André 3000 Says Happy Valentine's Day: February 2006 Reviews

And there's so much fuss about Santa Claus
But see Cupid will
not be defeated.
Happy Valentine's Day,
every day the 14th!
--Outkast, Speaker-
boxxx/The Love Below

These are some of the reviews I'm working on for this month.

Amazon: The Newsroom - The Complete Second Season [two-disc set] (clever Canadian sitcom verité, but not as funny as that first amazing season), New York Doll (moving portrait of the late Arthur "Killer" Kane, bass player for the New York Dolls), Sugarcubes - The DVD (crude, but fun), Yellowcard - Lights and Sounds (slick LA-by-way-of-FL pop-punk), The Chess Players (entertaining historical allegory from the legendary Satyajit Ray), Tristram Shandy - A Cock and Bull Story (Michael Winterbottom's amusingly digressive take on the famously digressive novel), Rhett Miller - The Believer (third solo effort from the Old 97's frontman), and Who's That Girl (Yes! The infamous Madonna debacle; co-written by Newsroom creator Ken Finkleman).

Seattle Film Blog: Darwin's Nightmare (harrowing, Oscar-nominated
documentary about the deleterious effects of globalization on
Tanzania--and by extension, the entire Third World), Who
Gets to Call It Art? (lively documentary about Met curat-
or Henry Geldzahler, Andy Warhol pal and all-around
modern art proponent), and Sophie Scholl - The Fin-
al Days (heartbreaking tribute to the anti-Nazi
heroine, another deserving Oscar nominee).

Endnote: Outkast image from the AMG, which notes that
they have a record coming out this year. According to the latest
Mojo, "Idlewild, a musical set in a speakeasy in the South in the
'30s, sees André 3000 portraying piano player Percival and Big
Boi as singing club manager Rooster. The two have to see off gang-
sters who want to take their club over, with dancing." About the
soundtrack, set for release in April: " 'There's a lot of piano play-
ing, a lot of ragtime, Cab Calloway, Jelly Roll (Morton),' says Big
Boi, who promises a 1930s flavour and lots of surprises. 'It's a
very mature album, it's rapping and everything else.' "