Student Loan Debt

Biden plans to forgive 10K for everyone (more or less). Prediction: loan applications for 10K increase next year. 

Another Thought

I know I blog too much about wokeness, but maybe it's a better place to get the thoughts off my chest than elsewhere?

Antidote

The antidote to wokeness is friendship.

Under Woke Rules

The only identity you cannot have is American (without caveat)

Logging

Film: Top Gun: Maverick 

The film is enjoyable, awesome, and also a bit depressing.

Yikes

Now reports of parents begging cops to go in during the active shooter.

Obviously, I don't know what really happened or the situation, but this I do know: when the Defund the Police movement started and a good portion of the elite in our society turned on the police, a cop I know told me it's the good cops who will leave the job for greener pastures because they're the ones who have options. 

Uh Huh

Trans person wants to be able to call Chappelle the n word.

God, what are they going to call Gervais?

Lowering School Shootings

I'm pretty sure if the media stopped reporting on school shootings we'd see a sharper decline than if we passed gun control legislation. All things should be on the table.

Accidentally Speaking Truth

I love it when these public clowns accidentally speak the truth. Kap:

Everything I've said should be in alignment with what you're saying publicly," he said. "It's a $16 billion business. When I first took a knee, my jersey went to No. 1. When I did the deal with Nike, their value increased by six billion dollars. Six billion. With a B.

It was always about this👆 

Gun Sellers

At the risk of doing what I hate most - make a tragedy into a political argument - would it be so out of the question to make gun sellers somehow partially responsible for mass shootings? I mean, a lonely, weird kid turns 18 in this day and age shouldn't be owning an assault rifle. I'm sorry, on this one I agree gun control advocates. At the very least, we should make the age 21. 

And for the people who might say...gun seller can't be responsible for what people do with them...really? You're selling heavy duty weaponry to civilians...if you don't want to be responsible for what happens maybe be in the business of selling clothing or something else...

And just other food for thought:

-can school districts do a little better job of keeping tabs on the psycho kids?

-can schools make it harder for these psychos to enter? can they have more eyes out on entry points and buy some time to anticipate these situations?

-can there be a psycho alert system where kids who are worried about psychos in their communities can report them and can there be a coordination with gun sellers, police, school admin, caretakers, etc?

-is it worth considering that toy stores like target, etc, don't sell machine guns and gatling gun type of weapons to kids? i mean, we had water guns, etc when i was little, now they have these weapons from Commando for kids. pretty soon they'll have a NERF nuclear bomb

Logging

Comedy: Gervais Super Nature

Gervais goes head first into the locomotive of all PC pieties. Absolutely relentless. Not the funniest special -- most of the laughs are from the audacity of what he's saying -- the funniest bit is his imagination around the scenarios of God creating AIDS. 

Logging

Film: The 400 Blows 

Never seen before. From a 2022 perspective...strikes me as a socially conservative film. The villain of the film if you want to call it that, are the boy's parents and particularly the mother, who is irresponsible, unloving, and lazy toward her child. I found the poor teachers at his school oddly sympathetic - they were unfair and judgmental but at least they cared and tried. They were overwhelmed! They had too many students, many without any discipline whatsoever. Hard to escape the detail that the mother wanted to abort the boy -- what might the pro choicers say on this matter?

Biden

Accidentally says the policy I would like re: Taiwan. 

But God, tis weird to have a President where the basic assumption needs to be that he misspoke...

Abortion

I guess abortion as a topic got tired of racism getting all the attention and was like, "hold my beer"... so here goes -

It's complicated, so I err on the side of pro choice. But I also imagine if I were to explain abortion as a concept to a reasonably bright 5 or 6 year old and they're going to get a pretty horrified and incredulous reaction to what could be considered the standard "feminist" position of "it's not life yet," or "my body, my choice, etc." I feel like a child can more readily relate to the fetus than to the mother's desire to keep living her best life. 

Logging

Film: Memoria

For the 5 minute walk back to my car I didn't want to look at my phone for some reason. 

The theater in Pasadena was half full on a Thursday night. The line for other movies was out the door. The theater experience is coming back! The movie offerings this past month are the best they've been in years...The Northman, Memoria, Ambulance, Everything Everywhere, plus the usual franchises and kids movies...

As for the movie itself...my only thought is that there seems to be a new subgenre of films I'll call "Middle Aged Women Wander Around" that seem to be speaking to the audience. I'll put The Lost Daughter, Nomadland, and Memoria in this category. All feature middle aged women with some tragic past wandering in a foreign landscape experiencing ennui, a vague sexually charged encounter with a new man, and ultimately dealing with some revelation about their own past.

