‘Exterior Night' Review: Life in Perilous Times
When the great Italian filmmaker Marco Bellocchio made 'Good Morning, Night' in 2003, about the 1978 kidnapping and killing of the politician Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades, he provided a fanciful, heartbreaking coda: an image of Moro walking away from captivity, looking not much worse for wear after 55 days in a small cell.
Bellocchio revisits the Moro affair in his first television series, 'Exterior Night,' and once again he frees Moro (Fabrizio Gifuni) for just a bit. This time the scholarly, prickly statesman gets to stare down his colleagues in Italy's Christian Democratic Party and tell them exactly how and why they have allowed him to die.
(Released in 2022, the series is now available in the United States on MHz Choice, where the third and fourth of six episodes will stream beginning Tuesday.)
Moro's abduction and death was a watershed moment in the 'years of lead,' when politically motivated bombings, shootings, kidnappings and assassinations convulsed Italy and other European countries. But it is a story that can speak to anyone who has a sense of living in perilous times. As a character in 'Exterior Night' says, a society can tolerate a certain amount of crazy behavior, but 'when the crazy party has the majority, we'll see what happens.'
What makes Moro's fate such prime material for dramatization, though, are its elements of mystery and imponderability and its hints of conspiracy, as murky today as they were four decades ago. Why did Moro's own government — of which he would have become president later that year — refuse to negotiate for his release? Why did the Red Brigades finally kill him, knowing it probably would be disastrous for their cause?
'Good Morning, Night,' told from the point of view of a female captor who begins to sympathize with Moro, was a splendid film, both passionate and razor sharp. Working across five and a half hours in 'Exterior Night,' Bellocchio spreads out, adding historical detail and giving space to players he had little or no room for in the film.
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Buzz Feed
41 minutes ago
- Buzz Feed
Must-Visit LGBTQ+ Owned Eateries Across India
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Chicago Tribune
an hour ago
- Chicago Tribune
Restaurant review: Void, a whimsical Italian American refuge for the weird and wonderful in Chicago
While the Italian American restaurant Void does whimsy well, most evident with its Spaghetti Uh-O's and No-Lört, it's become one of the best restaurants in Chicago right now. It's the first business by a trio of industry veterans who've seen their acclaimed workplaces rise and fall: chef and owner Tyler Hudec; co-chef and co-owner Dani Kaplan; and general manager, managing partner and owner Pat Ray. When you go to Void — across the street from Loaf Lounge, just up from the curious free bookstore on the corner — you'll find a storefront transformed from a nondescript neighborhood bar to a creative refuge for the weird and wonderful. Spaghetti Uh-O's emerged early as the signature dish since opening in Avondale last August. 'It was something we put on the first menu,' said Kaplan. 'We always had the intention that the menu would change frequently, but it just became so popular that we knew we'd never be able to take it off.' Your server will bring a custom-labeled can to the table, then pour the SpaghettiOs-inspired pasta into a soup plate, and finish with crumbled cheese. It's too hot to eat right away, but eat you will, slurping tiny al dente by the spoonful. The Sicilian ringlets are traditionally used in baked pastas, similar to the timpano in the 1996 film 'Big Night.' Here they swim with teeny tender meatballs in a bright vodka sauce, the spirited Italian or Italian American creation of disputed national origin. I was a Beefaroni kid, who hated sweet and soupy SpaghettiOs, but Spaghetti Uh-O's have redeemed the concept with what's truly Void's identity: Italian American that's playful yet precise with innovation and nostalgia. 'I grew up in a house where there was always SpaghettiOs in the pantry,' said Kaplan. 'We decided to add a little bit of flair with a table presentation, and my sister is a graphic artist, so I asked her to come up with a fun label.' The grown-up mini meatballs use a mixture of ground chuck and ground pork shoulder, said the chef, and pancetta. 'We make thousands of tiny meatballs a week,' said Kaplan. 'If we would have known back then, I don't know if we would have chosen to do it.' And there's that redemptive sauce, which begins with their house red, said the chef, a mixture of garlic, olive oil, red wine, herbs, onions and tomatoes, slowly cooked for seven hours or so. 'We fortify it with more tomato,' she added. 'And cream and butter and vodka and some fresh parsley.' House-made Italian sausage debuted recently as one of the newest dishes. On my first of two visits, my server said it was one of her favorites, reminding her of homemade sausage and peppers. While I saw the dish on Instagram before that dinner, I was still not prepared for the stunning whole coil, snappy and smothered with silky piquillo peppers, plus fennel in ribbons and fronds, all on a radiant red sauce conjured from more of those sweet Spanish chiles. Kaplan worked at The Butcher & Larder when chef and owner Rob Levitt first opened it in 2011, before he closed and moved on to Publican Quality Meats as chef de cuisine and head butcher. 