HBO Game of Thrones Season Four: A Foreshadowing

Well, this looks like fun. It's always interesting to hear actors' interpretation of their characters or storylines. And I am happy to hear that unlike in previous seasons, the penultimate episode will not necessarily be the big WTF moment for the entire season. As usual if you have any spoilers to share..DON'T.

Season 4: A Foreshadowing

Book Reviews: Faerie Tale, Fevre Dream

Faerie Tale
by Raymond Feist

I had heard good things about the fantasy author Raymond E. Feist over the years. So I was interested in reading his work. But I wasn't really in the mood for starting another fantasy series. I don't have the interest or time at this moment. So Faerie Tale, an older book by Feist, was exactly what I was looking for. This book mixes the thriller and fantasy genres with just a minor touch of horror near the end. Compared to today's gore fests it's very mild indeed. It's a blink and you'll miss it sort of thing. I thought the story was lengthier than it needed to be but that impression may have had more to do with things going on in my life than the author's pacing. You may feel differently. I was interested in what happened next but to me this wasn't a page turner which I'm staying up late to read or reading at every opportunity during the day. So it took me a little longer to get thru the book than it usually does. I did think that this book would be ripe for a cinematic treatment, as Feist is very very good at invoking the pleasures and fears of an old house with plenty of secrets and even older woods where strange things lurk. In Faerie Tale, a very successful family decides to move from California back to upstate New York. Phil Hastings is a famous screenwriter, movie producer and author who would like to reinvigorate his literary career outside of Hollywood. His wife Gloria is an actress more known for character and stage roles than lucrative leading famous ones. 

Phil has three children. His eldest, Gabrielle, his teen daughter by Phil's first wife, is an heiress whose wealth upon maturity will far exceed Phil's own. Gabrielle's mother comes from old money but Gabrielle's grandmother disinherited her daughter in favor of Gabrielle. Phil also has two young sons by Gloria, Sean and Patrick, enthusiastic young baseball fans. In moving back to New York, Phil is not only looking to get some writing done but looking forward to being closer to his now elderly graduate adviser, Aggie, one of the first and most important people to believe in and encourage Phil's writing career.
So everything looks good. Of course if all was really good there wouldn't be much of a story. The mansion which Phil and Gloria purchased was originally owned by a turn of the century German immigrant named Kessler. Kessler was involved in some shady religious rituals in Europe before fleeing to America. Phil and Gloria learn this from Mark Blackmon, one of Aggie's younger associates, though she dismisses a lot of his work. Mark tends to write or edit a lot of books about alien encounters, archaic religions, alternate history, and pre-human races. Aggie thinks his evidence gathering is not rigorous though she grudgingly admits that he knows more than people give him credit for. As Mark seems harmless enough, though somewhat secretive, Phil and Gloria allow Mark and his research assistant Gary to search through the house for anything Kessler may have hidden as well as research Kessler's library. Mark has been eager to get into their house for years.

Meanwhile Gabrielle and her brothers have encounters, some of which seem very real with things that can't be there. Adults, with the exception of Mark, tend to ignore what the children tell them. But things reach a fever pitch when Gabrielle is assaulted by someone who fits the description of Puck. Having found a handy local drunk who has an encyclopedic knowledge of Irish myths, Sean and Patrick think they know what they're up against. But again, besides Mark no one believes them. Mark knows that the stories told don't begin to capture the malice and majesty of the creatures known as The Fair Folk. As it is close to Midsummer's Night those people will be on the move. But this time the being known as The Fool thinks the time may be right to restart an ancient war long forgotten by humanity. I guess you could place this in the urban fantasy genre, that is magic interacting with people in our modern world. Overall it was an ok read but as mentioned the pacing didn't quite grab me. This book was written a while ago and people's expectations have likely changed. There are some erotic themes as the virginal Gabrielle has met the man she intends to marry. But the young lady also seems to attract the attention of more malicious creatures. I liked how the story posited an underlying truth that's hinted at in various myths and religions across the world.






