Chimes of Freedom : The Songs of Bob Dylan

Last Tuesday Amnesty International released a benefit album which contained 75 covers of Bob Dylan songs. This should be a good fundraiser for Amnesty and certainly should provide significant amounts of press play and publicity which is something Amnesty certainly needs.

In our house we were very much looking forward to this collection. I have a very strong predisposition for cover songs. I have a friend who does not like live versions as he likes to hear the song as he first heard it on the radio and thus covers completely shake his world. For me I think a new interpretation of a song you love is always nothing less than interesting and sometimes can be amazing.

Bob Dylan is an amazing songwriter. Often critics in the past have conceded this point and said but if he just had someone else sing the songs but this album at least for me proves what we might not have believed. We want Dylan to sing these songs. They are what they are not just because of the lyrics but because Bob is singing them.

In a collection of seventy five songs there are going to be some hits and most likely even more misses. In this collection I would not classify that many songs as misses as just being in the words of Simon Cowell " forgettable." The fact is that at least for me it is hard to make a Dylan song better without Dylan in it.

There are some songs that work very well however. First on my list is the song that starts the collection. A version of One Too Many Mornings with the vocal from Johnny Cash and Dylan, and added vocals from The Avett Brothers. This has been my song of the week. This is the song I play each day and am singing when I am not. My kids are tired of it though my youngest daughter plays along and agrees that it is neat how they put the Avett's in with Cash's voice.

Pete Townsend does justice to Corinna, Corinna and Diana Krall offers a lovely take on Simple Twist of Fate. Ziggy Marley gives a reggae twist to Blowin' in the Wind that works, while New Jersey's Gaslight Anthem rocks Changing of the Guard. My Morning Jacket offers up Your a Big Girl Now and Jim James voice works as well.

Miley Cyrus offers up a surprising success on her version of Your Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go. It is quite good. Jack's Mannequin does well on Mr Tambourine Man. The best song on the second disc is Jackson Browne with Love Minus Zero/No Limit. Browne's version works on all levels.

The third disc does not offer much but it does hold the highlight of the album. Not just the highlight but the shockingly effective highlight. The highlight that in now way could have been predicted. Keisha the pop slut princess of the moment known for songs like Tick Tock sings a version of Don't Think Twice It's Alright that is at least for a music fan earth shattering. Recorded on Garage Band at her home, and kept as the recording because it ended up being so powerful, this girls sings from so far down her heart that she is hollow. She ends up crying and as she pauses by verse you can hear her sniffing her tears and runny nose away. This might be contrived but it does not feel like it. It is amazing.

On Side Four there are more winning entries. Mick Hucknall actually sounds a bit like Dylan on his version of One of Us Must Know, Micheal Franti puts a pop reggae spin on Subterrean Homesick Blues, and a band I have never heard of called We Are Augustus takes on Mama, You've Been on My Mind and does very well.

Lastly of note Kris Kristofferson's version of Quinn the Eskimo, his sigh on the intro is more meaningful than have the singers songs on the album and Pete Seeger who is I believe over 90 sings Forever Young and with his age and his history it is a success.

What doesn't work? It is not so much that a song does not work as it just does not add much. Sting's version of Girl From the North Country and Lenny Kravitz doing a take on Rainy Day Women, neither work for me. They both sound like almost every song they have done and just sound like bad takes on the originals. Sugarland, Flogging Molly and Sinead O' Connor do not do well on their takes as well. Flogging Molly sounds like all other Flogging Molly but Blowin in the Wind does not sound very strong through and Irish lilt.

Dave Matthews and Adele have their well known live versions of All Along the Watchtower and To Make You Feel My Love. These work but I did not rate them as they are not new material.

All in all I love Spotify, it gives one the chance to hear them all without a twenty dollar investment. I know, I know it was for a good cause to spend the money. But I did listen all week, Spotify must pay royalties. Listen to Keisha the next time your feeling blue. Just stay away from window ledges when you do.

Politcally Incorrect

Bill Maher has returned for another season of his HBO show. Maher is well known for his pro pot, anti religion, can you believe these guys on the right, sense of humor.

At times I find him quite funny but at other times I think that he, like most current comedians, lean on crudity and lewdness in exchange of well worded humor.

Still Maher does have good guests, usually a wide range of entertainers, politicians and others. Most of his guests are from the left side of the spectrum but not all and those from the right who go on deserve extra credit for being willing to suffer Maher's gaze.

This is a worthy show. One I enjoy. Still anyone who thinks what he is doing is harder than what comedians who have to work inside boundaries and still be funny would be wrong. The more lines are around you the harder it is to be funny. Bill Maher's success at what he does should make us appreciate the Jon Stewart's and David Letterman's even more.

Big Love The Final Season

We have watched the first four episodes of Season Five. This series seems to be stronger than it has been recently. We can be sure that there will never be a day of relaxation for Bill Henrickson. Still portryaing him as a victim of racial discrimination is an intersting take on his situation.

Chloe Sevigny, all the wives including Genifer Goodwin and Jeanne Tripplehorn are especially strong this year. This show is ending very strong.

Game of Thrones Season One Conclusion

Of course this series was on last spring and ended long ago, in fact Season Two begins in just a couple of months in April later this spring.

My wife and I have just caught up, just having watched the series over the last month. I must say that this is a Fantastic series. With the exception of needing a diagram in the first few episodes to try to figure out all of the characters and their relationship this is one of the most engrossing shows one would find.

We were rivited. As the season drew to a close each episode ended with something that was not just eventful but shocking and for those of us who had not read the books, surprising.

We saw the Kaleesi's brother given a liquid crown of molten gold, we saw the Lord Ned Stark betrayed and decapitated and in the final episode the biggest shock of all. When Khalesi walked into the burial fire that was a surprise. When we see her sitting naked in the embers of the fire that was a surprise. When we see that the dragons eggs she had placed in her husbands burial pyre have hatched three baby dragons who are clinging to her I was floored.

I cannot wait for Season Two

Dinner for Schmucks

We watched this movie last night on HBO. About thirty minutes in I said to my wife that this movie was not that funny. We stuck with it and in the end were rewarded. The movie itself was not great. The cast however was strong and in the case of Steve Carell and Zak Galifinakas exceptional.

Paul Rudd plays Tim Conrad an ambitous business executive who is trying to get ahead. Looking for a promotion he brings an Swiss client into the business and offered a promotion. Still for the promotion he must take part in a Dinner for Winners. The purpose of this dinner when it becomes apparent is to bring the biggest idiot to supper. Tim's girlfriend a museum curator is against this idea.

Pondering all this Tim runs into, literally, Barry Speck played by Steve Carell. Speck accidentally sabotages his relationship with his girlfriend and his business dinner with his potential client. Still Tim knows that Barry is a good person and develops an affection for him.

In the end everything turns out the way one would like but there are many detours on the way. Galifinakas plays Barry Speck's fellow IRS employee and arch competitor and as in all of his roles is over the top and scene stealing.

