Roundup: Pop Culture & the Arts ... Movies, Documentaries and Museum Exhibits

Protests from Holocaust Institute; Berlinale Resists Call to Pull Romanian Film

The Elie Wiesel National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania has protested against the inclusion of a Romanian film about anti-communist partisans in the Berlinale festival program. They say the main character was fascist and anti-Semitic. The Berlin International Film Festival is no stranger to controversy and, as it celebrates its 60th anniversary, another scandal may be brewing. The Romanian film "Portrait of the Young Man as a Fighter," whi

Counting Down to the 2010 Winter Olympic Games

As we count down the hours until the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver, we thought we’d take a look at past Olympics games to mark the occasion.... The oldest Olympic stamp in the collection is a 2 cent stamp from the 1932 Winter Games held in Lake Placid, New York. This piece of postage pictures a ski jumper flying over the mountains, was criticized for the skier’s unnatural position, according to the exhibit. (Funky form usually costs you some seriou

Museum Marks Presidents Day with Release of Amateur Footage

Gary Mack, Curator at The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza, is calling it "the best home movie known to exist of the Kennedy arrival in Dallas on November 22, 1963" that he has ever seen. For the first time, color film and new glimpses of President and Mrs. Kennedy arriving on Air Force One on that fateful day is being released for public viewing. On November 22, 1963, local television stations were broadcasting live coverage of the Kennedy arrival at Dallas Love Field

Kennedy Miniseries Stirs Controversy

A new mini-series about John F. Kennedy’s presidency that is being prepared by the History channel does not yet have a cast or a premiere date. Not a frame of footage has been shot. It does, however, have prominent critics who want it brought to a halt. The critics, including Theodore C. Sorensen, a former Kennedy adviser, say they have read the scripts for the project and that those contain errors of fact and emphasis. But like a similar controversy over a 2003 television film abou

Xie Zhiliu's Traces and Originality in Art

Copying is bad; originality is good. That’s what we learn from toddlerdom on. In art as in life, be yourself. Don’t pretend. Nobody likes phonies, fakes or frauds. Forgery is illegal. Authenticity is holy. But wait. Copying and imitating have been the rule for most of the history of human civilization. In the West artists from Raphael to Picasso have profited from copying the works of others. In art there is no such thing as pure originality. Which brings us to a philos

North Carolina as It Was, Split and Seething: "Blood Done Sign My Name"

Whether or not North Carolinians are more inclined than other Americans to follow Thomas Wolfe’s injunction to “look homeward,” some past the age of 50 have personal reasons to cast a retrospective glance on the state of their youth. It was a time when a century of Jim Crow laws and segregation were being challenged by the advocates of civil rights in a struggle that was often more bitter and bloody than popular history likes to admit. For Robert K. Steel, the re-evaluation of his p

American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein

“American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein” is a cautiously respectful documentary portrait of a political firebrand who presents himself as a beacon of moral truth in the murk of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A scholar, author and passionate advocate of the Palestinian cause, Mr. Finkelstein, 56, is a thorn in the side of the Israel lobby.... Early in the film, directed by David Ridgen and Nicolas Rossier, Mr. Finkelstein is shown at a 1982 rally in front of the Israel

‘The Mountaintop,’ Play About Martin Luther King Jr., Planned for Broadway

“The Mountaintop,” a new two-character play that imagines a surprising turn of events for the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on the night before his assassination, is aiming for Broadway in the fall, the producers Jean Doumanian and Sonia Friedman announced Wednesday. The play, by Katori Hall, received a critically praised production in London last summer, and the producers said in a statement that they were eager to capitalize on its success by moving swiftly ahead with a Broadway

New Louisiana museum pays tribute to legendary black coach

When Eddie Robinson was growing up here in Louisiana’s capital city about 80 years ago, he discovered the only way a black person infatuated with football could attend a game at the state university: He showed up at 5 a.m. on Saturdays to clean the stadium. To take his first job as a football coach, in 1941, Mr. Robinson had to travel several hundred miles north, to a segregated teachers’ college in an unincorporated hamlet called Grambling. Mail arrived by train, and students helpe

National Gallery Visitors will be Able to Flip through Fragile Art Books (Canada)

Visitors of the National Gallery of Canada will be able to browse and appreciate rare historical art books that are too fragile to touch, as a result of a new collaboration between the National Gallery of Canada (NGC) and HP Canada (HP). Thanks to interactive HP TouchSmart technology, viewers will be able to “flip through” electronic versions of the books on a widescreen display with a multi-touch enabled screen, while the original works remain safely protected in a display case. The NGC is the

Exhibition Explores the Egyptians' Beliefs about Life and Death and the Afterlife (US)

