The 3-D Comeback of an Epic Romance

Fifteen years ago, James Cameron turned a tragic maritime disaster into a romantic disaster epic cum box-office-shattering pop-culture phenomenon. “Titanic” was the first film ever to gross over a billion dollars worldwide and scooped up 11 Oscars. It confirmed Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet as rising A-list stars and even made Billy Zane briefly relevant, a feat that I think might be even more impressive than the film’s revolutionary special effects. With the centennial of the actual sinki

From Children’s Fantasy to Magical Homage

In its very first shot, Martin Scorsese’s “Hugo” [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hR-kP-olcpM] sucks you into a magical, wonderful new world and refuses to let you go. The camera pans over the 1930’s Parisian skyline, but this is not the “real” Paris; it is the enchanted city of lights and love that Americans have been so fond of imagining for decades now (we saw it most recently in Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris”). Lingering only for a moment to allow the city’s supernatural allure to sink in,

Investigating FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover

John Edgar Hoover took over the post of Director of the Bureau of Investigations in 1924 (they wouldn’t add the “Federal” until 1935), when an Amherst graduate sat in the White House, the Chicago Cubs hadn’t won a World Series in 18 years and race riots, union strikes and anarchist bombings made Occupy Wall Street look like child’s play. Hoover would remain in his office until the day he died 48 years later, when Tricky Dick ticked off entries on his enemies list, the Vietnam War just kept ragin

Gates-way to Neva-land: Rarities in Rural Russia

Our first excursion into the countryside was a day trip to Vyborg, a medieval town a stone’s throw away from the Finnish border. The city’s strategic location on the Karelian Isthmus (oh, look at a map) has made it a point of contention between nations in the past, with Sweden, Germany, Finland and Russia all having made claims to the territory. On paper, Vyborg boasted a 13th century Swedish fortress, a library designed by prominent Finnish architect Alvar Aalto and a gorgeous, isolated landsca