Category: Film

Tidy Tidbits: Mixed Bag Viewing

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This blog brings a round-up of two recent films (Oscar contenders), the latest season of a French crime series, and an outstanding production of a theater classic.

CHILLING AMERICAN HISTORY

Killers of the Flower Moon (Apple TV, $ Prime Video & others)

Mollie, King, Ernest (apple.com)

This is a very long film, more than three hours, so we watched it over two nights.  It begins slowly as young Ernest Burkhart arrives in Osage County, Oklahoma to “work” for his uncle William Hale, known locally as King.  As a paid driver, Ernest squires around people like Mollie, a young attractive Osage woman, heir to oil rich land.  Encouraged by his uncle and his own interest in her, Ernest marries Mollie.  While King is outwardly benevolent toward the Osage community, he is slyly buying up and acquiring the rich oil headrights.  He doesn’t hesitate to hire hit men to murder business associates or natives or to pressure Ernest to handle the orders.

King is a smiling devil, smooth and suave while dim Ernest loves Mollie, but loves money more. Ernest isn’t smart enough to catch on to what he’s being asked, then ordered, to do.  Seemingly unaware of Ernest’s treachery, Mollie struggles to save her community.  Based on true events, the film reveals the horror of these white men’s actions toward the Osage slowly until finally the nascent FBI steps in to investigate more fully.  

The performances by Lily Gladstone as Mollie, Robert DeNiro as King, and Leonardo DiCaprio as Ernest are all Oscar worthy.

IN THE PINK

Barbie ($ Prime Video et al)

Ken & Barbie (nyt.com)

As you might expect, everything in Barbie Land revolves around the color pink.  Bubble gum pink.  Doll Barbie is in control and her compatriots are everywhere. Each girl is empowered to be active and productive.  Ken is docile and along for the ride.  When Barbie and Ken leave Barbie Land for the real world of humans, they are both in for a shock.  Here, men run things, and women and girls are definitely lesser.  

I liked some of the spirit of the film and the theme of female empowerment, but I found it all a bit much, cluttered and too long, with a story line that was only okay.  Given its popularity at the box office, I thought I ought to see it. Verdict: colorful and sometimes cute, but not memorable.

FRIENDSHIP & CRIMES

Astrid Season 3 (Prime Video)

Raphaelle & Astrid (Plex)

High-functioning autistic Astrid Nielsen works for the Paris police in their archives.  With her razor-sharp observational skills and her encyclopedic knowledge of previous cases, she assists inspector Raphaelle Coste in solving complex and often exotic crimes.  While the premises of some crimes strain credulity, the real meat of this series is the burgeoning friendship between Astrid and Raphaelle and Astrid’s growing comfort in a platonic-verging-on-romantic relationship with Tetsuo.  

Along the way, Astrid works to become more socially comfortable and gains new knowledge about her late father’s last activities.  I’ve enjoyed every season of this series, but this one is even more wonderful.  Highly recommended!

TIMELY THEATER

Inherit the Wind (Asolo Repertory Theatre)

Rachel, Drummond, Judge, Brady, Rev. Brown (yourobserver.com)

Asolo Theatre has a new artistic director from Minneapolis, Peter Rothstein, and this is his first production in his new role.  It is superb, soaring high.  Written in 1955 and loosely based on the Scopes Trial of 1925, Inherit the Wind deals with the teaching of evolution in a small public school in the south.  Much of the action is set in and around the courtroom with the accused young teacher’s fate played out in a battle of wits between the attorneys.

Prosecuting attorney Brady is modeled on politician and presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, while Drummond, the defendant’s attorney is a Clarence Darrow clone.  Add in preaching from local fire and brimstone Reverend Brown and the ambivalence of his more nuanced daughter Rachel, friend of the accused, and you have other perspectives.  

While initially, the play looks like a contest between religion on one side and science on the other, it’s more complicated than that.  Both lawyers are extremely strong and present in their arguments, but underneath there is humanity and fellow feeling between them. Neither man is one-dimensional.

