DVD Battle: Muppetational Edition

(From The Free Press, 4/20/09)

Jim Henson.

That’s not a sentence, but dropping the name is a cheap and easy way to inspire goodwill at the top of your DVD column – at least for anybody 26 and older. I can’t speak for kids today, and I know it’s possible that a majority of those taking their SATs right now are only vaguely aware of Kermit the Frog, which seems like a damn shame.

Or maybe it’s liberating? For all his inspirational humor, you could argue that Henson was a brutally monopolistic power over family entertainment for about three decades: First, they started you on Sesame Street, just to make sure you could count the cash in your parents’ wallets. In a few years, you were ready for the musical hippie vibe of Fraggle Rock. Then, just when you’re starting to learn the value of melancholy and double entendres, POW! They hit you with the classic Muppet Show and subsequent Muppet movies.

But I digress…for now…and greet with warm enthusiasm the recent news that Jason Segel (currently starring in I Love You, Man) has convinced the Walt Disney Corporation – who snatched the Muppets up back in 2004 – to let him script a revival for their foamy, felty careers in an edgy new movie. We’re a year or two from knowing whether his plan will work, but it’s only a short trip to your local independent video store to enjoy years of classic Muppetdom on VHS or DVD. Avoid buckling under the stress of picking one with this handy guide.

Parents push for reprieve on daycare closing

Cite ‘hidden costs’ of closure

Photo by Brandon McKenney

(From The Free Press, 2/9/09)

When Bridgid and Tom Hood left Indian Township, a small reservation in Northern Maine, late last year, they were moving hundreds of miles from family and friends. But Bridgid, having begun her college career at the University of Maine, wanted to finish it in USM’s nursing program; Tom had his eye on the paramedicine program at Southern Maine Community College.

But the deciding factor in their move wasn’t their own alma matars, it was where they could send their two young children during the long schoolday.

So once daughter Aselis, 2, and son Molihk, 1, made it to the top of the waiting list for USM’s Child and Family Center last summer, the Hoods headed south.

“They love it. We love it!” says Bridgid.

“When we walk in there it’s like family. The teachers care about what’s going on in our lives, in our kids’ lives.”

“And it’s one of the ways we’ve been able to afford daycare,” she adds, referring to the highly subsidized rate.

Asleis and Molihk are among 88 children enrolled in USM’s childcare program, now in its 35th year. And the staff is quick to point out that it is more than just a couple of daycares, located at the University’s two main campuses. From infancy to age 5, the centers aim to provide a cutting-edge, age-appropriate educational experience.

In 1988 it became Maine’s first such program to earn accreditation from the National Association for the Education of Young People.

And on Aug 14, due to the latest round of budget cuts, the centers are set to close down.

DVD Battle: Free-for-all

(From The Free Press, 2/9/09)

A number of movies were released on DVD last year that continue to cling to the edges of the ‘new release’ shelf at certain local video stores. And once the film companies finally know which new movies to slap “Oscar Winner” onto in a few days, they’ll finally be a changing of the guards.

So now, here’s a royal rumble of a DVD battle, to finally bury the dreaded year 2008. Except for next week, when I pit that year’s largely-ignored Noise against the even more ignored Itty Bitty Titty Committee. But that, I promise, will be the end of it.

I’m Not There

Here’s one of several recent films to present a life by slicing and shuffling it up real good. Only this time, it’s Bob Dylan’s life, which may have been written about and discussed to death, but nobody has ever really made a film about it. And somebody was going to someday, so it’s noble that Todd Haynes decided he’d beat everyone to the punch (while Dylan is still alive and touring like a madman, mind you. That’s called cheating.)

And unlike Ray and Walk the Line, he wanted to play with the very idea of a biopic – ideal when the subject is Dylan, who is often accused (unfairly, I think) of morphing into an entirely different man and artist every several years. Needless to say, six or seven actors play Dylan, and one of them is Cate Blanchett.

It’s great that Haynes ditched all the nagging conventions of a biopic, but what exactly did he think he was trading them in for? Instead of a really formulaic narrative structure, how about no narrative structure at all. Instead of making some sense out of the subject’s life or latching on to theme, how about just making a psychedelic mess out of all the popular stereotypes?

Since the movie doesn’t say anything about Bob Dylan, it’s anybody’s guess what it’s actually about. I guess I’d wager that it’s an incredibly profound meditation on the life lived in public. So interesting and profound, in fact, that I got bored and wandered off before it ended.

DVD Battle: Stand-up edition

Two new-releases. Gladiator-style combat.

(From The Free Press, 2/2/09)

George Carlin
“It’s Bad For Ya”
HBO Video

If George Carlin seems a tiny bit more worn out than Chris Rock in his latest special, it’s excusable: Carlin was 71, in his 52nd year in showbusiness, several years since his last stint in rehab. Since 1977, he’d maintained a grind of returning to HBO every three to four years with an hour of all-new material.

An interview with President Botman

By David O’Donnell

(From The Free Press, 12/1/08)

“Budget challenges are, regrettably, part of the DNA of public education,” said President Selma Botman, a day after touring USM with grim news about the school’s finances.

In recent emails and speeches, she’s stressed the difficulty of cutting anything from the already cash-strapped University’s operating budget. But the timing of the states’ curtailment of $2.7 million couldn’t be worse, with much of the years’ budget already allocated and even spent. As a result, next semesters’ supply of books, equipment, and professors will be hardest hit.

24-hours after her address to the Portland campus, we sat down with President Botman – and, according to protocol, public affairs director Robert Caswell – to get a better sense of how she came to make such big decisions, how USM will begin feeling them, and her pending return to the classroom.

Tina Smith takes on City Hall

(From The Free Press, 10/27/08)

“I’m not a politician, I’m a community organizer,” says City Council candidate Tina Smith, as fellow candidates and voters shuffle past her on a rainy Wednesday evening, after wrapping up a lively election forum at the North Star cafe in downtown Portland.

“I’m never going to be a politician.”

Nevertheless, Smith is running for an at-large seat on Portland’s city council that’s up for grabs next month.

Film Review: W.

(Originally appeared in The Free Press, 10/27/08)

Given that we’re still living in “George W. Bush’s America”, are we in any place to stand back and take stock of what the man and his Presidency really mean? I mean, any better than I was able to ruminate on what my generation was all about when I was 14 years old? (I have those essays, if you’re interested.)

But making the statement on George W. Bush is just one route Oliver Stone could go with his new film, W. Another is a long, SNL-style Bush-bashing comedy, which the trailers would like you to believe it is in highlighting the classic “Bushisms” and shots of Richard Dreyfus as Cheney prancing around like Dr. Evil.