MetaFilter posts tagged with review

Will Self reviews fast food

hydatius — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 06:54:13 -0800

"Real Meals": Will Self's (relatively) new fortnightly restaurant column reviewing high street food outlets for The New Statesman. Thus far: McDonald's, KFC, Indian Restaurant, Starbucks, Subway.

Prometheus In The Kitchen

The Whelk — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 07:48:07 -0800

"Good, big ideas about evolution are rare." Simon Ings of the Independent reviews "Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human" by Richard Wrangham. (via)

Since when does Hollywood shy away from controversy?

zarq — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 10:25:39 -0800

The Producer Cites Religious Controversy. The Director points to a recessionary trend against "serious" movies. A new film about Charles Darwin's life ("Creation") is reportedly having difficulty finding a US distributor. ( Creation: IMDB / Official Site / Trailer / Spoiler-laden review from Roger Ebert / LA Times review // Darwin: Previously on MeFi).

A review site for various freeware apps and games

scrutiny — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:36:16 -0800

Freeware Genius is a large review site for various freeware apps, from desktop organizing tools to philosophical flash games . There are literally hundreds of applications reviewed, as well as a few compilations to get you started. Sick of iTunes? Check out these free options. Got a video on youtube that you think will be taken down? Copy it with this app! Really, there's tons of interesting stuff here, so check it out.

...ink by the barrel...

zarq — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:04:30 -0800

Negative reviews prompt author meltdowns: Ali ce Hoff man. Lee Oi-soo. Alain de Botton. Ayelet Waldman. Previously on MeFi. They should all probably take a deep breath, then read one of these articles. Ayelet Waldman's outraged comments on Twitter were made over Jill Lepore's negative review of her book "Bad Mother." This hilariously contradictory and ironic tweet (language, NSFW) was quickly deleted from her feed.

Or have we eaten on the insane root that takes the reason prisoner?

The Whelk — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 08:09:04 -0800

“Josephine had practically every desirable personal characteristic, except wisdom and mercy.” Gee, that sounds like she actually isn’t a nice person at all! Gary Brecher (previously) reviews Banquo’s Ghosts, a political-minded spy thriller from National Review editor Richard Lowry and novelist Keith Korman. Lowry describes it as an "episode of “24″ written by Proust. " Bonus Conservative Potboiler Review: Matt Taibbi on William F. Buckley's Tucker's Last Stand.

Let yourself go in your adult diaper, Michael Bay invites you.

blue_beetle — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 12:20:55 -0800

Could Transformers:ROTF(L) be one of the greatest achievements in the history of cinema, if not the greatest? This reviewer argues that it just might be.

Mark Helprin vs The Mouth Breathing Morons

shoesfullofdust — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:56:15 -0800

The overall effect is like listening to an erudite gentleman employing $20 words while he screams at a bunch of punk kids to get off his front lawn. A review of Mark Helprin's Digital Barbarism : A Writer's Manifesto. This is an insanely long review of Helprin's book by Lawrence Lessig. You can read Helprin's 2007 NYT editorial, the impetus behind all of this, here. [previously]

Maybe I'm missing something, but...

Wrinkled Stumpskin — Thu, 07 May 2009 12:45:25 -0800

You Can't Please Everyone is a collection of one-star reviews of classic movies, music, and literature on Amazon. It contains reviews of The Odyssey and many others. From Cynical-C [via]

Blindspots

flatluigi — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 23:20:38 -0800

Blindspots is a continually-updated collection of movie reviews based around one very interesting concept -- how accessible they are to the visually impaired. Movies that score high in accessibility include "The American President" (10/10) and "Ghosts of Mississippi" (9/10). At the other end of the scale are "101 Dalmatians", "Buddy", and "Spawn", each receiving 2/10.

RIP John Leonard

ed — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 13:43:18 -0800

John Leonard is dead. A literary prodigy at thirty-two when asked to edit the New York Times Book Review, Leonard oversaw the NYTBR's glory days between 1971 and 1975. Television critic for New York, monthly books critic for Harper's, regular contributor to The Nation and The New York Review of Books, he also went out of his way to help young writers.

Sokal and beyond

Gyan — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 01:22:03 -0800

Truth's Caper : essay by Simon Blackburn on Sokal's Hoax.

Lifetime, wow!

XQUZYPHYR — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 14:52:14 -0800

Lifetime, Wow! A blog devoted to watching, reviewing, and ranking Lifetime movies, including such classics as Fifteen and Pregnant, Fatal Trust, and Love Sick: Secrets of a Sex Addict.

