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Alex Bentley

Alex Bentley

Associate Editor

Alex Bentley isn’t a Dallas-Fort Worth native, but with all his experience in the area, he’s the next best thing. He received his bachelor’s degree from TCU, and after a five-year sojourn to work for the Florida Marlins in Miami, he returned to the area to get his master’s degree at UNT. Prior to joining CultureMap, he worked for Pegasus News, helping deliver hyper-local news to the internet masses. He uses that experience to make CultureMap the go-to site for everything to see and do in Dallas.

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From the Final Frontier

Star Trek Into Darkness continues rejuvenation of formerly stale franchise

By Alex Bentley

05.18.13 | 9:45 am

The rebooting of Star Trek four years ago by director J.J. Abrams was a much-needed shot in the arm for an endangered franchise. The last film in the series ...


Movie Apocalypse

Oblivion and Tom Cruise deliver a fantastic-looking end of the world

By Alex Bentley

04.20.13 | 3:05 pm

If you fear some kind of forthcoming apocalypse, this is not the year for you to go to the movies. There are multiple films that deal with the end of ...


Goody Two Shoes Again

Adam Ant to stand and deliver Austin concert during massive North American tour

By Alex Bentley

04.10.13 | 8:45 am

For many years, it seemed like '80s singer Adam Ant had dropped off the face of the earth. With a just-announced North American tour that stops in 36 cities, including ...


Mum's the Word

In-demand band Mumford & Sons hits Texas stages this summer

By Alex Bentley

03.26.13 | 9:24 am

Austin fans of the folk rock group Mumford & Sons will be rewarded on June 8 and 9 when the band plays two nights at the Austin 360 Ampitheater alongside Michael ...


Waste of Comedic Talent

Despite the talent, Admission fails to make the grade as a comedy

By Alex Bentley

03.23.13 | 10:59 am

You’d be hard-pressed to find two funnier people in show business than Tina Fey and Paul Rudd. Fey has earned much acclaim for her work on Saturday Night Live ...


R.I.P.

World-renowned pianist Van Cliburn dies at Fort Worth home

By Alex Bentley

02.27.13 | 12:09 pm

Van Cliburn, the legendary pianist whose eponymous competition has been bringing world-class musicians to Fort Worth for more than 50 years, died on Wednesday. He was 78. Cliburn was born ...


The invincible John McClane

Jaw-dropping action can't save A Good Day To Die Hard from its precarious storyline

By Alex Bentley

02.15.13 | 9:18 am

It's been 25 years since Die Hard, labeled by many as the best action movie of all time, catapulted Bruce Willis from middling success on television to movie superstardom ...


Stealing laughs

Melissa McCarthy and Jason Bateman's palpable comedic chemistry carries Identity Thief

By Alex Bentley

02.08.13 | 11:15 am

Since her breakout role in 2011’s Bridesmaids, Melissa McCarthy has been everywhere, it seems. However, that’s been more for her ubiquitous presence at entertainment awards shows than actual ...


Zombie-rrific

Zombies in love: Warm Bodies is unlike any romantic comedy you've ever seen

By Alex Bentley

02.02.13 | 4:59 pm

If you’re going to make a zombie-centric movie at this point, you’d better have something special. Straight-up horror movies are a dime a dozen — and now outdone by ...


He warned us he'd be back

The Last Stand launches Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback by exceeding low expectations

By Alex Bentley

01.19.13 | 9:30 am

When last we saw Arnold Schwarzenegger in a starring role, it was in 2003, with Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, just before he improbably became the governor of California ...


All action and no creativity

Perfunctory action scenes dim the big-name stars in Gangster Squad

By Alex Bentley

01.11.13 | 11:45 am

January is shaping up to be quite a strange month for movie releases. On one hand, you have prestige movies such as The Impossible and Zero Dark Thirty expanding into ...


Hope amid tragedy

Only the tsunami transcends the acting in the visually stunning The Impossible

By Alex Bentley

01.04.13 | 12:30 pm

Making films about horrific events will always be tricky. How soon is too soon? If you’re dealing with actual victims, how personal is too personal? Conversely, if you’re ...


Films you can't miss

Movie mania: The 10 best films of 2012

By Alex Bentley

01.01.13 | 10:37 am

Any end-of-the-year "best of" list should be taken with a grain of salt. Opinions on any art form, but especially movies, vary wildly from person to person. One may think ...


Cover your eyes — and your ears

Oh, the horror! The worst movies of 2012

By Alex Bentley

12.31.12 | 4:00 pm

Almost everybody loves to recount their favorite movies. But it takes a brave soul to remember the worst movies of the year, because those are the types of films you ...


Dream the dream

Magic of Les Misérables lost in translation from stage to screen

By Alex Bentley

12.26.12 | 12:15 pm

Since the dawn of the 21st century, the movie musical has been slowly but surely been making a comeback. The relative failures of films like A Chorus Line and Little ...


Bloody Christmas

Django Unchained entertains, but Quentin Tarantino may have finally taken violence too far

By Alex Bentley

12.24.12 | 11:45 am

Of all the A-list directors working today, Quentin Tarantino seems the least likely to have made it to that lofty spot. Yes, he has a knack for writing snappy dialogue ...


Who needs to get older?

Judd Apatow drags down This Is 40, a depressing, mostly unfunny look at middle age

By Alex Bentley

12.22.12 | 11:46 am

Judd Apatow is such a ubiquitous name in comedy these days that it’s easy to forget what a Johnny-come-lately he is. Aside from a couple of one-offs in the ...


The return of Middle Earth

Peter Jackson meddles too much in the undeniably fun The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

By Alex Bentley

12.14.12 | 9:15 am

In the wake of the massive success of The Lord of Rings trilogy, speculation naturally turned to if and when director Peter Jackson would adapt its prequel, The Hobbit. Nine ...


Classic band alert

Rock band Yes to play unusual, three-album concert at ACL Live in 2013

By Alex Bentley

12.10.12 | 3:56 pm

Austin sees more than its fair share of legendary music acts pass through town, so it takes something a little special to get our undivided attention. Yes, which has been ...


Movie nirvana

Holiday film feast: The 5 most anticipated movies in December

By Alex Bentley

12.08.12 | 2:30 pm

December is the most anticipated month of the year for film lovers. This is when Oscar season kicks into high gear. Strangely, though, 2012 is almost completely devoid of typical ...


All articles by this author.  29 Results. Showing 1 to 20
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