Lions for Lambs

The title of this 2007 movie refers to the frustration of incompetent military leaders sending brave, heroic soldiers on ill thought out and or conceived missions.

The movie starring Robert Redford, Tom Cruise and Meryl Streep certainly has enough star power to be a success. The reviews however were not good, the movie made very little money, and has generally been classified as a disappointment.

Last weekend I happened upon this movie and seeing the cast started watching it and despite the reviews that have been widespread I have to say that I most definitely do not concur. I thought the movie was very strong.

In fairness to the reviewers there was a sense that the movie was going somewhere, as you watch the opening scenes you do not realize that these scenes are going to be the biggest part of the movie. That said, for me it still worked.

We meet Tom Cruise as California Senator Jasper Irving. A young, handsome, war hero he is considered a future Presidential candidate and is as ambitious as he is well thought of. A huge advocate of our military adventures in the Middle East he invites a semi hostile reporter in for an interview.

Meryl Streep plays Janine Roth, a veteran reporter shocked to be given an audience with Irving. Little does she know he has determined that she is just the kind of reporter he needs to sell his plan for what is called establishing forward points in Afghanistan to increase the chances for success. When she advises him that to her forward points might be otherwise called bait he realizes she is in for a battle in making her convinced. Playing on her patriotism he pulls her in until she knows not what to do. She feels a responsibility for the Iraq war and the lack of questions put forth by the news media including herself.

As this is going on, at a California university a typical liberal minded college Professor named Stephen Malley, played by Redford, has called a meeting with one of his students. Todd Hayes has all the potential in the world, easily recognized by Malley, but he now is missing too many classes and while he is doing the work he is not engaged and Malley is convinced that he could be a bright light, one of few that enters his classroom that can make a difference.

The third scene connects the two first. The mission that Senator Irving is trying to sell to Reporter Roth is starting as they speak. In it are two soldiers named Rodriguez and Finch who are to be among a group landing at a forward point. As they land however they are fired upon and the mission is soon in trouble.

These two soldiers also hold the distinction of being the other shining lights for Professor Malley. While he is trying to engage his new student he tells them the story of these two young men who came through his classroom and then instead of going to graduate school at Harvard or Yale joined the army. They felt to stand outside the system and mock it was hypocritical.

For me this movie worked. Perhaps it struck my idealism bone. I am not sure. Redford had a great deal of skin in the game, he produced, directed and starred in the movie. It must have been a sadness to him to have it do so poorly. I am not afraid of being in the minority, that much is well established, in this movie I am.

I give it a strong positive rating.

Psychedelic Pill by Neil Young and Crazy Horse

This past Tuesday brought the release of a new album by Neil Young. Not just Neil Young however but Neil Young and Crazy Horse. For any knowledgeable fan of Young's music they know what this has meant in the past. It could mean some incredible recordings such as the famous Live Rust era recordings. It could also mean albums like a couple of the early nineties recordings which were forgettable at best.

While not being a complete washout this album leans to the latter. With eight songs stretched over two discs, and over eighty minutes the album is self indulgent in the extreme.

There are a couple of, if not gems, certainly worthwhile listens on the album. Born in Ontario is a silly little song about just that, where Young was born. More importantly the song Twisted Road is one of Young's best over the recent years. With nods to the first time he heard Dylan's " Like A Rolling Stone" and continued references to Hank Williams and especially The Grateful Dead the song is catchy and if nothing else will make one feel nostalgic.

Another success on the album is For the Love of Man a typical plaintive song from Young which while a nice song still has nothing in it to distinguish it from songs Neil has written ten times in his career.

What is most buzzed about on the album are the songs in which Young and Crazy Horse let loose and riff and riff and riff. Frankly for me, it is too much. For an artist that to me is at his best when he is giving us those incredible lyrics and unique voice I do not need to be reminded for twenty seven minutes as in the abominably long " Driftin Back" that Young and the boys can still jam.

A bit better but still a huge investment in time for what nuggets of joy are imbedded in them are " Walk Like A Giant," and " Ramada Inn." These are not bad songs, indeed some of the lyrics are clever and worth hearing but with these lyrics each being buried in sixteen minutes of guitar pounding solos it is a stretch.

The best that can be said of this album is that it is for Young enthusiasts only. Truthfully however that might be too welcoming as no one would call me anything but a huge fan of Young's music. Even so this is one Psychedelic Pill i do not see myself swallowing again.

Winston Churchill, Visions of Glory by William Manchester

William Manchester was a great biographer in the second half of the twentieth century. Writing about Kennedy, the American Century as a whole, and most notably what is considered the definitive biography of Winston Churchill.

Manchester died before he could publish the last of the planned trilogy but we are told that the final book, much delayed, put together by another author from Manchester's notes will be published next month. For many who have loved the first two books this is great news.

Knowing that all the book would be available to me I began my much delayed plan to learn more about this legendary public figure. Having read several books about Franklin Roosevelt I was quite familiar with Churchill as a historic figure but wanted to learn more.

I have to say that in reading the first book in the series which covers Churchill from birth to 1932 I was sorely disappointed. I have not seen a bad review for the Manchester series. People love it, they call it a masterwork, I call it clunky and poorly written.

Sometimes you only feel what you feel. I love biographies, my reading history makes that clear. Some obvious potential problems for me with this book stand out, namely that much of the first 58 years of his life were spent in the lower echelons of government and certainly a great deal of the book examines his military career. It is well established that I am not a great military historian, my interest is slim in the nuts and bolts of war, who moved troops here, whose great strategy won this battle, perhaps it was preordained I would thus not like this book.

The book does offer a wide ranging look at Churchill's youth. It is not pretty. Born the grandson of a Duke Churchill was brought up in a life of privilege. Still for all that he had just as important is what he did not have. He did not have a loving family. His greatest patron in his early life, the one person who truly loved him, was his nanny. His mother was an American. Extramarital affairs were not considered stigmatized by the upper classes at this time and Jennie Churchill made sure she took advantage of this. By almost any standard she was a promiscuous woman even though she slept with only the best of men. His father was incapable of loving his son, any chance he had of changing was taken away by his being struck syphilitic after a drunken encounter with a crone in his youth. Perhaps the most freeing event of his youth for Churchill was when his father passed on and he no longer had to fight for acceptance and approval that was not to come.

This was all interesting and I do not object to biographies that go into minutiae. Still comparing Manchester's writing of Churchill's youth with, for example, Robert Carp's writing on the youth of Lyndon Johnson the contrast is remarkable. Perhaps if nothing else it shows the absolute stunning ability of Caro more than it does that Manchester was not the best biography writer.

Or it could mean nothing more than that for whatever reason this book did not work for me. I will plan at some point to pick up book two. Perhaps at that time in his life the material will be more interesting and will overcome the writing style of which I just cannot speak well of.

Deadline Artists edited by John Avlon, Jesse Angelo, and Errol Louis

Subtitled America's Greatest Newspaper Columns this is a collection of some of the most famous works of some of the most important newspaper columnists this country has produced.

This is a very enjoyable book. I am a big reader of newspapers and especially columnists so this book was right up my alley. Currently I follow writers such as Eugene Robinson of The Washington Post, David Brooks, Paul Krugman, and Ross Douthat of The New York Times, and many others including Pat Buchanan Joe Scarborough from the Republican camp.

I will say that the book is not perfect. I was not enamored of all the writers, I always find humorists to be pretty hit and miss and in this book I think that the same occurs.

Some of the articles are to be treasured. Writers such as Ernest Hemingway and Ernie Pyle were among the best of the World War II era. Pyle was himself killed in action as he moved about with the troops.

Over the years Jimmy Breslin wrote some articles never to be forgotten including two covering the assassination of President Kennedy that are a pair of the best you will ever read. A column Breslin wrote about the man who dug the grave for the President still can haunt you.

I read many sportswriters today and enjoy them. Rick Reilly is occasionally brilliant but is always arrogant and this diminishes him often. In the book several articles stand out including Peter Gammons on the unforgettable Game Six of the 1975 World Series, Jack Newfield's article on Mohammad Ali, interestingly hoping he would retire with the title after regaining it from Leon Spinks, and for a change of pace you will not find an article to surprise you more than Bill Plaschke's masterpiece Her Blue Heaven.

Mike Royko and Mike Barnicle became fixtures in their home cities of Chicago and Boston and with a few of the articles including especially Royko's paean to the deceased Richard Daly show us why.

One of the most eloquent writers for the last quarter century has been George Will. With politics his game it is interesting to note that several of Will's most famous pieces are about baseball and in this collection an essay on the death of his mother and an exquisite writing about his 21 year old son with down syndrome. There is a reason George Will is one of the most respected writers of his generation and we see some examples here.

Easily picked up by me in this collection was the fact that even comparing some of the writers today, such as Will on the right and Michael Kinsley on the left, with their former selves writing decades ago is that the writers they were years ago were much more generous to the other side, much less venomous. It seems that even in our greatest writers, perhaps unconsciously so, have become more partisan, more harsh. I am sure that this is not a good thing.

This book is very solid and the great thing about a collection such as this is that some of the articles which meant less to me might be superior to you. With a collection like this you cannot go wrong.

Argo

Ben Affleck has struck gold. Producing, directing, and starring in this thriller that, last weekend, four weeks out, was the highest grossing movie of the past weekend. And for good reason.

