Posted inCulture

Repossess This! Harvesting organs reduces Repo Men to the sum of its bloody parts

Sharing nothing in common with Alex Cox's 1984 punk-rock-crazy Repo Man yet more aligned with Darren Lynn Bousman's 2008 film Repo!: The Genetic Opera, this Repo Men has some wit, violence and gore, but also some problems. Like Saw VI, this film provides commentary (albeit only at surface level) on the current health care debate.
Repo Men introduces us to the future with a news voiceover montage of how things came to be: global recession, fifth stage of war in Nigeria, technological breakthroughs. A corporation called The Union manufactures technologically sophisticated artificial organs, or “artiforgs” marketed and sold to gullible customers at exorbitant prices. The downside lies in the fine print that tells patients that if payments aren't made, hotshot repo men are sent to cut them open and yank out the bionic organ. Then, of course, you die.

Posted inCulture

Dead People's Court

Guys, I should TOTALLY be a judge on one of those daytime courtroom shows! You know, like Judge Judy, or Judge Joe Brown, or Judge Judgey McJudgerson? I'd be all sassy (and possibly black) and smackin' down the witnesses with snappy quips such as, “Hey! Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining pee!” Or “Don't slice off my head with an ax and tell me it's a pencil sharpener!” Or “Shut your G-D baloney-hole or I'll kick the tongue out of your yap.” (Okay… that one needs work.)
But instead of settling arguments in the old-timey, boring, legal way, my courtroom would have a super-cool twist – such as Judge Wm.โ„ข Steven Humphrey's Kangaroo Court! Basically it would be like other courtroom shows, except at the end, the loser would be kicked in the face by a kangaroo. Another amazingly awesome idea would be Judge Wm.โ„ข Steven Humphrey's Famous Court Cases Reenacted by Chimps. Is that title too vague? Basically I reenact famous court cases – with chimps. Like the Scopes Monkey Trial? Admit it… I'M BRILLIANT.

Posted inCulture

Suffer Little Children: Michael Haneke asks: “Where do little Nazis come from?” in The White Ribbon

Funny Games director Michael Haneke's loudly lauded black-and-white drama, The White Ribbon, isn't a film to be enjoyed. It's not exactly a film to be endured, but it is closer to that end of the entertainment spectrum. Bob Dylan once said to a Time magazine reporter who asked if the audience at the concert was entertained by his performance, “Who wants to go get whipped? And if you don't want to go get whipped, then aren't you really being entertained?”
In Funny Games, Haneke questioned the use of violence in films for entertainment, but here he theorizes on the origins of the violence committed by the Nazis. With Funny Games, the director was vocal about how he expected his audience to react – he wanted them to walk out once the child gets shot by the intruders. I read this in an interview after seeing the film, of which I did walk out. I didn't want to be entertained, and he didn't want to entertain me.

Posted inFood & Drink

In Case You Missed It: A recap of our recent restaurant reviews

RED DRAGON
One of the area's many American-style Chinese food hotspots, Red Dragon serves up enormous portions of favorites like Monoglian Beef and General Tso's chicken. Chef Casey Chan, a native of Hong Kong, prepares dishes with Szechuan, Hunan, Mongolian, Cantonese and American roots. While it's not fine dining by any means, Red Dragon is sure to please when you're craving heaping servings of steaming wok- fried goodness. 61247 S. Highway 97. (541) 389-9888.

Posted inFood & Drink

Little Bites: In Case You Missed It: A recap of our recent restaurant reviews

RED DRAGON
One of the area's many American-style Chinese food hotspots, Red Dragon serves up enormous portions of favorites like Monoglian Beef and General Tso's chicken. Chef Casey Chan, a native of Hong Kong, prepares dishes with Szechuan, Hunan, Mongolian, Cantonese and American roots. While it's not fine dining by any means, Red Dragon is sure to please when you're craving heaping servings of steaming wok- fried goodness. 61247 S. Highway 97. (541) 389-9888.

Posted inFood & Drink

Sandwich Me ASAP! Redmond's only beer café does it all

I should have listened when my mother told me not to judge a restaurant from the sidewalk. But I didn't. Instead, I learn these lessons at my own expense. The most recent discrimination cost me countless lunches at an award-winning cafe. Readers of yours truly, The Source Weekly, voted Cross Creek Cafe “Redmond's best lunch spot” two years in a row.
But based on a few passing glances at 20 miles per hour … er … the posted speed limit, Cross Creek Cafe looked like an ordinary deli serving, likely, the same 'ole sandwiches. Boy, was I wrong.

Posted inFood & Drink

Sandwich Me ASAP! Redmond's only beer café does it all

I should have listened when my mother told me not to judge a restaurant from the sidewalk. But I didn't. Instead, I learn these lessons at my own expense. The most recent discrimination cost me countless lunches at an award-winning cafe. Readers of yours truly, The Source Weekly, voted Cross Creek Cafe “Redmond's best lunch spot” two years in a row.
But based on a few passing glances at 20 miles per hour … er … the posted speed limit, Cross Creek Cafe looked like an ordinary deli serving, likely, the same 'ole sandwiches. Boy, was I wrong.

Posted inMusic

Toss Your Textbooks Aside: Let The Dimes be your historical audio guide

On a recent Tuesday afternoon, Johnny Clay is eating lunch and he feels like it's about to start raining. He's on a break from his job fixing printers for Hewlett Packard in Vancouver, the gig that keeps him occupied when he's not serving as lead singer and songwriter for Portland's indie folk-pop outfit, The Dimes.
Clay, a Texas native, moved to Portland from Austin to follow a girl, the age-old story. Don't worry, he assures me, he married her and they are now expecting their first child, a little girl. In December, The Dimes released their second album, The King Can Drink the Harbour Dry, which if you didn't catch from the title, alludes to the Boston Tea Party. The concept album centers on the city of Boston and it's immense role in American history. You can toss those American history textbooks aside, as this LP is an audio guide through one of the most instrumental cities in America's development.

Posted inCulture

Laughing by the Seat of His Pants: Cash Levy decides Bend is the place for his improvisational humor

One wouldn't think that mentioning the anatomy of an extinct animal could offend anyone, but comedian Cash Levy learned otherwise when he told a joke in one of his shows that included the phrase “pterodactyl scrotum.” A couple just couldn't handle the fact that he'd made such a comment and voiced their concern. Perhaps they were offended by the mere size of prehistoric junk, or maybe it's still too soon to poke fun at dinosaurs because, well, they've had a rough go over the past couple hundred million years.

Posted inMusic

The Slackers' Chilled-Out Greatness

There was a time when the Slackers album, The Question, would spend weeks at a time in the car stereo. The record is a pure recreation of authentic Caribbean ska music, not dressed up in punk accouterments, as was the case with so many other “ska” bands that were on the airwaves in the mid-1990s. Some might find what the Slackers do closer to reggae, and maybe they're right, but classifications aside, The Question is decisively my favorite album of the genre.
But in the past eight years or so, I couldn't even be positive that the disc was still in my possession. That was before I heard that the Slackers were the next in a continuing line of ska bands to, somewhat oddly (but awesomely) play the Mountain's Edge Bar on the south end of town on Tuesday night. Further evidence of the Mountain's Edge's plan to become Oregon's integral ska venue (if that's possible) is the fact that just before The Slackers arrive, the Voodoo Glow Skulls play the joint on Friday night.

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