Comics

Speed Reading

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THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST HORROR COMICS

Edited by Peter Normanton

Running Press

448 pages

$17.95

It probably comes as no surprise that post–World War II Americans decided Hitler was a lot scarier than the Boogeyman. It’s a little more shocking to see that fear realized in their comic books. The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics contains its fair share of vampires, werewolves, and zombies, but those early years are dominated by ghostly stormtroopers, Nazi clones and — more often than not — the reanimated fuhrer himself. I’m particularly fond of "Terror of the Stolen Legs," which, I assure you, is creepier than the title suggests.

For this collection, editor Peter Normanton has culled prime examples from more than six decades of horror comics. The results are often fascinating: how else to see Nazi anxiety so aptly literalized? And, of course, they’re fun. Don’t forget these are comics, so for all of their time capsule–esque appeal, they retain that guilty pleasure quality. Imagine you’re a kid in the pre-"graphic novel" ’50s while reading the collection— it enhances the thrill.

For the most part, it’s these early offerings that prove the most delightful, if only for the camptastic writing. The best example comes from "The Game Keeper," which begins, "Run Avis Drood! Run as fast as your lovely legs can carry you, for the full moon burgeons beyond Drood Castle and the game is afoot!"

The only real downside to the collection is Normanton’s purple prose. He tends to ham it up in his introductions to each story, promising a life-changing experience on every page. But hey, feel free to skip those parts they don’t have pictures, anyway.

“Japan Dance Now”

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PREVIEW What does avant-garde Japanese dance look like? Butoh is 40 years old. Eiko and Koma have been working their version of slow dancing for three decades. What about dancers who have grown up in a high-tech, high-velocity, video-drenched urban environment? We at least get glimpses of the movies, comics, and pop music that are part of their lives. Once in a while, a company like the Condors will come through town on their way to somewhere else. But for the most part, our exposure to that type of edgy new dance — highly influenced by electronic media and sophisticated in its use of those elements — remains nil.

Now Yerba Buena Center for the Arts is making an attempt to open minds and ears to new moves from Japan. Next month they bring back Papa Taruhamara, and this weekend they present three companies in a performance titled "Japan Dance Now" on their first stop of a three-city tour of the states. Baby-Q, a multimedia company that includes a robotics specialist, is directed by choreographer Yoko Higashino. The group stages her solo E/G-Ego Geometria. Nibroll’s seven athlete-dancer-comedians are taking on the everyday in their excerpt of Coffee. Sennichimae Blue Sky Dance Club is an all-female ensemble with serious hair. The company describes The End of Water as an exploration of aspects of femininity from a pop butoh perspective.

JAPAN DANCE NOW Thurs/29–Sat/31, 8 p.m., $25–$30 (On Sat/31 audience members receive special entrance to the post-performance "Big Idea" party, 9 p.m.-midnight, in the Grand Lobby and Galleries). Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission, SF. (415) 978-2787, www.ybca.org

The stink of ink

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Film noir doesn’t fuck around. It gives you tough-taking characters, gunshots, stiff drinks, and outrage, all within 90 minutes (frequently less). The seventh Noir City, programmed by Anita Monga and Eddie Muller, is stacked with double-features focused on "Newspaper Noir," the inkiest of subgenres. The fest kicks off with Humphrey Bogart in Deadline USA (1952), a crackling newsroom thriller from Richard Brooks (1955’s The Blackboard Jungle, 1967’s In Cold Blood). Rapid-fire pacing is the only way this film crams in so much exciting stuff: a storied newspaper, The Day, that’s on the verge of being sold; a mysterious blonde, found dead and wearing only a fur coat; a gangster-about-town who’s got his fingerprints on City Hall; a courtroom battle; and a murder that literally stops the presses. Bogart ("Newspaperman is the best profession in the world!") is aces as a soon-to-be-unemployed editor who makes a last stand by exposing the gangster’s crimes on his front page. He also has a nice subplot trying to woo back his ex-wife (future Planet of the Apes-er Kim Hunter) and barks plenty of wisdom about the state of the news biz, some of it oddly prophetic: "It’s not enough anymore to give ’em just news — they want comics, contests, puzzles …" Ethel Barrymore adds Old Hollywood class as the widow of Bogie’s boss, while Gilligan’s Island‘s Jim Backus pops up as a Day reporter.

But not all newspapermen are as heroic as Deadline USA‘s scum-busting bunch; opening night concludes with 1952’s Scandal Sheet, based on a Sam Fuller novel. The film’s New York Express lives for a lurid mix of "thrills, escape, and news," with a special talent for manufacturing the latter. But editor Mark Chapman (Broderick Crawford) is as sleazy as his paper. When a secret from his past threatens his position, he commits a murder that becomes the obsession of the Express‘s top reporter (John Derek) — and the end result is dramatic irony at its juiciest.

NOIR CITY

Jan. 23-Feb. 1, double features $10

Castro Theatre, 429 Castro, SF

www.noircity.com

The Mix: What we’ve been up to

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The Guardian staff got frisky — and predictably hungover last week:

(1) Breakfast of Champions on New Year’s Day

(2) The Music Library, Jonny Trunk (Fuel Publishing)

(3) Scoping hot bears at the Lone Star Saloon

(4) Y: The Last Man (DC/Vertigo) comics binge

(5) Snorbot

Youthquake

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Wooo! Wooooo! No, I’m not a giant faggotty owl. I’m the ghost of recent San Francisco underground dance floors past — equally faggotty — and I controool you. Or at least I did, until that brazen neon bitch from American Apparel showed up on the 2k8 guest list, with his matte lamé leggings, Adderall diet, Marvel comics mask, baile funk BFF, and Ableton plug-ins.

Gurl, I got caught with my ZOMGs down, and it was total fap fap fap.

For more than a decade, I fierce ruled the insular world of club tunes, dividing them up into techno, house, and hip-hop, with some occasional ’80s nostalgia on the side. I froze all dance genres in the booty-phat ’90s with my snap-hand, casting off up-and-comers with a haughty high-hat spray of laughs. Breakbeats? Electroclash? IDM? Nu-rave? Trance? Specter, please. Passing fancies, they all got swallowed up with ghostly ease. Despite my aging denizens — no more backflips at the breakdowns, no more weekend trips to Body and Soul in NYC, a lazy wash of Rihanna remixes and Mary J. mash-ups — I held all the club cards, and it felt mighty real.

I just never thought the children would use my own tools to destroy me.

Sure, I peeped those Misshapen mid-aughts electro youngsters at the fringes, flashing their disabled glasses and pajama-like outerwear on Lastnightsparty, snapping up Justice remixes on BIGSTEREO, laughing along with Hipster Runoff. And, yeah, I knew that high-school crunkers fetishized "da club"; that feisty programmers refreshed techno; that global styles stewed together in dubstep; that iDJs resurrected ancient categories like grunge and hair metal, irony slowly melting into earnestness.

But all that was old news, relying on even older genres — I mean, electro’s like from what, 1972? — and most of those darned kids, I figured, would end up directly beamed into MySpace, never setting a single fluorescent Nike onto me. The few who found their way to the "real" underground — my underground, with my same five goddamned DJs — would still have to bow down before me.

Oh, how wrong I was. I never opened up to any of the newer energies — I was afraid, I got petrified — despite their thrilling old-school affinity, preferring to keep my exhausted thralls lockstep in an endless search for purity, the enslaving chimera of "authenticity."

"Fuck that," said the children, and exploded. This year, especially, the local scene saw an infusion of youth like it hasn’t seen since rave. And like rave, there’s just no stopping the march of the Smurfs — with more to come, if the wide-eyed, underage flood at LoveFest was any indication. Everything’s escaping my control! Lazer bass! Bloody Beetroots remixes! Banger freaks! Electro-cumbia! Disco perversion!

I’d blame the hipsters, except I helped create them, d’oh. And even if, in this onslaught of danceable enthusiasm, some of that old underground feeling seems to be lost — the yearning for an inverted hierarchy to escape the real world, the notion of a special dance floor family — it’s still kind of thrilling. Maybe I, the ghostess with the mostest, should float down from my high horse and show the new gen how to dance properly.

MARKE B.’S TOP 10 EARWORMS OF 2008

Frankmusik, "3 Little Words" (Island Music)

Ane Brun, "Headphone Silence (Henrik Schwarz Remix — Dixon Edit)" (Objektivity)

Clubfeet, "Die Yuppie Scum" and Gold on Gold (both Plant Music)

Mark E., "Slave 1" (Running Back)

Foals, "Olympic Airways," Antidotes (Sub Pop)

SIS, "Nesrib" (Cecille)

Buraka Som Sistema, "Sound of Kuduro" (Modular)

The Golden Filter, "Hide Me" (Dummy)

The Very Best, "Sister Betina," Esau Mwamwaya and Radioclit are the Very Best mixtape

The Notwist, "Boneless," The Devil, You + Me (Domino)

>>MORE YEAR IN MUSIC 2008

Hail to the king, baby

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› cheryl@sfbg.com

Evil Dead II was released in 1987. I was a horror-crazed sixth grader, the kind of kid who insisted on screening Psycho at her 12th birthday party. Bruce Campbell became a god to me that year — me, and about a zillion others, who’ve basically worshiped the man throughout his colorful career, which spans TV (including USA Network’s current Burn Notice) and movies (with starring roles in cult hits like 2002’s Bubba Ho-Tep and cameos in Evil Dead series director Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man flicks).

Throughout it all, it’s hard not to see a little bit of Evil Dead‘s cocky Ash in all of Campbell’s roles. Campbell knows this. After two decades, he’s used to it.

"Perceptions are all over the map," Campbell told me over the phone from Minneapolis, where he was screening his latest film, My Name Is Bruce. "On one hand, someone’s pissed if you don’t present that smart-alecky persona. And yet whenever I have characters that are similar to the Ash character, I get blamed for not doing anything different. So you’re kind of screwed if you don’t, screwed if you do."

Enter the mega-meta My Name is Bruce, which is about a movie star named Bruce Campbell who’s kidnapped by a superfan to help rid his town of a seriously pissed-off demon. Campbell directed, co-produced, and hosted the filming ("Now I have a Western town I can’t do anything with") on his rural Oregon property. And, of course, he stars, as "a warped, distorted, worst-case-scenario version of myself."

Campbell the character is a guy so jerky he inspires a production assistant to serve him a bottle of pee instead of his demanded-for lemon water (he drinks it anyway — yep, it’s that kind of movie). His sleazy agent (Ted Raimi) holds business meetings at strip clubs; his ex-wife, Cheryl (Ellen Sandweiss, who played Cheryl in 1981’s The Evil Dead — one of many in-jokes scattered throughout), seeks ever-larger portions of his meager earnings. He spends booze-soaked nights in his trailer, taunting his dog.

In other words, dude ain’t no hero. But li’l goth Jeff (Taylor Sharpe) — "Bruce Campbell is the greatest actor of his generation!" — sees Campbell as Gold Lick, Oregon’s only salvation.

"The idea [for the film] was pitched to me by Mark Verheiden, who wrote it, and by my producer partner, Mike Richardson, who owns Dark Horse Comics," Campbell explained. "It was based on a comic that Mark had read years before called The Adventures of Alan Ladd — Alan Ladd was sort of a swashbuckling guy who did some movies in the ’40s and ’50s. [In the comic], people kidnapped him to help them fight pirates, because they knew he was a swashbuckling actor. So we just decided to do an updated, twisted version of that."

If you’re seeking slick terror, you may be let down by My Name Is Bruce; it’s a staunchly B-grade affair, and the villain is no scarier than anything Scooby-Doo ever faced. The main enjoyment is seeing Campbell on the loose, gleefully mocking his image and all that goes with it, including dorky fans who quiz him about career footnotes. Who else would remember 2002’s Serving Sara?

"I mean, [in My Name Is Bruce], I come across as the biggest jerk on the planet. So I’m taking everybody down with me. If you’re gonna do a dumbbell version of Bruce Campbell, then you’re gonna get a dumbbell version of the fans as well," he said. "There’s a sequence where I talk to a group of fans outside a studio, and it’s basically verbatim various conversations I’ve had. Ninety-eight percent of my fans are really normal, rational people. I just included the other two percent in the movie."

Campbell, whose previous directing experience includes 2005’s Man with the Screaming Brain, said he’s comfortable calling the shots on a low-budget shoot.

"I don’t mind being in this world because we’re kind of left alone," he said. "We don’t have to appeal to everybody. We don’t have to have a $48 million opening. It’s a lot less pressure. If this movie sucks, I’ll take the blame because I have no one else to blame. So I guess that’s the beauty and the horror of that scenario."

Campbell reports back to film the third season of spy dramedy Burn Notice in a few months; it’s a full-time gig for most of the year, and he’s just fine with that. He’s fine with playing second banana.

"That’s the best gig in the world. You watch the other guy sweat, and then I show up and go, ‘What did I miss?’" he said.

But back to My Name Is Bruce, the reason Campbell is crisscrossing the country at present. I had to ask: if Campbell could kidnap one of his idols, who would it be, and why?

"Robert Redford," he said without any hesitation. "Robert Redford, I would kidnap. Just to ask him about [his] movies. I would just sit him down. I wouldn’t hurt him. I would just poke him a little bit and ask him questions."

MY NAME IS BRUCE opens Wed/17 in Bay Area theaters.

Bruce Campbell in person with Peaches Christ

Wed/17, 7 and 9:40 p.m., $10.50

Bridge, 3010 Geary, SF.

Bruce Campbell in person

Thurs/18, 7:30 and 10 p.m.

California Theatre, 2113 Kittredge, Berk.

www.landmarktheatres.com

Mwa ha ha!: Chip Kidd on Batman’s adventures in Japan

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By Louis Peitzman

There’s a good chance you own a piece of Chip Kidd’s artwork, whether or not you’re aware of it. The New York-based graphic designer is a prolific producer of book cover art, drafting an average of 75 jacket designs a year. He’s also a huge comic book fan, and has written and edited works including 2004’s The Golden Age of DC Comics and this year’s Watching the Watchmen. His latest book is Bat-Manga!: The Secret History of Batman in Japan (Pantheon, 384 pages, $29.95 paperback and $60 hardcover), which collects a series of previously unseen manga starring the caped crusader. In a phone interview, I spoke to Kidd about Batman’s culture shock, the bitchin’ Batmobile, and how to pronounce “manga” without sounding ignorant.

batmanga2.jpg

SFBG: The first question should be an easy one. Is it “mayn-gah” or “mahn-ga”?
Chip Kidd: [laughs] It’s “mahn-ga.” That’s the Japanese pronunciation.

SFBG: All right, I’ll do my best to say it that way from now on. So rather than being just Batman or just manga, how does Bat-Manga! represent a fusion of styles?
CK: The artist Jiro Kuwata was very much drawing on what was going on in the American comics, but taking that as a visual cue, and then doing his own riff on it.

SFBG: In the interview with Kuwata included in the book, he talks about trying to make Batman more mature for Japanese audiences. Do you think he succeeded in doing that?
CK: That interview was translated. I don’t know if I’d call it “maturity.” It’s just a different kind of sensibility. I think maybe what he means [is] these stories have a sort of whimsical tone, but then when you look at what’s really going on, the villains are really trying to kill Batman and Robin. It’s not like a game. It’s fun, but there’s this actual sense of menace that the Batman comics at the time, in the U.S., did not have.

Holiday Guide 2008

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Think global, shop local

Funny how quickly this holiday season has snuck up on us, isn’t it? That election sure was distracting. Here’s hoping our ultimate holiday gift guide can help you navigate these next few months while you’re busy celebrating President Obama and protesting Prop. 8. Speaking of politics, the Guardian has joined a national effort to support local businesses this year as a way to boost our economy. Read Tim Redmond’s explanation. May this be a holiday season of change!

Molly Freedenberg

Holiday Guide editor

All illustrations by Justin Renteria

>>Think global, shop local
Saving SF’s economy one gift at a time
By Tim Redmond

>>Guilt-free gifts
A guide to supporting good causes
By Katie Baker

>>Head Bangin’
Too much metal for one gift
Photo by Arlene Romana, styling by Ben Hopfer

>>Graphic gifts
Epic comics for your twisted loved ones
By Justin Hall

>>The game room
Fantastic new releases for computers and consoles
By Daniel N. Alvarez

>>Burner bourgeois
Leather and feathers trump fun fur and faux fabrics
Photo by Arlene Romana, styling by Ben Hopfer

>>Seasonal sounds
Sifting through the year’s albums and shows for melodic gifting
By Brandon Bussolini

>>Bike-ster
Retro, velo-inspired ideas for hipster gifts
Photo by Arlene Romana, styling by Ben Hopfer

>>Giving on a shoestring
Cheap and DIY ideas for the financially-challenged
By Molly Freedenberg

>>Not your pilgrim’s pie
Modern pumpkin desserts for the historically-minded
By Meghan McCloskey

>>So fresh, so clean
Hip-hop duds for your homies
Photo by Arlene Romana, styling by Ben Hopfer

>>A holiday from the holidays
Spa ideas for the weary shopper or lucky gift-getter
By Chloe Schildhause

Holiday Guide 2008: Graphic gifts

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› culture@sfbg.com

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re aware that the last few years have seen an impressive flowering of graphic novels and comic book art. These days, every self-respecting, well-read person should have a graphic novel or two on the shelf — and that makes this the perfect moment to give your fave loved one a comic as a holiday gift. If a picture is worth a thousand words, how about a present with both?

FOR THE SMARTY-PANTS IN UNDEROOS


Watchmen changed the world of comic books when it debuted in 1986, ushering in an era of more serious and ambitious storytelling. Written by the revered Alan Moore, Watchmen uses the trope of superheroes to examine American culture. It won the Hugo Award that year (the first time a comic book had ever won a major literary award in America), was later named one of Time Magazine‘s "Best 100 Books of All Time" (the only comic book on the list), and is now being made into an movie. Watchmen dissects the superhero, revealing the elements of fascism, nihilism, and sexual obsession inherent in the genre, while always maintaining a sense of empathy for its characters’ humanity. It is beautiful, incredibly dense and intricate, and profoundly moving.

Watchmen: The Absolute Edition (DC Comics, 2008, 436 pages, $39.99) is a magnificent large-format reissue that beautifully shows off illustrator Dave Gibbon’s meticulous art, is completely re-colored, and has plenty of additional material. This is something that any geek would be proud to own.

FOR THE TWEEN WHO STILL BELIEVES IN MAGIC


Forget Harry Potter, Bone (Cartoon Books, 2004, 1300 pages, $39.95) is the bomb! Jeff Smith’s magnum opus is something truly rare in comics — a fully realized, all-ages fantasy story that balances thrilling adventure, humor, and lovable characters that develop and grow.

Three cousins stumble into a new land complete with dragons, a super-strong grandma, a princess with a destiny, a terrifying lord of locusts, and stupid rat creatures. As in the Harry Potter series, Bone becomes darker and more serious as the story progresses, but it never loses a delightful playfulness, both in the moments of comic relief and in Smith’s light, masterful brushwork. Bone can be found either as a single volume in its original black-and-white form, or as a set of color books from Scholastic Press.

FOR SCI-FI FANS WITH POST-APOCALYPTIC DAYDREAMS


Perhaps the best science fiction comic book ever produced starts off the way the best sci-fi stories do, with a simple premise that creates a ripple-effect of expanding consequences. In Y: The Last Man, all the males on the planet except for two die off from a sudden, horrifying plague, leaving poor Yorick and his pet monkey Ampersand the last creatures alive with Y chromosomes.

Writer Brian K. Vaughn, one of the best of a new generation of comics writers and one of the principle writers for TV’s Lost, cut his teeth creating the Y saga, which has been seeping out in one-volume installments since 2003. He imagines a world without men in fascinating ways, but never lets the setting get in the way of a gripping, fast-paced story. Pia Guerra’s art is competent and engaging, and propels the story along at the same clip as the writing. The entire breathtaking story comes in 10 soft-cover volumes from publisher Vertigo for around $13–<\d>$15 each. A just-published comprehensive deluxe edition (Vertigo, 2008, 256 pages, $29.99) comprises the first five volumes, with the second installation scheduled to come out in May 2009.

FOR TORTURED, BEAUTIFUL SOULS


There is a long, venerable history to comics biographies and autobiographies, from Art Spiegleman’s Maus to Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis and Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home (fabulous gifts all). I want, however, to point out an often-overlooked book that deserves its place in the canon, Phoebe Gloeckner’s Diary of a Teenage Girl (Frog Books, 2002, 312 pages, $22.95), which is one of the most compelling accounts of a troubled childhood that I’ve ever read.

Diary is not just a comic book. It weaves together graphic chapters with diary-form prose and illustrations to tell the story of Minnie Goetze, a 15-year-old girl who has an affair with her mother’s boyfriend before spiraling downward into drugs and abusive relationships.

It all takes place in 1970s San Francisco, and the city is an integral part of the story, from Minnie’s home in a Victorian flat in Laurel Heights to the world of gay hustlers and runaways on Polk Street.

FOR ROCKET-POWERED LOVERS


Have someone on your gift list who loves the magical realism, multigenerational storylines, and fantastic characters of Gabriel García Márquez? How about someone who can’t get enough of cool-ass, punk-rock dykes? Well, I have the perfect graphic novels for you: Gilbert Hernandez’s Palomar: The Heartbreak Soup Stories (Fantagraphics, 2003, 512 pages, $39.95), which chronicles the adventures of the denizens of a fictional Central American village, and Locas: The Maggie and Hopey Stories (Fantagraphics, 2004, 712 pages, $49.95) by Jaime Hernandez, which centers around two punk girls in the Mexican barrios of Los Angeles.

Both collect stories originally serialized in what is arguably the greatest American comic ever produced, Love and Rockets (and yes, that’s where the band got its name), which has been published somewhat consistently since 1981.

FOR EPIC MEDICAL DRAMA QUEENS


Ode to Kirihito (Vertical, 2006, 832 pages, $24.95) will blow your mind. Created in 1969 by the stellar Osama Tezuka, godfather of manga and anime (Japanese comics and cartoons), it was markedly more sophisticated and accomplished than anything coming out of the United States at the time. In fact, American popular culture is only now catching up to Tezuka — we’re just now getting translations of his works. Luckily, the new American versions are well designed and nimbly translated.

Kirihito tells the story of a plague that turns people into doglike creatures, and reads like a combination of a medical drama (Tezuka was trained as a physician), a panoramic 19th-century novel, and an existentialist treatise à la Albert Camus. Maybe your loved ones think that manga is all melodramatic kids with big eyes, spiky hair, and cute pets that shoot lightning? Ode to Kirihito will expand their view.

FOR YOUR FAVORITE PERVERT


Best Erotic Comics 2008 (Last Gasp, 2008, 200 pages, $19.95) is trying to fill an important, ahem, hole in the world of alternative comics. As the current comics renaissance gains steam, it is becoming curiously less and less sexual. Compared to the wild antics of the underground cartoonists of the 1960s, today’s indie comics tend to be flaccid fare.

BEC 2008 aims to change all that, as the first of an annual series of anthologies devoted to showcasing the best of comics erotica and restoring sexuality as a centerpiece of the indie comics sensibility. Last Gasp, a venerable San Francisco–based comics and alt-media publisher and distributor, is putting out the series.

Impressively diverse on all levels, BEC 2008 features a young dyke’s first encounter with a vibrator, a dominatrix who hires a gay masseur to fuck her boyfriend, King Kong and Godzilla getting it on … there’s a little something here for every proud pervert to treasure. That’s the magic of the holiday season! 2

WHERE TO GET YOUR GIFTS

Isotope Comics 326 Fell, SF. (415) 621-6543, www.isotopecomics.com

Al’s Comics 1803 Market, SF. (415) 861-1220, www.alscomicssf.com

Whatever 548 Castro, SF. (415) 861-9428, www.whateverstoreonline.com

Comix Experience 305 Divisadero, SF. (415) 863-9258, www.comixexperience.com

Comic Relief 2026 Shattuck, Berk. (510) 843-5002, www.comicrelief.net

Justin Hall is a San Francisco–based comics artist and owner of All Thumbs Press (www.allthumbspress.com).

More Holiday Guide 2008.

Magazinester

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My heart’s made of paper and held in place with two staples: I’ll always love zines. Recent issues of David Brazil’s and Sara Larsen’s biweekly roundup Try include Dana Ward’s languorous thoughts on feeling and some playful lyricism courtesy of Julian Brolaski (e-mail trymagazine@gmail.com.). Runx Tales #1 is a collection of comics by Matt Runkle (runkle.matt@gmail.com). Lots to enjoy: an exploration of why straight marriages are so gay; a well-spun tale about a town named Coeur d’Alene; nicely-rendered portraits of recent romantic obsessions; an account of dancing to ABBA on a gay pride float; and a memory of a wet, hot American summer. Runkle has Lynda Barry’s ability to capture a personality in one panel, and he draws himself to look a little like Jiminy Cricket.

