Month: September 2016

Categories
Film Features Film/TV

Don’t Breathe

Judging from this year’s crop of horror films, Americans must be longing for escape from something. I would say three films is officially a trend, and the three best horror movies of 2016 are all about being trapped in a claustrophobic space with someone — perhaps several someones — up to no good. First we were locked in a bomb shelter with John Goodman in 10 Cloverfield Lane, then neo-Nazi Captain Picard wanted to burn down our punk rock party in Green Room, and now we’re trapped in a house with a psychotic blind man in Don’t Breathe.

To be fair, the three “heroes” in Fede Alvarez’s new horror film pretty much deserve what’s coming to them. Rocky (Jane Levy), Money (Daniel Zovatto), and Alex (Dylan Minnette) are a trio of burglars, kind of like a Detroit version of The Bling Ring, enabled by Alex’s access to keys and info from his father’s security service. Alvarez, an Uruguayan filmmaker whose last project was a remake of Sam Raimi’s classic Evil Dead, concentrates on building sympathy for Rocky, who lives in an abusive situation with her alcoholic mother and longs to buy her and her little sister passage to California. After a less-than-successful job, they learn of a sure thing: the last inhabited house in a dying neighborhood, where a blind Gulf War veteran (nameless, but played by Stephen Lang) is believed to be sitting on a huge stash of cash from an insurance settlement. After a little persuading, Alex agrees to help with one last job.

Dylan Minnette (left) and Stephen Lang in Fede Alvarez’s Don’t Breathe

From the slavering Rottweiler guarding the house to the four locks on every door, the signs are that there’s something worth guarding in this home, a relic of Detroit’s better days. Once they’re inside, our sneak thieves discover that the Blind Man is hiding more than just a stack of bills.

Alvarez’s greatest strength lies in his eye for moody photography. He uses strategically placed light sources to paint Rocky and the Blind Man in chiaroscuro tones. When Alex and Rocky are trapped in a darkened basement, Alvarez uses the opportunity to crank the image contrast down as low as it will go, evoking claustrophobic feelings with only vague, moving gray shapes. He is also a master of timing, getting a lot of mileage out of opening doors at the perfect moment.

Don’t Breathe can best be described as a series of steadily escalating variations on a theme. From being trapped in a ventilation duct with a rabid dog to slowly inching across broken glass, Alvarez is evoking the feeling of wanting to flee, but seeing your options for escape slowly dwindling. The effect is chilling enough to overcome a late-film flurry of false endings and the occasional disbelief-killing logical stretch. You may find the feeling of getting squeezed strikes an unexpectedly familiar chord.

Categories
Film/TV TV Features

The Get Down

As I watched The Get Down, I felt the slow realization that I don’t think Baz Luhrmann understands how narrative works.

Over the course of his 26-year film career, from the slick exploitation of Strictly Ballroom to his wildly overblown take on The Great Gatsby, he’s certainly proven he knows how to create spectacle. The Get Down is a vision of the birth of hip-hop as Olympian myth. Empowered by a free-spending Netflix, Luhrmann seems to have been encouraged to go more fully Luhrmann-esque than ever before. In his hands, the Brooklyn of 1977 is a hallucinatory war zone populated by characters of operatic breadth. The cast are all relative newcomers, led by Justice Smith as Zeke, a young poet whom we meet on the edge of becoming a proto-MC. His love interest is a singer named Mylene (Herizen F. Guardiola), and his mentor is a mysterious DJ named Shaolin Fantastic (Shameik Moore), and together they set out to conquer the world through tight flow and sick beats.

Justice Smith (left) dips Herizen F. Guardiola in The Get Down.

Or something like that. It’s really hard to fathom what is going on, plot-wise, at any given moment. Luhrmann seems incapable of concentrating on a storyline for more than three or four shots — and that’s only if there’s some kind of interesting movement taking place that he can track in some outrageous Dutch angle. He treats emotion the same way he treats color, splashing it across the screen for garish effect. Take his use of the great Giancarlo Esposito as Mylene’s father, the puritanical Pastor Ramon. Here’s an actor with superhuman control to spin a tapestry of conflicting emotion on his face, but Luhrmann sets him on one speed — “righteous rage.”