Fevre Dream
by George R.R. Martin

This is one of Martin's earlier works. It was written long before A Song of Ice and Fire Series. I originally read it WAY back in the day. Then because I was curious to see how he had changed as a writer, I reread it about three months back. The most obvious difference between the Martin of then and now is that he was much less verbose. This book is just under 400 pages but it feels like less than that. The plotting is very tight and the story, while not quite breakneck, doesn't spend a lot of time on what I thought of as irrelevancies. As far as the theme, there's not a lot of similarities between this and his later work except that the protagonist, much like Tyrion Lannister, is a remarkably ugly fellow with a sardonic sense of humor. Good and evil are more sharply defined than you would expect given Martin's oft cynical voice in his other creations. There are characters for whom you will be rooting to win and those for whom you will have nothing but contempt. 
The story takes place in antebellum America, mostly in the South and lower Midwest so if realistic depictions of racist characters offend you why would you read this book. The most racist characters are the most morally debased in every way so there's that. The supernatural elements are in no way as horrific as the casual and widely accepted racism. Although the subject matter and a few harrowing scenes make this a horror novel, again just like Faerie Tale, this could be understood as dark fantasy. Ultimately Fevre Dream is an optimistic book. 

Abner Marsh (think Mark Twain) is a steamboat captain who's fallen on hard times. He doesn't have the capital to keep up with his competitors. He's very good at what he does and still has some fire in his belly but not much else. He is anti-slavery and does what he can behind the scenes. In 1857 Marsh is approached by a polite and eccentric man named Joshua York who has researched Marsh and his business. York wants to partner in an investment to build the biggest fastest steamboat the Mississippi River has ever seen. It will be called the Fevre Dream. Marsh will be captain and York will be the silent partner with all the cash. York has enough capital to make this dream a reality. The frank but shrewd Marsh decides to accept the offer. But York is a strange sort. He is quick to command Marsh, sleeps all day and is incredibly furious when Marsh wakes him up during daytime, refusing to leave his darkened room. And York's friends behave as he does. Marsh doesn't like anyone telling him what to do and is concerned about never seeing York out and about during the daytime. It's obvious as to what sort of story this is to the reader before it is to Marsh as Martin very early introduces a "man" named Damon Julian, who is York's opposite number. Living in New Orleans, Julian is an enthusiastic slaveowner who doesn't hide his true nature as well as he should. He is completely opposed to everything York stands for. When things get a little too hot for him in New Orleans and he hears of York's attempts to "fix" their kind's nature, he decides to set his will against that of York's to see just who will be the true Bloodmaster. 

Julian likes slavery in part because he views it as humanity's attempt to imitate his kind. Julian very much believes in superior and inferior groups and individuals. And to him trying to change something that is "natural", such as his people being at the top of the food chain, is insane, blasphemous and ultimately impossible. Martin has some insights into morality here. He does not stint in describing slavery's ugliness or the foulness of humans who would hurt other humans just for fun or a chance to advance. Julian's aide-de-camp, Sour Billy, is just as much of a monster as later Martin characters such as Gregor Clegane or Ramsay Bolton. Marsh is a stand in for the reader as he is forced to make a decision about doing the right thing and helping the "man" who would become his friend, Joshua York. This has some strong horror scenes in it, both supernatural and otherwise, so if that's not your deal then you know what to do. If you are into this stuff there was also a graphic novel version but I prefer the original novel.

Corporate Welfare or Good Business Sense???

I'll take any mother*****'s money if he giving it away!!!!
-Clay Davis
Regardless of race, gender, political affiliation or geography, when you say "welfare", many people probably still think of a person who looks and sounds like this. Such a wretched individual makes an easy target for people who are tired of other people putting hands in their pocket while having the nerve, the audacity to claim that they are somehow entitled to do so.

However it has never ceased to amaze me that the more you need money the less likely people are to give it to you while the less you need it, the more people break their neck trying to give it to you. I was reminded of that by two separate recent events, one national and one local. If we take our focus off "welfare" as money given to "underclass" mothers and/or other loud obese moochers and expand the term to include well off people, we might be surprised by how much government assistance the rich get, even for doing things they would already do. There have been books written on this. This is a tremendously inefficient use of government resources. And it's unfair. I don't mind paying taxes if those taxes can prevent someone from starving to death or being homeless. I do mind paying taxes when those taxes are given to individuals or companies that are not so troubled.

