No fighting chance
Movie: Soldier
No fighting chance
Movie: Soldier
Mapping the gray areas
Some days are so great for the editor of The F State that his feet don’t touch ground for hours. Like, last Tuesday, when The University of Florida opened a $60 million facility called (drum roll, please!) the Florida Brain Institute, to provide “new levels of speed, precision, computational complexity, and visual depth and detail”…
Charming presentation of life’s many colors
Movie: Pleasantville
Third-grade cynicism
Movie: Apt Pupil
Wicked parody of Titanic frenzy
Movie: The Chambermaid
Indie auteurs deliver digital drama at a discount
Movie: The Last Broadcast
Charming presentation of life’s many colors
Movie: Pleasantville
Third-grade cynicism
Movie: Apt Pupil
Wicked parody of Titanic frenzy
Movie: The Chambermaid
Indie auteurs deliver digital drama at a discount
Movie: The Last Broadcast
Trying to get a handle on hate
A gay college student in Wyoming is brutally beaten and left to die tied to a fence. A gay Orlando man says he is attacked by thugs in his home. Several African-American families in Pine Hills find their homes have been vandalized and wonder if hate is the motive. Hate crimes have been increasingly making…
Bear necessities
Blame the big-haired woman. Casino kingpin Steve Wynn claims that Montecore — the sharp-toothed beast that feasted on flamboyant illusionist Roy Horn — was set off by the oversized ‘do on a front-row spectator. As the big cat and Roy strode onto the stage at The Mirage, Montecore dropped to all fours to check out…
Base runner
Orlando won a victory in its effort to turn over the former Naval Training Center to developers when a federal judge threw out a local woman’s lawsuit trying to halt the sale. But Nancy Mellon, who is arguing the case herself, pledged to appeal. The lawsuit, which U.S. District Judge Patricia Fawcett dismissed on Oct.…
No blue news
A few months back, Mayor Buddy Dyer promised to beef up enforcement of code enforcement fines. With the city struggling to stay in the black, the $33 million in fines the city has failed to collect over the last 14 years sure would come in handy right now. The reality is that collecting the money…
Blessings in disguise
Hundreds of people began arriving in the town of Bras D’Or, Nova Scotia, in September, when residents spotted a likeness of Jesus Christ on an outside wall of Tim Horton’s doughnut shop. The clearest image is said to be under the floodlights of a nearby chicken restaurant called the Lick-a-Chick. And in Rio de Janeiro,…
Get unplugged for one day
If high-tech gadgetry is supposed to save us time and make our lives so much easier, why do so many people seem to be always plugged into something electronic and always working? They’ve got their laptops with them on vacations, they yack on their cell phones in restaurants, they have PCs at home so they’re…
Sonic collective dwells in experimental realms
The Legendary Pink Dots have become one of the most prolific and respected artists in the realm of experimental music since their formation in 1980. The group originated in London and evolved into a cast of revolving musicians led by head Dot Edward Ka-Spel. Through extensive recording, they created a unique psychedelic hybrid of industrial-strength…
Something to chew on
I know this guy who said he started taking ginkgo biloba to improve his memory. “The problem was,” he said, “I kept forgetting to take it.” ; ; I believed him. You’d need three or four memories to store information on all the herbal elixirs suddenly available to jack up everything from your metabolism to…
Cattle call
Judging from the packed parking lot, we thought we were about to experience Steaks “R” Us. And since we spotted quite a few “Jeb!” and Confederate flag bumper stickers, we weren’t quite sure what else to expect. A gaudy marquee announced Sam Seltzer’s Steakhouse to the traffic on State Road 436, and a small group…
Serious catch
If there’s one thing you don’t want to smell when you’re in a seafood restaurant, it’s fish. Straub’s Seafood in Altamonte Springs passed the sniff test on a recent visit. The longtime popular favorite also impressed us with outstanding service despite some glitches behind the scenes. The broiler was on the fritz on this particular…
Recipes for the jack-o’-lantern
Pumpkin-carving season is shifting into high gear. If you decide to tackle the job at home, you’re likely to have a lot of leftovers. What to do with all that pumpkin stuff? Toasting the seeds in the oven is easy — just grease a cookie sheet, add some salt and broil them for about 10…
The golden eggs
Florida developer Al Hoffman learned how to talk serious business during 20 years of cutting deals with conglomerates like Beatrice Foods. He bought 1,600 undeveloped acres near Tampa from them in 1985, with an unsolicited bid. “I wrote out a check for $100,000 to keep their attention,” he told an interviewer. Then he spent $22…
