"No matter how cynical I get, I can’t keep up.” — Lily Tomlin
Unsolicited opinions on books, movies, TV shows, consumer products
“Young Lamar Jimmerson went to France in 1917 with the American Expeditionary Forces, serving first with the Balloon Section, stumbling about in open fields holding one end of a long rope, and then later as a telephone switchboard operator at AEF headquarters in Chaumont. It was there on the banks of the Marne River that […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. From my last You Can’t Read That! post: Apparently it’s a widely-held belief in anti-gay Christian conservative circles that the government — particularly the jack-booted thugs who run public libraries and schools — foists pro-gay literature on young readers while […]
“My God, the kid was right. The killer is the tire.” — Stephen Spinella as Lieutenant Chad in Rubber Casino Jack (2010) I watched the straight documentary, Casino Jack and the United States of Money, a couple of months ago (you can read my review here). The documentary is an interesting contrast with this dramatization, […]
I started reading a thick paperback yesterday around noon … it looked to be a 400- to 500-pager … but it turned out to be written in blank verse, with just a few words per page. Including breaks for errands, dinner, and the Rachel Maddow Show, I was done by seven. The book was Crank […]
You Can’t Read That! is my new title for banned book reviews and news roundups. From a previous banned book news roundup: Conservative groups who believe in and fear the so-called gay agenda accuse the American Library Association of suppressing books with pro-hetereosexual themes. But 99% of books in libraries implicitly or explicitly endorse heterosexuality, […]
“The sun peers over the rim of the earth, casting its blaze across Bangkok. It rushes molten over the wrecked tower bones of the old Expansion and the gold-sheathed chedi of the city’s temples, engulfing them in light and heat. It ignites the sharp high roofs of the Grand Palace where the Child Queen lives […]
“Kindness. That can kill you here.” — Ed Harris as Mister Smith in The Way Back Reversible Errors (TV 2004) Strong cast, weak movie. To be fair, it’s not really a movie … it’s a TV miniseries. Because it was made for TV, Reversible Errors is full of “pause for commercial break” setups and an […]
“We didn’t have to look into your souls, we had to see if you had souls at all.” — Charlotte Rampling as Miss Emily in Never Let Me Go Oceans (2009) If you can get past the 20-minute block of Disney advertising and previews at the start of the DVD, you’ll be glad you rented […]