Where Franz Ferdinand Got Their Name 10.23.09
World War II has been described as the most destructive war in the history of mankind. The holocaust, wholesale destruction of many of Europe's finest cities by aerial bombardment and the horror of nuclear devastation testifies to the accuracy of this judgement.
The war with a far greater political, cultural, and psychic record of destruction took place twenty-five years earlier. The Great War swept away the European enlightenment of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and laid the groundwork for the totalitarianism that made the Second and Cold Wars not only possible but inevitable. Even more tragically, the Great War wrenched from mankind's tenuous grasp the optimism that prevailed at the turn of the century and thrust into our clenched and bloody fists a pessimism and hopelessness that haunts us still today. more
Service in a Service Economy 10.07.09
With the fourth carload of stuff delivered to Goodwill I declined a receipt. The fellow there was quite pleasant and must have seen me as singularly responsible for global warming and the glut of consumer waste foisted upon the rural Chinese so desperate for any form of income they will boil the lead from circuit board welds with the hot plate I donated two moves ago.
We're not really moving this time, only vacating temporarily while...more
Films In Current Release
Up In the Air 12.28.09
Everyone but me seemed to like this one. Of course George Clooney (Ryan Bingham) is magnetic, Vera Farmiga an unappreciated gift to the art, Anna Kendrick lit up the screen, and the screenplay was as crisp as Reitman's directing but I never believed any of the characters. Living for miles, really? Those airport clubs... more
The Hurt Locker 12.27.09
The Hurt Locker begins with a quote about war as drug. The soldiers we follow are a particular kind of warrior. They defuse bombs, the weapon of choice in our current two wars. Current two wars. How accustomed we've become to that phrase. Last month no Americans died in Iraq and more died in Afghanistan that any month since our invasion of that country nearly a decade ago. A measure of how far we have to go as a people ... more
Avatar 12.19.09
Where to begin? The longest cartoon ever, yet another loving family of natives pillaged by the marauding white man in his quest for gold, oil, nee unobtainium (are you kidding me - unobtanium?!), the pure heart triumphs over mechanized evil with the aid of the creatures of the forest, ... more
The Road 11.27.09
A few years ago a tropical storm popped up in the Gulf and drifted slowly over Houston. Houston is as flat a piece of land as you're likely to see outside Bonne- of Jackson- ville. Houston sits about sixty miles inland from the Gulf of Mexico at an elevation of about sixty feet. For every fifteen hundred steps you take toward Houston from the Gulf you can take one step up. Really, really flat. The landscape is littered... more
A Serious Man 11.15.09
A friend observed how pleased she was that car manufacturers solved the radio theft problem. Praise God, I responded. Yes, she said, aren't you glad God has begun to address the car alarm problem? If only he would solve that starving children thing so I could watch my shows without having to look at those dreadful images... more
Films On DVD
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince 08.03.09
We're almost done, thank goodness. It will be a decade when Part Two of the final book is finally in theaters. The sequels and spinoffs will likely begin then as the last few dollars are wrung from Rowling's books. Books. Soon to go the way of Dumbledore. ... more
Born in 1968 07.28.09
Does what comes come from what came? Oliver Martineau and Jacques Ducastel appear to answer this question in the affirmative in their nearly three hour epic tale of two generations of French gentle folk whose lives span the forty years from the Paris riots of 1968 to the election of Nicolas Sarkozy.
"Born in 1968" begins with the Sorbonne riots of 1968 and follows the trajectory of French politics from the repressive post-war DeGaulle to the Socialist Mitterand to... more
The Reader 12.30.08
The two women in front of me in line were each buying tickets to two films, The Reader and Slumdog Millionaire. I was bracketed by ticket buyers for the seniors only showing of Slumdog Millionaire two weeks ago when I went to see The Day the Earth Stood Still. Now I was behind two ladies discussing the qualifications for senior status with the college student behind the window. The third member of their group ran up and breathlessly explained ... more
Watchmen 03.15.09
I had a friend, or a colleague, or really a co-worker, once, years ago when we lived in LA. We actually lived in Long Beach, well, initially Signal Hill, which is inside Long Beach which is south of Los Angeles and north of Newport Beach. Few people will admit residency in Los Angeles when a claim can be made for Malibu or Naples or any of the dozens of tony and not-so hamlets that comprise the southern California... more
Sunshine Cleaning 04.03.09
Amy Adams is perfect for the role of the once popular cheerleader reduced to positive affirmations taped to the mirror. She was very nearly that woman. A few years ago she was on the verge of giving up on acting. And then came Junebug and ... more