Michigan billionaires, Mike and Marian Illitch (net worth around $3 billion), owners of Little Caesars, The Detroit Tigers, The Detroit Red Wings, various land development companies and Motor City Casino (under Marian's name for business reasons) have decided that they want a new arena for the Red Wings. The current one, Joe Louis Arena is not quite decrepit but is definitely outdated.

Well in a so-called free market when you want to take a risk and build/buy something new you pony up the dollars and either get the rewards or take the losses. But that's not how things work for billionaires, especially in sports. Despite the fact that tons of evidence exists that public financing of sports arenas rarely brings the ROI that supporters claim it does, the City of Detroit and the State of Michigan have come together to ensure that the Illitches get public land for essentially nothing in order to build their new stadium/entertainment complex. That's how things work, not just in Detroit, but in many cities. The subsidy is bad enough but what made this deal stand out to me was that the Illitches, or rather their company, will keep ALL revenues from the stadium. There will be no sharing with either the state or the city. Additionally Olympia Entertainment will pay no property taxes on the new stadium. Even the building of the stadium itself will be 60% publicly funded. Now does that sound like a win-win deal for the city? 

In one of the largest land transfers in the city’s history, the Detroit City Council agreed Tuesday to hand over 39 parcels of land along the Cass Corridor to transform what was once a blighted, crime-ridden strip near downtown Detroit into a $650-million entertainment venue that will include a new arena for the Detroit Red Wings. The vote authorizes the city to sell the public land for $1 to the Detroit Downtown Development Authority, which will own the arena and lease it for up to 95 years to Olympia Development of Michigan. The company is owned by the Ilitch family, which owns the Red Wings. The essentially free transfer of public land — with an assessed value of about $2.9 million — is the city’s chief contribution to the development.

As proposed, construction of the arena itself would be 58% publicly funded and 42% privately funded. No Detroit general fund dollars would be spent; the state is contributing the bulk of the public investment. Olympia has agreed to pay $11.5 million annually for about 30 years to help pay off the construction bonds. Olympia will own the arena’s naming rights and will keep all revenues from arena operations, including parking fees and concessions sales. The city will not collect property taxes on the arena.

The second instance of corporate welfare which caught my ire was the agreement over the latest farm bill, which President Obama is going to sign into law today, likely at Michigan State University, that center of agricultural higher learning better known as Moo U. I hear that the President will also be treated to a demonstration of the correct techniques of cow artificial insemination and 101 uses of cowpies. But I digress. The bill, soon to become law, has all sorts of goodies included into it, most of which are going to insurers and agribusiness, not "farmers". Think less Tom Joad and more Monsanto.

The bill stinks. And given that it also cuts food stamps can Democratic partisans stop talking about how the evil Republicans are behind this. If the food stamp cuts really bothered the President he would veto the bill. He's not doing that. Take from that what you will. I learn from people's actions, not their words.

WASHINGTON — No one was happier than Danny Murphy, a Mississippi soybean farmer with 1,500 acres, when the Senate on Tuesday passed a farm bill that expanded crop insurance and other benefits for agribusiness. “It’s a relief,” Mr. Murphy said. Few were as unhappy as Sheena Wright, the president of the United Way in New York, who expects to see a surge of hungry people seeking help because the bill cuts $8 billion in food stamps over a decade. “You are going to have to make a decision on what you are going to do, buy food or pay rent,” Ms. Wright said.

The nearly 1,000-page bill, which President Obama is to sign at Michigan State University on Friday, among other things expanded crop insurance for farmers by $7 billion over a decade and created new subsidies for rice and peanut growers that would kick in when prices drop. But anti-hunger advocates said the bill would harm 850,000 American households, about 1.7 million people spread across 15 states, which would lose an average of $90 per month in benefits because of the cuts in the food stamp program.

Unlike the food stamp program, the federally subsidized crop insurance program was not cut. The program, which is administered by 18 companies that are paid $1.4 billion annually by the government to sell policies to farmers, pays 62 percent of farmers’ premiums.

LINK

So the rich will get richer and piggish private interests will continue to feed from the government trough, only pausing long enough to wipe the crumbs from their snout and mumble "free market" or "individual responsibility" to the rest of us, before continuing their gluttony. Such is life I guess. I would like to know though where is the conservative outrage over such transfers of public monies to private hands? Why are some conservatives silent about this when businesses are the recipients? And flipping the script would liberals be quiet if it were a President Bush cutting food stamps in the economic environment we have now? Somehow I doubt it. But look over there! Chris Christie!!! Benghazi!! Birth Control Pills!!!!!!

