Ancient grains with a modern twist—that’s the motto behind Nativa SPA’s line of skin care products, which focus on the healing and restorative powers of quinoa to help create healthy, glowing skin. Committed to a sustainable future, Native SPA uses recyclable packages made from recycled materials. The company also gives 1% of its proceeds back to environmental initiatives. Products are vegan, cruelty-free and free from toxins.
Here are our 5 fave Native SPA products for healthy, glowing skin:
1. Madagascar Vanilla Soothing Body Scrub is not your average scrub. This heavenly exfoliant is the perfect first step to get your skin glowing again. Sustainably sourced Madagascar vanilla is antioxidant rich and delivers a soothing, relaxing scent. It’s blended with 100% pure quinoa oil in this plant-based product that provides your skin with the nutrition it craves. The scrub comes with its own gold spoon, so the aesthetics definitely match the sensations. Start with a golden spoonful of this scrub as a way to open up your pores to let lotions and oils be absorbed more thoroughly by the skin.
2. Ginseng & Caffeine Toning Body Lotion contains quinoa, bioavailable caffeine and energizing ginseng. While that might sound like the most invigorating cup of tea ever, let us spill this one for you: it’s even more energizing for your skin. The Ginseng & Caffeine Toning Body Lotion is best used as a lotion during a sculpting self-massage. If you don’t know how to give yourself a sculpting self-massage, here’s a great video that explains exactly how to treat yourself and your body to this ritual. It’s called self-care, right? Combine that technique with this lotion and you will increase the effectiveness in sculpting silhouettes, reduce the orange peel appearance, toning your skin and actually getting a good massage. A no-brainer!
3. Quinoa Firming Body Oil is daily bliss in a bottle. With two times the nutrients of argon and almond oils, it’s no wonder quinoa makes such a splash. It’s rich in omegas 3, 6 and 9 and in the Quinoa Firming Body Oil it restores firmness and vitality giving you the nutrient rich, hydrated skin that you deserve. Nativa SPA’s patented quinoa extraction methodologies ensure that this 100% pure quinoa oil does as much for your skin as possible.
4. Plum Moisturizing Body Lotion smells as good as it feels! This sumptuous lotion is rich in antioxidants and combines naturally hydrating sunflower oil with 100% pure quinoa oil in a lotion that’s designed specifically to promote soft skin. The subtle and natural fragrance will invigorate you and freshen your day. For an extra delicious touch, you can also buy a refill of this product, which not only features more environmentally friendly packaging but also a reduced price tag. It’s what we call a win-win.
5. Shea Ultra-Moisturizing Hand Cream is deeply moisturizing and perfect for hardworking hands. The blend of pure shea butter and quinoa oil creates a thick, dense lotion that provides deep restorative care to your skin. The compact, convenient packaging is great for keeping in your desk drawer or in your car, so you can quickly add an element of luxury to your skin routine on the go. The Shea Ultra-Moisturizing Hand Cream will make your daily rituals just that much sweeter.
Following the Supreme Court draft leak indicating the court’s plan to overturn Roe v. Wade, supporters on both sides of the issue are making their opinions known across social media. Then there’s the proposed laws coming out of some states, as well as trigger laws that will take effect immediately. When Roe v. Wade was challenged, the argument was centered around saving the unborn from abortion, but as new laws are discussed, more questions are being raised, especially concerning states with high poverty rates.
Louisiana has proposed a law that would classify voluntarily terminating a pregnancy as homicide and remove all exceptions for abortion; it also gives an egg personhood from the moment of fertilization. This means that even before the fertilized egg implants into the uterus, it is considered a child and terminating pregnancy would be considered homicide. A sweeping law like this could affect birth control devices and medical procedures that help a person become pregnant, such as in vitro fertilization (IVF). Birth control such as intrauterine devices (IUDs) might not be permitted as they do not stop eggs from being fertilized. The proposed law would also rule out the Plan B, sometimes known as the “morning after pill,” which is an emergency contraception in the event that another form of birth control fails, birth control is forgotten, or worse, a sexual assault occurs.
If a fertilized egg is considered the same as a living child outside of the uterus, what would that mean for miscarriages? This law would open up subjecting grieving parents to a murder investigation. It’s unclear if the law would also outlaw abortions in the case of a partial miscarriage, treated with a dilation and curettage (D&C) procedure that clears the remaining tissue in the uterus after a miscarriage. Under the proposed Louisiana law, would this be available to parents? The law raises questions, but it seems to be based on holding the person receiving an abortion to the same level of accountability as someone who murdered a child that lived without the assistance of another person’s body. If this law is passed it could have devastating effects on families, considering as many as 6 in 10 women who seek abortions are already parents.
The Louisiana lawmakers hope for this bill to be passed before the Supreme Court rules on overturning Roe v. Wade. In Mississippi, the trigger law banning abortions at any stage in pregnancy will take effect immediately if Roe v. Wade is overturned, though the state does allow for a few exceptions, including when the life of the mother is in danger. From the extreme laws at the ready for the Supreme Court’s final ruling, it would be easy to assume that these laws are a southern states issue, but there are currently 26 states likely to ban abortions if Roe v. Wade is overturned. In Michigan, a state that started off very pro-life but has since become staunchly pro-choice, a 1931 trigger law banning abortions is still on the books, though the state’s Democratic governor is suing to block the law from going into effect.
