Arts & Culture

Arts & Culture

Right about now

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Right about now

THEATER It’s a rare thing, really too rare, to find an audience eagerly erupting into political discussions between acts of a play. But that’s what Little Brother inspires, and in an unaffected way, without pretension or unwelcome goading. It’s too cool, confident, and contemporary for that. After all, the night I saw the play — adapted by director Josh Costello from the 2008 teen novel by Canadian sci-fi author and activist (and co-editor of Boing Boing) Cory Doctorow — was just one night after Occupy Oakland tried to convert a vacant building into a much-needed community center for the needier of the 99 percent. That didn’t go too well. The street clashes with shock-trooping Oakland police forces led to something like 400 arrests before the night was over.

That latest incident, in an ongoing resistance to systemic and overweening injustice, resonated effortlessly with the proceedings onstage at Custom Made Theatre. There, on an intimate thrust stage, three sharp young actors (Daniel Petzold, Marissa Keltie, and Cory Censoprano) smoothly embodied a fleet series of characters in a story pitting a group of Mission District high school teens against the Department of Homeland Security. The battle takes place in the aftermath of a terrorist attack that levels the Bay Bridge and unleashes an all-out totalitarian crackdown by the federal government. It’s a dramatic, humorous, irreverent, and urgent story all at once. While far from a perfect play (dramatic consistency and verisimilitude are stretched a bit thin by the end), Little Brother is probably the most exciting thing on stage just now, alive like few other productions in its response to the present moment.

Behind the dynamic trio onstage stands a patchwork wall-projection screen (courtesy of set designer Sarah Phykitt, video designer Pauline Luppert, and video engineer Darl Andrew Packard) papered over with pages seemingly torn from radical histories and revolutionary tracts (it was easy enough to make out Emma Goldman’s visage among the repeated black-and-white pages), and periodically set aglow with live video feed, scene-setting photo montage, text messages, and hacker scrawl across computer and videogame screens.

While DHS is synonymous with Big Brother throughout, and for good reason — the agency is at the forefront of a total invasion of American private life and the Gitmo’ing of American teens — it can also be understood at times as a synonym for the state at large, from high school vice principals on up. As main character Marcus Yallow (a bright, engaging Petzold) explains in an early address to the audience, he’s a senior at a San Francisco public high school. Even before the Bay Bridge attack, “that makes me one of the most surveilled people in the world.”

Before being transformed into an all-out revolutionary by his violent, extra-constitutional encounter with DHS, Marcus and buddy Darryl (a sharp and versatile Censoprano) are fun-loving rebel hackers and gamers often on the receiving end of unwanted attention by the usual authorities. In an early scene, an inept school administrator interrogates Marcus, believing him, correctly, to be the hacker menace “w1n5t0n” (though, hilariously, pronouncing the handle literally instead of the intended “Winston”). Marcus outwits him, and the administrator loses his grip on the free-roaming online hooligan who, among other things, has handily derailed the “snitch tags” the school plants in library books to track the students.

At this point, Little Brother bears a striking similarity to The North Pool, Rajiv Joseph’s psychological two-hander set in a vice principal’s office after school, which had its premiere last year at Palo Alto’s TheatreWorks. But Joseph’s battle, while resonating with a larger political and historical context, ultimately remains more personal than political. Little Brother moves via the next terrorist attack into the realm of all-out political crisis, as short a distance from here as that may seem, and in this way resists reducing its themes to merely personal terms, highlights a tension with the personal throughout — even as it cleaves to a familiar coming-of-age narrative involving Marcus and girlfriend-coconspirator Ange (played compellingly by Keltie).

Costello shrewdly emphasizes this tension in his staging, which begins with the three principal characters recreating the story for a video cam so that it can be posted online. As Marcus begins a first-person account, his cohorts interrupt him almost immediately. “Dude, you can’t make it all about you,” says Darryl, with good-humored conviction. “It’s too big.”

 

LITTLE BROTHER

Through Feb. 25

Thurs.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 7 p.m., $25-$32

Gough Street Playhouse

1620 Gough, SF

www.custommade.org

Twisted misters

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Twisted misters

cheryl@sfbg.com

FILM This year’s San Francisco Independent Film Festival kicks off with a film that knows exactly what time it is: 4:44 Last Day on Earth.

Abel Ferrara’s latest imagines what the end of the world might be like for a volatile Lower East Side couple — he’s an ex-junkie (Ferrara favorite Willem Dafoe), she’s a young painter (Shanyn Leigh, Ferrara’s real-life companion). The film’s title refers to the predicted instant that an environmental catastrophe will completely dissolve the ozone layer, but 4:44 is mostly set indoors, specifically within the headspace of Dafoe’s character. It’s a gritty film that veers between self-indulgence and stuff that honestly seems pretty practical (sure, there’s a lot of Skyping, but if the world were ending, wouldn’t you?); as far as inward-looking disaster movies go, anyone planning an apocalypse film festival could double-bill 4:44 nicely with 2011’s Melancholia.

IndieFest is not an apocalypse film festival, per se. You could choose to have a jolly old time; there’s a power ballad sing-along, and even a flick called I Like You. But the selections for sick puppies are truly, truly outstanding this year. Personally, I recommend going as dark as you can possibly stand.

Start your journey with Michael R. Roskam’s Bullhead, a Belgian import that just scored a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nomination. The five-second description of this film, which is about a cattle farmer who injects both his livestock and his own body with illegal hormones, doesn’t do it justice. Who knew there was such a thing, for instance, as a “hormone mafia underworld”? While some of Bullhead‘s nuances, which occasionally pivot on culture-clash moments specific to its Belgium setting, will inevitably be lost on American viewers, the most important parts of the movie come through loud and clear, and you won’t soon forget them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fvLVNlMvus

Also memorable is Snowtown, another standout Australian crime film on the heels of Animal Kingdom (2010). While Snowtown — whose vérité shooting style recalls Andrea Arnold’s films about desperate living amid Britain’s council estates — isn’t quite as exportable as Animal Kingdom, it is just as uncomfortably tense, and features a teenage protagonist struggling to survive amid close-to-home evil. It’s based on the real-life case of Australia’s worst serial killer, and follows the gruesome facts quite closely. The film has a lot of characters that come and go without much explanation or introduction, which starts to seem deliberate after awhile. Fortunately, the core cast is magnetic. Remember 2005’s Wolf Creek? Snowtown is just as intense.

Still have a lust for blood? Of course you do. British director Ben Wheatley made a splash with 2009 gangster drama Down Terrace; he’s back with much buzz surrounding Kill List, with a review in the IndieFest catalog citing it as “the number one horror film of the year.” I’d hate to hand out that accolade so early in 2012, but this hired-killer-down-the-rabbit-hole tale is indeed worth considering.

Of course, there’s more to horror than guts and torture; if you need a reminder as to why, check out the festival’s pair of home-is-where-the-creepy-is films from Austria, Beside My Brother and Still Life. Beside My Brother‘s set-up — an emotionally disturbed father pretends his twin sons are the same person, and forces them to live as such, a practice they maintain into adulthood — is more promising than its payoff. Remember how in Dead Ringers (1988), the doppelganger bros were gynecologists? Here, they’re painters, and pretty bland ones at that. Far more harrowing is Still Life, about the irrevocable damage wrought by a father’s single, horrible revelation. First-time feature director Sebastian Meise manages to distill the complete crumbling of a seemingly normal-ish family into a slender, wrenching 77 minutes.

Speaking of harrowing, there’s nothing scarier in all of IndieFest than the early scenes of documentary Last Days Here, made by Don Argott and Demian Fenton (directors of 2009’s excellent The Art of the Steal). The film alights upon Bobby Liebling, dubbed the “godfather of doom” for his forty-plus year stint fronting legendary band Pentagram, as a fiftysomething crack addict living in his parents’ basement. Last Days Here is both heartfelt and gloves-off; it’s also blessed with having one of the most unbelievable comeback stories at its core (not a spoiler if you keep abreast of Bay Area concerts; Pentagram’s played here several times in recent years). It, like many of the films discussed here, has a distributor and will be coming around after IndieFest, but I implore you not to sleep on this one — even if you don’t love heavy metal, but especially if you do.

Less successful but no less intriguing is Atlanta oddity Snow On Tha Bluff, which is somewhere between an old-school ethnographic film — like, Robert Flaherty old — and self-aware product of the YouTube generation. The opening and closing scenes are obviously staged, as a drug dealer named Curtis Snow steals a video camera and decides he’ll make an autobiographical movie from the footage he collects. What’s between those bookends is what appears to be an authentic record of life in Snow’s crime-infested neighborhood, complete with drive-by shootings, home invasions, run-ins with the police, copious drug use, etc. Why any of the involved would allow their faces to be shown on camera while, say, firing a non-street legal weapon into a rival’s home is the film’s biggest mystery; its biggest accomplishment is obscuring the obvious lines of demarcation between what’s real and what’s not.

To end your IndieFest experience on a slightly uplifted note, you will have to die — or at least be cool with hanging out with the ghosts in Finisterrae, the first feature from Catalan artist Sergio Caballaro.

Expressing themselves via droll, post-production “dialogue” (in Russian, subtitled in English), the newly-deceased, sheet-wearing duo decides they would like to live again. A-journeying they go, following the wind and encountering an array of strange characters, including enough taxidermied animals to make Chuck Testa‘s head spin. Finisterrae starts slow but builds to glorious, gorgeously filmed and supremely weird heights. Hippies beware.

SAN FRANCISCO INDEPENDENT FILM FESTIVAL

Feb. 9-23, most films $11

Roxie Theater

3117 16th St., SF

www.sfindie.com

 

Eternal return

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Eternal return

arts@sfbg.com

FILM Gregory Markopoulos was born in Toledo, Ohio, but his Greek heritage lights the way in critical appraisals of his refined and elusive body of work. Many of the films featured in the Pacific Film Archive’s “Seconds of Eternity” series are imagined on the stage of Greek myth. After leaving New York in 1967 with his partner Robert Beavers, an outstanding filmmaker in his own right, Markopoulos drew still closer to his ancestral home. He died in 1992, but Beavers, who will be on hand at the PFA to shepherd the films, has preserved the work for the Temenos, a unique archive and biennial outdoor screening cycle located near Lyssaraia, Markopoulos’s father’s home. This June brings another such event.

Markopoulos’s films have themselves long achieved mythic stature. He was a colossal figure during the heroic phase of the American avant-garde and then left it behind. Dissatisfied with exhibition standards, he withdrew his prints from circulation (the Temenos screenings represents the idealistic rejoinder). Remarkably, he requested that critic P. Adams Sitney excise a full chapter on his works from Visionary Film, generally considered the central critical survey of the American avant-garde. So Markopoulos went to almost unthinkable lengths to maintain the primacy of his early films (he continued making new ones, as well). Any opportunity to watch these ravishing films close to home is unusual.

Markopoulos once remarked that “locations and beautiful faces have been the backbone of my work,” and one sees that to an archetypal degree in Psyche (1947), the first film of his Du Sang, de la volupté et de la mort trilogy, made when he was still a teenage student at USC living across the hall from Curtis Harrington. Inspired by a Pierre Louÿs novella, the film replaces spoken language with dynamic color and framing. We begin with a man and woman crossing each other on a leafy Angeleno street: a few steps further and they turn back to consider what they’ve just passed. All that follows might be transpire within this instant: a languid fantasia hatched within a fugitive moment of lost time. Markopoulos frames the couple in deep focus two-shots, grazing shoulders and lips and tumbling toward dreams.

An evident poverty of means only concentrates the film’s withdrawal into a private world of frustrated beauty (across town Kenneth Anger was fashioning his more explicitly Dionysian Fireworks). The dive into inexpressible desire reaches a peak when Ralph Vaughn Williams’ “Serenade” suddenly drops out and the image snaps to a silent interlude of natural splendor bordering on abstraction — sea grass gorgeously superimposed upon the sea. This image gives magnificent form to the phrase “out of the blue” and overflows the frame in such a way as to shake loose the film’s more studied visual effects.

Markopoulos would later articulate in written form (“Towards a New Narrative Form in Motion Pictures”) what he set out to accomplish beginning with Psyche: “The film maker gradually convinces the spectator not only to see and to hear, but to participate in what is being created on the screen, on both the narrative and introspective levels. The magnificent landscapes of emotions, with colors brighter than the film viewer has ever been concerned with, begin to exist. The transient impact of meetings, handshakes, kisses, and the hours apart from these contacts becomes revealed in all its astounding simplicity.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w59mrfKQRdQ

That “astounding simplicity” is readily apparent in A Christmas Carol (1940), a compressed bildungsroman evoking a richly embroidered fabric of memory with only a few spare images (mother setting the table, father looking up over his newspaper, figures dancing on a nearby rooftop). Twice a Man (1963) reveals the full extent of Markopoulos’ dream of a new narrative language. A psychologically fraught interpolation of the myth of Hippolytus and Phaedra (son seduced by mother and liberated from suicidal thoughts by a healer-artist), the film surfaces an internal state of emergency in a persistently emergent form.

Most remarkable is the densely interleaved editing by which Markopoulos folds multiple registers of time, color, and theme. Though often likened to other seminal works of the American avant-garde (especially Stan Brakhage’s Dog Star Man, 1961-64), Twice a Man‘s fractal form also recalls contemporaneous French films like Alain Resnais’s Muriel (1963) — though if anything Markopoulos’s cutting seems more evolved for its thoroughgoing commitment to simultaneity. Beginning with a ferry ride into blue New York, suggestive of any number of mythic crossings, there is an ever-sharpening concordance of different blocks of imagery. The protagonist’s central struggle to get out from under his mother and be reborn as his own person takes root in these syntactical somersaults. Indeed, this is where the modernist character of Markopoulos’s work shines through: a classical story embodied in the radical address of the senses. (You don’t need a neurologist to know that your brain gets a tune-up watching this film). Less successful is the cut-up spoken address that Phaedra delivers to her son, with which Markopoulos seems a little too assured of his genius. The haranguing pure speech dampens an otherwise brilliant film with a faintly misogynistic mist.

Though Markopoulos delved still deeper into myth with his Illiac Passion (1964-1967), he also gravitated towards more focused portraits of people and places in these years. San Francisco Cinematheque will screen Galaxie (1966), his anthology of New York people, in May. Meanwhile, the PFA sneaks in Ming Green (1966) before the epic Illiac Passion. The silent film gathers up images of the New York home Markopoulos was soon to leave as if for a bouquet. Edited in camera with great fluency, Ming Green revises the still life for cinema: the apartment’s objects sit in repose, vibrating with the articulation of color and residue of memory. Flourishing superimpositions put on a terrific show without abandoning the refined air of quietude. It’s unlikely that you’ll see a more exquisite short roll of film this year.