'When we were setting up the kitchen, I was like, we gotta have a meat grinder and a sausage stuffer and one day we'll have time to use them,' said Kaplan. 'We get in whole pork shoulders from Slagel and grind and encase everything in house.' The result is flawless, from the subtle spicing to careful cooking. It's no small feat to keep the casing completely intact, revealing patience and skill. A native of the northwest suburbs, Kaplan started working in kitchens at 15, she said, cooked at Lula Cafe 20 years ago, and was sous chef at Analogue, where she met Hudec, who was a line cook then. 'The last place I was at for a significant amount of time was Lost Lake,' said Kaplan about the craft tropical cocktail bar and kitchen, which closed in 2022. That's where she launched her annual charitable Chick-feel-gay pop-up, a satirical take on Chick-Fil-A, indeed with fried chicken sandwiches and waffle fries. This year, the chef held the event at Void on June 22, and donated 20% of the proceeds to Brave Space Alliance, the Black and trans-led LGBTQ+ focused center in Hyde Park. On the regular menu, fried chicken Marsala delivers a half bird with double-fried light and dark meat, maitake mushrooms, Marsala and house-made (Hidden Valley in Italian) dressing. An homage to three iconic chicken dishes (Korean fried, Marsala and Harold's, with a paper bag presentation), the bird was tasty, but the sauce softened crust leaned more toward chicken katsudon meets Brown's Chicken with their coveted fried mushrooms. Eggplant Parm achieves that difficult dance between crispy and soft with a depth completely unexpected. I almost didn't order the ubiquitous dish with eggplant, mozzarella, the defining Parmesan and red sauce. But then another terrific server my second night described a complex preparation, which sounded something like a terrine. Nothing could have prepared me for the exquisite crispy cheese frill and the extraordinary layers within. 'We take whole Italian eggplant and peel them and slice them thin,' said Kaplan. 'And each slice is individually breaded and fried, and then it gets layered in a pan with some really nice imported whole milk mozzarella and Parmesan, and our house red sauce, with probably 140 slices of eggplant in each pan. And then we bake it and press it, and then, once chilled, slice it into individual portions. And then the top gets coated in Parmesan and then seared to get that frico on the top.' Eggplant parmigiana is a dish that we all really enjoy, said the chef, but it's so frustrating when it's just a slab of wet eggplant with breading falling off. Shrimp scampi toast tells an operatic love story between an Italian American dish and Hong Kong dim sum. 'We essentially take everything that would go into the sauce of shrimp scampi — garlic, olive oil, chile flake, parsley, dry vermouth and lemon zest — and we cook that down til it's super concentrated,' Kaplan said. 'Then we make a farce with shrimp and spread that onto white bread, and then it gets deep-fried.' So it's dim sum shrimp toast with the flavors of shrimp scampi. Then they're loaded with pristine head-on banana prawns from Australia, then bathed in buttery scampi sauce, and gilded with petals of what I call 'GoodFellas' garlic from the 1990 film by Martin Scorsese. 'Uh-huh,' said the chef. 'Where they gotta slice it with a razor blade.' As a Chinese American person myself who grew up on Italian American food on the Northwest Side, the marriage of these flavors was forever fated. And every time Kaplan's family ordered Chinese takeout as a kid, they had to get shrimp toast, she said, 'and everyone fought over it.' At void, it's a full reimagination of the familiar. The wedge, with classic iceberg lettuce, but creamy garlic dressing, includes a market vegetable garnish. I wondered if it was an interpretation of giardiniera, but turns out they're more elemental. 'When you would go to a Chicago Italian American restaurant, it was always like a wedge of tomatoes, some peeled carrots, a slice of cucumber and like one pepperoncini,' said the chef. 'And you always get the creamy garlic dressing.' The cabbage at Void, however, is unlike any other. It's extraordinary, elevating the unlovely side vegetable to be a sculptural main event with an aromatic sear, Caesar dressing, garlic chives, white anchovies, crushed croutons and feathery Parmesan. A spumoni milk punch cocktail asks on the menu, 'is pistachio an aphrodisiac?' Quite possibly, when foamed over a delicious and delicately sweet clarified potion that drinks magically like melted ice cream, but mixed with bourbon, rum and aronia berry liqueur made by their friends at Apologue, now a spirit maker. At Void, Ray has some input on their cocktails, he said, but their main bar supervisor is Guillermo Bravo. Bartender Amanda Figueroa concocted the nonalcoholic Chaotic Good as a complex sippable snow cone in a glass with cold brew espresso, grapefruit, Demerara sugar and No-Lört made by Void. That is, in fact, their own house-made Malört instigated digestif that's an alcohol-free glycerin extraction on several botanicals, the most prominent of which is wormwood, said Ray. 'We were trying to create all of the flavors of the spirit that everyone knows and loves,' he added. 