Since the draft was leaked, it’s not only laws that are already written that are causing concern but some of the language in the draft itself, especially that concerning adoption and the “domestic supply of infants.” Seeing infants next to the phrase “domestic supply” is quite jarring, and raises some questions about what exactly that means. It reads as though the concern is less about saving unborn babies and more about supply and demand of newborns.
In many of the states where abortion laws will be most restrictive, a large proportion of the population is already living in poverty. There are limited or no comprehensive sex education in schools, and places like Planned Parenthood, which is a provider of birth control that directly helps low-income people, are few and far between. Affordable child care, paid parental leave after giving birth, and free medical care to ensure a healthy pregnancy and delivery are things that are weak or even nonexistent in the states eager to enact these laws. Once the baby is born, it appears the family is expected to give the child up for adoption or go further into poverty to care for a child that they may not have felt ready for.
It seems like the people writing these laws are quick to forget that there are not just women who will bear the consequences, but entire family units in many cases. Birth control is never 100% effective and limiting birth control options is counterintuitive to reducing the rates of unwanted pregnancies, but some of these lawmakers are not focused on this aspect. Where is the responsibility on the part of the men who impregnate these women? The laws mention punishing the mothers and their doctors, but the potential fathers are notably absent from the list.
Before we start “leaving abortion up to the states,” there should be a responsibility to make sure that states have a secure safety net in place to help these families. If there’s no safety net to ensure that children being born will have a healthy existence, then we are only creating a larger problem that will put strain on the already overburdened foster care system. While they’re setting families up to fail, the accountable parties will raise their hands as they shift the blame back onto the struggling families. The cycle of generational poverty needs to be broken, not compounded by extreme laws.
Each week our staff of film and TV experts surveys the entertainment landscape to select the ten best new/newish shows available for you to stream at home. We put a lot of thought into our selections, and our debates on what to include and what not to include can sometimes get a little heated and feelings may get hurt, but so be it, this is an important service for you, our readers. With that said, here are our selections for this week.
If you think about it, Winning Time (HBO’s new Adam McKay-produced series about the 1980s LA Lakers) has all the elements of a classic heist movie. Assembled by a larger than life fast talker with equally big ambitions (in this case, former Lakers owner Jerry Buss), a rag-tag group comes together, leaning on their exceptional and unique talents to paper over any personality conflicts that might arise while taking the thing (a whole mess of gold trophies) no one thought they’d ever get their hands on. This while having some wild misadventures along the way. We’re simplifying, of course, but the point is this should appeal to basketball fans and non-basketball fans alike, earning the right to be the most buzzed-about piece of basketball culture crossover content since The Last Dance helped us all stave off boredom for a few months by telling the story of another mismatched group of big personalities and champions. Watch it on HBO.
It’s been 27 years since the last Kids In The Hall episode and 26 since the release of Brain Candy, the movie that almost broke the group apart forever. Since then, there has been inter-group litigation, a period of resolution, numerous tours, health scares, and onscreen reunions official (Death Comes To Town) and not (numerous cameos in each other’s projects), but the Kids are back. Not quite “kids” anymore, but with the same charm and bend toward dark comedic absurdity. No, I mean really the same, but in a way that should connect in equal measure with old fans and potential new viewers whose dads won’t shut up about them when they walk into the room and see you watching I Think You Should Leave and they want to contribute so they tell you about a guy with lettuce for hair and “Love And Sausages” and how communists and killer bees are LIKE THIS! OK. The point is, the new Kids In The Hall is a brilliant mix of old and new that further solidifies the group’s legend status. Watch it on Amazon Prime.
Vanessa Bayer was one of the best things about Saturday Night Live during her seven-year run and while nothing beats her awards-worthy work in the sketch comedy’s Totino’s trilogy, this definitely comes close. Based on Bayer’s own experience with childhood cancer (and her ongoing love affair with the home shopping channel) the show follows a yet-to-fully-mature woman who lies about her cancer diagnosis to keep her dream job. Everyone from Molly Shannon to Jenifer Lewis helps out here but it’s some of the lesser known members of the cast that really shine. Watch it on Showtime.
Does Andrew Garfield have a kink for playing spiritually tortured characters on screen? Maybe, but we’re not complaining. Especially when he’s serving up some of the best work of his career in this FX true-crime series that’s everything it should be: gritty, introspective, with edge-of-your-seat thrills and the kind of theological world-building normally reserved for fantasy fare. The timeline hopping can be a bit jarring, but Garfield and the rest of the cast (Daisy Edgar-Jones and Gil Birmingham in particular) help ground things. Watch it on Hulu.
Prepare to have the Girls5eva theme song stuck in your head again, assuming you haven’t still been humming it every day since season one. Peacock’s comedy about a reunited 1990s girl group, played by Sara Bareilles, Busy Philipps, Renée Elise Goldsberry, and the great Paula Pell, is a fine addition to the Tina Fey and Robert Carlock canon (30 Rock, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt). The jokes fly fast, there’s pop culture references a-plenty, and gonna be famous 5eva, ’cause forever’s too short. It begins. Watch it on Peacock.
The original true-crime docuseries (originally on Sundance TV) captivated enough people on Netflix that HBO Max decided to dramatize the story, and lo and behold, it works. Colin Firth plays Michael Peterson, who served prison time after the death of his wife, Kathleen (portrayed by Toni Collette) under mysterious circumstances. Sophie Turner and Parker Posey are on hand, and there’s a (SPOILER ALERT) certain theory that won’t be overlooked. This shall be an eight-part adaptation that explores the nature of fact and fiction and goes to some unexpected places. Watch it on HBO Max.
