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Stories by Philip Martin
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Dublin’s heart A dog's heart works hard.It bumps along at 120 to 150 beats per minute, techno rhythms, almost twice as fast as ours. A mean little fist squeezing double-time in a dog's chest.You cannot sync ... August 9, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: What once was lost — Joni Mitchell’s amazing grace Everything dies, mister, that's a fact.But maybe everything that dies, someday comes back.— Bruce Springsteen, "Atlantic City"Is there a word to describe the joy of finding somethi... August 7, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Bill Russell, S.O.B. I didn't like Bill Russell. Back then he was an S.O.B.I didn't know Russell as one of our great athlete-citizens, a guy who, after the 1963 murder of Medgar Evers, came down to Jim Crow Missis... August 7, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm85 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jt9J937W2... August 5, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: In the street There was a disturbance in the force; I shot up in bed at 3 a.m.I saw them before I heard them, a flash of motion in the street, maybe 70 yards beyond our window. Two figures beneath a streetlight, on... August 2, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Teacher, I need you I remember only a few of my teachers.It's unlikely that many of them remember me either; I spent a lot of time in school trying very hard not to call attention to myself, a quiet back-row kid.I al... July 31, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: ‘Shoresy’ trickled through the ‘vast wasteland’ My favorite show on television now is "Better Call Saul."You probably know about that show; you might have read something I wrote about Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn) a year or so ago. Lots of pe... July 31, 2022
‘Breathless’ was a breath of fresh air Vivre dangereusement jusqu'au bout.-- "Live dangerously until the end," the French title of the 1959 Robert Aldrich film "10 Seconds to Hell," seen on a poster in "Breathl... July 29, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm729 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3Gt255Xs... July 29, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Exceptional Americanism It is our nature to make up stories to tell ourselves, then believe them.Some people will believe what they want, for whatever reasons they can invent. Some of us need to invest in heroes and myths an... July 26, 2022
CRITICAL MASS: Some country for old men — ‘Geri-action’ trend continues with big stars as old heroes in low-budget films You might assume that the chief protagonist of the FX series "The Old Man" is the old man.After all, Dan Chase, the former CIA asset who has been hiding out from the agency for 30 years afte... July 24, 2022
OPINION | ON BOOKS: Larry Brown — the will and the want-to A friend of mine doesn't like to read columns about "process"; he thinks that it's too easy for a writer to write about writing, which usually results in a bunch of navel-gazing nons... July 24, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Lying in politics, Hannah Arendt and me A reader asked the other day if it was stressful for me to write about politics.There are a lot of ways to take this question. I could have interpreted it as a dig at my column about Ray Fosse and Pet... July 24, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm722 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/anioXQUD... July 22, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: The Tiger in winter Tiger Woods did not have a very good British Open.He played a defenseless St. Andrews politely, posting 78-75. He knew relatively early Friday that he would not be playing the weekend. He dutifully fi... July 19, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Rose v. Fosse It's been years since I've paid any attention to all-star games.I've probably not watched more than an inning or two of Major League Baseball's "Midsummer Classic" since I wa... July 17, 2022
Where the ‘Crawdads’ review is I have been told that one of the things studio executives tend to ask when someone pitches them on an idea for a new movie is "what's the IP?"They mean what is the intellectual property?... July 15, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm715 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Xh5lxNpq... July 15, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: James Caan naked "Hookers? Well, I never paid for them, you know. I just gave them all the cocaine they wanted."-- James Caan, 1999Jimmy is the son of a kosher butcher.His dad Arthur is born in a Rhineland s... July 12, 2022
OPINION | ON BOOKS: ‘Lost Son’ doesn’t read like Arkansas author Stephanie Vanderslice’s first novel "The Lost Son" ($28.95 hardcover, Regal House) is the first novel by Stephanie Vanderslice, director of the Arkansas Writers MFA Workshop at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway.At l... July 10, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: Jackson’s ‘The Beatles: Get Back’ feels so honest I wish it was the sixtiesI wish I could be happy— Radiohead, "The Bends," 1995On Tuesday, Peter Jackson's "The Beatles: Get Back" will be released on DVD.Maybe that's... July 10, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Surviving summer I keep hearing people say this will be the coolest summer for the rest of our lives. I don't want to believe that, and given how weather--as opposed to climate--works, it's probably not true. ... July 10, 2022
