Roundup: Pop Culture & the Arts ... Movies, Documentaries and Museum Exhibits

'The Counterfeiters': A Holocaust Fable With A Happy Ending?

Let's be clear: Austria's The Counterfeiters was not the best foreign-language film of the year. (For my money, that would be the minutely observed, grim-but-humane Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days.) It is a good, compelling film, but, its Oscar win notwithstanding, it is an uneasy hybrid of competing forms: Holocaust fable, crime thriller, true(ish) story, and moral inquiry. The story begins in prewar Berlin, where master forger Salomon Sorowitsch, or "Sally" (Karl M

John Adams: Now the most widely sung unsung hero

In 1819, 18 years after leaving the White House, John Adams fretted that "Mausoleums, Statues, Monuments will never be erected to me. … Panegyrical romances will never be written, nor flattering orations spoken to transmit me to posterity in brilliant colors." He was mostly right. Where's the Adams Memorial in Washington, the college named after Adams, the currency bearing Adams's image? The first and third presidents are on Mount Rushmore, but no Adams gazes out between G

Film details how Allies foiled Nazi pillage of Europe's art

Adolf Hitler's obsession with creating a Nazi super museum to house plundered art is at the heart of The Rape of Europa. Equally fascinating about the documentary is America's wartime attempt to minimize damage to European public art during bombing raids and to return stolen pieces to their original owners. Dubbed Monuments Men, these were artists and curators drafted into military service. Many marched along with troops into France, Italy and Germany in the hope of sec

Cartoonist sets out to take taboo out of swastika

Swastikas can be funny, insists American cartoonist Sam Gross, whose new book is devoted to cartoons featuring the controversial symbol most often associated with the German Nazi Party. The swastika is the focus of the jokes in We Have Ways of Making You Laugh: 120 Funny Swastika Cartoons, the latest effort from the 74-year-old cartoonist best known for his drawings of talking cats, flying cows and snails falling in love with Scotch-tape dispensers. The idea came to Gro

U.S. TV's The History Channel drops 'the' and 'channel' from its name

The History Channel in the United States is now history. Make that History. The cable network quietly dropped "the" and "channel" from its name recently, claiming History for itself. "Our brand is, in the media landscape, synonymous with the genre of history so I don't think it's presumptuous of us to call ourselves History," said Nancy Dubuc, the network's executive vice-president. That's how many viewers already refer to it, she said. &qu

Stolen painting of General Sherman has been recovered, restored

Lancaster native William Tecumseh Sherman is coming home. A rare original portrait of a youthful Sherman, stolen from the Sherman House Museum in Lancaster in 1982, has been recovered, restored and will be returned to the museum in a March 29 ceremony. Sherman, a Civil War general who was appointed commander of the U.S. Army after Ulysses S. Grant became president, probably had the painting of him in civilian clothes done when he was superintendent of what would later b

Mystery painter of a Victorian portrait donated to Trowbridge Museum may have finally been identified

After 22 years of conjecture, the mystery painter of a Victorian portrait donated to Trowbridge Museum may have finally been identified. The portrait, donated in 1986, shows a young Victorian woman showing off her wedding ring, in a piece museum staff believe is likely to have been painted especially for her husband. Until now, no-one at the museum has known anything about the origins of the painting, but a member of the public recently enlightened them on the possible

British schools to play off of Hollywood histories

CSEs in ancient history will be introduced for the first time to capitalise on the popularity of Hollywood blockbusters such as 300 and Troy, examiners have said. Teenagers will study key world events stretching back thousands of years following demand from pupils and teachers, it was disclosed. The courses will focus on the foundation of Rome, Greece and the Persian wars, as well as historical figures such as Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Cleopatra and Agrippina the Y

What's Inaccurate About the New HBO Series on John Adams

Mr. Stern is now completing his doctorate in the department of history, Princeton University; his dissertation is tentatively entitled,"The Overflowings of Liberty": Practical Politics, Political Ideas and the Townshend Crisis in Massachusetts, 1766-1770. He is also the author of"Jane Franklin Mecom: A Boston Woman in Revolutionary Times" (Early American Studies, Spring 2006). The opening installment of the new HBO miniseries on John Adams, first aired on March 16, skillfully depicts

Paul Robeson Exhibit in Bay Area

“PAUL ROBESON, A HERO FOR ALL TIME” Exhibition, March 31-April 30, 2008, Oakland City Hall Rotunda April 9, 2008 will mark the 110th anniversary of the birth of Paul Robeson, son of an escaped slave who became world famous as a scholar, All-American athlete, singer, actor of stage and film, and political activist. The exhibit draws from the extensive collection of memorabilia assembled by the Bay Area Paul Robeson Centennial Committee and consists of artifacts s

