1. R.I.P. Doug MacWithey. The artist passed away last Thursday at 58. Stephen Becker reports on his life, with reflections from Barry Whistler and Charles Dee Mitchell. MacWithey’s last major project was a collaboration with Mitchell during SXSW called testsite. At the time, Art Fag City wrote that the “exhibition space/open studio/temporary residency program of Fluent Collaborative was the last stop on my Austin art tour and certainly amongst the most enjoyable.”

2. As you can read about here, last week Dallas Symphony Pops Conductor Marvin Hamlisch (who added the Pasadena Pops to his long list of orchestral affiliations this weekend) plucked Dacia Kings from the Booker T. Washington stage and gave her the opportunity to perform at the Meyerson with the DSO. How did she do?

As Hamlisch watched from the sidelines, grinning like a proud uncle, Dacia and her dad received a standing ovation.

3. Fleeing New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina changed more than just where lawyer Candace Murphy lived. After resettling in North Texas, Murphy realized a lifelong dream of opening a dance studio.

Mesrine: Killer Instinct is a two-part film (part one opens today at the Magnolia followed by part two next week) based on the life of the legendary French criminal Jacques Mesrine. But before you think this is a bio film, a title card at the very start of the film dismisses its objectivity: “all films are fiction because it is impossible to recreate the complexity of human life that is seen from so many perspectives.” Then in a literal manifestation ..read more

A great deal of time in the Roman-era war movie Centurion, written and directed by Neil Marshall (Doomsday, Dog Soldiers), is spent dwelling on hacking, dripping, slicing, and stabbing. The camera zooms in as arrows go through eyes, hands fall off arms, and axes chop at necks until the victim’s head is loose. Part of the film’s mission, it would seem, is to show ancient combat as it was, all in the name of historical realism. The problem with Centurion, ..read more

Sitting in the center of the empty concert hall on the Booker T. Washington campus is the man for whom everyone has come to perform: Marvin Hamlisch. The accomplished composer, now the Dallas Symphony’s principal pops conductor, is a hulking man with a sharp, triangular nose that juts out from the center of his great round head. He fills up his seat, chin resting on his hand and a stack of papers in his lap, each with a name of a ..read more

Exorcism movies are by definition formulaic, and director Daniel Stamm’s The Last Exorcism has all of the requisite pieces: a fresh-faced girl, an exorcist with issues and, of course, dirty rotten lies. Stamm’s interpretation has its merits, especially his casting of character actors and the set devices he created on a rural Louisiana farm.  But boy this movie needed an editor. And I’m pretty sure it was supposed to be scary. Still, if you like the genre, The Last Exorcism ..read more

George Gershwin, alas, did his job too well: he absorbed music from the past, was influenced by his contemporaries, and produced a body of music that was innovative, appealing, and enduring. He had an unsurpassed gift for melody and the ability to create new but viable musical structures. As a result, he is one of the most approachable of all serious composers, with music that not only stands up to fairly rigorous examination but which also can be appreciated by ..read more

When it’s done right, there’s nothing wrong with a movie following a formula. Think about this summer’s brilliant Inception. Director Christopher Nolan’s twisting tale about dream thieves purposefully embraced the tried-and-true conventions of a heist movie. You know the drill: A gang of outlaws, each with specialized talents, assembles to tackle the biggest job of their careers. Their leader only reluctantly takes the gig and declares he’s getting out of the business once it’s completed. Their clever plan is explained, and ..read more

1. Today is the 20^th anniversary of the death of the man who perhaps is the most influential modern musician to come out of Dallas, the master axe-slinger, Stevie Ray Vaughan. In the Dallas Morning News, Jacquielynn Floyd argues that Dallas should reclaim the singer from Austin. The Oak Cliff Advocate looks back at Vaughan’s Oak Cliff roots. And Austin 360 reflects on Vaughan’s rise through the local club scene and highlights his importance in the state capital’s music scene.

2. The Dallas Voice profiles the Dallas Museum of Art’s newest curator, Jeffrey Grove, speaking to him about his role creating the Spy Museum in Washington D.C. as well as the current installation of work by Barry Le Va, Charles Ray, and Bruce Nauman Grove curated to complement the Luc Tuymans exhibition.

3. Sure art theft is sexy and romantic, but even the French are getting sick of high-profile thefts. Combating the thieves, however, may not be easy. The New York Times raises some questions:

Who is behind the 20 or more museum art thefts that take place in France every year? How do the thieves even hope to unload easily identifiable pieces by prominent artists? And, most important, are the country’s vaunted art institutions up to dealing with the maneuverings of what appear to be loose bands of professional criminals?

If anything in particular is remembered about the summer movies of 2010, it may be the arrival of the brilliant films by two Australian filmmakers. A few months ago, Nash Edgerton debuted The Square, a Hitchcock-esque tale of a greedy building contractor. Writer/director David Michôd follows up his friend’s effort with an even better film, Animal Kingdom, an intense moral tale about a close-knit crime family. Both films are thrilling, spellbinding and psychologically intense, and they reflect serious and clever ..read more

Movies based on living legends run a particular risk: if the movie-making doesn’t measure up to the legend, it’s pretty much doomed. In that regard, Mao’s Last Dancer calls to mind Invictus, the story about Nelson Mandela and the Rugby World Cup in South Africa, which failed miserably because it was (merely) okay.  Mao’s Last Dancer avoids some of the comparison because it’s a lower-budget movie about a lesser-known character.  The movie has flaws, but if you keep your expectations in ..read more