March 2020

If you’re into older music, the classics where David Bowie, Elton John, Bob Dylan and many other kings of sound reigned, then I have a show for you. A show that stars Zoe Kravitz, converses with you and walks you through dealing with love and despair: the remake of “High Fidelity.” Spoilers ahead. 

Available to stream on Hulu, “High Fidelity” was released on Valentine’s Day 2020. From the get-go, there’s a sense of nostalgia. The producers made no excuse to majorly jet from the original plot created by novel writer, Nick Hornby. If you watched John Cusack’s 2000 movie version of “High Fidelity,” then Kravitz’s performance is a real treat. 

The show opens to Rob, short for Robyn (played by Kravitz) as she stares somberly into the camera. Her lover packs his bags and walks out the door. The scene is emotionally tense, and you can feel the tone being set for the rest of the show: a rollercoaster of feels. Unlike Cusack’s version, the gender roles are switched, providing an inside look into the female mind. Take notes, gentlemen. 

Rob is the owner of Champion’s Vinyl, a struggling record store in the ever-expanding second borough of Brooklyn, New York. She has an encyclopedia-like mind when it comes to pop-culture references, and, throughout the show, will list out great singers nonchalantly. Despite the show being set in modern-day Brooklyn, Rob wears clothes as if she were a cast member straight out of Seinfield. Rob drinks her whiskey neat, chain-smokes cigarettes and only drinks bodega coffee. Her chaotic New Yorker vibe is loud and clear. As the story progresses, she uses her large knowledge of music to explain her heartbreaks. However, it wasn’t until the end of the third episode when she decided to actually meet with all her heartbreakers ro find out why each respective relationship ended. 

The cinematography is definitely worth noting. When actors break the fourth wall, it’s difficult to make it seem natural as they stare into the camera. However, the hand camera movement is our part in the story — the silent character. The pans, tilts and close-ups are so beautifully choreographed that it doesn’t feel awkward. Additionally, what really took it away were their breathtaking establishing shots. If you love big cities, they grasp the constant movement and hurriedness that matches Rob’s go-go behavior. Watch closely because in some of those shots the ambiance clearly coincides with Rob’s mood. 

What makes the show especially remarkable is the actor’s relation to the film. Kravitz’s mother is Lisa Bonet, who was actually one of Cusack’s love interests in the 2000 version. They look almost exactly alike, which brings out that sense of nostalgia the producers were not afraid to use. By having Kravitz play the role this time, it was as if we got the perspective of Cusack’s love interest and how she would have lived her life. 

Overall, “High Fidelity” is a show full of hit catchphrases and art that would make your grunge middle school self reappear. To some, that would be an offsetting and horrifying experience, but, for the purposes of the show, it’s sentimental. “High Fidelity” is a tribute to a great book and film, and a reminder of how music can be used to explain the otherwise inexplicable matters of the heart.

On the morning of March 9, 1989, the light that was Robert Mapplethorpe’s life dimmed at the hands of his three-year struggle with AIDS.

The controversial photographer has long been a giant in the art scene of the 70s and 80s, known to focus on nudes, portraits, and, toward the later years of his life, flowers. His works and life have sparked best-selling memoirs, worldwide exhibitions, a foundation in his name, and, at one point, the attention of the U.S. Congress and the nation, when his work was considered too obscene to be shown in federally-funded art galleries.

Today, it’s likely this name may not ring a bell to generations born after his death. Yet, the winding story of his life and the prolific collection of his photographs still stand as some of the most influential and groundbreaking pieces of art in the past century.

Influenced by Joseph Cornell and Marcel Duchamp, the artist first started drawing and painting in 1963, while studying at the Pratt Institute in New York. But the fire that lit his flame didn’t appear until 1967, when a young and homeless Patti Smith, known as the “Godmother of Punk Rock” today, moved to the city. The two then began an intimate relationship with each other and the New York art scene, when his sexuality was not yet fully recognized. 