Every Day a Friday by Joel Osteen

Reading a Joel Osteen book is like talking to your Mom. He tells you many things that you already know. He places the information in the form of stories that illustrate the point.

Osteen's brand of religion is positive. Some call it prosperity Christianity. I am not sure that I agree with all he says, particularly in regards to God wanting you to have that your heart desires as long as you give him the credit.

That said however I think Osteen's message can be life changing. When you read his advice and talks about how one should act you find yourself filling in the people in your lives. The people that are negative and complain who, in Osteen speak, have lost their joy. Contrasting that with those people who are positive and one knows that we always have a choice.

Osteen talks about how we always have a choice in how we react to a situation. How we can always see something positive. He talks about if you live in a house that is too small that one should be thankful for having a house. If one has a job they do not like they should be happy they have a job.

As I said these are all things we know in our head. Osteen talks about the fact that there will always be somebody richer, stronger and prettier than you. He stresses that we should always be the best we can but that we must run our own race, not someone else's.

It is hard to describe all the times I, in reading this book, nodded my head and agreed with Osteen's writing. This is a great book. I would buy ten copies of this and give one to my friends and family. The best self help book I have ever read.

Sometimes we just need to be reminded of what we already know.

5 Short Stories by Kurt Vonnegut

I have never been a big fan of Kurt Vonnegut. I have found his stories to be a little too farcical for me. Slaughterhouse Five is considered a great story but my attempts to read it have never gotten very far.

Still I was pleasantly pleased with a few short stories that I was able to download for free from IBooks. These too were out there and certainly not as much flesh and bone stories. There is not a sense of realism in Vonnegut stories but these were interesting.

The first story I read was The Big Trip Up Yonder. This story takes us to a future where no one dies. Anti-Gerasone is a medicine that has been developed allowing the aging process to start. Gramps is the head of his family which gets larger and larger as no one dies. How he deals with the crowd in his house is told.

In 2 B R O 2 B Vonnegut takes us to a world that is overpopulated. In order to to deal with this the worlds population has been set to a fixed rate. What this means is that in order to have a child one has to find a volunteer to die. What a Dad has to do when his wife gives birth to triplets is seen.

Where I Live is a nice little story tells about the town of Barnstable on the Cape where Vonnegut lived part of the year.

Who Am I this Time tells of a small town play company.

Best of all is the story of Harrison Bergeron. I recognized it from having read it in college. The story tells of another time in the future where equality is the most important element in life. If one is beautiful they must wear masks, if graceful they wear weights, if intelligent they must wear devices which blast into their ear so that they cannot ponder anything too long. George and Hazel are a married couple living in this time and watching television one night see a man try to take off his handicaps and start people to think for themselves. They do not comprehend that it is their son Harrison, a 7 foot tall genius with amazing strength. How Harrison is dealt with by society is shown.

The futuristic writings are interesting. In small doses. They are a good example of much of his writing. I am not sure a full novel told along these lines would hold me, but these were interesting.

Tommy Boy

Do you have any movies that just make you laugh. Not just the first time you see them but each time. This movie starring Chris Farley and David Spade is that movie for me. It is silly. It is certainly not possessing of much to improve ones intellect.

It is however very funny. Farley's brand of physical humor either plays well or it does not. As much depends on the viewer and his sense of humor.

In the movie Farley plays Tommy Callahan. After graduating from Marquette in just seven years he returns home to work for the family business Callahan Auto Parts. His Dad Tom Callahan Jr installs Tommy the third, Tommy Boy, as an executive. He also introduces him to his new wife to be Beverly Barish played by Bo Derek. She has brought her brother Paul to the company as well. Played delightfully by Rob Lowe we soon find out she is not his sister but that they are lovers, con artists looking to steal half the company by marrying big Tom.

Everything changes when Big Tom dies. To save the company Tommy Boy along with his Dads assistant Richard, a hugely funny David Spade, embark on a trip to sell half a million brake pads to convince the bank that the business remains viable.

Tommy is not a good salesperson. He is clumsy and cannot say the right thing. Some of the scenes have become iconic. The road scene with the car being destroyed and perhaps best of all the airplane scene always make me laugh.

In the end we have a happy ending. And Tommy Boy is a hero. The final scene with Tommy on a becalmed lake talking to his Dad and hoping for a breeze is actually pretty moving for a movie that had been so silly. Just to show we should not be too serious even about that in the end Tommy is hit on the head by the sail when the wind grabs it. That works too.

I love this movie.

Fix You by Young at Heart

It is hard to describe how powerful the versions of songs recorded by this group of elderly citizens. They have become very famous and well known.

This is one of the most powerful performances I have ever seen. You cannot feel anything but lifted after seeing this.

Find it on the web. Watch it when you are feeling discouraged. You will not be any longer.

Almost President by Scott Farris

Scott Farris has written a book advocating the long term importance of many losing Presidential candidates. In this book Farris opines that several of the losers have had a much stronger impact on the national discourse than that of many men who actually won the Presidency. While I do not agree with all the figures mentioned I believe his case is a strong one. The book also provides brief biographies of each of these figures.

Henry Clay, called the Greatest Legislator of his time is the first to have his career reviewed. Abraham Lincoln's hero, Andrew Jackson's great nemesis, Clay was the nominee three time. Named the Great Compromiser for his efforts to keep the country from sliding into Civil War three times Clay's status is well deserved. He had some horrible luck as well. Losing on election when electors from one state missed the convention, and in a snit refusing the Vice Presidency from William Henry Harrison. When he died one month into this term John Tyler became President.

Stephen Douglas, known for the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates with Lincoln in 1958 should also be remembered as the Democratic candidate for President in 1960 who purposely made the choice to blow up his own party by campaigning in the South against secession and secessionist thought. By keeping the Democratic party alive in the North and loyal, he allowed for there to be honest dissent and not totalitarian rule during the war. Indeed Lincoln facing reelection in 1964 had to defeat a Democrat, namely General George McLellan. Misguided as Douglas's Kansas-Nebraska act was he did believe that popular sovereignty would make the states eventually free without the edict of the Federal government leaving a sour taste.

William Jennings Bryan gave one of the most famous convention speeches ever, The Cross of Gold speech in 1896. While losing against the moneyed interests of the East Bryan was a man whose social agenda was way ahead if it's time and was seen as the floor of the New Deal and other liberal programs. A great orator , Bryan had his luster dampened by his taking part in the Scopes Monkey trial. Bryan did not surely believe the Bible as the written word of God but he did believe that loss of the power of religion would lesson the message of his social gospel.

Al Smith is shown as a very strong Governor, perhaps even more so than FDR who followed him in the Governor's chair in New York and won the Presidency 8 years after Smith lost in 1924. The extent of the anti Catholic bigotry shocks the modern reader. Still Smith set the precedent for JFK to follow.

Thomas Dewey the Republican nominee in 44 and, disastrously, in 1948, is shown to be a fantastic Governor, and a man who was really very modern. A man that was a better Governor than he was a candidate Dewey had the misfortune of becoming a caricature of himself. Still his social agenda as a Democrat was very modern, a precursor to what some call the last liberal President who just happened to be Richard Nixon.