SECONDS OF ETERNITY: THE FILMS OF GREGORY J. MARKOPOULOS

Feb. 9-16, $5.50-$9.50

Pacific Film Archive

2575 Bancroft, Berk.

(510) 642-5249

bampfa.berkeley.edu

On the Cheap Listings

Andrew Lam
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WEDNESDAY 8

Aphrodesia Afterhours Valentine’s Day Conservatory of Flowers, Golden Gate Park, 100 John F. Kennedy, SF. (415) 831-2090, www.conservatoryofflowers.org. 6 p.m.-10 p.m., $10.

Chocolate is hands down the best part of Valentine’s Day. Join local chocolatier TCHO’s chief chocolate guru, Brad Kintzer, for his demonstration on how to transform beans into bliss. Afterwards, grab a love potion from the Cocktail Lab, frolic amongst the orchids, and enjoy a live performance by Le Quartet de Jazz. Remember to take a picture in the photobooth — a night dedicated to chocolate is a night to remember.

Love on Wheels dating game Public Works, 161 Erie, SF. (415) 932-0955, www.sfbike.org. 6 p.m., $5 for SF Bicycle Coalition members; $10 for non-members. The cutest people always seem to be railing past each other on their bikes. The SF Bicycle Coalition is going to sit all you guys down so you can date already. Lovebirds will quiz three potential dates (hidden from view) and go on a date provided by one of the sponsors. This annual tradition is a cute hoot.

THURSDAY 9

“Animal Attraction” NightLife aquarium gallery and sex talk California Academy of Sciences, 55 Music Concourse, SF. (415) 379-8000, www.calacademy.org. 6 p.m.-10 p.m., $12. Cal Academy’s weekly Thursday evening party, NightLife, is launching a new gallery for fish-lovers (and friends!) with a series of reproduction-themed talks. Various experts will be talking about mating strategies in the animal kingdom, penis bones of different species, and the sex life of Zodiac signs. Dr. Carol Queen from Good Vibrations will be sharing her knowledge about the science of orgasms. So let’s do like they do on the Discovery Channel.

“Cupid’s Back” sixth annual Valentine’s Day party Supperclub, 657 Harrison, SF. (415) 348-0900, cupidsback.kintera.org. 8 p.m.-midnight, $30-35. Gay charity impressario Mark Rhoades is back — like Cupid, you might say — with this popular shindig that brings together oodles of hot men. DJ Juanita More will fluff the crowd, and it all goes to help out our invaluable GLBT Historical Society. Shoot your arrow and it goes real high …

“Go Deep” lube wrestling for the boys El Rio, 3158 Mission, SF. (415) 379-8000, www.calacademy.org/events/nightlife. 8 p.m.-11:30 p.m., $10–<\d>$15. What says romance more than watching half-naked queer boys with fantastical monikers like Yogzar and Red Dragon wrestling in a vat of lube? Slide your way into V-Day at this monthly grip ‘n slip put on by neo-Vaudevillian troupe SF Boylesque, with DJ Drama Bin Laden, a performance by the Bohemian Brethren, and Cajon food from Family Meal available on the back patio.

FRIDAY 10

Bardot A Go Go Pre-Valentine’s Dance Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF. (415) 861-2011, www.bardotagogo.com. 9 p.m., $10. “Music by French people for everybody” is the motto of the neato longtime roving Bardot A Go Go — and that includes a bubbly beretful of cute folks who revel in 1960s pop glamour filtered through contemporary va-va-voom. Live band Nous Non Plus is très adorable, and DJs Pink Frankenstein, Brother Grimm, and Cali Kid bring French kisses galore. Plus: free hairstyling by Peter Thomas Hair Design, d’accord.

I Heart Some Thing The Stud, 399 9th St., SF. (415) 863-6623, www.studsf.com. 10 p.m.-late, $8. “We love love! We just love it!” scream the awesome queens of Some Thing, the mind-altering weekly friday drag show and party at the Stud. You may detect a hint of the sardonic in there, but the smart Some Thingers always cover their bases with a healthy dose of sincerity to go with the staged pop culture send-ups. heart-shaped performers include Glamamore, Manicure Versace, Cricket Bardot, and Nikki Sixx Mile. Afterhours dancing, too.

Mortified’s Annual Doomed Valentine’s Show DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., SF. (415) 626-1409, www.getmortified.com. 7:30 p.m., $14 adv; $21 at door. Do you remember your first kiss when you went in for the gold, missed completely, and your lips puckered mid-air? Well, the folks at Mortified sure do. They have sorted through the oldest and nerdiest notebooks, letters, photos, and shoeboxes so that they can share with you their most humiliating romantic encounters. Reinvigorate your disdain for this holiday by taking comedic comfort in the mishaps of these thick-skinned Valentine’s veterans.

Ninth Annual Food from the Heart Festival Ferry Building Marketplace, 1 Ferry Building, SF. (415) 983-8000, www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com. Through Saturday. 5:30-8 p.m., free entrance. Nothing says “I love you” like food. Give the gift of a happy stomach to your lover this Valentine’s in the candlelit Grand Nave of the Ferry Building, with a night of dancing and eating. Revel in the magic of the waterfront, sip on wine poured by local Napa Vinters, and taste a scrumptious hors-d’oeuvre or five.

“On The Edge 2” erotic photography exhibition Gallery 4N5, 863 Mission, SF. (415) 522-2400, www.gallery4n5.com. Through Sunday. Gallery hours Fri., 4 p.m.-9 p.m.; Sat., 11 p.m.-9 p.m.; Sun., noon-5 p.m., free. Valentine’s Day may be about romance for some people, but for us it’s about getting naked. (And eating, but mostly getting naked.) This group exhibition features 400 pictures of artful sexiness taken by 25 erotic photographers who bring on the nudes.

SATURDAY 11

“Drunk with Love” with Carol Peters The Emerald Tablet, 80 Fresno, SF. (415) 500-2323, www.carolpeters.net. 8 p.m., $10. Carol Peters, a.k.a. “Velvet Voice,” is known for her passionate and amorous renderings. For one steamy night in light of Valentine’s Day, Peters will grace the stage to croon sensual tunes that capture the many dimensions of love.

Valentine’s Surprise SF Lindy Ball Womens Building, 3543 18th St., SF. sfswingjam.eventbee.com. 7:30 p.m.-12:30 a.m., $22 This Lindy Hop and Swing ball is actually the centerpiece of a three-day swing summit in celebration of romance (check the website for full line-up) — because what says, “I love you” more than artfully mopping the floor with your partner? We sure don’t know. Hoppin’ workshops and technique tune-up sessions complement the ball, which consists of a Lindy contest, live swing music, and a surprise 91st birthday celebration for classic movie star Ray Hirsch.

Watson’s “Naked at the Art Museum Scavenger Hunt” Legion of Honor, 34th Ave, SF. (415) 750-3600, legionofhonor.famsf.org. Through Sunday. 2 p.m.-4:30 p.m., $20. Who said museums had to be tame? Bring a lover or friend this weekend to the Legion of Honor for a sexy scavenger hunt. You will scope the halls for studly sculptures, titillating paintings, bathing beauties, and many sexy inanimate objects more. Museums will never be the same again.

SUNDAY 12

SF Mixtape Society’s “Under The Covers” music exchange and contest The Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St, SF. (415) 440-4177, www.sfmixtapesociety.com. 6 p.m., free with mix. Don’t have someone to make a mixtape for this year? It’s OK. Your ex’s music taste was awful anyways! Put that playlist you love on a CD, cassette, or USB drive and have it land right in the ears of a random yet lucky someone. You’ll end the night with someone else’s coveted mix, and everyone will get to vote for the playlist with the best track listings and artwork.

MONDAY 13

Litquake Literary Festival presents: Love Hurts readings of grief-stricken passages of love and lust The Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St, SF. (415) 440-4177, www.litquake.org. 7 p.m., $10. Ten Bay Area writers will give their own cynical (and mostly hilarious) twists on the forlorn words of some of the most melancholic and/or melodramatic novels ever written. Come sort out the parallels between drug dependency and romance in Valley of the Dolls, the masochistic plotline of The Story of O, and many more classics that well forewarned of broken hearts.

TUESDAY 14

Club Neon’s Eighth Annual Vaslentine’s Day Underwear Party The Knockout, 3223 Mission, SF. (415) 550-6884, www.theknockoutsf.com. This is THE event for fresh and nubile indie heartbreakers, stripping down to make you all “damn!” and stuff. One of our favorite annual pantsless throwdowns, with steamy rock DJs Jamie Jams and EmDee making you want to take it all off.

The Fifth Annual Poetry and Music Battle of ALL of the Sexes Uncle Al and Mama Dee’s Cafe at POOR Magazine, 2940 16th St, SF. (415) 865-1932, www.poormagazine.org. 7 p.m., $5-$20 suggested donation for dinner and show. Instead of scribbling your words in to a Hallmark card, show off your love this Valentine’s in rhyme and verse. All proceeds will support POOR magazine, a local arts organization that advocates education and media access for struggling communities. The theme is 1950s, but the beats will be timeless.

Love Story film showing and gala with Justin MX Bond Castro Theatre, 429 Casto, SF. (415) 621-6120, www.castrotheatre.com. 8 p.m., $10 film only; $25 for gala tickets. Relive the drama, the tragic heartaches, and the swooning love story of the 1970 film classic. Ali MacGraw will be at the Castro mezzanine in person, “Theme from Love Story” will be sung by Katya Smirnoff-Skyy, and special guest Mx Justin Vivian bond will be doing a “sorry” medley.

Passion Punch Valentine’s day kickboxing class UFC Gym, 1975 Diamond, Concord. (925) 265-8130, www.ufcgyms.com. 6:30 p.m., free. Valentine’s got you foaming at the mouth? Let it out. This 60-minute class will incorporate dynamic boxing moves so that you can punch away all the annoyances you will be feeling by the end of this day.

The Crackpot Crones present “I Hate Valentine’s Day” sketch comedy and improv show The Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF. (415) 648-5244, www.crackpotcrones.com. 8 p.m., $20. Outrageous duo Terry Baum and Carolyn Myers are providing a public service for the romantically challenged. They will be making fun of everything Valentine’s related — especially silly little concepts like true love and soul mates. Belt along to the song, “The Twelve Days of Being Dumped,” and give your best evil cackle at this sketch comedy show.

Valentine’s Day Party with T.I.T.S and Uzi Rash Hemlock, 1131 Polk, SF. (415) 923-0923, www.hemlocktavern.com. 9 p.m., free. There is no need for all the fuss, the fancy gifts, the cutesy ribbons, or the overpriced dinner. If you’re sick of the pink, come dance your anti-heart out at this doom punk show. Flowers wilt anyways.

Rep Clock

Andrew Lam
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Schedules are for Wed/8-Tues/14 except where noted. Director and year are given when available. Double and triple features are marked with a •. All times p.m. unless otherwise specified.

ARTISTS’ TELEVISION ACCESS 992 Valencia, SF; www.atasite.org. $6-10. Dirty Looks presents: City of Lost Souls, Fri, 8. “Mindscapes,” short films, Sat, 8.

CALIFORNIA COLLEGE OF THE ARTS 1118 Eighth St, SF; www.dirtylooksnyc.org. Free. Dirty Looks presents: “Queer Conversations on Culture in the Arts,” with selections from the “Female Trouble” experimental shorts program and a conversation with Margaret Tedesco, Thurs, 7.

CASTRO 429 Castro, SF; (415) 621-6120, www.castrotheatre.com. $7.50-10. •Pickpocket (Bresson, 1959), Wed, 3:30, 7:15, and American Gigolo (Schrader, 1979), Wed, 4:55, 8:45. •Beauty and the Beast (Cocteau, 1946), Thurs, 3:05, 7, and No Such Thing (Hartley, 2001), Thurs, 4:55, 8:50. “Midnites for Maniacs: I’m Black and I’m Proud:” •I’m Gonna Git You Sucka (Wayans, 1988), Fri, 7:30; Pootie Tang (Louis CK, 2001), Fri, 9:30; CB4 (Davis, 1993), Fri, 11:30. French American International School presents: “I-Speak: Celebrating 50 Years of International Education,” Sat, 6:30. This event, $5-10; tickets at www.internationalsf.org. •Do The Right Thing (Lee, 1989), Sun, 2, 8, and Malcolm X (Lee, 1992), Sun, 4:15. “Love: Ali MacGraw:” Love Story (Hiller, 1970), Tues, 8. With pre-show gala performance and MacGraw in person; for tickets ($25-45), visit www.ticketfly.com.

ELMWOOD 10070 San Pablo, El Cerrito; www.rialtocinemas.com. Free. “Community Cinema:” More Than a Month: One Man’s Journey to End Black History Month (Tilghman, 2012), Wed, 7.

CHRISTOPHER B. SMITH RAFAEL FILM CENTER 1118 Fourth St, San Rafael; (415) 454-1222, www.cafilm.org. $6.75-10.25. “Rafael Film Club:” “Jan Wahl,” Thurs, 1. Pina (Wenders, 2011), call for dates and times. “Mostly British Film Festival:” Route Irish (Loach, 2010), Wed, 7; Albatross (MacCormick, 2011), Thurs, 7. “2012 Oscar Nominated Short Films,” narrative and documentary (separate admission), Feb 3-9, call for times.

LAMORINDA THEATRES Four Orinda Theatre Square, Orinda; www.caiff.org. $12-15. “California Independent Film Festival,” 11 features, plus docs, shorts, and educational seminars, Feb 10-16.

MECHANICS’ INSTITUTE 57 Post, SF; (415) 393-0100, rsvp@milibrary.org. $10. “CinemaLit Film Series: Hollywood Dames: Beauty and Brains:” Intermezzo (Ratoff, 1939), Fri, 6.

PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE 2575 Bancroft, Berk; (510) 642-5249, bampfa.berkeley.edu. $5.50-9.50. “Documentary Voices:” The Green Wave (Ahadi, 2010), Wed, 7. “Seconds of Eternity: The Films of Gregory J. Markopoulos:” “Markopoulos: The Early Films (1940-49)” Thurs, 7; “Eros and Myth (1950-63),” Sat, 6:30. “Austere Perfectionism: The Films of Robert Bresson:” The Trial of Joan of Arc (1962), Fri, 7; Les dames du Bois du Boulogne (1945), Fri, 8:25; Lancelot of the Lake (1974), Sat, 8:30. “Screenagers: 14th Annual Bay Area High School Film and Video Festival,” Sat, 3. “Howard Hawks: The Measure of Man:” The Criminal Code (1931), Sun, 4:30; Bringing Up Baby (1938), Tues, 7. “African Film Festival 2012:” Viva Riva! (Munga, 2010), Sun, 6:30.