The first season of The Flight Attendant was a blast, just fizzy chaos and murder from the opening scene to the very end, with Kaley Cuoco carrying the action as a party girl airline employee who finds herself wrapped up in about eight layers of international flim-flammery. It’s back for a second season, thank God, with her character, Cassie, now assisting the CIA. That probably sounds like an insane twist to you if you didn’t watch the first season. And it is. But more importantly… why haven’t you watched the first season yet. Good Lord. Get in there. You deserve a good time. Watch it on HBO Max.
Well, guess what: Atlanta is back, four years since its second season and just as ready and willing to throw you for a loop. Earn and Paper Boi and Darius are still off in Europe on that tour they were en route to way back then, but there are detours and flights of fancy and all the other weird, stunning, inventive stuff that made (and makes) this one of our greatest shows. Donald Glover and this crew are pretty good at this stuff. It’s great to have them back. Watch it on Hulu.
Alright, one thing is certain: this season is gonna be violent, and that could land right on top of Ruth Langmore and the Byrde family. Marty desperately wants to leave his money-laundering hellscape and go back to Chicagoan suburbia. Also, Ruth is hellaciously angry about losing almost everything. We’ll see if she can finally rise above that “cursed Langmore” status that she keeps clinging onto. There’s more cursed cookie jar, too, so we’ll see if she can rise above those ashes as the show careens to an end. Watch it on Netflix.
It should not be possible to enjoy watching a sweet man like Bill Hader destroy his life and the lives of those around him, and yet, here we all are, ready for season three of Barry, one of the best shows on television. It’s a dilemma, honestly. Not as much of a dilemma as, say, being a hitman who stumbles into an acting career and has to occasionally kill more people to prevent other people from learning that he has a history of killing people, but still. There’s an embarrassment of riches at play here. Find another show that features Henry Winkler and Stephen Root and D’Arcy Carden where none of them are the funniest character, somehow, against incredible odds. This is the power of NoHo Hank. You either know what that sentence means or you desperately need to binge Barry as soon as possible. Watch it on HBO Max.
Jean Smart’s dueling curmudgeons won’t both return because we can’t always have nice things. Yet we still have her cranky comedian, Deborah, who’s back in the comedy game (this time on tour) with Hannah Einbinder’s Ava in tow. The second season’s a lean, mean comedy machine but unfortunately for Ava, her big betrayal is still out there, looming over both of them. Also, Jean gets to wield a chainsaw, and that’s worth the price of admission on its own, but getting to see the dynamic duo in action is something that we’re frankly not worthy of — we will take it. Watch it on HBO Max.
Better Call Saul is back, soon, finally, after an extended layoff. It remains one of our greatest shows, a ball of tension and comedy, the former of which is amped up even more as it heads into its final season. What will happen to Kim? What will happen to Nacho and Lalo? The Breaking Bad timeline is rapidly approaching and it’s time to answer these questions once and for all. It’s okay to be nervous. We’re nervous, too. Take some time for a quick Season 5 rewatch on Netflix and then strap in for the new episodes on AMC Plus
Each week our staff of film and TV experts surveys the entertainment landscape to select the ten best new/newish movies available for you to stream at home. We put a lot of thought into our selections, and our debates on what to include and what not to include can sometimes get a little heated and feelings may get hurt, but so be it, this is an important service for you, our readers. With that said, here are our selections for this week.
Jennifer Lopez and Owen Wilson star as a preposterously attractive couple who get together after her character — one half of a global sensation pop duo — discovers her lover and music partner has been stepping out. That’s right, it is rom-com time over here. Will they? Won’t they? Whose hair will look better in the pivotal scene that will probably take place in the driving rain? There’s one way to find out: Grab some popcorn and comfy pajamas and set up shop on the couch. Watch it on Peacock.
Zoe Kravitz plays a stay-at-home digital detective in this latest thriller from Steven Soderbergh who — with the help of her friendly A.I. sidekick Kimi — uncovers a string of murders she traces back to the company she works for. She then must venture out into a pandemic-ridden Seattle in search of the reason why. Honestly, we can’t relate. But, Kravitz is quickly becoming a bonafide action star and a Soderbergh script rarely disappoints. Watch it on HBO Max.
Steven Spielberg brings the classic musical to the big and/or small screen, to the delight of both older fans and newer ones who get to experience it all for the first time. Get in there. Really let the experience wash over you. Sing along. Dance around your living room. Get in a knife fight with your sworn enemy. Okay, maybe not that last one. But the other ones, definitely. Watch it on Disney Plus.
In Domee Shi’s Turning Red, a boy band-loving teenage girl turns into a red panda whenever she experiences strong emotions, which as every parent of a teenager knows all too well, is often. Too often. It’s all the time, really. Turning Red is being called Pixar’s best movie in years, as it should. It’s about time red pandas got the cinematic showcase they deserve. Watch it on Disney Plus.
Deep Water is an erotic thriller that stars Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas as… honestly, what more do you need? It’s a “weird, wild mess” of a movie from the director of Fatal Attraction and Unfaithful, with a murder mystery, duplicitous characters, and Affleck as an alpha cuck. Deep Water is the kind of sleazy mainstream movie that rarely gets made anymore, so it feels like a sexy treat that it even exists (from Disney, no less). Break out your Ana de Armas cardboard cutout and make it a double feature with Basic Instinct.Watch it on Hulu.
