Bottle Shock captures the 1976 triumph of the then-young California wine industry, a scrappy mix of old world agrarian traditions and new world love of capitalism and technology.

This advice columnist doesn’t care if she hurts your feelings. Every week in a column syndicated in over 100 papers across America, Amy Alkon delivers hilariously hard-nosed counsel to thousands of clueless souls.

Amal is an unusually kind and gentle movie about the possibilities—and limits—of money and love.

There’s nothing wrong with bringing a musty classic onto the silver screen for a 21st-century update. But Julian Jarrold’s decision to adapt Waugh’s masterpiece as a “forbidden romance” melodrama is nothing short of literary vandalism.

What you can learn from a candidate’s choice of food.

A renegade cop is appealing, except when he’s busting down your door for the wrong reasons.

A visit to New York helps a guy realize how little Washington makes sense.

We’re interested in Paris Hilton because we’re interested in reality. Really.

If we get Monday off next week, that means we get Friday off this week, right? Yes! … If you work for the government.

Relive your college days. Or, if you didn’t go to college, pretend to “relive” them. I don’t know, just do whatever the guy next to you is doing. Take this ping pong ball.

Is love like jazz, or Wikipedia? And wouldn’tcha know it, there’s a lunch at Cato! Fill your week with events. FILL IT!

The actual harm caused in the Virginia Tech shooting is bad enough, but if we are not aware of our hurdles to judgment we make ourselves more vulnerable to tragic events than we already are.

Los Angeles appreciates the charity of the rich, but let’s forget museums. We could use a better transit system.

An unusual morality tale radiates from an S&M domestic abuse fiasco film. What’s not to like?

If you thought you had nothing important to do this week, K-Sol has a few suggestions.

You’re young. You’re fun. And you’re eager to show off the home-made business cards your mom taught you how to make.

Christmas–and anything that smacks of the alleged superstition of Christianity–seems to be slowly but methodically being removed from the British public sphere (as it is in America).

Mel Gibson may not know where all the world’s wars originate, but in Apocalypto, he seems to have a gift for violence.

There’s something fishy about the new animated penguin feature Happy Feet.

The current rash of celebrity crotch shots is yet more evidence of how what was once private has become public.

From Charles Murray’s Bell Curve to Satoshi Kanazawa’s new paper on IQ’s, each and every time, a new idea or provocative opinion has produced a reaction among cultural elites that is nothing but closed, dogmatic, rigid, and shrill.

What can Borat teach us about ourselves?

A new documentary on the F-word is gleefully salty. But what does fuck actually say?

Are art collectors only paying for the signature on a painting? Is a painting not valuable if the signature is fake?

Has cheating become part of the academic learning process?

Professional hockey’s popularity has fallen hard in America. But there’s no reason it can’t get back up.

Style trumps substance in Hollywood’s latest return to the noir genre.

Former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey forgets to bring the facts along for his new, confessional book tour.

A review of the new film Conversations with Other Women.

While the NCAA makes money hand-over-fist thanks to its student-athletes, it hypocritically punishes them for taking any compensation.

The Pope’s recent comments about Islam were well stated–an atheist should know.

A review of “An Enemy of the People,” now playing at the Shakespeare Theatre, explaining why Henrik Ibsen wants Al Gore to run for president.

A review of Sam Harris’ Letter to a Christian Nation.

The elevated, novelistic trend we’re currently seeing in television — and first seen in shows like Homicide — combined with the increasing popularity of DVD box sets, suggests that television may transcend its throwaway nature and acquire a new permanence.

Our “special relationship” with England goes deeper than simply speaking the same language, the great political virtues, moral habits and social customs which made America great are rooted in Englishness.

How folk Irish ditties instill a healthy distrust of authority and government power in the old and the young.

Earlier this month, the FCC mailed letters to 77 television stations as part of a probe into the use of video news releases. One Boston radio station seems to be getting half of its technology news segments from Toyota. Should companies be criticized for such sneaky marketing ploys?

A review of the new solo album by Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke.

Paris Hilton without sex? Unthinkable. Like Angelina Jolie without rugrats, Ashlee Simpson without “guide tracks” or Lindsay Lohan without tears.

Should the film industry — and taxpayers — support vile personalities, even talented ones?

An interview with Jeremy Lott, author of the new book In Defense of Hypocrisy.

Why can’t America get excited about soccer? It’s not hatred that defines American sentiment toward the world’s most popular game but, rather, indifference

We asked some of the smartest young people on the right for summer reading suggestions. What are they hoping to read this summer? And what do they recommend others read?

Those who decided to break down the walls of public morality have not succeeded in patching them up with latex.

