It seems inconceivable now, but when Lethal Weapon 4 opened in 1998, it had only been 11 years since the first installment. And back then, it really did seem like both Danny Glover and Mel Gibson were getting too old for that ish.

Well, it’s been nearly as long as the gap between LW1 and LW4 to follow up Men in Black II with Men in Black 3. And the franchise apparently feels old enough to warrant a retro maneuver, sending Will Smith’s coasting Agent J back in time to prevent a rupture in the space-time continuum that would allow for poison-dart spitting alien criminal Boris the Animal to kill Tommy Lee Jones’ Agent K before he can deploy the invasion-preventing ArcNet surrounding Earth.

Got that?

Less complicated than merely far-fetched, the plot at times resembles the ramblings of a nursing home rec room’s denizens attempting to describe the events of Back to the Future to a newcomer.

(Speaking of time gaps that make one feel old: The distance between when MIB3 takes place and the era Agent J leaps back to — 1969 — is more than a decade vaster than the leap Michael J. Fox made back in 1985 when he DeLorean’d himself into the Eisenhower years. Mr. Sandman, just bury me.)

I was never the biggest fan of director Barry Sonnenfeld’s artisan-like job on the Steven Spielberg property when the 1997 original came out. Yes, Men in Black the First delivered a competent good time without insulting the audience’s intelligence, which automatically put it well above the baseline for summer entertainment that year (lest we forget Harrison Ford’s President James Marshall growling, “Get! Off! My! Plane!”). But given the movie’s pretty obvious debt to Ghostbusters, I always thought it seemed slight, and the chemistry between Jones and Smith always felt engineered, unlike the dynamite friction between Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, Ernie Hudson, Rick Moranis and Annie Potts.

If I mention casting, it’s because MIB3‘s one ace in the hole is the decision to cast Josh Brolin as the 1969 version of Agent K. Though the script doesn’t give him nearly enough to do, Brolin nails Jones’ drawl and carriage, at the same time as he suggests the uncanny valley between how Agent K used to be before whatever happened to him to make him so gruff and craggy (i.e. age) happened. Brolin’s vigor makes the comparative indolence of Smith and the check-cashing cameo appearance by Jones all the more irksome.

Bottom line: the experience of Men in Black 3 — enjoyable enough in the moment but something that evaporates instantly from your memory like hand sanitizer — will either have you feeling older than Murtaugh, Riggs and Agent K combined, or as though you’ve just looked into the flashing light of that portable neuralyzer. It’s summer movie smack, and it leaves you hungry only for more of the same.

Well-known for their mega-hits “Barracuda,” “Crazy On You” and “Dog And Butterfly,” Heart is still rocking and recording albums after four decades of making music.

To promote her upcoming concert at Mystic Lake Casino, lead singer Ann Wilson took some time for a WCCO interview to discuss the show and a plethora of other topics, including her upcoming album, “Fanatic,” Heart’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nomination and much more!

At what point in your life did you decide you wanted to pursue singing/songwriting? Did you and your sister kind of come to the whole idea together or did your interest in music influence your sister?

“Well, we, being sisters, we grew up in a musical family and it was just a natural thing for us to progress into. I think that when we got into a band together, like everybody in the band, you know, wants to make a record someday – that was our goal, too. When that looked like a reality, then we knew that was something we wanted to do. And that was probably around 1976.”

To go along with that, who are your musical and/or artist inspirations?

“Oh god, Aretha Franklin, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, god, there are so many, Elton John. I mean, those are people who were having huge careers when I was a kid … of course Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, the Beatles.”

I’ve heard how you were inspired/angered to write Barracuda … are many of your songs created in this way, out of a sudden inspiration or reaction to an experience? Or do you have many different types of processes?

“Most of our songs are taken from our lives. We really write in response to things that happen to us, about real people and real feelings and everything. We don’t usually sit down and make stuff up that often. In fact, when we’ve tried to do that, the songs haven’t been as cool.”

I like hearing what musicians consider their message. So, what would you like a listener to take away from a Heart experience?

“If there is any one thing I can boil it down to is, I would say that, you know, Nancy and I are the real thing and we’re not posers. We just really just try to remain true to ourselves and call it like we see it.”

Are there politics in your songs?

“We don’t take a side, like, you know, Democrat or Republican, in our songs, but we definitely have opinions. And on the new album, there’s a song called “Dear Old America,” which is from the perspective of a soldier in, you know, like in Afghanistan or Iraq and what it’s like to be them and what goes through their mind, and coming back to America after they go through that and see that. We definitely can relate to the modern day world and have opinions. We’re not going to just shut up because we’re in music and don’t want to offend. I think musicians should be participants.”

Do you consider yourself a pioneer for women when it comes to music?

“Yeah, I guess. You know … we did go into the rock music scene when there weren’t any other women really for things rock. I mean, there was Fleetwood Mac, but they were a little less rock, like they were more folk rock, you know? So, yeah, I think we did help to loosen the lock on the door a bit. Joan Jett, too, of course.”

What should fans expect from your show at Mystic Lake?

“Well, they’re going to see a cross-section of all the stuff we do, from the beginning, from our first album, all the way through to the new album that we’re going to release in October, called Fanatic. They’ll see a real cross section. They’ll see a lot of rock and roll, and they’ll see some ballads. They’ll see, you know, Nancy really, really digging in on the guitar and me doing what I do!”

You’re going to be performing a show with Joan Jett at Mystic Lake. Do you have a good relationship with her and the band? Have you played shows together before?

“We’ve played together a time or two — a few times I think. I met her and thought she was awesome, you know? Once again, really authentic … she just really is the real thing. She is what she is, really inspiring.”

Through the course of your career, which musician outside your band have you most enjoyed playing with?

“We collaborated with John Paul Jones at one point on an album we did called “The Road Home.” He produced and played and everything. That was amazing – memorable for sure. He was an amazing musician – was and is. You know, Jerry Cantrell and the guys from Alice (and Chains) have always been close friends and I played a little bit on a couple of their records. That’s a really good musical relationship.”

In 2012, Heart was a nominee for the Rock and Roll hall of fame … will being inducted mean a lot to you or what are your thoughts on this?

“I’m not sitting on a hot stove waiting, you know, to be inducted, because they seem to have a little bit of a … I mean, there’s a woman deficit in the rock hall. But having said that, it’s incredible acknowledgment for your work. And I think if that ever happened, it’d be really amazing to be acknowledged that way. It’s just an amazing deal.”

Talking about that “thing you do,” singing, … have you ever had problems with your voice? You hear of musicians, e.g., Adele and Anthony Hamilton, who’ve had to take extended breaks due to singing-related injuries …

“No, I’ve been really lucky. I’ve been really, really, lucky in my career. I haven’t had throat problems. I mean, I’ve gotten sick once in a while like everybody. But as long as I’m healthy, I haven’t had any ongoing problems – knock on wood. It’s only skin, so a singer has to be careful … So far, it’s been really great for me and singing is really personally and physically liberating.”

Tell me more about the upcoming album.

“Well, ‘Fanatic’ is way more rock-heavy then Red Velvet Car was. It’s got 10 songs on it and I think two of them are what you’d call ballads. It’s quite, it’s a lot heavier. You’re just going to have to judge for yourself. It’s going to be released on October 2. I’m real excited about it.”

Finally, if you had to pick one song to be remembered by, which song would that be and why?

“I’d say probably ‘Dog and Butterfly.” It’s a ballad, but I think it talks about balance, and it talks about going after what you want to go after and, you know, keeping after it. I think that would be the one if I had to boil it down to one. The other one would of course be Barracuda, because it’s the other side of the ballad coin.”

Heart and Joan Jett and the Black Hearts will be opening the 2012 Mystic Ampitheatre season on June 29, 2012. For more on tickets, click here.

(credit: Crystal Grobe)

Great news! My oven is fixed. Turns out it was an easy solution, but several repair people failed to see the cracked tubing that caused the gas leak to happen in the first place. I’m excited to move past this and get back into cooking on a regular basis. Bring on the cooking sprees!

While our oven was out of commission, one of the things I missed most was breakfast. It’s not like I skipped breakfast during this time, but I missed making freshly baked biscuits and gravy while still in my pajamas or the warm scent of caramel rolls rising in the oven as I read the Sunday paper.

I also missed having things “my way”, especially when it came to eggs. I learned how to fry an egg pretty early on in life since it was something my dad made often and I’ve become a bit particular over the years in terms of how runny the yolk should be.

Imagine my excitement when I was given the green light to pull out my frying pan and crack an egg into a pool of sizzling butter. After a couple swirls and a flip, I was able to enjoy a fried egg once again.

With the Amy Senser case there is none of that.

The jury’s guilty verdict seemed so clear cut.

It appeared obvious that jurors had not believed her testimony that she did not believe she hit a person. But then days after the verdict comes the note from jurors saying they wanted Senser to know that they believed her.

The jury apparently believed Senser thought she had damaged a car. But Senser did not hit Anousone Phanthavong’s car.

The odd part of the note is that the jury was apparently trying to reach out to Senser, and in a bizarre way, comfort her.

The highly unusual twist is the groundwork for an appeal of the verdict.

The defense is now arguing that the verdict should be thrown out.

The case, which attracted so much attention, will continue to do so.

The debate about Senser and her actions that August night will only continue.

And it’s not clear if the appeals process, whatever the outcome, will put an end to that.

(credit: Amy Rea)

Yes! Minneapolis’s long-time (since 1965) German restaurant, the Black Forest Inn, kicks off its annual tribute to one of spring’s finest vegetables this weekend with Spargelfest. Given that the Black Forest has one of the Twin Cities’ best outdoor spaces, the time is right to enjoy the warmer weather along with your feast.

And yes, the restaurant may be German, but it buys its asparagus from the Southeast Minnesota Food Network. It’s a connection the restaurant’s owners made through a caterer who contracts use of the Black Forest kitchen (which, by the way, thanks to its huge size, is also used by the likes of Saucy Burt’s and A Fork in the Road food trucks, when they need more kitchen space than their trucks allow).

(credit: Amy Rea)

What can you expect at this year’s Spargelfest? Among the items offered is an appetizer of ham-wrapped asparagus, which is then wrapped in puff pastry and fried, and served with sauce. Delicious.

(credit: Amy Rea)

This salad, composed of asparagus with fennel, radish, mushrooms, brown rice, barley, and mixed greens, and served with a lemon dressing, is fresh and bright.

(credit: Amy Rea)

Grilled ham and asparagus, served with hollandaise sauce. Other menu offerings this season include asparagus with veal, asparagus with venison, and asparagus with salmon. Also:

(credit: Amy Rea)

Spargel perogi. Seriously, this might be my favorite, although it’s a tough call, especially with the appetizer and salad. Handmade perogi stuffed with asparagus and cheese, served on a warm asparagus mousse and drizzled with a butter-hazelnut sauce. Slightly sweet, lovely and rich.

(credit: Amy Rea)

Dessert with—yes—asparagus: asparagus and rhubarb strudel with whipped cream. As flavorful as asparagus is, the rhubarb holds its own.

There are other options too: spargel flan, cream of spargel soup, spargel dumplings, and three spargel-based cocktails.