It is wild to think about how long Tony Hawk has been a figure in American pop culture. It is also wild to watch a full-length documentary about it, which is good and notable here because HBO made one. The whole thing is fascinating, the way the guy whose name is synonymous with skateboarding at this point is still doing it and does not plan to stop, and the way he’s built a career and lifestyle out of the thing he loved doing as a kid. It’s cool. And a good watch. Crank up “Superman” by Goldfinger and give it a run. Watch it on HBO Max.
8. Apollo 10 1/2: A Space-Aged Childhood (Netflix)
NETFLIX
Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood is loosely inspired by director Richard Linklater’s childhood in Texas. The coming-of-age animated film (think: Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly, but more nostalgic) is set during the summer of the Moon landing, and features performances from Glen Powell, Zachary Levi, and Jack Black. Linklater brings out the best in Black (he’s fantastic in both School of Rock and Bernie), and Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood looks to be no exception. Watch it on Netflix.
Judd Apatow’s The Bubble is a pandemic-era movie about making a movie during the pandemic. We’re through the looking glass, people. The comedy, which stars Karen Gillan, David Duchovny, Keegan-Michael Key, Pedro Pascal, and Borat Subsequent Moviefilm breakout Maria Bakalova, was produced like a “two-hour Simpsons episode,” according to Apatow, and reportedly inspired by the production of Jurassic World Dominion. If enough people watch it on Netflix, maybe we’ll get a full-length Cliff Beasts 6: The Battle For Everest movie. Watch it on Netflix.
6. Metal Lords (Netflix)
NETFLIX
Game Of Thrones HBO co-creator D.B. Weiss wrote this little ditty while teaming up with Rage Against The Machine axeman Tom Morello as a love letter to the metal genre. The story revolves around two high-schoolers who seek the ultimate glory and win contests and be gods, and so on. Unfortunately, it’s hard to find a bassist when Black Sabbath isn’t as popular with the kids as Justin Bieber is. The struggle is real.
What we have here is a French-language buddy action-comedy about two mismatched cops attempting to solve a mystery that starts with a simple drug deal and spins into a massive international conspiracy. We do not, in a typical week, recommend French-language buddy action-comedies to our largely English speaking audience, but we make an exception here for three reasons: One, it is directed by Louis Leterrier, who was hired to replace Justin Lin as the director of the upcoming 10th Fast & Furious movie and is therefore in the news; two, it stars Omar Sy from Lupin, which rules; three, expand your horizons a little bit, geez. Watch it on Netflix.
4. The Mystery of Marilyn Monroe: The Unheard Tapes (Netflix)
NETFLIX
Netflix continues its push into true(…ish) crime with this look at the death of Marilyn Monroe. While the title and general tone seem to imply some sort of new potential conspiracy at play, most of it appears to be a rehashing/reheating of things that have bubbled up in the past. Still, for a new generation of Marilyn fans, and with a new movie about her starring Ana de Armas, it could be a useful look at the strange final days of an American icon. Or a decent refresher. Or a decent way to kill a couple hours. It can be a lot of things, really. Watch it on Netflix.
3. White Hot: The Rise & Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch (Netflix)
NETFLIX
The chokehold that Abercrombie & Fitch had on an entire generation of impressionable teens is just one of the many reasons watching the company’s disastrous fall in documentary form is so damn fun. This is a retail store that sold infant-sized clothes to fully-grown adults at the price of a life-time’s worth of body image issues. But if that’s just too dark to think about, it’s also a place where bare-chested men and heavy cologne assaulted you at every turn. In short, it was a hellscape disguised a shopping destination and this doc from Netflix peels back the curtains to paint a really interesting picture on discrimination in the workplace and the cost of cool. Watch it on Netflix.
2. On the Count of Three (VOD)
ANNAPURNA
Jerrod Carmichael is having a moment, garnering all the praise for his revealing and powerful HBO special (Rothaniel, watch it again!), a great turn as SNL host, and now, for the release of his festival fave narrative directorial debut, On The Count Of Three. But, of course, you knew Carmichael was a force from his previous specials and The Carmichael Show. You’re just happy to see everyone else catch up and, with this film, get the chance to see Carmichael flex his dramatic muscles opposite Christopher Abbott as two friends trying to get the most out of the last moments before they execute each other as a part of a suicide pact. Track it down on your VOD service of choice.
What if Seven but with way more leather and punching? In a lot of ways, that could serve as a very simple synopsis of what Matt Reeves has done with the crown jewel of DC Comics lore, placing his take beside The Joker on the highest shelf (both in terms of artistry, societal commentary, and other adult themes) in the DCEU film library. Does it work? In some ways, absolutely, providing a grim but intriguing vision of the Batman as a detective with the mother of all chips on his shoulder as he wrestles with his thirst for vengeance and a vicious villain in Paul Dano’s Riddler, who is always seemingly one step ahead of him and Jeffrey Wright’s Jim Gordon (a buddy cop pairing that is as awkward as it is rewarding). Throw in Zoe Kravitz’s tremendous turn as Selina Kyle/Catwoman (who also connects so well with Robert Pattinson’s Batman that you wish Reeves would have allowed for even more of their on-screen back and forth) and Gotham City’s usual mix of criminal underworld string-pulling and civic corruption and you’ve got a very full meal. Overfull? Too mature? Let’s just say The Batman can seem so grown up and dense at times that you may forget that it’s a superhero movie, for better or worse. Watch it on HBO Max.
One of the more highly-anticipated games of 2022 has been Bethesda’s new IP, Starfield. The sci-fi action-adventure was officially announced back in 2018, and after a lengthy development time, it seemed like we were finally going to get our hands on it late in 2022.