Some of the summer’s best films and books aren’t new at all. A look at Jean-Pierre Melville’s re-released 1969 film Army of Shadows and Irene Nemirovsky’s Suite Française.

A review of Ann Coulter’s new book, Godless.

There are still plenty of serious performers who offer concert-goers more than mere theatrics. Three of them came to the Washington, D.C., area this spring: Peter Serkin, Yo-Yo Ma, and Angela Hewitt.

The Duke rape case is like a Rorschach blot. From one perspective we see the race of the victim, from another angle her occupation emerges, and then it comes out that she has accused a group of rape before. But the only shape we should see yet is a question mark.

John Meacham’s new book, like his Newsweek articles on religion, offers almost nothing in the way of substance. But if you like a lot of cheapened metaphors about darkness and light and approving (but not too approving) references to “transcendence” then run right out and buy this book.

The first theatrically released film to explicitly portray the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, United 93, like the day it depicts, is wholly unique–a captivating, devastating experience that is anything but safe.

Honoring The Dartmouth Review on its 25th anniversary.

It will take more than blonde hair and a Colgate smile to save network news from irrelevance.

The mythic alcoholic and mysoginistic persona of poet and novelist Charles Bukowski is captured in Bukowski: Born into This. But what makes the film a success is not its relentless evidence of that myth’s truth. It’s in its hints that the man may have been something more than just the larger than life figure.

The initial concept of Ave Maria–Domino Pizza founder Thomas Monaghan’s plan to build a community founded on Catholic principles–if implemented, would scale back on what the modern American understands to be the personal freedoms he is entitled to: privacy rights, free speech, free press, no establishment of religion.

How Rod Dreher has probably bit off more than he can chew when he takes on agribusiness, public education, McMansions, the free market and a conservative movement that long ago stopped being interested in the Eternal Verities.

In Music from the Inside Out, Daniel Anker conveys his personal devotion to music. In doing so, he’s created an inspired piece of filmmaking. No music-lover should miss it.

The young man who aspires to dress well must turn to books, but the revival in fashion has produced no Summa Fashionistica for men. Here’s a guide to the best tomes on men’s fashion.

A review of Autobahn, a Neil LaBute play now at the Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C.

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is nothing more than a mild disappointment. It is the epitome of a decent film: thoroughly, depressingly adequate, but not one smidgen more.

Our annual gift guide for all the conservatives and libertarians on your list!

A new biography of Sam Cooke is evidence of Baby Boomers’ attempt to legitimize popular culture.

Your girlfriend or wife is wonderfully and fearfully alive — so beware of the pitfalls in your harmless adoration of celebrity beauties.

The new biopic Capote gets the atmosphere right–but the life wrong.

George Clooney’s take on Murrow and McCarthy is a gripping, eloquent piece of propaganda.

A review of the new collection, The Weekly Standard: A Reader: 1995-2005.

Michael Winterbottom’s tepid film effort, 9 Songs, concedes artistic limitations in order to break new ground.

A review of Álex de la Iglesia’s new film, El Crimen Perfecto.

A bit of gonzo reportage from NoVa and D.C.

The democratization of book reviewing on Amazon.com has begun to crowd out professional reviewers and change the way we read. Is this a good thing?

Understanding the implosion of the Libertarian Bore: the perfect mirror image of the Marxist who constantly ruins everyone else’s dinner with his incessant dialectics.

What’s right and not so right with Human Events‘ list of the “Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries.”

A message to pop culture conservatives: everything, even fitting in, has a cost.

Ismail Merchant, producer of classy, elegant British period pieces, was the ultimate independent filmmaker.

A new collection of letters and routines sheds light on the complexity of late comedian Bill Hicks.

A review of a maturing Ben Fold’s new album, Songs for Silverman.

Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling face trial in the new documentary Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room.

While we mourn the loss of Pope John Paul II, we should celebrating the music of another Catholic.

If consumers of television programs and films had to pay a recycling fee–for recycled shows like The Office–we might not be subject to the dearth of creativity we’re witnessing in Hollywood right now.

His inspiration may have disappeared years ago, but the literary world still suffered a loss when Hunter S. Thompson took his own life last month.

Over one third of high school students believe the First Amendment goes “too far” in the rights it secures. But why should they care about freedom, when nobody else does?

Tom Wolfe’s latest may be reactionary and hyperbolic–but it’s still a great read.

Every year there are deserving movies robbed of Oscar nominations. This year, Closer, the best movie of 2004, is at the top of the list.

How Johnny Ramone and Ronald Reagan each played a central role in major movements once considered on the fringe.

The definitive gift guide for all the conservatives and libertarians on our lists!

Is 2004 the year the documentary went from film-geek fetish to mainstream marvel, or the year that Americans gave up their imaginations?