We were among the many who went to see Argo last weekend. The movie is true edge of your seat fare. The challenge of a historical movie, one in which we know the ending, is to create real drama. After all we know as we watch the movie that the plane carrying those being rescued will get in the air, they will evade the Iranians, and the plan to get them out will work.

Still, with these challenges, Affleck makes it work and work beyond compare.

The movie tells the story of six American embassy workers who escape from the takeover of the embassy by the Iranian protestors. Hidden by the Canadian embassy for a time what becomes clear is that they need to be brought out of the country before the Iranians discover their presence. Affleck as CIA agent Tony Mendez comes up with a plan, a crazy plan, to create a fake movie to provide cover for getting those embassy workers out of the country.

Casting in the movie is brilliant. Alan Arkin and John Goodman play the Hollywood types brought in to help create the supposed movie. Arkin is perfect in his role but truly needing to be recognized is Goodman. Is there anyone acting today that is better at these character rolls than John Goodman. Familiar faces abound in the movie, most however are not those one can put a name to but we know that we know them. Kyle Chandler of Friday Night Lights fame makes an appearance as Hodding Carter.

The movie in all respects however is all about Affleck. He dominates this movie and it is a good thing. His character is an agent who takes his job seriously and has a sense of responsibility toward each and every person he is to help.

As we watch a movie we often wonder about how it will age, this is a movie that could easily become a classic. A fantastic movie.

Vegas Update

The new CBS series has become must see television on my calender. The series is a very solid show with a cast with stars such as Dennis Quaid and Michael Chilkis. What has become clear in the series is that this well shot series with it's both weekly plots as well as it's long term serial plot.

This is a hard mix and it is telling on the plots. We know as we watch the show that eventually the mobster Savino and Sherrif Lamb are going to have to come to blows. Each week however the flotsam and jetsam of characters that have found their way to Las Vegas offers up a murderer or victim that needs to be dealt with.

The problem the show has shown thus far is that in order to keep much of the show available for it's long developing simmer between the main characters the weekly crimes to be solved are formula at best. Crime is committed, easy suspect is brought forward, seems too easy so more research is done, and soon the real suspect with a hidden motive is found. Soon after that the suspect confesses to Lamb's interrogation technique which calls for goading and agreeing with the suspect that something " had to be done."

In short what is wrong with this show is what is wrong with any network drama. With the need for weekly self enclosed plots to justify the long term serial arcs most of those weekly crimes are the worst part of the show.

I love the actors and will continue to watch this show, it is however on notice from me, it is no longer a given that I will continue to watch.

Watership Down by Richard Adams

Watership Down is a classic book written by English author Richard Adams. The book was rejected by thirteen publishers before being accepted.

My daughter was given this book to read this fall in her English class. Using my normal routine I decided to read the book with her. Surprisingly to me, for my daughter loves to read, always has, she was not a big fan of this book. My guess is that being told she had to read it reduced it's viability in her eyes, and after all I suspect that a 13 year old told to read a story about bunnies might often reject the idea.

In this I have to tell you, she was wrong. This is a fantastic book. Adams told his daughters stories about rabbits that were based on his experiences in the war. Later these stories became the book and the book became a classic.

The book begins with Hazel and Fiver, two members of a rabbit warren. Fiver is a small rabbit, a runt rabbit, who has visions of the future. As the book begins Fiver has seen a vision of the destruction of his warren. He and Hazel, though they are of low stature in the warren, visit the Chief Rabbit who, as might be expected, does not take them seriously.

This leads the two rabbits, along wit a few other rabbits that for various reasons decide to join them, to leave the warren and set out on their own. Most important among these is a rabbit of high stature named BigWig who had been reprimanded by the Chief Rabbit for bringing the two before him.

After leaving the warren nothing comes easy. The rabbits have adventure after adventure. They are taken in by a warren that appears to be the perfect place to be, Fiver feels a discomfort however and soon enough the reason becomes apparent. Eventually the rabbits find a high plain, Watership Down, to settle on. Hazel has by now become Chief Rabbit and he uses some methods never seen before, including developing at least passing relationships with other woodland creatures.

Happy and satisfied as they are the rabbits realize they have a problem. All of the warren members are male. The warren will not survive if this cannot be corrected. Hearing of another warren a few miles to the south a group is sent to inquire about the possibility of taking a few does from that warren to help them get their own started. This inquiry, the response and what comes from that lead us to the real crux of the story of Watership Down.

The book is fast moving and with it's somewhat martial air seems likely to be a book that young boys would especially like. I am somewhat surprised that I had never really heard of the book when I was young but I am very pleased to read it now. It is a book I hope to share with my grandchildren someday.

The Signal and Noise by Nate Silver

Nate Silver has become a fairly important person in certain circles recently. As a statistician Silver devised a system for measuring performance in baseball. Then in 2008 he earned more praise when he nailed the vote in the Presidential election. During this election series his Political Forecasting Blog Five Thirty Eight has been syndicated by The New York Times.

For my own sanity and as an Obama supporter I have not paid much attention to all of the polls that are released each day and instead only follow Silver's blog which takes a great deal of information, including those same polls, and comes up with a likelihood of an Obama victory in both the popular vote and the electoral college.

In this heavily buzzed book Silver tackles the subject and science, if you will, of prediction and forecasting. Chapters dedicated to weather, sports, poker, global science, and others show examples of the use of probability theory to make accurate forecasts.

The book is fascinating. As Silver talks about the weather he praises the gains made in Weather prediction. He also points out what most of us know, that local weather forecasts are a joke, and that the best forecasts come from the sources that are less profit driven. The National Weather Service, who has no agenda other than being correct, is much more clairvoyant if you will than even The Weather Channel which is multiples more accurate than your local forecaster.

Silver talks about the fact that many forecasters have an agenda that makes their accuracy much lower. Talking heads on Fox or MSNBC are perfect examples of this, the forecasts on these channels in almost all cases match the agenda of the networks themselves.

There is so much information in this book that it cannot all be summarized but the highlights for me include an explanation of Bayes Theorem. This methodology, a simple algebraic equation according to Silver, can be the best tool to make any prediction. It talks about Prior Probabilities and Posterior Probabilities and it works beyond compare. It is not, to me, a simple algebraic equation but with slow thought I was able, with my wife's help to make it work. As she said she was not Captain of the Math team for nothing. Probabilistic theory is the best way to make predictions because it recognizes that no one can be truly objective, in any prediction there is some level of subjectivity. With Prior Probabilities this is taken into account.

As an aside I realized that I used this theory without knowing it in my fantasy baseball leagues. I also realized that not everyone does. Prior opinion, matched and compared against current results can bring a great deal of knowledge.

Another methodology called Power Theory is fascinating. Originally coming to the fore in earthquake prediction, a science that is beyond difficult, power theory offers some significant measure of prediction can be found. We are not close to being able to predict earthquakes far in advance, but we can get a general sense of the likelihood of catastrophic earthquakes in any given area. Late in the book we also see that in the methodology of predicting terror events the same theory can be used. When one thinks of this, it cannot be rational, but the charts and graphs shown prove that indeed, what power theory shows us, is that just because something has not happened, power theory can show us that it is indeed possible and in some cases, likely.

The last illustration I want to talk about is a particular illustration of Baye's Theorem that applies to false positives in the mammograms of younger women. While not being for me enough to increase the age of mammogram recommendation, a false positive can be proven wrong while not catching cancer cannot be corrected, it does show in a clear way the use of Baye's Theory in the real world.

This is a fascinating book, full of great information. It is not a skimmer, one has to pay attention and in my case at least some real thought is required. It is well worth it.

Tom Hanks on Jimmy Fallon Last Night

Some people are funny no matter what they do. Tom Hanks appeared on Jimmy Fallon last night. Hanks has been everywhere lately. Making a surprise appearance on Saturday Night Live, working the phones on Jon Stewart's autism benefit, and then last night appeared on Fallon last night.

There might not be two more likable people in entertainment than Jimmy Fallon and Tom Hanks. Tom Hanks, now Hollywood Royalty, never seems to forget that he is the same person that we first saw on Bosom Buddies, or if you dig deep as the alcoholic uncle of Alex P Keaton on Family Ties.

Last night Hanks did a slam poem about the nineties sitcom Full House and as funny as that was the real highlight was just the stories he told while visiting with Jimmy. Telling the story of Jimmy's desire to appear on the Hanks HBO Miniseries Band of Brothers, and another story of Hanks almost playing guitar for Bruce Springsteen Hanks is just naturally funny. His ability to laugh at himself, combined with Fallon's constant joy in whatever he is doing made this fantastic television.

I watch a good deal of late night television. Only a few people are must see, Tom Hanks and Bill Murray are two of them. Hanks showed us why last night.

Bruno Mars on Saturday Night Live

A few observations on this week of Saturday Night Live. The cold open this week again featured a look at a Presidential debate, this one being the second held last week. It was funny in a different way than the first debate parody which we saw earlier in the season.

In this round the folks asking the question became part of the humor, the debate having been held on Long Island made for some easy to mock characters just in the asking of the question. For all the accolades Jay Pharoah gets for his performance on Obama the real star of these skits is Jason Sudekis, his take on Obama while not physically as similar is spot on with his speaking patters. When Sudekis as Romney says " Candy, Candy, Candy just let me make three more points" he is Mitt Romney. Perhaps the standout moment of the skit however, was the wry observation of when a voter asks what they two will do to keep AK-47's out the hands of the wrong people and both the fictitious candidates quickly agreed that the answer to that was " Nothing, Absolutely Nothing."