Unfortunately, the November release date that was originally set is no longer going to be met. Early Thursday morning, Bethesda announced that Starfield, alongside another anticipated game, Redfall, will get delayed to a 2023 release date. The reason for the delay was cited as an opportunity to polish the games more and bring fans the best experience possible.
While the delay is disappointing, it likely was for the best because a follow-up report from Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier says that Starfield, in particular, may have been doomed at launch had Bethesda chosen to force the game out to meet its November release date. Supposedly some devs said it would have been akin to the “next Cyberpunk.”
Last spring before E3, I spoke to some folks on Starfield who were extremely worried about committing to a 11-11-22 date based on the progress they’d made so far. (“Next Cyberpunk” was the term floated.) Good on Bethesda for delaying even after announcing that specific date. https://t.co/QdWFf0zGIY
The Cyberpunk launch in 2020 was one of the most infamous cases of a game not being ready at launch we’ve seen in quite some time. If even a single dev was comparing the state of Starfield to Cyberpunk, then we should all be happy that the game was delayed into 2023. While it’s very possible the game might be in a much better state than it was when Schreier originally talked to those devs around E3 2021, it’s still good to know that it’s getting a delay to be in a better place at launch.
We’ve all been feeling cooped up over the past few years. Although restrictions have relaxed, we’re still in the middle of a global pandemic, which makes every excursion out of the house feel like a choice between safety and sickness. Post Malone encapsulates the feeling of release from this long-term run of cabin fever with his new single “Cooped Up,” featuring Compton rap crooner Roddy Ricch.
The new single is the duo’s first collaboration since 2019 when Roddy was added to Post’s 2018 single “Wow.” along with fellow West Coast rapper Tyga. The first single from Post’s record-breaking 2019 album Hollywood’s Bleeding, “Wow.” peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was one of Roddy’s earliest top ten singles, coming one month after his appearance on Nipsey Hussle’s “Racks In The Middle,” which earned both a Grammy for Best Rap Performance, and just about two months before he delivered Mustard his own highest-charting single with “Ballin’.”
As the first official single from Post’s upcoming album Twelve Carat Toothache, it looks like Posty’s trying to replicate the success of the duo’s respective 2019s — especially since this will be his first album since then. Hollywood’s Bleeding became the top-selling album of 2019, while its single “Circles” spent more time in the Hot 100 top ten than any song in history. If Roddy Ricch and Post Malone are each other’s good luck charms, “Cooped Up” could very well be the beginning of a very lucrative year for them both.
Listen to Post Malone and Roddy Ricch’s “Cooped Up” above.
Top Gun: Maverick sure looks to be an audience pleaser. Our own Mike Ryan reveals that the blockbuster sequel reeled him in and is now one of his favorite movies ever. And nearly every other critic feels similarly. In other words, everyone will be feeling the need for speed very soon, and prepare to have your breath taken away.
That was already the case with a recent trailer, so it’s nice to know there’s some real truth in movie advertising these days. And that trailer also revealed that Val Kilmer’s Admiral Tom “Iceman” Kazanzky is the guy who brought Cruise’s Pete “Maverick” Mitchell back into the fold. All that old-school tension should be enjoyable to revisit, and Tom has now also revealed that he was the guy guy brought Kilmer into the sequel fold. As Cruise recounted while speaking with Entertainment Tonight (after hopping out of a helicopter at San Diego’s USS Midway Museum for the film’s premiere), he went in hard for more Iceman.
“I really rallied hard for him to make the movie,” Cruise told ET. He then alluded to a dramatic scene between Maverick and Iceman while gushing about Kilmer. “The kind of talent that he has, and you see that scene, it’s very special, it’s just very special.”
Via People, Maverick producer Jerry Bruckheimer previously told the world that he was also thrilled to see Val make a grand return. He also confirmed that Tom was the one who really did the thing. “He was the driving force,” Bruckheimer declared. “We all wanted him, but Tom was really adamant that if he’s going to make another Top Gun, Val had to be in it.”
The NBA is introducing a pair of new MVP awards. According to Kirk Goldsberry of ESPN, the league has decided to crown the best player in the Eastern and Western Conference Finals every year with a pair of trophies named after Boston Celtics legend Larry Bird and Los Angeles Lakers icon Magic Johnson.
“Larry and Magic defining the ’80s and having that bicoastal relationship representing their conferences like no other two people have,” NBA head of on-court brand and partnerships Christopher Arena told ESPN. “We just thought it was a perfect symmetry as you percolate up to the NBA Finals and you potentially win that Bill Russell Trophy, and obviously the winningest player we have in our history.”
The league announced the news on its Twitter account and unveiled both of the trophies.
Larry Bird and Earvin “Magic” Johnson helped define the modern NBA with their individual brilliance and team success in the 1980s. The two NBA legends are honored as the namesakes for the trophies that will now be awarded each year to the Eastern & Western Conference Finals MVPs. pic.twitter.com/9G5oiCvEfV
In a video posted to an NBA social media account, Bird was informed of the name change, and made it a point to crack a joke about winning the award named after his longtime friend and rival.
