PROVIDENCE

See ya, '09!

Off the Couch
Forget those gift cards burning a hole in your pocket and catch some good shows around to close out '09.

By PROVIDENCE PHOENIX MUSIC STAFF | December 22, 2009

Review: It's Complicated

Indeed it is
It's complicated, and so are my feelings about Nancy Meyer's predictable and overlong boomer-bait rom-com.

By MIKE MILIARD | December 22, 2009

Rob Marshall continues his assault on good taste
It doesn't get much farther from human experience than this: an adaptation of a Broadway production adapting a film ( 8-1/2 ) about a filmmaker who imagines making a film.

By PETER KEOUGH | December 22, 2009

Review: Broken Embraces [Los Abrazos Rotos]

Broken promises: Pedro Almodóvar's open Embraces
No filmmaker generates narrative like Pedro Almodóvar. Five minutes into Broken Embraces and he's got half a dozen potential storylines spinning.

By PETER KEOUGH | December 22, 2009

Review: Sherlock Holmes

Boys will be boys
In its own way an ideal holiday blockbuster for the moderately educated, the new light-footed overhaul of Sherlock Holmes is three parts self-satisfied mixer to one part hard storytelling, and if anything, the film's popular trailers should have deterred you from expecting strong drink.

By MICHAEL ATKINSON | December 22, 2009

Review: Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel

Ugh
In playing evil ex-Chipmunk-band manager Ian Hawke, comedian David Cross draws the Short Straw of Irony, being dealt the line "At least I still have my dignity."

By LANCE GOULD | December 22, 2009

2009: The year in movies

Men behaving badly
As I looked over my list of the best movies of 2009, it suddenly struck me: where are all the women on screen?

By PETER KEOUGH | December 28, 2009

Best unsung albums of 2009

The cocky and the cock-blocked
These days, it's not so easy to feel useful as a music critic.

By MICHAEL BRODEUR | December 22, 2009

2009: Year in video games

Swimming the mainstream
At the end of each year, there's the temptation to identify a common theme among the games that were released.

By MITCH KRPATA | December 22, 2009

2009: The year in books

True stories - fact and fiction
Here, listed alphabetically by author, are 10 of the best books the Phoenix reviewed in 2009.

By JON GARELICK | December 22, 2009

RISD tunes up its moonbuggy

Space Travel
At the Rhode Island School of Design’s NASA-sponsored industrial design studio, the evidence of late-night activity is aplenty: granola bar wrappers, an empty Orangina bottle, and a crumpled potato-chip bag.

By ABIGAIL CROCKER | December 23, 2009

Spice

A hot and cheap Thai bistro
You might find it difficult to believe, but at one time there were no Thai restaurants in Providence. I know, I know, it’s sad — no pad Thai, no pik pow sauce, such deprivation, such shamed downward glances in the streets.

By BILL RODRIGUEZ | December 21, 2009

A lawyer’s adventures in bad judgment

Contempt of Court
People who know Keven McKenna know he is not a stupid man. Whether or not the Providence attorney, ex-state representative, and Harold Stassen of Providence mayoral races uses good judgment is another question.

By MARY ANN SORRENTINO | December 21, 2009

Have Yourself a Mugabe Little Christmas

Dr. Lovemonkey answers your questions
I work in a small office where everyone gets along well. I am in my early 20s, the youngest and only single employee ...

By DR. LOVEMONKEY | December 21, 2009

Meet Santa

Hoopleville
He can't stop the violins, either

By DAVID KISH | December 22, 2009

Worth the gamble?

A push for full-scale Vegas-style casinos is in the cards again. Can poker and craps save a state in freefall?
Just three years after Rhode Island voters killed plans for a full-scale, Vegas-style casino, big-time gambling is in the cards again.

By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | December 16, 2009

Two sides of life

Photographs by Andy Warhol and Stewart Martin
"I started as a commercial artist, and I want to finish as a business artist," the Pop artist Andy Warhol wrote in 1975. "Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art."

By GREG COOK | December 17, 2009

Change? What change?

Operation Afghan Tragedy. Plus, getting steamed over global warming and men in tights.
Nice to see Goldman Sachs employee Barack "President" Obama get rolled by Gen. Stanley McChrystal so we can send more troops to Afghanistan on a hopeless mission.

By PHILLIPE AND JORGE | December 16, 2009

Ama’s

Don’t read this, please
I'm in a quandary. I want to tell you about Ama's, but it's a tiny place with very few seats, and I really don't want to see a line outside the next time I show up.

By BILL RODRIGUEZ | December 16, 2009