News-Press – Page 67

Time to Shine

January 29, 2010May 7, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Sandra Bullock may finally be having her time in the sun. After the critical and popular success of “Speed” and “While You Were Sleeping” in 1994 and 1995, the actress has never been off our marquees, from thrillers and romantic comedies. But the big awards have eluded her, until now.

11 Amazing Days, 10 Starry Nights.

This year’s Santa Barbara International Film Festival almost throws down a gauntlet with that slogan: we’ve got so many must-see events, we dare you to get to them all! And we know. We’ve seen those people in line, heck sometimes we’ve been them, too: the hardened determination, the 1,000-yard stare of the film addict. More stories, more inspiration, more celluloid, more tributes, more buzz, more, more, more!

Red’s Bloody Mary

January 22, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Dana Walters keeps evolving her funk zone space, Reds Wine Bar, as the area evolves. For years, it was a well traversed coffee shop. Then, Walters changed it into a wine bar to sync with the Kalyra tasting room located behind Reds, and to fit in with the growth in tasting rooms nearby. Having managed that, Walters started the process of attaining a liquor license, putting herself down for the lottery. Now that she has that paper in hand, who should turn up but those boozy reprobates! That is, us.

Now, Reds is not slinging drinks like a Friday night at EOS. The atmosphere is more like a good friend making a drink for you in their kitchen. So we put Walters through her paces. Could she handle our demands?

Paradise Café’s Greentini

January 15, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

“It’s about time you walked over here!”

Yes, the Paradise Café is literally a 30-second walk from the News-Press offices, but we mixologists have a habit of not seeing the nose in front of our face. After all, our noses are red and can be mistaken for neon signs and traffic lights.

For 27 years the Paradise Café has been a consistent eatery and watering hole, and its multi-leveled dining areas give off a slight M.C. Escher-esque aura. (I can’t think of many places where one must ascend to the gents’ room). However, the drinks don’t flow uphill, but in a more sensible fashion — into our glasses.

It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, etc. World — ‘In the Loop’ introduces one of Britain’s best satirists

January 10, 2010May 4, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Armando Iannucci’s bitter and barbed satire “In the Loop” presents global politics — in particular Washington and some pokey little failed empire called Britain — as a continuation of high school culture. There are bullies, cliques, pranks, bad behavior, badder behavior and worse behavior. There are egos to be stroked and personalities to be torpedoed. By the end, we come to feel that while Iannucci’s vision may be jaded, he may be closest to the truth.

He’s also a deft and clever wordsmith, and “In the Loop” — which features some of the characters in his BBC series “The Thick of It” — is zipitty-spit 90 minutes of hilarious and profane dialogue. This film will probably be many Americans’ first exposure to the Scotsman’s writing, but since the early 1990s, Iannucci has penned some of the UK’s greatest television and radio comedy, starting with “On the Hour” and “The Day Today,” precursors in tone and style to the sharp satire of “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” on this side of the pond.

Pastavino’s Peach Mojito

January 8, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Previously, on “Mixologists a GoGo”: Our intrepid explorers found themselves out at the Holdren’s Steak House outpost at the Camino Real Marketplace, aka Big Box Mall. Having finished their liqueur-filled ramblings, they set off to find a bathroom, took a left, took a right, walked past the kitchen, and … what the hey? There’s another restaurant and bar back here!

Indeed, Holdren’s shares a kitchen (and owners) with Pastavino, an Italian restaurant with dark maroon walls and a small, horseshoe-shaped bar, presided over by Reuben Soto, who manages both restaurants.

Just Say Yes — ‘Yes Men’ asks if there can be profit in doing the right, moral thing

January 8, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Andy Bechlbaum and Mike Bonanno take on big business and big politics in "Yes Men Fix the World." — Andy Bechlbaum and Mike Bonanno take on big business and big politics in “Yes Men Fix the World.”

Andy Bechlbaum has the eyes of a prankster. Although in his 40s, he still has the wide stare and ear-to-ear grin of a kid who has pulled off something naughty. So it’s a wonder how he and Mike Bonanno, collectively known as the Yes Men, can keep it together to fool a string of people, getting them into business conventions, conferences and televised interviews. Once at their destination — usually a podium — one or both of them present thinly veiled Swiftian satire that leads to befuddlement, and they’re usually tossed out for — and this is the scary part — the request for business cards and further information.

In the speedy film “The Yes Men Fix the World,” we see five situationist pranks from these artists, who have made corporation criticism their raison d”tre since 2000. At a conference for bankers, they discuss a way of profiting from tragedy, and, posing as Halliburton representatives, they unveil an absurd SurvivaBall, an inflatable suit in which one can ride out the apocalypse. At an energy conference, they pass out candles made from a former employee for a world where the dead can be used for fuel. There’s no real flesh in the candle, of course, but the real human hair inside smells foul.

