Three tangled lives revealed in The Hours
by Penney White

The Hours is an emotional film about three women linked through time and place, in search of purpose in life and joined by similar fears.

Director Stephen Daldry and Screenwriter David Hare do an extraordinary job of guiding the viewer through a day of writer Virginia Woolf, played by Nicole Kidman, as she deals with depression and insanity.

With a little help from the makeup department, Kidman is morphed into a character and that is unrecognizable compared to her everyday look.

Anyone who has read the literary award-winning novel, Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, will in some way recognize the characters.

Screenwriter David Hare has done a fine job of adapting Pulitzer Prize winning Michael Cunningham’s, The Hours, as homage to Woolf’s work.

In the beginning you are introduced to Virginia Woolf (Kidman) in 1923. Laura Brown (Juliane Moore) lives in 1949 and Clarissa (Meryl Streep) is in the present. They are all dealing with complex emotions and personal issues.

Laura feels pregnant and stuck in a life that is not right for her and Clarissa is a professional hostess giving a party for a friend dying of AIDS. The twist, if you follow the movie’s plot, is that Clarissa’s life in the present mirrors Mrs. Dalloway’s in the book.

An unhappy Laura reads Woolf’s book in 1949 while Virginia is writing the book in 1923.

Prepare yourself for a movie that is slow, yet intense. This film is like watching three real perspectives with many themes including insanity, suicide and a touch of homosexuality.

Other flicks to see, Coming in February with great previews:

Darkness Falls **** The Life of David Gale

Final Destination 2 *** The Hunted

Chicago *** Daredevil

The Recruit**** How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days **

Confessions of A Dangerous Mind**1/2 (catchy)

Shanghai Knights

Kangaroo Jack*

(but making money)

Local artist shares 70 years of work

by Laleña Broussard

In addition to turning 90, local artist Gwendolyn Knight is showing her artwork at the Tacoma Art Museum. The new exhibit expresses her artistic maturity as well as her vivaciousness.

The show, entitled 12th Street series: Never Late for Heaven: The Art of Gwendolyn Knight, showcases her art work spanning the last 70 years, including many that were created more recently.

The works on display exhibit a delightful use of brilliant color and are primarily expressionistic pieces that reflect Knight’s background as a dancer and training in painting during the Harlem Renaissance.

Knight spoke at the museum Feb.1 to a full house. Knight could barely hold her seat as she gestured with grand sweeping movements expressing excitement and pleasure at seeing all her works together for the first time.

The crowd that gathered to hear Knight speak sat quietly listening to her share past and future plans.

When the audience was given an opportunity to ask Knight their own questions many hands shot up. Knight answered each question thoroughly, but not always in the expected manner. She spoke about how what she paints is what she saw in day-to-day life. Knight’s day-to-day life as a youth was filled with the richness of life and the imagination of the Harlem Renaissance.

Ethel Waters, who lived in the same apartment complex as Knight, and she saw Duke Ellington perform at the Savoy.

A student from UWT asked Knight why she chooses the colors she does for the portraits, and why she uses such brilliant yet unnatural colors.

The response was “because that’s the way I paint.”

Kinght’s feisty attitude and her big smile made the whole room laugh.

Knight was born in Barbados in 1913. She moved to St. Louis at the age of seven and began her love of painting in High school. Knight met and married Jacob Lawrence who later became a teacher at The University of Washington.

A book she purchased upon the move to New York City inspired her art career. The book was The Significant Moderns, a book that credited turning her onto the modernistic style of painting.

The exhibit runs Jan. 14 - May 3 and is the last exhibit, along with the two others currently showing, before the museum moves to its new location.

Veteran M’s players don’t need Melvin to win

Pitchers, catchers and position players for the Seattle Mariners reported to camp at the Peoria Sports Complex on Sunday Feb. 9. New M’s manager Bob Melvin is gathered with the veteran boys in Peoria to help prepare for a title run in 2003 that starts in a mere 41 days.

M’s fans such as myself have worried about the switch to former D-backs bench coach Bob Melvin, but the truth is that the veteran players of the M’s can practically run themselves.

Melvin can offer wisdom and general guidance, but the bottom line is that the Mariners baseball club knows how to play ball.

Melvin is a 42-year-old former big-league catcher who has virtually no experience being a manager.

After losing Lou Piniella to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Melvin won the race for a new manager and signed a 2-year contract with the Mariners, which includes a club option for 2005.

“To land in a spot like this, being a first-year guy, just doesn’t happen,” said Melvin. “Usually you start in a place where you have to turn things around and bring in a bunch of younger kids trying to fill roles you don’t even know.”

The season opener for the M’s will be played in Tokyo, Japan on March 25, marking the earliest Major League Baseball regular season opener ever.

The M’s will be facing their rivals the Oakland Athletics, so it will be a great way to see how Melvin will handle the team and how the team will operate under Melvin.

“I’m very, very excited and I’m glad we’re going to Japan because it gets us onto the field early,” said Melvin.

Melvin is lucky that Lou did such a phenomenal job with the ballclub during the 10 years that he was around. Otherwise, the new manager would be sinking.

As it stands now, Melvin is in a pretty good place. The line-up is practically permanent, and with the exception of looking for some changes in the bullpen, his veteran club can practically run themselves.

Between booster breakfasts, media lunches, banquets and the all-popular Mariners FanFest, Melvin has been busy in Seattle for the past few weeks.

The two-day FanFest drew a record breaking 15,437 fans to SAFECO field on Feb. 1and 2 and provided fans with a chance to tour the clubhouse.

“I think it’s good for the fans to see where we basically live in the summer,” said second baseman Bret Boone. “I went to the clubhouse and there was a huge line waiting to get in.”

Although the M’s didn’t make it as far as fans would have hoped last year, lets remember that they have still won over 300 games in the past three years. These boys know how to play ball.