Larry Bird learns about the new Larry Bird Trophy, awarded to the Eastern Conference Finals MVP, from NBA Deputy Commissioner and Chief Operating Officer, Mark Tatum. pic.twitter.com/CTdvhPI20y
Additionally, the league decided to name its two conference championship trophies after a separate pair of legendary players, as the Eastern Conference championship trophy will be named after Celtics great Bob Cousy and the Western Conference championship trophy will be named after the great Oscar Robertson.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
For the better part of their nearly 30-year career, the members of Radiohead have operated in a world of elevated (and maybe even insane) expectations. Their albums are inspected, dissected, deconstructed, and parsed exhaustively for cultural significance and hidden meanings. Ultimately, they have been judged not only on artistic merit, but on whether they have successfully shifted preexisting paradigms for how music is made and sold. And this pressure comes from both the fanbase and from inside the band. Nobody ever gives Radiohead permission to be “just okay.”
This, naturally, has made the creation of Radiohead music an arduous and deliberative process, with the time between releases growing longer and longer as the band has wandered into middle age. In 2006, Thom Yorke was finally moved to put out a solo record, The Eraser, in part because it was so much easier than working on the future Radiohead classic in development at the time, In Rainbows. These stretched-out gestation periods have also been wearying for the band’s unofficial musical director. “I’m the most impatient of everybody in Radiohead,” Jonny Greenwood recently told NME. “I’ve always said I’d much rather the records were 90 percent as good, but come out twice as often, or whatever the maths works out on that.”
Greenwood’s comments were made in the context of A Light For Attracting Attention, the new album by his band The Smile, formed with Yorke and Sons Of Kemet drummer Tom Skinner. The title of the LP could be taken as ironic, given that The Smile appears to be an antidote to the fanatical anticipation that typically greets Thom and Jonny’s work with their “regular” group. The Smile, in contrast, feels like a deliberately low-stakes affair, having come together during lockdown after 40 percent of one of the world’s most beloved bands decided to work on music together with a highly regarded jazz drummer. If anything, adopting The Smile moniker is a means of attracting significantly less attention than a proper Radiohead release inevitably would.
Then again, going back to 2021, Yorke and Greenwood have teased The Smile as a return of sorts to the kind of overt rock moves that Radiohead abandoned on record on their previous two releases, 2011’s King Of Limbs and 2016’s A Moon Shaped Pool. And this is bound to excite a fanbase that’s had precious little new music to inspect, dissect, deconstruct, and parse in recent years.
In January, they released the first single from A Light For Attracting Attention, “You’ll Never Work In Television Again,” a buzzsaw rocker with a shrapnel-spitting vocal by Yorke that is easily the most supercharged rocker to emerge from the Radiohead camp since “Bodysnatchers” on In Rainbows, released a full 15 years ago. Backed by Skinner’s technically brilliant but unobtrusive timekeeping, The Smile present themselves on that song as the most un-Radiohead-like of propositions — a guitar-driven power trio! — that happens to sound, tantalizingly, like a version of Radiohead that Radiohead no longer is apparently interested in being. Given the dearth of actual Radiohead albums since A Moon Shaped Pool, it’s almost too easy to regard A Light For Attracting Attention as the next best thing, a kind of musical methadone for Kid Anation.
The rest of A Light For Attracting Attention doesn’t always conform to the “old rocking Radiohead” standard of “You’ll Never Work In Television Again.” For one thing, Skinner is too good of a drummer to be reduced to mere sideman for two rock stars. His spirited syncopations echo throughout the record, giving the music a relentless pull even when the music slows to an atmospheric, piano-based crawl. On songs like “The Opposite” and “The Smoke,” he gives The Smile a subtle swing, while his machine-like Motorik groove on “Thin Thing” accentuates the song’s robo-funk amid the splashes of sci-fi synths. While almost nothing on the record can be credibly likened to jazz, Skinner’s soft touch on the ballad “Pana-vision” gives the song a smoky, after-hours feel.
But there’s no question that the most profound pleasures of this album are also the simplest — it’s just extremely nice to hear Jonny Greenwood play ripping guitar (or supple bass) while Thom Yorke sings beautiful melodies. On Radiohead records, these men have frequently been moved to subvert their most obvious musical talents, with Greenwood exchanging his guitar for an ondes Martenot and Yorke burying his voice in glitchy subterfuge. (As he famously remarked upon the release of The Eraser, “It annoys me how pretty my voice is.”) But the cover of The Smile guise has apparently liberated them to sound more like, well, them. The album’s most stunning song, “Free In The Knowledge,” is a throwback to unabashedly gorgeous prog-folk epics like “How To Disappear Completely,” in which a simple acoustic strum swells on lush orchestral strings (courtesy of the London Contemporary Orchestra) and Yorke’s operatic emoting. On the opposite end of the spectrum is “We Don’t Know What Tomorrow Brings,” a synth-rock burner that seethes like a Hail To The Thief outtake, with delightfully churning guitars clanging a wiry riff in the direction of some unidentified apocalypse.
As overseen by Radiohead’s in-house producer Nigel Godrich, A Light For Attracting Attention of course sounds impeccable, perfectly balancing the delicacies of Greenwood’s circular, minor-key licks and Yorke’s choir-boy trilling with the more bombastic elements of the orchestra and brass sections, in the manner of Radiohead’s most famous music. What’s missing, at times, are songs that meet their usual standards. Parts of the record are a little stock in a familiar Radiohead mode; tracks like “Speech Bubbles” and “Skirting On The Surface” are lovely but feel more like outtakes than necessary deep cuts. Much better is “Waving A White Flag,” a spooky and cinematic slice of doom that sounds like Beethoven played on a Prophet 5, in which Yorke and Greenwood find a midpoint between their respective solo careers as a laptop electro-popper and an in-demand film composer.