Given the Black Forest’s work with food trucks, I asked the owner if she had ever considered starting her own. She said it’s not in the plans at the moment, but what she would like to do in the future is open something like a sidewalk space, where people could walk up to a window at the restaurant and order something to enjoy on the go, or to sit on at a streetside table for a quick break. I love that idea. Imagine a beer and brat as a quick lunch…

Go. Sit on the patio. Enjoy the weather, and the fresh and local asparagus.

My thanks to the Black Forest Inn for having me as their guest.

What else is happening in our state? Be sure to check out the 10 p.m. Sunday night WCCO newscasts, where you can learn more in the weekly segment, Finding Minnesota.

Well now someone’s gone and done it. They’ve made a documentary about the scene in The 40-Year-Old Virgin when Steve Carrell gets the hair yanked out of his chest to the accompanying screams of, “YeeeeAAAAAHHHHHH, Kelly Clarkson!”

In Mansome, director Morgan Spurlock bids new school beefcake icons Will Arnett and Jason Bateman to be our tour guides through our brave new world of men waxing, exfoliating, clipping, buffing, tweezing, plucking, target-zoning, lifting and separating.

(Lest you may laugh at my description of Arnett and Bateman as “beefcake,” but ask any woman who she’d rather marry between Arnett and Ah-nold, even in his prime.)

The main focus of the movie ends up dwelling on men’s varying attitudes toward the spots on their bodies where hair grows — which for many marks the separation between them and womenfolk.

Spurlock interviews a cross-section of men on their grooming habits, including a muscle-bound jock who by most standards would likely be considered a paragon of masculinity but for the fact that he’s on an endless mission to remove every unsightly hair from his well-formed husk. On the other side of the coin is a weenie hipster whose ginger beard hangs down to his knees. Embracing his manly facial hair has already earned him wins in competition.

While Spurlock’s movie would deign to position those who obsessively remove every last strand from their chest, neck and back follicles as pathetic narcissists, in practice, the movie ends up making the men who endlessly procure and celebrate their hirsute manes (both up top and elsewhere) seem every bit as self-involved.

Worse, even. Their fixation on their hairy maws ends up, in Spurlock’s hands, verging dangerously close to a neo-misogyny. Because Spurlock is, as ever, so devoted to stunt juxtapositions and snarky asides, he ends up making pretty much everyone look bad, including the gamut of celebrities that have been recruited to pepper the movie’s two-bit sociological inquiry.

There is actually plenty to say about the topic of men and their ever-changing sartorial standards. As more than a few headlines have noted, “Boys are the new girls.” It’s just that Mansome is the movie equivalent of a Cosmo sex quiz.

It took Penumbra’s founder and artistic director Lou Bellamy three decades before he was able to take this powerful play off his to-do list. He said just needed the right timing and the perfect players to pull it off. And boy, did he find them.

Leading the cast of this inspiring production is none other than Greta Oglesby — a woman that’s no stranger to the Guthrie or to bringing down the house with her performances.

Oglesby recently chatted with us about being cast in the role of a lifetime and the personal memories she used to perfect the part.

Q: Tell us a little about “The Amen Corner” and your role in the show.

A: “The Amen Corner” follows the life of Sister Margaret Alexander. She is the bold, charismatic pastor of a small storefront church in Harlem in 1958. She has devoted much of her life to the ministry. When her son reunites her with her estranged husband — a jazz musician — she risks losing her standing in the church and her son, who she’s trying to keep on a religious path.

Q: This production has been 30 years in the making, what’s it like to see it all come together now?

A: Lou Bellamy has been toying with the idea of producing this show for 30 years. He never thought he had the right elements in place to bring his vision to fruition. But a year ago, the stars aligned and here we are today. Baldwin has penned a masterpiece that Lou has honored on many levels.

Q: A lot of people remember you from your outstanding performance in “Caroline, or Change.” What’s it like to be back on the Guthrie stage?

A: After Caroline, (one of my all-time favorite roles) I am thrilled to be back at the Guthrie! On the first day of rehearsal, someone opened the glass doors for me and said “Welcome home.” It truly feels like home.

(credit: Guthrie Theater)

Q: You’ve said the role of Sister Margaret is one that you were born to do. Why is that and how does that translate on stage?

A: I feel like the role of Sister Margaret is a role that I was born play. Because this was my life! I was raised in a little store front church in inner city Chicago. My father was a pentecostal preacher. I know the characters in this play very intimately.

Q: How did you prepare for this role?

A: Unlike other roles, I didn’t have to do much research. I just had to remember Daddy on Sunday mornings, my aunts teaching Sunday School, Mama leading bible study, singing in the choir, and of course, the church politics.

Q: How do you think Minneapolis audiences will react to this show?

A: I don’t think anyone can experience this show and not be deeply moved. It is a powerful story about faith and family, love and sacrifice, and ultimately, redemption.

Q: You also wrote a book, “Mama ‘N Nem.” How did you find the time and why was it important for you to share your family’s stories?

A: I recently published a book “Mama ‘N Nem, Handprints on my Life.” I started writing this book in 2005. It is a love story to the extraordinary people who gave me a history that has shaped my destiny. The stories are poignant, hilarious, rich and full of life. I hope “Mama ‘N Nem” will inspire readers to think about the handprints on their own lives and write those stories down, document them and share them as often as possible.

The Amen Corner runs through June 17. For more information or to buy tickets to the show, click here.

Wednesday was close to average with a high near 70. With the light wind, dry conditions and sunshine, some would say it was close to perfection.

The first thing you will notice over the next few days will be the wind. It will blow from the south 15-25 mph through Saturday. Warmer and more humid air will ride the wind and change things around here.

Expect a high near 90 on Friday with temps pushing into the upper-80s again on Saturday. Moisture will be limited with scattered showers possible early on Friday.

The best chance of rain arrives with the passage of the cold front on Saturday. It is still too far out to nail down the timing, but do know that it will cool down and dry out later on Sunday.

Sorry, it won’t be as nice as last weekend.

Kookie cat lady Mrs. Smith (played by David Hanbury) — best known for her appearance on “America’s Got Talent” — will head to Bryant Lake Bowl this week for a show-stopping performance with her infamous Broadway Boys.

But wait, what? You’ve never heard of Mrs. Smith? Not familiar with her over-the-top guitar skills and big, crazy gray hair? Well, not to worry, child. She was kind enough to chat with us before her big show this weekend.

Q: Tell us about Mrs. Smith. Who is she and how did she come about?

A: I’m really just a woman searching for my missing cat Carlyle. Along the way, I’ve found myself catapulted onto the national stage because of this quest. Along with that I’m a philanthropist, cat lover and electric guitar virtouoso.

Q: What’s a show with Mrs. Smith like?

A: Music! Comedy! Spectacle! Cats! There’s some audience interaction (but not the annoying, stupid, or scary kind) as well as musical numbers, special guests, and classic tunes sung in the classic style!

Q: Who is this show for?

A: Anyone who loves a gangbusters, take-no-prisoner, Broadway-style one-woman show in the style of “Stritch at Liberty” or “Liza with a Z!”

Q: Obviously national audiences are most familiar with Mrs. Smith from “America’s Got Talent.” What was that experience like? What was it like to be on that big stage?

A: Nerve-wracking and AMAZING! The audience at the Orpheum embraced me wholeheartedly and lifted me up. I was standing on their shoulders — their broad, capable, steady Midwestern shoulders — and because of that I found my head in the clouds! I’m not from Minnesota originally and I thank God for the even-keeled nature of the incredible people who blazed trails to settle here. I call them my Living Lithium because they help me stay calm!

Q: When you saw the reactions from Howie and Sharon and saw how impressed they were during your incredible guitar riff audition, what was that like?

A: In real life (not in the edited version that appeared on TV) Piers Morgan was, in fact, there and he adored me as much as Sharon did and they both voted me through to the Vegas rounds. The complexities of my performance seemed to be too sophisticated for Howie Mandel, which isn’t surprising because he’s a washed-up stand-up comedian with very little to offer the world.

Q: Meow. So did you travel to Vegas with everyone for the show?

A: After I was voted through by the judges with brains they sent me a laughable, 100-page contract that I literally laughed at. After I picked myself up off the floor, I faxed it to my paralegal Mr. Mau and he described it as “draconian.” I put the contract into the shredder and never looked back!

Q: Tell me about your cat, Carlyle, and how you became such a lovable cat lady.

A: Carlyle is always there with a kind whisker or thoughtful meow when you’re having a tough day. People literally flock to him because he’s such a soothing presence and I have to say, “Please go away, he’s mine!” He is compassionate, wise and possesses special abilities as well. He’s been studied by medical science and parapsychologists alike, he’s just that unique a feline. My life is empty and pointless without him. Why do I go on?

Q: Who are the Broadway Boys?

A: Rick Latterell and Tony Milder are my Broadway Boys. They are multi-talented singer, dancer, actors, puppeteers. They also transport the props from the bins in the basement onto the stage. They inspire me, they perspire on me (which is gross and I wish it wasn’t so hot onstage), they challenge me. They’re great kids and they’ve got a lot to offer the world (if they can keep from falling into the pitfalls of fame and fortune!) I hammer away at them, “Yes, you are brilliant and unique … and so is everybody else!” You’ve got to keep them on their toes!

Q: What was it like working with Andrew Rasmussen for this production?

A: It’s a mixed bag. He’s a slave-driver and yet also very kind. He’s a sadist and a masochist from one moment to the next. Speaking personally, it’s been a horrendous living nightmare and my greatest dream fulfilled at the very same time. He’s is a razzle-dazzle, showbiz showmaster who is giving my whole thing the Broadway treatment.

Q: Final pitch – what would you say to get someone to come to this show?

A: Dancing Broadway Boys! A tortured diva singing to save her own life! Cats! What more could you ask for? Come and be part of the fun already!

Mrs. Smith Live At The Bowl opens May 17 and runs through May 26. For tickets or more information, click here.

At my last book club meeting (we read “A Girl Named Zippy”), the host made a wonderful salad that would be perfect for an afternoon picnic or a potluck. She was nice enough to share the recipe with me and since I turned around and made it immediately, I’ll share it here. We served it alongside grilled rib eye and local asparagus for the perfect side dish.

Tomato, Basil, Mozzarella Salad
(serves 4-6)

1 shallot, thinly sliced
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 pint grape or cherry tomatoes, halved
8 oz. bocconcini (small balls of mozzarella)
1/4 cup of basil, chopped
1/2 cup kalamata olives, chopped
1-2 tbsp olive oil, to taste
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a small bowl combine shallots, red wine vinegar and a pinch of salt. Let sit for 10 to 15 minutes. This will reduce the sharp bite of the shallot and also serve as a quick pickle.

Meanwhile, combine tomatoes, olives, mozzarella, basil and 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Toss gently to combine and season with salt and pepper. Add additional olive oil as desired. Add shallots and 1-2 tablespoons of the vinegar. Gently toss again and transfer to a serving bowl. Enjoy!

May is always that fun time of year. Conference titles are on the line, games and meets get bunched together and often times athletes are wondering if they’re even going to play that day with the threat of spring rain.