Tom Hanks as he is often want to do hung around Saturday night and appeared in a couple of skits. It must be nice for both sides, clearly Hanks has an open invitation to show up whenever he feels like it, and what a good day it must be for Lorne Michaels when he walks in the door.

The star of the show was, unequivocally, Mr. Mars. When he came out to do the monologue the first thing that I noticed was how incredibly short he is. This man is tiny, both small and short. He talked a bit about being the host and the musical guest and away the show went.

Mars appeared in a Pandora music skit that showed off his range and an incredible range it is, he sang a few lines of six different singes and did it amazingly well. Mars cannot not be listened to and not make one think of Michael Jackson. He is an amazing singer. His second performance of the night, of a song I have not yet heard, called Crazy Lost Girls, or something like that, was amazing. I assume that it is on a forthcoming album.

Another win was the short called Sad Clown featuring Mars and a return to the tunnel ride at an amusement park that breaks down leaving the amniatronic figures to menace those on the ride. Hanks made a special appearance in this role and it was solid.

There were misses, Weekend update wss subpar, I never find Stefan to be that funny and the Brad Pitt themed commercials did not strike gold.

Still another great week for SNL, they are on a roll.

The Best of Jimmy Cliff

Jimmy Cliff has released an album this year and as a legendary reggae figure it has received some positive reviews. I confess that my knowledge of Jimmy Cliff until recently was knowing that the song Trapped that Bruce Springsteen has performed over the years is a Jimmy Cliff song

Over the last couple of weeks I have listened to this album quite a few times and have to advise that while Cliff has been recording for years and years and thus doing a deep dive on his recording history is not really feasible for me this Best of compilation is well worth taking a test.

Reggae historians will tell you that most feel that Jimmy Cliff came before Bob Marley in Jamaica. Marley through a combination of factors became the Godfather of all Reggae but a quick perusal of this album will make one aware that Jimmy Cliff is very and I mean very underrated.

Cliff has it all, listening to Hard Road to Travel, the reggae beat, the inspirational lyrics, there is nothing here that would be diminished by comparison to a Bob Marley song and in fact holds up stronger than 98 percent of what Marley recorded. I would go so far as to say that as big a Marley fan as I am, with the exception of No Woman No Cry and Three Little Birds there is nothing in Marley's music that can compare with five or six of the songs on this album.

You Can Get It If You Really Want, The Harder They Come and Many Rivers to Cross, I do not know how I could have listened to as much music as I have, as much reggae as I have without knowing these songs. They are impeccable. I turned my son onto Bob Marley by playing it when he was growing up. Sending him information on this album is now at the top of my list of things to do today.


Which brings me to the essential Jimmy Cliff song I knew nothing about. Cliff recorded an anti war song called Vietnam that might be the best song of that era. It is easily singable, has an incredible beat and Cliff's voice is angelic. In the song we hear about a letter received from Vietnam from a soldier telling his friends that he will be home soon, his time is almost up, and he looks forward to seeing them all. The very next day a telegram arrives stating that the young man has died and " Mistress Brown your Son is Dead. " This is a bone chillingly great song.

Jimmy Cliff is an example of a great performer getting lost, hiding in plain sight. Inevitably he has had a good career, his fans have known about him, but how can such talent not be known in a mainstream way. Somethings are hard to comprehend.

Listen to Jimmy Cliff. It will make your day .

Bonnie and Clyde

This 1967 movie starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the famed gangsters was one of the most popular movies of it's time and is considered one of the most influential movies of it's time. Shot at a time when Hollywood was changing to a more modern approach to movie making the film showed a mix of sensuality and violence that had never been seen in a successful wide screen release.

The Bonnie and Clyde story is a complicated one and the movie certainly simplifies the story. That said the movie is a stunning success. The first thing I noticed in this movie was Faye Dunaway. As the movie begins she is laying in bed, naked, having an internal fight with herself about getting out of bed for another day at her hated waitress job. Looking out the window she sees a young man attempting to steal her Momma's car. She talks to him and on a dare comes out to talk a man who introduces himself as Clyde Barrow. As to the nudity we do not see anything, save a bare back, and the realization when she dresses quickly she puts on no undergarments but Dunaway oozes sensuality in this role that I have never seen in any movie previously. This part of her character fades as the criminals life on the run becomes tiresome, but at the beginning of this movie it can barely fit on the screen, when Clyde takes her for a Coke and the camera pays special attention to her drinking and then talking over the top of the bottle as kids will sometimes do she is a movie star. A presence like few you will see.

After bragging of his exploits to Bonnie she dares him to show her and he goes and steals a little money from a small store in town. They flee and Bonnie is so excited by the act, she had been desperate in her boredom, that she wants to have sex with Clyde in the car, she can barely contain herself. Clyde lets her know that " he ain't no loverboy" , he is impotent, and one sees how outrageous this relationship is right from the beginning.

The movie goes from there, they add members to their gang as they go. Gene Hackman plays Buck Barrow, Clyde's brother who is paroled and looking to make good decisions. His wife is played by Estelle Parsons, a preachers daughter who immediately comes in conflict with Bonnie. They could not be more different. Buck soon gets sucked into the crime wave.

Denver Pyle of Dukes of Hazzard fame appears a a bounty seeking Texas Ranger, Gene Wilder has his first movie role, and Dub Taylor also appears.

A funny note, Estelle Parsons, who looked familiar, but honestly looked like a man in drag I struggled to identify. Then I realized she played Roseanne's mother on the famous sitcom. Parson for her part won an Oscar for this role, it was the most unlikable character in the whole movie, annoying times ten, I am on Bonnie's side on that score.

This was a very good movie. The death scene itself changed movie history and in general the movie broke many rules and set many new precedents. Beatty was strong, but at least for this reviewer this movie was all about Faye Dunaway. One of the most stunningly sensual roles you will ever see in a movie.

Days of Heaven

I am becoming a fan of Terrence Malick. My wife tells me I can be contrary sometimes and perhaps Malick's refusal to make a movie anyway but the way he pictures it is something I admire.

This 1978 movie was his second film. Typical of what was to come from Malick it took over two years for him to edit, as he filmed an enormous amount of scenes and struggled to put the story together. Finally using narration by the young girl in the movie he was able to bring the picture to match his vision.

When it was released it was critically disparaged with only the cinematography being highlighted. Over time the critics have changed their minds, as have later viewers as it often receives very high ratings from any of the rating services which measure such things.

For me the movie was almost perfect. The filming itself, the scenery, the animals, the mountains, lakes and fields. The rustling of the wheat fields in the wind, everything that is filmed is filmed exquisitely. It might be the most beautifully filmed movie I have ever seen. The story is a simple one. Set in 1916 we meet Bill, played by a remarkably Richard Gere, is a steel worker in Chicago who after a dispute with his boss at work accidentally kills him in an altercation. Fleeing to the panhandle of Texas with his girlfriend Abby they get work on a wealthy landowners ranch bringing in crops. Adams, an actress I am not familiar with, is wonderful. She appears dark, perhaps olive skinned, and the farmer becomes attracted to her. As she and Bill are traveling as brother and sister to avoid trouble Bill, who has overheard a conversation between The Farmer and his Doctor advising that the farmer is terminally ill encourages her to marry him and eventually she will inherit the farm.

Sam Shepard plays the farmer, brilliantly. Traveling with the couple is Abby's little sister Linda played by young actress Linda Manz. She becomes the narrator of the story, her accent which I cannot place, perhaps it is the stockyards of Chicago, but with a lisp included it is entrancing and effective.

Also of note is the role played by The Farmer's foreman played by Robert Wilke. He suspects the couple of trouble right away and is dismayed when The Farmer marries, to avoid open dispute with this man he thinks of like a son he goes to another of his holdings to run that farm, when he returns at the end of the movie, his face, the lines in his forehead, creased with age and disappointment tell a story all of their own.

If it is not clear I believe this movie is a treasure. Malick does the rare thing, he makes all parties, both sides of the potential conflict, sympathetic. The movie is filmed wonderfully and sparingly. It is a treasure. Anyone who considers themselves a series movie fan has to see this movie.

Why Does the World Exist by Jim Holt

I was very interested in this book when I picked it up, I am always intrigued by the science of origin and this book promised to offer a mix of the physical sciences and of course the theology theories.

The book was a sore disappointment. It was, for me, almost unreadable. Very little of the science was discussed, there were some basic thoughts of physics but more was spent on the philosophical side.

There were discussions of nothing, what is the default state of the universe, and of course the age old of " Are we really here, do we really exist? " It was written in prose that was fairly inaccessible and put me to mind of the last scene in St Elsewhere where the boy is looking at the snow globe and of course also brings one back to some chemically induced conversations in college, " Hey man, what if this whole world is just a blade of grass in another universe."

Having not partaken of chemicals this book failed for me. Again it is perhaps a mistake on my part for expecting from the book what it was not and perhaps did not set out to be. I was looking for a dissertation and theories on creationism science and theology and how or if the trains can meet.

This book was just a little too much of nothing for me.