In the end, nitpicking about filler tracks might be missing the point — what matters is that Yorke and Greenwood are working together, and creating exciting music in a slightly different and incalculably more relaxed environment. For such hard-driven perfectionists, the handful of bum tracks could even be taken as a sign of growth. Either way, an album that’s 90 percent as good as a Radiohead record is damn good indeed.
If you thought Red Rocket was a warts-and-all depiction of porn stardom, then Pleasure might be its perfect complement. Whereas Sean Baker’s Simon Rex vehicle is an outsider picture, mostly depicting post-porn stardom and pre-porn stardom, largely from a male perspective, Pleasure, a debut feature from Swede Ninja Thyberg, depicts the machinations of the industry itself, as experienced by its 22-year-old protagonist, Bella Cherry, played by Sofia Kappel.
While both films feature ingenue aspiring porn stars named after fruit, you could make a case that Pleasure retains the edge in boldness. The film opens with a closeup of Bella shaving her vulva in the shower and continues with countless erect penises, nary a prosthetic in sight (with no offense meant to Rex, who has proved he doesn’t need one). There’s also the plain facts of its release: initially acquired by A24, the distributor behind Red Rocket, A24 traded Pleasure‘s rights Neon in October, rumored to be the result of A24 wanting a different cut for a theatrical release. Neon is releasing the unedited version in New York and LA this weekend, to expand wider the following week.
There’s a push-pull in depictions of porn, between porn being seen progressive or retrograde, feminist or misogynist, and it manages to encompass more than enough material to tell as sensationally a pro-porn or anti-porn story as the teller wants. The anecdotes in both cases would all be 100% true. For her part, Thyberg says this debate over porn is something of a lifelong project for her, and part of what drew her to the material in the first place. As she says, Pleasure, which she initially made as a short in 2013, evolved into something more “about power structures, and using the porn industry as a metaphor or a backdrop.”
Pleasure struck this reviewer (and I’ve spent my fair share of time around porn people myself, hearing all kinds of stories, both horrifying and heartwarming) as a thoroughly even-handed depiction. It’s a testament to Thyberg’s inherent fairness that the cast of Pleasure, aside from Kappel who is a young non-porn actress from Sweden, are all current and former porn professionals — from ex-improv comic-turned-ubiquitous porn actor Tommy Pistol to porn super-agent Mark Spiegel, to a brilliant supporting turn by Chris Cock. Thyberg enjoyed their full participation, even in scenes that portray some particularly nightmarish realities of the industry (one Pleasure scene in particular is even more horrifying than anything in Red Rocket, which was occasionally pretty horrifying in its own right, capturing the same stomach-turning dread with none of Red Rocket‘s ironic cheer).
That Thyberg makes porn industry insiders (and not ex-porn stars turned born again religious anti-porn crusaders, of which there are many, a pattern that began with Linda Lovelace and continues today) complicit in these unsettling scenes is a tribute to their veracity. And also to the fact that Pleasure is neither broadly pro-porn nor anti-porn. It’s a genuine exploration undertaken with respect for the characters involved.
And if that’s too high-minded, porn’s natural juxtapositions can’t help but be endlessly entertaining and occasionally hilarious. When my Pleasure screener expired the night before our interview when I had intended to rewatch it to prepare (I saw it the first time during Sundance), I had to ask to get it renewed. I ended up trying to watch it the following morning just before our interview, viewing this movie full of tumescent penises and closeups of shaved vulva on my laptop at the coffee shop where I do a lot of my writing, surrounded on this morning on either side by patrons literally reading the Bible and highlighting favorite passages. Life’s rich tapestry.
—
I was listening to another story about the porn world, and a porn producer told the journalist, “You can find whatever story you want to tell here.” What was it about that world that made you want to tell a story set there?
I’ve been working with this subject for over 20 years, and I think when I went there the first time in 2014, I had one idea. Also, I made a short film the year before. But that idea has really shifted during the process. I think when I started, I really wanted to focus on the porn industry because I’ve always been very interested in challenging the male gaze and, as a filmmaker, that’s what I see myself as having, a female gaze, exposing the male gaze, or challenging it. But the more time I spent there, the more the film started to be about saying something about our society and being a woman, talking about power structures, and using the porn industry as a metaphor or a backdrop.
But I would say the female gaze, because porn is really the essence of male gaze. Heterosexual porn, 99.99%, is made for the male viewer, made from a male perspective. And that’s the sexual education for people all over the world. So we all get to learn about sex from a male perspective. And that’s why I really wanted to go into the epicenter of that, and from that position, turn the camera around the other way, both figuratively but also metaphorically, and tell the other story. What do we not get to see in the porn film? What is the other point of view? And show images that people hadn’t seen before.
Right. I mean, I could tell just from the people in it, and the types of extras and actors that you cast that you’d done quite a lot of research in that world. Can you tell me about that process?
I came there the first time in 2014, and the good thing was I had already done a short film called Pleasure, where my intention had been to portray the real people behind the porn stereotypes. Like kind of a behind-the-scenes on a porn shoot, but at the time I had never been on a porn shoot. I tried to do it as authentic as possible, but of course it was also made out of just assumptions or prejudice. But I could send that as showing that it’s my intention, that it had a very… not trying to…
Sensationalize?
Yeah, no. So then that helped a lot for people to open up, and showed them that I was very genuine and honest, I really want to learn. But then also, I spent so much time there and after a while people got more used to having me around and I became part of the community.
So what were you doing? You were just hanging around on sets ?
