4 d. ago Dig! XX review – amazing film of battling 90s psych rockers revisited two decades on

Rereleased documentary study of the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre is an epic story of success and failureAfter 20 years, Ondi Timoner has rereleased her riveting and colossal documentary study of two psych rock bands, the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre, and their epic dual story of success and failure. There is about 40 minutes of extra material and a present-day coda that reveals, among other things, that each band has a member who now sells real estate. That ending, brutally and suddenly visiting grey-haired middle age on these gorgeous rock’n’roll exquisites, reminded me of the Fellini-esque dream opening to Woody Allen’s Stardust Memories in which two trains, one carrying life’s winners and the other with hapless losers, wind up at the same dusty rubbish heap.Dig! XX, which took years to shoot, is alternately narrated by the Warhols’ frontman, Courtney Taylor-Taylor, and the BJM’s relentlessly goofy tambourine player, Joel Gion, and it shows the ...

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7 d. ago Just Another Girl on the IRT review – Leslie Harris takes on race, sex and class in 90s indie gem

Ariyan A Johnson stars as the back-talking, fourth wall-breaking high schooler who falls pregnant in Harris’s rough and ready dramaThere’s an undimmed freshness, warmth and freewheeling energy in this 1992 indie gem, and its director Leslie Harris – whose career since has chiefly involved writing and teaching – deserves a far bigger presence in US film history. Ariyan A Johnson plays Chantel, a young Black American high schooler who lives with her stressed parents and two kid brothers in Brooklyn (in an era before its gentrification) and rides the subway’s IRT Eastern Parkway line.Chantel is getting great grades in school, and plans to be a doctor, but is addicted to talking back to the teachers and won’t restrain herself, even when she’s sent to the principal’s office. Her relationship with her mother and father is just as fraught – and as far as dating goes, Chantel is not going to sell herself short. And when she finally has sex with her boyfriend Tyrone (Kevin Thigpen), dizzied ...

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1 week ago Clueless, The Musical review: 90s nostalgia fest with KT Tunstall sprinkling her magic

The stars were out in force for the launch of Clueless, The Musical this week. The 90s classic is the latest cult movie to be given the West End treatment and does not disappoint thanks to powerhouse performances, stunning sets and one incredible soundtrack

Politics

1 week ago Clueless The Musical actress Emma Flynn on playing icon Cher

The noughties classic has been given a musical makeover, but it's not just the film where the actors can draw on for inspiration

Culture

1 week ago Nova Scotia House by Charlie Porter review – radical visions of gay 90s London

Memories of love and heartbreak during the Aids epidemic are brought vividly to life in this exhilarating, risk-taking debutHalfway through his debut novel, Charlie Porter has a character ask the question that still haunts generations of British gay men: “What am I to do with this anger?” The book is Porter’s answer. The starting point is simple. Johnny is 19, and on the run from a small-town childhood; arriving in London, he falls in love with Jerry, who is 45 and HIV positive. Their affair coincides exactly with the last four years in which the virus was untreatable; Jerry dies of an Aids-related illness in the summer of 1995, just months before effective combination therapies began to be prescribed.Twenty-six years later, Johnny is still living in Jerry’s flat. This is in the Nova Scotia House of the title, an oasis of public housing in one of the last pockets of unredeveloped land in London’s East End. Inevitably, a tower of flats is now being built right nex...

Politics

2 w. ago Clueless: The Musical in London is like so not fixable — theatre review

Clueless: The Musical in London is like so not fixable — theatre review  Financial Times

Culture

2 w. ago Clueless the Musical at Trafalgar Theatre review: powerfully sung, and actually, like, kinda fun

In the ranks of musical adaptations of cult movies, this is almost as good as Legally Blonde, and it’s what Mean Girls should have been

Culture

3 w. ago Clueless, The Musical: The ultimate 90s nostalgia trip hits London’s West End

Clueless, The Musical: The ultimate 90s nostalgia trip hits London’s West End  attitude.co.uk

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