Portside

This new book reconsiders the social and political impact of the energy crisis of the mid 1970s.

Kaili Blues, an eccentric, remarkably assured first feature by the young Chinese director Bi Gan, is both the most elusive and the most memorable new movie that I’ve seen in quite some time—“elusive” and “memorable” being central to Bi’s ambitions. - J. Hoberman

In the two years since Colorado legalised cannabis, chefs in the state have been finding new ways to make a meal of it.

Robert Schenkkan’s Tony award winning All the Way portrays Lyndon Baines Johnson in his finest hour, and its multi-media staging on Broadway was already cinematic in nature. HBO’s TV adaptation — directed by Jay Roach in collaboration with Schenkkan’s screenplay and airing Saturday — has upped the ante, giving us a leaner, less unwieldy and more intimate rendering.

What's funny about drones? Nothing. The poet Jennifer L. Knox has a sense of humor. Also a sense of outrage. Seldom do these traits go so well together as in her poetry.

Mayer charts the domestic far-right effort to remake the political system through foundations, think tanks, university institutes, paid political commentators and huge campaign contributions by heirs to energy giant Koch Industries. One strategist admitted, "We want to decrease regulations. Why? It's because we can make more profit, okay?" Yet selling that line is hard. So they pose that ameliorative legislation denies the "opportunity for earned success" to the poor.

In Banking on Words, Arjun Appadurai argues that the 2008 financial crisis was, in essence, a failure of language. Narendar Pani finds that argument somewhat overstated, while at the same time acknowledging this book's "path-breaking" analysis of the role language has come to play in the way markets behave and are managed.

When arriving at a film festival like Tribeca, it’s pretty much a crap shoot when you scour the large catalog and read the brief descriptions of the films. Among the many choices, there were at least three narratives that passed the test and went on to win awards from the jury and the audience.

The food activist group, Eco Practicum, came together for five days in New York City for the third annual program produced in partnership with Our Name Is Farm, a training aimed at building “effective advocacy for a better food system.”

The CBS drama’s dramatic finale brought a sad but fitting end to a show that has always been a little bit awkward about its female friendships.