At Berwyn’s Czech Plaza, when someone orders dumplings with the breaded pork tenderloin, the waitresses don’t bat an eye. “We’re like, ‘Sure, of course!’” says Zdenka Manetti. “But that is absolutely not the way you eat it.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Zdenka was four years old when the family fled Czechoslovakia, seven months after the Soviets tanks rolled over it in 1968. After another half a year in an Austrian refugee camp, they joined a distant great-aunt they’d never met before, who sponsored their immigration here....

Sami Frey and Romy Schneider: mad love or romantic madness? Though less essential than some of the other rediscoveries to play at the Gene Siskel Film Center in the past few months (Moi, Un Noir; Karayuki-San: The Making of a Prostitute), Claude Sautet’s Max et les Ferrailleurs nonetheless has been the most eye-opening for me. As I wrote last month, I hadn’t given much thought to Sautet prior to this revival, but the film pointed to a tough, cynical subtext behind the director’s genteel storytelling that I hadn’t considered before....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Friday from 7-10 PM at Architectural Artifacts (4325 N. Ravenswood), First Slice hosts “Get On the Bus,” a fund-raiser kicking off its new mobile meals program to deliver hot, high-quality meals directly to Chicagoans living on the street. The benefit features wine, beer, and coffee; dishes prepared by local chefs and the First Slice Kitchen; and live music from Cadillac Dave & His Chicago Redhots....

In the name of reform, of course. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Governor Walker wrote that Mayor Emanuel has no choice to impose cuts because the mayor has tried “to reach agreements on benefits cuts with individual unions, though such efforts so far have fallen flat.” But instead he’s getting ready to cut pensions only because he wants to save Chicago from falling off the “fiscal cliff” and becoming another Detroit....

Unfold: A Cultural Response to Climate Change Museum of Contemporary Photography and Glass Curtain Gallery Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » But leave it to a poet to express the true pomposity of the endeavor. Seizing the reins of self-importance, Lemn Sissay rides off into the glaciers declaring, “This was a group of artists wanting to create, battling with ideas in the middle of the sea, dwarfed by icebergs and the possibility of a disappearing planet....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “Conroy would rather I give plaudits to the defense lawyers who pushed the investigations and others who refused to look away from the truth, and while he named many names, I’m afraid I don’t have room, although it should be noted that he gives a lot of credit to former Gov. George Ryan. It was Ryan’s pardons that opened the door to the lawsuits that gave Burge the opportunity to perjure himself, eliminating the statute of limitations problem that had blocked his prosecution....

The Chef: Erling Wu-Bower (The Publican)The Challenger: John Anderes (Telegraph Wine Bar)The Ingredient: Gold leaf Though he’s not really criticizing—”making food look good is very important”—Wu-Bower still isn’t sold on gold, at least not for the Publican. “I think you should garnish with what you have in front of you, what’s in season, what’s local, what’s edible—not metallic.” Le Bernardin, on the other hand? “Eric Ripert is the chef that I respect most on earth, so he can use gold leaf whenever he wants to....

The third Architecture & Design Film Festival runs Thursday through Monday, April 12 through 16, at Music Box, with 31 films screening in 15 different programs. Tickets are $11, with packages available for $45 (five tickets) and $90 (13 tickets). Following are selected films screening; for a full schedule see adfilmfest.com. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Detroit Wild City French filmmaker Florent Tillon calls RoboCop one of his favorite movies, but his 2010 documentary owes little to Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 Motor City dystopia....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » But what New Republic essayist Leon Wieseltier calls “the solipsism of situatedness” rules when New York City itself is bludgeoned. As I noted in a recent Bleader post, Wieseltier’s own reaction to Hurricane Sandy provided a worthy example of this solipsism. He called Sandy only “the most recent of the devastating proofs” of climate change, and thundered that “the repudiation of climate sciences deserves to be universally regarded as intellectually and socially disreputable, the ravings of cranks and the scheming of capitalists at their most contemptible....

The CBF [Chicagoland Bicycle Federation], [35th Ward] alderman Rey Colon, and the city did not communicate effectively about the boulevard biking Sundays to the churches in question–and they didn’t want to or chose to ignore the property owners whose homes, front yards, and gardens will be inundated with noise, people, trash, and the other effects of a big party blowout [“Where Would Jesus Park?” June 22]. I never received any information on this topic, maybe they thought longtime property owners shouldn’t be consulted?...

A lot of my tweets are from when I’m half asleep or drunk or something. In real life, if you say things like, “A long time ago a dog stood up on two legs and got sad and that’s where humans came from,” people kind of dismiss it, or they’re like, “Uh, let’s not talk about this.” There’s not really a point in any conversation to insert that thought, but on Twitter you can just say these little tiny things that don’t have to have any context or introduction....