The fact that the liberalism of Richard Nixon can be discussed and with a straight face shows that sometimes labels mean nothing.

Adlai Stevenson rant twice for President as the nominee against Eisenhower. Adlai was for many of the Eastern establishment the ultimate candidate. Intelligent, affluent, wordy and effusive Stevenson was a brilliant man. Many also feel however that his candidacy, the first with widespread television coverage, was the beginning of the Democrats loss of the average middle class American worker as Stevenson was perceived by some to be too brainy, too much of an egghead. Still losing two elections can make you a martyr. There was a whole generation of Democrats who raised in the fifties who felt that Adlai was the greatest man of his generation.

Barry Goldwater and George McGovern were both derided as almost killing their party with their far right and far left losses in 1964 and 1972 but most historians now give them both credit for modernizing their parties and setting them up for later victories.

Goldwater gets more direct credit for the later Republican revolution but McGovern choice to reach out to women and minorities framed what might have been the only constituency that could allow the Democrats to still be a national force at that time.

This is not a great book. Farris writes in a clunky way. As a resource for getting a brief picture of historical figures you might want to read more about however the book serves a good purpose

Fail Safe

This 1964 movie directed by Sidney Lumet was adapted from the book of the same name. Produced at the height of the cold war and released just a couple of years after the Cuban Missile Crisis the movie tapped into a serious fear of the potential not only of nuclear war but the potential for accidental nuclear war.

Henry Fonda who might have been one of the more underrated actors of his generation stars as the President. As the movie begins the Strategic Air Command in Omaha is being toured by a Congressman. Concurrently Political Scientist Walter Matthau, a known hawk even on the subject of nuclear war, is attending a meeting at the Pentagon. Against this backdrop an unidentified object is picked up on radar approaching the United States. the object soon appears as a plane off course and the warnings are ceased. Near Alaska however a bomber squadron has a malfunction in their radio's and gets an inaccurate message advising them to proceed past the Fail Safe point and drop their bombs on Moscow.

This creates a catastrophe. The pilots trained to expect tricks once their mission starts do not listen to requests to turn back. The Russian President after being convinced of the story of this being accidental still has to deal with hawks in his cabinet who feel that Russia should attack. On the United States side much the same occurs, with many generals advocating taking this accident and making it a pretense to finish the Russians off.

The President holds firm and as means to preventing full out nuclear war comes up with a solution to convince the Russians of our innocence that will shock you.

This is a very good,suspenseful movie. One can only imagine how somebody felt in 1964 watching it.

George Harrison: Living in the Material World

This Martin Scorsese directed biopic appeared in two parts on HBO last fall. As part of the new feature HBO GO I watched this on my Ipad this weekend.

Scorsese appears to be the leader in this type of movie as he continues to do these type of biopics on musical performers. This is a very well done show. It compares well with the Beatles Anthology that we saw years ago while focusing on George himself.

Harrison's interest in Eastern relgions is well documented. His relationship with Ravi Shankir was long and prosperous. His relationship with Eric Clapton and Patty Boyd and the whole Layla mess is shown in detail.

Outside of that however we see much about Harrison's musical career. It was very interesting to note that All Things Must Pass was the most successful of the Beatles first solo albums. Harrison had a stockpile of material. While Something and Here Comes The Sun highlighted Abbey Road the fact is that there was not much room for Harrison's material on The Beatles albums. Thus he was well prepared.

Harrison was a conflicted individual. As much as he embraced religion and explored Eastern ideas he also had a long and large experience with drugs. His concert for Bangladesh was the first large scale charity concert yet he was embroiled in many lawsuits with his fellow Beatles.

As we look at Harrison's later career his time with The Traveling Wilbury was a highlight. It is hard to think about a band with Harrison, Dylan, and Tom Petty. What an amazing group that was.

Harrison died too young. In watching the movie one will see perhaps the most interesting Beatle as he was very hard to paint. When Ringo breaks into tears when talking about the last time he was with George it is hard not to choke up yourself. Harrison was a strong character in our time.

Pulp Fiction

This Quentin Tarantino movie from 1994 established him as one of the hottest directors around. The movie, something between a gangster, crime noir, camp sendup all with a modern nineties twist, is crazy good.

Told in a series of vignettes that are shown out of order the movie features dialogue that just goes on and on. Soliloquoy;s on religion, drugs, and pop culture are just a few of the sojourns the characters take.

The acting is fierce. First and formeost this movie is known as the movie that revitalized the career of John Travolta. Travolta whose career went on a ten year dip is so strong in this role. It is impossible to take your eyes off the screen when he is on it.

A short synopsis of the movie is hard to give. I will try. As the movie begins two small time robbers are eating breakfast at a diner when they decide to rob it. As they stand up to announce the robbery the opening credits role.

Then we join Jewels, played by Samuel L Jackson and the aforementioned Travolta as Vincent Vega. Jewels and Vega two hit men are on their way to a job and discuss Vega's recent three year trip to Europe. They then enter a house and steal a case, or retake a case, that belongs to their boss. In the process a few people get shot.

Then we meet the Boss Marcellus as he gives a large amount of money to Bruce Willis who plays Buddy Coolidge. Coolidge, a boxer, is being paid to take a dive.

From there we have an incredible scene with Travolta's Vega taking Marcellus's girl on a date. Uma Thurman is captivating, enchanting and lots of other adjectives even when she overdoses.

Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Roseanna Arquette, and in a memorable one scene performance Christopher Walken also appear in this movie.

This is a bueatifully shot movie. It is violent, gory and has more twelve letter curse words than any movie I have seen. With all that it is a very strong movie.

There Will Be Blood

This 2007 movie by Paul Anderson was rated by many sources to be the greatest movie of the first decade of this century. Starring Daniel Day Lewis as an oilman at the turn of the last century, and in particular his dealings with a community who he is attempting to gain the oil rights in the movie is ambitious.

Lewis himself won the Oscar for Best Actor. Still, surprising to me, this was not a movie that grabbed me. It was not a movie that I even finished. I had a very hard time understanding the dialogue. Lewis used an accent that to be made all the words hard to understand.

I do believe that this is a movie that I will try again someday. It must be a good movie and perhaps with better concentration or even closed captioning I can follow better. For now I cannot give it a good rating. I do believe Lewis does a a great job in his role, he is the oilman Plainview but the movie itself does not sell to me.

Shenandoah

This 1965 movie stars Jimmy Stewart. There might not be an actor that I enjoy more than Jimmy Stewart. Stewart plays Charlie Anderson, a Virginia widower with six sons. Living an idyllic, yet lonely without his wife, life running the family farm Charlie Anderson wants to keep his sons out of the Civil War.

Watching this movie one sees several people that are faces you recall from other TV shows. There is Dabs Greer and Kevin Hagen later to be Reverend Alden and the Doctor on Little House on the Prairie. Denver Pyle, later to be Uncle Jesse on the Dukes of Hazzard and John Wayne's oldest son Patrick Wayne also appear.

