Brewed Fresh Daily

"The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame notwithstanding, Cleveland doesn't have an abundance of celebrities. But it does have one: a quirky cartoonist named Harvey Pekar. Haven't heard of him? Try going to the movies. A film about Pekar, 'American Splendor,' was released recently to wide critical acclaim. But the thing that makes Pekar so interesting is his cynical view of the world around him, including his hometown. That cynicism was on view in a cartoon he drew for the New York Times in late August, the point of which was that Cleveland was an urban wasteland. Local officials were not amused. 'Having someone of his notoriety, an insider, portray his town like that, it's not a good thing,' said the head of the tourism bureau. The mayor was more peeved. 'If people actually came to Cleveland, they'd find out there's a lot more going on than Harvey Pekar seems to know,' she said. It's not just the cartoon that has people upset. There's the movie, too. The good news: It was filmed in in Cleveland, which is good for the economy. The bad news: Cleveland comes off as, well, an urban wasteland. As the Cleveland Plain Dealer put it, the film 'makes great use of the city's hulking factories, aging houses and garbage-strewn sidewalks.' The paper added primly, 'A recruiting film for Cleveland it is not.' But not everyone is distressed by the movie's portrayal. The head of the chamber of commerce, for one, thinks local officials are being too sensitive. 'There are movies about gangs in Los Angeles, but nobody says, don't go to L.A. because of crime or gangs,' he says. Not surprisingly, the director of the Cleveland Film Commission agrees. 'Every Martin Scorsese movie doesn't make New York look great, but it adds to the mythology (of the city) and it employs."