ROXIE 3117 and 3125 16th St, SF; (415) 863-1087, www.roxie.com. $6.50-10. Come Back, Africa (Rogosin, 1959/2012), Wed-Thurs, 6:45, 8:30. Drive (Winding Refn, 2011), Wed, 8:45. Into the Abyss (Herzog, 2011), Wed, 6:45. SF IndieFest, Feb 9-23. Visit www.sfindie.com for complete schedule.

SFFS | NEW PEOPLE CINEMA 1746 Post, SF; www.sffs.org. $10-11. Domain (Chiha, 2010), Wed-Thurs, 2, 4:30, 7, 9:30. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (Ceylan, 2011), Feb 10-16, 2, 5:30, 8:30.

TWINSPACE CONTINUUM 2111 Mission, Third Flr, Ste 3, SF; www.blockreportradio.com. $15. “Human Rights and Hip-Hop Film Festival,” documentaries and shorts, Fri, 5; Sat, 6:30.

VOGUE 3290 Sacramento, SF; www.mostlybritish.org. $12.50. “Mostly British Film Festival:” Black Butterflies (van der Oest, 2011), Wed, 5; London Boulevard (Monahan, 2010), Wed, 7:15; The Great White Silence (Ponting, 1924), Wed, 9:30; A Passionate Woman (2010), Thurs, 5; Route Irish (Loach, 2010), Thurs, 7:30.

VORTEX ROOM 1082 Howard, SF; www.myspace.com/thevortexroom. $7 donation. “The Second Coming of the Vortex Room:” The Second Coming of Suzanne (Barry, 1974), and Marjoe (Kernochan and Smith, 1972), Thurs, 8.

YERBA BUENA CENTER FOR THE ARTS 701 Mission, SF; (415) 978-2787, www.ybca.org. $6-8. “Bros Before Hos:” The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (Cassavetes, 1976), Thurs, 7:30; “Female Trouble,” experimental shorts program presented by Dirty Looks curator Bradford Nordeen, Sun, 2.

Psychic Dream Astrology: February 8-14

Andrew Lam
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ARIES

March 21-April 19

Be brave enough to move to the next stage of your relationships. All it will take is to trust in your own instincts enough to do what’s right in current dynamics, instead of what you’re used to doing out of habit. Consider the big picture as you improve your interactions this week.

TAURUS

April 20-May 20

Whether you are dating or not, it’s time to invest in your love life. Make the effort to revisit what you want for yourself with relationships, and check in with how close or far you are from your goals. This will allow you to participate with others in a way that will help get everyone’s needs met.

GEMINI

May 21-June 21

You are meant to go directly towards what you want, and to do it with an open heart. The direction that you point yourself in this week will determine where you end up in coming months, so take full responsibility for where you set yourself to go and how you plan on getting there, Twin Star.

CANCER

June 22-July 22

Think in terms of building blocks. You are creative and capable, but if you lack vision then you will fritter away all your awesome energy. Now is the time to strategically envision what you need to do and embody in order to be where you want to be. Move steady, and step by step.

LEO

July 23-Aug. 22

What’s the rush, Leo? Sit still for a minute and calmly assess where you’re at, both in your dynamics and also more deeply within yourself. There is no way to deal authentically with others if you don’t know what’s real within you! Take the time to be with yourself this week for best results.

VIRGO

Aug. 23-Sept. 22

The power of your mind is formidable, but can be used as a weapon as well as a tool. Instead of running over every detail you can, why not check in with yourself about how you feel? Nothing in your life is written in stone, and you can turn things around that don’t make you happy. Lighten up as you reflect.

LIBRA

Sept. 23-Oct. 22

Go forth towards love with your ego held in check, and your emotional needs placed first, right where they belong. Partnership is a big theme in your life; don’t look for what compels you as much as what inspires you. it is time for you to be more whole and engaged in your life. Take a chance on love, Libra.

SCORPIO

Oct. 23-Nov. 21

You are both at the end of a cycle and at the start of something new. Look around you to see all that you have accomplished over the last three months and feel good about it. Once this is done you’ll be ready to push ahead in the realm of relationships. Participate, Scorpio; don’t hide yourself away.

SAGITTARIUS

Nov. 22-Dec. 21

Be where you’re at and enjoy it without jumping ahead in your mind and getting all future-trippy. Honesty with yourself and the people around you is essential. Be vibrantly here right now, but you don’t have to commit to anything. The truth won’t spoil anything good, so lather it on this week.

CAPRICORN

Dec. 22-Jan. 19

You are free, Capricorn, but you need to deal with the ways that you feel trapped so you act more independent of your fears and bad habits. Cultivate patience with your personal life as it develops at the pace it needs to. Be willing to change and to share those changes with others.

AQUARIUS

Jan. 20-Feb. 18

There is no way to make things perfect, so instead work with what you’ve got. This week your need for connection is battling with your needs to be alone, and it’s unclear which side you’re rooting for. Take care of your insides so you’re a better advocate for your outsides.

PISCES

Feb. 19-March 20

Kindness is the answer, and don’t get it twisted. No matter how fretful you feel, now is the time to make sure you are being caring to yourself and also showing compassion to others. The trick is to not play out any willing victim games or to fall for others’ martyr trips. Consideration without strings this week.

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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Stage listings are compiled by Guardian staff. Performance times may change; call venues to confirm. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Rita Felciano, and Nicole Gluckstern. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

THEATER

OPENING

Blue/Orange Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, 450 Post, SF; (415) 474-8800, www.lhtsf.org. $43-53. Previews Wed/8-Fri/10, 8pm. Opens Sat/11, 8pm. Runs Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm). Through March 18. Lorraine Hansberry Theatre performs Joe Penhall’s comedic drama about a hospital patient who claims to be the son of an African dictator.

52 Man Pick Up Brava Theater, 2781 24th St, SF; (415) 647-2822, www.brava.org. $10-25. Opens Tues/14, 8pm. Runs Thurs-Sat, Feb 15, and Feb 27, 8pm. Through March 3. Desiree Butch performs her solo show about a deck of cards’ worth of sexual encounters.

Geezer Marsh San Francisco, MainStage, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $25-100. Opens Thurs/9, 8pm. Runs Thurs and Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through March 18. Geoff Hoyle’s hit solo show returns.

BAY AREA

A Doctor in Spire of Himself Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison, Berk; (510) 647-2949, www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Previews Fri/10-Sat/11 and Tues/14, 8pm; Sun/12, 7pm. Opens Feb 15, 8pm. Runs Tues and Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Thurs and Sat, 2pm; no matinees Feb 16, Feb 25, March 1, 8, and 15; no show March 23); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 2pm). Through March 25. Berkeley Rep performs a contemporary update of the Molière comedy.

ONGOING

Cabaret Young Performers Theatre, Fort Mason Center, Bldc C, Room 300, Marina at Laguna, SF; (415) 381-1638, cabaretsf.wordpress.com. $25-45. Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 7pm. Through Feb 19. Shakespeare at Stinson and Independent Cabaret Productions perform the Kander and Ebb classic in an intimate setting.

Glengarry Glen Ross Actors Theatre of San Francisco, 855 Bush, SF; (415) 345-1287, www.brownpapertickets.com. $26-40. Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through March 24. David Mamet’s cutthroat comedy, courtesy of the Actors Theatre of San Francisco.

Higher Theater at Children’s Creativity Museum, 221 Howard, SF; (415) 749-2228, www.act-sf.org. $10-65. Tues-Sat, 8pm (also Wed, Sat-Sun, 2pm; no matinee Wed/8). Through Feb 19. American Conservatory Theatre presents Carey Perloff’s smart and sexy world premiere.

Jesus in India Magic Theatre, Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; www.magictheatre.org. $20-55. Tues, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm (also Feb 18, 2:30pm); Sun, 2:30pm. Through Feb 19. Lloyd Suh’s American Hwangap is still one of Magic’s strongest premieres in recent years, an intriguingly funny and affecting cross-cultural tale of an absent Korean father’s return to the family he abandoned in West Texas 15 years earlier. Suh’s latest makes a disappointing contrast. There’s again an absent father (or two) and a sense of dislocation, but Suh’s “Jesus in India” does little or nothing with them. Director Daniella Topol assembles a bright cast headed by musically adept charmer Damon Daunno — on Michael Locher’s colorful, all-encompassing street mosaic set (comprised of floor-to-wall stickers, spray-paint, and mandalas around a central thicket of abandoned bicycle wheels) — but it all serves an insipid chronicle of the deity’s wayward teen years, which are spent getting high and playing in a punk band in India. Pure irreverence might have been worthwhile, but the “dude, fuckin’ &ldots; dude” humor here — one-note and rarely that funny — comes yoked to a fourth-quarter theme (basically a Henry IV thing, the sowing of wild oats ahead of the taking on of a “king’s” responsibilities) that proves even sketchier, not to mention out-of-step with these deliberately leaderless times. (Avila)

*Little Brother Gough Street Playhouse, 1620 Gough, SF; www.custommade.org. $25-32. Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 7pm. Through Feb 25. Custom Made Theatre Co. performs Josh Costello’s adaptation of Cory Doctorow’s San Francisco-set thriller.

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh San Francisco, Studio Theater, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5 and 8:30pm. Extended through Feb 25. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. (Avila)

Olivia’s Kitchen Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.generationtheatre.com. $20-40. Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Through Feb 19. GenerationTheatre offers this “remix” of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.

Private Parts SF Playhouse, Stage 2, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Thurs, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through Feb 25. Graham Gremore performs his autobiographical solo comedy.

*True West Boxcar Studios, 125A Hyde, SF; (415) 967-2227, www.boxcartheatre.org. $25. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through April 7. The first installment of Boxcar Theatre’s four-play Sam Shepard repertory project, True West ushers in the ambitious run with a bang. This tale of two brothers who gradually assume the role of the other is one of Shepard’s most enduring plays, rich with humorous interludes, veering sharply into dangerous terrain at the drop of a toaster. In time-honored, True West tradition, the lead roles of Austin, the unassuming younger brother, and Lee, his violent older sibling, are being alternated between Nick A. Olivero and Brian Trybom, and in a new twist, the role of the mother is being played by two different actresses as well (Adrienne Krug and Katya Rivera). The evening I saw it, Olivero was playing Austin, a writer banging away at his first screenplay, and Trybom was Lee, a troubled, alcoholic drifter who usurps his brother’s Hollywood shot, and trashes their mother’s home while trying to honor his as yet unwritten “contract”. The chemistry between the two actors was a perfect blend of menace and fraternity, and the extreme wreckage they make of both the set (designed by both actors), and their ever-tenuous relationship, was truly inspired. (Gluckstern)

*Vice Palace: The Last Cockettes Musical Thrillpeddlers’ Hypnodrome, 575 10th St, SF; (415) 377-4202, www.thrillpeddlers.com. $30-35. Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through March 3. Hot on the high heels of a 22-month run of Pearls Over Shanghai, the Thrillpeddlers are continuing their Theatre of the Ridiculous revival with a tits-up, balls-out production of the Cockettes’ last musical, Vice Palace. Loosely based on the terrifyingly grim “Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe, part of the thrill of Palace is the way that it weds the campy drag-glamour of Pearls Over Shanghai with the Thrillpeddlers’ signature Grand Guignol aesthetic. From an opening number set on a plague-stricken street (“There’s Blood on Your Face”) to a charming little cabaret about Caligula, staged with live assassinations, an undercurrent of darkness runs like blood beneath the shameless slapstick of the thinly-plotted revue. As plague-obsessed hostess Divina (Leigh Crow) and her right-hand “gal” Bella (Eric Tyson Wertz) try to distract a group of stir-crazy socialites from the dangers outside the villa walls, the entertainments range from silly to salacious: a suggestively-sung song about camel’s humps, the wistful ballad “Just a Lonely Little Turd,” a truly unexpected Rite of Spring-style dance number entitled “Flesh Ballet.” Sumptuously costumed by Kara Emry, cleverly lit by Nicholas Torre, accompanied by songwriter/lyricist (and original Cockette) Scrumbly Koldewyn, and anchored by a core of Thrillpeddler regulars, Palace is one nice vice. (Gluckstern)

*Vigilance Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; (415) 335-6087, secondwind.8m.com. $20-25. Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Feb 25. Ian Walker (The Tender King) directs a sharp revival of his own lucid, involving 2000 domestic drama about three households brought to the brink by the arrival of a menacing working-class loner. Seamlessly staged in a single pair of rooms (designed by Fred Sharkey) representing all three suburban middle-class homes — as well as downstage on the street where dream-home lottery winner Duncan (an imposing Steven Westdahl) throws his beer cans and leers at the wives and children — Vigilance begins with three friends meeting under the pretext of a poker game. Host Virgil (played with gruff charm by a commanding Mike Newman) is a 30-something husband, father, and guy’s guy whose Montana-grown libertarian machismo compensates for the agro of a stormy marriage and rocky finances. He talks the suggestible, nebbishy Bert (a slyly humorous Ben Ortega) and the equally nerdy but independent-minded Dick (a nicely layered Stephen Muterspaugh) into forming a “committee” to deal with the troublesome Duncan. Walker’s well-honed dialogue brings out the false notes in the supposed pre-Duncan harmony right away, especially in the volatile arguments between Virgil and wife Marla (a sure Natalie Palan Walker) and the passive but more troubled confrontations between Dick and his distant, frustrated wife Cathy (a subtly fraught Kim Stephenson). While the insular, repressed lives of the moderately well off come across well, Duncan’s final monologue is a compressed, if dramatically necessary, attempt at voicing the other side. Vigilance strikes best at the buried politics of marriage and friendship, the latter further invoked in the concerned intervention of cop and childhood friend Frank (a sympathetic Leon Goertzen). (Avila)

Waiting for Godot Royce Gallery, 2901 Mariposa, SF; (415) 336-3522, www.tidestheatre.org. $20-38. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Feb 18. The fuchsia papier-mâché tree and swirling grey-on-white floor pattern (courtesy of scenic designer Richard Colman) lend a psychedelic accent to the famously barren landscape inhabited by Vladimir (Keith Burkland) and Estragon (Jack Halton) in this production of the Samuel Beckett play by newcomers Tides Theatre. Director (and Tides’ producing artistic director) Jennifer Welch layers the avant-garde classic with some audio accents as well (although Jon Bernson’s minimalist industrial soundscape is a bit low in the mix to be very effective). More compelling is the gentle, sad humor and couched intelligence captured expertly by Halton in the circular but deliberate rhythms of his hapless tramp. Burkland as pal Vladimir exudes a palpable presence as well, though lacks the same focus. Timing is all in vaudeville — the parallel universe from whence these tangible modernist archetypes hail — as well as in a play whose plot goes intentionally nowhere, or rather loops back on itself in an implied dance with eternity. The halting aspect to Tides’ staging gets compounded with the arrival of brash whip-cracker Pozzo (a suitably stentorian but inconsistent Duane Lawrence) and his pitiful slave Lucky (a haunted, generally sharp Renzo Ampuero, made up to look like a goth doll à la some Tim Burton movie). That said, the best moments here broadcast the brooding beauty of the play, with its purposely vague but readily familiar world of viciousness, servility, trauma, want, fear, grudging compassion, and the daring, fragile humor that can look it all squarely in the eye. (Avila)

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Through March 24. Brian Copeland returns with a new solo show about his struggles with depression.

