The Rake: Sidelines

A Rakish Interview with Best-Selling Author Darin Strauss

Max Ross — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 18:10:26 -0500

"If you don't belong to a book club," Ron Charles wrote in The Washington Post last week, "Darin Strauss's bitter and brilliant new novel is reason enough to start one." The novel - Strauss's third - marks a departure from the author's previous books, both of which were (somewhat incidentally) historical fiction. More Than It Hurts You sets us in über-modern Long Island, a place where George Clooney, Austin Powers, and "Everybody Loves Raymond" all figure into the collective consciousness (while Fitzgerald and Tolstoy hide in the shadows).

Solstice Film Festival — It's a Killer

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 01:15:45 -0500

Killer Movie, a tongue-in-cheek story of a reality television shoot in a northern border town that goes terrifyingly awry, will open the third annual Solstice Film Festival (June 19-21) at Galtier Plaza in downtown St. Paul. The movie premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival (founded by Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal) in New York last month, but this will be its Minnesota premiere—a fitting start as it was shot almost entirely in Minnesota.

The Man Behind Bigger, Stronger, Faster

Cristina Cordova — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 09:29:30 -0500

Thanks for taking the time to talk to The Rake. I throughly enjoyed the film. How did you get into film, particularly documentary film making?

Well, it's interesting, I didn't ever want to make a documentary, but my brothers and I had been talking about the whole steroid issue, and I was already a filmmaker at the USC film school. I was also probably the only filmmaker who is a power lifter (I can bench press 500 lbs) so between lifting weights and making movies and it was the kind of the time to put them both together I guess.

Bikram Blues

Cristina Cordova — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 00:52:00 -0500

It's 105 degrees in here, and I can't place the smell. Somewhere between hot feet and freshly popped kettle corn. Not distractingly smelly, but enough to remind me that I'm not at the Y, and I didn't fall asleep in the sauna. This is Bikram Yoga.

Living the Dream

Cristina Cordova — Tue, 20 May 2008 17:27:27 -0500

Taghazout, Morocco — It's a postcard Malibu Beach view from the second floor balcony of a reclusive African surf camp. There's a warm breeze. A few rocks and a broken formation of surfers crown the sea. The offbeat tinkle of a distant camel bell mixed with cries from trinket vendors is the lazy rhythm on this beach. The scene is so exotic you want to keep it a secret — then again, it's such a beautiful place, you have to tell someone.

Mikenastics: 50 Years and Tumbling

Cristina Cordova — Fri, 16 May 2008 23:52:32 -0500

They don't know what to expect, and why would they, they're just passing by with dogs or strollers on this sleepy Coon Rapids sidewalk, and out of nowhere a stout bald man wearing nothing but cutoff jeans or tight shorts comes bolting down the side yard, throws his hands forward, leaps toward a padded sawhorse, and, if all goes well, flips up and lands on his feet.

Enter the World of Brian Andreas and the Story People

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 08 May 2008 16:03:29 -0500

Once upon a time there was a young girl who wandered in search of a very specific story. She looked in bookstores and couldn't find it. She walked through library stacks but never found it. Finally, she went to the storyteller himself. He was sitting in a park, waiting for her. He seemed eager to help. But when she asked, he said he had never heard such a story.

"But you wrote it!" said the girl. "It had a grandfather and a granddaughter who were fishing on a lake in a blue boat."

Franco-American Relations, Indeed

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:19:20 -0500

A smattering of bonjours and soft smiles accompanied the light, nervous energy that breezed through the Alliance Française this particular Monday morning. Huge croissants and berries lay untouched on the table as hosts and hostesses pinned tricolored nametags to their jackets and blouses.

Meet Local Filmmaker Jon Springer

Cristina Cordova — Tue, 06 May 2008 13:15:17 -0500

Local filmmaker Jon Springer's new film The Hagstone Demon will be shown as a free sneak preview Thursday, May 8, at the Riverview Theater. The film stars Mark Borchardt, the subject of the Sundance award-winning documentary American Movie, which made him a cult celebrity of the indie film set.