A Midsummer Nights Dream by William Shakespeare

Anyone who follows this blog or knows me knows that I am a huge fan of Shakespeare. However this play may prove the exception to the rule. I was looking to branch out from the histories and tragedies that I have focused my attention on the Shakespeare canon but must admit that in moving to this play I was sorely disappointed.

I had high hopes, in fact I read a passage from the opening scene to my wife in wonder at the way the author can turn a phrase. However the play quickly becomes a jumble of apparently everyone sleeping with someone. Now I will be first in line to tell you that most likely this play is wonderful to the right audience, it might just be a question of the reader and his interest in the subject matter, but for me this play was a very large disappointment. As I move on to the next reading of Shakespeare I will have to move back to the familiar and come back again to these comedies and the like when my attitude of admiration is reassured.

Still love the Bard just not a fan of this one.

Big Bang Theory

Thursday night has become crowded on the networks. With some hope held out over The Last Resort, and at least in my house, the cardinal rule that no singing show such as The X Factor can be missed we have been relegated to viewing The Big Bang Theory on demand. Fortunately CBS makes it available in this format for there can be no doubt that this is clearly the best comedy on television.

How I Met Your Mother is a good show as well, but occasionally will have a throw away episode, Big Bang is consistently spectacular. At times it surprises you as well, the episode last year when Howard goes into space and the characters all end up holding hands out of concern and depth of feeling went a great way in making these characters more than the parodies they play.

This show connects consistently and if anything is getting better and better.

The Birds

Considered Hitchcock's last great film The Birds tells a troubling story of all the birds going crazy, flocking together, and attacking humans.

As the movie begins Melanie Davis played by Tippi Hendren enters a pet store to pick up a bird she has ordered. As she waits a man mistakes her for a store employee and she plays along. Eventually it is determined she is not telling the truth and he and she both leave without their birds.

On a lark she determines to deliver his birds to him, and when a neighbor informs he has gone to Bodega Bay for the weekend she decides to deliver them there. We see her take a set of lovebirds to him, even crossing the bay in a rented skiff to surprise him. When he discovers her gift he races on the coast road and is there waiting for Melanie as she passes back across the lake. As she pulls up to the dock a gull attacks her leaving a cut on her head.

This is just the beginning of some very scary events.

The cast is strong. Jessica Tandy plays Lydia Brenner, the young man Mitch's mother, for much of the movie we see a remnant from Psycho, a domineering mother but by movie's end she is a more sympathetic character.

Hendren is strong in her role but certainly not as captivating as her forebears Grace Kelly, Kim Novak and Janet Leigh. Susanne Pleshette plays Annie, the schoolteacher in the village who as a former flame of Mitch offers friendship to Melanie as she decides if she is attracted to Mitch or not.

This is a good movie but it certainly suffers in comparison to many of the Hitchcock movies I have seen and enjoyed, the plot is less about the suspense between human relationships and more about the supernatural. For me that makes the movie solid but certainly not as successful as some of the earlier movies.

NBC's Revolution Continues to Improve

While I have written earlier about the difficulties shows of this nature have in keeping the excitement they create at their beginning Revolution continues each week to bring it's viewers into a world that is more and more interesting.

JJ Abrams is making use of the same device we saw on Lost, that is, slowly filling in the backstory on the characters in the show. Of course many shows might follow this practice but each time it is done in this show thus far I have never failed to be surprised at the history of the character being revealed. It makes the characters much more complex to have this information.

Aside from the plot twists and the fact that we are learning much more about each of the characters we also are becoming used to offhand references and asides which, for those of us in the know, create smiles, nods, or if you are playing along at home a checkmark for another " cookie" found.

In just the past couple of weeks we have seen a reference to Stephen King's The Stand characters such as Stu Redman and Frannie Goldsmith, as well as last night having the password for members of the resistance be asking for a biography of Joe Biden. Pretty clever stuff.

We still do not know of it's long term success but if you have been waiting for the right time to catch up on this show and enjoy the new episodes now might be an opportune time. It is becoming must see television.

Hunger

This 2008 Irish film written and directed by Steve McQueen, not that one, is one of the most harrowing, visually uncomfortable movies I have seen.

Based on the hunger strikes of the Irish Republican Army that led to the deaths of nine strikers including the leader and first striker Bobby Sands the movie is a brutal look at the event.

I remember clearly this happening when I was in high school. I did not understand why anyone would go to such an extreme. What I know now is that event was precipitated by the 1976 decision by the British Government to remove Political Status to the IRA. By doing so captured prisoners would therefore be treated as regular prisoners, or worse terrorists.

It is hard to imagine a Westernized country with such hatred and anger over a dispute between Catholics and Protestants. Still one should remember the anti Catholic bigotry in this country for a great part of our history.

The movie shows the incredible cruelty of the British Prison system to these men. Beatings were just the beginning of the torture given. One has to remember that in most cases however, the prisoners were people accused of and in most cases convicted and admitted to terrible crimes which led to the deaths of many innocent civilians.

Two wrongs do not make a right. Seeing prisoners spread feces on their wall, being beaten, probed, violated and then watching them make a decision to starve themselves to bring attention to their cause is never comfortable. This movie is not a comfortable one to watch. Watching Sands die, and the horrible effects of the starvation is hard to watch.

It is hard to imagine this is not in the Middle East or China. This was in England, civilized England that this took place.

One of the paradoxes of Western civilization, and especially the United States, is how over the post World War II history we have picked and chosen what dictators we supported and what ones we felt were terrible and had to be replaced. It is factual to say that we seemed to have a much easier time with practices that are considered cruel and inhumane when performed by our allies and or those that had something that we wanted, be it a port, or access, or of course oil.

I remember when I was in college having an IRA flag and honestly not realizing all that it meant on both sides. Still supporting dictators has been a common practice in this country and one can draw lines between what happend in the IRA prisons and what happens today in Middle Eastern prisons and perhaps in the days of Bush/Cheney at Guantanomo.

No matter how you feel about the treatment of prisoners, political, terroists, or otherwise, this movie might give you a brief glimpse of what might be done to those prisoners even in the West. It should, hopefully give us pause.

This movie received great reviews. I cannot call it a great movie. I will say it is a movie you will not soon forget.

Mirage Rock by Band of Horses

With the release of their new album Band of Horses is making a strong attempt at moving to next step of success. Acclaim and praise is not new for this band, previous albums have met with strong critical reviews and songs such as The Funeral and No One's Gonna Love You are of that group of songs that more people know than think they do, attribution to the band is still less.

Mirage Rock is a deeper record with nods to seventies rock, The Byrds, and for those looking for the most perfect comparison a review of nineties Jayhawks would be a good place to start.

The opening track Knock, Knock is a song destined to be popular, following that How to Live stronger still. The first true hit of the album is Slow Cruel Hands of Time. With sweet guitar, perfect harmonies and a haunting lyric everything good and yet everything limited in this album becomes apparent. I have to say that if I close my eyes and someone told me this was a track from Smile of Town Hall by The Jayhawks, albums I am not as familiar with as I should be, I would accept that information. The Jayhawks are a wonderful band, one of my favorites, and have a niche fanbase that is as dedicated as one can find. They were never a commercial success. It would appear Band of Horses must know in this day of teeny pop and rap music that their audience is limited.

A Little Biblical, Everything's Gonna Be Undone, and especially Heartbreak on the 101 are killer tracks that will be on many playlists from those in the know. This is a band I would go see and a band that will continue to develop their fan base with albums like this.

Perhaps Band of Horses is an indictment on popular music, unless a band such as this puts their songs on Grey's Anatomy, the chances of a major breakthrough are limited. Perhaps that is a good thing for fans of a band such as this.

This is a very good album

Play the Game

About a month or so ago we were looking for something to watch on streaming Netflix. We made a decision, we being not me that is, to watch this Andy Griffith vehicle.

Starring Griffith and Doris Roberts of Everyone Loves Raymond fame it certainly had an appeal for my wife's Mom. Nana loves Andy Griffith, don't we all.

The film centers around a young man named David who considers himself a ladies man. He does not have much of a relationship with his father so his Grandfather and he are very close. Grandpa Joe played by Andy Griffith misses his wife, being a widower is hard on him. He would like to date but has no clue. David teaches him some basics thinking he will use them to just ask a nice little old lady to have lunch but Grandpa Joe becomes a Casonova. Soon he is the Lothario of his nursing home.

In the meantime David is chasing the girl of his dreams, Julie, played by Marla Sokoloff. As we watched the movie she seemed very familiar but we could not place her. Google made us feel better when it informed us that she played Lucy on The Practice. She still looks very young, for that role having been so long ago.

In the end this movie is not that good. There are some laughs. It is a little raunchy in places. I think that if he had the chance to do it over that perhaps Andy Griffith might have preferred a movie like this, with lines delivered such as he gave in this movie, not be the last film credit he had. On the other hand he loved to work and he still had the ability to deliver a line with conviction.

The Andy Griffith show is a treasure and Griffith himself was. If you are an Andy fan, and who isn't, you might be better off not watching this one.

The Invisible Man by H G Wells

We all have at one point or another read, seen, or heard a version of the story of The Invisible Man. H G Wells, writing at the end of the nineteenth century was certainly one of the most prolific writers of his time.