‘A Hard Day’s Night’ still matters after all these years I've been thinking -- and writing -- a bit about The Beatles lately, as the past few years have seen the 50th anniversary of their late-period albums -- "Sgt. Pepper," "The Beatles&... July 8, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm78 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/x_-Fjf4tR... July 8, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Angel dust In February 1992, the White Collar Criminal's son told me there was a Pulitzer Prize in the dozens of file boxes he dropped off at my office. I went through the boxes, and couldn't find it.So ... July 5, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Unpopular opinions Baseball would be a better game if we moved the outfield fences back another 50 feet or so. It would make out-of-the-park home runs much rarer while giving us lots more singles, doubles, triples and i... July 3, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: A glimpse at 9 of the best films thus far in 2022 Consider how everything changed in the late '70s and early '80s when cable television suddenly (it seemed to most of us) put 40 or more channels at our disposal. Baby boomers grew up in an era... July 3, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/71onfilm <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gpRb31J50... July 1, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Courtly politics The judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power ... it can never attack with success either of the other two ... [it] has no influence over either the sword or the pur... June 28, 2022
OPINION | ON BOOKS: Did a man write Ferrante’s books? "Relationships between women don't have solid rules like those between men." — Elena Ferrante to Vogue magazine in 2014No one knows who Elena Ferrante really is — the au... June 26, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: Elvis Presley still haunts us after all these years Baz Luhrmann's new Elvis movie is out. My sources in the industry suspect, more for reasons of logistics than quality, that it might have the biggest opening weekend of the summer. I've heard ... June 26, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: The first insurrectionist Daniel Shays was nothing before the war, a landless laborer on someone else's farm.So when in April 1775, 700 British troops set out from Boston for supplies stashed by the Colonial militia in Lex... June 26, 2022
Attending film fest virtually The section is stuffed this week, so here are just a few housekeeping notes.I had every intention of making it up to the Bentonville Film Festival this year; but you know what they say about God laugh... June 24, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm624 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/kFA_-SmV... June 24, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: The Arkansas connection NEW YORK -- There is an Arkansas connection.That's why we said "yes" to an invitation to attend a party in the Crosby Hotel adjacent to the Tribeca Festival. It wasn't the Wagyu chee... June 21, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: A father’s mark The original version of this column appeared on Father's Day 1999.Facts slide through my mind reluctantly, heavy as mercury, nagging yet reticent. I remember old houses, sharp smells of wet dog an... June 19, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/617onfilm <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_M72TlMV... June 17, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: ‘Madman Across the Water’ hits 50 I've remarked in this space before that if I wanted to, I could write a column about some cultural artifact celebrating its 50th anniversary every week. That's how the early '70s were, or ... June 12, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Ch-ch-changes I find myself talking--and thinking--a lot about change these days.Some people are really resistant to it. It's not hard to understand why. It feels difficult because it causes us to have to think... June 12, 2022
Returning to Tribeca for festival This is a getaway column; we're headed to New York for the Tribeca Film Festival this weekend.We haven't been there in a couple of years -- the 2020 festival was canceled and we weren't up... June 10, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm610 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YTXOVOBv... June 10, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Running man "When I first met you, you were larger than life."-- Charlie (Kelly McGillis) to Maverick (Tom Cruise) in "Top Gun" (1986)One of the reasons they don't often let me speak to th... June 7, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Al and Socrates Alcibiades was born with pretty much everything.He was young and handsome and rich, the scion of one of Athens' most distinguished families, the Alcmaeonidae, who could trace their lineage back to... June 5, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: A brutal reality — the state of violence in cinema We all have our articles of faith.Some people believe in the quasi-sacredness of guns, that they are more often the solution than the problem and, besides, like the poor, they will be with us always a... June 5, 2022
OPINION | ON BOOKS: ‘The Damage Done’ depicts the duality of mankind Why is it so much easier to write a sad story than a happy one?The simplest answer is that happy people are more likely to be out and about, getting on with their lives, instead of being holed up in s... June 5, 2022
OPINION | NEW MOVIES: Missing ‘Crimes of the Future’ at Cannes Film Festival I've never been to the Cannes Film Festival.We had a chance to go, back in the '90s, when the media landscape was way different than it is today, but we declined on the grounds that it was too... June 3, 2022
ON FILM Watch Philip Martin’s On Film column at: arkansasonline.com/onfilm63 <center> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/y2FEYbVAH... June 3, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Here comes a regular I don't know of a game that's changed more in the past 50 years or so than golf. I've been playing since the late '60s and honestly don't believe I could go out and play a round to... May 31, 2022
OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: The Momentary, a Crystal Bridges sister museum, puts American art in conversation BENTONVILLE — Think of the Momentary as the kicky younger sister to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. Maybe like Princess Margaret was to Queen Elizabeth in the '60s and '70s. Whil... May 29, 2022
OPINION | PHILIP MARTIN: Old news By now, it's old news to most of us.We've been through a couple of cycles--the arguments have rinsed and repeated. It's just to do with mental health and culture. Gov. Greg Abbott says &qu... May 29, 2022
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