Mapplethorpe mostly spent his time making collages, but as he evolved, so did his work, and by the time the 70s came around, he was focused on black and white photography almost strictly depicting people. His work wove between intimate self-portraits and the unknown corners of the gay community, portraits of celebrities such as Andy Warhol and Debbie Harry, and into photographic studies of form with bodybuilder Lisa Lyon. He photographed every part of humanity, from the soul and heart to sexuality and body.

All of his work is significant, but his self-portraits take a truly special glimpse at the breath of an artist. In one of his self-portraits from 1980, we can see a dressed up Mapplethorpe in drag, revealing the parts of himself once hidden beneath the skin. His sexuality became a pinpoint of his work and not a hidden complex of his heart. In 1985, he posed in devil horns and glared into the camera, a representation of his Christian childhood. One of his most well-known works, however, didn’t come to fruition until 1988, when one of his self-portraits depicted him staring solemnly at the camera with a skull walking cane he held in the forefront of the frame. It’s a work full of depth, as Mapplethorpe knew at the time he was dying of AIDS and was coming to terms with the fact. A year later, the predicted death would come true, and the output of his photography came to a halt. 

Looking through Mapplethorpe’s catalog of work, it is clear that his photographs capture much more than just black and white aesthetics. His work is raw and personal, his nudes and portraits revealing the souls of both the model and Mapplethorpe himself. He divulges the inner workings of body and mind in an unapologetically vulnerable light. His death came at a time when the gay community and world of photography were still trying to grasp the true impact they had, and his work will forever live on as some of the most important and beautiful photography of its time. 

“Much has been said about Robert, and more will be added. Young men will adopt his gait. Young girls will wear white dresses and mourn his curls. He will be condemned and adored. His excesses damned or romanticized. In the end, truth will be found in his work, the corporeal body of the artist. It will not fall away.” Patti Smith, from her memoir, “Just Kids.”

When I first went to see “Parasite,” I was determined to understand what many of my friends had called a “cinematic masterpiece.” And in that dim-lit theater, I wasn’t disappointed; going in blind was probably the best decision I made. The directing, the subtle call-backs and the cinematography had me on the edge of my seat. So when “Parasite” won the Oscar for Best Picture a month ago, I was elated. A movie I wholly appreciated had won, and many agreed it deserved everything it got. 

But when I started looking deeper at the resentful people that thought any other movie on that nomination list deserved the accolade more because “Parasite” wasn’t American, I realized many were angry it got the chance in the first place. People have made comments about the film, ranging from “they used to call it ‘best foreign movie’” to “these people are the destruction of America,” which seemed to have racist connotations. 

Who could forget that, in as recent as 2014, American born and raised Nina Davuluri won Miss America only to receive immense backlash and blatant racism for the mere fact that she was the daughter of immigrants and didn’t “look American.” To critics, her darker brown skin meant she didn’t represent American values; people questioned the judges. How could they give the crown to someone like her? Someone that didn’t look like them? Someone so different? She made history that night, but to some people, that didn’t matter. To them, she just wasn’t the right person to do so. 

“Parasite’s” director, Bong Joon Ho doesn’t look American — because he isn’t. But that doesn’t demerit his work, and it doesn’t demerit the awards he’s won. Whether you agree or disagree that the best film of the year won, you can’t deny that, politics aside, “Parasite” was a damn good film. And its origins shouldn’t interfere with that opinion. 

The definition of “American” is not singular. It’s deeply complex, rooted in immigration from all over, blended in spices and herbs like Chung-Sook’s seasoning of ram-don in the movie, and many tend to forget that when they think of what deserves our praise and what doesn’t. “Parasite” is South Korean in execution and performance, but that doesn’t mean that it cannot be appreciated through an American lens or that it cannot receive an “American” award. It doesn’t have the coronavirus, people — just a determination to portray society’s issues in a hilarious, yet unsettling way. What’s wrong with that?