The Red Baron: unease, but national hero at last as film hits theaters

A film about the heroic Prussian pilot who shot down a record 80 British, Canadian and Australian airmen during the First World War, will be shown at cinemas across the country next month. It will be the first time since the Nazi era that Germany will portray one of its own military figures in film as a national hero. In Germany, The Red Baron, which has cost a record €18m (£14m) to produce, is almost predestined to provoke a wave of anguished criticism, a batch of dreadful reviews

Donatello's David shines after laser clean-up

Laser technology has revealed that Donatello's David, one of the most important statues of the Italian Renaissance, was once decorated with gold leaf. The priceless piece, created by the artist in the 1440s, is being given its first facelift in more than 100 years at Florence's Bargello Museum. The work has been opened to the public, who can watch the restorers using a medical-grade laser to clean off the residue that has built up on the statue, which was the first free

Before Polaroid fades into history, let's remember how influential -- and cool -- the art of the snapshot, and the cameras themselves, could be

It's not as if "instant photography" died in an instant. Once digital cameras became affordable, its days were numbered. And technically (if not technologically), it's not even dead. Fuji still makes instant film. Even so, the announcement last month that Polaroid would stop producing instant film is a landmark in the history of photography. Cambridge photographer Elsa Dorfman exclusively uses Polaroid film in her celebrated large-format portraits. Her response to the news

Paris exhibition re-examines Marie-Antoinette

France has a chance to re-assess the life of its most notorious queen with the opening today of a major exhibition dedicated to Marie-Antoinette. Negatively portrayed by generations of republican historians, Marie-Antoinette has in the past received little sympathy from a nation that tended to see her either as a giddy symbol of ancien régime decadence or as a treacherous Austrian schemer. But in recent years there has been a rehabilitation, encouraged by new biographie

NYT says actor who plays John Adams in HBO series was miscast

When John Adams begins acting like a pompous windbag, his wife, Abigail, reproaches him with a single word. “Ambition,” Abigail warns, when Adams tells her that he will get a lot of attention if he defends British soldiers in the Boston Massacre trial. “Vanity” is what she says to steer her husband away from what she calls “ostentatious erudition.” “Casting,” she might have told the producers of this new seven-part HBO mini-series, which begins on Sunday ev

New Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart portrait found

A rare portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has been unearthed which gives a true picture of the famous composer's looks at the height of his fame. It shows him in 1783, aged 27, dressed in a red tunic and a white ruff, with a wig of grey hair and an elegant but slightly hooked nose. Until now the enduring image of Mozart has been largely based on the posthumous 1819 portrait by Barbara Kraft, painted 18 years after his death. But this discovery could help change that.

Poor John Adams gets no respect

Oh, sure, our second president was praised 175 years after his death by historian David McCullough in his adoring 2001 biography. And his reputation no doubt will rise again as the HBO miniseries "John Adams" unfolds, beginning Sunday (Reviewed on Page D7). However, when it comes to more lasting tributes, our second president has been sorely overlooked both inside the Beltway and beyond. Monuments on the Mall and Tidal Basin commemorate George Washington, Thomas Jefferson,

Not Tony Soprano but John Adams on HBO

Ms. Hamilton has a Ph.D. in English from Berkeley. Her website: http://www.carolvanderveerhamilton.com. Her screenplay about Alexander Hamilton is posted at inktip.com.John Adams lacks historical charisma. Portly, short,

Salon.com likes HBO's "John Adams"

... Remember when the epic television miniseries featured earth-shattering romances and big, shiny stallions and riotous town meetings with heroes and villains clearly delineated? The founders of our great nation would fight valiantly and give speeches that moved crowds of attractive blonds to tears, and then they'd get on their horses and ride off to fight the bloodthirsty redcoats. But these are the days of David Milch's "Deadwood" and Paul Thomas Anderson's "There

L.A. Theatre Works will stage a revised 1991 play on the Pentagon Papers case

War and secrecy are longtime companions, for reasons that can include protecting the lives of soldiers and protecting the reputation of a government that has lied about why and how a war is being conducted. When the news media chooses to break that secrecy in the public interest, a battle is often joined over the 1st Amendment, as was the case with the unauthorized release of the Pentagon Papers in 1971, a historic event that writers Geoffrey Cowan and the late Leroy Aarons turned into a radio p