Joakim Noah Meltdown

Chicago Bulls center Joakim Noah provides unimpeachable evidence that I am not the only person in the world who occasionally gets irritated with his co-workers and supervisors. I can't and don't do what Noah did when I lose patience with annoying people. It's not my personality nor am I that important to my firm. At worst Noah will lose a small piece of his salary and/or be asked to stay away from work a day or two. Generally speaking I find such hyper emotional displays somewhat childish. I've worked with people who have had regular meltdowns during work conflicts. If the powers that be like them it's written off as passion for their work. If the powers that be don't like them it's considered insubordination and they're written up or terminated. But when you have the exceedingly rare skill set that Joakim Noah possesses you can do things like this on occasion. Noah may well have had a point. I don't know. I just thought it was funny how Noah wanted to make sure each referee knew exactly what he thought of them at that point in time. I guess if you're gonna get ejected you might as well get your money's worth.

Movie Reviews: A Single Shot, Carrie(2013), Cold Comes The Night, Runner, Runner

A Single Shot
directed by David Rosenthal

Although the guitarist Robin Trower should be appreciated in his own right, when you listen to his most famous creations it's very obvious that Jimi Hendrix was a major influence. Trower has never denied this. Hendrix influenced many musicians. Some of Trower's music sounds like unreleased Hendrix Band of Gypsys cuts. That's a compliment but it can also be worrying. Similarly, although A Single Shot is based on a book not written by the famed filmmakers The Coen Brothers, Rosenthal's noir film gives such a homage to the Coen Brothers in general and specifically such films as Blood Simple or Fargo that some people might wonder why Rosenthal just didn't ask the Coens if they wanted to produce or direct. A Single Shot takes place in the isolated West Virginia backwoods. Similar to many movies that I like, especially from the seventies, A Single Shot attempts realism in people's actions and speech. Events take time to play out. There are pauses in conversations and long periods of silence when someone is engaged in a solitary pursuit. The camera work is solid and far from hyperactive. A Single Shot is a quiet bleak film which takes its time getting to the point. The protagonist is not a particularly nice person. The introduction makes that quite clear. I don't know if this was their first film together since 2002's Welcome to Collinwood (which you should see) but it was nice to see Sam Rockwell and William Macy together again. Perhaps the film tried too much for realism as between the attempted accents and oft inebriated or angered state of the characters it was occasionally difficult to understand the dialog. So what's this film about?

John Moon (Sam Rockwell) is a desperate West Virginia hunter and farmer who has lost his father's farm. As a result, and possibly because he's too proud and/or lazy to work for other people, he feeds himself by poaching. Moon has also lost his attractive wife Jess (British actress Kelly Reilly-again showing what seems to me to be a decent interpretation of a upper Southern accent), and son. Jess, a poor diner waitress, wants a real man, that is someone with money. This film doesn't depict her as a golddigger. Jess just would like to be able to live somewhere nice without ducking calls from bill collectors or wondering if she'll have enough money to feed herself and her son. She still likes John. She just doesn't love him any more. The first 5-10 minutes of the film have virtually no dialogue as we watch John stalk a deer.

John briefly loses sight of the deer as it runs into a gully. He's working to flush it out when he sees/feels its movement. He shoots and sees it fall. He runs to finish the killing process and start the gutting. But he's made a horrible mistake, one that anyone properly trained with a gun should never make. Know what you're shooting at before you pull the trigger. John has not actually shot a deer but a young woman. He is horrified and tries to save her but it's too late. Poking around the area John discovers the woman's camp. Searching through her belongings he finds a large amount of cash-tens of thousands. He takes the cash and disposes of the body, hightailing it out of the area before anyone comes to investigate the shot. He doesn't go to the police. So right from the beginning we can see that John is not the most lawful or ethical man.

