Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

 20. Little Murders (1971) Alan Arkin's directorial debut amplifies Jules Feiffer's comic surrealism with neurotic characters and seemingly random outcomes. It's basis in Feiffer's stage play seems evident in its apartment settings, but Arkin also readily channels much of Feiffer's typical manias that appear throughout the cartoonist's body of work. Patsy Newquist (Marcia Rodd) and her boyfriend, Alfred Chamberlain (Elliott Gould), live in the darkest 1970s embodiment of New York City that accentuates how its residents might have felt as crime seemed eternally rampant and law enforcement could never cope. The film's stark commentary does not provide answers, but speaks to collective neuroses, while the actors' choices singularly mirror how we might react to pure chaos. I highly recommend this one for its ability to question existing power structures in novel and unexpected ways.  19.  The Loveless (1981) Kathryn Bigelow and Monty Montgomery's rockabi...

The documentary style effectively grounds this one as a realistic crime story, but the horror elements continually surprise, sewing elements of supernatural doubt. 

Cardinology takes a little time to appreciate. At first listen, it seems all too familiar, yet unsatisfying. Not dissimilar from Easy Tiger , the songs are pure pop songs yet they are more complex than those found on Easy Tiger incorporating more of Adam's love for the Grateful Dead with more dead-influenced guitar work. The power of Easy Tiger lay in its familiarity coupled with Adam's seemingly newfound direction and lauded consistency, yet after ten or so songs each song began to blend together leaving the listener appreciating the album, but remembering little of it. A few songs stood out, particularly the personal call-to-arms song, “Halloweenhead,” but overall the surprise element, the where will he go next element so integral to Adams varied songwriting, was missing. Cardinology may not be as consistent an album (there are a few misses, particularly the arena rock U2-aping song, “Magick”), but it does an amazing job showcasing Adam's songwriting, and more imp...