I don't understand why this film is a masterpiece (per the critics), so I'll chalk it up to my own ignorance. Maybe I'll try watching his other films...although I dread seeing them on TV...

For my money, in this "realm" of slow film festival cinema, I am most interested in the Turkish director Ceylan who made Winter's Sleep and Once Upon a Time in Anatolia.

Ouch

Thomas Sowell:

Activism is a way for useless people to feel important, even if the consequences of their activism are counterproductive for those they claim to be helping and damaging to the fabric of society as a whole.

Logging

TV: The Last Kingdom S5

I completed the show. They stuck the landing, despite S5 having some clutter and nonsense. King Edward had quite a wonderful season 5 arc and the first half of the season served Brieda very well. A number of actors in small roles from the show are worth remembering:

-Whoever played the Scottish King

-King Alfred

-The ambitious Mercian military leader's sister

-Father Bianca

-The guy who replaced Father Bianca

My last two favorite shows are Gomorrah and this.

Logging

Screenplay: The Godfather 

I read over an early version of the script called Second Draft, dated March 1, 1971. Given the film came OUT in 1972, this must be pretty close to a Production Draft. Nevertheless, an incredible number of differences to the final film, some of which I log below:

-script suggests that studio chief jack woltz is a child molester

-we meet genco - the old consigliere as he is dying / dead

-there is a scene early in the film between michael and the don about him joining the family business

-a bunch non-linear storytelling in this draft where events are not fully shown and then when our main characters find out, we cut backwards to see what happened. for example - we cut back to luca brasi getting killed only after the fish is delivered. same thing later in the script with sonny's death. we see his death only after bonosara finds out sonny has been killed. thus, we are with characters, not ahead of them. obviously, this is jolting and the actual film plays it much better.

-there is no line "take the cannoli" - must've been added later

-spend a whole lot longer time on the paulie hit -- follow clemenza for the entire day

-sonny instructs michael what to do with the don in the hospital when they find out he's unguarded. in the film, michael figures all this out himself.

-carlo beats up connie and sonny is killed on the way back. in the film, sonny beats him up and then later connie calls him again. in the script this logic doesn't quite fly. i'm guessing they did reshoots to get this.

-as mentioned before, we reveal sonny's death thru bonosara. it really doesn't work. 

-the michael in italy sequence comes after santino's death. 

-in general, major storytelling elements integrated differently

-in italy, michael is curious to find out about how his father became godfather. hears a story, they cut back to 1920. this basic outline of events of course finds itself in to part 2, but is stretched out much further.

-in general, we use a lot more POVs in the script. bonosara has more of a POV, clemenza, mama, and kay. in the film, we get more sonny, fredo, tom. casting makes a huge difference.

-in vegas, michael says to fredo when he appeals to tom "i'm running the family now, all business through me." in the film, tom says it. more powerful as a line coming from tom.

-no puppetmaster scene from don. a much thinner, smaller version of the classic scene. i wonder how they figured that one out.

-michael, and others find don dying, his final words are. "life is so beautiful" eek. glad they got rid of that.

-i was never clear on the timeline in the film, but via the script, the events at the end are 9-10 years after the beginning. doesn't feel this way in the movie.

-a weird moment at the end: michael completes the final "hit" after he kills carlo. he goes to a pizza parlour and kills fabrizzio - the bodyguard who betrayed and killed apollonia.

There are of course more differences, but these are just interesting to note. The biggest thing to recognize is that were this film being made today, the guilds and studio would impose diversity requirements and we'd have a BIPOC POV character (see The Many Saints of Newark). In reading over and thinking about the complex storytelling and filmmaking realities that made this film such a miracle, one can easily see how this dumb consideration would completely derail the ability of a filmmaker to make such a film today. This is why we will not see a film of this caliber ever come out of the present incarnation of Hollywood.

DEI

When we give people a job to look for racism, of course they are going to do it.

Deal Making

Isn't there a deal to be had involving Sweden and Finland not joining NATO in exchange for Russia keeping some territory in Eastern Ukraine?

Logging

Film: Everything Everywhere All At Once

Mixed feelings on this one. I want to intellectually support original films with ambitious filmmaking techniques. And the audience I watched with seemed to enjoy the film. But I didn't laugh much. And I don't think it was my mood. I think it was because when you strip away all the style, weirdness, and butt plugs what you really have is a super sentimental tale whose big idea is "Don't Worry, Be Happy."  

Good For Netflix

Officially telling their woke employees to f*** off and quit if they don't like the content. 

