Cristian Mungiu’s Palme d’Or-winning second feature, “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days,” an intimate drama of two friends forced to seek extralegal abortion under Communist rule, played better as a thriller than a message movie. The same curious quality informs Mungiu’s follow-up, “Beyond the Hills,” a gripping depiction of a remote Romanian monastery that similarly falls short of making a statement. Read more...
Arts, Music
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March 4, 10:55 pm
Album Review: ‘Cerulean Salt’ by Waxahatchee
Punk rock is dead, punk rock is dying, punk rock died surviving. In a year when the genre threatens to crash at full throttle back into the mainstream (or at least pseudo-mainstream), from the anguished roar of Pissed Jeans to the wheezing desperation of Iceage, the quieter anguish of Waxahatchee’s “Cerulean Salt” could easily be overlooked as a folksy interlude. Read more...
Arts
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February 21, 12:00 am
Album review: ‘Push the Sky Away’ by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave never pretended to be nice. Putting aside the noisy side project, Grinderman, his “quiet” albums always aimed to disquiet, his singer-songwriter affectations merely a sneaky way to disturb and perturb. Read more...
Arts, Music
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February 4, 2:46 am
Album review: ‘II’ by Unknown Mortal Orchestra
Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s self-titled first album recalled the deceptively pleasant pop of what had seemed a lost music: melodic guitar phrasing, Lennon-tinged vocals, a haze of noise and above all, insanely catchy tunes (see “Ffunny Ffriends”). Read more...
Arts, Film & TV
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January 31, 12:00 am
Oscar Short Film nominations feature strong contenders
The Oscar prediction game usually comes down to the Short films – many a perfect score has been ruined by guessing winners via the less-than-foolproof method of whoever’s name sounds most award-worthy. Read more...
Photo: Minkyu Lee’s 2-D “Adam and Dog” is a retelling of Adam and Eve through the perspective of man’s best friend.
Arts, Film & TV
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January 21, 11:59 pm
Movie Review: “Tabu”
By most technical standards, Miguel Gomes’ “Tabu” is a film out of time. It’s shot in gauzy black and white, it’s framed in boxy Academy ratio, and the latter half of the film, titled “Paradise” and without dialogue, is devoted to a love story set in Portuguese-colonized Africa. Read more...
Arts, Lifestyle
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January 14, 1:08 am
Bruins close out Harry Potter Week with Yule Ball
Serving as centerpiece and finale to Harry Potter Week, the Yule Ball drew the biggest crowd of all the events, which included a Quidditch tournament, a festival, a Horcrux Hunt and an inter-residential competition for House Points. Read more...