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Sundance Day 3: Ballast Premiers

Yesterday's premier generated Sundance buzz. Bloggers are comparing Ballast to the lyrical films of Terrence Malick and David Gordon Green, and the all-important Hollywood Reporter and Variety have given beaming reviews. Like Malick's work, Ballast is deliberately and poignantly shot. Like Green's work, the movie is carried by a leaden sense of place. But this time, we recognize the place—Canton Square in Christmas-glow, winter sky over barren fields, Delta rain collecting in corduroy rows...

Sundance Day 2: Which is really all about Slamdance…

It's 8pm and I am already exhausted. For one thing, it takes a ridiculous amount of energy just to stay warm. The high today hovered at 20 degrees, and the low landed somewhere around 1 degree. At any given time, I sport four layers.

Sundance Day 1: Travel Lite

After a full day of airports (and a cozy airplane ride with a blanket named Bunky and the shrillest baby I've ever met—he's lucky he can flash that cherubic four-toothed grin!), here I am in Park City, Utah, where even grocery stores look like ski lodges. It's been snowing since we rolled into town around 8pm, just in time to layer up and stroll down twinkle-twinkle-little Main Street for the Slamdance Opening Reception at a local fave, the Star Bar.

Tweaking Twiggy

Photos by Jason 'Twiggy' Lott

A week into January, 27-year-old Jason "Twiggy" Lott leans back in his faux-Swedish chair, running his fingers through close-cropped hair and casually tossing one denim-clad leg over the other. In the flawless glow of bright wood and industrial metal, Twiggy is pondering issues as clichéd as his place in the world, and as weighty as the coiled potential of 2008.

What's In A Label?

Photos by Katrina Hercules, Jaro Vacek, Darren Schwindaman, and Nate Glenn

It's a Thursday evening in late August. For some reason, the AC's on the fritz, but who cares? Hal & Mal's Red Room is slammed. Through open doors, overflow—sound and people—puncture the imaginary breeze. Kids fling sweat from unwashed hair, clambering on benches to glimpse the stage. Two sundress-swathed hippies douse each other with water bottles, and with his green shirt bobbing, a curly-headed lad unsuccessfully attempts crowd-surfing. Girls bump hips, grab each other and squeal, while guys try to retain dude-itude in the midst of head bouncing and the occasional sing-a-long faux pas.

Your Friendly Neighborhood Thai House

At the new Thai House, the food is exotic and elegantly showcased in a venue awash in muted color, exposed brick and imported furniture. But there is something beyond the ambiance. Perhaps it's the warmth of the proprietors or the comfort of a steaming cup of Tomkha, but in the midst of spicy food, Eastern music and hand-carved teakwood, the Thai House offers the familiarity of a diner, but the cuisine is almost certainly better than that local greasy-spoon.

Jannie Johnson

Jannie Johnson teaches children in the same one-room Madison County schoolhouse that her grandfather built 85 years ago. Inspired by her late father, herb doctor Seth Ballard Sr., and the philosophy engraved on his tombstone—"do right and go straight"—Johnson decided to meet a need: to ensure that neighborhood kids received education despite segregation.

More Glory, Less Grease

Grant Nooe knows food. He knows saté from sauté and semifreddo from shabbu-shabbu. With a handful of ingredients and a grill, he can fly you to the moon (or at least to Asia), but mostly, Nooe is a down-to-earth guy. He speaks frankly, maintains eye contact, gestures when excited. And he gets excited when he talks about food, particularly that food we've known longest—southern home-cookin', in all its greasy glory. Except that Nooe's mission is to help southern food change its image—more glory, less grease.

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