From Devil's Food to the Dark Side

Cristina Cordova — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:11:00 -0500

Betty Crocker is perfect. She bakes flawless pies and gives sage advice, such as: "A fricasse without dumplings is like a wedding without a bride." Also, unlike another domestic goddess that we know of, she's never been in the slammer. It's easy to be the perfect woman, though, when you don't actually exist. An invention of General Mills, Crocker was created to sell flour and serve as the company's face.

Oral Distractions

Cristina Cordova — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 10:07:17 -0500

"I'm probably more middle of the road than most people I went to film school with," says Dan Orozco, host of Butter City, the hottest talk show to cover filmmaking since Siskel and Ebert ruled the airwaves, "I like movies that I can eat a whole thing of popcorn and drink a whole can of soda to. I think Truffaut called those ‘oral distractions' because he hated movie theaters that sold that stuff."

Errol Morris Speaks

Cristina Cordova — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 09:19:30 -0500

In his latest documentary, Standard Operating Procedure, Errol Morris is addressing questions no one has bothered to ask and finding answers no one has bothered to tell.

The Surreal Bourgeois Life of Eluded Love

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 02:50:05 -0500

Ra'mon-Lawrence A. Coleman
Hometown: Chicago, Il. (born and raised on the South Side)

Meet Aaron

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 23:07:11 -0500

Aaron Eckhart doesn't like too much attention. It makes him uncomfortable, which oddly enough, isn't such an odd thing for an actor. Sure, there are artists that live for the limelight, but then there are others that live for the art (not that you can't live for both, mind you). Eckhart is not a spotlight fiend. That much is clear. He doesn't look uncomfortable, mind you, but he tells me so; and it's clear from his quiet, pensive approach that he's not out for the big headline, that he's not going to flex his muscles to impress me.

"God talked to me today"

Cristina Cordova — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 14:10:01 -0500

The first time it happened, he was sitting in the kitchen behind me.

I was at the counter cutting vegetables for dinner when my older son said, "When God talked to me earlier today, before I went to school..."

That's how he spoke as a child. He was only 11, but his diction was formal, biblical almost, and he habitually attached clauses to make his points more precise. If he heard from God, it would be important to know not only that it was today and that it was early but also that it had occurred before school.

The Art of Coffee

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 13:23:18 -0500

Sea green walls, worn wood floors, granite table tops, and ruby red chairs surround the counter. It looks and feels like any other coffee house, but what happens behind the bar only happens at Kopplin’s Coffee.

Minnesota Naughty

Cristina Cordova — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 10:31:45 -0500

The lights dimmed, and a hush fell over the Ritz Theater. Two hundred and fifty bodies leaned forward in anticipation, and two hundred and fifty sets of eyes stared straight ahead at the empty stage. The audience remained suspended in this moment as the silence caressed their ears and the darkness teased their imaginations. Then, in a sudden burst of sound, the band started playing and the tension was broken.

The Men Who Sold the World

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 12:41:38 -0600

Two men. Father and son. One dead, one living. Both entertainers, choosing different paths in show business to make their mark. The father was Mel Jass, television ad man without peer, best remembered as the host of Matinee Movie and the Wonderful World of Movies with Mel Jass on WTCN Channel 11 (later KARE-11).

Attack on the Border

Cristina Cordova — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 16:13:31 -0600

By the disposition of officials in the Colombian border town of Ipiales early on Saturday, March 1, one never would have guessed what happened only hours earlier, roughly 200 km south, near the Ecuadorian town of Angostura.

“We Can’t Really Control it Yet.”

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 15:12:30 -0600

“Johnson is our name, cheering is our game!” The chants of a cheerleading squad echoed faintly inside Colin Denis’s classroom one winter afternoon at John A. Johnson High School in St. Paul’s inner-city Payne-Phalen neighborhood. Denis, looking the very epitome of a high-school science teacher with his wispy hair, thick glasses, and lab coat, collected papers from two lingering students. “OK,” Denis told them, “now I’ll take you down to see the robot.” The girls giggled with excitement.