John tries to convince Jess to reconcile before the divorce is final. He gives her money. While he's in town he stops by his attorney Dagger Pitt's (William Macy) office to order him to slow walk the divorce process. John gives money to Pitt. As everyone knows John never has any money, the fact that he's throwing around $100 bills does not go unnoticed. As the garrulous Pitt points out, they all live in a small town with interrelated businesses, interests and people. Later, going to Jess' apartment, John finds that Jess is absent but that her babysitter has invited over the sinewy ex-con Obadiah (Joe Anderson-another British actor) for some private meet and greet time. Obadiah put a gun to John's head because John entered without announcing himself. John is angry to find another man in his wife's apartment, particularly one who even after he learns who John is, is dismissive and disrespectful. Obadiah seems to know more of John's business than he should. Obadiah may be working for even more dangerous folks.

John's friend Simon (Jeffrey Wright), a rake, has returned to town just to visit or so he says. John starts getting telephone threats to return the money. Local rich girl Abbie (Opehlia Lovibond-another British actress) starts to make a play for John. Pitt hints that he has clients whose interests might conflict with those of John. Someone shoots and kills John's dog. An anonymous phone caller tells John that unless he returns the money the dog won't be the last loved one of John's to be killed. But John won't return the money. He sees the money as his only chance to regain Jess and redeem his father's farm. So events proceed apace. As mentioned, this film moved at a very leisurely pace. The ultimately ambiguous ending dramatically upped the tension and dread but the film may have waited too long to do that. But I'd say it was a good film.
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Carrie(2013)
directed by Kimberly Peirce

It had been a very long time since I had read the Stephen King book upon which this story was based or seen the original film with Sissy Spacek. So I didn't have a lot of preconceptions before sitting down to watch the third cinematic adaptation of this novel. I'm sure you know the basic story. A bullied shy socially inept girl with an emotionally and physically abusive mother is humiliated at her prom. However this girl also happens to have a very strong telekinetic ability. So she proceeds, almost despite herself, to open up a HUGE can of whoop-a$$ on everyone who ever hurt her. That's the big external story. It has some obvious links to current fears about bullying as well as constant fears about the process by which we become men and women. I've heard that some people never really truly believe and understand that they're going to get old and die until they bring another life into this world. Carrie touches on that, albeit obliquely.

The internal theme which is the story's core is how people, in this case, mostly girls, can ruthlessly single out, crush and humiliate those who are different. Girls can be just as wicked, mean and evil as boys can be. Based on talking to or even being related to a few women who weren't exactly founts of joy and happiness during their high school years I think the original novel and this adaptation realistically displayed female aggression and anger. The real horror of Carrie is simply meanness, not a telekinetic run amok. Carrie (Chloe Grace Moretz) is an elfin high school student who is mocked and bullied at school and home. Moretz, perhaps as much as Spacek in the original, captures Carrie's almost visceral vulnerability and naivete. The only misstep is that in today's world of constant sexual information flow in which some people try to lecture third graders on gay sex, it seems beyond belief that a female high school student would be ignorant of menstruation. The movie explains this by having had Carrie home schooled by her mother. Margaret White (Julianne Moore) is a religious nut who cuts and scourges herself. Moore's performance here was suitably disturbing, if not quite as intense as I remember the original. The elder White most definitely believes in Original Sin (S-E-X). Moore inhabits a very different character than her Mrs. Robinson type role in Don Jon but that's why they call it acting. For Margaret the need to cut out sin is FAR more important than anything silly like motherly love.

Showering alone after gym class to avoid being nude in front of others, Carrie has her first period. She has no idea what's going on. She thinks that she's dying. The other girls are initially amused but become irritated as the frightened Carrie becomes hysterical and bleeds over the floor. They start to throw tampons at her, chanting "Plug it up". The lead bully, Chris (Portia Doubleday) records the event on her cell phone. Even Sue (Gabriella Wilde), an intelligent girl who knows better, initially joins in with the taunting. The no-nonsense gym teacher Miss Desjardin (Judy Greer), marches into the showers to see what the fuss is about, stops the bullying and forcefully brings Carrie out of her hysteria. Miss Desjardin arranges for Carrie's mother to take her home. The teacher tries to talk to Mrs. White about Carrie's obvious ignorance of human bodily functions but Margaret is not having it. There is a moment of pathos at home as the frightened and confused Carrie desperately begs her mother to explain why she never told her about the change. But Margaret thinks this is just the sign of Carrie's turn toward sin. She beats her with a Bible and locks her in a closet to pray. Carrie's telekinesis starts to manifest.

