Russia
Nixon
“Nixon” is a long, lumbering ox of a film that, though tedious and muddled at times, is ambitious in its exploration of the life and undoing of the infamous president. Far from being the character assassination one might expect, Oliver Stone’s film is a surprisingly fair portrayal of Nixon (played brilliantly by Anthony Hopkins) and a complex examination of his rise and, ultimately, tragic political demise…
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
In 1986, I discovered the heavy metal band Metallica. I was in seventh grade and living in Saudi Arabia, of all places, when my musical world was rocked by their album Master of Puppets. A friend who had gone to the States over Christmas break lent me the tape. Although there were several music stores in Saudi Arabia, their selection was limited to mostly mainstream pop and Top 40s rock; you couldn’t wander into a store like you can in the US and discover something new or offbeat. The fact that Saudi Arabia is an authoritarian state which employs diverse and heavy-handed methods of censorship also made it difficult to find great, fresh music…
Categories
