Reese Witherspoon as Cheryl Strayed in Wild. There are many ways that Jean-Marie Vallee’s adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s memoir Wild could have gone wrong. A story anchored more by internal struggles than external conflict, this is the sort of insular story that’s often difficult to present in a film, with directors often falling back on […]
death
Posted inOpinion
Remembering Judy Baar Topinka
Judy Baar Topinka PHOTO BY GINNY LEE As you already know, Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka passed away last week. Topinka had a stroke the morning of Dec. 9 but that’s not what killed her. In fact, by the afternoon, she announced she was going to walk to the restroom. Her Chief of Staff Nancy Kimme […]
Posted inNews
IDOT spends $143,000 on zombie-themed seat belt ad
IDOT’s “Driving Dead” short film on seat belt use features an armored Mustang with a machine gun and actor Michael Rooker from the “Walking Dead” TV series about zombies. PHOTO COURTESY IDOT In a dusty, dimly-lit warehouse, a horde of zombies closes in two men with high-powered firearms trying in vain to escape through a […]
Posted inArts & Culture
vermontpoem #36
I weep a littlethis first night heregiving this place upwhere I’ve been comingsummers for sixty yearsthe colorful poetry wallin the bathroom blaketolkien le guin tennysonmy own kids’ writingsthe lake quiet out frontclouds shield a half moonI’m surrounded by mydead daughter hercreativity her presencefills this place but eventhis place she so lovedcouldn’t save her and Iweep […]
Posted inNews
10-year prison sentence for hit-and-run driver
He was left to die in a pool of his own blood “like roadkill.” That’s how Sangamon County Circuit Judge Leo Zappa described the death of Danny Dapron Jr., a 30-year-old cyclist killed in a hit-and-run accident on Aug. 8, 2010. Zappa sentenced the driver, Ursula Jones, 23, of Springfield, to 10 years in prison […]
