In Drake Doremus' drama Like Crazy, a young couple is forced to separate when one of them violates the terms of her student visa. Movie critic David Edelstein says the movie is painful and compelling -- and reminds him of Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise.
American film critic Pauline Kael was a brash, exuberant female writer at a time when most of her colleagues were buttoned up -- and male. The Age of Movies, a new collection of selected essays and movie reviews from Kael, showcases the gutsy and passionate style that made her a household name.
The former American Idol winner has just released her fifth album, Stronger. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the record doesn't contain Clarkson's strongest material, but still shows off her powerful vocal cords.
Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple are expanding rapidly into finance, advertising, media and retail. Tech writer Farad Manjoo outlines how the four companies are heading in new directions -- and encroaching on each other's territory -- as they try to expand their customer base.
The British character actor shot to international stardom after playing an aging rocker in the 2003 romantic comedy Love Actually. In his latest project, the BBC drama Page Eight, Nighy plays a British intelligence officer who discovers a state secret.
Two years after the death of her husband, Joan Didion suffered the untimely loss of her only daughter. She pieces together her memories of Quintana Roo in her new memoir, Blue Nights.
SMiLE may be the most famous unreleased album of all time, but it's not really unreleased: bits and pieces of it wound up on other Beach Boys albums. Now that EMI has assembled a definitive collection of the session tracks, Ed Ward has listened to them -- and wonders what the shouting was about.
Criminologist David M. Kennedy's strategy for reducing gang violence has dramatically reduced youth homicide rates nationwide. In his new memoir, Don't Shoot, Kennedy outlines his community meetings and interventions have worked to curb youth violence in more than 70 cities.
At its core, John le Carre's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy isn't really about espionage, says critic John Powers. The 1974 novel, adapted for the screen in 1979 by the BBC, is actually about secrets and lies and shifting identities -- which is to say, a metaphor for our own daily lives.
The darkness of Tom Waits' lyrics is accentuated by the rumble and rasp of his voice, which sounded old even when he was young. On Bad As Me, Waits reflects on loneliness, life, death and heartbreak. Here, he talks to Terry Gross about performing, being a father and writing his haunting melodies.
The lives of writers drive two films opening this week: The Rum Diary, starring Johnny Depp, dramatizes a Hunter S. Thompson novel. Roland Emmerich's Anonymous, meanwhile, examines who wrote Shakespeare's plays. Critic David Edelstein says both films show how hard it is to write about writers.
The PBS documentary series America in Primetime, which premieres this weekend, puts TV under the microscope, analyzing various tropes and character archetypes. Critic David Bianculli says it's the smartest TV show about television he's seen in the past two decades.
David Carr, who writes the Media Equation column for The New York Times, says that despite cuts, the future of journalism has never looked brighter. "I look at my backpack that is sitting here and it contains more journalistic firepower than the entire newsroom that I walked into 30-40 years ago," he says.
Deer Tick has just released its fourth album, Divine Providence. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the album takes the Rhode Island band in a more raw-sounding direction.
Since 2006, 40,000 people have been murdered in Mexico as drug cartels battle each other and the Mexican military. Journalist Ioan Grillo traces how Mexico came to control drug trafficking in El Narco.
More than half of all employed people worldwide work off the books. And that number is expected to climb over the next decade. Investigative journalist Robert Neuwirth examines how the underground economy works in his book, Stealth of Nations.
After Steve Jobs was diagnosed with cancer, he asked Walter Isaacson to write his biography. The new book tells the personal story of the man behind the personal computer — from his childhood in California to his thoughts on family, friends, death and religion.
The "i" prefix began as an abbreviation for the word "Internet," but ended up being much more than that. "By the time i- was fleshed out, Apple had transformed itself from a culty computer-maker to a major religion," says linguist Geoff Nunberg.
In a new book, medical ethicist Harriet Washington details how genes and tissues are increasingly being patented by pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Those firms, she argues, are focused more on their profits than on the medical needs of patients.
The actor plays a righteous federal agent who succumbs to all sorts of temptations on the HBO drama Boardwalk Empire. To build the character of Nelson Van Alden, he says, he worked out an elaborate back story about the agent's childhood.
