By Skip Sheffield
The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts & Letters at Florida Atlantic University is presenting Michael Hollinger’s film noir spy movie spoof “Red Herring” at 8 p.m. Friday, April 16 and Saturday April 17 and 2 p.m. Sunday April 18 at Florida Atlantic University’s Studio One Theater. The show debuted at the university venue last weekend.
Tickets are $16 and group rates are available. Call 800-564-9539.
Delray Beach has 48th “Affair”
How long has the Delray Affair been going on?
Promoters say the arts, crafts and entertainment extravaganza held last weekend is more than 50 years old, but they are counting a long-gone Gladiola Festival that began in 1947 and faded out in the 1950s.
The current Delray Affair was begun in 1962 by a group of Delray Beach businesses that wanted to stimulate sales in the slowdown after Easter weekend.
This year’s event had more than 800 artists and scores of art and craft vendors set up in a ten-block area from Swinton Avenue to the Intracoastal.
Strolling entertainment was provided by Dall as the Fire Guy, Niktorius and Will Soto. Eclipse was set up in Veteran’s Park.
Admission was free and more than 250,000 people were said to have attended.
Propaganda Lake Worth Celebrates First Anniversary
Propaganda, the concert club at 6 S. J St., Lake Worth, celebrated its first anniversary Saturday, April 10 with four bands and free admission.
Full disclosure: one of the bands: Zombies! Organize! Features my daughters Laura and Mary and Mary’s husband Bob Jividen.
Others on the bill were Sweet Bronco, Everymen and the Jameses.
Not Much Sense in “After.Life”
I went to the film, “After.Life” hoping to see a serious examination of the near-death experience.
I went home disappointed.
“After.Life” stars Christina Ricci as Anna, a young schoolteacher caught in limbo between life and death, Liam Neeson as the undertaker who knows of her predicament but seems unwilling to help her, and Justin Long as Paul, her boyfriend who cries crocodile tears but is otherwise ineffective.
“Seems” is the operative word here, because we never know what’s going on with creepy Eliot Deacon (Neeson), who runs a one-man funeral home in a gloomy gray Gothic mansion. Is he a sensitive soul with a special empathy for the dying and dead, or is he simply a lunatic?
This first effort by writer director Agieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo is an ineffective hodgepodge of horror film clichés and gory jolts. The mostly naked Ricci catches your attention, but the mind wanders after the first half hour or so and at 90 minutes the film seems long and pointless.
“The Runaways” a lurid, entertaining cautionary tale
A scene from "The Runaways"
On a more positive note, “The Runaways” is an entertaining look at America’s first all-girl punk band, The Runaways.
The girl-on-girl kiss between Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning has overshadowed what is a rather good biopic by director Floria Sigismondi, who co-wrote the screenplay with Cherie Currie, based on her tell-all book, “Neon Angel.”
Cherie Currie was the lead singer of The Runaways, hand-picked by manager Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon), simply because of her look. Just 15-year-years-old, Cherie (Dakota Fanning) reminded Fowley of a jailbait Brigitte Bardot.
Shannon is the star player and over-the-top villain who insists to the five girls that are The Runaways that sex sells, and if they want to be successful, they have to flaunt it.
The creative mastermind of The Runaways was guitarist, singer and songwriter Joan Jett, played by “Twilight’s” teen star, Kristen Stewart.
Joan Jett was to Cherie Currie what Mick Jagger was to Keith Richards: the former more focused and career-minded, and the latter more libertine, thrill-seeking and out-of-control.
If anything “The Runways” is a cautionary tale about the dangers of alcohol and drugs- especially for the young and naïve.
Cherie Currie burned out and fell into the abyss of addictions. This is the story of her return to real life. It is remarkably well done by two fearless young actresses and an older actor who relishes playing the exploitive, mercenary cad, entertaining us in the process.