Shakespeare and philosophy

painquale — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:38:38 -0800

Martha Nussbaum reviews three recent books on Shakespeare and philosophy. The essay offers an excellent analysis of love in Antony and Cleopatra and Othello, and an excellent discussion of the interaction between philosophy and literature. From the essay: "To make any contribution worth caring about, a philosopher's study of Shakespeare should do three things. First and most centrally, it should really do philosophy, and not just allude to familiar philosophical ideas and positions. It should pursue tough questions and come up with something interesting and subtle--rather than just connecting Shakespeare to this or that idea from Philosophy 101. A philosopher reading Shakespeare should wonder, and ponder, in a genuinely philosophical way. Second, it should illuminate the world of the plays, attending closely enough to language and to texture that the interpretation changes the way we see the work, rather than just uses the work as grist for some argumentative mill. And finally, such a study should offer some account of why philosophical thinking needs to turn to Shakespeare's plays, or to works like them. Why must the philosopher care about these plays? Do they supply to thought something that a straightforward piece of philosophical prose cannot supply, and if so, what?" There is some discussion of the piece here.

From Anthropophagous Beast to Zombie Flesh Eaters

TheophileEscargot — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 02:38:59 -0800

The Video Nasty Project seeks to watch and review all 74 "video nasties" effectively banned in the UK in the 1980s in a moral panic over the subversive new video cassette technology. 39 videos were successfully prosecuted, initally under the Obscene Publications Act 1959, then the Video Recordings Act 1984.

Premature Evaluation

rocket88 — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 09:21:58 -0800

In the March issue of Maxim magazine, music critic David Peisner gave the Black Crowes' upcoming release Warpaint two and a half stars out of five, remarking: "...they sound pretty much like they always have: boozy, competent, and in slavish debt to the Stones, the Allmans, and the Faces." Nothing remarkable, right? Except he had never heard the album.

Rant Of The Century

fearfulsymmetry — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 10:30:20 -0800

Mark Kermode reviews Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. "Is that a nest of tables? No, it's Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley having some red hot passionate embrace that is positively teaky." More of the good doctor's reviews: Daddy Day Camp "Excrementally terrible" Death Proof "A really half-witted idea" Die Hard 4.0 "Like watching Hits On 45 of action movie clichés" Good Luck Chuck "This thing is eating my soul from the inside." Transformers "The aesthetic sensibilities resemble that of someone who has just ingested half a ton of weapons grade plutonium." But he doesn't hate everything... here he is on Inland Empire and Control and Black Sheep "Money can buy art, but it can't make squishy sheep movies." Several more on the 'tubes. And catch him weekly via this BBC podcast with Simon Mayo He also interviews people: Warren Clarke on a Clockwork Orange set visit David Cronenberg Werner Herzog - during which Herzog is shot! Shane Meadows Guillermo del Toro Edward Woodward on a Wicker Man set visit Neil Young who he now likes but didn’t used to He's more than slightly obsessed by The Exorcist (Presenting this excellent documentary. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7) Until very recently he didn't own a television. He gets mentioned in the odd advert. Presents his alternative Oscars every year. And in what remains of his free time he plays bass in an a skiffle band.

Mr Paxman at the Cafe Royal

parmanparman — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 13:57:21 -0800

"You haven't seen true competition until you've watched editors of broadsheet newspapers, distinguished novelists and the controller of Radio 4 locked in furious argument about which was Frederick the Great's favourite musical instrument and what was the name of Jade Goody's range of perfumes." Jeremy Paxman, host of BBC's Newsnight, reviews the events of his week.

This keyboard will not only stomp your colon, but the colons of distant relatives of the human species such as lagomorphs

East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 07:58:25 -0800

Maddox on iPhone

First kiss soft, next one passionate; In World War Hulk, My green homey be smashin' it.

Outlawyr — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 08:20:53 -0800

Reviews of Dating Tips...? Comic book review blog Hoopla! takes a break from the funny books and instead reviews internet dating tips. Much hilarity ensues.

manga review of da Vinci's "Annunciation"

gen — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 09:20:53 -0800

Painter and comic artist Jun-Pierre Shiozawa visited the Tokyo National Museum recently to view da Vinci's Annunciata which created protests in Italy when the Uffizi Gallery lent this artwork to Japan. Shiozawa then created a fantastic "manga review" of the experience for Tokyo Art Beat's TABlog. You can see the steps Shiozawa made to create his manga review on Shiozawa's Flickr account or blog.

Lucid Movement

hama7 — Sat, 26 May 2007 17:57:33 -0800

Lucid Movement.

What, no Styx?!

hellbient — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 08:47:31 -0800

Cockeyed Absurdist - jonmc's 300 most favorite songs and why, including Iron Maiden, The Exciters, Neil Young (as a greaser), Captain Beefheart, Hanson, and of course, The Dictators.

Now for some actual Bruce Schneier facts

grobstein — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 15:52:31 -0800

You know Bruce Schneier the polymath security genius. Now meet Bruce Schneier the kind-hearted reviewer of local Minnesota restaurants. (He doesn't like to give bad reviews -- sounds like "security through obscurity" to me!)
[previously, also]

The Ten Word Review

chrismear — Wed, 17 Jan 2007 08:01:11 -0800

The Ten Word Review Review anything you like, but in ten words or less. For example:
A Scanner Darkly: Rotoscoping gives Keanu a soul. Shame he opens his mouth.