The story itself is fairly predictable. Charlie Anderson, somehow, inexplicably so, has managed to get through four years of the civil war in Virginia with no damage to his home or his family. Still he is facing pressure from his community as to why his sons are not in the war.

Eventually the family does become, against their will, in the war. The youngest son having been mistaken for a Confederate Soldier is taken prisoner. Anderson decides to go looking for him and on the way more heartache is in store.

Oscar worthy the movie is not. Still the scenery is nice and Jimmy Stewart is worth the price of admission for any movie he is in. Interestingly the anti war sentiment was thought to be a correlation to Vietnam but the timing of 1965, when the war was widely supported and Stewart's stalwart Conservative record makes it unlikely he would have knowingly particpated in a movie with such an obvious corralary.

Worth watching.

Arcade Fire on PBS

I have been familiar with the band Arcade Fire for the last few years. I have not heard much of the music but when listening have found it intersting but tough to appreciate. Still when I saw that they were to appear on Austin City Limits I Tivoed it.

The performance was amazing. The vocals were a bit muddy in the mix and the singer, Win Butler, does not sing in such a way to make his vocals perfectly audible. Even now after watching the show twice I can only say by name a few of the songs. Starting Now, Haiti, Keep the Car Running are three I know.

The show itself was something to behold. A band with so many members the stage was crowded. Band members playing different instruments or in some cases multiple instruments in each song. A girl who is a part time lead singer, a harmonizer, a drummer and player of other various instruments. A dude who looks like he might be Win Butler's brother as I know there are two Butler's in the band who plays the keyboards, drums and in one memorable song the tree. No lie, he runs around stage with a tree beating it on things.

I do not know if the music is sit at home listening music. I do not know if I would really even buy the albums, I do know that if the band ever appeared close enough to go see I would be there in a minute. I have not seen a band perform with that much energy and excitement in a long,long time.

Bill Cosby on Jimmy Fallon

Last night I was reading late in the living room. My son joined me about 12:30 as he had been preparing for finals. As per normal when David Letterman was over I switched over to NBC and Jimmy Fallon.

A great night to see the show as Bill Cosby was the guest. Cosby must be at least 75 now and he looks like one of those men whose features have never stopped growing. Cosby is a large man. He has big hands, a big head, big ears and an enormous nose. And he still may be the funniest man on the planet.

Cosby features are stretchable like the jello he used to do advertisements for. Last night Cosby told a routine about joining the army, and the horrors of basic training and how they fueled his desire for education. Having not been a good student as he passed through high school this was a challenge for him.

The fact is that Cosby can talk about anything and be funny. Fallon in his role as Superfan which comes so naturally to him appeared as excited, perhaps more so, than you or I would be.

Perhaps the best part of the performance was that my son watched it with me. Cosby, who works clean, made my son laugh. His exposure to Cosby is mostly in passing and of the famous Bill Cosby. Last night my son learned how funny a person could be just being funny. No profanity, no insulting, just simple stories told in a way that made them fall down funny.

Cosby is a legend for all the right reasons. Anytime he is scheduled to be on television we would all be wise to watch.

We Take Care of Our Own by Bruce Springsteen

Christmas has come and gone. It is cold outside and in this drafty house none too warm inside. It feels like it will never be warm again. It is hard to be positive and look to better, warmer days.

Fortunately we now have a precursor of good things to come. Today we hear the first single from the soon to be released, on March 6th, Bruce Springsteen album. My wife and I have already been discussing if we think he will get close enough for us to see him and what venue he might play. We saw him three years ago at The Comcast Center in Foxboro and although our seats were not as close as we might have wished one can never really complain about a Springsteen show.

On this first single Springsteen sounds like, well Springsteen. For all the talk of his working with a new producer, a Pearl Jam drummer and other new influences this song does not stray too far from what one expects. I listened to it twice on first lesson and the song has a strong intro and Bruce is serious, almost drawing a line in the sand, stating that We Take Care of Our Own.

Of course his argument could be the contrast between the songs title and what is happening in many places in the country. If this is another socially concious album then this first single does nothing to dissipate that rumor.

New Bruce can never live up to old Bruce. It is just impossible for him to get to the level of intensity he had years ago and his core fans will never like new music like the songs that are in their DNA from the last 30 to 40 years. Still it is a holiday when Bruce gives us anything new and this song, this album, and this tour gives us lots to look forward to on a cold winter's night.

Hell on Wheels Season One Finale

So now we are ten episodes, one season into Hell on Wheels. At times we saw promise. Still the sum total of ten episodes was nothing. Bohannon is on the run. Elam, played by Common is feeling like he might have a future and alienating everyone in the process. The young whore with the marked face wants someone to treat her special. Durant wants Bohannon gone so he can have a path to the dead photographers wife. The Irish brothers are leading the merchants in a tarring and feathering of The Swede. The Swede, the character with the best chance to be truly rememberable has now been defeated too many times to be anything more than a rat behind the chaos.

Perhaps I will try it again when, if, it returns. However a show advertised as a Western really was far from it. Characters were interesting. Certainly the minister's beheading of the Army Captain was one scene that will stay with you. The show just feels like it could have been more, in the end, not much happens. Kind of a waste.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

This is another of the movies that I have often heard references to but somehow have never seen this movie. The combined star power of Paul Newman and Robert Redford in itself make this movie something special.

In 1969 when this movie was made Newman was one of the greats and Redford sporting a bushy mustache and long hair was as handsome in a sixties kind of way as could be.

Based on real events, and as stated on the screen at the beginning of the movie, the events are mostly true. Paul Newman plays Butch Cassidy, described as an affable bank robber. He never has shot anybody, he does not want to and he tries not to hurt anybody. He says that he has been robbing banks for years but never has any money. He is reminded by Etta Place, the schoolteacher involved with The Sundance Kid, played by Katherine Ross that it is most likely because he likes to eat well, drink well and carouse too much. He admits that much is true.

The Sundance Kid is a wry, slow moving , crack shot ( when he is moving) who tells Butch to do the thinking as that is what he is good at.

In another life these two would be good old boys, racing cars, hanging out at the tracks. In the late eighteen hundreds they were as they said destined to be bank robbers. Sundance said he does not know how to farm and when discussing any other way to make a living Newman mentions in a very twentieth century way that the hours are terrible. In short they are lazy.

In the movie, tired of their consistent robbing the President of The Union Pacific hires a crack lawman and an Indian Scout to catch them. Faced with potential capture, or worse being shot they along with Etta flee to Bolivia.

As they begin robbing banks again we see their humorous attempts to be understood in their broken Spanish. In Bolivia the Yanquees Bandito's become well known. In the end spotted in a town they pass through they are surrounded. After both being shot but not in a fatal way they are preparing to make a getaway and head to Australia. Australia being a wonderful place for bank robbing as Butch tells him, much as he had promised Bolivia as a similar land of milk and honey, they head out the door and shot ends.

We know what happens to them.

