Word: spirit
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Translating LA has chapters on Forest Lawn and the earthquakes, the misery of the city"s black ghettos, the unspeakable wealth of Beverly Hills. As a writer seeking to capture the spirit of place, Peter Theroux is a kinder, gentler clone of his older brother Paul (The Happy Isles of Oceania, Riding the Iron Rooster.) . For all their sparkle, the latter's travel books are suffused with a sour misanthropy : the natives are usually too noisy or too smelly or otherwise lacking in the finer human attributes...
...woman can sing. A breathy, deep, honey-rich tone filled the microphone and, I'm sure made the hair on the hyenas' backs stand on end. I don't remember any of the words to the songs she sang, but she and her band started our viewing off with spirit. She gyrates like, and reminds me a great deal, of a young Tina Turner with her flaunted sexiness and bulging muscles...
...Blind Boys from Alabama got on stage and showed everyone the solidity, the evenness of tone, the impeccable harmonies which can happen when a group has been together for more than 50 years. They sang soulful hymnals that could convert the heathens and which made my spirit rise up from what seemed like an eternity of drought to relish in the harmonies they produced. These men tell it like it is. They believe in what they sing about, and it comes across here like only the Word...
...another point, that of the movie's supposed anti-Arab bias. On the one hand, Cameron is not as sensitive as he could be with matters of Islam and Arabic culture. The terrorists are fairly one-dimensional. On the other hand, they don't seem that far removed in spirit from the group that bombed the World Trade Center. They're terrorists. It's not an easy call, but I don't think the movie comes across as specifically anti-Islamic...
Ambling down the hill, the Dead-head saw that even the police had become intoxicated with the spirit of revelry and had let their guard down somewhat, which is to say they were all sitting on the hoods of cruisers watching all the people go by. They realized that they had been pulled off the streets of the nation's most violent city to guard people who most pressing problem was whether or Dark Star was going to be played tonight. They were happy...