Speaking of thumb-size icons, Mr. Peanut is back on the scene and looking debonair in an ad (for a show by Haim Steinbach) within the new Artforum. The same issue brings the disquieting news, also via advertisement, that Mr. Pharrell Williams has a show in a Parisian gallery. Bleh, I’d rather dream of buying a brand-new New York Post needlepoint pillow by under-sung and influential OCD artist Brigid Berlin.

Madonna and Guy’s divorce rules the glossy tabloids. "Tears, Lies, and Money," declares the front of OK!, while Us Weekly opts for a similar-but-different yellow-hued trilogy of ingredients: "Lies, Cheating, and Abuse." Esquire declares Halle Berry "the Sexiest Woman Alive," while L’ Uomo Vogue presents Tilda Swinton, looking more handsome than she’s managed on any recent red carpets. James Franco is kissable as ever on Man About Town, while Q touts its new design alongside a photo of world’s-oldest-schoolboy Angus Young.

Last, fate decreed that the 700th issue of Fate: True Reports of the Strange and Unknowncomplete with a contents-inspired cover illustration of an alien, a wolf, a droid, Sasquatch, and Jesus in front of a pyramid — arrives in the mail today. Eerie!

XXX queer cartoonists gear up for Folsom

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justincomix1a.jpg
Too Hard to Swallow!
Drawing by Justin Hall

Dip your pen in: SF-based queer comics impressario Justin Hall of All Thumbs Press and the Hard to Swallow series (and who keeps chasing down that bitch-queen Glamazonia the Uncanny Super Tranny for us) and Hard to Swallow partner Dave Davenport are popping our corks and celebrating the release of their new sticky-fingered tome Hard to Swallow #4 at Isotope Comics this Friday from 7-11pm — raunchy comics, booze, loose men and brash women, weak-willed sexy cartoonists, and the saucy tunes of DJ Bearzbub, they promise! Not only that, but the new 72-page Hard to Swallow features “skater boy ghosts and pushy werewolves.” I’m drooling already.
Hard to Swallow #4 release
Fri/26, 7pm-11pm, free
Isotope Comics
326 Fell
www.isotopecomics.com

THEN: Catch Justin, Dave, and a slew of other totally NSFW comics artists at the Folsom Street Fair‘s Erotic Artist’s Alley on Sunday on 10th St. between Folsom and Harrison for a truly delectable selection of naughty output. Last year I totally scored this awesome print of a lacrosse team raping each other with their sticks. That was subversive on ’07! What will be subversive this year? I’m guessing Moose forced-fellatio revenge.

justincomix2a.jpg
Pushy werewolves!
From Hard to Swallow #4

Dot Dash

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ISBN REAL Exciting news for the tangibility fetishists among us (digital space-children, just hum some binary code for a minute while we grasp at one more straw): Dash Shaw’s serial Web comic BodyWorld (dashshaw.com) will be gracing the third dimension in (earth-) bound form some time next year, as a graphic novel published by Pantheon.

BodyWorld, now up to chapter eight of 12, concerns Paulie Panther, a botanist in the not-too-distant future whose job is to update an encyclopedia of hallucinogenic plant life. This assignment has brought him to the insular forest community of Boney Borough, where an unknown specimen has been discovered on the grounds of the local high school. Panther, the romantically hopeless type (in other words, charmless, unkempt, occasionally suicidal, and still somehow attractive to women), makes a scummy motel room the base of his operation, which consists primarily of nursing and widening the scope of his addictions. Stuck in town waiting for the demurring plant to reveal its effects, he passively falls in with the goings-on of the school.

BodyWorld is most affecting and formally adventurous in its drug sequences, which sneak up on the reader as the plant’s effect — the opening of a conduit to any neighboring consciousness — sneaks up on Panther. Mind-melding and substance abuse (especially the romantically hopeless kind) aren’t the freshest of raw materials, but plot twists that could have been boring are elevated by the effectiveness of their representation. The laconic panel layout (three equally-dimensioned squares across and as many squares as necessary down) is subtly subverted here and there to convey the altered state. Most notably, the confusion of amateur telepathy is rendered with overlapping panels.

A digital space-child out of financial necessity, I read what’s available of BodyWorld before checking out any of Shaw’s earlier, off-line work. I wish I’d read it all in order. BodyWorld is a little disorienting without some wider frame of reference. Its noirish coyness seemed possibly rushed and incommunicative, and the sudden spikes of concentrated empathy came off as conciliatory attempts at cohesion. But it’s easier to trust that the comic’s erratic emotional register isn’t just a broken valve when considered alongside such tonally assured creations as 2006’s The Mother’s Mouth (Alternative Comics, 128 pages, $12.95) and Bottomless Belly Button (Fantagraphics Books, 720 pages, $29.99).

Shaw’s engagement with human frailty hasn’t fully shaken that tannic flavor of a detached exercise. I’m not sure what was preoccupying Dan Kois when he read Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth, but Shaw has a way to go yet before his output’s "emotional jolt" — as Kois puts it in a recent New York magazine profile of Shaw — out-zaps that of Corrigan creator Chris Ware. Still, we’re talking about a 25-year-old who renders intimate character dramas that aren’t obviously autobiographical. That endeavor in itself deserves applause. Viewed as part of an impressive and varied body of work (Shaw created thousands of pages before he could even rent a car), BodyWorld feels genuinely experimental instead of rhythmically wayward. It’s an experiment moored by stimuutf8g visual syntax: shards of solid candy hues, evocative lapses in the coloring, those dreamy wandering panels. Plus, shopworn or not, drugs and ESP are just neat.

Speed Reading

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THE THREE TRILLION DOLLAR WAR: THE TRUE COST OF THE IRAQ CONFLICT

By Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes

W.W. Norton & Company

192 pages, $22.95 (hardcover)

336 pages, $14.95 (trade paperback available next month)

Since the recent television writers’ strike seemed to have a greater impact on the nation than our two ongoing wars or the frequently floated possibility of a third, maybe it’s money that matters. After all, a trillion here, a trillion there, and pretty soon you are talking real money. In The Three Trillion Dollar War, Nobel Prize–winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and co-author Linda Bilmes try to illustrate what it means to spend $3 trillion on the Iraq war.

Arguing that “money spent on armaments is money poured down the drain,” Stiglitz and Bilmes dismiss the notion that wars are always “good for the economy.” Their arguments are bolstered by the grim reality that during the Iraq conflict oil prices have risen from $25 a barrel to more than $120 a barrel, while household savings rates have gone “negative for the first time since the Great Depression.” Meanwhile, as they point out, the National Guard has been under-equipped in the face of domestic disasters such as Hurricane Katrina due to Iraq deployment.

Unfortunately supporters of Sen. John McCain, who foresees a century of Iraq occupation, aren’t likely to read this book. But it would not be wasted on Barack Obama’s supporters since — much as they might want to overlook it — his presidential plan also envisions tens of thousands of American troops remaining in Iraq after the combat troops have gone. (Tom Gallagher)

THE COMIC BOOK HOLOCAUST

THE KLASSIC KOMIX KLUB

By Johnny Ryan

Buenaventura Press

128 pages each

$9.95 (Comic Book Holocaust)

$14.95 (Klassic Komix Klub)

If there were such a thing as achieving the zen of filth — the zero-sum nirvana of willful wallowing in sweat, spunk, excrement, and blood till one has achieved the nihilistic bliss of transgressive freedom — then cartoonist Johnny Ryan might be dubbed our comic book bodhisattva. The evidence is all over two handsome volumes on Oakland’s Buenaventura Press: The Comic Book Holocaust, the cartoonist’s 2006 send-up (and put-down) of mainstream and underground/alternative comics from Thor to Persepolis, and The Klassic Komix Klub, his short, sharp wholesale demolition of literary warhorses à la Ulysses and, hey, Siddhartha (the search for enlightenment ends with a diaper loaded with poo, home to “Osamarexic Slim Laden”).

Sure, the unrelenting butt-violation, mutilation, rape, boner, crap-eating, racial stereotype, and flying vulvas jokes tend to hit or miss — and get monotonous. Reading Ryan panels in, say, Vice offers hipsters the fast, nasty frisson of a chuckle, while reading more than 50 in one sitting can be quease-inducing, which is more than Mad can claim. Ryan’s quick ‘n’ dirty, reductionist aesthetic, absurdist and disgust-centered shit-vision, and all-inclusive takedowns come off as a bit dated for these post-9/11 times — redolent of a ’90s alt-nation, slacker pessimism fed by punk rock, J.K. Huysmans, Howard Stern, and Peter Bagge. Still, at its most effective, Ryan’s work is the funny-book equivalent of watching nonstop war footage. He gives us a dirty-bird cartoon version of the Marquis de Sade, leavened by the occasional chortle at Garfield’s expense. (Kimberly Chun)

 

The Fourth of July in Rock Rapids, Iowa, 1940-53

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The good old days in Rock Rapids, Iowa,
the Fourth of July, l940-53

By Bruce B. Brugmann

(Note: In July of l972, when the Guardian was short a Fourth of July story, I sat down and cranked out this one for the front page on my trusty Royal Typewriter. I now reprint it each year on the Bruce blog, with some San Francisco updates and postscripts.)

Back where I come from, a small town beneath a tall standpipe in northwestern Iowa, the Fourth of July was the best day of a long, hot summer.

The Fourth came after YMCA camp and Scout camp and church camp, but before the older boys had to worry about getting into shape for football. It was welcome relief from the scalding, 100-degree heat in a town without a swimming pool and whose swimming holes at Scout Island were usually dried up by early July. But best of all, it had the kind of excitement that began building weeks in advance.

The calm of the summer dawn and the cooing of the mourning doves on the telephone wires would be broken early on July Fourth: The Creglow boys would be up by 7 a.m. and out on the lawn shooting off their arsenal of firecrackers. They were older and had somehow sent their agents by car across the state line and into South Dakota where, not far above the highway curves of Larchwood, you could legally buy fireworks at roadside stands.

Ted Fisch, Jim Ramsey, Wiener Winters, the Cook boys, Hermie Casjens, Jerry Prahl, and the rest of the neighborhood would race of their houses to catch the action. Some of them had cajoled firecrackers from their parents or bartered from the older boys in the neighborhood: some torpedoes (the kind you smashed against the sidewalk); lots of 2 and 3-inchers, occasionally the granddaddy of them all, the cherry bomb (the really explosive firecracker, stubby, cherry red, with a wick sticking up menacingly from its middle; the kind of firecracker you’d gladly trade away your best set of Submariner comics for).

Ah, the cherry bomb. It was a microcosm of excitement and mischief and good fun. Bob Creglow, the most resourceful of the Creglow boys, would take a cherry bomb, set it beneath a tin can on a porch, light the fuse, then head for the lilac bushes behind the barn.

“The trick,” he would say, imparting wisdom of the highest order, “is to place the can on a wood porch with a wood roof. Then it will hit the top of the porch, bang, then the bottom of the porch, bang. That’s how you get the biggest clatter.”

So I trudged off to the Linkenheil house, the nearest front porch suitable for cherry bombing, to try my hand at small-town demolition. Bang went the firecracker. Bang went the can on the roof. Bang went the can on the floor. Bang went the screen door as Karl Linkenheil roared out in a sweat, and I lit out for the lilacs behind the barn with my dog, Oscar.

It was glorious stuff – not to be outdone for years, I found out later, until the Halloween eve in high school when Dave Dietz, Ted Fisch, Ken Roach, Bob Babl, and rest of the Hermie Casjens gang and I made the big time and twice pushed a boxcar loaded with lumber across Main Street and blocked it for hours. But that’s another story in my Halloween blog of last year.

Shooting off fireworks was, of course, illegal in Rock Rapids, but Chief of Police Del Woodburn and later Elmer “Shinny” Sheneberger used to lay low on the Fourth. I don’t recall ever seeing them about in our neighborhood and I don’t think they ever arrested anybody, although each year the Rock Rapids Reporter would carry vague warnings about everybody cooperating to have “a safe and sane Fourth of July.”

Perhaps it was just too dangerous for them to start making firecracker arrests on the Fourth – on the same principle, I guess, that it was dangerous to do too much about the swashbuckling on Halloween or start running down dogs without leashes (Mayor Earl Fisher used to run on the platform that, as long as he was in office, no dog in town would have to be leashed. The neighborhood consensus was that Fisher’s dog, a big, boisterous boxer, was one of the few that ought to be leashed).