Paul Newman has the definition of charm in this movie. Wry with a dry sense of humor his character is a great hit. Redford too shines.

This is a period piece. The sepia tones fade out as the movie begins and then freeze on our heroes as the movie ends. In between we see a time and place and a way of life fading away. This is not a great movie, I think the star power brought it more acclaim that it deserved. It is however a very good movie.

Antigone by Sophocles

In continuance with my tradition of reading the books that my children are assigned I last night read Antigone. My daughter in her advanced English class was assigned this in seventh grade which seemed a little extreme to me.

Still when I read the story and commented on it to my wife, my daughter filled in all the blank spaces and clearly had got a great deal out of the book. She has a brand new teacher in her first assignment for English this year and certainly she has applied some new ideas and the class is learning a great deal.

The story is pretty simple but still timeless. In the story which is preceded in time by the story Oedipus Rex, Oedipus has discovered he has married his mother and so after the mayhem when he discovers his marriage and having a child with Jocosta his mother his kingdom is ruled by Creon. His daughter by his mother Antigone defies his ruling that her brother Polynices who died in battle with his onw brothe, Antigone's too, have his body left on the plain to rot denying him proper burial.

Antigone, following the main projection of the story, decides to follow what she perceives as divine law rather than mans law and thus buries her brother. Eventually this leads to her admitting her crime, not apologizing and being sentenced to death. Her admirier is Creon's son who fails to convince his father that his punishment is not the right thing.

In the end a traditional tragedy. Interestingly long before Jesus walked the Earth we have a story in which the choice between mans law and divine law is contrasted.

A very good story. A story that could be made into a movie today.

The Making of the President 1960 by Theodore H White

This book has long been considered one of the seminal writings on American politics. Theodore White documented the 1960 campaigns of Nixon and Kennedy as well as their challengers for their respective parties nominations.

White, who I have been reading about in the David Halberstam book The Powers That Be, began as a journalist in with Time magazine under Henry Luce. His writing and book on China made him famous.

This book started a new chapter in his life. Later he wrote similar books about the 64, 68, and 1972 elections.

Perhaps it is because I have read several books on Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and the major players in the 1960 election. I am not sure why. This book, however, is just not that good. Maybe the more modern political writing is just better or more my style but as much as I wanted to like this, as much as I wanted to be reverant to something that has been spoken of as some of the best political writing ever, I cannot. This book is just not very good.

Werewolves of London by Warren Zevon

When I first heard this song when I was kid the song seemed as much a novelty as anything else. I did not know who Warren Zevon was and it really was years before I did. Over the last ten to fifteen years however Warren Zevon has become a strong presence in my rock and roll hierarchy.

Zevon's performances on Letterman were legendary. He wrote a book, admitting that he has whole gaps of time in the seventies and eighties that he does not remember. When he found out he had terminal cancer he recorded an album called The Wind that includes some heartbreaking songs including a version of Knockin' on Heaven's Door. His last appearance on David Letterman could bring tears, especially when he gave Dave a guitar.

Zevon was a talent, an underrated one. Lawyers, Guns, and Money, Excitable Boy, Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner were all great early songs but the song that most of us were first introduced to him with was Werewolves of London.

London is a song you can sing along with, it is a song which we all have known the words to for years and years. A song that even now when it comes on the radio you stop scanning, that you turn up the volume...Werewolves is one of those songs.

Owwoooo...we miss you Warren Zevon. My Ride's Here was an Ironic album near the end of your career before you knew you were sick. We wish you missed that ride for a few more years but are thankful for all that you left us.

Big Love on HBO Go

I have closely followed the battle between Time Warner and HBO over Time Warner's use of the HBO Go app on the Ipad. This is an incredible service. For those of us who enjoy the HBO series as much as anything they might see on television this is great news.

While allowing the on demand broadcast of the movies and programs being shown on any given month the real carrot in this programming is the feature that allows one to watch any of the series and any episode thereof on demand on their Ipad.

We in our house watched The Sopranos and thought it was a great show. My friends and i would dissect each episode each Monday at lunch. We never will hear the name Christopher again without hearing Tony's take on it.

The Wire and Six Feet Under were shows that we missed the first time around. The Wire especially is considered one of the best shows ever on television and I look forward to watching that. First and foremost however we are watching the final season of Big Love. Last night we watched the the final episode of Season 4 to reaquaint ourselves thought reacquainting may be too much for anyone on a show with this much going on. Still we look forward to watching the end of the series.

After that there will be two seasons of Boardwalk Empire to catch up on. The on demand feature is a great feature. This just takes us further down the the road of being able to watch what we want, when we want, where we want.

It is just the beginning.

To Catch a Thief

This 1955 Hitchcock movie stars Cary Grant and Grace Kelly. In the movie Grant plays John Robie, a man who had earlier in life been known as The Cat and was the most famous Cat Burglar in France. In World War II both he and his crime compatriots had been active members of the French resistance leading to parole for them.

As the movie starts a wave of burglaries reminiscent of the style of Robie have been occuring and suspicion is quickly cast on him. Realizing the only way he can prove his innocence is to capture the true thief he begins just that.

Grace Kelly plays Francie Stevens a woman visiting the French Riveria with her Mother and who is " husband hunting" as Robie puts it.

This is a good movie and any movie with Kelly in it will always have that going for it. She might well be the prettiest woman ever in film. That said, compared against most other Hitchcock movies this one pales a bit.

The scenery in the Riveria is wonderful, Kelly is strong but Grant seems too old to be a real love interest for Kelly, and the movie's plot is not confusing in a normal twist and turn Hitchcock way but more confusing for the sake of being confusing.

This movie does not get a high rating.

All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

I believe I attempted to read this book over a decade ago. At the time it could not hold my interest. My reading habits have changed greatly in the last ten to fifteen years and with a more literary bent now I wished to try again.

In this book by McCarthy we meet John Grady Cole a sixteen year old in Texas in 1949. His Grandfather has died and his Mother, now divorced from his father has no interest in keeping her Father's ranch. Cole has never wanted to be anything more than a rancher and implores his Mother to let him run the ranch to no avail.

Faced with moving to town Cole instead sets off with his best friend Lacey Rawlins traveling by horseback south through Texas. Crossing into Mexico they intend to travel South to work as cowboys.

Just before crossing the Rio Grande they meet a young man who calls himself Jimmy Blevins. He rides a big bay horse which it seems doubtful is his and though he claims to be sixteen does not appear to be past 13. Eventually he falls in with the boys, much to Lacey's disgust.

After losing his horse and gun in a thunderstorm Blevins convinces the boys to go with him into a nearby town to see if his horse landed there. He did, they steal it back and are chased. The boys and Blevins split and they continue South eventually finding work on a large ranch. Thier expert horse skills find them both work, Cole as a horse trainer.

The ranch owner's daughter the bueatiful Alejandor tempts Cole and they fall into an affair.

The story continues. Betrayal, prison, proving oneself, love, love lost, revenge and eventually isolation.