Staging and casting are excellent.  Given his fondness for musical theatre, Rothstein’s incorporation of several hymns sung by the community as punctuation points in the action is highly effective. Definitely worth seeing!   Inherit the Wind runs through February 24th.  

Note: Header photo is from Astrid, season 3, courtesy of World of Television.

January Jots: Reading & Viewing

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BOOKS: LITERARY & MYSTERIOUS

Dayswork by Chris Bachelder and Jennifer Habel

(Boston Globe)

Dayswork is unlike any other novel I’ve read, and I loved it.  Written in a style that consists of two-to-three-line paragraphs followed by bursts of conversation and quotes from other writers, it’s quirky, fun, thoughtful, and literary, all at once.  

A woman academic stuck at home during the pandemic is researching Herman Melville’s life, work, and marriage.  Simultaneously, her husband is also around, referred to occasionally, and at one point, quarantining in their basement.  

In the process of her work, we learn about Melville’s writing struggles after the success of Moby Dick, his intense friendship with neighbor Nathaniel Hawthorne, his possible abuse of his wife Lizzie, and his neglect of their children.  Interspersed are quotes and notations from modern critics like Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick, or contemporaries like Emily Dickinson, along with comments about the work of other Melville biographers including one known initially only as the Biographer.  His identity is finally revealed at the end.  

Like going on a scavenger hunt with many clues, one stray comment about an event or a person inevitably leads to additional information about that action or person.  Overall the novel is a treasure trove of strands that come together to form a more rounded portrayal of Melville, the author and the man, while she reflects on the tumultuous marriage of Lowell and Hardwick as well as her own marriage choices.

The authors, Bachelder and Habel, are respectively a novelist and a poet, and married to each other.  This is their first joint work.  Highly recommended for fans of Melville and what constitutes a creative life! (~JWFarrington)

The Maid by Nita Prose

(Amazon.com)

A bestseller in more than forty countries and optioned to become a movie, The Maid starts out as simple story of the daily life of a lowly mostly invisible hotel worker.  Molly lives alone, doesn’t have friends, and still misses her deceased grandmother who raised her.  At first, I didn’t like this book. I thought it was dully written, and I was exasperated by Molly’s complete lack of awareness of the situations in which she was putting herself.  Yes, she is different and appears to be on the autism spectrum, which might be some justification for the slow pace. Then it picks up and becomes gripping.  One wonders how Molly, all alone, will cope with being accused of crimes she mostly didn’t commit.   

Prose is a book editor in Canada whose second novel, The Mystery Guest, also featuring Molly, was published late last year.  The other readers in my book group also found The Maid slow going, but we had a good discussion about Molly’s character and whether her later actions are believable.  A light read that might be good for an afternoon.

MOVIE–FRAGILE FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

May December (Netflix)

Gracie & Joe (People)

Borrowing from a legal case in the 1990’s of a teacher (Mary Kay Letourneau) who had sex with her 13-year-old student, May December focuses on a similar couple and their children 25 years later.  Husband Joe, who initially comes across as an overgrown kid, is thirty-six.  Wife Gracie, now in her 50’s, is needy, overbearing, and seemingly so naïve.  Their twins are getting ready for high school graduation and leaving home for college. They live in an elegant house in Savannah with a pool under construction in the backyard.  Who made or inherited the money for what appears to be a very comfortable lifestyle is never made clear.

Elizabeth Berry, a well-known actress, visits them as research for playing Gracie in a new film.  Elizabeth questions Joe and Gracie and the kids and interviews their friends and Gracie’s first husband.  She insinuates herself into their lives and both causes and exposes cracks and fissures in what first presented as a placid surface.  

More is revealed about Joe and Gracie’s past, and the viewer and Elizabeth are left to wonder what is true and what is not.  Who is credible?  Who is the predator?  Or as Gracie blurted out at one point, “Who is in charge?”  Is this a case of delayed acceptance of one’s personal responsibility?  