When I was in sixth grade my teacher, who I understand now was actually quite modern for mid seventies Maine, had us do a play. There was not much uncommon about that but to make it different she had us do an old style radio play. This would be a play with us all in chairs behind a curtain, the presumption being that listeners were home listening on the radio in there homes. I remember some of our parents did not quite understand the appeal but us children understood right away the significance of this type of play. I remember our teacher was conscious of using the radio style of making sure some children who were not as popular in some of the larger roles. The radio style gave some of those children, with less confidence, the ability to stand out.

The original book however, is far from the story we did that day, and indeed most of the versions of the story we have seen in our lifetime are not similar.

In the original Wells story, a man, we later learn named Griffin, arrives in Iping, dressed in an odd way and behaves very secretly. He has plenty of money however and thus arranges a room in a hotel. Over time we learn how this man came to be in the situation he is and we see how he struggles to make use of it. He quickly learns that the perceived advantages of being invisible do not work out as he expects it to be.

This is a short story and Wells does a fantastic job making the character of The Invisible Man both intense and scary, as well as despairing and sympathetic. This is truly a challenge few authors could succeed with or have succeeded with over the last one hundred years or more.

On to the next classic.

Barack Obama The Story by David Maraniss

David Maraniss is one of our best biographers publishing today. With a day job working for The Washington Post Maraniss is close to the political action and his biographies have become some of the most well thought of in the last generation. With a biography of Bill Clinton's early years certainly this was well traveled road for the author, so when he stated his book would end as Obama found himself headed to graduate school at Harvard Law we knew this was not to be the typical biography.

This is a fine book. I am not sure if it is a book that The President would be altogether fond of but it is a book that is quite enlightening and indeed some of the personality traits described at length in the book are still very evident in the man we see today.

The President does not even appear in the book until about one hundred pages in as Mr. Maraniss introduces us to the family history of the President. We hear the story of his grandfather in Kenya, and meet his father as he grows up in Africa. At the same time we read of his great grandmothers suicide in nineteen twenties Kansas, how his grandfather was always a dreamer, always looking for his El Dorado. Through their families both Stanley Ann Dunham ( his mother) and Barack Obama Sr. found themselves in a class together at the University of Hawaii.

This book offers some strong insight into the people in the Presidents life. The portrayal of his Mother is quite complimentary, his Grandparents the Dunham's seem to be salt of the earth people. Much of is made of his Grandfather being the quintessential talker and as a man who felt like he had not made as much of himself as he should have. That might well be true but the man Maranniss profiles for me, a man who sold insurance for the last twenty years of his life, a job he disliked, but did it because it had to be done and helped to raise his grandson seems to me the story of a man who put his family first. It could not have been easy.

The story of Obama's African roots is more complex. His father, an incredibly intelligent man was also a very conflicted man, filled with demons. Violence, alcoholism, physical abuse of women, it does not a pretty picture make.

After Obama is born his Mother has her parents help in raising him. Eventually he gets into the exclusive Punahoo High School. Obama was a typical high school student,playing basketball, smoking weed, none of his friends would have identified him as a future President.

In fact one of the odder things about the biography is how uninvolved Obama was in politics. Stories of Bill Clinton being involved in politics from a young age are everywhere, here at my kids school there is a young man who already has a thirst for politics in the extreme. He will run for office someday and we all expect it. How did Obama fly under the radar.

Obama goes to college at Occidental and Columbia. He socially runs more with the international students than the white ones or black ones. His identity is always a concern for him. He feels in between and belonging nowhere. It is in college we see the constant watchfulness for what he calls traps, we also see the caution the willingness to avoid argument and confrontation in a sometime frustrating way.

Much has been made of his Chicago organizing experience. We see this here and it required much more than I knew. It was certainly not an easy job, one, however, gets the sense that at this point Obama's purpose was two fold. He felt the need to do something to connect with his black community and inevitably he had some of the anthropological urges his Mother had as well.

Critics of the President surely have latched onto his great friendships and visitations with his Pakistani friends. Obama certainly has a worldview that is much more expansive than the normal politician.

As a college student he does not appear very likable. His journals and letters written to a couple of girlfriends who cooperated with the book are pretentious and of a nature that would never be elected to be President. I think that the sense of being above it all that often frustrates both is opponents and his own party was readily becoming apparent in this book.


This is a great book. People change and certainly the President has matured. Many people in his life have been there for him, helped him a great deal. The young man we meet in the book however does not seem headed for greatness, he does not seem altogether likable, but of course not many twenty year olds are, perhaps that is th full message of the book.


In reading the book and then looking at the calender at the end of the book at what happened after the story ends in the book, culminating with his being sworn in, is the shocking resume he possessed at this time. He was a state legislator for ten years, ran for Congress and lost, won a Senate seat and three years later ran for President. He might have been the most unqualified man ever to be elected President, certainly in the modern age. It was certainly a confluence of unlikely events that put him into the White House.

Doom and Gloom by The Rolling Stones

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of The Rolling Stones. That is an incredible length of time. The band is currently in rehearsal for some celebratory shows in Newark and London, a release next month of a anniversary compilation and at least if things go well a potential full scale tour next year.

Keith Richards almost died a few years ago when, and you cannot make this up, he fell out of a coconut tree and landed on his head. The man who most assumed would be next casualty to the rock and roll lifestyle for a period of over thirty years almost died of a coconut tree accident but other than that appears healthy. Bill Wyman left the band years ago but the Charlie Watts still drums and Ronny Wood still slithers around the stage. And of course Mick's voice has not faltered a bit.

What is most remarkable to me this fall however is that as has now become the norm for these repackagings of old material the Stones have recorded a couple of new songs, one of which has recently been released. The new song, titled Gloom and Doom has the signature Stones sound. If listening to the song I had to put an era to it I would call it something that would fit in the late seventies, early eighties but the truth is the song is a killer track.

There is a great deal of flotsam out in the music industry and here come these rock Gods yes, but grandfathers also, to release a new song that does not miss a beat, slow a step, or otherwise accommodate the inevitable expected decline and slowing of recording artists their age.

This might be one of the strongest singles you will hear this year. Make sure you do.

SNL at the Top of It's Game

Saturday Night Live has now been on the air 37 years. As we watch the show from week to week one of the most frustrating facts that we realize is that this show can in one week can go from funny and relevant to having an episode that is terrible. Sometimes the skits that do not work make you think to yourself who, in their right mind, thought this would be funny.

With that being true there is another truth however and that is that SNL has a place in our popular culture that no other show has. While the late night comics consistently pick on our politicians and the news as part of their monologues and Jon Stewart has turned political spear-throwing into an art form no show is more relevant than SNL in demonstrating the humor of current events.

Saturday night's show was not perfect. One wonders why we continue to see Kenan Thompson's French singer on Weekend Update for example, but to counter that the Arianna Huffington skit was topical, funny and biting. One wonders if Democratic candidates could speak on women's issues in as strong and sharp a way as the Huffington character in this skit does if they would be further down the path to victory.

The most predictable skit in the show this week was the opening sequence which covered the debate between the Vice Presidential candidates. Certainly both of the candidates gave much material to be parodied. The skit was very well done, both sides were picked apart, notably the easy parody of Biden's physical gesturing and interruption tactics came early, but the skit did not stop there. It was not just the easy targets but more nuance was also apparent. A wonderful skit.

Still outside the political the most talked about skit, the skit that perhaps was more scathing, more bite the hand that feeds you, than anything we have seen in years was the Tech Talk skit. With Christina Applegate playing the host of a show in which folks complained about their new Apple phones the bite was when she, as host, introduced three peasant workers from China who make the phones. The contrast between the two groups forces shame on the Americans complaining and is a great critique of the American consumer.

At it's best SNL still skewers the culture better than any other entity.

Nashville

Perhaps the most talked about series of the fall season has been this ABC Country Music Drama. Centering around the Nashville music and, apparently, political scene the two main characters are Tami Terrell, er....Rayna James, a 40 year old country music superstar played by Connie Britton.

Her adversary in the show is a young, poppy country star, you can fill in the blank as to who this character might be modeled after, named Juliet Barnes. Played by Hayden Panettierre, who rose to fame a few years ago in the show of the moment Heroes, as the show begins Juliet is easy to dislike.

Powers Boothe who I will always remember for his performance in the early eighties miniseries on the Guyana Massacre, his role as Jim James earned him far reaching acclaim. In this series he plays Lamar Wyatt, Rayna's father who is a major figure in Nashville politics and could be considered, at least initially, as the J R figure, the master manipulator.

With Connie Britton as the star this show might have one of the largest advantages of any show starting out this year. She is without a doubt the most likable actress in television today. She is wonderful. Still the setting from Friday Night Lights to Nashville is quite different and one can be sure that ABC will not be satisfied to have a critics darling in this series. They are looking for ratings.

As I watched this show my opinion changed a couple of times. In the first fifteen minutes I about wrote the show off. Watching Panettierre snarl her way, as her role needs, as a very unlikable character and my dislike of soap operas I was reading to walk, my wife said however I should give it a chance and she was correct.

I am still not convinced that the show will keep my interest. If I was to bet my guess would be that it will not. It will be more a matter of personal preference on my part and not a denigration of the show. Britton and Boothe are tremendous, of that there is no doubt, I just do not know what the market is for a soap opera set in the country music scene. If one can succeed there is every reason to bet on this one however.

The Revenge of Geography by Robert D Kaplan

Robert Kaplan has written numerous books about the world's geopolitical scene over the years. After reading a geography book with my son this summer it seemed like an opportune time and go further and read this most recent book by Robert Kaplan titled above.