BAY AREA

Arms and the Man Lesher Center for the Arts, Margaret Lesher Theater, 1601 Civic, Walnut Creek; (925) 943-7469, www.centerrep.org. $38-43. Wed, 7:30pm; Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2:30pm. Through Feb 25. Center REPertory Company presents George Bernard Shaw’s classic romantic comedy.

Body Awareness Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; (510) 843-4822, www.auroratheatre.org. $34-55. Tues, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through March 4. Aurora Theatre performs Annie Baker’s comedy.

Counter Attack! Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; (510) 444-4755, ext. 114, www.stagebridge.org. $18-25. Wed-Thurs, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through March 4. Stagebridge presents the world premiere of Joan Holden’s waitress-centric play.

Ghost Light Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk; (510) 647-2949, www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tues, Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Sat and Feb 16, 2pm); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 2pm). Through Feb 19. Berkeley Rep performs Tony Taccone’s world-premiere play about George Moscone’s assassination, directed by the late San Francisco mayor’s son, Jonathan Moscone.

*The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through March 25. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

The Pitman Painters TheatreWorks at Mountain View Center for the Arts, 500 Castro, SF; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Wed/8, 7:30pm; Thurs/9-Sat/11, 8pm (also Sat/11, 2pm); Sun/12, 2 and 7pm. TheatreWorks performs a new comedy from the author of Billy Elliot about a group of British miners who become art world sensations.

A Steady Rain Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, SF; (415) 388-5208, www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Tues and Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Sat/11 and Feb 25, 2pm; Feb 16, 1pm); Wed, 7:30pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through Feb 26. Marin Theatre Company performs Keith Huff’s neo-noir drama.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Extended run: Sun/12, Feb 19, 26, March 11, and 18, 11am. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

“Elect to Laugh” Studio Theater, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. Tues, 8pm. Ongoing through Nov 6. $15-50. Will Durst and friends perform in this weekly political humor show that focuses on the upcoming presidential election.

“Epic Romance” Bayfront Theater, B350 Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; (415) 474-6776, www.improv.org. Tues/14, 8pm. $25. BATS Improv taps its collective quick-wit talents to conjure a romantic play on the spot.

“The Eric Show” Milk Bar, 1840 Haight, SF; www.milksf.com. Tues, 8pm (ongoing). $5. Local comedians perform with host Eric Barry.

“How We First Met” Marines’ Memorial Theatre, 609 Sutter, SF; www.howwefirstmet.com. Tues/14, 8pm. $40-75. Jill Bourque’s long-running holiday tradition is inspired by audience members’ real-life tales of romance.

“The I Hate Valentine’s Day Show” Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; www.crackpotcrones.com. Tues/14, 8pm; Feb 19, 5pm. $20. “Sketch comedy and improv as a public service for the romantically challenged” with Crackpot Crones Terry Baum and Carolyn Myers.

“It’s Got to Be Love” Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; (415) 392-4400, www.cityboxoffice.com. Mon/13-Tues/14, 8pm. $20. Craig Jessup sings Rodgers, Hart, Gershwin, and Sondheim to benefit the San Francisco Arts Education Project.

“Love Bites — and So Did the ’80s” Mission Cultural Center, 2868 Mission, SF; www.lgcsf.org. Fri/10-Sat/11, 8pm. $15-30. The Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco celebrates the neon decade with this cabaret and musical extravaganza.

“Mortified! Doomed Valentine’s Show” DNA Lounge, 375 11th St, SF; www.getmortified.com. Fri/10, 7:30pm. $21. Also Sat/11, 8pm, $20, Shattuck Down Low, 2184 Shattuck, Berk. The awkward storytelling series returns with a romance-gone-awry theme.

“Our Feet Speak the Rhythms of Our Hearts” Cowell Theater, Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; (415) 345-7575, www.fortmason.org. Sat/11, 8pm; Sun/12, 3pm. $15-25. Tango and More Argentine Dance and World Arts West present this event featuring six ethnic dance companies, including La Tania, Ensembles Ballet Folklórico de San Francisco, Valverde Dance, Barbary Coast Cloggers, and Ballet Pampa Argentina.

“Through the Night” Brava Theatre, 2781 24th St, SF; www.communityworkswest.org. Sat/11, 7pm. $40-100. Daniel Beaty performs at this evening honoring author Nell Bernstein and activist Sujatha Baliga; proceeds benefit Community Works’ programs for Bay Area children, families, and communities impacted by incarceration.

“The Weight Game” NOHspace Theater, 2840 Mariposa, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/10-Sat/11 and Feb 17-18, 8pm. $15. Sarah Abbey performs her semi-autobiographical solo show about diets and self-esteem.

BAY AREA

“Black Choreographers Festival: Here and Now 2012” Laney College Theater, 900 Fallon, Oakl; www.bcfhereandnow.com. Fri/10-Sat/11, 8pm; Sun/12, 4pm. Also Feb 17-18 and Feb 24-25, 8pm; Feb 19, 4pm; Feb 26, 7pm, Dance Mission Theater, 3316 24th St, SF. $10-25. Celebrate African and African American dance and culture at this multi-part festival, with works by Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Kendra Kimbrough Barnes, and more.

Film Listings

Andrew Lam
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Film listings are edited by Cheryl Eddy. Reviewers are Kimberly Chun, Max Goldberg, Dennis Harvey, Lynn Rapoport, and Matt Sussman. For rep house showtimes, see Rep Clock. For complete listings, including more Ongoing films, see www.sfbg.com.

INDIEFEST

The 14th San Francisco Independent Film Festival runs Feb 9-23 at the Roxie Theater, 3117 16th St, SF. For tickets (most films $11) and schedule info, visit www.sfindie.com. For commentary, see “Twisted Misters.”

OPENING

*Elite Squad: The Enemy Within A huge hit in its native Brazil, this drama from director José Padilha (2002’s Bus 174) uses insane amounts of bullets to spin a twisted tale of police and government corruption. It’s a sequel of sorts to 2007’s The Elite Squad, though having missed that film isn’t a barrier to enjoying part two. Special ops cop Roberto Nascimento (Wagner Moura) returns; he’s higher up the bureaucratic food chain, but finds himself locked in a constant battle with bad guys both criminal and co-worker. (“I created the monster that would eat me up,” he realizes after an elaborate scheme to eliminate drug dealers and dirty cops goes horribly awry.) Meanwhile, his wife is now his ex-wife, and she’s remarried a lefty politician (Irandhir Santos) who’s particularly interested in exposing the same villains making Nascimento’s life hell, while also making Nascimento’s life hell himself. Fans of The Wire and particularly City of God — Enemy co-writer Bráulio Mantovani was an Oscar nominee for that 2002 film — will have particular interest in Enemy, though it never quite achieves those works’ memorable heights. One possible reason: too much Nascimento voice-over. How do you say “show me, don’t tell me” in Portuguese? (1:55) Four Star. (Eddy)

*I Am Bruce Lee Not to be confused with Bruce Lee: A Warrior’s Journey (2000), this Spike TV co-production is nonetheless a similarly praise-filled portrait of the groundbreaking, charismatic action star. Warrior’s Journey‘s main coup was revealing long-thought-lost footage from 1978’s The Game of Death, one of only five feature films starring Lee (two of which were posthumous, including 1973 smash Enter the Dragon). I Am Bruce Lee tilts more toward exploring Lee’s lasting legacy — an extended debate over whether or not he invented what we now call “mixed martial arts” definitely plays to the doc’s Spike TV interests — but also contains the expected biography, with an emphasis on Lee’s unique approaches to martial arts and philosophy, as well as input from suspects usual (Lee’s widow and daughter, top Lee student Dan Inosanto, etc.), understandable (boxer Manny Pacquiao, martial arts champ Cung Lee), and fanboy (Mickey Rourke, Ed O’Neill). Screening in a very limited run, I Am Bruce Lee is a flashy, entertaining primer for beginning students of Lee (lesson one: he was basically the coolest guy who ever lived); longtime fans may not learn anything new, but will no doubt find much to enjoy anyway. (1:34) Four Star, Metreon. (Eddy)

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island Dwayne Johnson and Vanessa Hudgens play a father-daughter team of explorers in this sequel to 2008’s Journey to the Center of the Earth. (1:34)

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s deconstructed Turkish police procedural offers little action but plenty of atmosphere. The search for a corpse by a group of men — a prosecutor, a commissar, a doctor, and their two main suspects— through the desolate, wind-scoured hills of rural Anatolia, is in fact something of a Hitchcockian MacGuffin. Ceylan’s real investigation is philosophical, zeroing in on the way in which each of these men constructs his own truth out of the re-telling and mis-telling of past events. And the drudgery of this protracted investigation, much of it depicted in real-time, provides plenty of opportunities for all of the players to tell their stories or to simply ruminate, often bitterly, about their own lives. There is palpable loneliness that courses through all the chatter, formally mirrored by Ceylan’s penchant long-takes of isolated figures swallowed by the countryside or the darkness of night. But despite the endless landscape that surrounds them, there is no exit for these small men. (2:37) SF Film Society Cinema. (Sussman)

Safe House Denzel Washington is a rogue CIA agent who goes on the run with a rookie (Ryan Reynolds) when mercenaries attack. (2:00) Presidio.

Star Wars: Episode 1: The Phantom Menace 3D Spoiler alert: no matter how rad the special effects look in 3D, this movie will still contain Jar Jar Binks. (2:16)

This Means War Another flick about battlin’ CIA agents — this time, though, it’s Chris Pine and Tom Hardy fighting over Reese Witherspoon. (2:00)

“2011 Oscar-Nominated Short Films, Live Action and Animated” See the shorts tipped to compete for Oscar gold in two separate programs, divided into live-action and animated films. Lumiere, Opera Plaza, Shattuck, Smith Rafael.

The Vow Sorry Rachel McAdams and Channing Tatum, but 1987’s Overboard is the best amnesia-themed romance of all time. (1:44) Marina.

W.E. Madonna’s having a big week, no? (1:59) Bridge.

ONGOING

Big Miracle Three gray whales trapped beneath the Beaufort Sea ice near the tiny town of Barrow, Alaska become an international cause célèbre through the uneasily combined efforts of an Anchorage reporter (John Krasinski), a Greenpeace activist (Drew Barrymore), a group of chainsaw-toting Inupiaq fishermen, a Greenpeace-hating oilman (Ted Danson), a Reagan-administration aide (Vinessa Shaw), a U.S. Army colonel (Dermot Mulroney), a pair of Minnesotan entrepreneurs (James LeGros and Rob Riggle) with a homemade deicing machine, and the crew of a Soviet icebreaking ship. The magical pixie dust of Hollywood has been sprinkled liberally over events that did indeed take place in 1988, but the media frenzy that blossoms out of one little local newscast is entirely believable. Everyone loves a good whale story, and this one is a tearjerker — though the kind that parents can bring their kids to without worrying overly much about subsequent weeks of deep-sea-set nightmares and having to explain terms like “critically endangered Western North Pacific gray whale” if they don’t want to. The film makes clear that the weak-on-the-environment Reagan administration and Danson’s oilman stand to gain some powerfully good PR from this feat, with potentially devastating ecological results down the line, and Barrymore’s character gets to recite a quick litany of impending oceanic catastrophes. But this kind of talk is characterized as less useful than a nice, quick, visceral pull on the heartstrings, and while offering us the pleasurable sight of whales breaching in open water, the film avoids panning out too much farther, which may be why the miracle looks so big. (2:03) 1000 Van Ness. (Rapoport)

*Chronicle A misfit (Dane DeHaan) with an abusive father and an ever-present video camera, his affable cousin (Matt Garretty), and a popular jock (Michael B. Jordan) discover a strange, glowing object in the woods; before long, the boys realize they are newly telekinetic. At first, it’s all a lark, pulling pranks and — in the movie’s most exhilarating scene — learning to fly, but the fun ends when the one with the anger problem (guess which) starts abusing the ol’ with-great-power-comes-great-responsibilities creed. Chronicle is a pleasant surprise in a time when it’s better not to expect much from films aimed at teens; it grounds the superhero story in a (mostly) believable high-school setting, gently intellectualizes the boys’ dilemma (“hubris” is discussed), and also understands how satisfying it is to see superpowers used in the service of pure silliness — like, say, pretending you just happen to be really, really, really, good at magic tricks. First-time feature director Josh Trank and screenwriter Max “son of John” Landis also find creative ways, some more successful than others, to work with the film’s “self-shot” structure. The technique (curse you, Blair Witch) is long past feeling innovative, but Chronicle amply justifies its use in telling its story. (1:23) 1000 Van Ness. (Eddy)

