Comedy is tragedy plus time. – Samuel Clemens Early into Gilbert/Harmantown director Neil Berkeley’s new film Group Therapy, one of the central cast members, comedian Mike Birbiglia, comments that comedy is similar to therapy in that the comedian opens themselves… Read More ›
“Take my love, take my land Take me where I cannot stand I don’t care, I’m still free You can’t take the sky from me … .” – Sonny Rhodes, The Ballad of Serenity Speaking at Rice University on September… Read More ›
Do you recognize the following three products: the Artic Hat, the Air Hawk, and the Easy Feet? What if these were replaced with Veggetti, Shake Weight, or ShamWow? Can you picture them? Hear the sales pitch? Can you remember the… Read More ›
January 16th, 1865, American Civil War: General William Sherman includes in Special Field Orders No. 15 that 40 acres will be given to slaves as part of their freedom. It’s one of the largest redistributions of land in the country… Read More ›
“For the uninvited, there is much to fear.” – Sign posted above the entrance to a home in Realm of Satan. For all of human existence, where there wasn’t an explanation before them, one was created. Myths become legends which… Read More ›
Alexander Jeffery joins Meet me at the Movies 542 to engage in dialogue about the feature documentary You Have No Idea. This is the story of Evan, an autistic individual whose impact on the community around him is mind-blowing. It… Read More ›
The pandemic did a lot of things to the citizens of the world in the early years, the least of which was take thousands of lives. Those who remained in those initial months and years dealt with physical isolation, financial… Read More ›
It’s been a little over a hundred years since the first commercial radio broadcast when Pittsburgh’s KDKA broadcast the results of the Harding-Cox presidential election in 1920. In 1938, Orson Welles directed and narrated an adaptation of H.G. Wells’s novel… Read More ›
“We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.” – Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971). All families have myths and legends — sometimes it’s stories that seem generational (“walked… Read More ›
Like the David Bowie song from which filmmakers Carina Mia Wong and Alex Simmons (Buddymoon) drew inspiration for the title of their documentary, We Can Be Heroes is a bit of a melancholic tale of individuals who recognize that they… Read More ›
“You don’t stop playing because you grow old, you grow old because you stop playing.” – George Bernard Shaw, Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. On wintry days when it was too cold to venture out or on summer… Read More ›
Divorces are hard. Rarely is there an instance where both parties walk away satisfied, happy, or otherwise ok. Divorce is the resolution of a relationship ending and there’s often regret at what could have been or sadness over what is… Read More ›
In American high school sports, for most schools, it’s football, basketball, and maybe soccer as the big three. Sure, you can run cross country, maybe play tennis, but down on the lower rungs of high school competition (in terms of… Read More ›
E Pluribus Unum. This brief Latin phrase meaning “one from many” was first added to United States coins in 1795. It’s a motto that speaks to all citizens of the United States of America, even in an era when those… Read More ›
Though the first moving pictures were shown in the 1800s and began as a sideshow, they transformed into a main event with the advent of the movie theater. No longer having to go into a tent or side space, people… Read More ›
In the United States, names like World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), World Championship Wrestling (WCW), Assault Championship Wrestling (ACW), and All Elite Wrestling (AEW) may come to mind when bringing up sports entertainment. But wrestling isn’t a U.S.-based sport, with countries… Read More ›
Photosensitivity Warning: There are a few scenes of refracted light that may be triggering for sensitive viewers. In August 2020, a video of 11-year-old Anthony Mmesoma Madu dancing outside of his ballet school went viral, garnering attention not just from… Read More ›
Before there was The Mandalorian (2019-??), Andor (2022), The Book of Boba Fett (2021), or Ashoka (2023), before there was either a Prequel or Sequel Trilogy, there was only Star Wars (1977), The Empire Strikes Back (1980), and Return of… Read More ›
After spending time on the festival circuit in 2022 and 2023, documentarian Pierre Guillet’s (Bristol Fashion) latest project, The Book of Harth, is releasing on physical formats. This project follows a conceptual artist, David Greg Harth, in his quest to gather… Read More ›
Movies are magic. They take visions of the imagination and breathe life into them, projecting them high onto a silver screen in a large auditorium so that the gathered audience can share in the illusion together. Doesn’t matter if the… Read More ›