Trend spotters (and actresses) take note. This season John Cusack is struggling with parenthood and worlds of sorrow: In Martian Child he plays a novelist widower hoping to adopt a small, broken boy, and in the forthcoming Grace Is Gone his working-stiff widower grapples with trying to break the bad news to his girls. In each movie the beloved is already out of the picture, which allows Cusack instantly to take possession of the screen with his trademark sensitivity. Nice guys rule, and don't you forget it.
Cusack receives fierce competition in the "aw" department in Martian Child from a golden retriever (the noble Bud) and a wee killer called Dennis (Bobby Coleman), who arrives in a cardboard box literally marked "Fragile" and "Handle With Care," and who comes equipped with trembling lips and a load of cute. But Cusack is not one to relinquish the spotlight without a fight. Like W.C. Fields he takes the challenge presented by animals and children seriously. And so he bobs, weaves, weeps, plays with the volume, kisses the girl (bashfully, naturally), stutters and smiles, tucking his chin just enough to make those dark, pooling eyes look even more inviting. Come on in, the water's just fine.
Written by Seth Bass and Jonathan Tolins from David Gerrold's short story, Martian Child is 100 percent goo. There's nothing wrong with the setup - man meets boy, surrenders heart - but there's little right about the delivery. Menno Meyjes, who last directed Cusack in Max, appears never to have met a visual cliche he didn't want to embrace, an emotion he didn't want to milk or an obvious idea he didn't want to broadcast. He lets Cusack cut loose and go lazy, while the support team (Joan Cusack, Oliver Platt, Amanda Peet) smilingly basks in the star's glow. You might think that Bobby Coleman wouldn't stand a chance, but this kid bats his lashes like Joan Fontaine. The audience wept; I just cried uncle.
PHOTO: COURTESY OF ARM
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
Taiwan’s post-World War II architecture, “practical, cheap and temporary,” not to mention “rather forgettable.” This was a characterization recently given by Taiwan-based historian John Ross on his Formosa Files podcast. Yet the 1960s and 1970s were, in fact, the period of Taiwan’s foundational building boom, which, to a great extent, defined the look of Taiwan’s cities, determining the way denizens live today. During this period, functionalist concrete blocks and Chinese nostalgia gave way to new interpretations of modernism, large planned communities and high-rise skyscrapers. It is currently the subject of a new exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Modern
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and