Email Author John Powers

2002 Stories by John Powers

• Dangerous? Not Really

  published December 26, 2002

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• Con Air

  published December 26, 2002

  DOES STEVEN SPIELBERG EVER GET TIRED of being Steven Spielberg? It must be exhausting to be the world's most successful filmmaker, whose... More >>

• The Butcher and His Boy

  published December 26, 2002

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• You Don't Know Jack

  published December 19, 2002

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• Planet of the Dupes

  published December 5, 2002

  AFTER GLIDING FROM SUCCESS TO SUCCESS, Steven Soderbergh has hit a tricky patch. His last film, Full Frontal, a low-budget... More >>

• Quiet Americans

  published November 28, 2002

  One sweltering afternoon in Ho Chi Minh City, known to the kids there as HCMC, I was heading up Dong Khoi, the legendary downtown street that,... More >>

• Who Wears the Pants?

  published November 21, 2002

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• Get To Know Your Rabbit

  published November 14, 2002

  When word first came out that Eminem -- the most galvanizing figure in American pop culture -- was starring in a Hollywood movie, the big... More >>

• Rebellion in the Backlands

  published November 7, 2002

  Back in the waning days of the Brazilian dictatorship, hundreds of thousands of citizens, including some of my friends, attended a huge... More >>

• Paradise Lost and Lost and Lost . . .

  published October 31, 2002

  As I said this morning to Charlie There is far too much music in Bali --Noel Coward ... More >>

• The True Believer

  published October 24, 2002

  So here comes Paul Schrader -- father to America‘s craziest taxi driver and its unhappiest gigolo -- off to do the DVD commentary for his ne... More >>

• A Man Escaped

  published October 17, 2002

  PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON'S PECULIAR tour de force Punch-Drunk Love, perhaps the most assaultive romantic comedy in Hollywood history,... More >>

• Republic Relations

  published October 10, 2002

  At the Barcelona airport a few days ago, I overheard a young American businessman extolling the Catalan capital’s virtues to his newly arrive... More >>

• The Rise of Anthony Lane

  published September 19, 2002

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• Bubble Wrap

  published September 5, 2002

  Illustration by Peter Bennett An audience is like a broad. If you're indifferent, Endsville. --Frank Sinatra AS FAR... More >>

• Devil's Bargain

  published August 29, 2002

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• Crap Circles

  published August 15, 2002

  The best moment in Signs, a new thriller that offers a faith-based approach to intergalactic warfare, comes in its opening scene. Mel Gibson... More >>

• The Summer of Stolen Children

  published August 8, 2002

  Deep into The Lovely Bones, the new best-seller by Alice Sebold, the novel‘s narrator -- a 14-year-old named Susie Salmon who has been rape... More >>

• Doomsday Machine

  published July 25, 2002

  Ever since the collapse of communism, American pop culture has pulsed with nostalgia for the Cold War, exploring its currents and backwaters in... More >>

• Spiking the Punch

  published July 25, 2002

  Last Friday night on Fox News, The O’Reilly Factor turned its two-fisted gaze on the week‘s most incendiary news footage -- the video ... More >>

• American Idols

  published July 18, 2002

  A few weeks after the death of John Cassavetes in 1989, I was out drinking with an Australian documentarian who toasted the late filmmaker for... More >>

• Crime Wave

  published July 4, 2002

  Last week on The Daily Show, Jon Stewart was chatting with 2020‘s Cynthia McFadden about the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart, the Salt Lake Cit... More >>

• Majority Report

  published June 27, 2002

  You would have to kill me and prop me up in the seat of my car with a smile painted on my face to get me to go near Hollywood. ... More >>

• Liberté, Égalité, Infidélité

  published June 20, 2002

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• The Man Show

  published June 6, 2002

  “There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about,” wrote Oscar Wilde, “and that is not being talked about.” You might... More >>