Lurhmann’s not using his actors to their full potential, but the same can’t be said of his production designer and cinematographers. The Get Down is one great frame after another, stuffed with detail, and connected by more whip pans and smash cuts than the 1966 Batman. It’s this manic inventiveness that’s always been the attraction to the director’s fans, and it’s here in spades. It might not be so much that the director doesn’t understand how to construct a narrative as he just doesn’t care. There’s no recognizable human psychology, but often The Get Down reads like one of the best long-form music video projects since Thriller. Letting the beautiful dancing people, the bumping soundtrack, and the hot-shot construction wash over is a pretty pleasant use of an hour or so, even if its lack of clear story renders it emotionally flat.

Categories
Editorial Opinion

Pot, Police, and Ambulance Service: Three Wins for Memphis

When it comes to fast-breaking issues in a year of change, the presidential race ain’t got nothing on local government in Memphis and Shelby County. Last week alone featured decisive and potentially transformational action on a trio

of matters — two on the part of the Memphis City Council, another within county government.

The council was the scene of key votes on marijuana and residential requirements for city police. The most surprising perhaps — and certainly the most controversial — was Councilman Berlin Boyd’s proposed ordinance to decriminalize modest marijuana use, providing police with the alternative of writing tickets, much in the manner of traffic offenses, rather than arresting users under the state’s criminal statutes.

To the consternation of professed traditionalists on the council and, as it developed, of Police Director Michael Rallings, the Public Safety & Homeland Security Committee voted 5-2 to support the ordinance, which is due for its first of three required readings on September 6th. We anticipate that emotions will run, er, high on that date in City Hall. Rallings has already resolved to do what he can to defeat the ordinance, and Governor Bill Haslam, on a visit to Memphis last week, also made known his opposition. Opponents on the council, like Joe Brown, summoned up the specter of Demon Weed, but Boyd convinced a major of committee members that recreational use of marijuana is no gateway to hard drug use and that rigid employment of criminal penalties has resulted in instances of severe injustice, especially to young African Americans in Memphis.

At a time when numerous states as well as the seat of national government, the District of Columbia, have chosen to liberalize their attitudes toward marijuana, we find it both encouraging and timely that Boyd is giving Memphis the opportunity to at least rethink the matter.

If Rallings was upset over this Council action, he was relieved about another — the council’s vote last week to reject an ordinance that would have restricted his potential department hires to persons living within the city limits of Memphis. At a time when the buffing up of police ranks with quality recruits is a matter of increasing urgency, it would have been folly to impose so potentially crippling a curb on Rallings’ (and Mayor Jim Strickland’s) prerogatives, and the council recognized that fact resoundingly with a 10-2 no vote.

County government had its moment of clarity, too, at a committee meeting on Wednesday when officials of Mayor Mark Luttrell’s administration and an apparent commission majority read the riot act to representatives of American Medical Response (AMR), whose request for post-contract modifications that would double the county’s costs smacked rather obviously of bait-and-switch tactics. The upshot is a likely move by the county toward creating its own ambulance service — thereby underscoring in practical terms the difference between government’s straightforward mission to perform public service and the potential risks and derelictions to be encountered within the all-too-prevalent practice of outsourcing that mission.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Now open: The Kitchen at Shelby Farms.

Like all good stories, this one starts with a dog. A black Lab to be exact, who, on his walk down Pearl Street in Boulder, Colorado, took it upon himself to jump into the lap of an innocent bystander. That chance encounter would not only be the start of a longtime friendship, but also a business partnership and a national effort for food advocacy.

The lap belonged to chef Hugo Matheson, and the Lab to Kimbal Musk and Jen Lewin. The three (not sure if the Lab was invited) ended up having dinner that night, prepared by Matheson, and the idea of opening a neighborhood restaurant that builds community around eating healthy food was born. Since that day in 2002, the dynamic trio has opened eight restaurants in Boulder, Denver, Fort Collins, Chicago, and Glendale. This week, they added Memphis to the roster, with the opening of The Kitchen, a “world-class neighborhood restaurant,” in the new FedEx Events Center in Shelby Farms Park.

“Memphis picked me,” Musk said at a recent fund-raiser for his nonprofit, The Kitchen Community.