Well, This Is Disappointing

Upon hearing there is such a thing as cake gender, I foolishly thought it meant people were sexually attracted to cake.

Our Founding Mythology

The 1776 vs 1619 debate is only one angle about who we are as a country. The way we behave today makes me think the Salem Witch Trials might most represent who are. 

Logging

Screenplay: Casablanca

Holds up. Argument can be made that Rick Blaine is the quintessential American hero. Our heartbroken drunk Odysseus. It isn't that the audience wouldn't respond to such a film today - it would. Moreso than any film from its time, I'm comfortable showing the film to cynical depressive 20-something film students -- it can still melt hearts. The sad part is that we are institutionally incapable of making such a film anymore. It should disgust anyone who loves movies that we can't even bother to try. 

Storytelling notes:

-surprisingly long set up of the world prior to meeting Rick.

-transit papers a strong macguffin. set up very clearly their value and importance. notice rick is indifferent to the macguffin (ie no emotional connection to it), but it serves to make him the focus of the story because everyone wants the papers from him.

-nice foreshadowing of lazlo's introduction along with his "wife," who of course turns out to be a key character

-a great number of four character scenes. in particular, where the central drama is between rick, lazlo, and ilsa, renault often shows up in the scenes and adds wonderful off-handed commentary. what a jolt of energy and dynamism to the scenes! 

-a lot of small characters get little arcs within the film - no character is wasted or throwaway, many get great lines and moments. plenty of rich dialog to go around. 

-third act is emotional twist after emotional twist. filmmakers on fire. on one version of the screenplay I looked it, it seems they were rewriting up to the very last moment in the middle of production -- what a minor miracle -- the story feels so inevitable. 

-world building at the beginning and the flashback to paris aren't the greatest standalone parts, but boy do they pay off-- 

Logging

TV: The Last Kingdom S1-4

Prior to this, the last show I binged was Gomorrah. Really enjoying the show - great ability to introduce, new compelling characters but sustain a series of main storylines over time. Sort of an interesting example to examine "wokeness" in popular culture because something clearly happened between Season 4 and 5 in terms of casting. So to give some context - the show is about the battles between Saxons and Danes set in like 800s England - so yeah, everyone is white...

But in Season 5 E1, they very noticeably cast a deaf person and a black person in roles -- for what reason -- I don't know, other than I imagine they were trying to hit some diversity mandate or the showrunners suddenly became self conscious. It's sort of weird to see after watching 4 seasons of what felt like a fairly consistent vision. I wonder to what extent we'll continue to see this logic continue on TV shows -- maybe Season 2 Pachinko will feature Michael Pena as the Emperor of Japan.

Why I'm Mostly Out On Liberal Causes...

Lack of context or priorities. I can't keep up with all the things I'm supposed to be hysterically upset by. Can someone please tell me how I should order my anger on the following subjects:

1. Roe v Wade

2. Climate Change

3. White Supremacy 

4. Systemic Racism

5. Animal Rights

6. Income Inequality

7. Trans Rights

8. Gay Rights

9. Student Loan Debt

10. Ukraine-Russia War

11. Islamophobia

12. US Foreign Policy Generally

13. Underfunded Public Schools

14. Women's Rights

15. Tax Breaks For the Rich

16. Criminal Justice Reform

17. Vaccines

18. Disinformation

19. Republicans

20. Fascists

21. Capitalism

22. Parents

23. Corporations

24. Dave Chapelle

25. Elon Musk

That's just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are more.

Megacorporations

If I told you there was a relatively new ideology every major corporate entity and media organization was promoting, would you instinctively trust or distrust this ideology? 

Wow

Thread of Orson Welles talking shit. 

The Good Old Days

I remember the good old days when it was the abortion (and not anti-abortion) centers that were terrorized.

Logging

Film: The Northman 

I found myself highly aware of the filmmaking which is never a ringing endorsement. I guess I appreciated the gusto, ambition, and scale of the filmmaking -- but found myself bored by the over familiarity of the story.

Someone asked me this weekend if I recommend it and I said, "it depends on how you like your cinema."

J&J Vaccine

I remember when you could be banned from the internet for being vaccine skeptical.

Time have changed, I suppose.

Logging

Book: City On Fire by Don Winslow

Great fun to read a book in 2-3 days again. Doesn't happen that often for me anymore. And yet, I don't think I'll remember much from it.

Chapelle Attacked On Stage

A few thoughts:

1) I'd like to hear Will Smith weigh in

2) For all the transactivists who feared Chapelle's act would lead to "violence" -- now the only actual violence was caused by their rhetoric against Chapelle. I do not expect they will notice the irony.