Without revealing too much, there’s an early scene at Joe’s teenage workplace, where the viewer gets a foretaste of the danger that lies ahead.  Later, we see Joe begin to emerge from his cocoon as he shares a poignant moment with his son on the roof.  

Discomfiting, unfathomable, and yet strangely absorbing, it is powerful stuff.  Not a film for everyone, but one that will stay with me.  Julianne Moore as Gracie and Nathalie Portman as Elizabeth are superb as Elizabeth mirrors Gracie’s gestures and intonation.  (~JWFarrington)

TV–PALATE CLEANSER

All Creatures Great and Small, Season 4 (PBS Masterpiece)

Carmody (uk.finance.yahoo.com)

This season of All Creatures is both more serious than previous ones and simultaneously stickier with syrup.  World War II is present and being called up is looming for James.  Siegfried hires a sort of office manager, an attractive woman he met on the dance floor, and James presses for some additional help with Tristan away serving his country.  They take on vet student Richard Carmody, a knowledgeable nerd who is socially inept.  

Meanwhile, Helen and Mrs. Hall cope with changing circumstances that are both welcome and challenging.  The scenes with Mrs. Pomphrey are always fun, and in most episodes, things come out right in the end.  Enjoyable!

Note: Header image of January sky ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved.)

Tidy Tidbits: On Screen and Plate

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FRENCH WHODUNIT

Anatomy of a Fall ($ Amazon Prime, Apple TV)

Vincent, a lawyer & Sandra (The Daily Beast)

This is the third excellent new movie we’ve watched this season.  Sandra, her husband, and their son Daniel are at home in Switzerland.  Sandra, a writer, is being interviewed.  A thud is heard.  Investigation reveals the body of a man lying in the grass.  How did he get there? 

This French film, much of it in English with subtitles when French is spoken, is a fascinating and occasionally suspenseful examination of what or who caused the man’s death.  It’s also an excavation of a marriage, a fractured one with issues and disappointments.  One spouse has been more successful than the other, and their son had an accident which compromised his capabilities.  

French filmmakers like dialogue so perhaps some viewers might wish it were more concisely written. Nonetheless, the Chief Penguin and I were fully engaged.  The courtroom scenes with a cool and calm Sandra are especially compelling.  Highly recommended!

CRIME IN GOTLAND

Murder in Sweden, Season 2 (Prime Video)

Sebastian & Maria (PBS SoCal)

Titled, Maria Wern abroad, Murder in Sweden is an outstanding crime series.  Lead inspector Maria is a youngish widow and mother of a son and a daughter.  She’s also in a developing relationship with her colleague, junior detective Sebastian.  The rest of the team consists of two other men, Ek and Arvidsson; a tech person, and their boss Hartman.  Together they tackle challenging cases from chilling attacks on a politician, to death at a teen party, to the strange illness of a man on a plane claiming a murder has been committed.  

The cases have a dark side that can be hard to watch.  One of the most unsettling ones concerns online bullying and threats to Maria’s son’s high school class.  Over the course of the season, Maria both learns more and has more questions about her policeman husband’s death ten years before. 

Each case is solved in two episodes and there are 8 episodes total.  In my opinion, Season 2 is better than Season 1, which I also watched.  Recommended!

LUNCH OUT

Indian fare near Venice

Our good friend in Venice invited us down for lunch at Tikka Indian Cuisine.  This is a popular small restaurant located in a strip mall on the 41 Bypass with a Big Lots.  We were advised to arrive early as it quickly fills up.  And indeed, we got there about 11:15 and by noon, it was almost full.  When we finished, folks were lined up at the door awaiting tables.

Sample Tikka lunch (yoursun.com)

The lunch menu offers a selection of appetizers (samosas and the like) and combo lunches.  Combos include your choice of entrée with sides of rice, naan, and chef-selected appetizer and dessert.  We three ordered the korma, rogan josh, and vindaloo, all with chicken.  Other options were lamb, shrimp, paneer cheese, or vegetable.  The korma was appropriately mild, my rogan josh was medium spicy which was plenty of hotness for me, and the Chief Penguin bravely went for the vindaloo.  Even at medium level, it was very spicy—but then vindaloos are typically the hottest of Indian curries.  

