by Christina Waters | Sep 21, 2010 | Home, Movies |
Dutch director Anton Corbijn makes beautiful people and places look, well, beautiful.
Corbijn hasn’t an idea in his head, but he knows how to make ancient cobblestone stairways look blitheringly atmospheric. He knows how to show off buck naked actors, and their assets, to voyeuristic perfection.
He knows how to photograph George Clooney’s best angles. (And yes, there are quite a few of those.)
But he really has no clue as to how to create an absorbing cinematic experience. Pity really.
So much to work with, so little point.
The American is a non-film disguised as (more…)
by Christina Waters | Sep 17, 2010 | Food, Home |
Somebody once said that one picture was worth a thousand sips of sangiovese.
Like this one.
by Christina Waters | Sep 16, 2010 | Food, Home |
Our house.
Last week.
Dressed with Meyer lemon, olive oil and infant shiso leaves.
Perfectly ripe.
by Christina Waters | Sep 16, 2010 | Home, Wine |
It’s the first Santa Cruz Mountain pinot noir from the 2008 vintage I’ve tasted, and now I know why this beautiful creation from Thomas Fogarty Winery took a gold at the recent SF Chronicle competition.
This full-throated wine is loaded with complex aromatic information, and the flavors just go on and on. Dark plums and tamarind, an undercurrent of licorice and bay leaves, a suggestion of tangerine peel and black pepper — all of these gorgeous notes are delivered by a prime 14.1% alcohol content. Enough to carry the experience, yet definitely not engaged in the fruit bomb California stereotype.
Within reach too, at under $22 a bottle. Try Shoppers and New Leaf, but definitely try this lovely pinot noir.
by Christina Waters | Sep 14, 2010 | Home, Movies |
Eat Pray love is either better or worse than I expected. Like a wine that cannot be technically faulted, yet fails to engage the senses, this film seems to lack any distinction.
What it does have is a few fleeting glimpses of a potentially great actress struggling to break out of her contemporary, aging babe, Pretty Woman strait (sic) jacket. So frustrating, this one. The film is somehow packed to the hilt with clich̩s Рwise little brown people, ex-pats finding each other and eating, dancing and drinking with gusto, peasant women disapproving of single women Рyet also misses rich opportunities to bombard us with Hallmark moments.
St. Peter’s dome by sunset – a perfect all-purpose establishing shot that tells us we, and Liz Gilbert (the author/protagonist), are in Rome. You can practically smell the garlic and taste the wine. Yet we don’t get many glamor shots of the Eternal City. Instead we submit to silly new friends bonding episodes — so much so that between Roberts’ pleading eyes (more…)
