May 1, 2012

Star phenomena? People aren’t looking up at the sky – they’re tracking celebrities • by Geoff Olson • There’s a great jpeg floating around the Internet that shows the star systems within range of Earth’s radio and television broadcasts. Aldebaran, a red giant, located about 65 light years away, is in the range of President...

May 1, 2012

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead • The annual documentary festival DOXA is on this month. The Vancouver fest is hosting 72 screenings across five different venues from May 4 to 13. DOXA opens with the NFB Digital Studio’s interactive documentary Bear 71, which makes extensive use of surveillance footage of an electronically tagged grizzly in...

Apr 1, 2012

by Alan di Perna   When yoga arrived in the West, it brought its own jubilant soundtrack along for the ride. The practice of chanting sacred mantras from India’s ancient yogic traditions has taken on new life, thanks to the work of adventurous, modern musicians like Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, Wah, Snatam Kaur, MC Yogi, Deva Premal, Donna DeLory and...

Apr 1, 2012

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead • Given that recent polls suggest that around 40 percent of Americans believe that God created human beings in their present form 10,000 years ago, some people might consider Journey of the Universe quite a radical documentary. This story of the universe, which has screened on PBS, starts around 14 billion years ago...

Mar 1, 2012

How a few choice words can change worlds within and without • by Geoff Olson   • The world appears to be on a knife-edge again, with leaders from Tel Aviv to Tehran playing out idiotic games of brinkmanship better suited to pre-war Europe than the whistle-blowing world of WikiLeaks and Anonymous. To write about poetry in this context may seem...

Mar 1, 2012

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead   • On March 17, it will be six months since the beginning of Occupy Wall Street and the subsequent cascade of grassroots occupations that followed across the Western world. Two local filmmakers who have been documenting the Occupy movement – from the Arab Spring, through Zuccotti Park to the Vancouver Art...

Mar 1, 2012

NUTRISPEAK by Vesanto Melina • The kitchen has traditionally been the heart of the home, a powerful space to generate physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being. – Chef Joseph Forest • Some of us follow recipes to the letter. If directions say to whisk the sauce and we have a fork but no whisk, we turn to another recipe. Others refer...

Feb 8, 2012

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead • There have been many movies about the Holocaust. So much so there is a fear that filmmakers’ constant re-framing and re-imagining of it undermines and clouds the awful history they seek to convey. However, for Polish director Agnieszka Holland, there is still a sense the “main mystery” surrounding...

Feb 8, 2012

ON THE GARDEN PATH by Carolyn Herriot • The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. – Chinese Proverb • I often reflect on this wise proverb when thinking about the grassroots community seed shows we introduced to the West Coast over 20 years ago. The intention was to educate people on the imperative of preserving plant genetic diversity...

Jan 4, 2012

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead   Two films due to open this month bring the wizardry of digital cinema to the arthouse with stunning results. Firstly, there’s Wim Wenders’ Pina 3D, a portrait of the work of the celebrated German choreographer Pina Bausch (due out January 27). Pina was a film that almost didn’t get made. On June 30,...