Author: Molly Templeton

SXSW Film: ‘Mr. Nice’

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It’s about time Rhys Ifans — probably still best known as Hugh Grant’s peculiar roommate in Notting Hill — got himself a big, juicy whopper of a leading role. Unfortunately, this isn’t it. Mr. Nice, based on the true story of Welsh drug dealer and jack of many trades Howard Marks, starts out relatively strong, even carrying the absurdity of Ifans playing a high schooler. Continue reading →

SXSW Music: Animal Farm

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Portland’s Animal Farm played an afternoon show — one of several performances they had over the week — at the Texas Rockfest, a free event set up in a parking lot just off the main drag. It was a well run —  two stages meant there was very little downtime between bands — if slightly odd space, home also to a handful of seemingly miscellaneous booths (one of which boasted a giant banner reading I [HEART] VAGINA). Continue reading →

SXSW Film: ‘Tucker and Dale vs. Evil’

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Alan Tudyk and Taylor Labine in Tucker and Dale vs. Evil Winner, SXSW Midnighters Audience Award Eli Craig’s feature debut, which showed in perfectly appropriate midnight screenings at SXSW, is a fairly low-budget hillbilly slasher comedy packed with almost gentle send-ups of horror clichés. I loved it a little bit. Maybe more than a little bit. Perhaps you want to know a little more than that. Continue reading →

SXSW Film: ‘Some Days Are Better Than Others’

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Matt McCormick’s first feature-length film is a pensive character piece with a perfectly Portland heart — something that’s easy to say and harder to explain. Some Days Are Better Than Others is a three-pronged, subtle narrative about disconnection, loneliness and slow, quiet change; the SXSW film booklet says it “asks why the good times slip by so fast while the hard times always seem so sticky.” Continue reading →

SXSW Music: Timing is Everything

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I was on my way somewhere else when I stopped short in front of a bar on Red River. There was something awfully familiar about the sound issuing from the doors, though it seemed unnatural to hear such a song in daylight. It was music for midnights, at the very earliest. But I had to know. So I stepped inside, and lo and behold, it was indeed Eugene’s own macabre psychobilly punks The Sawyer Family. Continue reading →

SXSW Film: ‘Micmacs’

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The word Micmacs, director Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Amelie) explained before the screening of his new film, is slang for “shenanigans,” a word which sounded impossibly playful in Jeunet’s thick French accent. “Impossibly playful” is also one way to describe the film, which is as sweet and joyful and imperfect a revenge fantasy you might hope to see. Continue reading →

SXSW: Where time (and food) are in short supply

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I honestly thought I’d be blogging every day from SXSW. That’s the most laughable idea I’ve had in ages. Since Friday, I’ve been in Austin, Texas, for South by Southwest, which is hard to sum up in just one sentence: It’s a long-running music, film and nerd festival (the nerd track is loosely called “Interactive”) at which many of the things I write about overlap and converge (what a goddamn buzz word that is). I’m here to see bands, learn about Austin’s music scene, watch movies, go to panels and, well, write about them all. Continue reading →

Go See: Oscar-nominated short films at DIVA

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Yes, you could go see Alice in Wonderland this weekend. (I certainly plan to.) But you could also do something a little different and hop over to DIVA for one of the screenings of this year’s Oscar-nominated short films. Pick animated only, live-action only or go all-out and watch both — though if you have to pick, for my money, the animated set is the way to go. Continue reading →