In addition to creating homey, community-focused, and locally sourced restaurants, Musk, Matheson, and Lewin have developed The Kitchen Community, a series of outdoor Learning Gardens built at schools around the country to encourage healthy eating in students by incorporating the gardens into the curriculum.

It was the Learning Gardens that brought Musk to Memphis. And, of course, more kismet meetings centered around food.

“I was at a dinner, and I was sitting next to a great philanthropist from Memphis. I was telling him about our Learning Gardens, and he asked if I would consider building them in Memphis,” says Musk, who has a culinary degree from NYC’s French Culinary Institute. “I told him, ‘Sure, if someone will fund it.’ He said, ‘What if I funded it?'”

So far, Musk and company have built 65 Learning Gardens at Shelby County Schools, Jubilee Catholic Schools, and the Achievement School District, with three more approved so far. Their goal is to build 100 in Memphis.

A percentage of proceeds from the restaurants, which include The Kitchen community bistros, Next Door community pubs, and the Boulder-only Upstairs cocktail lounge, fund the Learning Gardens, as do various fund-raisers throughout the year.

But back to the restaurant.

Kimbal Musk admires the beautiful view from The Kitchen.

The 5,000-square-foot, 128-seat bistro keeps as its theme simple, clean, fresh, and local, preparing dishes like Sweet Corn Ravioli or Summer Melon & Country Ham using seasonal ingredients from local farmers, ranchers, and purveyors in and around Memphis.

And while the signature dishes such as the hand-cut garlic fries, the tomato soup, the mussels, and the Sticky Toffee Pudding will most definitely knock your socks off, the view might just be the main attraction.

Situated in the brand-new, eco-friendly FedEx Events Center as part of the $70 million Heart of the Park reimagining project near completion in Shelby Farms, the restaurant is almost entirely flanked by windows. That’s an important feature, because it sits on the southeast end of the newly expanded Patriot Lake, which recently grew from 52 acres to 80. Sunset views for days, people. There’s also a covered patio with tables and couches and lounge chairs facing the lake with western views.

With such competition, the interior needed some show stoppage, and it does not disappoint, with a blend of contemporary and rural styles that use reclaimed barn pendants, handmade wrought iron pipe sconces, and handcrafted dining tables made of reclaimed heart of pine.

Diners who stop by on Monday nights can opt to eat at the community table in the private dining room, where they are seated with strangers, and, who knows, might come up with the next idea that will change the world.

“My time in Memphis has been magical,” Musk says. “Memphis is historically an amazing food town. I want to give people a place they can go and get food that nourishes their body while creating local relationships.”

The Kitchen is the first of three endeavors Musk and his business partners have planned for Memphis. Next will be The Kitchenette, a grab-and-go cafe in the new Shelby Farms Visitors Center, and they will open one of their Next Door community pubs in the Crosstown Concourse building next year.

The Kitchen is open for dinner only until after Labor Day. Then its hours are lunch Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., brunch Saturday and Sunday, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., and dinner Sunday and Monday, 5 to 10 p.m., and Tuesday through Saturday, 5 to 10 p.m.

For more information, visit thekitchenbistros.com or call 729-9009.

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

Getting Out the Vote

The tradition of presidential-election years holds that the American electorate really doesn’t begin to pay serious attention to the candidates’ campaigns until Labor Day has come and gone. That holiday happens this weekend, and the local branches of the two major parties got a running start on things with events held last week.

The Republicans brought out some of their leading lights Tuesday night at the annual Master Meal banquet of the East Shelby Republican Club, the county’s largest. First up on the dais at the Great Hall in Germantown was David Kustoff, who recently won the GOP nomination for the 8th District congressional seat and, given the Republican propensities of that district these days, has every expectation of serving in Washington next year.

Kustoff made it clear that he hopes to do so in tandem with a President Donald J. Trump, to whose candidacy he gave unstinting verbal support. Though the brash New York billionaire has had highly publicized trouble gaining traction, even in pockets of his own Republican base, Kustoff said predictions of a Trump defeat by Hillary Clinton were the results, essentially, of myopia on the part of an unsympathetic media, and he called the roll of candidates, ranging from Ronald Reagan to current Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland, who, he said, had won out despite negative forecasts in the press.

