Quantum of Solace 11.14.08

Either this is what happens when one ages or this is a profoundly flawed film. I often have trouble understanding dialogue these days. Thanks to the digital recording device on the television I can up the volume and replay until I either get it or tire of the effort. I do it often enough that I think to it in the movie theater, even the concert hall. Occasionally I imagine using it in dinner conversation...more

Synecdoche, New York 11.07.08

Gifted writer of screenplays for Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, and Eternal SUnshine of the Spotless Mind sits in the directors chair for Synecdoche, New York. Charlie Kaufman irregular mind produces yet another strange story of a small scale theater director suddenly endowed with a genius grant. Freed of the mundane limitations imposed by budget and timelines ...more

Trouble the Water 11.07.08

Surely one of the great ironies of my lifetime will be the election of a black man to the presidency within three years of the time we allowed a major American city and its black population to drown. Countless millions of us watched in horror as our desperate fellow citizens waved banners from rooftops and highway overpasses begging to be saved. Ordinarily cool media anchors broke down on camera or lost control talking to the distant authorities as they listened too long to the insistence that everything that could be done was...more

Secret Life of Bees 10.26.08

I wonder what it means that I remember so few books. I watched a scene from Atonement the other day and was particularly taken by the blocking in the scene where Robbie confronts Briony and Cecilia acts to keep Robbie from striking her sister. I was watching because I had come upon it near the end and couldn't remember the vehicle employed to reveal the awful truth of Robbie and Cecilia's fate. I couldn't remember reading the book at all but I'm told I did. Interesting how much of one's consciousness can be transferred...more

Rachel Getting Married 10.18.08

Anne Hathaway charmed us in The Princess Diaries, worried us when she signed on for its sequel, gave us a hint of her depth in Brokeback Mountain, held her own with Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada and assumes her position in the first tier with her portrayal of a dark and desperate Kym in Rachel Getting Married. I just sat back down after turning down the...more

Vicky Cristina Barcelona 10.11.08

I hate feeling stupid. Especially at the hands of someone who I fear thinks we are all stupid. Just so you won't - Vicky is Rebecca Hall, Cristina is Scarlett Johansson and Barcelona is one of the coolest looking cities on the planet what with all its Goudy architecture. I thought the whole title was someone's name...

Patricia Clarkson (unforgettable in Pieces of April) and Javier Bardem (as a hedonistic artist ...more

Blindness 10.08.08

I think I've always thought we would be better off with women in charge. Women have so much more sense, so much less blind bravado. But patriarchal we are and patriarchal we will likely remain. Not because the latest two samples of women as leaders are so ...more