We handled the cherry bombs and other fireworks in our possession with extreme care and cultivation; I can’t remember a single mishap. Yet, even then, the handwriting was on the wall. There was talk of cutting off the fireworks supply in South Dakota because it was dangerous for young boys. Pretty soon, they did cut off the cherry bomb traffic and about all that was left, when I came back from college and the Roger boys had replaced the Creglow boys next door, was little stuff appropriately called ladyfingers.

Fireworks are dangerous, our parents would say, and each year they would dust off the old chestnut about the drugstore in Spencer that had a big stock of fireworks and they caught fire one night and much of the downtown went up in a spectacular shower of roman candles and sparkling fountains.

The story was hard to pin down, and seemed to get more gruesome every year – but, we were told, this was why Iowa banned fireworks years before, why they were so dangerous and why little boys shouldn’t be setting them off. The story, of course, never made quite the intended impression; we just wished we’d been on the scene.
My grandfather was the town druggist (Brugmann’s Drugstore, “where drugs and gold are fairly sold,” since 1902) and he said he knew the Spencer druggist personally. Fireworks put him out of business and into the poorhouse, he’d say, and walk away shaking his head.

In any event, firecrackers weren’t much of an issue past noon – the Fourth celebration at the fairgrounds was getting underway and there was too much else to do. Appropriately, the celebration was sponsored by the Rex Strait post of the American Legion (Strait, so the story went, was the first boy from Rock Rapids to die on foreign soil during World War I); the legionnaires were a bunch of good guys from the cleaners and the feed store and the bank who sponsored the American Legion baseball team each summer.

There was always a big carnival, with a ferris wheel somewhere in the center for the kids, a bingo stand for the elders, a booth where the ladies from the Methodist Church sold homemade baked goods, sometimes a hootchy dancer or two, and a couple of dank watering holes beneath the grandstand where the VFW and the Legion sold Grainbelt and Hamms at 30¢ a bottle to anybody who looked of age.

Later on, when the farmboys came in from George and Alvord, there was lots of pushing and shoving, and a fist fight or two.

In front of the grandstand, out in the dust and the sun, would come a succession of shows that made the summer rounds of the little towns. One year it would be Joey Chitwood and his daredevil drivers. (The announcer always fascinated me: “Here he comes, folks, rounding the far turn…he is doing a great job out there tonight…let’s give him a big, big hand as he pulls up in front on the grandstand…”)

Another year it would be harness racing and Mr. Hardy, our local trainer from Doon, would be in his moment of glory. Another year it was tag team wrestling and a couple of barrel-chested goons from Omaha, playing the mean heavies and rabbit-punching their opponents from the back, would provoke roars of disgust from the grandstand. ( The biggest barrel-chest would lean back on the ropes, looking menacingly at the crowd and yell, “ Aw, you dumb farmers. What the hell do you know anyway?” And the grandstand would roar back in glee.)

One year, Cedric Adams, the Herb Caen of Minneapolis and the Star-Tribune, would tour the provinces as the emcee of a variety show. “It’s great to be in Rock Rapids,” he would say expansively, “because it’s always been known as the ‘Gateway to Magnolia.” (Magnolia, he didn’t need to say, was a little town just over the state line in Minnesota which was known throughout the territory for its liquor-by-the-drink roadhouses. It was also Cedric Adams’ hometown: his “Sackamenna.”) Adams kissed each girl (soundly) who came on the platform to perform and, at the end, hushed the crowd for his radio broadcast to the big city “direct from the stage of the Lyon County Fairgrounds in Rock Rapids, Iowa.”

For a couple of years, when Rock Rapids had a “town team,” and a couple of imported left-handed pitchers named Peewee Wenger and Karl Kletschke, we would have some rousing baseball games with the best semi-pro team around, Larchwood and its gang of Snyder brothers: Barney the eldest at shortstop, Jimmy the youngest at third base, John in center field, Paul in left field, another Snyder behind the plate and a couple on the bench. They were as tough as they came in Iowa baseball.

I can remember it as if it were yesterday at Candlestick, the 1948 game with the Snyders of Larchwood. Peewee Wenger, a gawky, 17-year-old kid right off a high school team, was pitching for Rock Rapids and holding down the Snyder artillery in splendid fashion. Inning after inning he went on, nursing a small lead, mastering one tough Larchwood batter after another, with a blistering fastball and a curve that sliced wickedly into the bat handles of the right-handed Larchwood line-up.

Then the cagey Barney Snyder laid a slow bunt down the third base line. Wenger stumbled, lurched, almost fell getting to the ball, then toppled off balance again, stood helplessly holding the ball. He couldn’t make the throw to first. Barney was safe, cocky and firing insults like machine gun bullets at Peewee from first base.

Peewee, visibly shaken, went back to the mound. He pitched, the next Larchwood batter bunted, this time down the first base line. Peewee lurched for the ball, but couldn’t come up with it. A couple more bunts, a shot through the pitcher’s mound, more bunts and Peewee was out. He could pitch, but, alas, he was too clumsy to field. In came Bill Jammer, now in his late 30’s, but in his day the man who beat the University of Iowa while pitching at a small college called Simpson.

Now he was pitching on guts and beer, a combination good enough for many teams and on good days even to take on the Snyders. Jammer did well for a couple of innings, then he let two men on base, then came a close call at the plate. Jammer got mad. Both teams were off the bench and onto the field and, as Fred Roach wrote in the Rock Rapids Reporter, “fisticuffs erupted at home plate.” When the dust cleared, Jammer has a broken jaw, and for the next two weeks had to drink his soup through a straw at the Joy Lunch. John Snyder, it was said later, came all the way in from center field to throw the punch, but nobody knew for sure and he stayed in the game. I can’t remember the score or who won the game, but I remember it as the best Fourth ever.

At dusk, the people moved out on their porches or put up folding chairs on the lawn. Those who didn’t have a good view drove out to the New Addition or parked out near Mark Curtis’ place or along the river roads that snaked out to the five-mile bridge and Virgil Hasche’s place.

A hush came over the town. Fireflies started flickering in the river bottom and, along about 8:30, the first puff of smoke rose above the fairgrounds and an aerial bomb whistled into the heavens. BOOM! And the town shook as if hit by a clap of thunder.

Then the three-tiered sky bombs – pink, yellow, white, puff, puff, puff. The Niagara Falls and a gush of white sparks.

Then, in sudden fury, a dazzling display of sizzling comets and aerial bombs and star clusters that arched high, hung for a full breath and descended in a cascade of sparks that floated harmlessly over the meadows and cornfields. At the end, the flag – red, white and blue – would burst forth on the ground as the All-American finale in the darkest of the dark summer nights. On cue, the cheers rolled out from the grandstand and the cars honked from the high ground and the people trundled up their lawn chairs and everybody headed for home.

Well, I live in San Francisco now, and I drive to Daly City with my son, Danny, to buy some anemic stuff in gaudy yellow and blue wrapping and I try unsuccessfully each year to get through the fog or the traffic to see the fireworks at Candlestick. But I feel better knowing that, back where I come from, everybody in town will be on their porches and on the backroads on the evening of the Fourth to watch the fireworks and that, somewhere in town, a little boy will put a big firecracker under a tin can on a wood porch, then light out for the lilacs behind the barn.

P.S. Our family moved in l965 from Daly City to a house in the West Portal area of San Francisco. There are, I assure you, few visible fireworks in that neighborhood. However, down where we work at the Guardian building at the bottom of Potrero Hill, the professional and amateur action is spectacular.

From the roof of our building at 135 Mississippi, and from any Potrero Hill height, you can see the fireworks in several directions: the waterfront fireworks in the city, fireworks on the Marin side of the Golden Gate bridge, fireworks at several points in the East Bay, fireworks along the Peninsula coast line.

And for the amateur action, parents with kids, kids of all ages, spectators in cars and on foot, congregate after dusk along Terry Francois Boulevard in San Francisco along the shoreline between the Giants ballpark and Kellys Mission Rock restaurant.
The action is informal but fiery and furious: cherry bombs, clusters, spinning wheels, high flying arcs, whizzers of all shapes and sizes. The cops are quite civilized and patrol the perimeter but don’t bother anybody. I go every year. I think it’s the best show in town. B3.

Magazinester

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MAGAZINESTER

This month’s Magazinester saves the best for first: in conjunction with an art show, Needles and Pens has fantastic zines by Edie Fake on display. Rico McTaco stars a four-legged dyke not averse to carrot strap-ons and dizzying black and white lines Bridget Riley might admire. Issue four of Gaylord Phoenix adds color and erotic examinations by a quartet of wizards with entwined beards to the many-sexed picture.

In Matt Furie’s boy’s club, Andy, Bret, Landwolf, and Pepe bro down with Nintendo, pizza breakfasts, and T-shirt jokes when they aren’t fending off dust mites. The hug department in boy’s club is always open. Dead Pets No. 1 relates tales of tarantula starvation, ferrets crushed by futons, black-eyed white mice slain by children’s tea-party merriment, and many ill-fated betta fish. The centerfold lists five dead pet movies. Published in deluxe gold-embossed color by Blue Q, Killer Queen: The Freddie Mercury Story‘s terrific illustrations portray Mercury’s overbite and stamp collection. Issue 116 of Belladonna presents Dodie Bellamy’s Mother Montage, a combination of writer and subject matter (one’s mother, not motherhood) that sparks a demonologist’s wit — the kind that doesn’t pander. John McCain’s gizzard does not escape unscathed.

Best free mag honors go to Arthur for following Erick Morse’s superb Fantomas survey with an extensive critical hurrah for the music of Sparks. (Also, Arthur‘s comics page features Furie and mocks blogs.) Expensive-mag-to-browse honors go to Aperture for features on James Bidgood, Robert Frank, and Trevor Paglen, and a wild series of Iraq War vets portraits. A cheap raspberry to $29-and-up rags such as Paradis, Purple Fashion, UOVO, and Fantastic Man: most or all feature the saggy yet nonexistent ass of the overexposed, under-talented Terence Koh.

Speed Reading

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THE TEN CENT PLAGUE: THE GREAT COMIC BOOK SCARE AND HOW IT CHANGED AMERICA

By David Hadju

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

448 pages

$26

David Hajdu is an antidote to ersatz historiographers. He’s unearthed and analyzed formative but forgotten figures (such as Billy Strayhorn) and moments of 20th-century Americana. In The Ten Cent Plague: The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America, the Columbia University journalism professor turns his attention to Brooklyn and the Lower East Side of the 1940s and early ’50s, when a cadre of young outsiders engendered a new and controversial artistic medium: the comic book.

Hajdu surveys Famous Funnies pioneer Harry Wildenberg, eccentric militant Major Nicholson-Wheeler, Crime Does Not Pay impresario Charles Biro, psychological activist Frederic Wertham, and Superman creator Jerry Siegel. But milquetoast EC Comics owner Bill Gaines, partly responsible for the horror and sci-fi craze that accompanied the atomic age, is at the center of the book’s narrative.

The Ten Cent Plague thoroughly documents the censorship struggles and creative flourishes of a subculture and revolutionary art form, but it lacks the freewheeling energy of earlier histories. For all of his rhapsodizing about the authentic juvenile experience within comics, there is a dearth of playful and existential perspective. Instead, the writing takes on an insipid encyclopedic tone, forcing cohesion on a subject matter renowned for random creativity. Large portions of text come across as just the kind of parental lesson comic book enthusiasts might shun. Nonetheless, Hajdu provides a necessary investigation into the moment when America stepped from a black-and-white past into a Technicolor future. (Erik Morse)

 

UNCREDITED: GRAPHIC DESIGN AND OPENING TITLES IN THE MOVIES

By Gemma Solana and Antonio Boneu

Index Books

313 pages

$55

Initially, Gemma Solana and Antonio Boneu’s survey of credit sequences in movies sported the title The Art of the Title Sequence. But now it is called Uncredited: Graphic Design and Opening Titles in the Movies, a gesture of solidarity toward the legion of graphic artists, particularly in Hollywood, who have designed credits for movies without being acknowledged for their efforts. Early sections of this hardcover slab of imagery and text — which weighs a good five pounds, in case you want to strengthen your biceps — explore the white-on-black and title-as-logo roots of studio movies from the first half of the 20th century. The creators of signature sequences such as the umbrella-twirling opening of Singin’ in the Rain (1952) are praised while remaining anonymous. Even when credits were credited, as with Pacific Title and Art Studio’s splendorous text for Gone with the Wind (1939), it was under a corporate blueprint.