The first thing that must be recognized is that this is not an easy book, it is not written in a more pedestrian way and at least a moderate assumption of knowledge of prehistory is either assumed or helpful. However even without that Kaplan does offer enough information to inform his points to be understandable.The book is set up in three sections. Early in the book Kaplan tells us of his plan for the book, namely to go over some of the great thinkers in geography and how it affects history over previous times and civilizations and then in the final chapter to use the thoughts and premises brought forward and apply it to modern interpretation of future events.

No matter the book I always attempt to read the full material but I will confess that I did not find the long dissertation on pre history that fulfilling or neccesary with my background. So after digesting about thirty pages of it I did skim the rest of the section until we arrived at the last section of the book, which for me was the meat of the book, about how geography and demographics might well affect the future of our civilization.

The last section is well worth any struggles to get that far. A great deal of material is covered in this section, as Kaplan discusses the geopolitical past, present, and future of all the major powers in the world. There is much more information than can be gleaned into a short review. Still some very salient points of interest that can be mentioned are easy to mention to give one an idea of what they will find in this very interesting book.

- It is asserted that the historical dynamism in temperate zone climates such as Northern Europe and the Asian plains is related much to the fact that in order for a civilization to work together in common cause there must be a need for such actin in order to survive. To wit in the equatorial climates life was not hard, it was not necessary to act in concert with other groups of people to survive, with that in mind one can see how Asian and European civilizations had a huge and yet to be made up head start on the African and to some extent South American cultures.

- Geography plays a great part in the ability of a culture to be ruled. Mountainous regions such as the Balkans, Caucuses, and the Afghan and Pakistani regions are much harder to rule because many of these groups of people have created small societies inside their valleys and peaks of their geographic areas. Contrast this with an area such as Egypt where the geography or wide stretches is similar and this easier to control and intermingle.

- Perhaps the greatest single factor in twentieth century geopolitical struggle was the double insecurity of the German and Russian states as a result of the large Eastern European plain which offered no geographical boundary between Russia and the European continent to the West of it. Stalin and Hitler's non agggression pact was a direct result of this double insecurity and had Hitler not broken that pact it is quite certain that the history of the world would be different.

- In examining future events we learn about the ultra significance of Iran and Turkey to the future balance of the Middle East, about how the European continent remaining fractured to an extent is a good thing, about how the loss of the Southern parts of it's empire in the breakup of the Soviet Union was a critical loss for Russia, how conversely the rise of the Stan countries to the south of Russia might signal a re-balance in the worlds energy resources, and how China and it's free flowing spending on natural resources around the world is benefitted and made easier by the American presence and spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. To wit while the United States spends blood and treasure on calming the waters in Pakistan, Afghanistan and much of the lower Asian area China sends its thanks by pushing pipelines and roads through these same areas to further solidify its resource base.

- Lastly Kaplan examines the United States and its relationship with it's neighbors to the South. Primarily speaking about the potential loss of the American Southwest to a Mexican culture of immigration he also speaks about the potential loss of Northern Mexico from the rest of the Mexican state. Calling this area ungovernable and run by drug cartels with their own military and better weapons that the Mexican government Kaplan envisions a day where the United States has a long border with a Narco state. This is the result of the East Coast elites in Government being more interested in the world away from our shores and not the potential disaster at our doorstep. He contrasts that result with the possibility of a successful Mexican state working in concert with the United States as a hemispheric powerhouse to challenge anything that comes out of the Far East.

A very interesting, thought provoking book.

Paper Moon

Paper Moon is a 1973 movie directed by Peter Bogdanovich starring Ryan and Tatum O'Neal. Filmed in black and white it is a well done story about a Midwest Bible Salesman and con man saddled with the job of taking a young child ( who might be his daughter) after her mother dies.

Ryan O'Neal plays Moze Pray the aforementioned bible salesman. As he takes Addie to her Aunt's house she becomes an asset in his different scams that he consistently runs. He sells bibles to widows and widowers, and runs cash register change scams that consistently make me head hurt trying to figure them out. Tatum O'Neal is perfect as his daughter. She is cute, precocious, and incredibly gifted in body language acting. I believe she was nominated for an Oscar for her perfromance and it was well deserved.

This is not a great movie, but it certainly is a good one and the performance of both O'Neal's and the subsequent drama in thier own personal lives gives one pause as to what success can sometime lead to. Still this movie was well done, Bogdanovich made a great choice in using black and white, it was very effective.

The Joys of Grand Funk Railroad

In the early seventies Grand Funk Railroad was one of the most successful bands in American music. While not calling myself a diehard fan there are certainly a group of songs performed by the band that have a permanent place in the American Rock Catalog.

Some Kind of Wonderful is one of their most known songs, and is a great one, but in our house it comes down to just one song and it is polarizing in the extreme.

I'm Your Captain/Closer to Home was one of those self indulgent, overblown, songs that became iconic in the seventies. Years ago at my work I had a gentleman who was about twenty years older working for me in our department. He had brought in a picture of himself from the early seventies, with long hair, looking like a child of Aquarius. His coworkers were shocked. He said are you surprised and I told him no, that my guess was that the day that picture was taken he was tooling around in his Camaro listening to Grand Funk Railroad. He was surprised and acknowledged that I was dead on.

Grand Funk Railroad was a polarizing band, they were considered overblown, copycat and not as talented as their pretensions would have one think. One can never doubt thier success however.

I have always enjoyed I'm Your Captain and my oldest son has followed suit, when we hear Grand Funk upstairs at loud decibels we know my son is getting ready for something. My daughter however has, with me, had a running joke that this is the worst song in the world. For her the second half with the repetitive " I'm getting closer to my home " is torture. She comments on what kind of Captain is this guy if he has been lost at sea forever and he is about to lose his ship. It is one of our more reliable conversations. These are what memories are made of. My co worker still remembered his Camaro and long hair and sunny summer days from the early seventies.

In twenty or thirty years my daughter will hear this song and think of her Dad and how we used to debate the merits of Grand Funk Railroad. Few things besides music can create such easily accessed long standing memories of time and place.

Ellie Goulding and The Wallflowers

So in this weeks new music releases the most buzz-worthy of the new releases has been new albums by Ellie Goulding and The Wallflowers. This morning I took a listen to the albums and in both cases have to say that I was totally....uninspired.

After listening to Muse last week and being very impressed I believe sincerely that I am open to new music so I was prepared to be impressed by Elle Goulding. I have heard the song " Lights" quite a bit this fall and to me there was nothing about it that was remember-able.

The new album has got some good reviews, from Rolling Stone especially. Listening to the album I hear a great voice, many new sound effects and a very modern backing to a voice that could just as easily be singing standards. For me this combination is nothing short of a disaster. Their is nothing in this music that I can speak well of. I can say that Goulding has great potential, her voice is shimmering at times, however it does not work in this context.


Also released was The Wallflowers new album Glad All Over. The Wallflowers are perhaps the least successful band that has survived for fifteen years since their one great commercial success. Now it is surely not necessary for a great band to be a commercial success. However when a band does not really have a niche that allows them to be non commercial there is little room for growth. The best word for The Wallflowers music is forgettable. There is nothing that I hear that makes me have any desire to hear it again.

There are good weeks and bad weeks and I can uusally find something good to say about a band or an album. Not in these cases.

Rodriguez on 60 Minutes

This past Sunday 60 Minutes ran a feature on the musician Rodriguez and his improbable rebirth this past year as a Rock Star at age seventy. As I have written previously about the Searching for Sugar Man movie that is playing to wide acclaim and the corresponding soundtrack introducing people to this incredible singer-songwriter they missed generations ago most by now know the story of his rise this year.

This story on the show this week was told elegantly with conversations with the record label executive that signed him, and with the South African record store owner who decided to find him. Footage of his initial performance in South Africa is shown and it is moving in a way few things you will see are.

Watching Bob Simon, the reporter for CBS hold Rodriguez's arm as he walks gingerly down the street and comment on his struggles to walk and his almost being blind one thinks of the vagaries of life. From all accounts this humble and decent man who in conversation with Simon when asked if working hard labor for more than 30 years with the thought that music had passed him by says simply" There is no shame in hard work, there is no shame in being poor," is a man we can all be thankful to hear and know about.

It should also make us glad that some of the recognition of his talent and work has come while he is still alive. Perhaps we would all do well to think about people we know and care about that we should acknowledge while we are still able.

In days of bad news, ugly campaign rhetoric, and all the negativity in our society take fifteen minutes to watch this story online and feel good.

Muse on Saturday Night Live

I reviewed the new album by Muse recently and commented that I thought their music was interesting, big and alive with sound and freshness. I stated that I did not see myself going backward in their catalog but that were I twenty years younger I had no doubt that this band would be on the top of my list.

I have not changed any of my opinions but I will add this caveat. After watching their performance on Saturday Night Live this week, especially their performance of their new song Madness this is a band that any music fan needs to pay attention too. This performance was a game changer for me. This band must give an incredible live performance and the frontman is mesmerizing.

Thier is hope for rock and roll even in 2012.

The Conversation

When one thinks of the great movies of the seventies and there were many The Conversation does not often come to mind. In fact this was not even a movie I was aware of until recently when it appeared in reference to a few other movies that I have watched.

