classic

Thompson and Bleecker: Neapolitan With a Twist

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What Thompson and Bleecker has to offer surely goes beyond its creative artisanal pizza. Gazing around this vibrant Ithaca Commons spot on a Thursday evening transports me; I am no longer in Ithaca, but in New York City, almost. Perhaps this feeling is evoked since owners Milly and George named Thompson and Bleecker after the intersection of their first apartment in the city. The candles on each sleek, wooden table twinkle. Milly makes her rounds, ensuring all guests are having a wonderful time, which is an easy feat. Patrons sip on red wine while simultaneously biting into doughy crust and cheesy goodness.

brunch

Northstar House: the Bright Glow in Ithaca’s Gray Winters

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The Northstar Plate, a dish that can satisfy both your sweet and savory breakfast cravings, comes with choice of French toast or pancakes, bacon or sausage and potatoes or grits with two eggs your way. Northstar’s French toast is soaked overnight, giving it a cinnamon-y flavor throughout to its center. Topped with New York maple syrup, this French toast outshines all other French toast options in Ithaca.

review

Starting the Day Right at Sunset Grill

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A choice spot for brunch has a few early indicators of quality to look out for. The size of the crowd around brunch time is the first sign; one look through the doorway of Sunset Grill inspired confidence. The second, aroma, was immediately obvious as the sweet scent of the warm interior beckoned us to enter from the frigid parking lot and demanded that we stay. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the hot sauce waiting at the table speaks volumes about the establishment that placed it there. To sit at a table prepared for a medley of warmth and savory and be greeted with the familiar bottle of Frank’s RedHot is to be sure your chef knows what they are doing.

Arts & Culture

GUEST ROOM | An Ode to The Dude

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Many of us are easily familiar with the name “Lebowski.” When we hear it, we think of bathrobes, bowling balls and buddy-love between John Goodman’s Walter and Jeff Bridges’ The Dude. With its one-of-a-kind storyline and its clever comedic interjections, The Big Lebowski has become a household film title, an easy answer to the ice-breaker question “favorite movie?” and a classic go-to choice when you and your friends couldn’t agree on anything else to watch on Netflix. But the film has not always been held in such high regards. Twenty years ago, when it was first released, The Big Lebowski was met with dissatisfaction and criticism. The reviews were mediocre at best, and in the box office, it was far from a hit.

analysis

THE E’ER INSCRUTABLE | 1916: Annus Equi Sine Rectore and the Mechanized Frontier

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“The machines were more to his soul than the sun. He did not know these mechanisms, their great, human-contrived, inhuman power, and he wanted to know them… He wanted machines, machine-production… He wanted to go…  beyond the Self, into the great inhuman Not-Self, to create the great unliving creators, the machines, out of the active forces of nature that existed before flesh. But he is too old. It remains for the young Italian to embrace his mistress, the machine.” -D.H. Lawrence, Twilight in Italy

It was with a heavy heart that D.H. Lawrence published his aforementioned 1916 travelogue; the old Europe had by then taken up arms, and every peninsular limb of her gangrenous body stood poised to strangle the other. A crossroads had been reached: the two year hump of the war, the hellfire of Verdun and the Stahlgewitter of the Somme, the stalemate of offensive and counter-offensive swallowing up young male blood in torrents.

Arts & Culture

F is for Fake: Welles Explores Truth in Deception

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By NICK SWAN

Orson Welles’ documentary F is for Fake is as much an exploration of one filmmaker’s idiosyncratic technique, as it is a philosophical debate about authenticity and expertise. Released in 1974, F is for Fake is Orson Welles’ last completed film — the culmination of an extensive and acclaimed career in artistic media.The beginning of Welles’ work actually existed not in film, but rather in theatre and radio. In 1937, Welles wrote a modern adaptation of and starred in William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Although it premiered in an independent theatre, Caesar was soon moved to Broadway, where it ran until 1941. Welles burst onto the radio platform when, in 1938, he delivered the infamous “War of the Worlds” broadcast.