Kustoff’s commitment to the cause of Trump was further embodied in the opening on Wednesday night of this week of a “combined election headquarters” at 1755 Kirby Parkway, housing the “Kustoff for Congress” campaign as well as Trump’s Memphis-area efforts and the campaigns of other local GOP candidates.

Also toeing the line for a top-to-bottom Republican effort at the Master Meal were state Senate Majority Leader Mark Norris, Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell, and visiting state GOP executive director Brent Leatherwood, although Luttrell, who had also sought the GOP nomination in the 8th, gallantly focused most of his praise on Kustoff.

Perhaps the most telling commentary Tuesday night came from Shelby County Commissioner Terry Roland of Millington, who earned a Trump-like shoot-from-the-mouth reputation of his own during his rise as a political figure. Against all expectations, Roland, who has already launched a campaign to be elected county mayor in 2018, became something of a conciliator — enough so that, as he neared the formal end of his one-year term as chairman on Monday of this week, he received standing ovations from his commission colleagues at each of the legislative body’s last two public meetings. By way of suggesting that Trump’s own rough edges might smooth out during a term as president, Roland, who is West Tennessee chairman of the Republican nominee’s campaign, said of Trump, “Folks, six years ago, that was me!”

• For their part, a sizeable swath of the county’s Hillary Clinton supporters turned out last Wednesday night at a standing-room-only meeting of the Germantown Democratic Club that required the opening of a partition to combine two separate meeting rooms at Coletta’s Restaurant on Appling Road.

Among those present for the occasion were Tyler Yount of Chattanooga, a statewide organizer for the Clinton campaign, and Rickey Hobson of Somerville, the Democratic nominee in the 8th District congressional race. Although attendees of the recent Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia were there to recount their experiences at the convention, the main focus of the meeting was that of organizing a get-out-the-vote effort in Shelby County.

Although the long-troubled Shelby County Democratic Party organization is temporarily defunct after its decertification week before last by state Democratic chair Mary Mancini, and apparently won’t be reconstructed until a local party convention can be held in March, various informal Democratic groups — the Germantown Democrats, the Democratic Women of Shelby County, and the county’s Young Democrats among them — seem intent on organizing a significant GOTV effort.

According to Germantown Democratic Club president Dave Cambron, a headquarters to house a coordinated local Democratic campaign will be opened on Poplar soon.

Categories
News The Fly-By

OUTMemphis Plans Homeless Shelter Close to Cooper-Young

CREDIT: Google Maps

Google Maps

Boarded-up houses now inhabit the site where OUTMemphis wants to build a homeless shelter for LGBT youths.

OUTMemphis wants to build an emergency shelter for homeless LGBT youth not far from the group’s current headquarters in Cooper-Young.

OUTMemphis submitted plans for the shelter this month to the Shelby County Board of Adjustment for the shelter to be built at 2059 Southern, on the south side of the railroad tracks close to the corner of Southern and Tanglewood.

Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development

The site where OutMemphis hopes to build a homeless shelter.

The group is hoping to get a variance for the building to “build with shipping containers to incorporate sustainable housing design and to expedite the construction process due to the immediate need.” A site plan shows the basic layout of the shelter but the application did not include renderings to show what the building might look like.

A letter of intent to the board says that while LGBT people make up only about 7 percent-10 percent of the general population, homeless LGBT youth comprise 20 percent-40 percent of the homeless youth population.

“The numbers are overwhelming and have given us a reason to come up with a solution to help our youth here in Memphis,” reads the letter from Stephanie Reyes, youth services manager for OUTMemphis. “Our project will be a safe haven for young adults who are trying to improve their lives and move forward to a more stable place of their own.”

[pullquote-1]Reyes said OUTMemphis modeled its homeless shelter and programming after others in New York and Ohio, including plans to have 24-hour camera surveillance around the building and 24-hour staff supervision “of all young adults present on the property to ensure order and respect of the neighborhood.”

“With the properties being so close to our current home of over 13 years, we are confident the long-standing support from the community will carry on into this endeavor,” Reyes said. “We are looking to be an enhancement to the neighborhood and are planning to provide classes and workshops free of charge to young adults that are within the age parameters.” 


Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development

A site map shows how the group would use shipping containers to build its shelter.