McCarthy writes beautifully. His prose is as descriptive as will be found. It reminded me instantly of Hemingway. Short declaritive sentences and then again the description of nature and scenery so evocative as to place you there. I was pleased to see after reading and having the Hemingway thoughts that other reveiwers mentioned the same thing. Certainly anyone with experience with both can see the similarity. For my money being compared to Hemingway is never a bad thing.

One unfortunate in the book was the use of Spanish conversation with no translation. Not knowing Spanish I am sure I missed a few things. I do not believe it was integral to the story, often it seemed to be very simple conversation.

Still that in itself lent an air of additional authenticity to the book and the story itself is a strong one. Always liking Western imagary this was a book I greatly enjoyed. I look forward to the rest of The Border Triology.

In the Mood by Robert Plant

When I was in college I had a good friend on my floor who was the biggest Led Zeppelin fanatic I have ever known. I have earlier written about Led Zeppelin and how I felt that most young men go thru a Zeppelin stage but this was beyond that. He had the strongest stereo on our whole floor and at times the windows shook with Zeppelin songs. At that time Robert Plant was solo and Paul Rodgers was joining forces with Paul Rodgers in a band called The Firm.

In the Mood is a tremendous song. Starting slow, in fact so low that one wonders if the record has started before the back music starts being audible. The song is eminently singable with Plant's repetitive advising us that he is in the mood for a melody.

In particular this song, in contrast to some of the Manic Nirvana era solo work, has aged very well. This is a song that sounds fresh today, is as good as most Zeppelin work, and in a contemporary sense one could easily see this being used as a rif or a backtrack for the many samplers for modern music out there.

In many ways Zeppelin was denigrated when they burst on the scene as borrowers and stealers the blues legends they heavily borrowed from. Songs like this by Plant in the early eighties show that in time they became excellent songmasters themselves.

If you have not heard this for a decade or so Spotify it. It still shines.

The Aviator

Watching the Aviator on AMC I was struck by one clear thing. AMC shows too many commericals. Showing this as an AMC premiere, the movie stretched four hours with for the last three hours commercials every seven minutes. What a disqueting way to attempt to watch a movie, especially in contrast to viewing a movie on TMC with no commercials at all.

The movie itself was tremendous. A Martin Scorsece movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Howard Hughes the movie centers on the the glory years of the eccentric aviator and moviemaker - primarily the twenties through 1947. When his parents are both deceased he, at the age of 22, begins filming his debut movie Hell's Angels. Taking three years and millions to make, the movie is a success. John C Reily plays his harried business director who seems to have spent the time span of the movie saying " Howard we cannot do that."

Hughes sets speed records for flying, builds planes, and during World War II earns contracts to build spy planes and of course a very large transport plane, later dubbed The Spruce Goose.

Hughes has a long relationship with Katherine Hepburn. Cate Blanchett plays Hepburn, she won the Oscar for Best Actress and deservedly so. It is impossible to watch this movie and not be captivated by her performance. Anyone familiar with Hepburn, her mannerisms and ways, realizes right away that Blanchett nailed it. She was amazing.

Hughes deals with OCD his whole life and throughout the movie it gets progressivly worse. In today's world OCD is acknowledged and understood. It can be treated and helped. In Hughes day this was not the case. DiCaprio plays this part of the personality well and for the most part Scorsece does not overplay this hand.

The emotional highlight of the movie centers around the Pan Am, TWA flight. Hughes had purchased TWA and made plans to make TWA a competitor to Pan AM run by Juan Trippe. Alec Baldwin plays trip very well. Trippe using his crony Senator Owen Brewster played brilliantly by Alan Alda has a bill written which in the interest of the " people" Pan Am will be given a mononpoly on overseas commercial travel. Brewster bring Hughes before Congress to defend himself against charges of war profiteering.

Coming out of seclusion, having been lured out by Ava Gardner, another former lover Hughes fights back and fights back hard. He calls Brewster out on his being bought and sold by Trippe. The bill fails and eventually TWA becomes a worldwide power. This after having been on the edge of failure.

Hughes was clearly a flawed individual. The latter part of his life he was a recluse, all but crippled by the increasing effects of his OCD. Still for a twenty year period he was a figure of great import. It should not be understated.

A very good movie, filled notably with some incredibly strong acting performances. Alda and Blanchett both notably are Oscar worthy. Dicaprio is strong in his role but sonehow as good as he is these other two outshine him. A good movie. Great acting.

Pulphead, Essays by John Jeremiah Sullivan

This book has been receiving a great deal of press over the last few weeks. With write ups in magazines including The New Yorker a case has been made that this collection proves the vitality of the modern day essayist is very strong.

I cannot disagree. I love essays. I love the New Yorker. What makes the New Yorker so strong to me is that you can have articles where you learn about banannas and apples which my children enjoying reiviewing with me, to indepth political writing, commentary by some of the best in the business and some of the best writers in the world such as Roger Angel, Ian Frazier and Malcolm Gladwell just to name a few.

John J Sullivan does not write for The New Yorker. He writes or has written for GQ, The Oxford American and others. He writes...magnigicently.

This collection of essays might be the strongest thing I will read all year.

A review of the essays is as follows.

Upon This Rock finds Sullivan visiting a Christian Rock festival. While he disdains the term Christian Rock and finds the performers of it often a shill to crass marketing strategies Sullivan finds that as much as he would like to be cynical about those attending the festival he cannot be. He finds little to criticize and much to compliment, albeit in a manner that makes one think of how fond we are of people who believe in something and gain from it, something that we ourselves cannot make the leap to belive.

Feet in Smoke tells he personal story of his older brother Werth is electrocuted from a mike stand when singing in his rock band. He miracuously lives, Sullivan documents the month he spent at his brothers side while his brain was rewiring itself. It is funny and yet not mean funny as he talks of a nurse stating wouldn't it be great if his brother stayed in the innocent disoriented state he was in and he was humbled to admit he felt that too.

An Essay for Mr Andrew Lytle tells of his time at Swannee College when he was the live in companion of the great Southern writer Andrew Lytle.

At a Shelter tells of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and Getting Down to What's Really Real explores what happens to some of your favorite stars of MTV's the Real World when their time on the air is over.

Two essays about famous figures, one about Micheal Jackson shortly after his death, one about the ever on the comeback trail Axl Rose. They both are funny and personally told with the Rose story being a true keeper.

American Grotesque takes a meanandering look at the health care battle and how it affects deep into the spine of the American culture of haves and have nots.

Two stories are of a naturalist bent. Sullivan writes about An Eccentric Naturalist named Constantine Rafinesque who was busy in America in the first half of the nineteenth century. Eccentric and Crazy yes. Genius would be another word. In Unnamed Caves Sullivan explores the caves of the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee, their history and their discoveries in the last one hundred years and what it all means.

In Unknown Bards the writer explores the not exactly booming business, but very dedicated group of folks who troll looking for soul, rhythem and blues..i.e black music from the first half of the twentieth century. Most of these performers you have never heard or heard of but it is said and Sullivan agrees that listening to some of this music will be a life changing experience.