The outdoor state tournament season gets underway in just a few weeks with boys and girls lacrosse in early June. After that, it’s boys tennis, girls softball, state track and field, boys and girls golf and it all wraps up with the baseball championships at Target Field.

Here’s a quick look at some of the tournaments as playoff time is just around the corner.

Baseball: Burnsville looks to repeat

Burnsville beat Maple Grove 6-5 at Target Field for the 2011 Class AAA state baseball title. It appears this year’s title is the Blaze’s to lose. Burnsville won 13 of its first 14 games and is currently No. 1 in AAA at 16-2 with one regular season game left. The Blaze need to beat Rosemount on Wednesday to lock up the South Suburban Conference crown. They hit over .300 as a team and are led by Dan Motl’s .410 average. Matt Stemper is their ace on the mound.

Keep an eye on Class AA as there are two undefeated teams at the top. Little Falls is No. 1 at 15-0, and Minneapolis Washburn is No. 2 at 14-0. In Class A, Sleepy Eye/St. Mary’s is the top ranked team at 16-0.

Softball: North St. Paul emerging as favorite

North St. Paul made it to the AAA girls softball state tournament last year before suffering an early exit. The Polars are emerging as a state title contender this year as they’re currently ranked No. 1 with a 17-1 record. It’s a loaded top 10 that features Forest Lake (19-1) at No. 2 and Mankato West (18-1) ranked third.

In Class AA, keep an eye on Zumbrota-Mazeppa. The Sting are currently ranked No. 4 in the state at 14-2. Kasson-Mantorville is the top team at 16-2 and Pipestone is no. 2 at 17-0. Pipestone made the state semifinals last year before losing to state champion Park Center. Zumbrota-Mazeppa fell in the quarterfinals. In Class A, the top three teams are all undefeated. Mankato Loyola is No. 1 at 16-0, Cherry is No. 2 at 16-0 and Kerkoven-Murdock-Sunburg is third at 14-0.

With all these talented teams, whoever reaches the state tournament should make it fun to watch.

Golf: Wayzata boys are early favorite

We’re just a few weeks away from section golf tournaments around the state, and if the rankings hold it will be one of the better boys tournaments in history. Wayzata is currently ranked No. 1, with Eden Prairie second, perennial power Rogers third and Lakeville North fourth. Rogers senior Corey Muenzhuber, the medalist at the prestigious Tri-State Invitational, is the top ranked player in the state. Other contenders include Freddy Thomas from Lakeville North, Max Rosenthal from Eden Prairie and Dalton Charboneau from Osseo.

On the girls side, Wayzata is also the No. 1-ranked team, while Red Wing is second, Stillwater is third, Detroit Lakes is fourth and Eastview rounds out the top five. Cretin-Derham Hall sophomore Celia Kuenster is the top ranked player in the state. Another favorite to contend for a state title is New Prague’s McKenzie Neisen. The state golf tournament is less than a month away.

Boys Tennis: Few surprises on the court

There aren’t many surprises when it comes to this year’s favorites in boys tennis. Rochester Mayo is the No. 1-ranked team in Class AA, while Elk River, Wayzata, Eden Prairie and Minnetonka round out the top five. Dusty Boyer of Forest Lake is looking to defend his AA state title this year and is the player to beat.

In Class A, Blake is ranked No. 1, followed by Breck and Rochester Lourdes. Myles Tang, the No. 1-ranked individual, is back to defend his state title. He’ll be challenged by Robert Turlington of Rochester Lourdes and Charlie Adams of Blake among several others.

It will be an exciting finish to the spring high school sports season, so check back with the WCCO Prep Blog for all the latest as we close in on state tournament time.

Every Friday at 5:45 p.m. on WCCO Radio, John Williams has his weekly “Bright Side of Life” segment, where callers tell us what’s making them happy this week.

That might sound a little hokey, but as John always says, “it’s guaranteed leave you smiling,” and even for someone as cynical as yours truly, it generally does.

It’s difficult to find many things to smile about when the Twins are 9-24 overall in 2012, and 1-8 on games where I’ve been out at the ballpark.

But in the spirit of The John Williams Show, I’ll attempt to find something in this dreadful season to be happy about … namely the bullpen.

As a whole, the Twins relievers have logged 111 innings pitched this season which is the fourth highest total in baseball. Given the starting pitchers’ struggles (6.57 ERA, 1.60 WHIP, 4.91 K/9), you’d expect the relievers to be putting in a lot of innings.

What you might not expect is that they’ve held opponents to a .227 average (5th in the AL), with a 3.49 ERA (6th in the AL), and 1.10 WHIP (2nd in the AL). They’re not striking many batters out (6.41 K/9), but they’re not walking many either as evidenced by their 2.72 K/BB ratio (4th in the AL).

Individually, there are few guys who are having notable seasons so far in 2012.

Let’s start with Jared Burton. The six-year veteran was signed by the Twins in the off-season to a one-year, $750,000 contract. Not an extravagant expense, nor should it have been for a guy who appeared in only 10 games over the last two seasons.

But he’s been nothing short of brilliant for the Twins so far this season. In 13 innings he has a 2.08 ERA, 0.385 WHIP, and 9.0 K/9. In his last 11 appearances (11.1 IP) he’s allowed nary a hit nor a run. That stretch actually goes to 11.2 innings if you count the last appearance where he did give up a hit. Opposing batters are just 3-for-41 off of him this season. The resulting .073 Batting Average Against is second-lowest in the American League for qualifying relievers, trailing only Oakland’s Ryan Cook (no relation).

Burton’s hot-streak may be the top highlight for Twins relievers this season, but it’s not the only one.

Jeff Gray was acquired by the Twins this past October after the Seattle Mariners made him available via waivers. So far in 2012 the fifth-year reliever has held opponents to a .200 batting-average in his 15 appearances. He’s thrown scoreless frames in 12 of those outings. In the last eight games in which he’s pitched, he’s allowed only one run on six hits with three walks and eight strikeouts. Not bad for a $485K investment by Minnesota.

Brian Duensing is in his fourth year with the Twins, and is quietly putting up solid numbers as well. He’s surrendered runs in only two of his 15 appearances so far, and has held opponents hitless in seven of his last nine games. His 2.16 ERA and 0.90 WHIP would both easily qualify as career-bests if he stays at that rate for the rest of the season.

Prior to Saturday’s game, manager Ron Gardenhire described Duensing as one of his more valuable relievers since he’s able to go two or three innings per appearance and is stretched out making him available for a spot start if needed.

Glen Perkins isn’t putting up numbers quite as eye-popping as last season, but is still more than effective as a lefty out of the bullpen. And say what you will about Matt Capps (and judging by the way Twitter explodes every time he comes into the game, you can say a lot), but he’s six-for-six in save opportunities this season.

All in all, the bullpen has been one of the few bright sides in an otherwise dismal year for the Twins. Which may make the pitchers I’ve talked about nothing more than trade bait come June. But still, we can enjoy their talents while they last right?

I think John Williams would be proud.

I honestly can’t remember where I heard it, or who said it. But I kept thinking about it. It was so simple, so basic, so true. And in the end, it was why I was convinced that there was not a chance of a stadium bill getting through the legislature.

A couple of months ago, if you mentioned the topic on the radio, the phone calls and the texts were overwhelming in anger and opposition. But in a remarkable and fundamental turn around, public opinion began to shift and ultimately lawmakers began to soften.

Those involved, including Ted Mondale, the governor’s lead person in the battle, point to the visit to the state capitol by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and Pittsburgh Steelers owner Art Rooney late last month as the key turning point.

It was obvious then that the league was backing the Wilfs in their demand that the stadium vote happen this session. The Vikings blew out their website, listing legislators’ emails and phone numbers, and urging fans to contact them.

Mayor R.T. Rybak held a news conference with unemployed construction workers, framing the issue as a job creating public works project. And Gov. Mark Dayton and two Republican legislators, Sen. Julie Rosen and Rep. Morrie Lanning, simply never gave up.

It was memories of the shutdown last summer that had me convinced partisan paralysis would once again rule the day.

And it almost did.

Maybe the chants of “Skol Vikings” echoing through the capitol swayed some votes. In the end, legislators decided this is what the people and they themselves wanted — a guarantee that the Vikings would be the “Minnesota Vikings” for at least another generation.

The word progress, in my mind, has a bright, life-affirming connotation. Think of a dandelion seed suspended in a sunbeam or the opening of a cat’s eye in the night. Now, with the weapons of your imagination, pluck those images out.

The result of that game might have left with you a sense of what Surviving Progress feels like.

The documentary’s underlining idea is that humanity’s progress – ever expanding, conquering, multiplying, monetizing – isn’t always a good thing. According to Ronald Wright, arguably the movie’s main talking head, there are things called “progress traps.”

Wright – who didn’t come up with this term — wrote about human history in light of these traps in his book A Short History of Progress. Progress traps are defined (via Wikipedia) as: the condition societies experience when, in pursuing progress through ingenuity, they inadvertently introduce problems they do not have the resources or political will to solve, for fear of short-term losses in status, stability or quality of life. This prevents further progress and sometimes leads to collapse.

By now you’re probably thinking of where such traps exit in our global society. Since we are still feeling the tremors of economic fallout as brought on by the Great Recession, the global economy seems an obvious candidate. And according to the movie, a trap is indeed lurking in the structure of our economy.

But the trap is not imbedded in the idea that free markets are necessarily bad, the trap is imbedded in the big banks, which have rigged the world so that some poor countries are shackled to poverty.

These poor countries own such huge debts that even if they pay all their yearly earnings to their creditors, they only cover the interest, the movie says. Thus they end up selling off their assets – wood, minerals, oil – to banks and foreign powers. The trap, in this economic case, is in the form of credit; a tool (or a process/ technology) that many people can’t escape and some can’t seem to help but exploit to a ridiculous and dangerous degree.

I picked the debt trap because I found it the most interesting. Wall Street economist Michael Hudson’s words on the subject were particularly piquing.

“Progress has meant: You will never get back what we take from you,” he says.

The doomed tone in that statement is mirrored by the tone of the movie. Watching it, you get the feeling there are traps everywhere and unless global society makes some major changes – such as: cease to follow religion, forgive enormous debts, learn to live within its means, and make a serious effort to preserve the planet’s resources – civilization will fail.

That idea offends me. I think it should probably offend you, too. I’m horrified by the thought of self-destruction, of losing what we’ve worked so hard to create, of our best tools failing us.

In fact, I couldn’t help feeling annoyed when the movie talked about science and technology as though they can be problems. To me, religion is a problem; bigotry is a problem; corruption is a problem; our primitive brains are a problem; but science isn’t. If anything, science is the clear tool for our continued presence on the crust of this lovely, cooling planet.

Sorry, sometimes my Carl Sagan fanboi-idis gets the best of me. What I mean to say is: Surviving Progress is provocative. It challenges your view of humanity and what it will take for us and our planet to survive.

Also, the movie is beautiful. It’s shot with stoic style and there are some juxtapositions of image and idea that are surprisingly intuitive and poetic.

