Arts & Culture

Though Flawed, Emilia Pérez Wins Awards Aplenty

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With 26 wins and 33 nominations, Emilia Pérez has been basking in award glory. The musical crime comedy written and directed by Jacques Audiard premiered at the 77th Cannes Film Festival on May 18, 2024, and then hit Netflix on Nov. 1. The musical pieces are primarily in Spanish but feature English as well, and the film stars Zoe Saldaña, Karla Sofia Gascón, Selena Gomez and Adriana Paz. 

The film begins with Rita Castro (played by Zoe Saldaña) an under-appreciated and overworked lawyer working in Mexico on criminal cases, who has been contacted by Mexican drug lord Manitas Del Monte (Karla Sofía Gascón) for a job. 

After putting a bag over Rita’s head and taking her to an unmarked location, Manitas asks Rita to help him become a woman. Rita is to find the surgeon and help Manitas fake his own death in Mexico and find a new home for his kids and wife.

Arts & Culture

TEST SPINS | Mariah Carey: ‘Daydream’

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Thanksgiving is over, and whether we want it to be or not, it is officially Mariah Carey season. It’s debatable whether that season starts right after Halloween or Thanksgiving, but there’s no denying it now — it’s time. In recent years, Mariah Carey has essentially become synonymous with Christmas music and the holiday season, with smash hits like “All I Want for Christmas Is You” blasting right back into the charts nearly every year. I, like most other people, can appreciate her for this; There must be something special about her and her music if songs she made almost 30 years ago are still being resurrected to the point where they top the charts. But I’d like to make a case for the rest of Carey’s discography — namely, her 1995 album Daydream.

Arts & Culture

Someone Please Save the Movie Musical: On ‘Wicked’

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Some critics are calling Jon M. Chu’s Wicked adaptation “the best movie-to-musical adaptation since Chicago and Mamma Mia.” This may be an indictment of the movie musicals of the last 15 years rather than an endorsement of the film. Chu’s Wicked (2024) is a big swing and a miss, capturing the content of the stage musical but failing to hit on all of the beats that make it so great. Wicked had to follow in the huge footsteps of its Broadway predecessor, which starred two of Broadway’s most iconic actresses, paid back its production budget in a year and became one of the longest-running Broadway shows in history. Not only that, but the film also acts as the prequel to one of the most important movies of all time, The Wizard of Oz. It is often falsely said that The Wizard of Oz was the first color movie, and while this is not true, it utilized the vibrant Technicolor film process in an era where black and white was still dominant.

Arts & Culture

‘Gladiator II’ Takes Us Back to Rome, Or Somewhere Like It

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To preface, I am not a history buff. I have not studied Roman history to any great extent, yet I am a lover of the original Gladiator. In fact, I was first introduced to the glories of Rome by my father, who is also a fan of Gladiator and its epic tale of Maximus Decimus Meridius. When I heard of the release of a sequel, I was wary. I’m here to tell all lovers of the stunning classic that Gladiator II falls short of expectations, failing to match the original precisely because it reaches too far.

Arts & Culture

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’: A Must Read Banned Book

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A few weeks ago, I bought a book from the Cornell Store which has been on my reading list for eons. This is, of course, the infamous Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. I could feel myself getting consumed by the pages, as I spent hours flipping and immersing myself into the world of the dystopian Gilead, which is more than just a fictional place — it is a manifestation of far-right ideologies. Gilead is an alternative future United States, one where climate change drastically drove down fertility levels, and a group called the “Sons of Jacob” came together to take the country in their own hands. 

The Sons of Jacob lead a coup and install a new regime based on strict Fundamentalist Christian doctrines with a core focus on women’s reproductive rights. In this universe, women are separated into four different categories depending on their age, status and fertility.

Arts & Culture

Anniversary of Surrealism 

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A hundred years ago, in a world brewing with change, an idea emerged from the literary and artistic movement of the 1920s. The publication of André Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto in 1924 introduced groundbreaking ideas that challenged conventional notions of reality.

Arts & Culture

Electric Buffalo Records Creates a Home for Campus Musicians

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Every gig is an opportunity. If Alex Korner hadn’t asked his friends Mick Jagger, Ian Stewart, Keith Richards and Brian Jones to fill in for his band’s Thursday night gig at the Marquee Club in 1962, the world might have never seen The Rolling Stones. On a more recent Thursday night in 2024, up-and-coming student artists took to the stage at the Electric Buffalo Records “70s Night” open mic. Bell-bottoms, dusty records, colorful strobe lighting, and an array of extreme talent created an ambiance presumably similar to the Marquee, or one of other venues where rock and roll legends got their starts. As an entirely student-run record label and performance venue under the umbrella of Cornell Media Guild, Electric Buffalo Records (EBR) is a creative hub for all student musicians.

Arts & Culture

Art in a Digital Age: A Walk Through a ‘Winter in Paradise’

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Many of our mental schemas of the fine arts may resoundingly contrast with our mental images of technology. Art is an emotional visual expression through painting or sculpture, while technology is emotionally neutral, aimed at facilitating our daily tasks and advancing human society. To many of us, the merging of modern technology and art is highly unorthodox. Art is a mere pastime, while technology drives human civilization’s progress. I mean, we very well might be wasting $400,000 on our Cornell degrees to end up unemployed at the hands of AI.

Arts & Culture

Petrichor Brings an Elusive and Entrancing Take on Love

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The definition of petrichor is “a distinctive, earthy, usually pleasant odor that is associated with rainfall especially when following a warm, dry period.” 070 Shake spells her own meaning of Petrichor with her most recent album: She bathes in the lush bass tones of a new kind of rain, a new day after a long night out. 

Following her 2022 sophomore album You Can’t Kill Me, Petrichor takes a daunting yet

rejuvenating new look at what love is. Many of the songs in the collection emerge from the witching hours, where 070 Shake thrives in concocting reflective spells. On “Sin,” the opening track, smooth, layered vocals give way to the spacy outro: “chasing after waters, chase the moonlight.” Listeners are sure to be reminded of the  2019 track “Under The Moon” featured on her debut album Modus Vivendi; as long she’s been performing as 070 Shake, Danielle Balbuena has been a creature of the night. As this is the first album Balbuena has released since the beginning of her celebrity relationship with Lily-Rose Depp, Petrichor’s elusive, supernatural takes on love are fitting. In “Pieces of You,” Balbuena infuses misery and wonder within the discovery of another.

Arts & Culture

How ‘Dancing with the Stars’ Balances Its Legacy with Today’s Television Landscape

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The sight of a bedazzled ankle monitor on-screen during the Season 33 premiere of Dancing with the Stars perfectly encapsulated the series for me: flashy, innovative and compellingly self-aware. In today’s on-demand and streaming-dominated world, the live competitive reality show Dancing with the Stars has impressively managed to remain culturally relevant while maintaining its core identity. The show’s celebration of its 500th episode last week, complete with nostalgic reinventions of past show dances and appearances by former cast members, demonstrated its enduring appeal. However, controversial moves like casting con artist Anna Delvey, the aforementioned ankle monitor wearer, as a “star” make me question how far the series will go to captivate viewers. 

In my early days of watching Dancing with the Stars, I was completely captivated by the performances. I loved the spectacle of celebrities competing with their professional dance partners for the coveted Mirrorball Trophy, and the stars’ backstories and the show’s strategies were far from my priorities.