The Conversation was the baby of Francis Ford Coppola. Fresh off his Godfather success Coppola wrote, produced, and directed this psychological thriller starring Gene Hackman.

Hackman plays Harry Caul a surveillance expert who according to one of his peers is " the best bugger on the West Coast." Through the movie we learn that a recording that Caul did years ago led the deaths of a rat in the Teamsters union as well as that mans family. He lives with that guilt. Most of what he does in his career are of the typical insurance scam, cheating spouses sort of thing but as the movie begins we see Caul and his crew performing a unique surveillance.

Two people Bernie Moran, played by Frederic Forest and a woman known only as Ann, played by Cindy Williams, yes that Cindy Williams of Laverne and Shirley fame, are walking around a public square having a conversation. The Conversation is about that conversation and it's effects on all the people. John Cazale plays Caul's assistant. Cazale soon on his way to dieing of cancer and fresh off his role as Frodo in The Godfather was, even in a small role, magnificent.

Hackman again plays an everyman. This is not some suave, debonair, spy. This is a rumpled, balding, eyeglass wearing, everyman who lives in a small nondescript apartment, obsessed with privacy and security and who when he gets home the first thing he does is take off his pants and spend his evening in his boxers. No Harry Caul will never be confused with James Bond.


When preparing the tapes for his buyer Caul becomes concerned that these tapes may lead to someone's murder. Hearing Bernie say to Laurie as they walk around the square that " he would kill us if he could" he becomes sure that his client might do just that. With his past experience this sends Harry into a state of controlled panic. What we learn as the movie progresses is that what you think you hear is often not what you hear and the results of misinterpretation are sometimes much more severe than one might think.

Also starring in this movie are a young Terri Carr and an even younger Harrison Ford along with an uncredited performance by Robert Duvall. Still the movie is Hackman's from beginning to end, a tour de force performance, with Hackman a little more out there than his normal role.


Not quite the movie I expected but certainly one that I would reccomend.

Saint Augustine by Garry Wills

Saint Augustine is considered not just one of the great religious figures in history but also as one of the great thinkers. Most folks who know me know that I am a seeker, one who makes it a habit to always have at least one book going of a spiritual bent. I know what I believe, and who I believe in, yet I never fear to learn more and hear more from those that differ or at least might see things from a different angle.

Wills being the writer of several books on religion is a strong writer for me and so I embraced the idea of reading more on St. Augustine. This book, is a sort book in the Penguin publishing series on famous people but it certainly gives a basic introduction into the character and writings of the Catholic bishop that will, in my case, lead to further more in depth readings.

This is not to say that Wills dumbs down his efforts in this introductory book for he does not, he never does. In fact I will admit I struggle with some of the meanings and assumptions of Augustine's work. Writing just 400 years after Christ's death St Augustine himself goes from a life of sin to, eventually, a belief in Christianity. One would not know, at least I did not know, that Augustine lived a life mostly in Africa, centering around modern day Tunis, in the city of and cities around Carthage.

Wills examines much of Augustine's writings and time frames of the writings and compares them to where and what his life was doing at that time. I will not, and really could not give justifiable service to either the author or his subject in this writing. I am not a religious scholar. I will say however that the examination of Augustine's writings on crime and punishment are some of the best I have ever read. Indeed Augustine's opinion against the death penalty and his reasons for it is as eloquent as I have ever read. If punishment is meant to be punitive in our society we have strayed a far cry from where we began as a country of Angelo-Christian faith. It is always interesting to me that a good percentage of those people strongest in favor of capital punishment are those that purport to be Conservative Christians. There is nothing in my reading of the Bible or later New Testament interpretation that has much good to say about the death penalty. Both Jesus and Augustine talk about their concern for the soul of the criminal and when one examines the methodology of today's prison system one can see that we have deviated. Of course when you insist on a full and complete separation of church and state you cannot necessarily complain as one in favor of that system when the results do not follow Christian or Biblical imperatives.

This is not an easy read though Wills is as accessible as you will find on these subjects.

Well worth a person's time.

The French Connection Two

With the success of the 1971 Oscar best picture it was inevitable that a return to the story would take place. Unfortunately the first movie had been based on true events where the villain Charnier escaped. With profits beckoning however the producers of this movie took the original character and created a fictionalized account of Popeye Doyle's New York Police Detective continued chase of Charnair on the drug dealers home turf of Marseilles.

I gave the first movie a good rating, the elevated train chase scene is one of the best pursuit scenes you will ever see but the movie had flaws. This second movie also is good but it is not great.

Doyle, played again by Hackman, struggles with the language and it is clear that he is not welcomed by the French police. Perhaps it is to make an illustration of how isolated Popeye is but with most of the characters speaking in untranslated French one as a viewer can find that frustrating. Still the meaning is clear, the French detective Henri,played in an understated, rumpled way by Bernard Fresson, has read Doyle's file and finds his Wild West approach to police work unappealing.

Eventually Popeye finds his way to the beach and unbeknownst to him he is noticed by Charnier himself as he is having dinner in a restaurant adjacent to the beach. Popeye being trailed, by two French detectives to as much keep and eye on him as keep him safe, ditches his shadows at, what becomes a very poor time, as soon he is grabbed off the street by Charnier's man. Taken to a hotel he meets face to face with the Frenchman who wants to know what he knows about his operation. When Doyle refuses to cooperate he is injected with heroin which becomes his lifeline the next three weeks. As the police saturate the city however looks for Doyle, the Frenchman is feeling pinched in his activities. After a final interrogation of Doyle which merits nothing new in the way of information they give him one last injection of heroin and dump in a street.

Knowing that he will never be trusted as a policeman before if known as an ex junkie Herni puts him in isolation in one of the cells and we are witness to the cold turkey approach of getting off heroin. It is not pretty and Doyle suffers greatly, begging for a fix.

Eventually after a harrowing experience Doyle is off the junk and back on the job. He and Henri' have made an uneasy peace and from this point on work together to try to find the French drug lord.

An interesting correlation in the movie was that while the first movie had a high speed chase scene that is revered the second movie as it nears its conclusion has a low speed chase scene which if anything is more suspenseful that the first movie.

John Frankenheimer did a fine job with a movie that was going to be held up to a nearly impossible standard, writing a fictional end to a true story was always going to have its share of critics. The movie is strong and the scenes of drug withdrawal in a sympathetic character were very strong.

Worthy of the original. Hackman as always is wonderful.

The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving by Jonathan Evison

Imagine losing everything in one day. One sunny afternoon you are driving home, kids in the back, arguing like little kids do, knowing that when you get home you need to put the groceries away, get the kids settled, start dinner, and maybe if your lucky get five minutes to hear yourself think. Then imagine a careless move on your part, perhaps the car was not put in park and suddenly, instantly, with no rewind button your children are gone and you wife upon hearing the tragic news reacts by leaving you.

This is what happens to Benjamin Benjamin. It is not giving away the plot, as we hear early in the book of the loss he has suffered, though the exact details take time to emerge. In either case the story is really about his attempt at recovery, his pulling himself out of the bottle and trying, and only trying to start his life again.

As Ben had been the house husband while his wife was a practicing veterinarian his job skills are pretty non-existent. On a whim he takes a course as a caregiver and his agency places him with a young man named Trev who has advanced Muscular Dystrophy. Trev is a typical nerdy eighteen year old except that his body has betrayed him and left him in a state of perpetual horniness not just for girls but any reality of a normal life with no real life experience and a bitterness that is ever present.

Eventually and not instantly Ben and Trev develop a relationship that borders on trust and a decision is reached and Trev's mother convinced to allow them to take a trip across a couple of states to visit Trev's father. The boys relationship with his father is poor, the father had abandoned him, and now trying desperately hard to be in his life unsuccessfully he has been in a car accident.

The road trip is the meat of the story. Along the way Trev and Benjamin bond further, learn about idiot lights on dashboards, get caught in an epic dust storm, and pick up a few stragglers along the way. By the end of their trip they have quite a little hodgepodge of family in their van. No one in Evison's world is whole. Perhaps that is the message, we are all broken and gaping in places, it is just some of us that it is more obvious to see. These characters are all presented with large holes for all to see, and the book moves ever so steadily toward some hope of reconciliation, between young boys who will die to young and the vagaries of life, between daughters and fathers, fathers and sons, and between parents who suffered a tragedy none of us can imagine living through.

This book is a winner and when Dot the trying to be tough 18 year old girl on her own hitchhiking has been with the group for a while and at a rest stop takes Ben's hand and tells him she knows " he was a good father" you can feel yourself loving these broken people. But for the Grace of God go I has not been reflected quite so well in a book I have read in along time.

An easy read, a quick read, and a book you will want to keep reading Evison has written a wonderful book here.

Revolution, Vegas, and The Last Resort: Prognosis

In the last couple of days I have watched week two or The Last Resort and Vegas as well as Weeks two and three of Revolution.

All of these shows have been fairly well received out of the gate and I plan to keep readers apprised on how the shows progress and build on their big starts.

Revolution, the Monday night NBC drama has started off with strong ratings. Defeating Hawaii Five-0 in each of it's first three weeks the show continues to build it's story. I will admit that about half way through week two I was close to bagging it, it just was meandering a little too much and I am notoriously quick on the trigger. By the end of episode two however I was back involved when a huge plot twist presented itself. Week Three was very strong as we are seeing more more flashbacks that give us an understanding of the people in the show and where they were and who they have been before the time frame we are seeing now. The relationship between Miles and the leaders of the Monroe republic has been most interesting. These shows do have a hard time keeping the plot moving and yet having it maintain it's excitement but it can be done. Lost is always the prime example of this, Revolution still looks to me like it has an uphill climb to sustain success but if you are waiting to see how it does before you hop on board now might be the time, NBC has signed the show for a full compliment of episodes for the season.