Unlike many documentaries, Surviving Progress refreshingly ends without a call to arms. All too often, I’m enjoying a documentary when an eye-rolling, vainglorious ending ruins everything. Surviving Progress avoids this particular trap and leaves you with the weight of its ideas – ones that are enormously heavy, pregnant with doom, but nevertheless central to the current chapter in humanity’s history.

Surviving Progress is directed by Mathieu Roy and Harold Crooks. It’s playing at the Lagoon Cinema.

10. Alice Hyatt, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974)

Erin Brockovich almost made it into this slot in the single mom sweepstakes, but I prefer this Oscar-winning performance from the actress Julia Roberts beat out at the 2000 awards. Ellen Burstyn’s raw, very real performance anchors Martin Scorsese’s domestic drama. (She’s every bit as good, though a bit less “admirable” as a mother, in 1973′s The Exorcist.)

09. “Euphegenia Doubtfire,” Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)

Give up one of ten slots on a list of mothers to a father? What could I possibly be thinking?! Well, to be honest, the movie’s message seems to be that the best thing a father can do for their children is to be a little bit more like their mother. That’s pretty progressive, no?

08. Donna Trenton, Cujo (1983)

Dee Wallace’s performance in E.T. would’ve been fine here too, but there’s something awesomely ferocious and protective at work here. No scene hits on the combination of love, terror and frustration that motherhood can invoke as the scene when Donna snaps at her dying son, screaming “Alright, I’ll get your daddy!” Another strong candidate in this same vein (from the same year, even) is Jane Alexander as Carol Wetherly, helplessly watching her family die in the aftermath of nuclear disaster in Testament.

07. Mildred Pierce, Mildred Pierce (1945)

Faye Dunaway’s Joan Crawford topped the list of bad moms. But the real Joan Crawford played one of the best, or certainly one of the most (unbelievably) selfless mothers ever.

06. Mrs. Parker, A Christmas Story (1983)

Melinda Dillon has been a fantastic movie mother not once, but twice. She earned an Academy Award for, basically, radiating sheer maternal warmth in Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but it’s her performance in this holiday classic that will endure. Fully rounded, she allows her ’40s suburban mom to come off exactly as Ralphie (the narrator) remembers her, a bundle of neuroses wrapped up in nostalgia.

05. Julia, Julia (2009)

OK, Tilda Swinton’s alcoholic hot mess doesn’t exactly start out as a model mother. In fact, she only gets progressively worse after her introductory bender. The fact that the “child” she “mothers” is actually not hers, and that she actually kidnaps him at gunpoint … well, I guess you could call this my unconventional pick. But watch the movie and see if Swinton doesn’t turn you into a convert.

04. Ma Joad, The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Pathos and sacrifice aren’t required to be a great mother. But they don’t exactly hurt when it comes to movie representations.

03. Annie Johnson, Imitation of Life (1959)

See above. Also, see this movie, probably the best pre-Civil Rights era Hollywood movie to tackle racism in America.

02. Diane Freeling, Poltergeist (1982)

Steven Spielberg movies have had a lot of great moms, but the best of them all was in a movie he only wrote and produced. JoBeth Williams’ devoted mother remains steadfast even when otherworldly souls snatch her youngest daughter and take her into the dimension between life and death. She even plunges into the otherworld without so much as batting an eye, all in the name of protecting her kin.

01. Helen Buckman, Parenthood (1988)

The 1980s are positively littered with single mothers doing it for themselves. Many of them balanced career and family without a hitch. Dianne Wiest’s Helen Buckman doesn’t fall into that trap. She’s constantly perched on a fine line, trying to keep it together as her divorce continues to resonate and her children grow into their troubled teens. All the while, she maintains a mordant sense of humor about the whole mess. This is the realest portrait of suburban middle-class motherhood I’ve ever seen in a movie.

In fact, he’s poured his heart and soul into 104 minutes of pundit bashing, reality show smashing, and oodles of ultra-violent fantasy fodder. And all with a huge, wicked grin on his face.

White, middle-aged liberal Frank (played perfectly by Joel Murray, younger brother of Bill) gets fired from his desk job, and is diagnosed with a brain tumor soon after.

As he sits alone, weeping in front of his TV with a six-pack of beer and a loaded gun, a reality show featuring a sniveling sixteen year old girl comes on.
As the brat loudly laments her unacceptable birthday present of a Lexus, Frank flips into homicidal maniac-mode. He enlists a like-minded teenage girl, and a bloody rampage ensues, with the mean and the rude as the targets.

Goldthwait’s gleeful bloodlust may turn as many stomachs as the non-stop preachy speeches written for Frank and his accomplice. But Bobcat truly shines in his spot-on lampoons of 24-hour cable news silliness and endless reality show garbage.

Yeah, the first couple murders are funny and cleverly executed, and it’s fun to see several cameos from Goldthwait’s comedian pals, like Larry Miller and Tom Kenny. But this roadtrip is not nearly as much fun as Goldthwait’s previous effort and magnum opus, the 2009 Robin Williams vehicle World’s Best Dad. God Bless America lacks World’s heart, and surprisingly, it’s realism.

Goldthwait is a true independent filmmaker. He lovingly embraces his low budgets, and revels in the zero compromise his freedom affords. God Bless America may not be the savior of the long-rotting American independent movement, but it’s fearlessness and ethos should be commended.

- Stephen Swanson

You could see it in his eyes. TC needed a new ride. He needed something that was as environmentally conscious as Target Field yet still fun to ride.

The Pohlad family worked with the guys at Behind Bars Bicycle Shop in NE Minneapolis to hook him up Wednesday night with a new ride.

Watch Chuck and Cory of Behind Bars tell how it all came together.

Special thanks to photographers Aaron Goodyear and Dave Porter who helped shoot parts of this video.

In some respect, the Addams Family musical would be expected to be a bit more perky, a bit more bright and yes, a tad more jubilant. It’s a Broadway musical, after all.

But the family that greeted us on opening night Tuesday at the Ordway Center for Performing Arts was not at all what one might have expected. For better or worse? I’m still not sure.

I’ll give them credit — this show is packed with punchlines. Not all of them hit, but the ones that didn’t were quickly forgotten with the barrage of one-liners that followed.

Gomez (Douglas Sills) is credited with a majority of these zingers and plays to the audience well with his mix of rim-shot gags and physical humor. And while his Latin background certainly comes to the forefront in this show, it’s his animated mannerisms that had me more-so picturing a Chris-Kattan-esque “SNL” character than Mr. Addams.

The storyline itself also diverges a bit from what is typically “Addams.” Here, daughter Wednesday (played by Cortney Wolfson) announces she’s fallen in love and is planning to marry a seemingly “normal” boy. Of course, that means dinner with the future in-laws and a chance for both worlds to collide.

Wolfson does an amazing job with the vocals in the show and carries her solos in an absolutely pitch-perfect way. But the storyline’s transformation — from gloomy hunter Wednesday into falling-in-love, sunny, girly Wednesday is a bit far-fetched.

Personally, I believe Broadway has enough young teens falling in love, dancing around the stage, singing about their exciting future. I was looking forward to a night of bleak, expressionless faces with talk of death and darkness, not love and marriage.

Still, the show was plenty entertaining with original music, ghoulish dance numbers and a nod to the characters that made the movie and TV show a success.

Morticia, played by Sara Gettelfinger, had the same long, black hair and yes, slinky down-to-there attire (truth be told, I found myself slightly distracted waiting for a nip-slip that I missed most of her vocal numbers). But there was an essence of mystery and refinement that was so effortless in the Angelica Houston character that I found myself missing Tuesday night.

The side roles of Uncle Fester (Blake Hammond) and Lurch (Tom Corbeil) were perhaps my favorite of the evening. Lurch’s incredible zombie-like, understated movements and incomprehensible speech were only made funnier when he came out of his shell at the end of the performance. Uncle Fester’s side story (of his love affair with the moon) was certainly random but made for the show’s most entertaining musical number involving a pitch-black backdrop, hidden stage hands and a bright, bouncing moon ball.

I don’t blame the cast in this production at all — they all do a spectacular job with the script and task at hand. And perhaps I misjudged just how the evening would unfold and was expecting something far more gloomy and kooky — a bit more understated and less obvious. But it’s still a musical and certain characterizations must adapt.

So instead, I urge theater-goers to go to the show without any preconceived notions and expectations, because on face value it’s a great evening out — one that can provide the perfect escape to a dull week and perhaps help you reevaluate your own family and all their ookiness.

The Addams Family runs through May 20 at the Ordway Center for Performing Arts. For tickets or more information, click here.

While you can’t always predict when dinner will go up in flames, you can still have that fancy takeout dinner from a local restaurant. Operating without an oven and stovetop for over a month, I’ve been on the hunt for takeout options that feel like home cooking without breaking the bank and I think I found “the place:” Lucia’s To Go.

Lucia’s To Go is the quick stop version of Lucia’s restaurant offering sandwiches, deli salads, and soups, but it also has a whole section of entrees like organic salmon, seared polenta, and rotisserie chicken. What really caught my eye was the 4-person rotisserie chicken dinner. Order in advance, pick up after 3pm and for $26.95 you’ll get a free-range Callister Farms rotisserie chicken, creamy and decadent mashed potatoes, a bag of fresh mixed salad greens, a choice of three sauces (we went with the cilantro chutney), and maple-mustard vinaigrette salad dressing.

This was one of the most satisfying meals I’ve had in the last month. The chicken was flavorful and juicy, the potatoes almost sinful, and I couldn’t get enough of the maple mustard vinaigrette (yes, it was better than the one I make). We dug in a little too quickly to take a picture, but let me assure you that it looked as great as it tasted.

What’s your go-to takeout meal near home? Find mine here:

Lucia’s To Go
1432 W 31st St
Minneapolis, MN 55408
612-825-1572
info@lucias.com

Monday was our first dry day in May. It has rained in the Twin Cities 21 of the past 25 days.

I know we need the rain to ease our drought concerns, but it has been soggy as of late.

We do have a few more chances of rain this week (Tuesday and Friday), but it won’t be a soaking rain like the past few encounters.

Expect showers on our Tuesday with a cooler high in the upper-50s.

Look forward to a nice recovery on Wednesday and Thursday as we soak up some sunshine and warm to the low 70s.

After Friday’s showers we will have a tremendous weekend.

High pressure will set up camp keeping us dry with temps once again heading for the 70s.

Perfect for Mother’s Day, the Minnesota fishing opener and whatever you have planned outdoors.

Wolfson, who heads to the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts for the show’s opening on Tuesday, is fresh off the Broadway production of The Addams Family musical and said and said it’s been amazing to be part of the national tour.

Before donning the pale white skin and jet black wig, Wolfson starred in the Legally Blonde musical’s first national tour as sorority alum and fitness instructor Brooke Wyndham — quite the polar opposite to her dark and gloomy role of Wednesday.

But Wolfson said the character’s not exactly what you might remember from the TV or movie family. She explained why — and talked about her return visit to the Twin Cities — in a fun little chat before the show’s opening night.

Q: What were your memories, or introductions to The Addams Family before you signed on for this part?