But although Margaret may be beyond Miss Desjardin's authority, the girls who bullied Carrie aren't. The teacher doles out suicide drills as punishment. Refusal means that they don't pass gym class and can't go to prom. Being a woman herself, evidently the teacher has some insight into these girls' motivation. The girls agree to this, following Sue's lead. Chris, however is not only dismissive of the punishment but remains extremely vindictive towards Carrie, having uploaded the shower scene to youtube. When Chris refuses punishment she is kicked out of class and school. This breaks the friendship between Sue and Chris. It also kicks off a tragedy as Chris plots her revenge. Sue feels bad about what happened. She noticed that her boyfriend Tommy (Ansel Elgort) stuck up once for Carrie in class. So Sue asks Tommy to take Carrie to the prom instead of her. Against his better judgement, not because he dislikes Carrie but because he loves Sue, Tommy agrees. Tommy sweeps Carrie off her feet without being condescending, something the paranoid Carrie is always expecting. Carrie is researching her power and even showing it to her mother. Margaret freaks out about having a "witch" for a daughter who is attending prom in a dress that shows off her "dirtypillows". Chris and her court of friends have come up with the perfect revenge. And Tommy and Sue remain clueless, tragically so.

The film's final 20 minutes have all the requisite explosions, blood and death but you should never forget that everything happened because Carrie was a victim of an insane sexually repressed mother and mean peers. It's the ugliness of a broken mother-daughter relationship, the flow of repressed sexual urges into other channels, and people hurting the vulnerable among us that stays with you, not the special effects. I thought the Carrie character lost a little sympathy because she has more malice and intent when her powers make their public appearance.
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Cold Comes The Night
directed by Tse Chun

Walter White didn't die. He was just blinded. He moved to Eastern Europe to recuperate and plot his revenge while somehow picking up a Boris Badenov accent. You could be forgiven for thinking that after watching this movie. It's another noir film but it's not quite as cute or as smart as it thinks it is. The stars couldn't really save this movie from just being meh. Cold Comes The Night does feature Alice Eve in a deliberately deglamorized role that is not based on her more obvious attributes as seen in Star Trek. So there's that I guess. Chloe (Alice Eve) is a motel owner who lives in the motel with her daughter Sophia. She's a single mother and evidently money is tight. IIRC it's unexplained as to how she came to own the motel in the first place if money is so tight but details, details. Chloe is under pressure from the state to find another place for her daughter and herself to live. An officious and obese social worker (Ashley Atkinson) doesn't think that a motel is the proper place for a youngster to grow up. 

Chloe has two weeks to find new lodgings or the state will take her child. It would be interesting to know how Chloe's and Sophia's living arrangements came to the state's attention in the first place and by what right does some social worker claim to be able to remove a child from a parent's custody absent abuse or neglect. But the film leaves those details out. The only thing that I can imagine about how Chloe popped up on the social services radar is that Chloe, as do many motel owners, looks the other way about the goings-on in rooms that are rented by the hour. Yes, you see her motel is apparently the local Bristol Hotel. The ladies who ply their trade there are protected by their pimp, swaggering local police officer Billy (Logan-Marshall Green) who evidently has a thang going on with Chloe, despite being married. Chloe meets with Billy in his car(!), (and why do I get a feeling that the determinedly sleazy Billy has had  many other such "meetings" with Chloe and other women in the past) to demand that Billy find some other place to have his "girls" work. Billy doesn't like demands but he does like Chloe.

Meanwhile the taciturn and apparently legally blind "businessman" Topo (Bryan Cranston) is being driven to an undisclosed meeting by his associate/nephew. Time is of the essence so Topo really doesn't want to stop but his associate whines, begs and pleads. And since Topo can't drive he must assent. But he insists that they enter Chloe's motel separately and be on the road again very soon. The nephew is fine with this because he's noticed the young women hanging around. The nephew may not be American but it doesn't matter where you are, men and women can always communicate with each other. He retires to his room with a hooker. But later there's a dispute. The reason will remain unknown as the nephew and the prostitute have both killed each other. Billy and other police arrive to clean up the mess and impound the vehicle in which Topo and his nephew arrived. This is very problematic for Topo. See he's an aging organized crime hitman and courier, who was delivering a significant amount of money which was hidden in the jeep. Being late with the money is bad. Losing the money is far worse. Topo only got this job because of a favor from the boss, an old friend. But it's the boss' son who's running things now and he doesn't like Topo. And by "doesn't like" I mean that he would take any excuse to give Topo the dirt nap.

