Only a handful of the selections in this year’s Pacific Rim Film Festival are by filmmakers with local roots, and perhaps it’s merely coincidence that they are among the best. But what’s uncanny is the synchronicity in play among three of them—Where Heaven Meets Hell, The Power of Two and Playing With Fire. In separate interviews, the people behind the films sometimes even echo each other when they speak about how they achieved these three very different and yet strangely connected, truly compelling portraits.
Articles by Steve Palopoli
Author Has Advice For Zen Skeptics
When Rachel Neumann says “skeptic,” she means skeptic. “Reverence is difficult for me,” admits the author of ‘Not Quite Nirvana: A Skeptic’s Journey to Mindfulness,’ who will speak at Bookshop Santa Cruz Oct. 11.
Kitchen Gardens: Main St. Garden
The Bay Area culinary scene is known for its dedication to local and organic sourcing, but sometimes Nor Cal foodies can get a little delusional in thinking it all started with Alice Waters. In fact, Main St. Garden’s executive chef Chris Caloni and a local farmer also played a pivotal roll.
Slime Girls Bring Chiptune Movement To Crepe Place
Pedro Silva remembers walking out of the Catalyst atrium last year, after the first show he ever played with his band Slime Girls, and hearing two guys talking on the sidewalk about his set.
Helium Shortage Puts a Pinch on Business
Nita Robertson has owned Santa Cruz Floral on Ocean Street with her husband Bruce for more than 10 years. But in May, she ran into something that had never come up before: when she called her local helium supplier to stock up for the graduation rush, she was told none was available. A few more calls made it clear how dire the situation actually was: none was available anywhere.
Local aerialist Allie Cooper Takes TEDx Out of Its Comfort Zone
When the list of events for TEDx Santa Cruz’s second year came out, there was one that was completely unexpected. Sandwiched into the very TED-esque list of speakers was the collaboration between Santa Cruz aerialist Allie Cooper, local electronic artist and producer LoWGritt, and San Francisco MC Sight on the Mic. But everything that made it wrong for TEDx is what made it perfect for TEDx.
Green Day to Play Santa Cruz Civic Dec. 4
It was reaffirmed just how just how big Green Day has become when the 2000-seat Santa Cruz Civic was announced today as one of the “intimate venues” the band will play as part of the first leg of their “¡UNO!, ¡DOS!, ¡TRÉ!” tour, before expanding into an arena tour in 2013. Green Day will play the Civic Dec. 4, with tickets going on sale Sept. 14 at 10am.
UCSC Grad has Rising Comedic Talent
San Francisco comedienne Lisa Geldudig produces shows that try to bring some perspective to standup beyond the typical lineup of three white guys—because, as she says, “no offense, but the comedy spectrum and audience are wider than that.”
Dark Drive Clinic at the Blue
John Fryer became a sort of godfather of darkwave, producing and/or engineering Depeche Mode’s Speak and Spell, Nine Inch Nails’ Pretty Hate Machine, Swans’ Children of God and various albums for Stabbing Westward and HIM.
And yet, in all this time, Fryer’s never had a band of his own, really, until now.
The Making of A Blues Festival
For the festival’s co-founder Bill Welch, putting together the line-up each year is part alchemy and part music science. He’s always loved booking acts at the festival who have some kind of history together, whether the audience is aware of it or not. “We try to book a headliner, and then complement it with some stuff that works well, and then some things that are going to make it really interesting. That’s kind of a wacky theme I’ve had over the years,” he says.
