Desert Blue Quirky, small-town teen-agers discover love under quarantine. A cast of up-and-comers can’t save this movie from the feeling that you’ve seen it all before. Y.C. (2 stars)
Limbo John Sayles explores Alaska in a schizzy tale that starts as an epic and ends, alas, as a claustrophobic, stuck-on-an-island melodrama. D.A. (2 stars)
MUSIC
Sarah McLachlan, ‘Mirrorball’ (Arista) This live CD has the warmth and energy of a mini Lilith Fair. Best cut: the call-and-response “Ice Cream.” V.C. (4 stars)
Red Hot Chili Peppers, ‘Californication’ (Warner Bros.) The title hints at full-on funk, but it’s mostly midtempo mush. Give it a listen, then give it away. D.M.G. (2 stars)
Pavement, ‘Terror Twilight’ (Matador) The cryptic lyrics and Salvation Army sonics that made them classic indie rockers–except this time they’re in tune. A.D. (3 stars)
Andreas Scholl, ‘Heroes’ (Decca) The German countertenor lends his sweet, trumpetlike voice to arias by Handel, Gluck, Mozart and Hasse. D.G. (4 stars)
BOOKS
The First World War (Knopf), by John Keegan. An enormously readable and learned narrative history charting the folly and bloodshed of the Great War–and how a conflict whose origins no one can explain gave us the modern world. J.M. (4 stars)