Each combo was served on a thali (round metal tray). The day’s appetizer was a generously sized samosa and the dessert a rice pudding.  For vegetarians, there are several main dishes including yellow lentils, chickpeas, and a potato and cauliflower dish.  And if you dine in the evening, you can select from several tandoori dishes including one with salmon that our friend recommends.  Yum!

Tidy Tidbits: Winter Pastimes

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MOVIES—MEN AT WORK, PHYSICS & MUSIC

Oppenheimer ($5.99 on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, et al)

Einstein & Oppenheimer (Digital Spy)

Oppenheimer, one of the big films of 2023, is an almost mesmerizing portrayal of one individual’s huge impact on history.  Physicist Oppenheimer was a complex man and an intriguing one.  Brilliance, coupled with ego and drive, propelled him in overseeing the development of the atomic bomb.  This invention led directly to the end of World War II and, initially, accolades for Oppenheimer.  To what extent, Oppenheimer carefully considered the level of destruction use of the bomb would wreak is a question one can debate.  

Several years after the war, he was accused of being a Communist and a security threat. Based on the biography, American Prometheus,the film is multi-layered and nuanced in its depiction of Oppenheimer and those involved in the Manhattan Project.  And the special effects are stunning.  Highly recommended!

American Symphony (Netflix)

Suleika & Jon (Variety)

Until I read reviews of American Symphony, I had not heard of Jon Batiste.  He’s a composer, pianist, pop performer, and winner of numerous awards.  In this film, produced jointly with Higher Ground Productions (the Obamas’ company), the viewer experiences the creation of the musical piece of the title. Simultaneously, it follows the travails of Batiste’s wife Suleika Jaouad as she copes with a recurrence of leukemia.  Batiste is a dedicated and hard-working composer, but he is also tender and supportive of Suleika.  

I enjoyed parts of Jon’s creative process and admired her for her bravery and her willingness to share the raw as well as the joyful moments of her treatment.  Overall, I’d give the film a mixed review.  I thought it was unnecessarily long and would have edited out some of the composition scenes.  

As a side note, Suleika’s memoir Between Two Kingdoms about her earlier cancer journey was published in 2021.   I read it when it was released and included it in a blog post in Sept. 2021.

READING—GRIEF & LOVE

Lost and Found: A Memoir by Kathryn Schulz

Memoirs are one of my preferred genres, so I approached Lost and Found expectantly.  It is both emotional and scholarly in tone.  Schulz focuses on grief and love.  Besides detailing how and why we lose or misplace objects and citing a range of research articles about loss, she delves into her grief over her father’s death and describes his long physical and mental decline.  Anyone who has lost a parent or other loved one can relate to this section.  

Her other main topic is love and how one goes about finding one’s true love or life partner: what makes two people click and how does one arrange to have the right circumstances at hand for this to happen.  Schulz had a long search, sometimes fraught with self-doubt, before meeting her right person and then settling down together.

I confess to skimming some; I was more interested in her personal experiences than I was in the scientific explanations for loss and love.  My response may be colored by being older than the author with several decades more life experience.  Overall, I give it a qualified recommendation.  

LOCAL CULTURE—GREAT MUSIC

The Sarasota Orchestra was in fine form on Friday night for their first concert of the season at Neel Performing Arts Center in Bradenton.  Their playing was spirited with all sections performing strongly.  This concert, under the baton of guest conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya, included a recent work by composer Clarice Assad, an impressive rendition of Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by pianist Stephen Hough, and Elgar’s Enigma Variations.  All fourteen of them, each variation clearly delineated one from the other.  It was truly a great night for our local musicians.  Bravo!

Note: Header photo is of ducks over a pond in California in Jan. 2014 ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved.)