Arts & Culture

The Arts Desk’s weekly picks for television, movies, books and music By SIERRA JIMENEZ — arts@theaggie.org Book: “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley (1818) When you think of Frankenstein, you probably picture the green monster with jagged black hair and bolts through the sides of his square head. Hollywood did a fantastic job of hammering that image […]

Despite its resemblance to the successful “First Reformed,” Paul Schrader’s newest release lacks cohesion By JACOB ANDERSON — arts@theaggie.org If Paul Schrader (director of “First Reformed,” “Hardcore” and almost 20 other films in addition to his writing credits on myth-making films like “Taxi Driver” and “Raging Bull”)  has one defining artistic quality, it is endurance. […]

The Arts Desk’s weekly picks for television, movies, books and music By CLARA FISCHER — arts@theaggie.org Music: “Don’t Shut Me Down” by ABBA (2021) ABBA has been a global pop sensation ever since their debut at Eurovision 1974. Personally, I can proudly say that I grew up with ABBA — if my life were made […]

Students DJs and artists host concert, gala in basement of Art UC Davis’ student-led art gallery showcases both collaborative and personal, expressive artwork at first show of the quarteruilding By ANGIE CUMMINGS — arts@theaggie.org On Friday Oct. 8, UC Davis’ entirely student-run art gallery, The Basement Gallery, held its first in-house show since the COVID-19 […]

The surreal rock opera falls short with awkward artistic choices and an unsuccessful social commentary By ANGIE CUMMINGS — arts@theaggie.org “Annette” was perhaps one of the most talked-about movies of the Cannes Film Festival this year, due in part to its star-studded cast and its eccentric combination of operatics and surreal storytelling.  The film is […]

How social media has reshaped our idea of fame  We live in the age of the influencer — there’s one everywhere you look, from the Met Gala red carpet to the couch of any relevant talk show host — but how did our celebrity culture get so diluted?  Being deemed “famous” used to hold a […]

The Arts Desk’s weekly picks for television, movies, books and music By JACOB ANDERSON — arts@theaggie.org Movie: “Divorce: Italian Style” dir. by Pietro Germi (1961) Desperate to marry his extraordinarily pretty cousin, Ferdinando conspires to get around Italy’s restrictive divorce laws by inducing his cloying wife to cheat on him so he can kill her. […]

A volunteer provides insight on the used bookstore selling donated books at accessible prices Logos Books, a long-standing Davis institution acquired by Friends of the Davis Library in 2017, is Davis’ one-stop shop for affordable books. The store has a wide selection of genres and styles, ranging from poetry to thrillers to fiction and everything […]

St. Vincent and Carrie Brownstein’s new mockumentary shows us the greatness that follows from creatives coming together and combining their strengths into something new The mockumentary is a sacred genre, and while “The Nowhere Inn” does honor the art, it definitely blurs some lines with its avant-garde absurdity (that is somehow not pretentious). The film […]

Live music, art exhibits and more to check out in Davis this October “Manetti Shrem Museum of Art” (254 Old Davis Road, 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Thursday and Friday and 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Saturday and Sunday): The Manetti Shrem has extended hours this fall, just in time for students back in person […]

From September 1st through 25th, the Davis-based art gallery held an auction of over 100 artists’ work to raise money for the rest of the year When most think of an art auction, ideas of exclusivity and elitism might come up; however, this is not the case at Pence Gallery’s annual Art Auction. The non-profit […]

How Marvel is diversifying a very uniform industry Marvel Studio’s latest project is taking theaters by storm. Grossing $90 million over the Labor Day weekend, despite concerns surrounding the Delta variant, “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” has dominated the box-office for four consecutive weekends. The project features Destin Daniel Cretton as the […]