*Come Back, Africa Opposition to apartheid didn’t really pick up steam as a popular cause in the U.S. until the early 1980s. Which makes it all the more remarkable that New York City-based documentarian Lionel Rogosin made Come Back, Africa (1959) about a quarter-century earlier — though less surprisingly, the film itself was barely seen here at the time. Now finally playing American theaters outside his home town in a restored print, it’s a time capsule whose background is as intriguing as the history it captures onscreen. The horrors of World War II and some subsequent global travel had stirred a profound awareness of social injustices in Rogosin, who began planning a feature about South Africa while still working at his father’s textile business. He had very little filmmaking experience, however, so he took $30,000 of his earnings and as “practice” made On the Bowery (1956), a semi staged portrait of Manhattan’s skid row area that won considerable praise, if also some shocked and appalled responses from Eisenhower-era keepers of America’s wholesome, prosperous self-image. Armed with the confidence bestowed by that successful effort and several international awards, Bogosin traveled to South Africa — not for the first time, but now with the earnest intent of making his expose. In the mid- to late ’50s, however, that was hardly a simple task. The film, which mixes a loose, acted narrative with completely nonfiction elements, follows the luckless wanderings of an agreeable protagonist played by a first-time actor — Zacharia Mgabi, a 30-ish bearded worker “discovered” on a bus queue. His character, Zachariah, is caught in one catch-22 of apartheid life: he can’t get a job without the appropriate permits, and can’t get the permits without a job. And so on. All show and almost no “tell,” Come Back, Africa wasn’t shown in South Africa until the late 1980s; it nonetheless proved a great influence on development of the whole continent’s indigenous cinematic voices. (1:24) Roxie. (Harvey)

*Coriolanus For his film directing debut, Ralph Fiennes has chosen some pretty strong material: a military drama that is among Shakespeare’s least popular works, not that adapting the Bard to the screen has ever been easy. (Look how many times Kenneth Branagh, an even more fabled Shakespearean Brit on stage than Ralph, has managed to fumble that task.) The titular war hero, raised to glory in battle and little else, is undone by political backstabbers and his own contempt for the “common people” when appointed to a governmental role requiring some diplomatic finesse. This turn of events puts him right back in the role he was born for: that of ruthless, furious avenger, no matter that now he aims to conquer the Rome he’d hitherto pledged to defend. The setting of a modern city in crisis (threadbare protesting masses vs. oppressive police state) works just fine, Elizabethan language and all, as does Fiennes’ choice of a gritty contemporary action feel (using cinematographer Barry Ackroyd of 2006’s United 93 and 2008’s The Hurt Locker). He’s got a strong supporting cast — particularly Vanessa Redgrave as Coriolanus’ hawkish mother Volumnia — and an excellent lead in one Ralph Fiennes, who here becomes so warped by bloodthirst he seems to mutate into Lord Voldemort before our eyes, without need of any prosthetics. His crazy eyes under a razored bald pate are a special effect quite alarmingly inhuman enough. (2:03) Embarcadero. (Harvey)

*Haywire Female empowerment gets its kung-fu-grip thighs around the beet-red throat of all the old action-heroes. Despite a deflated second half — and director Steven Soderbergh’s determinedly cool-headed yet ultimately exciting-quelling approach to Bourne-free action scenes — Haywire is fully capable of seizing and demanding everyone’s attention, particularly that of the feminists in the darkened theater who have given up looking for an action star that might best Angelina Jolie’s Lara Croft. Former pro mixed martial arts fighter Gina Carano, who plays it as studiedly intense and charismatic as crossover grapplers Lee, Norris, and Seagal before her, is that woman, with convincingly formidable neck and shoulder muscles to distract from her curves. Her Mallory Kane is one of the few women in Haywire‘s pared-down, stylized mise-en-scene — the lone female in a world of men out to get her, starting with the opening diner scene of a watchful Mallory confronted by a man (Channing Tatum) playing at being her boyfriend, fed up with her shit, and preparing to pack her into the car — a scenario that doubtless many rebel girls can relate to until it explodes into an ultraviolent, floor-thrashing fight scene. Turns out Mallory is an ex-Marine and Blackwater-style mercenary, ready to get out of the firm and out of a relationship with her boss, Kenneth (Ewan McGregor), when she learns, the bruising way, that she’s been set up. The diner scene sets the tone for rest of Haywire, an otherwise straightforward (albeit flashback-loaded) feminist whodunit of sorts, limned with subtextual currents of sexualized violence and unfolding over a series of encounters with men who could be suitors — or killers. (1:45) California, 1000 Van Ness. (Chun)

*Pariah A teenage girl stands stock-still in a dark nightclub, gazing with desire and fear at the half-naked female dancers on the stage. Later, riding home on the bus, she slowly removes the layers of butch that held her together in the club, stripping down to some version of the person her parents need to see when she walks in the door. Nearly wordlessly, the opening scenes of Dee Rees’s Pariah poignantly depict the embattled internal life of Alike (Adepero Oduye), a 17-year-old African American girl living in Brooklyn with her family and struggling both to be seen as she is and to determine what that might look like. The battles are being waged externally, too, between Alike’s adoring father (Charles Parnell), living in willful ignorance, and angry, rigid mother (Kim Wayans), desperately enforcing a feminine dress code and steering Alike away from openly butch friend Laura (Pernell Walker). Rees’ script beautifully conveys a household of landmines and chasms, which widen as husband and wife and daughter struggle and fail to communicate, asking the wrong questions, fearfully skirting the truth about Alike’s sexuality and her parents’ crumbling marriage. And the world outside proves full of romantic pitfalls and the tensions of longtime friendship and peer pressure. The poems in which the talented Alike takes solace and makes her way toward a more truthful existence are beautiful, but at a certain point the lyricism overtakes the film, forcing an ending that is tidy but less than satisfying. (1:26) Lumiere, SF Center. (Rapoport)

The Woman in Black Daniel Radcliffe (a.k.a. Harry Potter) plays a grieving young widower in an old-fashioned ghost story, set in the era of spirit hands and other visitations from beyond the veil. But while Victorian séances were generally aimed at the dearly departed, the titular visitant (Liz White), who haunts the isolated estate of Eel Marsh House and its environs, is a vindictive, mean-spirited creature, avenging the long-ago loss of her child by wreaking havoc and heartbreak among the families of the nearby village, among them a local landowner (Ciarán Hinds) and his wife (Janet McTeer). Radcliffe’s character, a lawyer named Arthur Kipps, has been tasked with settling the affairs of the mansion’s recently deceased owner, an assignment that requires sifting through mounds of dusty, crumpled ephemera in one of the creakiest, squeakiest buildings ever constructed. Set at the end of a narrow spit of land that disappears into the surrounding wetlands when the tide is high, Eel Marsh House is a charming place to be marooned after dark. But no amount of horrified screams from the audience will keep Kipps from his duties, though it’s hard to make much headway amid the unrelenting creepiness. Nearly every moment brings a fresh inexplicable thumping noise from an upper floor; a new room full of dead-eyed dolls that Kipps has no business wandering into; another freakishly screaming face next to his as he gazes out the window. The house is a richly textured set piece; the horror is of the sort that makes you jump and then laugh, both at the filmmakers, for springing the same tricks on you over and over, and at yourself, for falling prey to them every time. (1:36) 1000 Van Ness, Shattuck. (Rapoport)

Hippies do it better

Andrew Lam
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Hippies do it better

caitlin@sfbg.com

HERBWISE I am not given overmuch to squealing over technology, particularly weed technology. Over the past few months I have sampled candy cane-flavored rolling papers, a cannabis aphrodisiac shot, the Ziggy Marley-endorsed Marijuana Man comic book.

Mind you, I’m not complaining. But –- minus perhaps Humboldt Hemp Wicks –- none of those products have found their way into my everyday retinue. Until, that is, the subject of last week’s Herbwise, Randy Thompson of the vaporizer website Puff it Up, introduced me to a singular machine.

The Magic-Flight Launch Box is a thing of beauty. A clean maple wood box barely larger than a matchbox, it makes the black plastic tabletop models I once associated with vaporizing look clunky, wasteful. Vaporizing, university studies show, cuts down on the lung-coating tar that results from pipes and joints. Plus, it imparts a much cleaner marijuana taste –- perfect for the scores of cannabis connoisseurs who are popping up across the Bay Area.

Operating the Launch Box is simple. Insert the glass mouthpiece into the small round hole, a battery (two lithium batt’s and a recharger come with the starter kit) into the large round hole, press down for about five seconds, and inhale. No wall jack, no noise, no black plastic. The back of the box is engraved with a manifesto on what love is.

Obviously, hippies made it. Namely, a one Forrest Landry, who in a recent phone interview with the Guardian explained that the Launch Box’s ingenious design is a reflection of a New Age philosophy he’s cultivated over decades.

“Understanding the nature of communication allows us to understand the nature of community,” Landry says. “The vaporizer as a device is a communication event. We’re helping people breathe easier because of what we do.” The Launch Box’s backside is engraved with Landry’s personal philosophy on love (precious!)

He says the internationality of the product extends to the mindset of the company’s staff, who convene in a workshop located just outside San Diego. “Working with these tools is a kind of meditation. Doing this kind of work allows for an expanded awareness. You’re not aware just of how the tool is cutting the wood.”

Once an East Coast software developer, Landry changed careers upon his migration to California (to follow a lady love, he tells me). “I was thinking about what community of folks I want in my life.”

The answer was cannabis folks –- or more accurately, herbal folks, since the Launch Box can be used to ingest other plants like St. John’s wort (a useful tool for fighting seasonal affective disorder) and tobacco. Magic-Flight plans to start selling its own herbal blends in the next few months that can be vaporized solo or with cannabis.

The last thing that Landry wants is for Magic-Flight to be considered an activist company –- but that’s not to say that there’s nothing the federal government can learn from his philosophy.

“We’re not trying to shift the laws or policies per se, but we’re promoting the idea that love is enabling choice. We’re hoping the government realizes that enabling choice is a good thing.”

The story of hip-hop

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The story of hip-hop

By Courtney Garcia

MUSIC From the start, Ice-T was a versatile chameleon, the product of an integrated culture, and a student of the marginalized.

Born in New Jersey, raised in the Crenshaw District of LA, he joined the Crips then pursued the army to pay his bills. His career was blazed in rap, though he once flipped the game to heavy metal. Multifaceted talent that he is, Ice would later grow even more famous on television.

It’s no surprise, then, that he now adds the title of director to his resume, with the debut of his first documentary, Something From Nothing: The Art of Rap, at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The feature length endeavor is the pioneering artist’s tribute to the culture that bred him, beat him, and made him who he is; it’s a culture he feels is slowly slipping from his grasp. It’s a story as much about the traditions of hip-hop as it is a fervent call to action, told through the eyes of its maker and his impressive posse of friends.

The premise, nevertheless, is simple: this is the story of hip-hop. “It’s a lot of life lessons because you’re not only hearing about rap, but experiences and struggles,” explained Ice during a one-on-one breakfast interview at The Lift in Park City, Utah. He was present for the screenings, along with Grandmaster Caz and Chuck D, both of whom appear in the film.

Other notable feature players include Eminem, Dr. Dre, Kool Moe Dee, Kanye West, Royce da 5’9,” Common, Rakim, KRS-One, Bun B, and Snoop Dogg. “You’re hearing people who you thought woke up successful talk about how they thought about quitting, how they had to find their voice,” Ice said. “I wanted to catch these guys when they were vulnerable, to show they’re real people, and that success doesn’t come without some blows.”

Ice got into rap initially to avoid falling back into gang life, first experimenting with turntables while enlisted in the military. Musically, he made his name as an underground artist before signing with Warner Music/Sire Records, and eventually winning a Grammy for his song, “Back On the Block.” He would follow such success with a branch into acting, currently starring in the primetime series, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. And while his schedule is more than demanding, he found time between shoots to direct this documentary, a film he believes had to be made to challenge the fallacious imagery of hip-hop in American culture.

“This movie is not about the money or the cars, it’s about the craft,” he says. “The only questions we get asked by the press were, you know, ‘Who are you having sex with?’ ‘How high do you get?’ ‘Who don’t you like?’ They don’t care about your work…I wanted people to see the hip-hop I know, not the hip-hop that’s been given out until now. You’re getting this image that’s not real.”

Something From Nothing begins on the streets of New York, and follows the beat to the sunny coast of Los Angeles. Interviewing the gamut of rap’s finest, Ice catches his friends at the record store, in the studio, on their patio and at the diner. They eat; they smoke; they talk hip-hop. Some, like Kanye, freestyle for the camera; others spit the rhymes they can’t get out of their heads.

In one of the more poignant scenes, Ice speaks with Eminem about his toil to commit to the trade amidst extreme discouragement, and the moment he realized it was his raison d’etre. Equally surreal, the filmmaker travels to Dr. Dre’s lavish estate in the Hollywood Hills, where the two converse about the late, Tupac Shakur.

Because the name ‘Ice-T’ signifies authority, the strength of this film is his access to the inside, exposing tales most people would never have a chance to hear. He hits on every shade of the genre, from gangster rap to native tongue, the poetics of Q-Tip to the in-your-face anarchy of Immortal Technique.

Introducing the film at Sundance, he described his impetus as a dissatisfaction with the current state of hip-hop, and an earnest aim to improve the situation.

Later, he elaborated. “To me, the most pinnacle moment in the movie was when Mos Def quoted Q-Tip saying ‘rap is not pop; rap never had pop ambitions.’ It’s a counterculture. Now it’s become pop, and how you gonna get mad at the kids? They want to eat; they want to make money; they want to live. If you ask me what my dream is, I would love to see a 19 year-old Public Enemy come out of nowhere; I would love to see the new 18 year-old Ice Cube just come kick in the door, and start telling motherfuckers, ‘Fuck the bling, this is what’s good. Let’s talk about Obama, let’s talk about Occupy Wall Street. Let’s go in.'”

He added, “It will never get radio play, but I believe if a young group of kids really nailed it, they could get a movement going. And it’s needed. I took Rage Against the Machine out as my opening act, so of course I want to see that. The terrain is wide open.”

It’s rare to catch Ice-T without his signature shades, and somehow it’s obvious he truly is the OG he claims. Yet his inner sincerity and passion show through in this project, an ode to the first platform to ever give him a voice. He sold the rights to film after the Sundance showings to The Indomina Group for worldwide distribution; a theatrical release is planned for summer.

“Music has that power to give people emotion, and that’s what’s lacking right now,” he reiterated. “They’re not using art form at full power. They’re just rubbing the surface of it.”

Cheap dates!

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Cheap dates!

VALENTINE’S Whether you’re hopelessly in love, completely philophobic, or somewhere in between, here’s a sweet slew of events on the horizon that won’t tap you dry. We’ve chosen our favorites that are all less than $20 (except for a couple worthwhile charity fundraisers). Now go out and get starry-eyed, you kid.  

