The Ten Best Things to Do in Coral Gables

Nicknamed the City Beautiful, Coral Gables is one of South Florida’s oldest and most historic neighborhoods. Designed with Mediterranean influence, Coral Gables features lush, tree-lined avenues, mighty, opulent buildings, winding roadways, and lots of green spaces. Incorporated in 1925, George Merrick, the founder of Coral Gables, set out to create one of…

Miami Book Fair Adds Geraldine Brooks to Headlining Events

In her career as a journalist and author, Geraldine Brooks has traveled the world. Born in Australia, Brooks became a U.S. citizen in 2002 and has ventured to the Middle East, Africa, the Balkans, and Yugoslavia in search of her next story.  And in November, she’ll head to Miami to…

Art Basel Miami Beach 2016 Includes Castillo, Snitzer Galleries

Since 2001 Art Basel has slowly transformed Miami Beach from a vacation spot for well-to-do snow birds into an art world mecca. The fair has also driven the local art scene, inspiring the community to rally around artists, gallery owners, and museums.  Though Art Basel 2016 will make Miami  the…

Ixcanul Finds Indigenous Life Pitted Against Modernity

The most destructive villain in this year’s summer movies isn’t some super-powered fiend. It’s us, the consumers of North America, whose desires shape the world. The U.S. looms over Jayro Bustamante’s patient, observant, exquisitely painful debut feature Ixcanul, just as it looms over the Guatemalan coffee plantation in which Bustamante’s…

Cinemax’s Crime Drama Quarry Mines Familiar Territory With Rare Feeling

Eight minutes into the pilot episode of Cinemax’s new crime show Quarry — an uneven but largely rewarding translation of Max Allan Collins’ crime books into emotionally challenging, character-driven television — Marine Lloyd “Mac” Conway, Jr. (Logan Marshall-Green) returns home a day early from his second tour in Vietnam. By…

A Toast to the Epic Dada Madness of The Eric Andre Show

Before The Eric Andre Show came along, I always thought acting like a complete lunatic on television was mostly a white-people thing. As a culture, African-Americans generally frown upon the idea of being unabashedly clownish for the masses — black folks call it “showing your ass.” All those years of…

Sharon Jones Won’t Let Cancer Stop the Funk

Barbara Kopple’s Miss Sharon Jones! tells the kind of true story that makes you want to kick creation itself square in the crotch. Here’s that firecracker soul singer, nearing her 60s, her boogie still majestic, her band still a tight retro marvel, her wail still the southern end of a northbound…

Craig Robinson At Last Gets to Show His Range in Morris From America

In contemporary film, it’s typical for an African-American character to be the sole person of color in the story, only existing to reveal hidden racism or make white people uncomfortable with themselves. Black characters rarely get to talk to other black characters. Last year, Manohla Dargis suggested a new Bechdel-type…

Bass Museum Postpones Its Reopening Until Spring 2017

The Bass Museum, Miami Beach’s only major art museum, has been under renovation for over a year in a remodel that plans to drastically expand the building’s programmable space without altering its footprint. Recently, the museum announced a massive reopening for Art Basel 2016, with three new shows from contemporary…

Why Is Pablo Escobar Having a Pop Culture Moment?

When Pablo Escobar’s beachfront Miami mansion was torn down earlier this year, some felt it closed the books on a bloody chapter of history that tied the city to the reportedly richest drug lord ever. The tale of the infamous narco king spanned two continents, claiming the lives of thousands…

Yoga Hosers Finds Kevin Smith Barely Making a Movie

Were we wrong to root for Kevin Smith? When he burst onto the scene in 1994, it was the most improbable of rags-to-riches movie narratives: bankrolling Clerks by selling his comic book collection and running up thousands of dollars in credit card debt. Almost overnight, he joined the likes of…