the accompanying soundtrack to "Inside Llewyn Davis," an album that could spark a resurgence in folk music with new recordings to fit the film's early-'60s Greenwich Village setting.

Starring Oscar Isaac as the title character, "Inside Llewyn Davis" explores the trials and tribulations of Llewyn as he tries to make a solo career for himself from the baskethouses of the Village to Chicago. Carey Mulligan, Justin Timberlake, Adam Driver and Stark Sands also star in the film, lending their own voices for live performances in the film and the soundtrack recordings.

Album review: 'Artpop'- 2013: A Gaga Odyssey

In the two-and-a-half years since her last album Born This Way, Lady Gaga must have watched Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "A Clockwork Orange" on repeat for a long while. For starters, on the Artpop album cover she looks like one of the sculptures of the girls in the Korovo Milk Bar, and the album on the whole sounds like it's a voyage to space, to a faraway planet where dance music rules and inhibitions are left at the door.

Artpop is Gaga's weirdest, most experimental album to date, and it shows the "progression" she has made from party girl to all out crazy girl playing with all of the knobs in the studio. Since her first album, The Fame, came out five years, she's donned more personas than Roger from "American Dad!" On Artpop, Gaga takes us through her own musical stargate sequence as she tries to find herself, and it's not the most pleasant journey.

Movie Review: '12 Years a Slave' Run-Of-The-Mill Slavery Movie

Chiwetel Ejiofor as Solomon Northup has his last meal as a free man in "12 Years a Slave."

“12 Years a Slave” has received universal acclaim, but what else would you expect from a historical drama like this? For one, it exploits a painful time in the country’s history, and two, it makes a hero out of a normal person. Look at “Schindler’s List,” “Sophie Scholl: The Final Days,” and even last year’s “Lincoln.” All three films were showered with praise for doing just that.

This is exactly what I was hoping Steve McQueen wouldn’t do with “12 Years,” but I was wrong. The English auteur threw out his signature raw style for a convenient and rudimentary way of telling a story we’ve seen time and again.

Some Grammy 2014 Submissions!

 

I have already written about what I think the Grammy nominees will be in a good chunk of categories come December 6, just guessing on what could be submitted. In a partially leaked submission list posted at www.carriefans.com, some of my guesses have been more or less confirmed.

Of the surprise guesses I made that could be true (based on this list) include rap duo Macklemore & Ryan Lewis submitting "Same Love" for song of the year over "Thrift Shop" (submitted for record of the year) or "Can't Hold Us." The number one song of the summer, "Blurred Lines," was not listed as potential submissions for record or song of the year. Did it not submit at all? Furthermore, Burno Mars did not, allegedly, submit "When I Was Your Man" or "Locked Out of Heaven," for song of the year, but submitted the latter for record of the year.

Philadelphia Film Festival- STRANGER BY THE LAKE

Wednesday was my closing night at the 22nd Philadelphia Film Festival, two days before the actual closing. I had only seen four movies, "The Congress," "August: Osage County," "Blue is the Warmest Color" and now "Stranger By the Lake." With that film I could not have asked for a better end to my first film festival.

Premiering at Cannes, alongside Palme d'Or winner and PFF entry"Blue is the Warmest Color," "Stranger By the Lake" is what I call the gay counterpart to "Blue." They both feature uncompromising showings of same-sex relations but with characters we care about, even if they're two completely different stories.

During the summer a lake spot in France becomes a cruising destination for gay men. On the rocky shores are men of all ages hanging around naked in the open, including Franck (Pierre Deladonchamps) a guy who we know nothing about except that he's looking for a lover. He has his flings in the woods with some of the naturalists, but nothing of substance.

Philadelphia Film Festival- AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY and BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR.

Obviously, I wasn't impressed at all by "The Congress," the first film I had seen at the Philadelphia Film Society this year. Things picked up, a bit, with my viewings of "August: Osage County," starring Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts, and the Palme d'Or-winning "Blue is the Warmest Color." A slight technical hiccup interrupted the screening of "August" (the screen went blank), and I kind of wish that happened to "Blue."

August: Osage County 

Adapting his Tony-winning play of the same name, Tracy Letts writes an incredible vehicle for Meryl Streep and Margo Martindale, who play sisters Violet and Mattie Fae, in the story of a family coping with a loss in the fiery summer hells of Oklahoma.

Violet's husband has killed himself and her family comes back to console her, opening up a barrage of posionous words on her three girls Barbara (Julia Roberts), Ivy (Julianne Nicholson) and Karen (Juliette Lewis), and their respective families and loved ones. The relationship among the daughters and their mother isn't the best, but it makes for absolutely gritty and, at times, hilarious moments.

Philadelphia Film Festival: THE CONGRESS

I've never been to a film festival, much less the Philadelphia Film Festival (now in its 22nd year). But something changed in me this year, I thought I should check out what they're showing and buy some tickets.

When tickets went on sale in early October I ended up buying tickets to four movies; "The Congress," "August: Osage County," "Blue is the Warmest Color," and "Stranger By The Lake." I had heard of all of them by reading their reviews after playing in Cannes (except "August") so I knew I picked some good ones. "August" is Meryl Streep's latest film so of course I had to see it.

These are just some of the critically-lauded films that are showing this year, but I obviously can't afford to go to all of them. Other highlights include "12 Years s Slave," "All is Lost," "Philomena," and "Labor Day," all of which early Oscar bait.

The first film I saw was "The Congress" on October 18. Didn't know what it was about until I saw the trailer for it, which really interested me. However, the film was something totally different. The latest project from Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman —who shattered documentary protocol with his animated "Waltz With Bashir" — this was such a mess!

The half-live-action, half-animated film stars Robin Wright, as herself, as an aging actress who agrees to get herself scanned so a film studio can use her in any film they want without actually having her in it. The film morphs into a "Miyazaki on LSD" visual spectacle that collapses under the weight of its own stupidity. Folman thought he was trying something awesome here, and it could have been, but it looked like the anime "Steamboy" combined with "The Tree of Life," minus the latter's deep philosophical messages. It was just as stupid as "Steamboy," too.

"The Congress" is nothing more than Folman looking at himself in the mirror as he pleasures himself with an idea only he thought was a good one. It's a long, painful concoction that ends up being so pretentious you'd think Folman was a 4-year-old trying to impress his older brother by jumping off the roof of a house to proves he's stronger. He's not, and I hope it kills him.