Check out the new gallery of photos taken by my neice Amelia. (Thanks, Amelia!) I’m weary, and it’s late, but I need to take a moment and thank everyone who came to tonight’s Third Place Books “release party” for Auralia’s Colors. It was so great to see so many of you. Even my landlords came! Tommy and Vivian Fong sat right in the front. And I owe them so many thanks for giving Anne and me such a wonderful place... Read more
Rolling Stone asks: What strange power does Jack White have over Bob Dylan? I don’t know, but wouldn’t it be interesting if White ended up producing a Dylan album? Sure didn’t hurt Loretta Lynn… Read more
One of my favorite film bloggers has just relocated to WordPress. And when I went to check out the new look, I realized that I’d fallen behind. A lot of good reading here, and my trembling anticipation for several upcoming films just continue to escalate. Read more
Did you miss The Kindlings Muse on Monday night? Now you can listen in! The Kindlings podcast is here! From The Kindlings Muse site: Madeleine L’Engle, CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien each embraced the Christian faith and found in their imaginative fantasy a way to explore and understand it. Yet to this day, some Christians see no place for fantasy literature. Tonight’s subject is Fantasy & Myth: Christian Contributions & Consumption. We explore the subject with author & film critic Jeffrey... Read more
Local news programs have known this secret for a long time: There’s nothing like on-the-scene reporting. We can listen to a weatherman speculate, and we can watch as he points to a digital map. But if you’ve got a reporter out there clinging to an umbrella as the storm hits… that’s persuasive coverage! In the documentary No End in Sight, you’ll see a lot of familiar sights, and listen again to excerpts from recently televised speeches. These are the ways... Read more
Mark Galli on breaking our addiction to spectacle. …we try to bring earthquake, wind, and fire to church. God is the god of life, after all. We should feel it, no? This, of course, is one of the draws of megachurches, which, because of their size, can do mega-things. Bumper-to-bumper cars streaming into the parking lot. People eight or ten abreast rushing to get a good seat. The voices of thousands raised in song. Lights, video, booming bass and pounding... Read more
The Brandon Fibbs Review of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. That was fun to type out. I think I’ll share some more news in the same style… – The Proposal of Josh Hurst to Kati Ferst Resulting in Their Engagement Congratulations to one of my favorite bloggers and critics… Josh Hurst! – And finally… The Perspective of Flannery O’Connor on the Imperfections of the Church A memorable quote, worth passing around, featured recently at Flannery’s... Read more
My good friend, Mike Demokowicz, a photographer and educator who has taught me a great deal, sent along this quote in an email today. It made me think of Anton Ego’s speech in Ratatouille… only it’s richer and more complete. (more…) Read more
Many, many thanks to the crowd that filled all available chairs in The Next Chapter bookstore last Saturday night. Many thanks to John and Sharon Connell for being such generous, gracious hosts there. Thanks to all who listened while I shared the story behind Auralia’s Colors, and read Chapter One. Thanks to the heckler who stood across the street from the store and shouted at me. Thanks to my parents for driving all the way from Portland, Oregon. And for... Read more
This review was originally published at Christianity Today. – In 2004, screenwriter Stephen Knight went prowling in the London underworld and found one of the year’s best big-screen stories—Dirty Pretty Things. In that film, illegal immigrants accepted laborious, thankless, humiliating jobs just to scrape up enough cash to survive. For some, desperation led to dangerous deals, like selling their bodily organs to the black market. But the underworld’s overlord was eventually challenged by a brave, compassionate man—a hotel employee with medical... Read more
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