'But with none of the payoff.' Available by the shot and bottle, their slogan is, 'We have successfully removed Malört's only redeeming feature.' It's a throwback to the original era of Jeppson's Malört, when a number of amateur distillers made allegedly medicinal elixirs. 'We're trying to play with nostalgia the same way that the kitchen is,' Ray said. 'And we have a large range of nonalcoholic options in our beverage program, which is one of our cornerstones.' He grew up in Indiana, but started his bar and restaurant career in Tokyo, before working nearly every position at Sepia and eventually managing the day-to-day operations at The Violet Hour. House-made focaccia rounds out the trio of menu mainstays alongside the Spaghetti Uh-O's and wedge salad. Served with olive oil and fermented garlic honey butter, the bread retains its character from an 18-hour fermentation, but I found it a touch too dense. Especially since Kaplan intended the focaccia to act as a little , she said, for that last loving gesture of swiping your plate. Her cannoli cake though captures the flavors of creamy filled shells in an ethereal layered dream. A recent seasonal sundae offered a perfectly petite silver coupe filled with scoops of a gorgeous house-made salted vanilla gelato and blueberry sorbet, topped by crunchy cornbread toffee and drizzled with a golden buttermilk caramel. It's a nostalgic presentation in an age of over-the-top desserts. As is the space, which feels inherited, but was painstakingly reclaimed by the business partners. Hudec and Ray bought the former Moe's Tavern in 2021. But it took 296 days from the time they submitted their plans until the city approved them. They began rebuilding in 2022. 'It was pretty bad,' Hudec said. 'And it took the help of all of our friends who are involved in the trades, and a lot of friends and family.' But the trio designed the distinctive vintage art-filled interior themselves. 'We went to every thrift store within reasonable driving distance,' Hudec said. 'And anything that we really liked with a cool frame came home with us.' Originally from New Jersey, he was most recently the executive chef at Wyler Road, and was previously at The Winchester. Both restaurants closed, in 2024 and 2018 respectively. The latter space became Kasama in 2020. The partners have succeeded in creating their own space that's inviting and inclusive for their exceptional staff and diners alike. On my visits, families with babies sat at tables, before solo smokers sat at the bar after one last cigarette out front. 'We really did want to make a place that we would want to eat at and spend a lot of time at,' Hudec said. 'We all have to work here, so it should be a place that we like to be too, along with everyone else.' Void 2937 N. Milwaukee Ave. 872-315-2199 Open: Tuesday to Thursday from 5 to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday from 5 to 11 p.m.; closed Sunday and Monday Prices: $21 (Spaghetti Uh-O's), $31 (shrimp scampi toast), $27 (eggplant Parm), $29 (sausage), $12 (cannoli cake), $12 (Chaotic Good nonalcoholic drink), $14 (spumoni milk punch cocktail) Sound: OK (65 to 70 dB) Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible with restrooms on same level Tribune rating: Excellent to outstanding, 3.5 of 4 stars Ratings key: Four stars, outstanding; three stars, excellent; two stars, very good; one star, good; no stars, unsatisfactory. Meals are paid for by the Tribune.
Miami Herald
2 hours ago
- Miami Herald
Coral Gables restaurants are luring diners with deals during the slow summer days
Where do you eat when you want a bargain but it's not yet time for Miami Spice? You go to Coral Gables and take part in Taste the Gables Restaurant Month. Throughout the month of July, more than 70 restaurants in the Gables will offer specially priced lunch and dinner menus as well as other promotional deals. The list of participants includes culinary favorites like Niven Patel's Italian restaurant Erba, which was hailed by Esquire magazine as one of the best new restaurants of 2023; Thomas Keller's French Bouchon Bistro; the Michelin-recognized Asian spot Kojin; and the Michelin-starred omakase counter Shingo. You'll also find a couple of Michelin Bib Gourmands on the list, too, like Zitz Sum and Bachour. A Bib Gourmand designates a restaurant with good food that's affordable. Lunch menus starting at $30, while dinners run from $45-$60 for three courses. Belkys Perez, economic development director for the city, said that the program aims to highlight the culinary talent in the area as well as help out restaurants that usually see business drop off during the long, hot Miami summer. 'Taste the Gables gives residents and visitors alike a reason to explore our restaurants, try new flavors and support local businesses during a traditionally slower time of year,' she said. The promotion is also way for restaurants to encourage locals to to try their cuisine. 'We are proud and excited to be part of Taste the Gables and share our Journey of the Hispanic flavors with our community,' said Juan Diego Canahuati, who owns the Latin restaurant Arcano with his wife Nicole. 'There's no better place than this event, where we are celebrating local flavors and culinary artistry, to showcase and give a taste of our passion for pan-Hispanic soul food.' Taste the Gables When: July 1-31 Where: Restaurants throughout Coral Gables List of participating restaurants and menus:
