"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
Unsolicited opinions on books, movies, TV shows, consumer products
“Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.” — P.J. O’Rourke The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation: Volume !: The Pox Party, by M.T. Anderson An astonishingly rich historical novel, right up there with the Aubrey/Maturin series by Patrick O’Brian. I am […]
Resurrecting the Champ (2006) You may not be a fan of boxing — and I’m not — but like Million Dollar Baby, this movie sucks you in. Okay, perhaps a little slow to get rolling, but it gets better and better as it unfolds. The real story’s not about boxing, of course; it’s about journalistic […]
The Garden of Last Days, by Andre Dubus III. A novel about people at the ends of their ropes. The characters are well-developed, the story line vividly gritty and believable, but I felt let down and sleazy afterward, because apart from a secondary older-cop character no one is happy or good or has any real […]
Downfall (2004) If you have even the slightest interest in WWII in Europe, Downfall is a must-see. Who isn’t fascinated by Hitler? I lived in Germany in the mid-1950s and the images are still with me: bombed out buildings, walls with bullet holes, kids my age with twisted legs from rickets, women everywhere, almost no […]
Army of the Republic, by Stuart Archer Cohen For the past two years I’ve been seriously thinking about what American working people might do if the government allows employers to destroy labor unions and cancel pension obligations. I’ve been entertaining fantasies of assassination teams, composed of unemployed and retired auto workers, picking off high-profile CEOs […]
Cleaner (2007) I didn’t know this was a straight-to-DVD release until after I’d watched it. Might that have influenced my decision to rent it? Probably, so I’m glad I didn’t know, because I really enjoyed the movie. Great cast, interesting story. Okay, maybe not the most brilliant movie, but if TV was this good I’d […]
The Counterfeiters (2008) When Germans of the current generation face their past, they do it with utter honesty. For all the Hobbesian bleakness inherent in this movie’s subject — “continual fear, and danger of violent death, and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” — there’s a weak ray of triumph at […]
It’s in the dictionary, somewhere between “shit” and “syphillis.” Two quick reviews of movies whose main characters I could not sympathize with: Secretary (2002) My wife got up and stomped out of the room halfway through, mumbling about perverts . . . and the seriously perverted stuff hadn’t even started yet! Self-mutilation and sadomasochism, the […]