Uncredited‘s latter chapters right those wrongs committed by the film industry by exploring the efforts of Otto Preminger’s and Alfred Hitchcock’s frequent partner-in-design Saul Bass (probably the only credit specialist to receive exhibition and monograph showcases) and his wife Elaine, as well as Jean Fouchet (an influence on Jacques Demy?), Pablo Nuñez (who created the credits for Victor Erice’s 1973 The Spirit of the Beehive), Dan Perri, and others. A climactic section about current trends displays work that uniformly pales in comparison to the work by Arcady, Fernand Léger, and especially Mary Ellen Bute and Jean-Luc Godard in a central chapter devoted to concepts. Uncredited is lavishly, gorgeously illustrated (complete with a DVD) and playfully designed. There are errors galore in the informative text though — a sharper editorial eye was needed. And who exactly is that mysterious “QT” who seems to have provided captions for a number of the illustrations? (Johnny Ray Huston)

 

Summer 2008 fairs and festivals

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Grab your calendars, then get outside and celebrate summer in the Bay.

>Click here for a full-text version of this article.

ONGOING

United States of Asian America Arts Festival Various locations, SF; (415) 864-4120, www.apiculturalcenter.org. Through May 25. This festival, presented by the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center, showcases Asian Pacific Islander dance, music, visual art, theater, and multidisciplinary performance ensembles at many San Francisco venues.

Yerba Buena Gardens Festival Yerba Buena Gardens, Third St at Mission, SF; (415) 543-1718, www.ybgf.org. Through Oct, free. Nearly 100 artistic and cultural events for all ages take place at the Gardens, including the Latin Jazz series and a performance by Rupa & the April Fishes.

MAY 10–31

Asian Pacific Heritage Festival Oakland Asian Cultural Center, 388 Ninth St, Oakl; (510) 637-0462, www.oacc.cc. Times vary, free. The OACC presents hands-on activities for families, film screenings, cooking classes, and performances throughout the month of May.

MAY 15–18

Carmel Art Festival Devendorf Park, Carmel; (831) 642-2503, www.carmelartfestival.org. Call for times, free. Enjoy viewing works by more than 60 visual artists at this four-day festival. In addition to the Plein Air and Sculpture-in-the-Park events, the CAF is host to the Carmel Youth Art Show, Quick Draw, and Kids Art Day.

MAY 16–18

Oakland Greek Festival 4700 Lincoln, Oakl; (510) 531-3400, www.oaklandgreekfestival.com. Fri-Sat, 10am-11pm; Sun, 11am-9pm, $6. Let’s hear an "opa!" for Greek music, dance, food, and a stunning view at the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Ascension’s three-day festival.

MAY 17

Asian Heritage Street Celebration Japantown; www.asianfairsf.com. 11am-6pm, free. The largest gathering of Asian Pacific Americans in the nation features artists, DJs, martial arts, Asian pop culture, karaoke, and much more.

Saints Kiril and Methody Bulgarian Festival Croatian American Cultural Center, 60 Onondaga; (510) 649-0941, www.slavonicweb.org. 4pm, $15. Enjoy live music, dance, and traditional food and wine in celebration of Bulgarian culture. A concert features special guests Radostina Koneva and Orchestra Ludi Maldi.

Taiwanese American Cultural Festival Union Square, SF; (408) 268-5637, www.tafnc.org. 11am-5pm, free. Explore Taiwan by tasting delicious Taiwanese delicacies, viewing a puppet show and other performances, and browsing arts and crafts exhibits.

Uncorked! Ghirardelli Square; 775-5500, www.ghirardellisq.com. 1-6pm, $40-45. Ghirardelli Square and nonprofit COPIA present their third annual wine festival, showcasing more than 40 local wineries and an array of gourmet food offerings.

BAY AREA

Cupertino Special Festival in the Park Cupertino Civic Center, 10300 Torre, Cupertino; (408) 996-0850, www.osfamilies.org. 10am-6pm, free. The Organization of Special Needs Families hosts its fourth annual festival for people of all walks or wheels of life. Featuring live music, food and beer, a petting zoo, arts and crafts, and other activities.

Enchanted Village Fair 1870 Salvador, Napa; (707) 252-5522. 11am-4pm, $1. Stone Bridge School creates a magical land of wonder and imagination, featuring games, crafts, a crystal room, and food.

Immigrants Day Festival Courthouse Square, 2200 Broadway, Redwood City; (650) 299-0104, www.historysmc.org. 12-4pm, free. Sample traditional Mexican food, make papel picado decorations, and watch Aztec dancing group Casa de la Cultura Quetzalcoatl at the San Mateo County History Museum.

MAY 17–18

A La Carte and Art Castro St, Mountain View; (650) 964-3395, www.miramarevents.com. 10am-6pm, free. The official kick-off to festival season, A La Carte is a moveable feast of people and colorful tents offering two days of attractions, music, art, a farmers’ market, and street performers.

Bay Area Storytelling Festival Kennedy Grove Regional Recreation Area, El Sobrante; (510) 869-4946, www.bayareastorytelling.org. Gather around and listen to stories told by storytellers from around the world at this outdoor festival. Carol Birch, Derek Burrows, Baba Jamal Koram, and Olga Loya are featured.

Castroville Artichoke Festival 10100 Merritt, Castroville; (831) 633-2465, www.artichoke-festival.org. Sat, 10am-6pm; Sun, 10am-5pm, $3-6. "Going Green and Global" is the theme of this year’s festival, which cooks up the vegetable in every way imaginable and features activities for kids, music, a parade, a farmers’ market, and much more.

French Flea Market Chateau Sonoma, 153 West Napa, Sonoma; (707) 935-8553, www.chateausonoma.com. Call for times and cost. Attention, Francophiles: this flea market is for you! Shop for antiques, garden furniture, and accessories from French importers.

Hats Off America Car Show Bollinger Canyon Rd and Camino Ramon, San Ramon; (925) 855-1950, www.hatsoffamerica.us. 10am-5pm, free. Hats Off America presents its fifth annual family event featuring muscle cars, classics and hot rods, art exhibits, children’s activities, live entertainment, a 10K run, and beer and wine.

Himalayan Fair Live Oak Park, 1300 Shattuck, Berk; (510) 869-3995, www.himalayanfair.net. Sat, 10am-7pm; Sun, 10am-5:30pm, $8.This benefit for humanitarian grassroots projects in the Himalayas features award-winning dancers and musicians representing Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan, India, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Mongolia. Check out the art and taste the delicious food.

Pixie Park Spring Fair Marin Art and Garden Center, Ross; www.pixiepark.org. 9am-4pm, free. The kids will love the bouncy houses, giant slide, petting zoo, pony rides, puppet shows, and more at this cooperative park designed for children under 6. Bring a book to donate to Homeward Bound of Marin.

Supercon San Jose Convention Center, San Jose; www.super-con.com. Sat., 10am-6pm; Sun., 10am-5pm, $20-30. The biggest stars of comics, sci-fi, and pop culture — including Lost’s Jorge Garcia and Groo writer Sergio Aragonés — descend on downtown San Jose for panels, discussions, displays, and presentations.

MAY 18

Bay to Breakers Begins at Howard and Spear, ends at the Great Highway along Ocean Beach, SF; www.baytobreakers.com. 8am, $39-59. See a gang of Elvis impersonators in running shorts and a gigantic balloon shaped like a tube of Crest floating above a crowd of scantily clad, and unclad, joggers at this annual "race" from the Embarcadero to the Pacific Ocean.

Carnival in the Xcelsior 125 Excelsior; 469-4739, my-sfcs.org/8.html. 11am-4pm, free. This benefit for the SF Community School features game booths, international food selections, prizes, music, and entertainment for all ages.

BAY AREA

Russian-American Fair Terman Middle School, 655 Arastradero, Palo Alto; (650) 852-3509, paloaltojcc.org. 10am-5pm, $3-5. The Palo Alto Jewish Community Center puts on this huge, colorful cultural extravaganza featuring ethnic food, entertainment, crafts and gift items, art exhibits, carnival games, and vodka tasting for adults.

MAY 21–JUNE 8

San Francisco International Arts Festival Various venues, SF; (415) 399-9554, www.sfiaf.org. The theme for the fifth year of this multidisciplinary festival is "The Truth in Knowing/Threads in Time, Place, Culture."

MAY 22–25

Sonoma Jazz Plus Festival Field of Dreams, 179 First St W, Sonoma; (866) 527-8499, www.sonomajazz.org. Thurs-Sat, 6:30 and 9pm; Sun, 8:30pm, $40+. Head on up to California’s wine country to soak in the sounds of Al Green, Herbie Hancock, Diana Krall, and Bonnie Raitt.

MAY 24–25

Carnaval Mission District, SF; (415) 920-0125, www.carnavalsf.com. 9:30am-6pm, free. California’s largest annual multicultural parade and festival celebrates its 30th anniversary with food, crafts, activities, performances by artists like deSoL, and "Zona Verde," an outdoor eco-green village at 17th and Harrison.

MAY 25–26

San Ramon Art and Wind Festival Central Park, San Ramon; (925) 973-3200, www.artandwind.com. 10am-5pm, free. For its 18th year, the City of San Ramon Parks and Community Services Department presents over 200 arts and crafts booths, entertainment on three stages, kite-flying demos, and activities for kids.

MAY 30–JUNE 8

Healdsburg Jazz Festival Check Web site for ticket prices and venues in and around Healdsburg; (707) 433-4644, www.healdsburgjazzfestival.com. This 10th annual, week-and-a-half-long jazz festival will feature a range of artists from Fred Hersch and Bobby Hutcherson to the Cedar Walton Trio.

MAY 31

Chocolate and Chalk Art Festival North Shattuck, Berk; (510) 548-5335, www.northshattuck.org. 10am-6pm, free. Create chalk drawings and sample chocolate delights while vendors, musicians, and clowns entertain the family.

Napa Valley Art Festival 500 Main, Napa; www.napavalleyartfestival.com. 10am-4pm, free. Napa Valley celebrates representational art on Copia’s beautiful garden promenade with art sales, ice cream, and live music. Net proceeds benefit The Land Trust of Napa County’s Connolly Ranch Education Center.

MAY 31–JUNE 1

Union Street Festival Union, between Gough and Steiner, SF; 1-800-310-6563, www.unionstreetfestival.com. 10am-6pm, free. For its 32nd anniversary, one of SF’s largest free art festivals is going green, featuring an organic farmer’s market, arts and crafts made with sustainable materials, eco-friendly exhibits, food, live entertainment, and bistro-style cafés.

JUNE 4–8

01SJ: Global Festival of Art on the Edge Various venues, San Jose; (408) 277-3111, ww.01sj.org. Various times. The nonprofit ZERO1 plans to host 20,000 visitors at this festival featuring 100 exhibiting artists exploring the digital age and novel creative expression.

JUNE 5–8

Harmony Festival Sonoma County Fairgrounds, Santa Rosa; www.harmonyfestival.com. $30-99. One of the largest progressive-lifestyle festivals of its kind, Harmony brings art, education, and cultural awareness together with world-class performers like George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic, Jefferson Starship, Damian Marley, Cheb I Sabbah, and Vau de Vire Society.

JUNE 7–8

Crystal Fair Fort Mason Center; 383-7837, www.crystalfair.com. Sat, 10am-6pm; Sun, 10am-5pm, $6. The Pacific Crystal Guild presents two days in celebration of crystals, minerals, jewelry, and metaphysical healing tools from an international selection of vendors.

BAY AREA

Sunset Celebration Weekend Sunset headquarters, 80 Willow Road, Menlo Park; 1-800-786-7375, www.sunset.com. 10am-5pm, $12, kids free. Sunset magazine presents a two-day outdoor festival featuring beer, wine, and food tasting; test-kitchen tours, celebrity chef demonstrations, live music, seminars, and more.

JUNE 8

Haight Ashbury Street Fair Haight and Ashbury; www.haightashburystreetfair.org. 11am-5:30pm, free. Celebrate the cultural contributions this historical district has made to SF with a one-day street fair featuring artisans, musicians, artists, and performers.

JUNE 14

Rock Art by the Bay Fort Mason, SF; www.trps.org. 10am-5pm, free. The Rock Poster Society hosts this event celebrating poster art from its origins to its most recent incarnations.

BAY AREA

City of Oakland Housing Fair Frank Ogawa Plaza; Oakl; (510) 238-3909, www.oaklandnet.com/housingfair. 10am-2pm, free. The City of Oakland presents this seventh annual event featuring workshops and resources for first-time homebuyers, renters, landlords, and homeowners.

