Bigfoot wins office in small northern Maine town

ST. POMME DE TERRE – Big things are afoot in one tiny northern Maine town.

The ever-elusive cryptozoological phenomenon known colloquially as Bigfoot has revealed itself to the population of the sparsely-populated village of St. Pomme de Terre, nestled away deep in the woods of northwestern Aroostook County.

This alone would be staggering enough, but it is the once-thought-mythical man-beast’s reasoning for self-revelation that makes this story truly astonishing. You see, Bigfoot came out of hiding for one reason and one reason only: he wanted to run for town selectman. So he did.

College-bound comedy can’t make up its mind

As someone who goes to the movies with regularity, I have grown accustomed to a certain level of misdirection when it comes to movie trailers. Trailers are one of the primary ways to get your movie onto the radar of the general population. So of course, you want to make your film as appealing as possible.

But I don’t care for feeling deceived.

Action movie shoots up the White House

There was a stretch of time when Hollywood was struggling to figure out who the bad guys were going to be. Since the Cold War ended, our conflicts with foreign powers have been seen as standing on murky moral ground. 

However, recent years have granted studios another go-to foreign bad guy to antagonize the red, white and blue. North Korea has been making increasingly frequent appearances as the generic “country that tries to fight with us.”

Maine native’s latest explores the power and perils of family

Elizabeth Strout was born in Portland and raised in a variety of small towns across Maine and New Hampshire. After an academic and professional career that sent her far and wide, she still spends time living in Maine, splitting her time between here and New York City.

She is also a Pulitzer Prize winner, having taken the award for fiction in 2009 for her short-story collection “Olive Kitteridge.”

‘Who’s on Worst?’ looks at bottom of baseball’s barrel

There are many reasons that we love sports, but one of the biggest is the fun found in athletic subjectivity. Using evidence both statistical and anecdotal to debate who was better or the best – Russell or Wilt, Montana or Brady, Jordan or James - there’s nothing better to a hardcore sports fan.

But of all the sports, baseball likely inspires more of these debates than any other. The game’s deep dedication to history and devotion to ever-evolving statistical analysis makes it perfect for these sorts of conversations. Everyone’s got their favorites and everyone has a reason why their guy is the best of all time.

Say it ain’t so, Franco!

We think we know celebrities. We’re constantly deluged with information about them, even outside their various film, television and music projects. All that data comes together and paints a picture of the famous that seems to be reliable in a general sense. We don’t necessarily know specifics of their personal lives, but their professional ones seem relatively clear.

But then something happens that completely turns your worldview upside down. Such an event recently took place involving actor James Franco.

New England says goodbye to fan favorite

One could accuse New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick of being a lot of things. Sentimental is not one of them.

Belichick recently continued a long and storied tradition of unapologetically cutting ties with veteran players, either through trades or outright releases. New England stalwarts and legends such as Lawyer Milloy, Ty Law, Richard Seymour, Randy Moss, Deion Branch and Adam Vinatieri have all been given their walking papers, unceremoniously dismissed despite still being talented and useful players.

PTC presents Pulitzer Prize-winning drama

BANGOR – There are few things as powerful as live theater.

Seeing stories unfold right in front of us is a beautiful thing. We are separate from the action onstage, yet the performers are undeniably present. That combination makes theater capable of telling tales in a way that impacts us in a way that is unlike any other art form. And even then, some pieces achieve more … so much more. 

Carell, Carrey headline good-not-great comedy

Any profession that gave us such pop culture touchstones as David Copperfield and Siegfried and Roy is ripe for satire. The world of the Las Vegas magician is one that rarely gets the Hollywood treatment, despite the fact that it is clearly asking for it.

But longtime television director Don Scardino has tackled this high-pressure world of excitement and illusion with the new film “The Incredible Burt Wonderstone.” Unfortunately, this star-driven comedy succumbs to the temptation of the formulaic, sacrificing some of the potential impact in the name of the familiar. The end result is a decent studio comedy that could have been ever so much more.

Thriller starts strong, loses steam

I enjoy a good thriller as much as anyone. There’s something wonderfully engaging about the mounting tension that a well-crafted thriller can bring. The agonizing wait as the story unfolds, the squirming in your seat as you question each twist in the action – it all makes for good cinema.

Unfortunately, recent tendencies in Hollywood indicate that studios have decided that a film that is “just” a thriller isn’t enough. There’s got to be something else, some other kind of hook. Maybe you throw in some big-budget action, maybe you tack on some supernatural elements – regardless, you’re basically saying that the tension is not enough.