FOR FILM CRITIC JAY CARR, the news that Tom Cruise would assume the role of co-head of United Artists in 2006 meant the studio had come full circle.

It was founded in the late 1910s by three superstars of silent film — Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin — who bemoaned the studio system's disregarding treatment of actors.

"In the beginning," says Carr, "United Artists really was a case of united artists."

Promoting independent and adventurous filmmaking for nearly a century, the studio is celebrating its 90th anniversary with film festivals in cities across the country as a lead-up to the massive 90-title United Artists 90th Anniversary Prestige Collection in December.

"You're going to need a forklift to move it," laughs Carr, who serves as the national spokesman for the festival.

The AFI Silver Theatre in Silver Spring is presenting seven classic United Artists films through early July.

Continue Reading "Movie Makers: United Artists at 90" »

ALTHOUGH 17TH-CENTURY composer Heinrich Biber's violin music is now semi-famous, his setting of the Stabat Mater, the Latin text describing Mary's sorrows during Jesus' Crucifixion, has lain unperformed for about 300 years.

That'll change when Daniel Abraham and his Bach Sinfonia present the modern premiere of the work at Woodside United Methodist Church in Silver Spring.

Though it works within a conservative, churchly aesthetic, "there are some interesting devices," Abraham explains. "There's a theme that underlays the Crucifixus moments, with some motivic ties to other words. There's a fair amount of word painting, given the time. Sometimes there's a lot of mixture of mode. Probably the most intriguing thing is, 'Where is it going next?'"

Continue Reading "Religion That's Set to Music: The Bach Sinfonia" »

SILVER SPRING ISN'T necessarily known as a Cuisine Capital, and a restaurant week isn't likely to change that. But there's no doubt that after Silver Spring became Silver Sprung, the variety of venues to chow in, and their attendant quality, has increased and improved.

There are 16 Silver Spring eateries participating in Restaurant Week, offering prix fixe lunch ($12) and dinner ($22 or $30) menus through Sun., April 13. Many will also offer standard fare at regular prices, which is a good thing since prix fixe menus don't always offer the best deals.

"While I do enjoy many of these other restaurants," says Sligo from the blog Silver Spring, Singular, "at some of them I'd have difficulty dropping $30 on a regular visit — which is a good thing — so the value of the Restaurant Week price is dubious. I'd first have to see what was on the Restaurant Week menus."

True dat.

There are actually plenty of good-to-great restaurants in Silver Spring that are not participating in Restaurant Week — Taste of Morocco, A Taste of Jerusalem and Ray's the Classics come to mind. But if you've been curious about eating in the Sprung, here is my highly educated — and, more often, not-so-educated — rundown of the restaurants participating in the promotion, along with some comments and recommendations from my fellow Silver Spring bloggers.

Continue Reading "Chowdown Rundown: Silver Spring Restaurant Week" »

THE AFI SILVER is having a Bette Davis festival all through April. If you don't know who that is, then you haven't been introduced to the greatest bug-eyed film actress of all time — sorry, Susan Sarandon.

Davis' greatest film is "All About Eve," the tale of an aging film star who is betrayed by her young assistant. The film is a classic, bitingly funny and filled with great performances from '50s character actors like Celeste Holm. Yeah, maybe you've never heard of her. Go see it anyway. You won't be sorry.

The film plays Friday and Tuesday night at 7 p.m., Saturday at 3:30 p.m., and Sunday at 1 p.m.

» AFI Silver Theater and Cultural Center, 8633 Colesville Rd., Silver Spring; $6.75-9.75; (301) 495-6720. (Silver Spring)

Photo Courtesy Everett Collection

"IN DOLLARS," announces Satish Pillalamarri, 29, over the din of Silver Spring's Mayorga Coffee Factory, "how much did a Washington, D.C,. judge sue a local dry cleaner for a lost pair of pants?"

Conspiratorial whispering commences among the roughly 40 players at Wits & Wagers night (the first Tuesday of every month at 7 p.m.). When all of the guesses are in, Pillalamarri — who invented the game with fellow University of Maryland business school alum Dominic Crapuchettes — writes them on a chalkboard. Each team bets on the answer, which turns out to be $65 million.

So it goes through the first round of this trivia-and-betting combo, which consistently draws a packed house. "I love that the game night is a very social event where one can meet lots of new people easily and have so much fun doing it," says Mary Halbe, 39, who organized the first event in 2005.

Adults playing board games — in public? Holy Chutes and Ladders! Believe it. While Irish pub trivia nights still rule social gaming, many D.C.-area residents are hedging their bets by hauling out the old-school stuff. And they're moving well beyond Monopoly.

