Anthropomorphizing its animal stars to a borderline-dubious degree, Disneynature’s non-fiction African Cats situates itself in Kenya’s Masai Mara National Reserve, where two four-legged mothers valiantly struggle to provide for and protect their young. On the northern side of the river that divides this gorgeous but pitiless land lives aging lioness…
When 13 Families, a new documentary about how the families of the thirteen victims of the Columbine shootings cope with their loss, premieres tonight at the Denver FilmCenter, it will be a new experience for the public. After so much media focus on the more sensational and political aspects of…
It’s been fifteen years since Scream came along and changed the whole horror movie paradigm with its self-awareness, satirizing the cliches of a genre then in the throes of death by indifference and employing them as plot devices, in the process pretty much single-handedly breathing life back into it. It…
Ever since he ended up as conspicuously the only member of the Breakfast Club not to get coupled up — and was pretty much okay with it — we knew Anthony Michael Hall was a guy we could identify with. Lanky, bug-eyed and just a little too weirdly enthusiastic, he…
Though it’s largely been forgotten in the annals of crack-pottery and snake-oil salesmanship, the story of Mark Kostabi is one of the art world’s weirdest and most head-slappingly dumb. A darling of the high-rolling ’80s New York scene, Kostabi and his rise to fame and riches on the backs of…
Mi Linda Soledad. This large exhibit at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center zeroes in on the career of one of Colorado’s most important abstract painters, Emilio Lobato. The show’s title, which means “My Beautiful Solitude,” refers both to Lobato’s life growing up in the San Luis Valley and to…
The opening title card of François Ozon’s 1977-set Potiche seems to take design inspiration from the exploitation films of that period — a sneaky-smart way of nodding to one of this pastel-colored political farce’s key topics, if not its stylistic mode. As Suzanne, Catherine Deneuve plays the title role, which…
Set in the months after Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, The Conspirator follows the consequences of the fatal shot at Ford’s Theater — specifically, the trial of Mary Surratt, Catholic, 42, and the owner of a Washington, D.C., boardinghouse, who was presented before a military tribunal as the den mother in…
The masses aren’t exactly clamoring for more experimental films. Not only is there exactly zero market for avant-garde film-making in the mainstream, but there aren’t even too many underground screenings of them, and even fewer people devote their careers to making them. Even so, says John Hartman, director of Indie…
Emilio Lobato and Sangeeta Reddy. Mixed-media artist and painter Emilio Lobato is surely near the top of anyone’s list of abstract artists in the region. His work relates well to that of the late Dale Chisman, as both artists studied with Mary Chenoweth at Colorado College. His latest creations, many…
Laws governing the keeping of exotic animals as pets vary from state to state in this country — and some states have no restrictions whatsoever, which means there’s a vibrant subculture of raising some of the most dangerous animals in the world as common household pets. That’s the premise behind…
The era of the teenage action heroine is fully upon us. As pop-cultural correctives go, it’s a mixed blessing. In one corner, you’ve got the jailbait fantasies of Donkey Punch and Kick Ass, which eagerly trade on notions of naughty girliness rather than transcend or interrogate them. In the other,…
Your Highness plays like a dirty-joke blooper reel made by the cast of a junky sword-and-sorcery epic, streaked with carelessly contemporary-sounding blue humor, blunt profanity replacing the naughty-naughty, tankard-sloshing, heaving-bosom ribaldry that goes with the period setting. The scene: a generic medieval realm from an EverQuest or Forgotten Realms module…
There are a lot of short films playing at the Aspen ShortsFest tonight and over the course of the next five days — like, a shitload of them. And since many of them are foreign and all of them, pretty much by definition because they are short films, are somewhat…
It’s hard out there for a pimp. Or at least a warlock like Charlie Sheen. When it was announced that CBS had begun looking for actors to replace his role on Two and a Half Men, the cogs started turning and the rumor mill spit out one replacement after another…
For proof that a lifelong obsession with trivia will win you literally tens of dollars and a modest measure of short-lived semi-fame, look no further than Jeopardy! tomorrow night, when Geeks Who Drink editor Christopher Short will throw down in representation of Denver’s community of nerds with an impressive ability…
After watching the Jersey Shore crew drink and fight and tan together just like a real family, they moved out of the house last week in a rather deflated thirteenth and final episode of the show’s third season. Though the group is still supposed to go to Italy for another…
In years past, putting together a Best of Denver issue was like Sophie’s Choice: In order to choose the favorite baby, all the rest of the babies had to die and then Meryl Streep killed herself. Now we have the vast internets and enough space to choose whatever we desire…
Emilio Lobato and Sangeeta Reddy. Mixed-media artist and painter Emilio Lobato is surely near the top of anyone’s list of abstract artists in the region. His work relates well to that of the late Dale Chisman, as both artists studied with Mary Chenoweth at Colorado College. His latest creations, many…
Based on a typically heart-wrenching case study by Oliver Sacks, the admirably modest adaptation The Music Never Stopped tells the story of Gabriel Sawyer (Lou Taylor Pucci), a homeless hippie whose burnout isn’t the product of drug abuse, but a ballooning benign tumor that’s erased his memory. Institutionalized in the…
The releases of Beastly and Red Riding Hood mark just two more additions to a time-honored film tradition: hackneyed, shitty movies based on fairy tales. Inspired by these cloying new releases, we decided to take a look back at five more insipid films that were vaguely based on magical children’s…
Watching a documentary can often be like eating your peas: It’s not exactly thrilling, but it is nourishing, and when it’s over, you kind of feel like you accomplished something. In that vein, the Denver Botanic Gardens’ monthly Indigenous Film Series kicks off tonight with two documentaries from Native American…
