PETTY CRIME
By Dan Rivoli
A Laundromat was burglarized on Jan. 6, but barely anything of value was taken. Police said that at 7 p.m., burglars smashed the glass front door of Astor Terrace Cleaners, 1809 Second Ave. and East 94th Street, and rummaged through the business. Aside from a few small, unknown items, only $5 was reportedly removed from the Laundromat.
CLEAN HEIST
By Dan Rivoli
A day after the Astor Terrace Cleaners burglary, thieves broke into another Laundromat, Knickerbocker Plaza Cleaners, at 6:30 a.m. on Jan. 7. Police said burglars used a red brick to smash the glass door. They entered the cleaners, at 767 Second Ave. and East 41st Street and took $296 in cash. The perps were seen fleeing north on Third Avenue, according to cops.
HARDSCRABBLE ATHLETE MEETS GLOBAL TALENT
CHRIS GORDON IS ELBOWING FOR HIS PLACE IN THE WORLDWIDE SQUASH COMMUNITY
By Adam Bloch
In the world squash scene, the United States doesn’t even register as a provincial backwater; it is a blip, a minuscule speed bump compared to powerhouse countries like England, Egypt, Australia and Pakistan.
At least that was the reality facing Chris Gordon eight years ago when, as a precocious and promising young American squash player, he decided to abandon his native soil temporarily for the more nurturing training environment of the United Kingdom. He was 14 at the time.
“That was very tough,” Gordon said last week by phone from Vancouver, where he was playing in the Comfort Inn Open. “We share the language, but it’s a completely different culture. Read more
THE LOVE THAT DARES TO SPEAK HIS NAME
SINGING THE PRAISES OF ‘MAN-CHILD’ ADAM SANDLER, A VULNERABLE GENIUS
By Susan Braudy
I love Adam Sandler, and I’m proud of it. Can I possibly be the only person with highbrow credentials who thinks he’s adorable and touching and possesses the widest range of any actor save Dustin Hoffman?
I’m sick of movie critics and culture vultures picking on Adam. “Man-child persona” wrote a menacing New York Times critic—like that’s a crime.
I chortled during Bedtime Stories, where he’s a handyman who tells his niece and nephew tales that come to life. (Adam jokes he made the film because he didn’t want his kids to see degenerate filth, then he realized he was talking about his own movies.) Read more
A NEIGHBORHOOD CURE-ALL
LONGTIME SHOPS AND EATERIES ARE GOOD PREVENTIVE MEDICINE
By Bette Dewing
“Don’t agonize, organize!” was the Older Women’s League’s rallying cry when OWL was a true movement for change. Organize and act! Ah, that’s change we need to overcome injustice—the illegal, but also the legal kind, like the shutting down of everyday places we need, above all the neighborhood restaurants. And get healthcare professionals, like cardiologist Benjamin Zaremski and Jeff Gold, chair of Metro Health Care For All, and social scientist writers like Sherman Yellen, to go public with their acute awareness of just how vital these places are to both preventive and maintenance health care. Read more
MALONEY FOR SENATE
To the Editor:
I was dismayed to read Lorraine Duffy Merkl’s column singing the supposed praises of Caroline Kennedy’s bid to inherit a senate seat (“Caroline: Just Like Us?” Jan. 8). It’s telling that the best Merkl could do was say that Kennedy is famous and that she lives in New York. We can do better than that.
As we look at who we would like to represent us in the United States Senate, we should be looking beyond celebrity or famous last names. I certainly hope that Gov. David Paterson can see past the glitz and media sparkle to find a candidate who has actually shown that she has the experience and merit to serve as a Senator. Sorry Caroline. Read more
STIMULUS MONEY MUST BE USED WISELY
WITH BILLIONS BEING DOLED OUT, OPPORTUNITIES FOR CORRUPTION ARISE
By Alan S. Chartock
There is Obama frenzy in the land. People are feeling positive, with each of us projecting some hope or aspiration onto Obama.
Congress has begun to give him the billions of dollars he needs to start making things better. Naturally, “bailout” is a very bad word in the minds of many Americans. Most little people don’t get bailed out. When their businesses go under, they go under.
Obama’s problem will be that when the government starts to give out billions of dollars to get the pump running, some bad ideas and some bad people will rise to the surface. Read more
MEET INDIA’S ADAM SANDLER
THIS BOLLYWOOD KUNG-FU ACTION COMEDY IS SHORT ON FUNNY
By Mark Peikert
A martial arts-Bollywood hybrid seems so promising on paper. Both films are wildly popular, feature intricate footwork and are inherently cinematic. So why is Chandni Chowk to China, the explosively colorful love child borne of a forced marriage between the two, such a bore?
Part of the blame can easily be laid at the feet of a hefty running time. Clocking in at two-and-a-half hours, the film is too long for such a flimsy plot. Sidhu (Akshay Kumar), a cook in Delhi, is somehow mistaken for the reincarnation of Chinese war hero and tricked into heading to China to kill the evil Hojo (Gordon Liu). Read more
THE LODGER
By Armond White
Unlike Terence Davies, whose use of the cinematic past becomes a felt element in his storytelling, writer-director David Ondaatje repeats the past so inexpertly that The Lodger (an update of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1926 film) is almost comically schlocky. Ondaatje’s poor technique lowers the basic material—the Jack the Ripper legend, which has already been remade three times and is the source of innumerable suspense films—as if deliberately seeking B-movie status.
The characterizations of a bickering married couple Read more
OF TIME AND THE CITY
By Armond White
Movies, at their greatest, are personal endeavors. That’s true for audiences as well as filmmakers—especially Terence Davies, whose newest film Of Time and The City continues his individual exploration of the medium. Once again, Davies revisits his youth growing up in post-WWII Liverpool, England—as in the masterly features Distant Voices, Still Lives and The Long Day Closes. Now, instead of fashioning lush dramatic recreations that use avant-garde narrative structures, Davies arranges straightforward documentary images taken from archival footage shot by others. Forced to find a new means of production, this new style breaks through to a deeper way of seeing. But how will it fare at a time when lightweight, derivative kitsch like Benjamin Button is taken seriously? Read more