Keith Major Kenny Garrett Few jazz saxophonists active over the last few decades can match the skills and power of Kenny Garrett, whose talent was spotted early by the likes of Art Blakey, Freddie Hubbard, and, most famously, Miles Davis—all of whom hired him. Yet at the same time, few jazz artists of his ability have made so many spotty recordings, seemingly in search of a distinct sound. Garrett has made some good albums and his most recent effort, Seeds From the Underground (Mack Avenue), contains plenty of highlights, but it’s often felt as if he’s failed to reach his artistic potential....

Ted Cox Stew beef and fixin’s at Redz Park on Paulina just north of Howard Street on a Sunday and you’re likely to be met by two things: the amplified voice of a preacher from inside Christ Covenant Ministries, and the smell of stew chicken wafting from the little storefront two doors down. Open since October, Redz Belizean Restaurant stands in the place of the old Tickie’s Belizean Cuisine, but the recipes remain the same—Tickie, who retired in August, is a family friend of new owner Levi “Red” Perez, and he passed them on along with the business....

[Plus: Michael Gebert on Avondale’s Dragonlady Lounge] KOREAN, PIZZA | LUNCH, DINNER: SEVEN DAYS | OPEN LATE: every night TILL 11 | RESERVATIONS NOT ACCEPTED ASIAN, KOREAN, JAPANESE | DINNER: SUNDAY-MONDAY, WEDNESDAY-SATURDAY | CLOSED TUESDAY | OPEN LATE: MONDAY, WEDNESDAY-SATURDAY TILL MIDNIGHT | RESERVATIONS FOR LARGE GROUPS ONLY ASIAN, KOREAN | LUNCH, DINNER: SEVEN DAYS Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Woo Bok Lee opened his restaurant in 1979, and it stands today as the oldest operating Korean restaurant in the city....

If you were patient enough to wait in the very long line for French specialties at the food expo Chicago Gourmet back in September, you were rewarded with some of the most beautiful, most delicious chocolates made in town today. Filled with smooth spiced pumpkin and white chocolate ganache, the glossy hand-painted bonbons in vibrant shades of orange, yellow, and green were made by Chris Nugent, the executive chef at Les Nomades, where they’re among the mignardises served at the end of meals....

You don’t have to get too far into Kazuo Ishiguro’s brilliant 2005 novel Never Let Me Go to realize it’s hopelessly unfilmable. Strictly speaking the book is science fiction, but that’s not the problem: there are no strange creatures or unknown worlds, and in any case digital technology has already made such fantastic images commonplace in the movies. What blocks Ishiguro’s story from the screen is simple language, precisely chosen and delicately shaped, which creates a sensibility the movie’s talented actors can only approximate....

When Asiel Hardison moved to Los Angeles in 2004—bent on actually making a living as a dancer—he had red dreads. At auditions, he says, “I was wearing my African jewelry, bangles, earrings. I had a bone in my ear, shells in my hair. I was so like: ‘I’m African! It’s my culture! Take me, take me, take me!’ In LA, you hear from casting directors, ‘Give me you. Show me something different....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Tonight’s your last chance to see Jiang Wen’s Let the Bullets Fly before it ends its weeklong run at Facets Multimedia (though if you pass it up in favor of Block Cinema’s free screening of The Home and the World or Doc Films’ revival of Fulltime Killer, I guess I can’t blame you). It’s the most entertaining movie to play Chicago in at least a month, rich in verbal wit, big action sequences, and historical detail—and striking a harmonious balance between all three....

As I type this, a freshly printed NCAA tournament bracket sits six inches away, taunting me. Since the field expanded to 68 teams some three years ago, the college basketball free-for-all has further complicated itself, adding more play-in games to an already dizzying (albeit always fun) onslaught of hoops. Filling out a March Madness bracket year after year—I have to do it, there’s gambling involved—while inevitably picking the wrong 14-seed to pull an upset, and predicting Kansas to go too deep, makes me pine for simpler times....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Pioneering independent filmmaker Nancy Savoca’s 1989 New York wedding comedy True Love, featuring future Sopranos cast members Annabella Sciorra, Aida Turturro, and Vincent Pastore (that’s Gloria, Janice, and Big Pussy respectively) screens at Chicago’s fifth annual celebration of International SWAN Day (Support Women Artists Now), produced by the women’s film organization WITASWAN. True Love was the first feature for Savoca and Sciorra, garnering Independent Spirit Award nominations for both of them, and winning the grand jury prize at the United States Film Festival, the forerunner to Sundance....