Banff Mountain Film Festival comes to Laramie

                            "Crossing the Ice"


The Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour will stop in Laramie Wednesday and Thursday at 7 p.m. The high profile festival, which has visited the University of Wyoming since 1999, focuses on mountain sports and culture while also looking at related topics like global warming. Films range in length as well and each tour date, and even screening night, are specially selected from all of the films to fit the interests of each stop.


The center piece of the festival is "Crossing the Ice" which won the grand prize and people's choice awards at the festival's opening.

Local and regional Valentine’s Day events

Happy early Valentine's Day everyone.

Here is a list of events in Denver, Cheyenne and Laramie going on in and around Valentine's Day. If you know of others feel free to post them in the comments. 

Duo Dmitri: Valentine’s Day Concert

What: Luba Agranovsky and Dmitri Kasyuk will perform on the piano and flute. Winners of numerous competitions, they grew up in Moscow before moving to Jerusalem. Wine and cheese will be served.

When: Feb. 14, 7-9 p.m.

Where: Mt. Sinai Synagogue, 2610 Pioneer Ave.

Cost: Tickets are $10 each or two for $18 with discounts for seniors and military.

“Exit the Body” 

What: Mystery/farce from the Cheyenne Little Theatre Company set in New England.

When: Feb. 14, 7:30 p.m.

Where: Mary Godfrey Playhouse, 2706 E. Pershing Blvd.

Cost: Tickets are reduced to $10 each.

Online: www.cheyennelittletheatre.org

New Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit opens Sunday in Denver

"It is not a country of light on things. It is a country of things in light."

I traveled to Denver yesterday to see the "Georgia O'Keeffe in New Mexico" exhibit at the Denver Art Museum during a media preview event.

While the display is lacking some of the large name works that can be seen on postcards, posters and perhaps most famously my mom's desktop wallpaper, it does feature a few rare paintings that should draw in knowledgeable fans and the curious first timers.

The One Day Show

The Ozymandian Theater, a local improv and sketch group, will be hosting an interesting show Friday.

The group will be taking ideas and suggestions for their show through social media sites most of the day Thursday. They will then take those ideas and fold them into a full show which will start at 7:30 p.m. Friday at the Atlas. It is a massive undertaking, and something the group has never tried before.

More from their their web page after the jump:

The Toasters- Atlas Theatre 1-29-13

"This one goes out to you Cheyenne. Because living here must be a real *Explative*" -Bucket 

The Atlas was empty Tuesday evening, save for about 80 people who braved the weather on a school night to see The Toasters. Still, I'm not sure there would have been a bigger crowd even if Cheyenne wasn't an ice rink already. While they are ska legends, the Toasters are hardly name brand, especially in a place like Cheyenne.

Their case wasn't helped by a string of incoherent local openers, which were often terrible and mostly unlistenable. In their defense, when some 60-80 people (in a room built for hundreds) are there specifically to see one act, any opener is going to have a hard time  Of course that doesn't excuse the terrible NOFX ripoff set (complete with incoherent yelling and swear words) that Ackrite put up or the random collection of over-energized/unintelligible covers and originals that locals It Gets Worse put together. Touring opener Mrs. Skannotto out of New York were the one highlight of the early sets, and I have to commend them for playing with such class and skill to a room which mostly just stared and leaned on the railings.

Upcoming shows of note in the area

The music scene is going pretty well in SE Wyoming these days despite it being the dead of winter. Here are a few shows to mark on your calendar in the upcoming weeks.- JJ

1/29 The Toasters @ The Atlas Theatre, 6 p.m. $10 in advance or $12 at the door. 
The Toasters are a legendary ska band that have been making music for more than 30 years. The lineup is in constant fluctuation as there is only one original member, Bucket, but that's not a bad thing. Bucket invites his friends, often ska legends in their own right, tour with him. The result is a heck of a good time from some real pros. Check out my story here  and the Facebook invite here.

Review: "How to Survive A Plague"

Directed by David France
Written by David France, Todd Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk
2013 Best Documentary Nominee (Academy Awards)
Currently streaming on Netflix

"PLAGUE! A PLAGUE is upon us and all you can do is argue with each other? That's what this is. Over 40 million infected is a plague! And what have we done, what have we done to stop this? Till we get our acts together we are as good as dead." 

I didn't know this story.

At 26 years old, I am too young to remember the AIDS crisis and have never really looked into. Why should I? AIDS doesn't draw the same fear and visceral reaction that it once did. It is still a scary disease that can and does kill, but we know about it. We know famous people with it. We know how it spreads and how we can protect ourselves. There is little left to the imagination about what it can do.