Wetlands Preserved
March 9th, 2008
From 1989 to 2001, the Wetlands Preserve flourished just off of New York’s Houston Street. Founded by a Deadhead, the club attracted rising bands in the burgeoning “jam bands” scene, along with ska and hip-hop acts, while maintaining an activism center that held “eco-saloons” and launched inventive street theater protests. Dean Budnick’s Wetlands Preserved, produced by second and final owner Peter Shapiro, is a heartfelt tribute to a joyous anomaly in New York’s nightlife scene that eventually surrendered to Tribeca’s increasing gentrification in the days following September 11.
Continue reading my review of Wetlands Preserved, opening March 14, on About.com.
Wetlands Preserved: The Story of an Activist Nightclub. Dean Budnick, 2006. ***
And here’s a video to go along with it: Ann Marie Calhoun and her brother Joe cover Phish’s “Stash” [via Andy Gadiel]:
This Is England
July 21st, 2007
After transforming the bucolic English countryside into a site of horror with the nasty revenge tale Dead Man’s Shoes, Shane Meadows turns to Maggie Thatcher’s England with a skinhead coming-of-age story. This is England starts out as well-acted and superbly designed mid-eighties time-capsule but degenerates to a formulaic conclusion that cheapens everything that went before.
This Is England opens next Friday. Read the rest of my review at About.com.
This Is England. Shane Meadows, 2006. ***
Watch the trailer:
