George Washington marks the stunning debut of David Gordon Green, 24, a writer and director of rare grace and feeling. The plot has nothing to do with our bewigged first president. George (Donald Holden) is a thirteen-year-old black boy living in a multiethnic town in North Carolina. He hangs with a handful of friends around a rusted-out railroad station. The film is narrated by Nasia (Candace Evanofski) in a style that evokes the Linda Manz voice-over in Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven. Nasia, who has just broken up with Buddy (Curtis Cotton III), sees quiet George as a romantic hero. It's a sharp contrast to the relationship between beefy Vernon (Damian Jewan Lee) and Sonya (Rachael Handy), a blond twig of a girl who helps Vernon steal a car. During a game, one of the kids is accidentally killed. A decision is made to hide the body, and Green focuses on how that decision affects the lives of the kids. Using nonprofessional actors and mostly improvised dialogue, Green creates a dreamlike evocation of youth — the delicacy of Ted Orr's widescreen camerawork is extraordinary — that is shattered by a pressing need for maturity. At times, the film recalls River's Edge and Kids as well as Days of Heaven, but, in essence, Green has created a work of startling originality that will haunt you for a good, long time.

“1999”

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.