Andre Braugher's The Last Resort started off perhaps stronger than any show we have seen in recent years. Last nights episode continued the intrigue as the American military moved in close to the boundary that Captain Chaplin had set and we learned that the invisibility ( on radar etc ) on the ship works and that thus the sailors have a pretty effective way to hide. The show is taking a little more time to flesh out it's characters and with the time slot it has this show might have a tougher time and a shorter leash. I think the show has promise but this show, even more than Revolution seems to be a show with little space to grow without getting more and more farfetched. It also should be on at ten. Watching this show at eight instead of the fun, I do not have to keep up with the plot of The Big Bang Theory is a tough sell. If your afraid of falling in love with a show that will soon be pulled you might wait a little longer on this one as I still, unless a new time slot is found, will be hard pressed to succeed.

The clearest hit and the one with the easiest path to success is also, not surprisingly the show of the three that is most conventional. Still one should not confuse conventional with hum drum. Set in the mob town of 1960 Las Vegas and with the double barreled approach of a long range plot of the battle between a resolute upright Sheriff and a mobster named Savino, while also having weekly crimes to investigate this show lights up the screen. Dennis Quaid is good in his role but Micheal Chilkis is fantastic, Emmy worthy right away, in his role as the Chicago gangster. Don't wait on this show, it is a little beyond the normal cop show, the historic setting adds and element, and the acting is first rate. This show is a sure fire winner.

The 2nd Law by Muse

I have come to find out that this band has been making music for a decade or more and I have had no real conception of what kind of band they were. I saw them on Saturday Night Live last year and found them so uninteresting that I fast forwarded through their performance. Recently I think I saw Kate Hudson on a talk show and she evidently is married and has had a baby with their front man.

So, with a slow week in record releases recently I decided to listen to their new album. I was quite pleasantly surprised. First it must be pointed out that I will not be going back to listen to the old catalog as I do in some cases, and most likely I will not be firing up Muse in any playlist of mine.

That said this album is strong and I do understand the appeal they have. As I listened three or four times to the album I hear influences that are far ranging. One cannot listen to any British band with a sound like theirs and not think of the glory days of Freddie Mercury and Queen but easily heard also on some notes is a bit of Bono. More easily discernible, at least to me, are traces of the pageantry of Use Your Illusion era Guns and Roses, and frequently Michael Hutchence comes to mind. So clearly the boys in Muse have many influences.

The album is strong and the interesting thing for me is that I have no idea what songs are the singles on this album. The band will be making another visit to SNL this weekend and it will be interesting to compare my reviews to the songs that htey play.


Standout tracks on this album are Madness and Panic Station with the latter dropping a few F Bombs and bearing witness to the tones of Hutchence. Operatic and bigger than life with a chanting backdrop, and a scream that compares with the singer from the Darkness the song Survival rocks. It is as big a sound as you will find in today's music. I am going to tell my son about it, a move I will probably regret when he starts playing it with his super speakers upstairs nightly. Still I feel compelled to share it with him.

A bit more accessible, still with a bit of an operatic voice, Follow Me is another winner that would best be played loud and sang strong. The other standout track for me is a song called Explorers that roars from a slow start, with piano backdrop into a fully orchestrated song in which the incredible tones and strength of the singer's voice is on display.

At the end of the album is a rather indulgent two song set both of which are called The Second Law that one will have to be a big fan to embrace but that said this album is strong enough that the band deserves to be a little excessive with their experiments.

This is a very strong album and for those of us concerned with the prevalence of bubblegum pop, boy bands, and rap music this is a hopeful sign that their are good modern bands that could easily have succeeded twenty or thirty years ago. I will not have this album on my rotation but were I in my teens and early twenties again this album by Muse would be at the top of my playlist.

Mortality by Christopher Hitchens

I was about a generation too young to have a clear picture of the erudite intellectuals one would have seen in the sixties and early seventies, the William F Buckley's and Gore Vidal's that would appear anywhere a stage was presented and a subject to debate.

As we in the last twenty years have become more and more a people of the lowest common denominator and one that values less and less thought and civil discussion this might soon be something one has to seek out in order to experience it.

One of our greatest intellectuals in the last generation was Christopher Hitchens. Hitchens still a fairly young man when he was struck with esophageal cancer two years ago passed away in December of 2011. Hitchens, perhaps best known as being the worlds most virulent atheist was a brilliant man. His writing over the last twenty years was voluminous in the extreme and he would write on anything. Public debate was another of his passions and because of his talent at this he often came into contact with those of differing opinions, including those who are strong Christians.

I think it must say something about a person if the people he disagrees, argues with, debates with are those that speak the highest of him. Hitchens loved life and when he was stricken with this especially nasty form of cancer he resolved to record his experience as best he could, as he always did, through the written word.

In this book we read the first essay he wrote for Vanity Fair once he was diagnosed. Originally not sure he wanted to write about it, once he did, the words flowed in his typical manner. Hitchens described living in Tumorland as opposed to the regular world. He tells us in the short book Mortality that one can visit Tumorland and even consider the experiences original but it is no place to stay.

Speaking about the horrible proton treatments he had and the severe burns inside and out one feels for him, hearing him speak about the phrase " what does not kill you makes you stronger" as one of the stupidest expressions he has ever heard mirrors my opinion on this subject. Hitchens describes that perhaps a small book of etiquette should be published for both those living in Tumorland and their friends and loved ones so that each avoids the things said which are not helpful.

Hitchens embraced his treatment, was a patient that was tough and a trooper, he writes of calling his friend the Geneticist Dr. Francis Collins about a treatment he had heard about that showed promise. Collins, a dear friend, and a Christian, told him gently but firmly that his cancer had spread too far to be treated in that way. One can feel Hitchens sitting down as he holds the phone feeling a kick in the solar plexus worse than any boot could give him.

The old saying goes that there are no atheists in foxholes but in the case of Mr. Hitchens there are evidently some with cancer. Hitchens expressed appreciation and wonder at thousands of letters he received advising that people, both regular citizens like you and me, as well as famous folk, were praying for him, but he never changed his mind that belief in God was not for him.

He even talks about those on the far right who saw a correlation to his illness to his " blasphemy against God." That " surely it is relevant that the organ that he blasphemed with ( his mouth) is where his cancer is based." For me, and I do believe in Jesus as the savior I think those folks with those thoughts do nothing to illustrate their belief that God is love. Hitchens in response questions if that means that a two year old who gets brain cancer is also chosen by God to have that disease. The answer is, in both cases, no.

Only reviewing the book and having read a great deal of his essays I can say this easily. Christopher Hitchens was an amazingly talented man, gifted and intelligent. The world will miss him.

Groundhog Day

This weekend in an effort to find a movie that both the adults and the kids could watch we dug up Groundhog Day on Netflix streaming.

Having seen the movie multiple times before I was multi tasking for much of the first half of the film I was pleasantly surprised to hear laughter from my children. Not the churlish, pre ordained laughter you hear at things that are supposed to be funny, but real laughter from something with no hidden agenda or double meaning other than good comedy, some physical, some not.

Bill Murray is a master and while this movie was strictly a comedic role it was not so slapstick as some of his previous roles and so provided a small bridge to the outstanding more varied roles that were to follow.

Phil Connor is the weatherman at a local station in Philadelphia and as tomorrow is February 2nd he gets himself ready to go to Punxsutawny to observe the seasonal Groundhog festival. Phil's is joined by his Cameraman, Chris Elliott, and the segment producer named Rita played by Andie MacDowell.

MacDowell was at this time just making the change from modeling to actor and is surprisingly good in the role. Perhaps it is because her beauty is not the traditional blonde bombshell but a little less easily defined, dark haired and all cheekbones. One can just see her splashing her face with water in a Noxzema commercial. Maybe she actually did that?

After getting through the broadcast Phil is dismayed to learn that he and the crew are trapped by a snowstorm, that he did not predict. Much to his chagrin they stay over and the next morning he awakes at six a.m. to the same song as February 2nd, I Got You Babe by Sonny and Cher. As he brushes his teeth and performs his morning rituals he notices that the radio hosts patter is the same as the day before. When it being Groundhog Day is mentioned Phil looks out the window and is aghast to see the town crowded with tourists and no signs of a snowstorm.

Phil is confused but with a couple of days he realizes that he is stuck inside a time loop. How Phil deals with this problem and learns to use it to his advantage in an effort to improve his relationship makes for a movie that while it is quite obvious in some places actually has more nuance than one would expect for a film of this type.

Murray is stupendous in the role, one cannot say enough good things about his performance as the car salesman like greasy weatherman with all the accompanying personality traits one expects but with, of course, a heart of gold under that exterior. Rita is earnest and finds herself more and more attracted to Phil and makes one wonder how well any of us would do if they could get a do over on any situation that did not work out as planned.

Directed by Murray's Ghostbusters pal Harold Ramis this movie is a winner. It also has been off the beaten path for enough time that your teenagers, like mine, might find it original and funny.