Yeah. The first step was to do regular interviews, and then each time I met someone, like Mark Spiegler, for example, was one of the first people that I met. But I asked them, do you know anyone else that you think that I could talk to, or that could share some information? And then it very quickly just led me to meeting new people. It took me a week before I was on my first porn set, and then I became friends with the team, and asked them when are you shooting next? And then after a while people started getting used to having me around, and then I also started to audition and try people for different roles. Quite early I knew that I wanted to have actual porn people in the film. A little bit of industry people. I never thought that it would be only industry people [except for star, Sofia Kappel, who plays Bella], that was just how it turned out. I thought that I would have a mix of professional actors and porn people, but I’m really glad that this is how it happened.
It sort of slowly came together. In the beginning, I didn’t know exactly the whole beginning, middle, and end, I was just picking up things that I found interesting and developed a story from there. But I mean now, in a way, the story is about what’s happening if someone from Sweden was coming into the porn industry and slowly step-by-step getting to know it, and that is also the journey that I went through.
When you were coming into this world, I assume it’s all kind of new, but were there any particular moments that stand out in terms of culture clash?
Yeah, there were a lot of those things. I mean, I just, I remember the first time being on a porn set and the male performer, he just like came up to me with his dick in his hand. With the other one just saying hi to me. And I just… I was blushing so much, I didn’t know where to look, and I was just freaking out. And they had so much fun to see me with that type of stuff, seeing how uncomfortable I was. It wasn’t like in a negative way, just blushing.
But there’s been several shifts I had in my thinking. One was when I was on this porn set and they were doing something that was two big black guys, tiny teenage white girl, schoolgirl outfit, and they were twice her age. And she got some instructions like, “you’re afraid of these big black cocks coming to molest you.” And I was sitting there with my little notebook, writing down how problematic they all are, and then the director turned and looked at me and said, “What is wrong with you people? Why are you making us do this shit? Why is this what you want to see?”
And that was a totally new perspective. Like, okay, so they think that what they’re doing, I’m the reason. I’m the one who’s guilty or responsible for this content. Because I was sitting there thinking this is on them. That was so interesting for me to just understand, oh, they think that we are the problem, or the perverts, or whatever you want to call it. And then so many people in the industry, they think that the mainstream people, as they call us, that we are crazy perverts because they’re just giving us what we want. That was a very important perspective shift.
So I know that you switched distributors, and I think that was over the other one [A24] wanting you to cut some more explicit material. Why was it important for you to leave that stuff in and what did they want you to take out?
I mean, I can’t really comment on anything specific, and I think it’s better also to maybe ask them, because I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know everything about all the details, but this is my film. This is the story that I wanted to tell. That’s always been very important for me.
It feels like there’s this constant conflict with porn depictions, whether people see porn as retrograde or whether they see it as progressive, whether they see it as sexist,or whether they see it as feminist. Does that make it hard for you to just be observational in your storytelling?
I wouldn’t say that it makes it hard for me. I think it’s the opposite. It makes it interesting for me, that whole thing challenging and always trying to find new perspectives, or how can I add other layers too. That’s also why I’m so intrigued by this because there are so many different nuances. And also there are so many different types of porn. I’ve been engaged in the porn debate for 20 years, and I think it’s just really interesting to understand how people can view things so differently. I think it’s a very interesting discussion. To me, the most important thing is that we need to get more images from a female perspective. It is a huge problem that so much of what we see, and especially in porn, is shot from a male perspective, and that that’s the porn everyone is watching. It’s the sexual education for most people, so I think that also makes us project the male gaze in places where it doesn’t belong. As an artist, I think I see myself a little bit as a researcher rather than someone finding the definite answer, but I’m always trying to challenge and push and dig further.
Porn is so ubiquitous, and sort of universally viewed, and yet it still seems like the people that make it and star in it are still ostracized in weird ways. Did you-
Sorry, what does that word mean?
Like they’re sort of pushed outside mainstream society in weird little ways. Were you surprised by any ways that mainstream society sort of tries to push them away, or keep them out of certain normal mainstream spaces?
Yeah. And I mean, I’m so provoked by that– I would say that it’s a lot about projecting your own shame or guilt onto the people in porn. And also blaming the people, the worker, who are just producing the stuff that you are searching for. They are giving their bodies and their work for your satisfication, but then you look down on them and blame them. And yeah, a lot of the porn, it is very problematic. It’s about taboo. It’s sexist and racist, but that is something that we have to deal with on a societal level. And the thing is also with the film, the negative things that happens to Bella, the fact that she is having sex on camera, that’s not what’s causing the problems. It’s misuse of power, it’s the power structures that exist in any industry.
I mean, do you see the way that we treat porn performers as similar to the way we treat workers in general?
What do you mean workers in general? No, I don’t think it’s like workers in general, but also how do we treat workers in general? I don’t completely understand the question.
Like we want their labor, but not them as people necessarily. We want the products of the things they do, but not be-
Yeah. I mean, if you talk about, for example, someone in a factory in a third world country, but I think that’s one thing, but what we’re doing with porn, it’s a little bit like walking past someone taking care of your garbage and saying, “Oh, you stink.” Because they’re dealing with your garbage. So then we’ll push them away and say that they are the problem.
[I think it’s a little revealing, a Swede not initially understanding “workers” as my sort of American shorthand for exploited workers here].
‘Pleasure’ opens in theaters in New York and LA May 13th, before expanding wider May 20th. Vince Mancini is on Twitter.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Cookie settingsACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