A: My history started in the ’90s when the movie came out. I was just at the right age to be a fan of Christina Ricci, or be close in age in real-life. I was a huge fan. And then, as I grew up, I wasn’t actually familiar with the TV show until I did the show on Broadway. We also had this book floating around of all the original sketches and this amazing book of all the cartoons, which was on the dresser so I’d look at those. And since then I’d watch the TV show and what not. My original Addams Family fandom came from the movies.

(credit: Ordway Center for the Performing Arts)

Q: When you heard about the musical, what were your thoughts?

A: I was excited because the story is completely unique. I think people come wondering if it’s going to be the same storyline or a continuation of the TV show or movies. But story’s 100 percent unique and I actually did a reading of it, it was actually like a workshop of it in the very, very beginning stages almost five years ago, I think, and when I was cast in that I was super excited just because of my familiarity with it, I thought, it was going to be great. And it turned out to be exactly what we wanted.

Q: So a lot of people are maybe wondering — The Addams Family plus a musical. Does that work?

A: Definitely. Most of the audiences probably know that Gomez is Latin, and so there’s a lot of flamenco and it really lends itself toward that and there’s a great tango at the end and a lot of this beautiful flamenco music. And then, also it’s such a contemporary musical and the composer/lyricist Andrew Lippa is such a contemporary writer so there’s a lot of great pop music in it, like most of the stuff that I sing is all contemporary music theater — you could hear it on a radio, pop-wise. But I think what people don’t normally know is that it’s a comedy — and it’s really, really funny. The music is all very clever and the writing and the lyrics just really lend itself towards that. It’s just like hilarious music theater. I think when a lot of people see Addams Family, they think ‘Oh, dark and spooky,’ but it’s actually this huge comedy.

Q: So looking at your bio, you were involved in the first national tour of Legally Blonde: The Musical.

A: Yes! We came through St. Paul.

Q: Oh awesome, that’s right. Well, I was going to say, I can’t really think of anyone that might be more of an opposite to Wednesday than Brooke Wyndham.

A: I know. I think when I came through St. Paul, I played Sarina who was a cheerleader and then I actually played Brooke Wyndham on tour later on, so yeah, I played both. Brooke Wyndham is like the exact opposite of Wednesday — hair color and all.

Q: Right, totally. So has it been difficult at all to transition to a polar opposite role?

A: You know, I think I actually fit somewhere in real life between the two of them. I’m not quite the Delta Nu blonde but not quite the dreary and dark Wednesday. But one of the fun things with this role, too, is that when it comes to the show the big crisis that happens at the beginning is that Wednesday is engaged to this boy — this normal guy from Ohio. And one of her problems as a character is that since she’s in love, she’s starting to feel all of these things she didn’t feel before, where she used to run around in the woods and shoot geese with a crossbow, now she’s thinking about bunny rabbits and the color pink and wearing yellow dresses. It’s kind of fun because you see her transition into more of the stereotypical, you know, teenager that’s falling in love. So it’s fun because she becomes a little bit of a more normal person as the show goes along, too.

Q: Was that the last time you were in Minnesota, with the Legally Blonde tour?

A: That was the last time that I was there, yeah. And actually my best friend since I was 11 years old now lives in St. Paul so I’m anxious to get there and see her and two kids actually that I went to high school with, because I’m from the Midwest. I grew up in Indiana, went to college in Michigan so we’re so happy to be in the Midwest, I love it. And I’ll head to Mall of America, obviously. I spent so much money the last time I was in St. Paul, oh my gosh, I came back broke after being there. I can’t wait to be back.

Q: Do you have any rituals that you do before each show?

A: I have a handshake with my brother Pugsley that we have to do before every show starts, every single night. If we don’t do it, we can’t start the show. (laughs)

Q: Awesome. So how have audiences been reacting to the show?

A: They’ve loved it. We have been so happy on tour. The show takes place, where the Addams family lives in the middle of New York. I have done this show in New York and know how audiences there react to the jokes but we have been so thrilled by the audience reaction. I think it’s just so relate-able. People come and they already love the characters, everyone knows who the Addams family is. But when they leave, they end up finding out they’re seemingly normal, or abnormal, and everyone can relate to them. I don’t think that they know that when they’re first going to the show. And every single night, people are on their feet. We’ve been so lucky. It’s so fun for us because when the audience loves it, it just makes our job 100 times easier. We have a blast.

The Addams Family Musical opens Tuesday and runs through May 20 at the Ordway Center for Performing Arts. Tickets are available at www.ordway.org.

“Tentpole” is hardly the word for The Avengers. The movie has a reported $100 million marketing budget beyond the movie’s estimated $220 million production budget. It has been preceded by what could now technically be referred to as four prequels — two Iron Mans, a Thor and a Captain America — with a collective budget of $630 million. In other words, depending on how you slice it up, more than $1 billion went into the making of this particular fanboy event. So, no, it’s no “tentpole.” It’s the Big Frickin’ Top.

Happily, it’s on the whole a more fully enjoyable affair than any of the movies that preceded it, save maybe the first Iron Man. Writer-director Joss Whedon doesn’t saddle the movie with a complicated plot set-up or multiple twists. In short, Thor’s nefarious (and, in my Norse opinion, misrepresented) brother Loki comes to earth from Asgard to snatch from the S.H.I.E.L.D. organization a blue, glowing energy cube called a Tesseract.

What it does, what it’s capable of and, frankly, why Loki even wants it aren’t important. All Whedon cares about is setting up the apparatus that will unite Marvel Comics’ almost all-star team to unite and conquer. The bumps in the road getting their iron wills to mesh are what Whedon seems to savor the most. The bulk of the movie’s running time is devoted to various scenes in which, say, Tony Stark trades barbs with Nick Fury, and Black Widow nervously navigates a conversation with loose cannon Bruce Banner. It’s like the superhero version of Duets.

That said, I came away from the movie greatly preferring some team members’ performance over others. If The Avengers is to be followed with sequels (which, oh yes, it is — three or four of which have already been given the green light), then here’s the batting order I’d most look forward to. (NOTE: Had I decided to rank Tom Hiddelston’s miscreant villain Loki among the rest, he would’ve been second or third. He’s a feisty minx.)

01. Hulk/Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: After two solo appearances in the aughts that most fans regard as misfires, what a joy it is to report that the Hulk has finally earned the distinction “Incredible.” It’s not even so much that Hulk, um, SMASHes with such abandon. It’s that Mark Ruffalo finally taps into Bruce Banner’s core tragedy. “I’m always angry” is both an intense call to action and a bitter adult truth amid so much child’s play.

CON: Practically none, though his powerhouse contributions to the final battle will have audiences so roused, you probably won’t catch some of the dialogue.

02. Iron Man/Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: As the only member of the Avengers to have already headlined two successful solo movies of his own, Tony Stark — or, rather, Robert Downey Jr. — has enough swagger for the entire militia. While that ‘tude grated during Iron Man 2, it provides nice ballast against some of the more rigid personalities among his teammates here.

CON: The pervasive sense that he’s about ready to go all Diana Ross on the rest of them.

03. Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: OK, this is a little bit of a cheat. He’s not technically a member of the Avengers. But Coulson’s half-suit, half-geek agent has been on the margins of this franchise for a while now, and his role moving The Avengers into its third act is absolutely crucial. If the movie has an emotional anchor, he’s it.

CON: Can not bench press a small town.

04. Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: Whether Hawkeye is regarded on the same level as Hulk or Thor or any other superhuman figure is in the eye of the beholder. What can’t be argued is that any of his fellow cast members do as much heavy lifting to elevate their respective characters as much as Jeremy Renner does here. No one else could’ve made a guy crouching with a bow and arrow seem so impossibly cool.

CON: Well, there is the small matter of what he does to S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Helicarrier.

05. Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: Black Widow wins the movie’s “most improved” prize, following a pretty inconsequential stint in Iron Man 2. Scarlett Johansson still fails to really sell the character’s apparently quite painful backstory, but that probably won’t matter to anyone when she’s doing that thing people say they do before they “take names.”

CON: She’s always one step behind Loki, in the end.

06. Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: Much like Phil Coulson, he gets in on a technicality, but he’s still a crucial inclusion. Without him, there would be no unified Avengers.

CON: Still, you’ve got to admit, given what happens in the middle of the film, you can’t exactly call him a faultless team leader. And there is that whole matter of what he knows about why S.H.I.E.L.D. wants the Tesseract. Moral relativism, anyone?

07. Thor (Chris Hemsworth)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: You know, I actually kind of liked last summer’s Thor, in a kitschy Xanadu sort of way. Chris Hemsworth emphasizes the Norse god’s stoicism just short of camp. C’mon, dude summons bolts of lightning!

CON: What we have here is sort of the opposite of Tony Stark’s “pro” column above. What registered as a humorous riff on square-jawed heroism in Thor’s solo movie seems a lot duller in an ensemble. For a god, he’s kind of a drag.

08. Captain America (Chris Evans)

(credit: Marvel)

PRO: Well, Chris Evans has the best physique in the entire cast, excepting maybe Hemsworth. (But I always thought Thor looked a little too juiced to be true.)

CON: Unfortunately, his personality pretty much begins and ends with his pectoral muscles. Yes, Captain America has always sort of been Marvel’s prom king. His dogmatic defense of old fashioned values (which worked in his solo movie’s WWII setting) always threatens to stop the movie cold, unfurl a stadium sized Old Glory in the background and give Evans a stage to recreate George C. Scott as Gen. Patton.

I can’t think of a more appropriate title for the final film of the 2012 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival. It’s been a long, winding grueling, exciting, surprising road to get to this final MSPIFF destination. And though in some ways the onslaught of films (many great, many … not) has left us a little dazed and weary, all due respect to the organizers of the festival for giving the Twin Cities the chance to get drunk on movies.

To say nothing of the increasingly rare opportunity moviegoers get to walk into a screening totally tabula rasa, knowing almost nothing at all about what they’re sitting down to see. Though I’m sure many people enjoy the comfort of knowing they, for the next two hours or so, won’t have to feel challenged by anything, there are others among us who look forward to tasting the unknown. As either Roger Ebert or Stephen King (can’t remember now) said, cheeseburgers are great, but do you really want to eat them for every meal?

So the MSPIFF closes this evening with a screening of its closing film, the Lebanese drama Where Do We Go Now?, directed by the part-Canadian Nadine Labaki. In it, a group of women caught in the middle of a tense, downright deadly political situation persist in staying true to their friendship, even though they would normally be considered opposing forces in their war zone.

If you want to stretch the metaphor of MSPIFF’s selection of this movie for their closing feature, you could surmise that it represents a happy medium between the increasingly polarized worlds of mass entertainment and, frankly, everything else. (Especially since Labaki’s commercial instincts are pretty marketable.) The cooperation of the movie’s characters could be said to suggest the viability of a popular cinema that moves between concepts of “niche” and “demographics.”

Or not. But for a few weeks every April, MSPIFF gives cinephiles more than enough fodder to dream about it.

Where Do We Go Now? plays in Theater 1 at 7:30 p.m.

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(credit: MSPIFF)

Other Highlights: Thursday, May 3

Fortress. A German coming-of-age drama about how a young girl deals with first love. (Theater 4; 4:45 p.m.)