When Bayard Catron started planning game nights in 2001, it usually meant a dozen or so close friends and Trivial Pursuit. But when the 38-year-old took over the Maryland/D.C./Virginia 20s to 40s Boardgames Meetup Group last April, that quickly changed. Each month, he helps a member host a party. When he posts an event on Meetup.com, it fills up in a day. There's even a waiting list.

While Taboo, Cranium and Scattergories are perennial faves, Catron recommends online research to find more unusual titles. Boardgamegeek.com is "a community of game lovers who rate and review games," he says. "There are forums, and it's good to get an overall feel for what's available." One of his more esoteric choices: Curses, in which players make others perform actions, preferably silly ones.

Continue Reading "Styles: Hardly Trivial Pursuits" »

EVEN IF YOU AREN'T A FAN of the Coen Brothers' oeuvre, you have to admit they've created some classically and endlessly quotable quirky characters over their 12 films. The Dude and all the rest abide at the AFI beginning on Friday through March 6 during the "Complete Coen Brothers" festival.

No doubt it helps that the Coens are good judges of character, or rather character actors. Big oaf needed? John Goodman's your man. Neurotic paranoid? Gotta be Buscemi. Put-upon nobody? Can't beat Bill Macy. Flamboyant trash-talking bowler? John Turturro.

Of course, having quirky characters just for quirkiness' sake is tiresome, so, fortunately, these mixed nuts go well with the Coens' favorite plotline of a common man in circumstances way beyond his control, a trope whose Capraesque elements get both celebrated and spoofed in "The Hudsucker Proxy."

Continue Reading "Fate, 10; the Meek, 0: The Coen Brothers" »

"SURE, THERE'S A MEN'S WAREHOUSE, but how frequently does one need a new suit? What I'm talking about are a wider variety of stores to browse where there is a good chance of finding something worth buying. Hell, if they put in a Banana Republic, that would probably cover 80% of my wardrobe right there."

— Local blogger Silver Spring Singular decrying the state of shopping for men in downtown Silver Spring.

File photo by James M. Thresher/The Washington Post

TOWERING ABOVE THE INTERSECTION of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road, the Discovery Communications headquarters is perhaps Silver Spring's most recognizable structure. Now, the building is Maryland's first existing structure to secure Platinum-level Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification. It's one of only nine buildings across the United States that have such certification by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Green-building certification is awarded to structures that have sustainable site development, use water and energy efficiently, make use of environmentally friendly building materials and have high levels of indoor environmental quality.

According to Discovery, the company saves more than 24,000 gallons of water annually and reduces carbon emissions by more than 260 tons each year because of the building.

ANYONE WHO WALKED OUT into the sunshine after seeing Fatih Akin's 2004 feature "Head-On," shaken by the story but exhilarated by the fact of this terrifically assured German-born Turkish filmmaker's arrival on the scene, will treat the release of his fifth feature, "The Edge of Heaven," a red-letter day for film.

And the movie, screening exactly once this weekend at AFI Silver, doesn't disappoint.

Moving away from the grim romanticism of the bloody "Head-On," "The Edge of Heaven" takes a cooler look at life in the Turkish diaspora as it toggles among countries, pitting the old world and its values against the dubious delights of New Europe.

Continue Reading "Dangerous Crossings: The Edge of Heaven" »

DOGS MAY BE MAN'S BEST FRIEND, but they can be divisive elements in many neighborhoods.

Last year, some dog owners in the District were squabbling over the D.C. government's proposed regulations for the location of dog parks. Now, a move by the Montgomery County Council directing police to step up enforcement of leash laws has sparked a sometimes feisty discussion on the Yahoo! Group for Silver Spring's Woodside Park neighborhood.

Writes resident Bill Borwegen:

As someone who has been bitten twice by unleashed unfamiliar dogs as both a child and adult, I am struck by the righteous glee some have about putting the fear of God in our fellow residents by purposely keeping their dog off their leash. Can't we at least agree as a caring community that respects the rights of people as well as animals in the principle that our children and adults should be allowed to feel safe when walking in their own neighborhoods without sensing the threat or mere perception of being attacked?

Lloyd Ator, who posted a message admitting that he occasionally lets his dog Remy off its leash "to pursue a squirrel because that is his nature and I'm too old and slow to participate in the chase personally," noted this sticky situation: "[O]nly a fool would try to hold the leash of a reasonably active dog while picking up the poop. Been there; done that — oops! Fortunately the leash is cotton webbing and washable."

Continue Reading "Dog Leash Laws Spur Online Debate in Silver Spring" »