 

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WEDNESDAY 8

Aphrodesia Afterhours Valentine’s Day Conservatory of Flowers, Golden Gate Park, 100 John F. Kennedy, SF. (415) 831-2090, www.conservatoryofflowers.org. 6 p.m.-10 p.m., $10. Chocolate is hands down the best part of Valentine’s Day. Join local chocolatier TCHO’s chief chocolate guru, Brad Kintzer, for his demonstration on how to transform beans into bliss. Afterwards, grab a love potion from the Cocktail Lab, frolic amongst the orchids, and enjoy a live performance by Le Quartet de Jazz. Remember to take a picture in the photobooth — a night dedicated to chocolate is a night to remember.

Love on Wheels dating game Public Works, 161 Erie, SF. (415) 932-0955, www.sfbike.org. 6 p.m., $5 for SF Bicycle Coalition members; $10 for non-members. The cutest people always seem to be railing past each other on their bikes. The SF Bicycle Coalition is going to sit all you guys down so you can date already. Lovebirds will quiz three potential dates (hidden from view) and go on a date provided by one of the sponsors. This annual tradition is a cute hoot.

 

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THURSDAY 9

“Animal Attraction” NightLife aquarium gallery and sex talk California Academy of Sciences, 55 Music Concourse, SF. (415) 379-8000, www.calacademy.org. 6 p.m.-10 p.m., $12. Cal Academy’s weekly Thursday evening party, NightLife, is launching a new gallery for fish-lovers (and friends!) with a series of reproduction-themed talks. Various experts will be talking about mating strategies in the animal kingdom, penis bones of different species, and the sex life of Zodiac signs. Dr. Carol Queen from Good Vibrations will be sharing her knowledge about the science of orgasms. So let’s do like they do on the Discovery Channel.

“Cupid’s Back” sixth annual Valentine’s Day party Supperclub, 657 Harrison, SF. (415) 348-0900, cupidsback.kintera.org. 8 p.m.-midnight, $30-35. Gay charity impressario Mark Rhoades is back — like Cupid, you might say — with this popular shindig that brings together oodles of hot men. DJ Juanita More will fluff the crowd, and it all goes to help out our invaluable GLBT Historical Society. Shoot your arrow and it goes real high …

“Go Deep” lube wrestling for the boys El Rio, 3158 Mission, SF. (415) 379-8000, www.calacademy.org/events/nightlife. 8 p.m.-11:30 p.m., $10–$15. What says romance more than watching half-naked queer boys with fantastical monikers like Yogzar and Red Dragon wrestling in a vat of lube? Slide your way into V-Day at this monthly (second Thursdays) grip ‘n slip put on by neo-Vaudevillian troupe SF Boylesque, with DJ Drama Bin Laden, a performance by the Bohemian Brethren, and Cajon food from Family Meal available on the back patio.

 

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FRIDAY 10

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FRIDAY 10

Bardot A Go Go Pre-Valentine’s Dance Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF. (415) 861-2011, www.bardotagogo.com. 9 p.m., $10. “Music by French people for everybody” is the motto of the neato longtime roving Bardot A Go Go — and that includes a bubbly beretful of cute folks who revel in 1960s pop glamour filtered through contemporary va-va-voom. Live band Nous Non Plus is très adorable, and DJs Pink Frankenstein, Brother Grimm, and Cali Kid bring French kisses galore. Plus: free hairstyling by Peter Thomas Hair Design, d’accord.

I Heart Some Thing The Stud, 399 9th St., SF. (415) 863-6623, www.studsf.com. 10 p.m.-late, $8. “We love love! We just love it!” scream the awesome queens of Some Thing, the mind-altering weekly friday drag show and party at the Stud. You may detect a hint of the sardonic in there, but the smart Some Thingers always cover their bases with a healthy dose of sincerity to go with the staged pop culture send-ups. heart-shaped performers include Glamamore, Manicure Versace, Cricket Bardot, and Nikki Sixx Mile. Afterhours dancing, too.

Mortified’s Annual Doomed Valentine’s Show DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., SF. (415) 626-1409, www.getmortified.com. 7:30 p.m., $14 adv; $21 at door. Do you remember your first kiss when you went in for the gold, missed completely, and your lips puckered mid-air? Well, the folks at Mortified sure do. They have sorted through the oldest and nerdiest notebooks, letters, photos, and shoeboxes so that they can share with you their most humiliating romantic encounters. Reinvigorate your disdain for this holiday by taking comedic comfort in the mishaps of these thick-skinned Valentine’s veterans.

Ninth Annual Food from the Heart Festival Ferry Building Marketplace, 1 Ferry Building, SF. (415) 983-8000, www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com. Through Saturday. 5:30-8 p.m., free entrance. Nothing says “I love you” like food. Give the gift of a happy stomach to your lover this Valentine’s in the candlelit Grand Nave of the Ferry Building, with a night of dancing and eating. Revel in the magic of the waterfront, sip on wine poured by local Napa Vinters, and taste a scrumptious hors-d’oeuvre or five.

“On The Edge 2” erotic photography exhibition Gallery 4N5, 863 Mission, SF. (415) 522-2400, www.gallery4n5.com. Through Sunday. Gallery hours Fri., 4 p.m.-9 p.m.; Sat., 11 p.m.-9 p.m.; Sun., noon-5 p.m., free. Valentine’s Day may be about romance for some people, but for us it’s about getting naked. (And eating, but mostly getting naked.) This group exhibition features 400 pictures of artful sexiness taken by 25 erotic photographers who bring on the nudes.

 

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SATURDAY 11

“Drunk with Love” with Carol Peters The Emerald Tablet, 80 Fresno, SF. (415) 500-2323, www.carolpeters.net. 8 p.m., $10. Carol Peters, a.k.a. “Velvet Voice,” is known for her passionate and amorous renderings. For one steamy night in light of Valentine’s Day, Peters will grace the stage to croon sensual tunes that capture the many dimensions of love.

Valentine’s Surprise SF Lindy Ball Womens Building, 3543 18th St., SF. sfswingjam.eventbee.com. 7:30 p.m.-12:30 a.m., $22 This Lindy Hop and Swing ball is actually the centerpiece of a three-day swing summit in celebration of romance (check the website for full line-up) — because what says, “I love you” more than artfully mopping the floor with your partner? We sure don’t know. Hoppin’ workshops and technique tune-up sessions complement the ball, which consists of a Lindy contest, live swing music, and a surprise 91st birthday celebration for classic movie star Ray Hirsch. Lessons offered!

Watson’s “Naked at the Art Museum Scavenger Hunt” Legion of Honor, 34th Ave, SF. (415) 750-3600, legionofhonor.famsf.org. Through Sunday. 2 p.m.-4:30 p.m., $20. Who said museums had to be tame? Bring a lover or friend this weekend to the Legion of Honor for a sexy scavenger hunt. You will scope the halls for studly sculptures, titillating paintings, bathing beauties, and many sexy inanimate objects more. Museums will never be the same again.

 

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SUNDAY 12

SF Mixtape Society’s “Under The Covers” music exchange and contest The Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St, SF. (415) 440-4177, www.sfmixtapesociety.com. 6 p.m., free with mix. Don’t have someone to make a mixtape for this year? It’s OK. Your ex’s music taste was awful anyways! Put that playlist you love on a CD, cassette, or USB drive and have it land right in the ears of a random yet lucky someone. You’ll end the night with someone else’s coveted mix, and everyone will get to vote for the playlist with the best track listings and artwork.

 

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MONDAY 13

Litquake Literary Festival presents: Love Hurts readings of grief-stricken passages of love and lust The Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St, SF. (415) 440-4177, www.litquake.org. 7 p.m., $10. Ten Bay Area writers will give their own cynical (and mostly hilarious) twists on the forlorn words of some of the most melancholic and/or melodramatic novels ever written. Come sort out the parallels between drug dependency and romance in Valley of the Dolls, the masochistic plotline of The Story of O, and many more classics that well forewarned of broken hearts.

 

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TUESDAY 14

Club Neon’s Eighth Annual Valentine’s Day Underwear Party The Knockout, 3223 Mission, SF. (415) 550-6884, www.theknockoutsf.com. 10 p.m.-2 a.m., $5, free with no pants before 11 p.m.! This is THE event for fresh and nubile indie heartbreakers, stripping down to make you all “damn!” and stuff. One of our favorite annual pantsless throwdowns, with steamy rock DJs Jamie Jams and EmDee making you want to take it all off.

The Fifth Annual Poetry and Music Battle of ALL of the Sexes Uncle Al and Mama Dee’s Cafe at POOR Magazine, 2940 16th St, SF. (415) 865-1932, www.poormagazine.org. 7 p.m., $5-$20 suggested donation for dinner and show. Instead of scribbling your words in to a Hallmark card, show off your love this Valentine’s in rhyme and verse. All proceeds will support POOR magazine, a local arts organization that advocates education and media access for struggling communities. The theme is 1950s, but the beats will be timeless.

Love Story film showing and gala with Justin MX Bond Castro Theatre, 429 Casto, SF. (415) 621-6120, www.castrotheatre.com. 8 p.m., $10 film only; $25 for gala tickets. Relive the drama, the tragic heartaches, and the swooning love story of the 1970 film classic. Ali MacGraw will be at the Castro mezzanine in person, “Theme from Love Story” will be sung by Katya Smirnoff-Skyy, and special guest Mx Justin Vivian bond will be doing a “sorry” medley.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMjsuYytrkg

Passion Punch Valentine’s day kickboxing class UFC Gym, 1975 Diamond, Concord. (925) 265-8130, www.ufcgyms.com. 6:30 p.m., free. Valentine’s got you foaming at the mouth? Let it out. This 60-minute class will incorporate dynamic boxing moves so that you can punch away all the annoyances you will be feeling by the end of this day.

The Crackpot Crones present “I Hate Valentine’s Day” sketch comedy and improv show The Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF. (415) 648-5244, www.crackpotcrones.com. 8 p.m., $20. Outrageous duo Terry Baum and Carolyn Myers are providing a public service for the romantically challenged. They will be making fun of everything Valentine’s related — especially silly little concepts like true love and soul mates. Belt along to the song, “The Twelve Days of Being Dumped,” and give your best evil cackle at this sketch comedy show.

Valentine’s Day Party with T.I.T.S and Uzi Rash Hemlock, 1131 Polk, SF. (415) 923-0923, www.hemlocktavern.com. 9 p.m., free. There is no need for all the fuss, the fancy gifts, the cutesy ribbons, or the overpriced dinner. If you’re sick of the pink, come dance your anti-heart out at this doom punk show. Flowers wilt anyways.

Toward the sun

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Toward the sun

I was pretty excited to hear about Heliotrope (www.heliotropesf.com), the new line of locally sourced, all-natural, unisex, essential oil-based, mostly fragrance-free beauty products launched by Bay Area style maven Jonathan Plotzker. I got more excited when Heliotrope’s exquisite, neighborhood-feeling retail boutique opened in Noe Valley (1515 Church, SF. 415-643-4847) — you mean I can grab some insanely good hot and sour soup from Eric’s Chinese and snag some natural product to vanish my all-night party bags? OK!

But things really got crazy for me when Plotzker told me over the phone about Heliotrope’s massage candles — when the candles melt, the heated wax dissolves into an oil perfect for an intimate rubdown. “We’re all about integration,” he said with a laugh, “our candles will melt you two ways.” Yes, I could go for a two-way melt right about now, in the middle of winter.

Plotzker had just returned from a visit to one of his chemists in Sonoma. “One of my original visions for the line was to help bring to light a lot of the small-batch local beauty developing going on,” he said. “The name Heliotrope means ‘turn toward the sun’ — but besides have the connotation of ‘enlightenment,’ I just really like the word. I think it describes our customers: smart, nature-oriented, and confident.” He adds that the company’s wood-grain logo comes from a scan of an actual redwood log that he happened to have in his car when he met with a graphic designer, giving it an extra local angle.

Heliotrope puts out dozens of products, from Witch Hazel and Birch Head-to-Toes Wash to single-note lemongrass essential oil. (The Heliotrope boutique sells a full range of accessories as well.) I asked Plotzker to pick out a few favorites that he’d recommend for our unique Bay Area winter.

 

FACE CARE

 

OLIVE LEAF AND NEROLI MOISTURIZER

Neroli is the essential oil of the orange blossom, and it’s a wonder, with anti-inflammatory and anti-redness properties. No more winter bloaty look. ($29 for 2 ounces, $39 for four ounces)

 

FRANKINCENSE AND ROSE GERANIUM OIL SERUM

People are realizing how good the right kind of oils can be for their skin! Our serums are concentrated treatments for the face — the frankincense calms, and the rose geranium rejuvenates. ($42)

 

ROSEWATER AND VITAMINS EYE LIFT CREAM

The rosewater acts as a humectant, meaning that the rose oil molecule attracts and retains the water molecule, keeping you hydrated and healthy. ($32)

 

BODY AND MASSAGE

 

SHEA AND BEESWAX HAND AND CUTICLE THERAPY

This is my favorite product in the shop. It’s a rich, creamy treatment for hands, cuticles, and nails that sinks in quickly so you don’t feel it — and your mittens won’t stick to your hands. ($16)

 

SOY AND SHEA BUTTER MASSAGE CANDLES

Soy wax melts at a lower temperature, so the resulting liquid can be poured on the skin and used as a smooth and natural massage oil, in fragrances like black fig cardamom and citrus nutmeg or fragrance-free. ($24)

 

ORGANIC AROMATHERAPY SPRAY MISTS FOR BODY AND HOME

Use this on your body to enhance your mood, use it as a facial toner to stay hydrated, and use it as a room fragrance — aloe, açai, pomegranate, and more. It’s a triple threat! ($19)

On the township

Andrew Lam
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On the township

FILM Opposition to apartheid didn’t really pick up steam as a popular cause in the U.S. until the early 1980s. Which makes it all the more remarkable that New York City-based documentarian Lionel Rogosin made Come Back, Africa about a quarter-century earlier — though less surprisingly, the film itself was barely seen here at the time. Now finally playing American theaters outside his home town in a restored print, it’s a time capsule whose background is as intriguing as the history it captures onscreen.

The horrors of World War II and some subsequent global travel had stirred a profound awareness of social injustices in Rogosin, who began planning a feature about South Africa while still working at his father’s textile business. He had very little filmmaking experience, however, so he took $30,000 of his earnings and as “practice” made On the Bowery (1956), a semi staged portrait of Manhattan’s skid row area that won considerable praise, if also some shocked and appalled responses from Eisenhower-era keepers of America’s wholesome, prosperous self-image. (It was, as 1959’s Come Back, Africa would also be, much more widely appreciated in Europe.)