Although it is, by Baker’s usual standards, a middling production, Checkpoint did occasion something of a second-order news event as critics and commentators from across the notional left-right spectrum rose to condemn it for immorality, bad taste, or both.

Paying for television programming once seemed absurd, now all the good stuff is on cable. Radio is next.

For a relatively small book, Where the Right Went Wrong makes a convincing, wide-ranging case that all is not well, and conservatives have no one to blame for that but themselves.

Polymath novelist Julian Barnes’ new short story collection, The Lemon Table, explores the worldly concerns of those close to death

A new Michigan case that limits government’s power of eminent domain is good news for property advocates, but Justice O’Connor may be standing in the way of broader reform.

Brad Miner’s The Compleat Gentleman tackles a worthy subject,
but won’t bring back the Age of Chivalry.

A D.C.-centric review of of filmmaker Jonathan Demme’s remake of the legendary 1962 political thriller, The Manchurian Candidate.

A tennis match in England and a country picnic in Texas make for a distinctly American Fourth of July.

David Brooks is an essayist and a satirist, not a political scientist, which is why his sweeping observations, unsubstantiated, often fall short.

Bubba Ho-Tep, recently released on DVD, features a redneck mummy, a black JFK–and plenty of fun.

This attempt to modernize the oldest story of Western civilization strips it of its essence; it deprives the Greeks of their gods.

Readers of Stephen Hayes’ new book will expect proof that Saddam was collaborating with al Qaeda in a way that endangered America, but they will be disappointed on that score.

The bills for new baseball stadiums have often been footed by local taxpayers; now state and federal taxpayers might get to chip in as well.

Some Catholic politicians stray from Church teaching, but still expect their faith to enhance their electoral appeal. Will the clergy take them to task?

You Are The Quarry, pop icon Morrissey’s first new album in seven years, is a triumphant return for the singer–even if it is a bit lopsided.

Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies hits the big screen, and his Bright Young Things are still missing their souls.

Aspiring writers once wanted to become literary greats like James Joyce or William Faulkner. Now they want to become screenwriters like Charlie Kaufman or Joe Eszterhas.

An admiring, but non-liberal, fan of The West Wing wonders: How do we go about electing such a perfect president?

A comic book crusader argues that the genre is a literature of ethics that can help answer life’s big questions.

A German atheist wonders, why all the controversy surrounding Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ?

A review of the Passion of the Christ from a Christian perspective.

Modern women (and modern science) are changing the time-honored traditions of the engagement ring.

Is Ayn Rand’s classic, Atlas Shrugged, founded on the use of traditional Christian apocalyptic archetypes?

A critical reevaluation of Reason magazine’s “35 Heroes of Freedom,” which were announced last month.

A college colleague of Steven Glass’ reviews the new movie Shattered Glass and examines what it doesn’t tell us about the liberal media.

The holidays might have taken a tastelessly consumerist turn a long time ago, but thoughtful gift-giving is still part of a a traditional Christmas.

It also attempts to unify freedom-loving people in intelligent dissent. However, while the work as a whole is thought-provoking and informative, the alienating rhetoric of several authors and the occasional redundancy of their topics ultimately undermine both the work’s efficacy and legitimacy.

To celebrate the Pope, all thoughtful people who believe in freedom, individual rights or the value of life, ought to consider John Paul II’s teachings on the value of life.

Loving the rise of the chain bookstore is part of the free market bible, but one can’t help but feel uneasy about their attitude towards book culture.

HBO’s K Street is doing the impossible: lowering the already abysmal dignity of the political class.

The End of Democracy? ends as both a discussion of judicial usurpation and an analysis of the dynamics of controversy and of the conservative movement.

Are biographies becoming the gossip magazines of a new intellectually pretentious culture?

A carnivorous jaunt through Argentina proves that not just the good food, but its celebrated culture of meat eating, that makes the country great.

Socrates said, “Thou shouldst eat to live, not live to eat.”
I say Socrates ended up with Hemlock by misreading the wine list.
Anyone who considers food only for the sake of and to the degree that it nourishes ignores one of modern civilization’s greatest achievements: Restaurants.
Socrates is forgiven, for food was largely a matter of survival [...]

If you’re a sports junkie, you have to be disappointed in Sunday’s Super Bowl match-up. What should have been a classic, nail-biting thriller between the Oakland Raiders and Tampa Bay Buccaneers turned into an embarassing rout. But if you’re a political junkie, you had even more reason to be disappointed with the ouctome. [...]

It’s easy for a Republican to get an inferiority complex in Manhattan. When the guy at the desk beside you with the Nader poster is also a published poet who fronts a jazz band at night, it can be hard for a conservative to retain intellectual assurance. Cool sophisticates never show up at the Stupid [...]