Sullivan writes a story about meeting Bunny Wailer, the last of the Bob Marley wailers and along the way explores Jamaica and the Rasta movement.

Perhaps the weakest story is Violence of the Lambs. This is a story about the changing behaviors of animal species, the effects of global warming and as we learn near the end much of the story is farcical though Sullivan maintains many of the animal attack incidents written are real.

Lastly Sullivan tells of the experience of living in Peyton's house. Peyton being a character on the television show One Tree Hill. His house, before being purchased by him, had been used for external and internal scenes on the show and to help meet the mortgage he decides to continue the practice. He takes us through that experience, the benefits and his eventual dissatisfaction with it.

Reading this book is like reading a great issue of your favorite literary magazine with an issue dedicted to articles by your favorite colulmnist, essayist or whatever you choose to call him.

Sullivan's writing is fantastic. This is a must read.

Love in Vain by Robert Johnson and the Rolling Stones

My son took a Music Survey course his freshman year in high school to meet his Fine Arts Requirement. While it was mostly a fluff course he did actually learn quite a bit about various musicians from the early twentieth century.

For those who do not know Robert Johnson had an enormous impact on rock and roll. Listening to early Led Zeppelin the question could be asked why that level of plagarism was not talked about even more.

The Rolling Stones released Let It Bleed and on that great album released Love in Vain. This is a great song. In reading John J Sullivan's collection of essays I read one on collectors and searchers of early American soul music, from the first half of the last century. Love in Vain was a song Robert Johnson recorded but even he modified the words from an earlier verse.

Music is meant to be plagarized if not openly, at least in spirit. If you hear something and like it it will influence what and how you play.

Robert Johnson is believed to have died at 27. Truly he was the first member of the rock and roll 27 club. Anyone doing even a modest trace through the rock and roll record will know that his influence was larger than anyone has ever truly acknowledged.

Four Strong Winds by Neil Young

This song appeared on the Comes a Time album. I first heard this...today...on the way to taking the kids to school. Love the Sirius.

Can anyone sing in the range Neil Young does. Listening to this song reminded me how much I hope to see him in concert and how great it would be were he to play Bangor. Neil Young is a legend and as such many of his songs that you have never heard are better than most you have heard over and over on the radio.

This song proves that.

Out Here in the Middle by James McMurtry

I have a well documented affection for the music of James McMurtry. Indeed it could be said that it was James McMurtry that brought me to Americana and Outlaw country. I think he may be as good a songwriter as there is today.

Today picking my daughter up from play practice this song came up on The Outlaw Radio and I told her that I was sorry she could not flip to 20 on 20...not with Brother James on the radio.

This song , touches me. McMurtry writes about the Middle as being flyover country. What he knows or should know however by his popularity in places like the Bangor Maine area is that the Middle is everywhere except of course where it is not.

For me when Brother Jim talks about the ghost of William Jennings Bryan preaches every night he has me sold. Find another song writer this side of Bob Dylan that might be able to put that reference in a song in a meaningful way.

This is a great song, by a great songwriter, a great performer. Did I say great enough. Call me a big fan.

Brian Williams on David Letterman

I write about my man crush on Brian Williams everytime he makes an appearnace on Fallon or Letterman but I am going to do it again tonight. Appearing as the only guest on Dave tonight Williams was on his game. Simply put this man is funny, not just funny but with a sense of wry humor that never fails to make me laugh.

Tonight Dave made him do his Regis Philbin impression. Perhaps he is so funny because of the contrast between serious newsman and what he does with Dave. That said he is a smart and funny man. For me his appearnces on Dave or Fallon are Must See TV

Young and Wild and Free by Snoop Dogg and Wiz Khalifa featuring Bruno Mars

I will give rappers credit. They collaberate better than rock and roll artists. This song which appears on a soundtrack album called Mac and Devin go to High School, though I am not sure this is a real movie.

My middle son has been playing this all the time. Listening to the words it is hard to embrace. So what we get drunk, so what we smoke weed. Roll one, Smoke one seems to be the theme.

So I listened to this today on Spotify. This song sends a bad message. It has bad language and is all about drug use. It is awful.

It is also incredibly and I mean incredibly addictive and enjoyable. If I were a 16 year old kid out with my friends this is the song that would be on the radio. It is not even a debate. It is catchy, it has a great rhythem and yes here is a news flash kids like songs about drinking and smoking. Even those like my kids who do not do these things.

I should also talk about a song on the same album I listened to today called I Get Lifted. Soaking up the breeze, smoking on this tree, and then with a back chorus of some female soul singers with I Get Lifted. If it is possible this song might be even more catchy than the song above.

Look this whole album is all about weed and smoking dope. This is not a good thing. One thing we must face is that as long as artists can make music this catchy with riffs like this kids are going to be influenced.

Now my worry is that it is on the radio. I do not think songs with drug refences and that need bleeps every three words should be on the radio. Teenagers will find these on Spotify if they wish, but so many of the Top 40 listeners are junior high or less. They do not need the music that is on this radio.

As parents we can always control some of what our kids listen to. I played this with my son tonight. He knows I do not endorse the message. It does not good however to be hypocritical and pretend this music, much like Lil Wayne is not incredibly strong. Can the message be ignored and the beat enjoyed. I am hoping it can be.

These are great songs. There is no denying it.

The Essential David Allan Coe

Since I have put Sirius XM in my truck I have found that one of the channels that I enjoy the most is Outlaw country. One of the artists often featured is David Allan Coe. I have heard the name before but was not knowledgable about what he sang.

David Allen Coe was one of the members of the original outlaw country group. Not with the stature of Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson indeed but he certainly seems to have been a member of the following.

Today I heard a song by him called You Never Even Called Me By Name. This song has much to offer the country fan. With several verses the most important would be one that speaks about Waylon Jennings, Charley Pride and Merle Haggard with a catchy chorus. Perhaps what seperates this song the most however is the last verse, a very self aware verse where Coe speaks about the writer of the song and his telling him that it was not the best country song in the world as it missed some country cliches such as Momma, Trains, Prison, Trucks and Being Drunk. As one might imagine the writer added a verse which included those items and Coe was happy to sing the new verse for us.

Is this silly. Yes. It still is an acknowlegement of what country music used to be and what many of us still enjoy.

I came home and looked him up on Spotify and listened to this album. The first of these songs is entitled The Ride and I realized that I had heard this as well on Outlaw country. Another very good song telling of a ghost encounter with Hank Williams the original.

Yes perhaps a few too many songs are written about beer but this is not literature and there are no pretensions. It is what it is. And it is very good at what it is.


On Willie, Waylon and Me Coe takes us through his life of listening to sixties and seventies country rock. The Burritos, Roger Mcguin and the Byrds, and the Eagles and even tips his hat to true rock icons such as The Beatles, The Stones and Janis. It is an effective song.

More country even is Long Haired Redneck and perhaps most country of all is If That Ain't Country in which he talks about a rural upbringing with cliches like a hard working mama and cars in the yard. It is not a sad song though it is a song that tells with pride where he comes from. If Coe really comes from this background I do not know, what I do know is there are many who have been from that place in their youth and a song that does not aplogize for it but tells of it with pride must have appeal to many folks not written about in Rolling Stone.