Armed with the confidence bestowed by that successful effort and several international awards, Bogosin traveled to South Africa — not for the first time, but now with the earnest intent of making his expose. In the mid- to late ’50s, however, that was hardly a simple task. He and wife Elinor Hart had to do everything clandestinely, from making contacts in the activist underground to recruiting actors and crew. (The latter eventually had to be brought in mostly from Europe and Israel.) To get permits he fed the government authorities a series of lines: first he pretended to be making an airline travelogue to encourage tourism; then a music documentary to show local blacks “were basically a happy people;” then another doc, about the Boer War. Amazingly, despite the myriad likelihoods of being informed on, he shot the entire film without being shut down or deported. It remained, however, a stressful and dangerous endeavor for all concerned.

Like On the Bowery, Come Back, Africa qualified as a documentary by the looser standards of the time (Rogosin preferred the term “poetic realism”), but mixed a loose, acted narrative with completely nonfiction elements. Like the prior film, it also followed the luckless wanderings of an agreeable protagonist played by a first-time actor actually found on the street — here Zacharia Mgabi, a 30-ish bearded worker “discovered” on a bus queue.

His character, Zachariah, is caught in one catch-22 of apartheid life: he can’t get a job without the appropriate permits, and can’t get the permits without a job. First he tries finding employment in the misery of a mining encampment, then travels to Johannesburg — where it’s illegal for him to be without further permits — where he’s bounced from one position to another. Working as “house boy” to a middle-class white couple, he’s fired when the racist, shrewish wife (a memorable performance by Myrtle Berman) catches him sneaking a drink from her own secret booze stash. An auto-shop stint is lost due to a friend’s incessant goofing off, while service as porter in a hotel is terminated when a hysterical white lady guest cries “Rape!” simply because he surprises her in a hallway.

Meanwhile Zachariah’s wife arrives from their native KwaZulu, and they tentatively set up house in a Sophiatown shack. (Come Back, Africa is of particular interest for its scenes there — within a few years the government had forcibly emptied this poor black township, having made its population mix of races illegal, and the area was razed to become an unrecognizable whites only suburb.) But even this small foothold on stability is doomed. Just as alcoholism dragged On the Bowery‘s hero back into a downward spiral at the end (both on- and offscreen), so Zachariah and his family are helpless to save themselves from the violence, police harassment, and self-destruction apartheid breeds and maintains itself with.

All show and almost no “tell,” Come Back, Africa pauses around the two-thirds point to let several men pass around a bottle, discussing the nature of and solutions to their oppression. They’re happily interrupted by the incongruity of a young woman in an elegant cocktail dress — no less than a then-unknown Miriam Makeba, who sings a couple of songs in her inimitable voice. When the film was finished, Rogosin bribed officials to get her out of the country, bankrolling his contracted “discovery’s” launch at the Venice Festival, and in the U.S. and England. But to his great disappointment, she was quickly taken under Harry Belafonte’s wing, dismissing her first benefactor as “not very nice” and “an amateur.” Thus a legend was born, with Rogosin pretty much cut out of the resume.

Come Back, Africa, too, would disappoint its maker in some respects. With a furious South African government swiftly condemning this portrait as “distorted,” his original plans for a trilogy became impossible. The film won a number of prizes — although unlike On the Bowery, it was pointedly not nominated for a Best Documentary Oscar — and would eventually be widely seen on European television. But it has still never been broadcast in the U.S., and despite Rogosin’s efforts — he went so far as to open NYC’s still-extant Bleeker Street Cinemas in 1960 to show it and other important new works — it collided with a thud against the overwhelming indifference of middle-class white audiences. They were barely starting to confront such thorny racial issues in their own backyard, much less in far-flung nations. Not shown in South Africa until the late 1980s, Come Back nonetheless proved a great influence on development of the whole continent’s indigenous cinematic voices.

A liberal shit-kicker to the end, Rogosin made other documentaries, was integral to the New American Cinema movement (alongside Jonas Mekas, Robert Downey Sr., Shirley Clark, and other experimental luminaries), founded distribution company Impact Films, and moved to England for a spell before dying in Los Angeles at the century’s turn. It’s a pity he didn’t live to see his two first features restored and rediscovered — though interviews late in life suggest he never let limited exposure dampen his activist zeal one whit.

COME BACK, AFRICA opens Fri/3 at the Roxie.

Hello, Carol!

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Hello, Carol!

FILM It is close to impossible not to love Carol Channing; those who would protest otherwise are simply heartless. The only adequate response to her is unconditional surrender, as if standing before an oncoming cyclone filled with puppies.

With her saucer eyes topped with false lashes that could give Bette Davis’ a run for her money and a mouth that seems as if it could swallow the world, Channing is a living incarnation of a Muppet (to watch her duet with Miss Piggy just seems natural, somehow). And yet, despite her cartoonish physicality and exaggerated appearance, there is nothing false or put-on about Channing.

When I hear that voice — dripping with whiskey, smoke, and honey, begging to be imitated — the effect is instant happiness. Everything just feels right. As Roland Barthes writes in his essay “The Grain of the Voice,” I then must face the task of articulating “the impossible account of an individual thrill I constantly experience in listening to singing.”

Dori Bernstein’s sweet if worshipful documentary Carol Channing: Larger Than Life necessarily fails at that task, even as it proves the now 91-year-old Broadway legend more than lives up to the second half of the film’s title.

Now slightly stooped, her hair in a choppy gray bob, which she occasionally pulls into a Peggy Moffitt-esque topknot, and her lips a smear of Malibu pink, Channing is still ever the professional, hilariously impersonating a Russian theater troupe one moment and chatting with young dancers in Times Square the next.

The life Channing recounts is an abbreviated and selective version of the one detailed in her 2002 memoir Just Lucky I Guess: her childhood in San Francisco spent being the class clown and worshiping Ethel Waters; her first big Broadway break playing Lorelei Lee in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes; and her career-cementing role as Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly! And many of the memoir’s same supporting characters, such as frequent TV variety show co-star Loni Anderson and Dolly composer Jerry Herman, also make appearances here.

What Bernstein’s documentary offers is the rare chance to witness the palpable impact Channing has made on others. In personal interactions, she gives her attention equally and wholly to anyone who seeks it (including the camera). Those who have worked with her — particularly the many gay chorus members interviewed here — speak of her as a mother rather than a diva.

The film’s most touching footage is of Channing with her late husband Harry Kullijian, who passed away last year. The two were childhood sweethearts who some 70 years later tied the knot (in Channing’s fourth go at marriage), and seeing them joke together and read aloud poetry passages they shared as love-struck teens is the very definition of adorable.

Curiously, Kullijian’s passing is not mentioned in the film, even as a postscript. You get the sense more generally that Bernstein tried to stay clear of reopening any old wounds with her subject. The awful tempestuousness of Channing’s second marriage to her publicist and manager Charles Lowe is referenced by others but not Channing, who speaks only in passing of the toll life on the road took on her relationship with her son from her first marriage.

Additionally, despite her fame, Channing has always had to share the larger cultural spotlight with Marilyn Monroe and Barbra Streisand, powerhouses in their own right who became associated with the roles she originally made famous on stage (Channing would have her Hollywood comeuppance in 1967 when she was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for 1967’s Thoroughly Modern Millie). Larger Than Life attempts to provide a corrective to this, but its motivations for doing so are as transparent as they are understandable. This film is a mash note to Channing as much as it is a gift to her fans, who, rest assured, didn’t need any more reason to love her. *

 

CAROL CHANNING: LARGER THAN LIFE opens Fri/3 in Bay Area theaters.

The key is patients

Andrew Lam
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The key is patients

HERBWISE “Never in a million years would I have chosen to do this,” wrote Randy Thompson’s mother in the September 1997 issue of Good Housekeeping. The title of Karen Thompson’s article was “I Broke the Law to Save My Son.” Her choice? To allow Randy to use marijuana to mitigate the gastrointestinal irritation, nausea, vomiting, and lack of appetite he suffered chronically from his Crohn’s Disease.

Two months after Karen’s article appeared, the magazine published letters it had received in response under the header “A Controversial Choice.” One respondent, a Crohn’s sufferer who opted to have her small bowels re-sectioned to mitigate her symptoms, claimed to be “disgusted” with the Thompsons: “It was the best decision I ever made. How foolish of Simon’s parents to not exhaust all medical possibilities before allowing him to smoke pot.”

Today Randy, undeterred by such suggestions, helps other cannabis users to find healthy ways to smoke. He is the sole proprietor of a San Jose vaporizer distribution company, Puff It Up (www.puffitup.com). Medical studies have suggested that using vaporizers dramatically cuts down the amount of tar ingested compared to smoking joints.

Johnson’s company is entirely staffed by patients — he has had his card since before Proposition 215 passed — and tries to stock the “little guys” of the vaporizer world, like San Diego’s Magic-Flight company. Surprisingly, Puff It Up doesn’t sell Volcano vaporizers, the most popular “vape” brand whose products you’ve probably seen filling massive plastic bags with smoke on a dorm room coffee table somewhere.

Randy says Volcanoes, which begin at $539 for a starter package, just aren’t practical. “Simplicity, that’s what we’re going for,” he says. Thompson’s favorite vaporizers — which he proceeded to pull out of his backpack by the handful at his Guardian interview on a sunny day on the Zeitgeist patio — are the kind of affordable, easy-to-use, portable tools you would expect people to use for self-administering medicine. Many of the models he brought go for under $200.

“We’re non-evil,” he says of Puff It Up’s small box approach. “We don’t like to think of ourselves as profit-driven, we’re just trying to get the word out that there’s a better way to smoke.”

Randy is still dealing with blowback from his decision to be involved with marijuana. Like many greater Bay Area dispensaries, Puff It Up received a letter from the Department of Justice a few months ago threatening punitive action if it did not stop selling vaporizers, which exist in a legal netherworld.

In the 1997 article, the Thompsons went by aliases. But in 2012, Randy is done with hiding. He thinks it’s important to stick his neck out for the medicine that he says has made his life better so that other people might have the same option.

In the struggle to make cannabis accessible to everyone who needs it, he thinks patients have a big role to play. Says Randy: “People need to stand up and say ‘I’m human too.'” 

Next week in Herbwise: We test out Randy Thompson’s favorite vaporizer — does the Magic Flight live up to its name?

 

Cheers, puppeteers!

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Cheers, puppeteers!

Showcasing the boldly imaginative and innovative talents of the artisans at the Jim Henson Company, the 1982 fantasy film The Dark Crystal broke new ground when it came to visual special effects and believable creature creations.

The movie’s tale — evil Skeksis versus good Gelflings and Mystics, just tryin’ to restore balance and freedom to their world — captivated viewers’ imaginations upon its release, and has gone on to become a beloved part of many people’s childhood memories. And it’s still earning new fans: in honor of the film’s 30th anniversary, SF Sketchfest presents a special Crystal screening with guest Dave Goelz, who performed the puppetry for fan favorite Fizzgig, as well as the Skeksi Garthim Master SkekUng.

Goelz, who’ll introduce the film and share some rare, behind-the-scenes footage, is looking forward to marking the movie’s milestone with fans. “What I love about doing these events is that it reminds me of the quality of the things we were doing, and that they are enduring, and how much we enjoyed making them,” he says.

Having worked with Henson since 1973, Goelz was no stranger to busting through creative and logistical boundaries on film and television projects, but even he was uncertain for a time about Crystal‘s chances of success. “We all knew Jim as an incredible, indefatigable optimist. He was just so positive about everything, and he just believed that we could do anything — and he usually figured out a way to do it,” Goelz remembers.

“On the first day of shooting, though, we had to have the Skeksis file by the bedside of their dying emperor, and that was the very first shot that I was in. We were up on a two-foot riser, walking, and each Skeksis has two people inside, and then about four people down below, sort of duck walking on the floor, with each one holding a cable control.

Partway through the first shot I fell off the riser — it was dark, I couldn’t see where I was going. I remember thinking at that moment, ‘Jim’s optimism has really caught up with him this time. We’ll never get this thing shot!’ But of course, within two weeks we were ad-libbing in the characters.”

Goelz attributes the film’s success to the hard work of everyone involved, but points especially to Henson’s emotional and financial commitment to the quality of their projects.

“These things were developed and rehearsed for months, only Jim Henson would make that kind of investment,” Goelz says. “He was always like that. People who worked in the shop all those years tell me that he never came in and said, ‘You can’t buy that fabric for Miss Piggy. It’s $200 a yard!’ — he never held back on anything for the shop and the characters.”

In addition to the time, money, and effort spent on bringing the world of Crystal to life through advances in special effects technology, the crew also found simple ways to add depth to the film’s characters, as was the case with the lovable Fizzgig.

“The reason he’s convincing is because he’s used sparingly,” Goelz notes. “He’s a character who can’t really do much; he can move his paws and blink and open his mouth, so if you overexpose him you will realize that he’s limited. But the way he was conceived was to be used sparingly and that was useful.

Secondly, the way he traveled was by rolling [himself into a ball], which made it very easy for us to shoot him. We just rolled him across the shot, so that was extremely simple. One of the simplest things in the movie!”

Having worked with the Muppets for nearly 40 years (bringing life to much-loved characters like Gonzo and Bunsen Honeydew) and lending his talents to affiliated projects such as Labyrinth (1986), Fraggle Rock, and a host of other films and television shows, Goelz says he loves to see the impact of his efforts on fans.

“A lot of people who originally saw these projects [as children] are in their 30s now and have little kids, and they want to pass this along to their kids,” he reflects. “It’s very heartwarming to see there is a legacy.”

THE DARK CRYSTAL 30TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION

Sat/4, 11 a.m., $10

Castro Theatre

429 Castro, SF

www.sfsketchfest.com

Bike lightly

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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1
Bike lightly

DIY has long been an integral part of San Franciscan culture. Underground music venues, art cars, pop-up food trucks — San Franciscans have been crafting their own good times for years. And while the concept of creating and customizing your own bike isn’t new, a bike studio in the Tenderloin is putting a lightweight, environmentally-friendly spin on it.

Bamboo Bike Studio, started in 2009 by three Brooklyn-based bike obsessives, gives patrons the opportunity to build a safe, quality, visually-striking bike from the ground up by attending one of its weekend workshops. (Kits start at $459.) The shop uses bamboo — a plentiful, regenerative material — harvested from the Yucatan Peninsula.

While the concept of creating a bike from scratch may seem like a tall order, the friendly, committed staff makes the bike-building fun and fascinating. (For those without a lot of time to tinker, the studio also offers a steel frame option that only takes about four to six hours to complete.)

