Air guitar like a superstar

This is just a shout out to my twin sister, Amy, because I miss her and can't wait to see her at Christmas! (Plus, I thought the picture - circa 1986 - was cute). As far as I can tell, Amy's in the Nike shirt and I'm in the sunglasses -- don't we look like we're about to party? You know, it's funny, we were so broke back then - if you look at the house in the background, you can tell it's a craphole, but it didn't really matter to us. I can remember during the winter it would get so cold there was frost on the inside of the windows and we could see our breath while lying in bed. We called that house "The Yellow House" and there was only one source of heat: a tall olive green heater in the hallway that had a gas fire inside it. Before school my mom would wake us up and she'd already have our school clothes laid out in front of the heater and all four of us kids would crowd in the hall to change because it was too cold to change in our rooms. In the summer we played outside a lot because there wasn't really airconditioning in the house (there was a window unit in the kitchen, but the rest of the house was hot). As a kid, I never knew that other kids had any more or any less than we did - materialism wasn't a concept I understood. Sure, that new pair of sunglasses was awesome or if we got new toys we were totally psyched, but we didn't care if our jeans had holes or our hair was clean (in fact, I hated washing and drying my hair because it would get so tangled).

Now that I teach kindergartners, I see some of that same carefree attitude toward clothes and possessions, but not as much as I'd like. A lot of the little girls I teach are very aware that their clothes cost a lot of money and they'll brag about where they bought it: Gap, Old Navy, etc. Sure, some of the kids are just excited that their jackets have Tinkerbell or Barbie on them, but some of the others are very aware of namebrands. These little children are walking advertisements for Tommy Hilfiger, Polo/ Ralph Lauren, and Calvin Klein. Some people may argue that because I teach private school the children are more aware of money and consumerism, and that's probably true in some aspects. But at the same time, I wonder if the whole country isn't just more aware of labels? Or were my childhood peers like this in the mid-80's and I was just oblivious to it? (I do realize as I write this that Amy is wearing a Nike shirt in the picture - but I can almost guarantee she didn't know what the shirt said and I'll bet my parents didn't buy it for her). I don't think I was aware of namebrands until I was 11 or 12 and only then it was because I was being made fun of for not wearing the right brands. I just hope that children aren't being consumed by consumerism at younger ages. I hate to think that childhood innocence is being erased by companies trying to make a buck.

Rent Control

Rosario Dawson joins the rest of the original Broadway cast in Rent, a passionate, highly energetic musical about life in the East Village of New York City during the height of the AIDS scare of the late 1980's/early 1990's.

Though I grew up listening to various Broadway musicals (thanks to the Bease, who's always been a fan of musical theater), I had never heard or seen Rent. Since I didn't quite know what to expect, I just went in to the movie with an open mind, and that's exactly the kind of mindset a viewer must have when approaching the musical. If you have rigid ideas about how to love and how to live life, then this movie will certainly challenge your ideas. As self-proclaimed Bohemians, the characters embrace and celebrate all walks of life; that's not to say that the movie glamorizes drug use, homosexuality, and exotic dancing, because it certainly shows the painful consequences that the characters must face due to their choices, but at the same time, the movie never judges these characters, and for that reason, the musical remains lighthearted and hopeful even in the darker moments of life.

The plot is fairly pointless to this musical (the plot? all these Bohemians are going to be evicted from their lofts because they haven't paid rent in months - oh no, where are they going to go?). What matters in this movie is not the thin plot, but the themes of love and embracing life despite the hard times. What the musical seems to be screaming at some points is: LIFE IS SHORT! LOVE EVERYONE YOU CAN! And though the "carpe diem" theme is common in many movies, it's nice to be reminded every now and then that happiness can be free if you're willing to let go of your own fear and love people who are different from you.

Breakthrough performances include Jesse L. Martin as Tom Collins, a part-time professor suffering from AIDS who has fallen in love with a drag queen named Angel (played with exuberance by Wilson Jermaine Heredia). Tom's love for Angel centers and stablilizes the other characters in their own quests for love. The character of Tom Collins could have been portrayed as angry or cynical about his own life (after all, he has AIDS, he gets kicked out of a teaching job at MIT presumably because of his disease, he gets mugged in the opening shots of the film, and his soul mate only has a few months to live). But instead, Martin gives the character a lot of joy and internal peace.

My other favorite performance in the movie is from Anthony Rapp, who plays Mark Cohen, a heterosexual film maker on the verge of selling out in order to make enough money to eat and pay rent. Rapp has had a fairly successful career in film (including roles in A Beautiful Mind, Adventures in Babysitting, Six Degrees of Separation, Dazed and Confused, and School Ties), but it's evident in this performance that musical theater is where he belongs. Not only is he an amazing singer and incredible actor, but he's also a great dancer and he throws himself completely into the role. Actually that can be said about all of the actors in the film - this musical calls for big performances and though some of the lyrics and lines are completely cheesy, the actors never seem embarrassed to be singing and dancing about AIDS.

Overall, I think the movie had great performances and a lot of energy, but at two hours and fifteen minutes, it's way too long - I think if 30 minutes had been cut, the movie would have been a lot more enjoyable. Perhaps Chris Columbus, the director, felt obligated to include every song from the original stage production, but I really think that the Maureen/ Joanne lesbian subplot is probably the most expendable and pointless, particularly the engagement dinner and Maureen's self-indulgent, painfully long stage performance in protest of being evicted (images of Susan Sarandon's tap dance routine in Elizabethtown came to mind).

Grade: B