Free Men. Another tense French crime pic. In this one, Muslims are leading a resistance in Paris. (Theater 2; 4:50 p.m.)

Tanguero. The seductiveness of the dance, the pull of Buenos Aires. A pas de deux meant to be seen on the big screen. (Theater 3; 5:15 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

(credit: Amy Rea)

It’s a considerable bounty, with about 600 around the state. I’m guessing you’re at least passingly familiar with the Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, the Walker Art Museum, the Weisman, the Science Museum of Minnesota, and the History Center in St. Paul. But there are so many other museums to explore, in the Twin Cities and around the state. Here are just a few to consider visiting this month.

The Museum of Russian Art is a small gem just off 35W in Minneapolis. It’s the only North American museum to focus exclusively on Russian artwork, and it offers a frequently changing set of exhibitions and traveling exhibits. The gift shop is beautiful.

The Foshay Museum is tiny, but it’s packed full of details about the life and times of the Foshay Tower. Bonus: access to the observation deck.

Or you can travel south to Austin and take in the SPAM Museum. Trust me, there’s much about SPAM you might not know. Also? Plenty of humor and things for kids to do.

(credit: Amy Rea)

There’s an architectural oddity out in Belle Plaine, at the Hooper-Bowler-Hillstrom House. It’s packed with a variety of antiques and period pieces, but is perhaps best known for its two-story outhouse. Yes, really.

The Iron Range is home to the Greyhound Bus Museum. Not only is a Minnesota company, but it played an important role in WWII.

History is on display all over the place, and featuring all different aspects of the state’s past. The Hinckley Fire Museum covers the horrific firestorm that in just a few short hours devastated the area around Hinckley.

(credit: Amy Rea)

History meets the outdoors at Roseau’s Polaris ATV Experience Center. Snowmobiles and ATVs abound, as well as discussions of their uses and evolutions.

(credit: Amy Rea)

Art is available around the state too, especially in the scenic town of Winona. The Minnesota Marine Art Museum is a lovely collection that’s much more diverse than you might guess from the name, and includes pieces by O’Keeffe, Picasso, and Van Gogh.

One of Minnesota’s crabbiest residents is cheerfully feted in Sauk Centre. The Sinclair Lewis Boyhood Home gives visitors a glimpse into the early life of the Nobel Prize-winning author who memorialized the town in his searing Main Street.

(credit: Amy Rea)

It doesn’t get much more Minnesotan—in a cheerful capacity—than the Dorothy Molter Museum in Ely. Molter was the last person to actually live in the Boundary Waters. After her death, her cabin was carefully dismantled, labeled, and brought to Ely and rebuilt, then filled with her belongings. She was known as the Root Beer Lady because she home-brewed root beer for visitors to her remote home. Yes, you can buy root beer at the gift shop. Yes, it’s worth it.

Finding Minnesota
What else is happening in our state? Be sure to check out the 10 p.m. Sunday night WCCO newscasts, where you can learn more in the weekly segment, Finding Minnesota.

It’s an extraordinary gift — one so special that only 12 people officially have it. Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory allows a person to remember moments and personal experiences in their lives down to specific details and exact dates. It’s different than photo-graphical memory — she said she can’t look at a piece of paper and immediately recall what it says. We’re talking about intimate memories.

For example, she can remember the exact day she was last in Minneapolis — what the weather was like that day, what day of the week it was, who she was with and what the inside of our Orpheum Theatre looks like. It’s hard to believe sometimes. I mean after all, some of those facts are hard to “fact check” but then she turns the tables on you.

“OK, give me your birthday,” she said.

“Nov. 1, 1983,” I reply.

“OK, so Nov. 1, 1983 — it was a Tuesday. Did you know that?” Henner said.

“I actually don’t think I did,” I say.

“It was a Tuesday. I know exactly what I was doing. I had just finished shooting ‘Johnny Dangerously,’” she said.

She then went on to correctly identify the exact day my 21st birthday fell on — Monday, Nov. 1, 2004. Crazy.

It’s this unique gift that has Henner on a national tour with her ninth book, “Total Memory Makeover,” (with a stop at 7 p.m. Wednesday night at the Mall of America) and a gift that continues to give — helping her teach others to contain their memory, helping her relate personal experiences in her acting career and landing her the role of consultant on the CBS hit show “Unforgettable,” about a woman with a memory much like her’s.

As her first stop back in the Twin Cities, Henner sat down and chatted with us about what it’s like to have such an in-depth memory and how she’s helping others to hang on to past moments.

Henner said she’s always known she’s had this gift but never knew it was rare.

“I’ve always been known for my memory. Even as a tiny girl, growing up in Chicago, 2, 3, 4, 5 years old, they’d call me the “Memory Kid” or “Miss Memory” or things like that,” she said. “So people would say to my parents, ‘What’s with that kid and her memory?’ It seemed so bizarre to people. So I knew I had the best memory in my family and then, sort of, the circle got bigger and I realized I had the best memory of anyone that I knew. But I figured, oh gosh, it must not be that rare, I’m sure a lot of people must have this memory.”

It wasn’t until she realized just how rare it was that she decided to do something about it. Henner started teaching classes and holding seminars on memory and how people can make the most of theirs.

“I know how my brain naturally works and I knew if I could somehow translate it into tips and theories for other people, then I could help other people tap into their autobiographical memories,” she said.

(credit: Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images)

It wasn’t until an appearance on “60 Minutes” with others like her that everything really expanded — she wrote nine books on memory topics and became the go-to expert on the subject.

“It’s not just about the bad memories or cushioning them with good memories. You have a great story. Every single person has a fabulous story so why not access it and bring it into the present so that it can then inform the future,” she said.

Henner said one of her first memories was the day of her baptism. Her godmother was a nun, so she would constantly tell her about her baptism and the details that unfolded. While that was certainly reinforced over the years, Henner said she can remember it — and yes, people thought that was absurd.

“I tell people this now and, well, they used to think I was crazy but now they know I’m telling the truth,” she said.

In a way, working on your memory and enhancing it now is more important than ever, Henner said. As we continue living in a communication-dominated world with everyone texting, GPSing and speed dialing — it’s easy to flow through life without really thinking about it or taking it in, she said.

“We never really have to think about where are we, what are we doing,” she said. “One of the whole sections in my book is that people are sense-dominate. I know from teaching my classes that everyone has a sense of which they are most proficient so they are recording their memories and therefore able to retrieve their memories by playing to their dominate sense.”

Henner said visual people take in information in a visual or photographic way. If you’re a sound person, you’re going to remember conversations more vividly.

“Once you know what sense is dominate to you, play to those strengths,” she said.

She described four different types of memory retrieval — horizontal, vertical, mushrooming and sporadic — and how each of us collects memories in a different way, with no way being necessarily “correct.”

Horizontal memory retrieval, she said, is very linear, more chronological and in a point-to-point way (“We got there Friday night, I went for a jog on Saturday morning”) where vertical is a bit deeper, where you’re remembering details and specific conversations. Mushrooming refers to a bit of a tangent from the initial memory. Henner used the example of a wedding, so if she were to ask about the wedding itself, someone mushrooming memories might say, “Oh, I met a guy, we went out to dinner that night and now we’re working on a project together.”

Sporadic memories are those that retrieve other memories — so going back to the wedding example, a person might respond to a question about the wedding by saying, “There was a guy there who looked just like my old boss and I was instantly reminded of my old job.”

“In my classes, people would say, ‘I can’t really just stay on the one thing’ and I’d say, ‘Don’t, don’t worry about it. Your not going to control your memories. Just take the wild ride,’” Henner said.

Henner’s extensive memory — and knowledge of how memories work — also landed her a new job as a consultant to the CBS show, “Unforgettable.” Henner said she was asked to help with the show since the main character is based on someone with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory and has been having a fantastic time adding her expertise — and let’s be honest, her credibility, which has already come in handy a few times.

She said she’s given the show ideas on how someone with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory would respond to certain scenarios — and even corrected them a time or two.

While watching a sneak peek of the show and what it will be like, Henner said she noticed something right away.

“I start watching it and the first thing is, a character says to Poppy’s character, Carrie, ‘Hey Carrie, show em that thing you do, March 27, 1998,’ so I’m thinking March 27, 1998, that was a Friday, I flew back from New York to Los Angeles, the night before I went to dinner at Picholine restaurant, I had the oysters and the white peppercorn soup, you know, I’m thinking this and all of a sudden she goes, ‘It was a Tuesday,’” Henner said. “And I’m thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, no! It was a Friday, it wasn’t a Tuesday!’”

The writers changed it after a call from Henner, who assured them, yes, people will check it and see if it’s right.

Marilu Henner will be at the Mall of America for a book signing at 7 p.m. Wednesday. Check back to the Curiocity column next week for the second part of her two-part interview.

“I wanted to take it before they had a chance to change their mind,” Tauer said.

After spending 12 years as an assistant to his mentor and current boss, Steve Fritz, the opportunity came after Fritz retired from coaching in 2011 following the Tommies’ run to a national title. Tauer was the interim coach for the 2011-12 season, one where St. Thomas won the MIAC regular season title, MIAC tournament title and a first round NCAA Tournament game.

(credit: St. Thomas Basketball)

The Tommies’ season ended with a loss to UW-Whitewater, this year’s eventual national champion, in the second round. What followed was a short time of uncertainty. Would Tauer have his interim label removed? Would the university go a different direction?

He says he never treated the season or his job any differently than if he already was the head coach.

“I looked at this like it was a job I wanted and I was going to take it. I wasn’t going to have a packed-up office because it was what we expected,” Tauer said.

Fritz said he had more than 70 coaches apply for the job at St. Thomas. That field was narrowed down to a select few who came on campus for an interview, a crop that included Tauer. Fritz said once the interview process was over, they knew who their guy was.

“I think he was the heir apparent for a long time. You have to take a look at all the options out there, but he’s the best candidate for us,” Fritz said. “John did a great job of being prepared as if he was a candidate from the outside. He took nothing for granted.”

It doesn’t hurt when you overcome the adversity Tauer faced last season. Four starters from a national title team graduated, then his star center, Tommy Hannon, went down early with a season-ending knee injury. Hannon recently learned he was granted an extra season of eligibility through a medical hardship waiver from the NCAA, similar to what Trevor Mbakwe from the Gophers was granted.

It gives Hannon one more year with the squad and Tauer arguably his best player back from last season.

Immediately after Tauer was offered and accepted the job, he sent text messages to his current players about a news conference for the announcement. He said some of them wanted to skip class to celebrate the decision, but advised them otherwise.

Tauer also played for Fritz at St. Thomas during his collegiate years, and came back to the school after college to be a professor of psychology. Basketball is in his blood, and there’s no place he feels more comfortable than on the St. Thomas bench.

He said having a successful year helped him feel like it was the right move to make if it came his way.

“Part of it is a reflection on the kids too. We went into the season with a target on our back. Coming off a national title, nobody felt sorry for us when our star got hurt,” Tauer said.

In theory, there will be virtually no transition needed for Tauer as the program’s leader as he’s already had a year to go through that. What’s clear is that the program now has a coach who wants to be there just as much as it wants him.

