If there’s one thing The Four Hipsters of the Apocalypse ““ the four immaculately dressed editors who run the arts and entertainment section ““ hate, it’s publicists. If you’re reading this and you work for a movie studio, record label or theater company, the Hipsters probably don’t want your phone calls. You can e-mail, but […]
Author Archives: Jake Tracer
Desperately seeking comedy
It wouldn’t surprise me if “Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World” has left every theater in the L.A. area by the time you finish reading this sentence. Albert Brooks’ new comedy about a character named Albert Brooks, who goes to India so the U.S. government can find out what makes Muslims laugh, has been […]
Oscar nominations predictable, yet good
Presumptuous as it may be, allow me to sum up this year’s Oscar nominations in just one word: boring. In conversations I had with the four pop-culture encyclopedias that run the arts and entertainment section ““ or, as I like to call them, the “Four Hipsters of the Apocalypse” ““ I heard almost every major […]
Crack-of-dawn Oscar nominations archaic publicity stunt
On the list of things I will never voluntarily do in my life, death comes first. Performance art is second and “Brokeback Mountain” sex comes in third, not that there’s anything wrong with it. The order gets a little fuzzy after that, fluctuating with my mood, but usually somewhere between numbers six and nine is […]
Are movie theaters at death’s door? Absolutely not.
As a longtime Daily Bruin contributor and former arts and entertainment editor, I never clash with the editorial decisions made in the A&E section. Of course, whenever writers deal in absolutes, they’re only setting themselves up for contradiction. But when I opened last week’s insert to read the annual In/Out list for the new year, […]
The silver screen loses its luster as the minutes wear on
In December, it’s almost impossible to go to the movies and spend less than two hours in the theater. The better the movie, it seems, the longer the necessary running time. In the last 10 years, only one Oscar Best Picture winner has clocked in at less than 120 minutes. (“Chicago” was 113.) Compare that […]
Studying the museum
To keynote speaker Malcolm Baker, Friday’s UCLA Art History Graduate Student Symposium is exciting. It’s not because in one day, it will feature nine presentations by art history graduate students from across the country. It’s not because it marks the 40th anniversary of the annual event, the longest-running of its kind in the U.S. It’s […]