Worries about the legitimacy, safety, and durability of bamboo bikes can be assuaged by a quick test-drive and conversation with someone who has either built one or ridden one. The bikes come in a variety of different sizes and with a variety of fixtures and are exceptionally smooth and strong. They are also pretty light and easy to take care of, perfect for commuters. And if you ever have a problem with your bike, you can always drop into the studio and get it fixed.

“It was intimidating for me before I built them,” says BBS co-founder Justin Aguinaldo, a Mendocino County native who originally opened the shop in Brooklyn, but moved it here in 2009. “I can understand that. But actually, we are specifically looking to help people who are not already experienced builders because the empowerment from building your own things so exceeds the part of being afraid. It’s something that everyone can enjoy and benefit from, which is what we build our program around.

Aguinaldo, a longtime bike messenger, never seems far from two wheels. “I ride a bamboo bike mostly because it’s incredibly comfortable. I use other bikes, but I mostly ride bamboo. I don’t use it for racing or working, but just day-to-day and functionality-wise, it’s really enjoyable and reliable.”

When you walk into the Tenderloin BBS studio, it’s clear that the DIY ethos is as integral to the shop as the bikes themselves. From the homemade tool racks to the not-yet-completed shop sign that is being worked on by an employee, nearly everything (save for the foosball table) was built by the studio workers from scratch. As someone who struggles to tie their own shoes, just being in the place was inspiring, and the process of building my own bike was, well, enlightening.

“DIY has always really appealed to me,” studio worker Erik Castillo said. “You don’t have to go get a fancy bike and pay for the brand. You can get just as good a bike here — whether it’s the steel frame ones or the bamboo ones. The actual bamboo bike is just one of our ships that we use to get where we’re going.”

That’s what’s really interesting about the studio — that its goal is not even necessarily to get you on their bamboo wheels, but to spread bike culture in general. In 2010, the founding members of the studio even traveled to Ghana to help open up a bamboo bike factory to serve those who couldn’t afford expensive rides.

The shop is also committed to integrating into the Tenderloin, and building a inspiring, positive haven in a community that is short on such places. Spend a half an hour in the unpretentious studio, and you’re liable to meet a cast of characters including bike messengers, regular citizens working on their bikes, and Tenderloin neighbors.

“It’s not closed off to anyone,” Castillo explained. “It’s totally open to everyone. If you need help, we are here for you. But if you want to just hang out, you can do that too. Everyone is welcome.”

“If just owning a bamboo bike was the end goal, we’d just build them for you,” Aguinaldo told me. “For us, it’s about empowering more people and providing people with the value of creating your own thing. The bike isn’t the end goal. It’s about building it, riding it, learning from it — seeing how it affects everything else in life.” *

Bamboo Bike Studio 982 Post, SF. www.bamboobikestudio.com

 

Tycho

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Tycho

It felt like we were all on the verge at Tycho’s (www.tychomusic.com) December show at the Independent, the breaking point of something momentous, a perfect merging of visuals and sounds. In an effortlessly cool — though I’m sure highly engineered — production, Tycho, a.k.a graphic designer Scott Hansen, played synthesizers with live guitars and drums out front of a screen splashed with fuzzy orange surf images, rolling waves and crashing water.

It was the backdrop to the expressive and expansive Dive (Ghostly International), the first official release in years from the Sacramento native-longtime San Franciscan. And it was the ultimate sensory experience. Now on tour on the East Coast and in Europe, Tycho recently blogged, “I spent the last year locked in my basement working on the album so it’s been really refreshing to be out here performing it for people.”

Description of sound: Ambient / Psychedelic / Electronic.

Like most about the Bay Area music scene: Any show at the Independent.

What piece of music means the most to you and why: I couldn’t really pick one instrument in particular. I see the studio and all of the equipment in it as a single instrument, so I suppose that means the most.

Favorite local eatery and dish: Thai Time — Red Chicken Curry (or anything else there).

Who would you most like tour with: Midlake.

First Lady blues

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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First Lady blues

arts@sfbg.com

DANCE Randee Paufve’s voice is quiet. But once you have heard her speak through her dances, you are unlikely to forget the strength of what she has to say. Her craft is impressive, her topics are many-layered, and the resulting choreography is pared down to its essence. Sometimes, I have even wished for a little more looseness just so I could catch my breath.

So I Married Abraham Lincoln takes on the life of Mary Todd Lincoln, wife and widow of a President, a life-long Washington outsider, the target of vicious gossip, a spiritualist, perhaps mentally unstable, and a mother of four sons — only one of whom outlived her. In this hour-long work, set on seven primary and nine additional dancers, Paufve examines the sense of restriction — personal, social, political — with which this Kentucky-born outcast, a free spirit at one time, had to cope.

>>View our slideshow of Paufve Dance’s So I Married Abraham Lincoln

Though Married starts with the figure of Todd Lincoln, it opens up to include all the First Ladies whose identities disappeared into their positions. In the work’s main section, in a take-off on beauty pageants, they parade down a runway cooing their first names. Taking a broader perspective, Paufve also addresses the toll taken when anyone — one of the wives is danced by a man — is forced into a role and is not allowed to be him or herself.

Married is structured in the now-fashionable installation format, in which the audience travels through a series of episodes. At its premiere at Dance Mission Theater, it opened with an informal lobby overture of short individualized solos that were probably meant to highlight each dancer’s uniqueness (sight lines were difficult). Then Paufve moved the show down a narrow hallway, segueing through several studios and ending in the theater proper. The idea, again, was clearly to focus on one woman and then widen the lens. Theoretically, the format looked good, but the logistics of having to squeeze all the audience members (the show was more than sold out) through narrow doorways, and then cram them into places to sit, stand, or lean, impeded the piece’s flow.

Todd Lincoln first appears on a throne-like chair at the end of the hallway, contemplating her life and people’s expectations and misperceptions of her. Her words echo back to her as from another world. A couple of scenes later, we find ourselves around a low table outlined with burning tea lights. Two women in white shifts (costumes by Keriann Egeland) anxiously crowd into a corner. Perhaps they are ghosts, perhaps they are mourners. The real action, however, happens above the table where — in a stroke of genius — designer Jack Carpenter suspended linked teacups over the candles. The rising heat makes the cups tinkle, and they gently dance.

Though it has its moments of levity and softness, Married aims for a stark, uncompromising perspective, with choreography that is linear, pattern-oriented, and rigorous. It’s powerful in the way it suggests a sense of objectification. You sense an invisibly controlling hand as women are moved around like figures on a chessboard. In the last scene, they parade, they strut, they primp, and they pose. When the bugle calls, off they march. You watch Todd Lincoln awkwardly trying to weave gaudy flowers into her hair, and you hear a voice cry out against “that ugly home,” presumably the White House. Several times in the middle of scurrying activity, like a photo you can’t forget, you see identical images of a body being mourned. Lincoln? His sons? Soldiers, then and now?

At the same time, Heather Heise’s lovely songs recall wistful folk traditions and suggest the possibility of a communal purpose. Beginning with a single voice, the music opens into rich harmonies. One of tunes starts with “Oh Mary, don’t you weep, don’t you mourn.” And as the piece comes to a quiet ending, the women sing “Oh where are our dear mothers?/They are gone to heaven a’shouting/Day is a’breaking/In my soul.”

 

Lookin’ good

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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0
Lookin’ good

culture@sfbg.com

BODY If your New Year’s resolution is flagging, here are some budget boosts to kickstart your makeover (or de-stress) ambitions. Never give up! Deals are for February: call ahead for more details or restrictions information.

 

FITNESS

Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Center 1200 Arguello, SF. (415) 681-2731, www.sfyoga.com Find your center at this Inner Sunset nonprofit that’s run by world peace-inspired volunteers. Get your first class for free, and 50 percent off the 10-class ($95-115) or monthly unlimited pass ($110). Individual classes are $10-15 each.

Planet Granite 924 Mason, SF. (415) 692-3434, www.planetgranite.com An indoor climbing gym and yoga studio in the Presidio that boasts of the best views in the Bay Area. A belay lesson for $34 comes with free gear rental and one-day pass.

START Fitness 1625 Bush, SF. (415) 225-5715, www.STARTfitness.com These Pacific Heights bootcamp workout programs are designed by an army fitness trainer. START claims to be the oldest program of its kind in the country. Four-week bootcamp $199, from regular price of $290.

Bianchi Fitness 566 Dolores, SF. (415) 218-7045, www.bianchifitness.com Year-round outdoor fitness training in the Castro that takes advantage of the Bay Area’s natural beauty, offering group and individual classes. Take as many classes as you want during a two-week period for $75.

Body Mechanix Fitness Cooperative 219 Brannan, SF. (877) 658-4757, www.body-mechanix.com An independently-owned fitness cooperative in SoMa offering innovative training programs. $49 for a $120 certificate.

ODC School and Rhythm and Motion Dance Program 351 Shotwell, SF. (415) 863-9830, www.odcschool.org This Mission District mainstay offers classes in all styles of dance, from ballet to hip hop, at every level of ability, from amateur to professional. $14 per dance class, $7 for seniors and teens.

Chestnut Pilates 1877 Chestnut, SF. (415) 673-3280, www.chestnutpilates.com Run by dancer Cathie Caraker, this Cow Hollow studio guides students to toned abs and inner peace through a better understanding of the body. $60 for $80 certificate.

Primal Health and Training 1074 Folsom, SF. (510) 432-9648, www.primalhealthsf.com At his SoMa studio, Khalid Kohgadai teaches how to overcome inertia and unwanted weight gain through the methods that worked for him. $50 for two sessions.

Caitlin Weeks Nutrition and Personal Training 2435 Polk, Suite 8, SF. (415) 624-5121, www.grassfedgirl.com In Russian Hill, Weeks teaches methods for battling obesity gathered from her personal experience of dropping 80 pounds and keeping it off. $75 for a $100 certificate.

Yoga Garden 286 Divisadero, SF. (415) 552-9644, www.yogagardensf.com This tucked-away studio is committed to teaching safe, accessible classes in Iyengar, Asthanga, Vinyasa, Hatha and pre-natal yoga in the Lower Haight. Get a four-week introductory membership for $65. First timers score an hour-long massage for $49. Get a class-a-day membership plus monthly massage for $120/month.

Jamz Trainings 292 4th Street, Oakl. (415) 857-5269, www.jamztraining.com In Oakland, James Robinson customizes personal programs specializing in weight loss, athletic performance, motivation, and strengthening. $50 for $75 certificate.

Bridges Rock Gym 5635 San Diego, El Cerrito. (510) 525-5635, www.bridgesrockgym.com This El Cerrito gym offers indoor “bouldering,” relatively short climbs full of obstacle arrangements designed to test problem-solving skills. $25 for a three-visit pass and climbing gear.

 

BEAUTY

The Barber Lounge 854 Folsom, SF. (415) 934-0411, www.barberlounge.com This 2012 industrial warehouse approximation of an old-fashioned barbershop caters to men and women in sunny, art-bedecked loft space. $15 brow-shapings, Mon.-Fri. 4 p.m.-8 p.m. Book a cut and color and receive $20 off a facial or massage of at least 60 minutes.

John Francis Spa Martin De Porres Medical Building, 4200 18th St., Suite 101, SF. (415) 861-3000, www.johnfrancisspa.com The staff at this Castro spa offers holistic massage, waxing and skin care, plus mineral makeup, and tension relief foot treatments. Glycolic peels are reduced from $75 to $35 when combined with a facial. Registered clients receive 20 percent off on facials on their birthdays. $20 off when combining facial and massage on the same day.

Shear Bliss Salon 275 Gough, SF. (415) 255-8761, www.shearblisssalon.com These Aveda-trained stylists use eco-friendly styling techniques and products. The salon focuses on straight perms, coloring, extensions, and curly hair. New clients receive $20 off hair coloring.

San Francisco Community Acupuncture 220 Valencia, SF. (415)675-8973, www.missionsfca.com Affordable acupuncture is offered here in a comfortable, calm group setting. Pay $25-50 per treatment, sliding scale. Yelp users can receive a $40 gift certificate for $25.

Love Your Face SF 1075 Pacific, Suite A, SF. (415)529-2368, www.loveyourfacesf.com Curious about semi-permanent eyelash curling or eyelash-eyebrow tinting and ditching the daily regimen? LYF is the place to check out. Also: Ayuvedic ear treatments for wax removal and nourishment of the ear canal and drum. Refer a friend for $5 off your next service. Purchase five services and get one free. Yelp users get $50 worth of treatments for $35.

Earth Body 534 Laguna, SF. (415) 552-7200, www.earthbody.net This organic skin care spa takes a holistic, sustainable approach that draws on ancient traditions of healing. First time clients receive $15 off any treatment Mon.-Fri. Add a supplemental foot therapy, facial massage, or heated neck therapy to your session for free.

Chez Sylva 1310 8th Ave., SF. (415) 242-1100, www.chezsylva.com Salon offers waxing, threading, and a number of signature facials, but is best known for electrolysis and permanent hair removal. New clients receive a 10 percent discount on first treatment. Mention its website and receive an additional 5 percent discount.

Flourish Skin and Wax 1905 Union, SF. (415) 370-6559, www.flourishskinandwax.com Cheerful pastel walls and mellow music here eases the usual pain of waxing. Perfectionist waxers can satisfy even the most sensitive skin types. Book a Flourish facial and receive a complimentary cleanser; book a Brazilian wax and receive a complimentary brow wax.

Rincon Chiropractic Massage and Acupuncture 101 Howard, Suite D, SF. (415) 896-2225, www.rinconchiro.com Rincon focuses on the relationship between the structure and function of your spine. It provides a wide range of services, like rehabilitation therapies, mother-to-be, and stress-relieving massages. $25 off for students who bring in a valid student ID. Yelp users can get a $90 specialty massage for $50.

Tiptoes Nail Spa 300 De Haro, Suite 336, SF. (415) 626-9637, www.tiptoesnailspa.com This swanky Potrero Hill spot uses vegan and DBP, touelene and formaldehyde-free nail polish as well as botanical-based, petrochemical-free products. Go for a relaxing ambiance, cool chairs, and free Red Vines. Early bird special: mani-pedis for $35 before 3 p.m.

Curl Up and Dye Beauty Salon 350 Alabama, SF. (415) 861-2515, www.curlupanddyesf.net Ally likes big hair and monster movies. Jerry likes cheeseburgers and tight fades. Both have trained with Vidal Sassoon, Bumble and bumble, and Kevin Murphy. Both have devoted clients who come back time and time again for bold cuts and sexy styles. Receive $20 off a cut or color with either stylist.

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