It’s a recipe for success that you simply just don’t find everywhere. Tauer said he’s thrilled to stay at the school he loves, working in the community he knows and coaching the kids he’s established a relationship with.

“I think it’s both exciting and a relief to get the search over with. I feel fortunate to have my dream job,” Tauer said.

Fritz said he knows he’s left the program in good hands, and it should stay that way for a long time.

If you read the word trilogy and immediately think Star Wars, prepare yourself: something new is on your horizon.

The Dreileben Trilogy bares more of a resemblance to Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colors Trilogy than it does to George Lucas’s films. The three movies — Beats Being Dead, Don’t Follow Me Around and One Minute of Darkness — are set in the same east German hinterland; however, the movie’s separate plots are only loosely connected.

Beats Being Dead is about a boy and a girl. The boy is a student of medicine (ambitious but lonely) and the girl is hotel maid with the temper of a hydrogen bomb. The two meet after suffering at the hands of a dirt bike gang; they kiss and fight, sleep together and argue; and their relationship tumbles on in the foreground of a backdrop that spans all three movies — a killer is on the loose!

The boy above actually lets the killer out, and this killer becomes the most interesting player in the trilogy. At times, he is the camera, moving like an animal about the countryside. Sometimes he’s a ghost, hovering about houses and windowpanes. Sometimes he’s a man-child, a son, a friend. Sometimes he’s a classic American psycho, complete with the exclamation mark of an up-turned butcher knife.

(I’ll skip over the second movie, Don’t Follow Me Around, because I found it the lesser of the three.)

The third, as you would hope, is the most engaging; One Minute of Darkness is a murder mystery. This is where the hunt for the killer leads a detective to question whether or not the killer actually killed anyone. This third film artfully shows how the alleged killer was everything listed above — an animal, a ghost, a son, a psycho — while keeping you on your toes.

However, you have to see the first movie (and the second, I guess) to enjoy the whodunit of the third. Although they are only loosely related, the movies support each other, like a spiderweb, creating a pretty architecture.

This loose fabric is both appealing and unsatisfying. While the trilogy tends to keep you guessing, it only reluctantly answers what you’re interested in knowing. Over the course of five hours, there’s certainly plenty of time for a viewer to get worn out.

At their best, the movies are surprising and mature, resembling some of my favorites in “arthouse” cinema, like Kieślowski’s Short Film About Love. But the problem is: they aren’t always at their best.

If you want a drama that doesn’t pretend to be anything but a drama, check this out. Remember, you can always see the first movie and then decide if the rest are worth watching.

Beats Being Dead plays at 5:30 p.m.

Don’t Follow Me Around plays at 7:20 p.m.

One Minute of Darkness plays at 9:10 p.m.

Other Highlights: Wednesday, May 2

Occupy the farm! That’s what one Swedish woman, Britt, is doing in the documentary Women With Cows. She’s trying to perverse her family farm, and she’s willing to risk her life in the process. However, there’s trouble in the family. (Women With Cows plays at 4:30 p.m.)

Turn me On, Dammit! is one of those awkward/funny movies about growing up. In this case, Alma comes of age to find that her sexual needs are much more demanding than those of her peers. To help deal with her new-found desires, she calls sex phone lines and … has at it. Although her family and friends find her behavior odd, embarrassing and immoral, Alma embraces the girl into which she blossoms. (Turn me On, Dammit! plays at 7:45 p.m.)

What better way to end a Wednesday than to watch a movie about a hitman who wakes up after a contract goes pear-shaped to find that his visions is inverted. Sound confusing? It seems like Headshot is supposed to be. But this thriller has won awards in both Hong Kong and Berlin. (Headshot plays at 9:45 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

“The dog ate my homework” gets a wryly navel-gazing, grad school spin in Nancy, Please (a film which, incidentally, boasts maybe my favorite title this year).

In Andrew Semans’ first feature film, Paul (Will “Not That Will” Rogers) is a Yalie grad student working on his doctorate thesis paper about Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit. The only problem is that he left his heavily-marked copy of the book at the apartment of his ex-girlfriend Nancy (Elenore Hendricks). And she doesn’t appear to be in a mood to return the tome and allow him to finish his work.

Or is that really all that’s blocking his academic progress? His current relationship with the forgiving Jen (Rebecca Lawrence) suggests that maybe Paul’s problem with women is just that: Paul’s problem.

All attempts Paul makes at reasoning with Nancy are met by equal parts silence and hostility, but the longer the stand-off goes between the two, the more it seems as though there’s a question of representation at work in Semans’ film. Could this whole drama, filtered through Paul’s eyes, be an attempt to validate to himself that the relationship was ready to end, though he doesn’t quite believe it himself?

Nancy, Please is an engrossing, alternately funny and horrifying dissection of academic self-involvement. Bring a pen, you’ll want to jot down a few footnotes.

Nancy, Please plays in Theater 1 at 9:15 p.m.

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(credit: MSPIFF)

Other Highlights: Tuesday, May 1

Yojimbo. Toshiro Mifune holds court in this classic 1961 samurai action epic, directed by Akira Kurosawa. Never have shoulders seemed so emotive. (Theater 2; 4:30 p.m.)

Death of a Superhero. A boy turns his sad battle with Leukemia into a fantasy world, in which he’s a superhero doing battle with “The Glove.” My money’s on this being better than The Avengers. (Theater 4; 9:20 p.m.)

Sleepless Nights. For the last decade, France has been showing up the U.S. in extreme horror. Their action movies have been no slouch, either. Actor-director Frederic Jardin makes a bid to rock your face off. (Theater 3; 10 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

Even I started to get antsy as I heard about spring foraging favorites like morels and ramps showing up at the co-ops. After a month of waiting, I’m happy to report that the markets are now open!

I made a run to opening day at the Minneapolis Farmers Market on Saturday to see what I could find. Donning a rain jacket and layers, I found plenty of parking under the bridge and joined the other market lovers on a quest to find things like asparagus, cheese, herbs, bread and bean sprouts for meals this week. Although I’m still without an oven (darn gas leak and incredibly slow repair people), I made good use of my toaster oven to melt Alemar Cheese Company’s Bent River Camembert over slices of New French Bakery’s baguette and used my electric tea kettle to soften up Untiedt’s asparagus for spring rolls with herbs and bean sprouts.

Just these little tastes made me even more excited for market season and what’s to come. St. Paul Farmer’s Market is also open and smaller markets are gearing up for their opening dates in May and June. Keep an eye out for markets opening near you and start enjoying some local produce in your meals.

The latest film from Canadian treasure Guy Maddin is a handmade masterpiece.

Like most of his previous films, Keyhole is pretty bizarre, visually beguiling, and features Isabella Rosselini and a member of the beloved comedy troupe The Kids In The Hall. Oh, and it’s really, truly bizarre.

Keyhole is Maddin’s idiosyncratic take on The Odyssey, complete with a touch that’s even unusual for Maddin – a proper leading man. Jason Patric plays the gangster Ulysses, who returns to his family home in search of his wife Hyacinth (Rosselini). But as Ulysses searches room to room for her in nightmarish vain, he must deal with his own angry goons, backstabbing family members (living and dead), and a very, very naked elderly man.

Jason Patric is perfectly cast as the wandering gangster, and is revelatory in Maddin’s gorgeous black and white. Most importantly, Patric seems perfectly at home in this experimental and miles-from-mainstream cinematic world.

Maddin’s typical style, which seems like a post-modern spin on silent-era cinema, is largely absent in Keyhole. Besides his usually painstaking, feverish and virtuosic editing, Keyhole is, visually, a spot-on film noir.

And I hate to say it, but it’s Maddin at his most David Lynchiest – down to the half-dissolves of shadowy haze, unnerving sound design, and frequent collaborator Rosselini. But make no mistake – Keyhole is pure, maddening Maddin.

If gorgeous, twirling nightmares are your thing (and you can stomach artfully filmed full-frontal elderly nudity), check out Keyhole tonight at 9 p.m.!

Other Highlights: Friday, April 27

The Last Dogs of Winter. This documentary takes a look at the long hard road sled dogs face. (4:45 p.m.)

Play involves Swedish teenage thieves, and was well received at this years Cannes Film Fest. (9:15 p.m.)

Nancy, Please is about a man’s quest to retrieve a beloved book from the clutches of a nasty ex-roommate. (7 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

An area of light to moderate rainfall will continue to move north out of Iowa and bring a soggy Sunday evening to south-central and southeastern Minnesota. The chance for showers Sunday evening does extend to the Twin Cities, with the best chance of rain across the southeast Metro.

Shower activity will likely diminish by early Monday morning, but by lunch time sunshine should punch through the clouds. The warm up will continue as highs near 70 degrees on Monday.

Near-80 degree highs are on tap for Tuesday, yet the warmth will build in ahead of a strong area of low pressure set to bring thunderstorms to the metro late-day Tuesday.

This system looks to slow and strengthen over the region, keeping showers and storms in the forecast for Tuesday night and much of Wednesday. Strong to severe thunderstorms are possible.

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – We have an upper-level area of low pressure positioned over the Dakotas to thank for this dreary and cool start to the weekend! Expect a chance for isolated showers to re-develop tonight as the low continues to spin off pulses of energy.

The upper low will exit north on Sunday, allowing warmer air to build in, which will help high temperatures to rebound to near 60 degrees by the afternoon.

As one system clears out, our next weather system will move in from the south, quickly bringing the chance of showers back to the forecast. Scattered shower activity to be confined mainly to south-eastern Minnesota and western Wisconsin on Sunday. The Twin Cities Metro is on the periphery of the rain threat, with the best chance of showers to be across the southeast Metro Sunday afternoon.

The warm-up will continue into the work week with highs in the mid to upper 70’s for the start of May on Tuesday, but that warmth will be ushered in ahead of a potent area of low pressure that may bring strong thunderstorms late-day Tuesday into Tuesday night.

In the end it passed 7-6, but after several near-death experiences. The final death threat came when Senator Warren Limmer tried to get the bill sent to the Judiciary Committee, where it would have been given a prompt and proper burial. There are still legislators wanting to reshape the very basic aspects of the funding mechanism by throwing user fees into the mix.

In the end legislators will vote most likely on Sunday, appropriately game day during football season. This will be the Vikings ultimate game, and while it’s a team that has delivered on the field heartbreak for diehard fans for years, the outcome here is a toss-up.

Is it a Hail Mary, a desperate attempt to see if the votes are there? Or are backers putting together the ultimate drive, the votes lined secretly lined up and secured? It is drama of a high order, and one that appears poised, at least right now, to come to a final resolution with the legislature finally after all these years making a decision.

Gorgeously filmed (with only the very faintest whiff of a Stella Artois advertisement), Found Memories is another spin on the “strong will of youth overcomes staid obsolescence of age” archetype. The full, original title of the film is actually Stories That Only Live When Remembered, which should give you a pretty good idea of the sort of tone the movie takes.

The debut feature of director Julia Murat, the Brazilian drama Memories concerns itself with the unleavened existence of bread maker Madalena (Sonia Guedes), who goes about her daily baking tasks with little remaining zest.

