Small Screen Clean
Olivier Assayas’ Clean opens in cinematic contemplativeness, with a series of views of lakeside smokestacks exhaling industrial clouds, haunting and ominous, by night and then by dawn. Then we’re dropped amidst a curious little bustle: Aging rock musicians on a low-budget tour, unpacking their sedan by daylight in the parking lot of a…
Current Events
When the words “Banksville Wildlife Sanctuary” appeared in a notice about a new stream-maintenance project along Banksville Road, I knew not to picture silver water in a sylvan setting. The wildest life on this busy route from the Ft. Pitt Tunnels to Mt Lebanon is the people trying to cross on foot. But I thought…
The Primadonna Restaurant
Location: 801 Broadway, McKees Rocks. 412-331-1001 Hours: Mon.-Sat. 4-11 p.m. Prices: Starters $7-13, entrées and pasta $18-25 Fare: Italian-American Atmosphere: Old-school Continental Liquor: Full bar Smoking: Designated areas If the 1980s movie Back to the Future taught us anything, it’s that DeLoreans were overrated. No, wait, that was what we realized in hindsight. The movie…
Cut!
It seems like nobody likes Dawn Keezer. Well, somebody does: She just got married. Keezer is the head of the Pittsburgh Film Office. She was once accused of embezzling money from the Film Office. Then they audited her and she was cleared. Funny thing, though … the guy she’s marrying? He was convicted of embezzling…
Penn State’s Portland in a Storm
In April, Penn State University handed down a decision following an in-house investigation of women’s basketball coach Rene Portland, who had allegedly been operating the women’s basketball program in violation of the university’s non-discrimination policy. Penn State’s actions were unprecedented. Portland’s response was not. She responded to the decision the way she has responded all…
Green Party’s Political Deforms
To live outside the two-party system, you must be honest. Bob Dylan said that, more or less. Too bad he never signed Carl Romanelli’s election petition. A lot of other celebrities — alive and dead — have supported Pennsylvania’s Green candidate for U.S. Senate. Supposedly. Among the signatures found on Romanelli’s petitions: Robert Redford, Lee…
A Conversation with Sarah Claire Morton
At 19 years old, Pittsburgh-born Sarah Claire Morton is a poet who coordinates the monthly “Beautiful Noise” spoken-word/music event at Brillobox (www.myspace.com/beautifulnoiseatbrillobox). But Morton doesn’t just commune with her muse: She actively chases the thing. Morton was the youngest female competitor in the recent Pittsburgh Triathlon, which features a 1.5-kilometer swim…
The Smart Girl’s Guide to Porn
It’s a long and torturous wait for the money shot in The Smart Girl’s Guide to Porn, and when it finally comes the payoff is paltry. Blogger, sex columnist and porn pundit Violet Blue sets out to explain how and why women of all types and sexual orientations can, do and…
The Fourth Annual City Paper Short-Fiction Contest: Sex
Given that our short-fiction contest last year bore the benign, even potentially wholesome, theme of “river stories,” we here at City Paper feared that going with a “sex” theme this year would look like pandering. Pandering to writers, to readers, to casual passersby … even to some of the upstanding advertisers whose candid photography you…
CourtsSex-for-Drugs Case Tries Top Court
The United States Supreme Court will announce Oct. 2 whether it plans to hear the appeal of a Plum doctor, Bernard Rottschaefer, convicted two years ago of distributing narcotics to his patients in exchange for sex. The court is Rottschaefer’s last chance to overturn his March 2004 conviction, in which a federal court found…
Who Killed the Electric Car?
Chris Paine’s documentary-cum-elegy Who Killed the Electric Car? begins with a funeral. It’s July 2003, and the black-beribboned deceased at the Hollywood Forever cemetery is Saturn’s EV1, a sleek, battery-powered coupe. Mourners in dark glasses read eulogies … “goodbye to a friend, to an idea.” Cars die all the time, you might say,…
Panhandling Battle … Unsubtle Diplomacy
After putting his cup out along Sixth Avenue next to the Duquesne Club on Aug. 3, Elvis Jefferson (left) had an unwelcome neighbor: a Pittsburgh “Safety Ambassador” being paid $9.50 an hour to convince passers-by not to give Jefferson money. It’s one aspect of the new Safety Ambassador program created by the Pittsburgh Downtown…
Wheels Turning for New Bike Lanes
Bicycle commuting along Liberty Avenue is about to become less treacherous, with bike lanes and, bike advocates hope, shared lane markings. After a year of working with the City Planning department, Bike Pittsburgh Executive Director Scott Bricker says bike lanes are set to go on Liberty between Ligonier Street in Lawrenceville and the Bloomfield…
PAT Called Placard Laggard
Since 2000, former convicts have been eligible to vote, even if they are on probation or parole. But the county’s buses won’t yet be the vehicle to get the facts to ex-offenders who may not be aware of the rules change. For six months, the ACLU and the League of Young Voters have tried…
Little Miss Sunshine
Little Miss Sunshine may signal a new genre: indie lite. A huge audience hit at Sundance this year, Little Miss Sunshine appears to be the logical distillation of 20 years of marketing independent cinema to a mass audience increasingly primed to receive it … as long as such films hit a few familiar…
Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos
I hung a photo of Cosmos soccer player Shep Messing on my wall, in the late 1970s. Not sure why. The memory just popped up, disconnected from its context, while watching Paul Crowder and John Dower’s thoroughly engaging documentary about U.S. professional soccer in the 1970s, Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story…
