Beyoncé’s Coachella documentary. It was amazing and just the tonic I needed for these political times. Black ladies rising, mor please. Also, if you are a fan of her butt, this is a must see. 
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Dumbland (2002)
David Lynch predicts the modern error, created entirely in Flash. Once offered as an exclusive on his now gone website. Nasty, brutish and short. And darkly hilarious.
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How much art has been lost to the flashocolypse?
I have a few .swf files of important human achievements that may oneday never be able to be played again.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
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Ah, unsupported file formats. Especially bad when true for backup files. I used FastBack for a couple years back in the MSDOS days. Company was bought by CPBackup, who promptly dropped support. So my backups were made useless.
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My pet peeve is when a file format (or communication protocol – hi there, Bluetooth!) changes specs, rendering old data/hardware useless, but without actually, you know, announcing anything about it, or letting people find a way to backwards compatibility.
But the name stays the same and we all get to find out the hard way.
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I watched The Greatest Showman last night.
The best comparison I can think of is Hans Christian Andersen, which, rather than trying to tell a true story about the historical person it portrays, it uses the medium that that same person would use to entertain their audience to present their life. And, while telling a tale about Andersen through a fairy-tale results in a sweet, simple, heart-felt story, aggrandizing Barnum through a huge spectacle left me feeling rather hollow.
That is: I found it to be exactly what it presented PT Barnum to be: a purveyor of cheap, feel-good moments, with only the vaguest truth or substance behind it.
And, to its credit, it did that very well. The musical numbers were great, the choreography was amazing (although “Rewrite the Stars” spent most of its time rewriting the laws of physics), and the were a couple of touching moments there.
It’s just too bad that they blew their run-time on spectacle and didn’t keep any back for characterization.
For the most egregious example: the star-crossed couple. Yes, they’re both very pretty, but, other than that, why are they interested in each other? Their storyline is probably the #2 plot behind Barnum himself, and I have no idea, beyond “pretty,” why these characters would risk what they risked.
Once final, minor disappointment: I wish they had made their big opera star sound more operatic. “Never Enough” was pretty enough, but it sounded like it could have been sung just as well by any finalist on American Idol.
If you see it your TV listings, or on a steaming service you subscribe to, I’d give it a watch. Otherwise, just give the soundtrack (the best part of the show) a listen on YouTube, and give the rest a pass.
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Well, I’m gonna be watching it - and it’ll also be the subject of my next blog post! (What is this “shame” thing of which I hear talk?)
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Yay! I had fun reading the Victor/Victoria post.
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Ironic, the last lines of the article.
“… Our minds simply cannot hold it all, and so people who make money off of narratives are just compressing it down and down and down into tinier and tinier pellets. Maybe that’s why people are enjoying something like this experience, because we took the time it needed.
This conversation has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.”
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Okay… this list is all kinds of wrong… Both White Bear and Black Museum deserve to be way higher, probably both in the top 5… Maybe Hated in the Nation too…
San Junipero IS the best one, though. Easily. No debate. Hang the DJ was just trying to redo that one, and should be after 10 somewhere. But how can people not adore both White Bear and Black Museum?
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I’m so glad! I don’t want it to run too long or too short.
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I’ve been on a tear watching older movies I’d never actually/fully seen yet.
Tess of the D’Urbervilles…jeez, it’s extremely annoying to know that Polanski could be so deft at reproducing such beautifully melancholy and feminist (?) work.
My Fair Lady. Eliza should never have come back to that dickweed.
Howard’s End. Hopkins is the trifecta of the banality of British patriarchy, capitalism, and misogyny.
Spartacus. Multi-ethnicity represented by a sea of white people and one black dude.
84 Charing Cross Road. A beautiful little film, despite being primarily concerned with post-war white people problems.
On the other hand, I saw a funny film from Taika Waititi (What We Do in the Shadows) starring Julian Dennison (the angry kid in Deadpool) and Sam Neill called The Hunt for the Wilderpeople, based on the book Wild Pork and Watercress by Barry Crump. Kids would like it.
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Yes. Can recommend.
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This 46 year old child liked The Hunt for the Wilderpeople!
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I didn’t realize you’d gotten some pieces up. I liked your bit on “The Sadder But Wiser Girl.” My favorite musical, I think. And “Woman On The Run” looks fabulous. I’m not really familiar with Anne Sheridan. I have a friend into such things; I wonder if he’s heard of it?
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I’m trying to be disciplined about writing. It’s something for which I have an inclination and no small measure of talent. Some day I may even write an ENTIRE BOOK. About what I don’t know, lol.
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A noir mystery about actors in musicals? 
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My Fair Lady. Eliza should never have come back to that dickweed.
In the movie’s opening scene, I hated both the two lead characters so much, that I wasn’t certain I wanted to finish the film. But, I did and decided that as a whole it’s fairly great. I even learned to appreciate Harrison’s sprechgesang. Still prefer the 1930’s Pygmalion though.
Howard’s End. Hopkins is the trifecta of the banality of British patriarchy, capitalism, and misogyny.
Not certain if this is a positive or negative review.
Spartacus. Multi-ethnicity represented by a sea of white people and one black dude.
Didn’t like this one when I saw it ages ago, although that may have been because it felt so un-Kubrick like.
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Yes! A great movie, and possibly Leslie Howard’s best movie.
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