That’s until the wanderer Rita (Lisa Favero) finds her way into both the town of Jotuomba and Madalena’s life and jolts what had been a sleepy, reactionary sort of burg into new life and runs up against interference from an authoritarian priest.

Despite the story’s obvious parallels with significantly more mawkish entertainments on the order of, say, the insufferable, retrograde Chocolat, Memories is far more sly and seductive about its attack plan, no more so than in its lovely establishing shots from director of photography Lucio Bonelli.

With his help, Memories emerges as a movie that truly does function as something both vaguely remembered and experienced anew once again.

Found Memories plays in Theater 2 at 5 p.m.

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(credit: MSPIFF)

Other Highlights: Friday, April 27

Gun Fight. Colin Goddard, one of the subjects of this documentary look at gun violence in America, will be attending this screening. He became a gun control advocate after surviving the Virginia Tech massacre of 2007. (Theater 1; 4:30 p.m.)

Farewell, My Queen. Underrated French director Benoit Jacquot’s new movie — a Marie Antoinette pic staring Inglourious Basterds‘ Diane Kruger — opened the Berlin International Film Festival. (Theater 1; 7:10 p.m.)

Juan of the Dead. Lesson #1 for aspiring horror movie directors: make your movie about zombies and give it a title that joshes Shaun of the Dead. Watch the fest screenings come lurching your way. (Theater 2; 10 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

This movie isn’t nearly as dark as it pretends to be.

The Curse of the Gothic Symphony centers around the behemoth that is the Gothic Symphony — the longest, biggest symphony ever written – and the difficulty people have in organizing its performances.

Until this documentary, the Gothic had only played on a handful of English stages due to the fact its two hours long, requires hundreds and hundreds of people and is, generally, not well-liked.

But that didn’t stop a group of music lovers from getting it played in Australia, despite the fact it took one man more than 20 years of effort.

The movie tries to blame the difficulty of getting the symphony played on a curse, and this is the root from which my complaints with the movie stem. The curse is all people talk about (more or less), and it’s highlighted to such a degree that it’s annoying.

A good documentary on struggle – say Les Blank’s Burden of Dreams – lets you see struggle on people’s faces, in their voices, in their environments, their desires. A mediocre documentary tells you these things and punctuates them with dark clouds and thunderclaps. In other words: Curse tells you, it doesn’t show you.

If you are a classical music buff who harbors an affinity for Havergal Brian, Curse may very well be for you. But if you’re in the market for a cinematic experience, see something else.

Curse plays at 7:30 p.m.

Other Highlights: Friday, April 26

Winter Light is for those with Norse blood. It’s a documentary that seeks to capture life in Norway during a particular time of winter when the sun dips below the horizon and casts vanilla rays up from the earth. (Theater 5, 3:15 p.m.)

The Last Dogs of Winter. This documentary takes a look at the long hard road sled dogs face. (Theater 5, 6:45 p.m.)

Summer Games. Who can resist such delicious counter-programming against the two previously mentioned highlights? (Theater 2, 7:15 p.m.)

For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

The thing about crowd-pleasers at film festivals … after a few of them, they start to all seem as though they’re operating from the exact same playbook. You can anticipate the emotional beats with no effort, and the end result often flatters certain tastes just as baldly as, say, Transformers.

There’s nothing all that wrong with Israeli import Restoration, per se. It’s been anointed (or at least chosen for consideration) by Sundance and Toronto and it doesn’t take much effort to see why. It’s a solidly-made but unassuming little movie about an old school man fighting a certain kind of obsolescence.

Sasson Gabai plays Yaakov Fidelman, a packrat who has made a life for himself restoring old furniture and, in his own defeated way, making a futile attempt to rage against the dying of the light. After Yaakov’s business partner dies, he wonders if he can shore up his own dwindling verve to stay in business. His son Noah, still young enough to switch gears, thinks it would be better for Yaakov to sell out and make way for condos.

Gee, I just can’t imagine why festival audiences mightn’t feel a certain level of recognition and self-congratulation in it. Swap out “antique furniture” for “movies presented in analog, 35mm format, free of 3-D manipulation and interchangeable superheroes” and that pretty well spells it out. Yaakov’s sexy new apprentice threatens to reignite Yaakov’s mojo (not to mention Noah’s pregnant wife), making him an easy point-of-entry for younger cinephiles still carrying the torch for that old romanticism.

All condescension aside, Restoration‘s plot is a little knottier (pun intended) than I’m giving it credit for having, and Gabai’s performance is filled with resonant ornaments (oh, I did it again). It both embodies and argues on behalf of middlebrow resilience, which it also unfortunately overvalues.

Restoration plays in Theater 2 at 4:45 p.m.

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(credit: MSPIFF)

Other Highlights: Wednesday, April 25

I Am Not A Hipster. And I am not a movie critic. (Theater 3; 7:20 p.m.)

Vinylmania. But I am a hipster. (Theater 4; 7:45 p.m.)

The Good Life. The intersection of old glamour and new decay makes this in-comp doc looks on paper a little bit like Denmark’s own Grey Gardens. A staunch must-see. (Theater 3; 9:15 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — It had been nine days since we last felt the 70s. Tuesday’s high of 73 cracked that streak and brought many smiles around town.

We will notch one more warm day before a cold front drops south bringing back the cool, crisp feel to spring. Ahead of that front, expect temps to punch into the 70s once again. As the high pressure center passes to the north, it will bring cool air with it.

The days will look great as the rain will be pushed farther south because of the strength of the high pressure. But it will only warm to the mid-50s each day into the weekend. That is 7-8 degrees cooler than average.

Minnesota and mumblecore. Like peanut butter and jelly (or, rather, like peanut butter and the roof of your cast’s mouth).

Local writer-director Peter McLarnan keeps his cards awfully close throughout The Sound of Small Things. Sam Hoolihan and Cara Krippner star as, well, Sam and Cara, a young married couple who are experiencing friction in their otherwise photogenically passive relationship.

The reason: Cara has suffered an accident that has left her deaf. Rather than learn sign language, she resorts to reading lips. And rather than tell her husband what happened that left her deaf, she withholds what one would presume would be crucial information from Sam.

McLarnan films the young, sometimes incoherent, usually tacit lovers with nice compositions that sometimes verge on preciosity. (More than once, I thought I was watching a viral feature film created by the insufferable indie-pop duo Pomplamoose.) And yet, there’s still something to be said for the sweetness of their performances.

What really distinguishes the movie from more overtly mumblecore-ish offerings is how much it foregrounds its delicate sound design, all in an effort to stress the “small things” Cara is doing without, and Sam could be accused of taking for granted (or, in the case of his frequent drumming, advantage of).

The Sound of Small Things plays in Theater 1 at 7 p.m. Director McLarnan will be present at the screening.

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(credit: MSPIFF)

Other Highlights: Tuesday, April 24

The Collaborator and His Family. The divide between Israel and Palestine comes home to roost in this documentary about a family forced to relocate from Palestine over to Tel Aviv. (Theater 1; 5 p.m.)

Kids of Today. One of the most stylish-looking offerings today is this documentary look at French rock critic Yves Adrian. (Theater 5; 9:40 p.m.)

Kill List. A reprise of one of the most buzzed-about cult movies of the year, a U.K. shocker about hitmen who stumble into a job that they’ll wish they hadn’t taken. (Theater 2; 9:45 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

In Organic We Trust – Teaser #1 from Pasture Pictures on Vimeo.

Have you ever considered what the word organic means when you see it on fruit, vegetables or ice cream cones? Did its meaning, in your mind, seem to be a mash of words like fresh, nutritious, eco-friendly, expensive and hip? If so, In Organic We Trust might be something fresh for you.

Kiplin Pastor, the movie’s director, offers you a look at his journey to the center of organic. Although the film is about as flavorful as Styrofoam peanuts, it does offer some insight into that word’s convoluted world.

Pastor shows there’s not really any evidence to support the popular belief that organic food is more nutritious for you. He also sheds light on the fact that organic is a marketing term — one that major corporate food companies use to push products. Pastor gets into history, pesticides and government practices. The movie is a learning experience, especially if organic means virtually nothing to you.

But the movie doesn’t debunk organic, so don’t get the wrong impression. In fact, Pastor starts the film quite open to the benefits of organic farming. He also shows that the philosophy behind the word – that of farming within the soil’s means, that of using tools and processes developed by nature – is quite sound and uplifting to farmers that practice it. However, organic is something like religion: its meaning changes depending on who you talk to.

As an added benefit, Pastor will be at tonight’s showing, which plays at 9:15 p.m., to talk apples and oranges.

Other Highlights: Monday, April 23

The Moon Is Jewish is a documentary that focuses on Pawel, an orthodox Jew in Poland who wasn’t always so orthodox. In fact, he used to be a skinhead. Screens as with Ub Lama (9:10 p.m.)

King For 2 Days captures local drummer Dave King, the foundation for some five bands — Happy Apple, The Bad Plus, Golden Valley Is Now, Buffalo Collision, and the Dave King Trucking Company — as they all take over Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center. (Learn what being in a band means at 7 p.m.)

And if another food doc is what you crave, Sushi: The Global Catch is about the past, present and future of the sushi industry, and the ecological consequences of the world’s growing love of the raw delicacy. (7:30 p.m.)

For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

King for Two Days Trailer from Couple 3 Films on Vimeo.

If you’ve never heard of Twin Cities’ drummer Dave King, you may have heard of one of his five bands. Yes, he’s in FIVE bands: Happy Apple, The Bad Plus, Golden Valley Is Now, Buffalo Collision, and the Dave King Trucking Company.

For two consecutive nights in March 2012, King allowed all of his musical worlds to collide at the Walker Art Center with a concert by each band. The result is this documentary, and total awesomeness. But what can you expect from a master percussionist with a ravenous appetite for collaboration, and the knack for writing fabulous song titles such as “The World Begins And Ends In Your Combover,” and “Keep The Bugs Off Your Glass And The Bears Off Your Ass”?

Directed by Noah Hutton (son of actors Debra Winger and Timothy Hutton), “King For 2 Days” let’s you marvel at the multi-genre drum mastery of King, as well as his wit and general likability. The onstage musical interactions are as beguiling as his backstage interactions are hilarious and endearing.

King For 2 Days plays tonight at 7 p.m., and is followed by a Q & A by Hutton and Dave King. Afterwards, Summit Brewing Co. sponsors a free afterparty down the block at Aster Cafe, where the Dave King Trucking Company will perform live!

Other Highlights: Monday, April 23

The Moon Is Jewish is a documentary that focuses on Pawel, an orthodox Jew in Poland who wasn’t always so orthodox. In fact, he used to be a skinhead. Screens as with Ub Lama (9:10 p.m.)

In Organic We Trust attempts to dig deep into the organic foods hype, debunk the idea of  the organic movement as the savior of the food industry. and show how the government and corporations have warped the public’s perception on the topic. Director Kiplin Pastor will be in attendance! (9:15 p.m.)

And if another food doc is what you crave, Sushi: The Global Catch is about the past, present and future of the sushi industry, and the ecological consequences of the world’s growing love of the raw delicacy. (7:30 p.m.)

For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

For more of the WCCO Movie Blog’s coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.