INQUIRER: A teenage boy was shot four times — twice in the head, once in the chest and once in the back — this afternoon outside one of the city’s disciplinary schools in Feltonville. Initial information was sketchy, but this much was known: The victim, described only as a 16-year-old male, was shot a by another male teenager — wearing a black hoodie — who escaped running through a nearby cemetery. The victim is described as being in “extremely critical condition,” by a police spokesperson. MORE
HELP WANTED: Reading Is Fundamental
Do you like to read books? Do you have an opinion of those books you read? Can you speak English? Do you secretly long to be a pompous-and-opiniated-but-always articulate-witty-and-absolutely-correct-about-everything book reviewer for the metroblog of record in the sixth largest metropolis in the United States of America? If so, drop us a line at feed@phawker.com. Because in these hard times, you need free books — and Phawker needs book reviews that taste great don’t suck. RELATED: The Sun-Times Media Group, owner of the Chicago Sun-Times and dozens of suburban newspapers, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Tuesday, making it the fifth […]
CINEMA: Our Daily Film Fest Picks
PHANTOM PUNCH (2008, directed by Robert Townsend, 112 minutes, U.S.) Tonight is your only chance to catch up with the latest film from Robert Townsend, who broke into the business in a big way twenty-two years ago with the black comic satire Hollywood Shuffle. Townsend has never recaptured that early success, although he has continued to direct, helming TV biopics of both Natalie Cole and Little Richard. In Phantom Punch Townsend tackles the biography of former Heavyweight Champ Sonny Liston, the hard-punching fighter who back in the sixties struck fear into fighters like few others. The always reliable Ving Rhames […]
CONFICKER WORM: Pearl Harbor Or April’s Fool?
DOW JONES NEWSWIRE: Security experts have sounded the alarm — and many others are just as loudly trying to quell the furor — over fears the Conficker computer worm could trigger Internet havoc on April 1. Some security researchers have warned that Conficker could unleash the equivalent of a “digital Pearl Harbor,” while others have suggested it could be world’s biggest April Fool’s joke. No one knows for sure what will happen on Wednesday when as many as 10 million computers infected by Conficker start “phoning home” for new instructions from the worm’s creators. Multiple versions of the worm, which […]
THIS TOO SHALL PASS: The End Of Rush?
VANITY FAIR: The dirty little secret of conservative talk radio is that the average age of listeners is 67 and rising, according to Sinton—the Fox News audience, likewise, is in its mid-60s: “What sort of continuing power do you have as your audience strokes out?” You can begin to make plausibly large statements about the end of—or at least a crisis in—conservative media. “There are fewer advertisers, fewer listeners, shrinking networks, shallower penetration,” says Sinton. “A lowering tide lowers all ships.” What’s more, it’s the Internet that is the fast-growing and arguably more powerful political medium—and it is the province […]
GAS, GRASS OR ASS: Nobody Rides For Free
[CLICK TO ENLARGE] DETROIT FREE PRESS: President Barack Obama took charge of Detroit’s auto industry Monday, vowing to transform it into a world leader in fuel-efficient vehicles — but demanding a plan of action within two months. Obama compared the decline of Detroit to a natural disaster, saying it deserved the same kind of emergency attention. But he warned that, within 60 days, General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC would either be on a path to independence or on their way out. MORE NEW YORK TIMES: President Obama struck an acceptable compromise on Monday between two unappealing options: letting General Motors […]
We Know It’s Only Rock N’ Roll But We Like It
KILLER WALES: Los Campesinos, TLA, Last Night BY MICHAEL DONOVAN You’ve got to hand it to Los Campesinos! — the little Welsh band that could —they sure know how to cater to an American audience. Fast songs with infectious hooks that anyone can dance too? Check. Attractive-yet-prickly bass player who rejects Joe Fraternity’s professions of love from the back of the venue? Check. References to robots? Check. Los Campesinos! have discovered the formula for across-the-pond success, and it doesn’t hurt that they’ve pumped out two stellar albums in the past year, either. After solid opening sets by Sky Larkin and […]
TOO MUCH SEXY TIME: MPAA Slaps NC-17 On Bruno
THE WRAP: Universal’s ”Bruno,” the widely anticipated Sacha Baron Cohen docu-comedy opening in July, has been slapped with an NC-17 rating on its first submission to the Motion Picture Association of America because of numerous sexual scenes that the ratings board considers over the line, according to the studio releasing the film. Among the objectionable scenes is one in which Bruno — a gay Austrian fashionista played by Baron Cohen — appears to have anal sex with a man on camera. In another, the actor goes on a hunting trip and sneaks naked into the tent of one of the […]
CINEMA: Our Daily Film Fest Picks
PLAGUE TOWN (2008, directed by David Gregory, 88 minutes, U.S.) Upstate Connecticut stands in for Ireland as a bickering American family playing tourist in a creepy rural town comes to wish they’d enjoyed their Guinness at home. The game cast starts out well but it soon becomes apparent that they’re stuck screaming and running through a predictable zombie film. The mute bride-to-be with doll eyes is a nicely spooky touch but if you’re rolling out a zombie movie at this late date you best be spinning some novel approach. Instead Plague Town is a meal of repackaged scares even the […]
WORTH REPEATING: Return Of The Robber Barons
ATLANTIC: In its depth and suddenness, the U.S. economic and financial crisis is shockingly reminiscent of moments we have recently seen in emerging markets (and only in emerging markets): South Korea (1997), Malaysia (1998), Russia and Argentina (time and again). In each of those cases, global investors, afraid that the country or its financial sector wouldn’t be able to pay off mountainous debt, suddenly stopped lending. And in each case, that fear became self-fulfilling, as banks that couldn’t roll over their debt did, in fact, become unable to pay. This is precisely what drove Lehman Brothers into bankruptcy on September […]
MAURICE JARRE: Somewhere My Love
BBC: French composer Maurice Jarre, best known for his music for Hollywood films, has died in Los Angeles at 84, after suffering from cancer. Jarre, father of the composer Jean-Michel Jarre, rose to prominence relatively late in life. His breakthrough came in 1962 when he wrote the score for Lawrence of Arabia, for which he was awarded an Oscar. He won two further Oscars for Doctor Zhivago and A Passage to India, and composed music for more than 150 films. MORE
CONCERT REVIEW: Top Five Things You Should Know About Asobi Seksu At Johnny Brendas Last Night
LOOMER: Asobi Seksu, Johnny Brendas, Last Night 1. Studio magic be damned. Let it be known now that Asobi Seksu know how to create that beautiful wall of noisy fuzz live, and do we ever love them for it. You can tell we love them for it when the crowd will wait around for an encore even when James Hanna puts a guitar face down on an amp before leaving and let the fans cheer at the face-melting feedback solo. 2. I was wondering about this for quite some time, and yes, Asobi Seksu does have a rhythm section. 3. […]
THE WAGES OF TORTURE: Zero Terror Plots Were Foiled By The Waterboard Confessions Of Abu Zubaida
WASHINGTON POST: When CIA officials subjected their first high-value captive, Abu Zubaida, to waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods, they were convinced that they had in their custody an al-Qaeda leader who knew details of operations yet to be unleashed, and they were facing increasing pressure from the White House to get those secrets out of him. The methods succeeded in breaking him, and the stories he told of al-Qaeda terrorism plots sent CIA officers around the globe chasing leads. In the end, though, not a single significant plot was foiled as a result of Abu Zubaida’s tortured confessions, according to […]