Through more than one hundred objects drawn from the Brooklyn Museum’s world-renowned holdings of ancient Egyptian art, including some of the greatest masterworks of the Egyptian artistic heritage, "To Live Forever" explores the Egyptians’ beliefs about life and death and the afterlife, the process of mummification, the conduct of a funeral, and the different types of tombs—answering questions at the core of the public’s fascination with ancient Egypt. The exhibition will be on view Fe

Henry Louis Gates practices genealogy for PBS's "Faces of America"

Eva Longoria and Yo-Yo Ma have a common ancestor. It takes a long time and considerable patience to get to that surprise denouement of “Faces of America,” a four-part PBS series, beginning on Wednesday, about family roots by the Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. And even with charming celebrities — Meryl Streep, Mike Nichols and Queen Noor of Jordan are among the 12 whose genealogy is explored almost back to Paleolithic times — the telling can at times be a little wearisome..

'Gangland bling' of Beowulf era to go on show in Staffordshire (UK)

Some Staffordshire clay has come home clinging to the sinuous curves and filigree ornament of the most spectacular heap of Anglo-Saxon golden loot ever found. More than 100 pieces of the Staffordshire Hoard, a glittering treasure from the world of Beowulf, news of which has gone around the world in eight months, is back in the county that hid it for 1,300 years. Many objects, including a gold horse intricate as a piece of lace and no bigger than a postage stamp, have ne

Steven Fielding: The Problem With Biopics

[Steven Fielding is Professor of Political History and Director of the Centre for British Politics in the School of Politics and International Relations, University of Nottingham. He is writing a book for Bloomsbury on fiction and British politics from An Ideal Husband to In the Loop. He is also a member of the History & Policy Network.] If journalism is the first draft of history the biopic is now a close second, having become the staple output of many television drama departme

Painting by Salvador Dalí, Made in the U.S., on Temporary Loan to the Dalí Foundation

The Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí presented the loan of the work Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pommegranate One Minute Before Awakening (1944), from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum (Madrid). The oil painting will be exhibited at the Drawings Room (number 6) of the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres from 9 February until 2 May 2010. The painting depicts a woman (Dalí's wife, Gala) sleeping while sunbathing naked during a calm day on rocks floating over the sea, possibly at P

How Did Chinese Artists Learn and Practice Their Craft?

A new installation at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Mastering the Art of Chinese Painting: Xie Zhiliu (1910-1997), demonstrates how Chinese artists learned, historically, from earlier masterpieces and from nature. It showcases more than 100 works—including paintings, sketches, drawings, calligraphies, and poetry manuscripts—by Xie Zhiliu (pronounced "shay jer leo"), one of modern China's leading artists and connoisseurs. It also marks the 100-year anniversary of his birth. A number o

Shaped by War: Photographs by Don McCullin at The Imperial War Museum (UK)

Imperial War Museum North in Manchester presents the largest ever UK exhibition about the life and work of Don McCullin, one of the world’s most acclaimed photographers, to mark his 75th year. Many items are on public display for the very first time. For more than 50 years, McCullin’s images have shaped our awareness of modern conflict and its consequences. His courage and integrity, as well as the exceptional quality of his work, are a continuing inspiration and influence worldwid

PBS Airing Documentary on Allied Bombing of Germany Monday Night

[Jonathan Tobin is executive editor of COMMENTARY.] Tonight, PBS’s American Experience series will broadcast a new documentary titled The Bombing of Germany, about the strategic-bombing campaign carried out against the Nazis by American forces in World War II. Coming from the liberal-leaning PBS and in an era where denunciations of American military actions — even in the “good war” against Nazi Germany — have become commonplace, it would have been no surprise if this film was yet an

Photo exhibition opens in Liverpool showing 1870s life in China (UK)

China: Through the Lens of John Thomson 1868-1872 is a photographic exhibition showcasing 150 images of China’s peoples and its landscapes. This is the first display outside of China devoted to John Thomson (1837-1921) and his 5,000 mile journey. Its premiere at the Merseyside Maritime Museum is fitting. Born in Edinburgh two years before the birth of photography, Thomson’s Chinese work established him as the pioneer of photojournalism. The Scot first travelled to Asia in 1862, wher

100 Years After the Death of Henri Rousseau, Fondation Beyeler Celebrates with Exhibition

One hundred years after the death of the French artist Henri Rousseau (1844-1910), the Fondation Beyeler is devoting an exhibition to this pioneer of modernism. Forty outstanding works provide a concise overview of the development and diversity of his oeuvre. A customs official, Rousseau had no formal art training and initially painted in his free time. Many years passed before his art, non-academic and long considered merely naive, found recognition in the Paris salons. In addition to the legen