David Allen Coe is a fine singer. He also knows exactly who he is. That is something to be valud and indeed even cherished.

Lisa Lampinelli on David Letterman

Last night Lisa Lampinelli made her first appearance in her long career on The David Letterman show. She is a funny lady but her brand of crude humor is often not what one would find on Dave.

Dave seems to like odd funny but not especially crude funny. Still Lampinelli was funny, skewering both Letterman and Paul Schaffer.

Dave seemed a little uncomfortable and indeed a few of her comments were squirm inducing. It will be interesting to see if she is invited back.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Close Encounters is the movie from that Star Wars, E T period that is often forgotten. A Stephen Spielberg movie, this movie is a sale of obsession. Early in the movie there is a blackout in a small nameless Western City. An electrical engineer is sent out by the power company and has a close encounter with a spaceship.

Played by Richard Dreyfuss he is the hero of the film if there is one. He becomes obsessed with visions, first forming mountains in his mashed potatoes. Eventually he scares his wife and children to the point of leaving as he is fired from his job, and builds a dirt mountain on the families dining room table.

Across the world a French scientist is exploring a phenomenon in India that seems to be related to alien encounters. Deciphering a musical note through some process that I never quite grasped they decipher the code to be longitude and latitude. This site is A Devils Mountain in Idaho.

The government creates a fake railroad spill of dangerous gasses to evacuate the area. Our electrical worker is living an unkempt life obsessing on a picture in his mind. Watching the news he sees his vision, the mountain area that is being evacuated by the government.

He travels to the area, sneaks through the military cordon and is there to witness what happens. We never really see the government folks put together what is to happen but clearly they have a good idea what is to happen.

The ending is neat, the first time I saw the movie I did not see what was coming but now watching it I am surprised I did not see it coming. It is a good movie, a bit dated surely but still entertaining.

The Angel Esmerelda by Dom Delillo

Dom Delillo is considered one of the best novelists of his generation. I have read a couple of his books and was particularly impressed with Underworld. Still, even in reading that I was not overwhelmed thinking this was the voice of a generation.

With the recent release of the above named collection of short stories and with my being a big fan of short fiction I was pleased to get this from the library.

I was sorely disappointed. It was not bad, it was just not interesting. I read five of the stories and here two days later can remember nothing of import. Having learned that with so much out there to read that is good that I must be ruthless I have tossed it aside.

At the same time I am reading Cormac Mccarthy and Sullivan's Pulphead and Delillo suffers in comparison.

So much good to read and Delillo suffers terribly in comparison.

We are Going to Be Friends by Bright Eyes and First Aid Kit

Making me feel better for noticing First Aid Kit as a band I very much appreciated I was pleased to see them join Bright Eyes, otherwise known as Conor Oberst for a cover of this Wild Stripes song.

Bright Eyes always sounds good and this is a good song. I expect big things from First Aid Kit in the coming year, at least in indie circles.

A neat little track.

Game of Thrones

We signed up for HBO the other day. We saw that HBO GO was going to be available in the next ten days and plan to use that to catch up on Boardwalk Empire and Big Love, but in the interim have decided to watch Game of Thrones.

I have never read the book series the show is based on and am not a big fan of that type of book genre though there is a huge segment of folks who do. Still HBO has put much money into the show and they usually do things correctly so today I watched the first episode.

Never having read any of the books I have come into this blind and have come away from the first episode--very impressed. In the first episode we meet Ned Stark who protects the Kingdom of the North- Winterfell. Strange happenings are about...white walkers are seen, The Kings man, a right hand sort of figure has been killed and the King is traveling to ask Stark to replace him. Across the river in another kingdom a prince is seeking to weld an alliance with a group of savages by offering his sister for their leader.

Intrigue continues in Winterfell when the Kings Wife and her twin brother seem to have a very close relationship which leads to misfortune for Ned Stark's youngest son. All of this in the first episode.

More nudity than I think necceary but the show itself offers much promise and I am very looking forward to future episodes

War Horse

Yesterday afternoon we went to the movies. It was a dreary day and we, evidently along with everyone else decided to go to the movies. My wife and daughter wanted to see We Bought A Zoo and while that looked entertaining I had seen the trailers for War Horse and the bit of history implied made it interesting for me. So, to my wife's shock I was not worried about going to a movie by myself, this fact became moot after my wife's mother joined us and chose War Horse as well.

I do not like going to the movies late but somehow we arrived there with little time to spare and by the time we entered the theatre of our movie it was very full. I was able to spot two seats in the stadium seating and regretfully bothered a couple of people so that we might reach them. It was a necessity however as if I have to look up at a screen my neck is very sore.

The movie was long and very good. It was a bit slow moving at first. The sequence where Albert Narracot teaches the horse to plow the rocky bottom farmland seemed to drag on forever and with the ensuing crop then destroyed by rain did little to advance the plot. That is a small trifle however with a movie as good as this.

In telling my daughter about the movie after the fact I compared it a bit with the children's book Ribsy that she and I and perhaps most of us in a generation had read. In that book a dog is lost and goes through several owners and experiences before he finds his way back to his master. This horse does much the same thing.

Joey the horse, sold by the father, to a soldier entering World War I ends up performing his duties on both sides of the war. I thought that it was admirable for Spielberg to make both sides of the war, English and Germans full of admirable characters. Truly wherever Joey ends up he finds people who admire him and want to keep him well.

For me the most memorable scene is when Joey after losing his rider ends up in no mans land at the Somme caught up in barbed wire and fortifications. A brave English soldier attempts to rescue him under a white flag only to be joined by a German solider with wire cutters. This scene strikes all of us who appreciate men being men, doing a job, and understanding there does not have to be animosity in competition, even competition such as war.

Late in the story the young boy who trained him, and whose Dad sold the horse into the war effort has joined the army. One would expect a reunion of miraculous good fortune and one would not be disappointed. Still the movie remains plausible and the ending is made to make one feel good.

I liked this movie, I liked the history, I liked the scenery and some scenes were very good. Still it seemed to be less than its parts if that is possible. Maybe because the star was a horse and the movie was filled with actors I did not know. The movie was very good, highly recommended but still lacked something. I am not sure if that makes sense.

The crowed liked it, lots of applause at the end. I liked it too.

The In Laws

We watched this movie the other day, this movie being the original starring Peter Falk and Alan Arkin. I love this movie, I think Peter Falk is a great actor, always someone to remember. Some actors just ooze personality and Falk is one of them.

A simple story, a CIA agent and a dentist. The agent caught up in some kind of currency manipulation scheme by South American dictators robs the U S Mint. Alan Arkin, as the New York City dentist, who gets caught up in it keeps saying he just does not want to be shot at.

Still as the story progresses he admits he finds his future in law crazy but with something lovable about him. And no one will ever forget the serpentine scene.

Comedies are hard for me. This is a great one.