Sure, when Ice Cube ducked out of NWA and into his first big-screen film role in 1991, he’d already starred as a rough-talking gangsta in plenty of music videos… but real cinema? What most naysayers overlooked was that the man could actually deliver a bona fide, heartfelt performance! Parading around South Central L.A. in a […]
Phil Busse
Posted inNews
Law and Disorder
Concern Mounts That Police Oversight Committee Has No Balls
With her shoulders hunched and eyes narrowed, Mayor Vera Katz pounded her gavel. “I can clear this room,” she declared, addressing a murmuring crowd of approximately 80 people who gathered at City Hall last Wednesday afternoon to talk about pending changes to the city’s police oversight committee. Over the past year, a growing number of […]
Posted inNews
The High Cost of Dope
Newly Enforced Drug Policy Threatens Financial Aid
Although summer vacation for students often means lax part-time jobs or internships to spruce up resumes, this summer some may be scrambling to find a way to earn bundles of cash in order to stay in school. Under a new policy–being enforced for the first time on a large scale–any student convicted of a so-called […]
Posted inNews
A NATION WITHIN A NATION
How the Latino Community is Learning to Help Itself
Number ten, Rolando Contreras, steps effortlessly through the key and towards the hoop. Although four defenders have clogged the court underneath the basket, it is as if he is alone; he moves forward untouched. In a slow-moving layup, Contreras rises up to the basket, his legs pumping like he’s climbing an invisible ladder. At the […]
Posted inNews
Hunting for Lost Business
Hawthorne Merchants Upset About The Hunted
Built in 1910, the Hawthorne Bridge is one of the enduring images of Portland. But in recent years, it has become as much a blessing as a finicky curse to the commercial district which derives both its name and the majority of its traffic from the bridge. Since 70 percent of of Hawthorne’s customers use […]
Posted inUncategorized
Mint
Mint 816 N Russell St, 284-5518 Two weeks ago, I had my first meal at Mint, the latest upscale dining spot in North Portland. That night the waiter bent over backwards and into pretzels to please us; but then came the second visit. The service was abysmal; about half-way through dessert (after we were twice […]
Posted inNews
Staying Put
A New Program Tries To Stop Gentrification in Its Tracks
The rows of houses along Interstate–an odd assortment of Victorians and ticky-tack ranch homes–are calm, even though they sit in one of Portland’s most heated battlefields. In a few years, an extension to the MAX line will tie the city’s economic center directly to the traditionally isolated and working-class neighborhoods of North Portland. And, if […]
Posted inNews
Reality vs. Perception
Have Portland Police Really Gone Gestapo?
What began as an alleged response to a noise complaint and spun into a scuffle between party-goers and 43 police officers has now turned into something even more: Activists claim that police are purposefully profiling them and orchestrating a plan of intimidation. Two weeks ago, police arrived at a small house party in inner Northeast […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
Riders to the Sea
Theater Review
Riders to the Sea Catamount Theatre Through April 6 Sixteen folding chairs line the edges of a third floor Pearl District loft. With sheets of white cloth billowing from the walls, thick twine strung across the ceiling, and scuffed wood floors, the loft has taken on the eerie feeling of a floating ship–which, of course, […]
Posted inBooks
Speaking With The Angel
Book Review
Speaking With The Angel edited by Nick Hornby (Riverhead Books) A collection of 12 stories from an equal number of writers, the table of contents for Speaking With the Angel reads like the all-star line-up for young literary hotshots; Melissa Banks; Nick Hornby; Dave Eggers. And, it’s as good as it promises. Well, it’s pretty […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Mercury Video Picks
Del Toro es mí amor-O! Common lore says that Benico Del Toro’s career took flight after a memorable bit part in The Usual Suspects–his enchanting bedroom eyes and nine mumbled lines kicking him into the upper echelons of the Hollywood A-list. But in fact, the world’s most famous living Puerto Rican started long before, with […]
Posted inNews
Brother Against Brother
Is In-Fighting Tearing Apart the Local NAACP?
On Saturday morning, even before the most recent meeting for the NAACP chapter began, the event had disintegrated into a shouting match. About 30 members had gathered with the hope–albeit slim–to resolve several issues that, for the past year, have been tearing apart the local chapter of the renowned civil rights organization. As current board […]