Bring the Funk — Tower of Power celebrates four decades of solid soul-dance tunes at Chumash

January 8, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Tower of Power lead vocalist Larry Braggs sings at the Chumash Casino Resortin January of 2006. The group returns for a performance Thursday night. Dwight McCann photo — Tower of Power lead vocalist Larry Braggs sings at the Chumash Casino Resortin January of 2006. The group returns for a performance Thursday night.
Dwight McCann photo

“It’s been like a college around there,” says Emilio Castillo, creator, leader and sax player, about his four decades bringing the funk to audiences worldwide. With five original members still at the core, the group sees many others come and go. “Musicians join us, hang out and mature. They’re good when they get here and they’re great when they leave. Then they go on to do great things, and it looks good on the résumé.”

Castillo also has an impressive résumé. Born in Detroit, but an Oakland resident since his 11th birthday, he picked up the sax at 14 and has never stopped playing. At 16, he and the first incarnation of Tower of Power were sneaking into East Bay clubs and laying down an irresistible dance beat. This Thursday, the band stops by the Chumash Casino Resort to remind the fans that Power cannot be stopped.

Penny for Your Artistic Vision? — The Amazing Animated Jukebox’ returns for CAF’s January First Thursday

January 1, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Rapper Azeem and Director Ben Stokes video for "Latin Revenge," above, and Russian rock band Lyapis Trubetskoy's video for "Capital," below, have made the cut for "The Amazing Animated Jukebox, Vol. 2." — Rapper Azeem and Director Ben Stokes video for “Latin Revenge,” above, and Russian rock band Lyapis Trubetskoy’s video for “Capital,” below, have made the cut for “The Amazing Animated Jukebox, Vol. 2.”

Ever since MTV devoted an entire network to airing music videos and record companies saw the potential for an all-encompassing marketing tool, visual imagery has become synonymous with music. While a bevy of musicians have embraced the medium to either make a fashion statement or sculpt an image, their more creative counterparts have effectively employed music videos as a means to an alternative creative perspective. When local filmmaker and writer Ted Mills presents a second installment of animated music videos at Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum next Thursday with “The Amazing Animated Jukebox Vol. 2,” it is to the latter that the curator will be paying specific homage.

“These are videos for musicians who don’t need to be the star of the video,” explained Mills. “You will see that, over the years, Radiohead appear in their videos less and less. When they first started out, they were your typical band and were in the videos. These days, if you see Thom Yorke you’re lucky. These tend to be artists that aren’t interested in themselves as rock or pop stars.”

Holdren’s Key Lime Pie Martini

January 1, 2010May 8, 2015 tedmills Leave a comment

Bartender John Randolph moved to Goleta’s Holdren’s branch after years of serving at the Chase Bar and Grill downtown. Could that explain the garlands and festive fairy lights hanging from the dark wood beams and corners of this steak restaurant? Or is it just the time of the season . . . the time to explore some cocktails?

With its long bar, the Good Land Holdren’s shares many cocktails with its downtown location, but we make sure to hold off on all those drinks and focus on the newest of the new, the differentest of the different. Sequestered away in the cozy environment of the bar, where one can’t see the box maulings outside, we watch Randolph whip up some fancy drinks.

Indie darling: Santa Barbara native Najarra Townsend takes a short break before a busy year to come

January 9, 2009September 1, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

“My roots are showing,” says actress Najarra Townsend in a self-conscious moment at the beginning of our interview. She’s talking about her hair—dark brunette, almost black, waiting to be transformed again for another role—but she could be talking about being back in the town of her birth, Santa Barbara. Here to see family, she’s taking an end of year break that has been filled with film premieres, auditions, and shoot days. Her most recent film, “Tru Loved,” screened this November at OUTrageous: The Santa Barbara Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Film Festival, and then down the road at the Ojai Film Festival. She plays the title character, Tru, who moves from a progressive Californian town to a more repressed suburb and sets about shaking things up in terms of gay and lesbian awareness. And 2009 is starting to shape up as a busy year, with three more lead roles (“Betty I Am,” “The Dawning” and “Cupid’s Arrow”) and parts in “We Are the Mods” and “The Telling.”

“This year (2008) has been the slowest year,” says Townsend as we chat downtown on an intermittently cold and sunny day. There were projects, she says, but they are all either being wrapped up or edited…and some she hasn’t heard from. But her upcoming film “Marin Blue”—-again, she plays the title character,–plays the Berlin Film Festival in February.