Since opening at the British Museum, The First Emperor Exhibition: China's Terracotta Warriors has received rave reviews. The Times described it as Spellbinding, while the Guardian has called it the most eagerly awaited exhibition of the year! It runs until April 2008.
Don’t miss your chance to explore one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th century with a fantastic value hotel and ticket package from Superbreak.
This once-in-a-lifetime exhibition will explore one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th century and provide an insight into China’s First Emperor, Qin Shihuangdi, and his legacy. Objects featured in the exhibition will include a number of the world-famous terracotta warriors from Xi'an, China, which were buried alongside the First Emperor in readiness for the afterlife.
The Walker, a new release by cinema veteran Paul Schrader, a screenwriter (Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980)), director (Affliction (1997), Autofocus (2002)), and occasional movie critic, was underwhelming in that "aw, shucks" kind of way (and certainly was not the best film I've seen all year.) By that I mean, with the set of credentials behind Schrader we want to be awestruck again with something that redefines what the world looks like, and it is usually its darker underside. Taxi Driver is seventies disillusionment defined; Raging Bull has a seedy swiftness that bowls you over in defeat; and his directorial contributions are likely to reveal regular peoples' more wretched sides (Autofocus takes this to a raunchy extreme.) The Walker stars Woody Harrelson as the homosexual son of a deceased senator with an outlandishly strong southern accent, an eye for high fashion, and a prejudice for almost no one. Weaving through the web of Washington society and politics he's a perfect fit among his gossipy gal pals (Lily Tomlin, Kristen Scott Thomas and Lauren Bacall) for weekly card games, but when a murder turns things terribly awry his friends disappear quickly. Washington politics are dirty, the story overtly goes. What's curious about The Walker, however, are how brightly lit his characters and sets are; the aesthetic is unnaturally sterile and symmetrical for a story regarding characters in up to their ears in deception, lies and greed. An irony that tips its hat directly to the planned, museum-like landscape of Washington, D.C. itself perhaps. If nothing more, Schrader remains consistent with The Walker in the way he shows us that nothing is ever as regal as it appears. It's the lack of urgency in this story where he diverges from his past. 
The Man From London was the first film I've seen by Hungarian director Bela Tarr, and was decidedly the most important to watch at the festival after the critical buzz his past films had received. I am going to think of this film as an easier, or at least more digestible, introduction to Tarr, whose Sátántangó (1994) clocks in at 450 minutes (that's 7 1/2 hours), and Werckmeister harmóniák (2000) at 145 minutes. The two hour run time of The Man From London felt a touch longer than that, but only as an adjustment from the standard film fare these days that allows for an abundance of (some say unnecessary and/or sloppy) cuts and close-ups. The first thing to know about Bela Tarr is his penchant for the long shot and long take. The still image from the film above is a nice illustration of this, the primary establishing shot of the movie that later comes back as a bookend at the film's conclusion. What you won't glean from the image above is the thick texture of the picture, the deep contrast of black against white so dense and dimensional it's analogous to the sound of a needle on a dusty record, a tactile sound, and in Tarr's case, image. It is a movie to be seen on a big screen, on DVD-TV at home as a last-ditch effort, for much of the meditation on form will probably be lost in translation. The scenery is stark and minimal, yet enveloping and hypnotizing; there's a simple sense of space the characters live in that doesn't make it seem artificial, even though each scene is staged as much (if not more) than that of any other fiction film. 
One of the big retrospectives this year at the festival was Rouben Mamoulian's 1935 film based on William Makepeace Thackeray's novel Vanity Fair, one of the main characters of which is Becky Sharp. If you know the novel, you know her character, a conniving gold digger in search of permanent socialite status. I found the performances over-played, melodramatic, but inadvertently so; the color palette was the main pull of the film, shot originally in 3-strip Technicolor. From reel to reel you could see a drastic difference in the tone and color contrast, and a friend of mine pointed out after the screening that not every reel was a copy of the 3-strip process, but rather 2-strip Technicolor. The picture at left gives you a good idea of the garish color scheme employed, which in and of itself was dazzling. However, as a piece of cinema the staging and dialogue was too theatrical to be memorable.
Organizing your space, stuff, and schedule helps you save time and money, keep stress in check, and enjoy yourself more year-round, but especially at the
holidays. Late October and early November--before the true holiday rush begins--are great times to get in gear on those organizing projects you've been
planning to do. The time and effort you put into organizing now will save you lots of both a few months down the line. What I want is to encourage you to look for ways of making this year's celebrations more relaxing, more meaningful, and less overstuffed than in years past.Take a look at the Holiday Event Planning in Cape Cod & Islands MA or contact holidays event coordinators in Charlotte NC.