JUNE 14–15

North Beach Festival Washington Square Park, 1200-1500 blocks of Grant and adjacent streets; 989-2220, www.sfnorthbeach.org. 10am-6pm, free. Touted as the country’s original outdoor arts and crafts festival, the North Beach Festival celebrates its 54th anniversary with juried arts and crafts exhibitions and sales, a celebrity pizza toss, live entertainment stages, a cooking stage with celebrity chefs, Assisi animal blessings, Arte di Gesso (Italian street chalk art competition, 1500 block Stockton), indoor Classical Concerts (4 pm, National Shrine of St. Francis), a poetry stage, and more.

BAY AREA

Sonoma Lavender Festival 8537 Sonoma Hwy, Kenwood; (707) 523-4411, www.sonomalavender.com. 10am-4pm, free. Sonoma Lavender opens its private farm to the public for craftmaking, lavender-infused culinary delights by Chef Richard Harper, tea time, and a chance to shop for one of Sonoma’s 300 fragrant products.

JUNE 7–AUG 17

Stern Grove Music Festival Stern Grove, 19th Ave and Sloat, SF; www.sterngrove.org. Sundays 2pm, free. This beloved San Francisco festival celebrates community, nature, and the arts is in its with its 71st year of admission-free concerts.

JUNE 17–20

Mission Creek Music Festival Venues and times vary; www.mcmf.org.The Mission Creek Music Festival celebrates twelve years of featuring the best and brightest local independent musicians and artists with this year’s events in venues big and small.

JUNE 20–22

Jewish Vintners Celebration Various locations, Napa Valley; (707) 968-9944, www.jewishvintners.org. Various times, $650. The third annual L’Chaim Napa Valley Jewish Vintners Celebration celebrates the theme "Connecting with Our Roots" with a weekend of wine, cuisine, camaraderie, and history featuring Jewish winemakers from Napa, Sonoma, and Israel.

Sierra Nevada World Music Festival Mendocino County Fairgrounds, 14480 Hwy 128, Boonville; (917) 777-5550, www.snwmf.com.Three-day pass, $135; camping, $50-100. Camp for three days and listen to the international sounds of Michael Franti & Spearhead, the English Beat, Yami Bolo, and many more.

JUNE 28–29

San Francisco Pride 2008 Civic Center, Larkin between Grove and McAllister; 864-FREE, www.sfpride.org. Celebration Sat-Sun, noon-6pm; parade Sun, 10:30am, free. A month of queer-empowering events culminates in this weekend celebration: a massive party with two days of music, food, and dancing that continues to boost San Francisco’s rep as a gay mecca. This year’s theme is "Bound for Equality."

JULY 3–6

High Sierra Music Festival Plumas-Sierra Fairgrounds, Quincy; (510) 547-1992, www.highsierramusic.com. Ticket prices vary. Enjoy four days of camping, stellar live music, yoga, shopping, and more at the 18th iteration of this beloved festival. This year’s highlights include ALO, Michael Franti and Spearhead, Built to Spill, Bob Weir & RatDog, Gov’t Mule, and Railroad Earth.

JULY 4

City of San Francisco Fourth of July Waterfront Celebration Pier 39, Embarcadero at Beach; 705-5500, www.pier39.com. 1-9:30pm, free. SF’s waterfront Independence Day celebration features live music by Big Bang Beat and Tainted Love, kids’ activities, and an exciting fireworks show.

JULY 5–6

Fillmore Jazz Festival Fillmore between Jackson and Eddy; www.fillmorejazzfestival.com.10am-6pm, free. More than 90,000 people will gather to celebrate Fillmore Street’s prosperous tradition of jazz, culture, and cuisine.

JULY 17–AUG 3

Midsummer Mozart Festival Various Bay Area venues; (415) 392-4400, www.midsummermozart.org. $20-60. This Mozart-only music concert series in its 34th season features talented musicians from SF and beyond.

JULY 18–AUG 8

Music@Menlo Chamber Music Festival Menlo School, 50 Valparaiso, Atherton; www.musicatmenlo.org. In its sixth season, this festival explores a musical journey through time, from Bach to Jennifer Higdon.

JULY 21–27

North Beach Jazz Fest Various locations; www.nbjazzfest.com. Various times and ticket prices. Sunset Productions presents the 15th annual gathering celebrating indoor and outdoor jazz by over 100 local and international artists. Special programs include free jazz in Washington Square Park.

JULY 26, AUG 16

FLAX Creative Arts Festival 1699 Market; 552-2355, www.flaxart.com. 11am-2pm, free. Flax Art and Design hosts an afternoon of hands-on demonstrations, free samples, and prizes for kids.

JULY 27

Up Your Alley Dore Alley between Folsom and Howard, Folsom between Ninth and 10th Sts; www.folsomstreetfair.com. 11am-6pm, free. Hundreds of naughty and nice leather-lovers sport their stuff in SoMa at this precursor to the Folsom Street Fair.

AUG 2–3

Aloha Festival San Francisco Presidio Parade Grounds, near Lincoln at Graham; www.pica-org.org/AlohaFest/index.html. 10am-5pm, free. The Pacific Islanders’ Cultural Association presents its annual Polynesian cultural festival featuring music, dance, arts, crafts, island cuisine, exhibits, and more.

AUG 9–10

Nihonmachi Street Fair Japantown Center, Post and Webster; www.nihonmachistreetfair.org. 11am-6pm, free. Japantown’s 35th annual celebration of the Bay Area’s Asian and Pacific Islander communities continues this year with educational booths and programs, local musicians and entertainers, exhibits, and artisans.

AUG 22–24

Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival Golden Gate Park; www.outsidelands.com. View Web site for times and price. Don’t miss the inaugural multifaceted festival of top-notch music, including Tom Petty, Jack Johnson, Manu Chao, Widespread Panic, Wilco, and Primus.

AUG 25–SEPT 1

Burning Man Black Rock City, NV; www.burningman.com. $295. Celebrate the theme "American Dream" at this weeklong participatory campout that started in the Bay Area. No tickets will be sold at the gate this year.

AUG 29–SEPT 1

Sausalito Art Festival 2400 Bridgeway, Sausalito; (415) 331-3757, www.sausalitoartfestival.org. Various times, $10. Spend Labor Day weekend enjoying the best local, national, and international artists as they display paintings, sculpture, ceramics, and more in this seaside village.

AUG 30–31

Millbrae Art and Wine Festival Broadway between Victoria and Meadow Glen, Millbrae; (650) 697-7324, www.miramarevents.com. 10am-5pm, free. The "Big Easy" comes to Millbrae for this huge Mardi Gras–style celebration featuring R&B, rock ‘n’ roll, jazz, and soul music, as well as arts and crafts, food and beverages, live performance, and activities for kids.

AUG 30–SEPT 1

Art and Soul Festival Various venues, Oakl; (510) 444-CITY, www.artandsouloakland.com. 11am-6pm, $5-$10. Enjoy three days of culturally diverse music, food, and art at the eighth annual Comcast Art and Soul Festival, which features a Family Fun Zone and an expo highlighting local food and wine producers.

SEPT 1–5

San Francisco Shakespeare Festival Various Bay Area locations; www.sfshakes.org. This nonprofit organization presents free Shakespeare in the Park, brings performances to schools, hosts theater camps, and more.

SEPT 6–7

Mountain View Art and Wine Festival Castro between El Camino Real and Evelyn, Mountain View; (650) 968-8378, www.miramarevents.com. 10am-6pm, free. Known as one of America’s finest art festivals, more than 200,000 arts lovers gather in Silicon Valley’s epicenter for this vibrant celebration featuring art, music, and a Kids’ Park.

SEPT 20–21

Treasure Island Music Festival Treasure Island; treasureislandfestival.com. The second year of this two-day celebration, organized by the creators of Noise Pop, promises an impressive selection of indie, rock, and hip-hop artists.

SEPT 28

Folsom Street Fair Folsom Street; www.folsomstreetfair.com. Eight days of Leather Pride Week finishes up with the 25th anniversary of this famous and fun fair.

Listings compiled by Molly Freedenberg.

CC Riders

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LIT When filmmaker Bruce Baillie founded Canyon Cinema in the early 1960s, it was a backyard bohemia to show artisanal films and drink wine with neighbors. But it quickly took root as a cooperative serving the needs of a movement of underground filmmakers. In scholar Scott MacDonald’s lovingly detailed history, Canyon Cinema: The Life and Times of an Independent Film Distributor (University of California Press, 480 pages, $29.95), Baillie’s early shambling is halcyon past, a sweet moment of spontaneous invention that then, rather surprisingly, begot a sustainable model for communal eclecticism.

Canyon wasn’t the only game in town — indeed, MacDonald describes the New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative, which preceded Canyon, as "a single instance of an idea whose time had come." But the organization’s underlying West Coast flavor, open channels of communication, and relatively clean distribution record put it at the center of an unwieldy film culture.

Drawing from a wealth of primary materials, MacDonald has woven a compelling narrative of American avant-garde cinema. One hardly needs to be aware of obscure corners of the underground to appreciate the book’s lively mix of voices. MacDonald doles out generous segments of Cinemanews, Canyon’s in-house clearinghouse for letters, critiques, advice, poems, recipes, and — in later years — extended interviews with the anointed giants of the avant-garde.

Among Canyon Cinema‘s five historical "portfolios," we get a full panorama of Canyon’s burning personalities: Baillie’s Zen road correspondences (describing pies that contain grapes and flowers); John Lennon’s zonked fan letter to Bruce Conner; Conner’s fierce riposte to Jonas Mekas’ NY Cinematheque; Saul Landau’s exposé of police pressure on a local Jean Genet screening; a photograph of the board of directors forming a naked pyramid; Stan Brakhage holding forth on etymologies; Robert Pike’s thoughtful report on how programming avant-garde cinema in peep houses could be a profitable venture; a tender letter from Will Hindle worrying over teaching filmmaking in art institutes; George Kuchar comics; and last, a precious line from Commodore Sloat: "Maybe more bits of film history next letter: Hollis Frampton and my junior high astronomy book (which he won’t admit he has and has refused to return)."

Canyon Cinema is wonderful in its particulars. It’s a pleasure to explore the depths of an organization that was emblematic of the counterculture without being beholden to it. Of course, being located in San Francisco and Sausalito, it had a pretty good view. Canyon keeper and former Pacific Film Archive programmer Edith Kramer recalls of the 1967-69 heyday that "The East Coast people were coming out; everybody wanted to come out — for the right reasons and the wrong reasons." Already in 1968, Robert Nelson writes of "the ever-growing dirge of psychedelica that in three years has gone from far-out to ad nauseam." Things dry up a bit with the intellectualization of the ’70s, though there are passionate, nothing-for-granted debates over the currents of the co-op’s milieu.

One suspects this overarching prudence is because, as filmmakers and co-op members, these people were intimately familiar with the economics of personal expression. Canyon is a romantic, idealistic group, but also a utilitarian one. Despite frequent brushes with insolvency, the amazing fact remains: "During the past 40 years, Canyon has evolved into the most dependable distributor of alternative cinema in the United States, and it has done so without betraying the fundamental principles on which it was founded."

Neo Geo trio

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› johnny@sfbg.com

"Bay Area Now" roundups have come and gone since Glen Helfand coined the term "the Mission School" in an influential 2002 Guardian cover piece (See "The Mission school," 04/07/02). Exactly six years later, the "heartfelt, handmade" traits Helfand described still hang heavy over or range freely through local art aesthetics, even if a few core creative forces from the loose movement — Alicia McCarthy, especially — didn’t cash in on the cachet of a higher profile. But April is always a month for growth: this year it brings a trio of shows by San Francisco (or SF-to-NYC) artists who’ve moved through or around Mission School color and figuration, forging a new direction and forming a new pattern. Call it 21st-century Neo Geo, though the tag might not apply to what these artists will be doing 12 months from today.

A playful approach to geometric shape is at the core of distinct traits shared by Todd Bura’s, Ruth Laskey’s, and Will Yackulic’s new shows. Dozens of triangles form formidable spheres in "A Prompt and Present Cure," Yackulic’s collection of 10 works on paper at Gregory Lind Gallery. These spheres have been likened to geodesic domes, disco globes, and IBM Selectric typewriter balls. I’d throw in mentions of Asteroids and the orb from Phantasm (1979) for good measure, though such 1980s pop cult references are no longer as near the forefront of Yackulic’s visuals as when he offered a twist on the phrase cubist via images that suggested the video game Q-Bert gone existentially lonely. Yackulic’s new work is a breakthrough, due to sheer inventiveness: in all the show’s pieces, he paints with a typewriter.