Fashioning a Movement

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 12:06:30 -0600

To highlight our semi-annual selection of new fashion, we turned to a population that—let’s face it, unfair as it seems—looks delightful no matter what they’re wearing. Our models are four dance students at the University of Minnesota and their choreographer (who moonlights as The Rake’s stylist); we captured them during a rehearsal at the Barbara Barker Center for Dance on the Minneapolis campus.

Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 15:20:50 -0600

Sally Strle was showering in her house in Virginia, Minnesota, when the vision appeared in her mind: an open Bible with the words Rest On His Word scrolled on the pages and a pillow adorned with Catholic art and scripture.

“I could see the beautiful pictures, even the phrase ‘Rest On His Word’ there, and I knew that God was calling me to do this business,” recalls Sally, fifty-four, a full-time mother and grandmother.

Stupid Is as Stupid Does

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:50:52 -0600

A story appeared in The New York Times on Valentine’s Day with the headline “Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?” It cited several recent books that bemoan America’s seeming self-satisfaction in the knowledge, that, well, we don’t need no knowledge, ’cause we’re Amurricans.

Creep Show Couture

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 15:35:13 -0600

“Do you ladies sew?” asked Rae Lundquist, a five-foot, fifty-something with a confident manner and long, silvering brown hair falling past her waist. Lundquist serves as costume director of MarsCon, a sci-fi convention that celebrates its tenth anniversary this month. As part of her duties, she had organized an educational field trip for her fellow costumiers.

Simulated Madness

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:59:12 -0600

Who could forget the game last December when Douglas Stewart, the low-scoring walk-on from Minneapolis, stepped out from the shadows of his all-conference teammates to lead the Annapolis Fightin’ Crabs to a national championship?

You’re forgiven if you don’t follow the defending champs; they don’t, alas, exist in the realm people persist in calling the “real world,” but rather as data warriors in the complex alternate universe that is SimulatedSports.com College Basketball.

All the News That Fits—and Then Some

Lisa Pahl — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 12:24:23 -0600

There’s an awful lot of talk about the news lately, but not, unfortunately, the sort of constructive conversation that promotes critical thinking and engages people with their neighborhoods, their country, or their world. No, what people are talking about is the media, or, more specifically, and more onerously, the business of media. The Star Tribune is losing readers, pages, and staff.

Crispin Glover — What Is It?

Cristina Cordova — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 23:29:55 -0600

I should have known better, having so many questions about a film with an elusive question for a title — and cult actor Crispin Glover as writer, director, and supporting character. I know, I know. But Glover describes What Is It?, a film featuring a number of actors with Down's Syndrome, as "the adventures of a young man whose principal interests are snails, salt, a pipe and how to get home," all while

Do You Really Believe?

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 14:01:59 -0600

One morning last summer, leaving my apartment on Grand Avenue in St. Paul, I noticed there weren’t many people outside. It was a fine June day, but there wasn’t the usual line of cars in front of Starbucks. No commuters schlepping insulated mochas, no dog walkers, no window washers at Cafe Latté, and no one else waiting for the 7:23 bus to downtown Minneapolis.

A Taste of Springs to Come

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:04:31 -0600

During a recent visit to the research and development laboratory at Dairy Queen’s international headquarters, a row of soft-serve ice cream machines stood disconcertingly silent. The waffle irons and the commercial-grade mixers were unplugged, and no syrups or candies were being tested in the refractometer, the colorometer, or the texturometer.

Discounting the Value of Work

Lisa Pahl — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 14:37:11 -0600

Every month or two a Costco coupon book arrives in the mail. Unlike the usual crap in most direct mail envelopes, the Costco book contains at least twenty coupons for stuff we actually use at our house: shampoo, Kleenex, garbage bags, dishwashing liquid. I usually look forward to my semi-monthly Costco runs, and do so even more when I’ve spent the night before tearing out a fist full of coupons.