Throughout most of "A Prompt & Perfect Cure," Yackulic uses endlessly repeated asterisk and period symbols to generate waves and horizons of visual energy, and sometimes even employs the typewriter to create the show’s signature orbs. Like op art, the resulting pieces lure one to press one’s face against the object itself, and they take on three-dimensionality when viewed as group formations from a distance. The potent, disconcerting humor of Yackulic’s show stems partly from his laconic use of text, a strategy that — along with his use of pre-electric typewriters — obliquely acknowledges his New York School poetic roots. But it stems primarily from his spheres, a gang of faceless main characters. Some are darker, some lighter, as if the viewer facing them is giving off varying degrees of glare. Yackulic also has a droll flair for timing, saving his bravura gesture for the tenth, last, and largest piece, where one orb joins another — a cause for celebration, or worry?

Some Time to Mend the Mind, the title of that duel-sphere finale, might apply in reverse to Todd Bura’s "Misfits" at Triple Base Gallery. Like Yackulic, Bura has an interest in geometrically-based architectural representations of mental states. But his penchant for arranging wooden right angles results in three-dimensional sculptural forms in addition to two-dimensional painterly ones. He also has a poetic sensibility, though his gambit of giving 14 pieces the title Untitled, followed by a small group of capital letters in parentheses, is cumulatively closer to language poetry, albeit language poetry overcome with angst.

"Misfits" has a unique quality, as if Bura found fragments from his inner world, brought them to a room, then mounted or arranged them for people to see. (Its quietude and careful use of placement, akin to that of the Bay Area’s Bill Jenkins, also draws attention to the space around Bura’s works — even or especially if they are framed or on canvas.) While Bura might be devoted to the idea of a unfinished whole that is nonetheless greater than the sum of its parts, there are a few standout enigmas. Untitled (NIT) builds from his past explorations of — and emphasis on — paper’s materiality, while remaining a riddle: does it utilize the inset of a book’s cover, or is it a collage in which comics peak from the very edges of aging blank pages? (A small formation of pinpricks on the surface characterizes Bura’s varied minimalism.) Perhaps indebted to Richard Tuttle, the much larger oil painting Untitled (ETRI) layers light over darkness. (Or does it cover darkness with light? Regardless, Bura plays the recurrent binary both ways.) The latter suggests a buried cross or intersection.

Ruth Laskey’s approach to geometric form is based upon intersections, though her presentation, at least at first glance, trades Bura’s evocative, open-ended symbolism for a plain approach that recognizes that literal meaning is many-faceted. As the saying goes, Laskey’s "7 Weavings," at Ratio 3, is what it is: seven tapestries from her ongoing "Twill" series, where the structures or perhaps strictures of the loom and the diagonals of twill shape help form diamonds, triangles, pyramids, and crosses of color. Like Yackulic, Laskey’s process involves extreme repetition that yields varying waves of visual energy — albeit megaminimal, muted waves that might require squinting. As Rachel Churner notes in a recent Artforum essay, Laskey’s tapestries "are not fields for projection, but rather instances of the figure being imbedded in the ground itself."

One of the rich literal pleasures of Laskey’s tapestries is their deployment of specific reds, blues, yellows, and greens, which is less antic but just as imaginative as the peak Mission School–era in terms of drawing from Josef Albers’s color theories. At times, new hues emerge from the intersection of two individual colors that Laskey has first created by blending dyes and then painting the thread that she weaves through cloth. There’s an inscrutable quality to "7 Weavings" that echoes that of Bura’s and Yackulic’s shows: the colorful cloth shapes Laskey forms might as well be flags for countries in a world a bit more observant, and less brutish, than our own.

MISFITS: NEW WORK BY TODD BURA

Through May 4; Thurs.–Sun., noon–5 p.m.

Triple Base

3041 24th St., SF

(415) 643-3943

www.basebasebase.com

RUTH LASKEY: 7 WEAVINGS

Through April 26; Wed.–Sat., 11 a.m.–6 p.m.

Ratio 3

1447 Stevenson, SF

(415) 821-3371

www.ratio3.org

WILL YACKULIC: A PROMPT & PERFECT CURE

Through May 17; Tues.–Sat., 10:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m.

Gregory Lind Gallery

49 Geary, Fifth Floor, SF

(415) 296-9661

www.gregorylindgallery.com

Where’s Otto?

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ISBN REAL Graphic novels, obviously, aren’t just movies with a lot of missing frames. In the hands of artists like David B. or Craig Thompson, the elastic potential of their subjects, and of the panels that hold them, is realized in a manner entirely at odds with the medium of film.

From the perspective of screenwriters, however — particularly ones beaten repeatedly over the head with the knotty stick of the studio system — that’s nothing that can’t be worked out over a cup of coffee. More and more frustrated writers and directors are reviving their dead film and television projects in the form of comics and graphic novels, either as a last, affordable option or as a way of seeing an original vision make it through the production process intact. Joss Whedon could follow his and not the WB’s muse with the illustrated-only eighth season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and certainly no one was knocking down Richard Kelly’s door to film the six-part prequel to Southland Tales.

Alex Cox, writer and director of the 1984 cult classic Repo Man, also has seen the light. His sequel to that film, Waldo’s Hawaiian Holiday (Gestalt Publishing, 164 pages, $19.95), is finally coming out, after more than a decade in the drawer, as a graphic novel. The script, written for the screen in the mid-1990s, was presented unsuccessfully to Universal and then later was the source material for an unfinished independent venture. So Cox posted the screenplay on his Web site, as well as dozens of others he has written or cowritten, with the open offer of a yearlong license to anyone interested in making a film.

Comics artist Chris Bones responded with a graphic novel proposal. The finished version, with artistic contributions by Justin Randall, is a richly drawn and smartly assembled festival of scuzz.

Waldo, as one might expect, answers the questions Repo Man raised with equivocation and deferment, and adds a couple of revelations that are quite cool if I understand them right.

You’ll recall that Repo Man left our hero, Otto, as he was shooting off into space in a glowing green 1964 Chevy Malibu. What we are kinda informed of right off the bat in the sequel is that Otto, now calling himself Waldo (presumably in a legal sidestep), has come back from a 10-year stint on Mars, maybe, though he thinks he’s only been gone for the night. Expecting to find his numskull parents where he left them on the couch, he shows up at their door only to discover he owes rent to a couple of bachelors (one "confirmed") now living there in meticulously rendered squalor.

Waldo more or less shrugs off his situation and proceeds to hop from one doomed job to the next, each of them overseen by the same mysterious man, though under different names. All the while, he abuses the trusting nature of the Russian Shopping Network and makes several attempts to use free tickets to Hawaii he earned by sitting through a real estate pitch. (I’m still not sure what was glowing in the Malibu’s trunk in Cox’s movie.)

Of course, there are more aliens and whatnot, but the strangest thing is Otto-now-Waldo’s change in temperament. The edgy, snotty Emilio Estevez of Repo Man is nowhere in sight. Waldo is a gentle, courteous kind of punk who says things like, "I’ll just redouble my efforts … buy a printer, get these job applications out, find another job ASAP." Waldo must have learned the word "redouble" in space, where he also picked up a considered cheeriness that could have been mistaken for maturity if it weren’t so apparent that Cox is up to something.

It helps to know that Cox is not one to shy away from the polemical, particularly at the expense of economic imperialism. The introduction to X-Films: True Confessions of a Radical Filmmaker (Soft Skull Press, 304 pages, $17.95), an upcoming book about his experiences as a filmmaker, is only a few angry pen strokes shy of a screed, and his 1987 film Walker lampooned — not very elegantly, really — the 19th-century American mercenary William Walker’s overthrow of the Nicaraguan government. Amongst Cox’s movies, Three Businessmen, a 1998 love child of the gospel according to Luke and Luis Buñuel’s The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972), presents the closest echoes of Waldo. Its characters share Waldo’s aimless, profligate compliance with the dictates of modern capitalism.

And that’s really what Waldo’s Hawaiian Adventure is about, probably.

Would you finance that movie?

SFIAAFF: Multiculti cock-meat sandwich

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› superego@sfbg.com

When we last left crazy-ass Kumar (Kal Penn) and his more straitlaced college pal Harold (John Cho), at the end of the 2005 stoner epic Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, they’d just victoriously satiated their munchies with enough sliders to block a rhino’s colon. That movie was a classic bong-wielding buddy road-trip flick — Question: How long does it take two potheads to get to a drive-through? Answer: Neil Patrick Harris on ecstasy — that was improbably hailed by serious critics as a multicultural breakthrough. Kumar is Indian American and Harold Asian American, a combination of lead ethnicities that was new to the American mainstream. And even though lineage figures little in the characters’ daily realities, Harold’s and Kumar’s difference from the cartoonish honky inbreds and skinheads (and candid others of color) that exist beyond their postmillennial collegiate bubble — and who often mistake them for Arabs — fuels the plot. Dude, where’s my kufi?

White Castle screenwriters Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg giddily foreground the first movie’s subtext in their follow-up (which they also directed), Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantánamo Bay, a special presentation at this year’s San Francisco Asian American Film Festival. Mistaken for terrorists when they’re caught with a "smokeless bong" on a flight to Amsterdam, weed capital of the world, our hapless heroes ("North Korea and al-Qaeda working together," gloats their bumbling FBI nemesis) are imprisoned in Gitmo. After being presented with a jailer’s massive "cock-meat sandwich" — "I’ve never sucked dick before," quips Kumar. "I bet it sucks dick!" — and submitted to various tortures, they eventually escape, crashing a "bottomless" hot tub party, impersonating Crockett and Tubbs from Miami Vice, and lighting up with George W. Bush himself. No shit.

I caught up with Hurwitz, Schlossberg, and actor Cho — a surprisingly intellectual type who studied English at UC Berkeley — as they prepared to promote the new movie at wacky comics convention WonderCon.

SFBG For Arab Americans like me, this movie is like a nightmare come true. People gasp whenever I stand up on an airplane, and 9 times out of 10 I’m the one who’s pulled over for "random" searches. I know that Indian Americans often experience similar treatment. But Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantánamo Bay seems revolutionary in that it expands that situation to include the feelings of Asian Americans, and it’s playing at the [SF International] Asian American Film Fest. Do you think Asian Americans relate?

JOHN CHO I would assume that every immigrant group has their own bag of individual problems. I don’t know if Asian Americans get hassled at the airport — maybe they do. Traveling with Kal on the publicity tour for the first film, I got to see firsthand how he was treated — and that’s real; he was patted down all the time. We were traveling together, and he’s the one that got pulled aside. I’m really happy that the film’s playing at the festival. I feared that Asian Americans wouldn’t accept this movie — the subject matter isn’t discussed much in the community — but it seems that the programmers feel they will.

SFBG Not to state the obvious here, but Jon and Hayden, you’re a couple of white guys. I’m wondering if these scripts come from your own experiences, or if you do a lot of research?

JON HURWITZ We’re white guys, but we’re Jews. So we’re already a minority subset, but I don’t really know if that plays into it. We’ve always had a large group of multicultural friends and been able to observe and have conversations with people with different points of view. As a writer and director you’re just hoping to put something out there that’s new. Something with Asian American and Indian American leads was something that hadn’t been done in the way that we were doing it. We felt that we had enough perspective as huge fans of comedy to pull it off.

HAYDEN SCHLOSSBERG We didn’t set out to make this big statement, although I have to say when we looked at the first one when it was done, we said, "Wow, this is so much better than we thought." It went way beyond the fart jokes, weed humor, and nudity that we love to put up on-screen. But it’s really just a classic comedy trope. Two guys, a baggie, a voyage. . . . It was the right time to have someone finally throw ethnicity into the mix. The script took off from there. The only question now is, where else can we take this? Harold and Kumar Fly the Space Shuttle?

JC And the focus is always on being funny first. The characters’ races are almost secondary. I find that so refreshing because a lot of Asian American cinema is just about being Asian American, how hard it is. Not to denigrate anyone’s work, but those movies get really repetitive, and fewer people want to see them.

SFBG Speaking of space — John, you’re about to be mobbed at WonderCon because you’ve accepted the role of Mr. Sulu in the upcoming Star Trek film. Following in actor George Takei’s footsteps must feel huge.

JC I’m delighted. As a kid it meant so much to me to see an Asian American on television and say, "Whoa! He’s not wearing a cone-shaped hat or teaching kung fu!" It was very important, a legacy that I desperately wanted to be a part of, and something I feel my work on the Harold and Kumar movies pays tribute to. Now Asian Americans can be stoners too.

HAROLD AND KUMAR ESCAPE FROM GUANTANAMO BAY

Sat/15, 9:15 p.m.

Castro Theatre

429 Castro, SF

(415) 621-6120

>> Complete Asian American Film Fest coverage

The return of the return of the DJ

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Born from the ashes of New York hip-hop DJ supergroup the X-ecutioners and from a frustration with the current state of turntablism, Ill Insanity are on a mission to return the art of the DJ to its former glory.

Composed of ex-X-ecutioners Rob Swift and Total Eclipse along with younger inductee DJ Precision, the turntable trio have just released their progressive scratch music debut, Ground Xero, on Fat Beats, which includes among its turntable guests fellow former X man Roc Raida, plus Excess and DJ Q-Bert.

Ill Insanity’s ongoing national tour, which stops in San Francisco on Feb. 21 for a performance and a workshop at Guitar Center and a party-rocking throw-down at Levende Lounge, seems less like a jaunt and more like a crusade to its three impassioned turntable ambassadors.

"This is the beginning of us taking the art form back," Rob Swift said, sounding something like one of the Marvel Comics heroes from which his original group, the X-Men, took their name. "And I feel that we are putting it on our shoulders to show people that this is real creative music. And we are educating people about this art form because it seems to me like no one else is really doing it right now."

Speaking a few weeks ago at Swift’s Queens, NY, apartment, which also serves as the group’s recording studio and rehearsal space, the trio had gathered to mourn what they see as a creative lull in the art of turntablism and to prepare for its pending renaissance.

"Basically we were all bored with music, and that’s what brought us together," Total Eclipse said. All three agreed that for several years now DJ battles, traditionally the barometers gauging the advancement of the turntable art form, have been in a decline. "There has been a really poor attendance at DJ battles for the past five years, especially here in the US," said Precision, the 2007 USA DMC Finals DJ battle champion. "And it’s because the art form has slipped so much."

Part of this artistic stagnation, they believe, is because DJs of recent years have been satisfied with merely imitating instead of trying to innovate. "The younger DJs are too caught up with looking up to what came before, so they stop practicing when they master that trick that QBert or whoever has already done years ago," Swift said, "and consequently now everyone is sounding the same."

Precision jumped in: "And a lot of them don’t even know the complete history of the DJ, like that Steve Dee created beat juggling."

In performance Ill Insanity’s setup includes five turntables, three mixers, and computers to operate the Serato program. "What we are trying to do is to use the new technology without dumbing down the art," Swift insisted. "We have much respect for what came before us, still applying the skills of Grandmaster Flash, party-rocking, and so on…. But we’re saying, ‘Let’s do a 2008 version of what’s already been done in the past.’<0x2009>"

And as for the future of turntablism? Swift is optimistic: "There could be a kind of DJ revolution again. I predict that in a couple of years things will go back to the way they were." (Billy Jam)

ILL INSANITY

Feb. 21, 6 p.m. performance and workshop, free

Guitar Center

1645 Van Ness, SF

(415) 409-0350

www.guitarcenter.com

Oops! They did it again

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› kimberly@sfbg.com

The best comedians always shear close to the bone with their truths, but believe it or not, few are necessarily a gut bust in conversation. Why is this a surprise? After all, the comic is on the interviewer’s mic, not on the clock and on script. Yet W. Kamau Bell plays against type and comes with not only the insights you wish you had spewed first but also the wit, centered on the issues of race that he’s been grappling with since childhood.

The rising incidence of racist cracks that reveal the persistent fissures in a country seemingly disinterested in identity politics — and those emerging from the 34-year-old San Franciscan’s own milieu, the alternative comedy scene — has led Bell to sharpen his attack with The W. Kamau Bell Curve, which focuses on the ugly slurs spilling from Sarah Silverman, Michael Richards, and Rosie O’Donnell, as well as other, unexpected quarters. And the nastiness keeps coming — cue Golf Channel commentator Kelly Tilghman’s recent remark that young players who want to defeat Tiger Woods would need to "lynch him in a back alley" — and spurring Bell to continue updating the show he first performed in October 2007.

According to Bell, racism is on the comeback trail with a crucial difference: "This time it’s coming from liberals and creeping in through pop culture in some weird way. I call it political correctness acid reflux. People are just burping out racism." The comic rose to the occasion to make Bell Curve after reading a story about Southern blackface comic Shirley Q. Liquor in Rolling Stone. He was outraged by the fact that the article even questioned whether the Liquor act was racist, much as he was troubled by the things coming from his own field. "It’s, like, wait a minute — this is my industry, and again, it’s not coming from redneck comics or blue-collar comics. It’s coming from alternative comics who are supposed to be liberal comics.

"It’s, like, ‘Look, you know I like black people, so it’s allegedly OK for me to use a joke with the word nigger in it’ — even though there’s no black people in the audience and you don’t have any black friends!" he continues. "Like I say in the show, the most racist things that have ever happened to me have come from people who were friends of mine. I had a friend who once said to me, ‘Kamau, I like you. You’re black, but you’re not black black.’ What does that mean? I’m black but you still have your wallet?"

The only child of author Janet Cheatham Bell, Bell is all too familiar with that kind of chum, having moved from private to public to private school throughout his life. "A lot of times I would be the only black person in school," recalls Bell, who now teaches solo performance at the Shelton Theater and frequently opens for Dave Chappelle. "And when you’re that person, either they forget you’re black, so things happen and you’re, like, [in a meek squeak] ‘Wait a minute — don’t forget I’m black, everybody,’ or because you’re black they unburden their, you know, ‘Kamau, lemme tell you something about black people I’ve never been able to tell any other black person.’ Oooh, please don’t!"

Be glad, however, that Bell is telling us about it all.

THE W. KAMAU BELL CURVE

Thurs/24, 8 p.m., $20 (bring a friend of a different race, who gets in free)

Shelton Theater

533 Sutter, SF

(415) 433-1227

www.sheltontheater.com

Year in Film: Cartooning the war

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› kimberly@sfbg.com

Oh! What a lovely war! At least that’s the overall tone of the most popular movies reflecting our current conflict, surge, or however we’re marketing it this week as it conveniently combusts so far from all of the happy $3.50 a gallon gas-guzzling Best Buy shoppers, out of ear- and eyeshot on the other side of the world.

Moviegoers have been avoiding Iraq’s realities in droves — this much the producers of The Kingdom, Lions for Lambs, In the Valley of Elah, Redacted, and others can attest. This year Americans liked their war with a good dose of comic book fantasy and clearly fictitious spectacle, their tongues teasing the CGI-enhanced teat, preferably attached to the too perfectly uniform six-pack abs on one of those hunka-hunka-burning-Spartan tough-love monkeys in 300.

While Grindhouse‘s bio-experiment rogue troops were banished to fiscal limbo, Hollywood blockbusters like 300, Transformers, and even Beowulf — stemming from comics, toys, and cartoons and steeped in the stuff of a distended childhood — turned out to be the only way Americans would swallow warfare. Fusing digital animation and live actors to produce spectacles that would have made Cecil B. DeMille reach for his next merchandising tie-in, those hit movies tacitly acknowledged the war we’re in and offered candy-colored, action-packed escapism for the inner fanboy and fangirl. Six years into the war on terror, we can’t feel good about imminent outright victory; hell, even the most fervent right-winger realizes, in his or her reptilian back brain and in the dark of the multiplex, that the real-life shoot-’em-ups are depressingly, futilely, infuriatingly misguided. But we still want our war to be a great ride — despite the fact that ambiguous reality finds a way of inserting itself into the metal-crushing, knuckle-skating mise-en-scène.

Picking up the air of suicide-mission doom suffusing 2006 Oscar contender Letters from Iwo Jima, 300 started the year with blood-spattered, heroic fatalism. Like Beowulf and even the tongue-in-cheek Transformers, the Zack Snyder–directed epic, based on a graphic novel by draconian edge maven Frank Miller (Batman: The Dark Knight Returns), self-consciously frames its narrative — and its uses as propaganda — from the start by revealing the bard or narrator telling the tale. Here the story is recounted for the distinct purpose of leading the Spartans into battle against the Persians.

Miller may have penned the original comic in the late ’90s, yet it’s hard to read 300 as anything more than emotionally skilled, cinematically compelling, and blatantly racist support for a US invasion of the country most associated with ancient Persia, Iran — little surprise that Javad Shangari, a cultural adviser to Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, described 300 as being "part of a comprehensive U.S. psychological warfare aimed at Iranian culture," according to Variety. Certainly, stereotyping is nothing new in the realm of the sword and the sandal, and 300‘s Spartan heroes are pale faced and peppered with accents from throughout the United Kingdom (though not the evilly aristocratic upper-crusty tones pushed by Romans of yore) — a case for multiculturalism and inclusiveness they ain’t.

The film, however, firmly positions these "free" people versus the dark-skinned "slaves" of the Orient, holding their noble defenses against the dusky masses. According to 300, it may be futile to battle the hordes of the Persian empire — tellingly, an imperial array of warriors from Asia and the Middle East that resembles a mindlessly blood-thirsty "It’s a Small World After All" — but dying a good death and fighting for one’s supposed freedom is the right and noble path to take. Freedom is a word that’s bandied about repeatedly here and in Transformers, but it’s obviously the privilege of a select Darwinian few.

Snyder resorts to the ignorant and offensive tact of visually equating the forces of evil and darkness with the dark skins of the Persian forces. And the empire’s pierced, proud, and power-hungry leader Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) — painted as perverse and ensconced in a polymorphic harem — comes off as a fetishy freak next to the Spartans’ King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) and Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey), who are fiercely straight (judging from Leonidas’s odd and likely historically inaccurate disparagement of bookish Athenian "boy lovers") and, by implication, straight shooting and Spartan-soldier tough. Which isn’t to say there aren’t vulnerabilities in the Spartan armor: Leonidas and his too meticulously CGI-embellished troops live and die by standards that doom the weak and disabled, and when a rejected Spartan hunchback is denied entry into their ranks, the scene is set for their final destruction, one that rhymes with that of Toshiro Mifune’s Japanese Macbeth in Akira Kurosawa’s 1957 Throne of Blood.

Able-bodied elite fighting forces take an even more artificial turn with Transformers. Though its production was aided and abetted by the US armed forces, preening military hardware in displays that rival those of the alien robots, the movie nonetheless exhibits a conflicted relationship with warfare that reflects the mood in the country. At moments its scenes precisely echo the visuals of those ubiquitous "Army of One" recruitment commercials; at others it reveals a wariness of its very exhibitionism. It’s no marvel that director Michael Bay (Pearl Harbor, Armageddon) can ape those ads as adeptly as a ‘bot can mimic a sports car: in early 2006 he wrote on the MichaelBay.com forum, "The military looks like it is going to support the film, which is a big deal in giving the movie scope and credibility. The Pentagon has always been great with me because I make our military look good."

In keeping with that two-way support system and setting Transformers clearly in the Persian Gulf, Bay applies a veneer of salable heroism to his scenes of military machinery in action by battling the nefarious Decepticons and hastily dabs a quick layer of humanism on an identifiable, multilingual, and diverse clutch of everyday grunts. Jon Voigt’s defense secretary makes his share of wrong moves, but he’s no Donald Rumsfeld. This is likely Bay’s most successful film, thanks to the self-mocking humor of the script, which extols the bond between "man and machine." After all, he knows and we know Transformers is all about toys — our hardware versus their hardware — and what makes them go, a.k.a. energy — whether it’s the magical, Energizer Bunny envy-inducing all-spark cube or that oil the film’s military is battling over when it isn’t strafing robots.

The question is, who is to be trusted? Intriguingly, the Decepticons hide in plain sight on Earth by assuming the guise of US Air Force jets, Army tanks, and police cars, while the good Autobots change into civilian big wheelers, trucks, and cars. If a car makes a man, the machines in Transformers are giving out conflicted signals. *

KIMBERLY CHUN’S POP TOPS

<\!s>Most valuable hair: Javier Bardem’s do in No Country for Old Men (Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, US)

<\!s>Most versatile player: Christian Bale in I’m Not There (Todd Haynes, US), Rescue Dawn (Werner Herzog, US), and 3:10 to Yuma (James Mangold, US)

<\!s>Thug life: Eastern Promises (David Cronenberg, UK/Canada/US) and American Gangster (Ridley Scott, US)

<\!s>Horrific kicks and sick twists: Grindhouse (Robert Rodriguez, Quentin Tarantino, et al., US), Black Sheep (Jonathan King, New Zealand), Hot Fuzz (Edgar Wright, UK/France), The Host (Bong Joon-ho, South Korea), Sicko (Michael Moore, US),

<\!s>Geek love: Rocket Science (Jeffrey Blitz, US), Eagle vs. Shark (Taika Waititi, New Zealand), Superbad (Greg Mottola, US)

<\!s>Little love: Control (Anton Corbijn, UK/US/Australia/Japan), Broken English (Zoe Cassavetes, US)