So the next morning Topo ,who occasionally pretends to have worse sight than he does, takes Chloe and Sophia hostage. He wants to know where the police took the vehicle and how Chloe can get inside it. Topo makes it very clear that he will shoot Sophia in the head, should Chloe try anything funny. However the money is no longer in the vehicle. Topo demands Chloe's assistance in the search. Chloe tries to save her daughter and make a deal with Topo for some of the cash. Although the idea of a legally blind hitman had potential, the film didn't greatly impress me. A good film noir usually needs a femme fatale. I'm not sure Chloe really fit the bill. I guess you could argue that she's an updated realistic resourceful femme fatale though. I liked seeing Cranston again but the role is something of a straitjacket. I think because we're supposed to identify with Chloe we don't need to know much about Topo other than he will shoot our child in the head if he doesn't get his money.
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Runner, Runner
directed by Brad Furman

This film was almost the definition of generic. You've seen it before. The only thing that made it watchable was Ben Affleck's smooth performance as Ivan Block, an American online gambling tycoon, who has relocated to Costa Rica to oversee his worldwide operations as well as run local gambling casinos. For some reason I didn't realize Affleck was that old or that tall. It looks like he's been hitting the weights as well. He plays his part quite well as an aggressive, confident alpha male who always has all the answers, knows what to say to other men to get what he wants, rarely backs down from confrontation and has any kind or any number of women that he desires. And women are a big part of what he desires.

In Princeton, Richie Furst (Justin Timberlake) is a former Wall Street big shot who lost everything in the crash. He may have been doing some shady things in 2008-2009 as well. He's now persona non grata on Wall Street. He's considered too old or too shady. Trying to ride the bad economic times out Richie has gone back to grad school to get his master's degree. He pays tuition by bookmaking and referring other students to online gambling sites. When a student drops a dime on Richie, the Dean warns Richie to stop all gambling activities or else. The Dean doesn't care that that's how Richie pays his tuition. Desperate, Richie starts an epic game of online poker using his own money. Although at first he's winning, he soon gets reckless and greedy and loses everything. But you don't work long on Wall Street without being statistically adept. Richie has noticed some inconsistencies in the play. Once he has someone smarter than he verify the numbers, he knows that the business cheated. Believing in standing up for himself as well as not having any other choice, Richie departs for Costa Rica to confront Ivan Block. Richie knows that in gambling the house always wins so there's no need for a legitimate operator like Block to cheat. 

Through luck and some quick thinking Richie finagles an invitation to a party Block will be attending. There he meets Block and explains that someone in Block's organization has to be cheating. Richie can't believe it's Block which is why he came to him first. Nonplussed, Block takes the proof and agrees to look into it before having Richie seen off. Surprise! Block has identified the miscreants available for the cheating and fired them. He offers Richie all of his money back plus a bonus. Or if Richie has real stones, and Block hopes that he does, Block is willing to hire Richie at a well paid position. At worst this offer is worth mid six figures in yearly income. And with bonus and time served it could be worth seven figures. Richie says yes and quickly rises to become an important member of Block's team. Richie works very closely, that is to say intimately, with Block's second-in-command and on-again/off-again girlfriend Rebecca (Gemma Arterton). Richie hires his friends to work with him. But things that look too good to be true usually are. A intense bully of an FBI agent named Shavers (Anthony Mackie) tries to explain this to Richie while Block pulls the curtains back on his business and invites Richie to swim in some deep waters without a life jacket.

The only question is who cons whom or rather were you conned into watching this film. I won't say it wasn't fun at times. It's stylish. It just wasn't super special or challenging. Definitely something that you keep half an eye on while you're deshedding your German Shepherd or some similar task.
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Warren Michigan Police Officer Cuts Off Woman's Weave

I don't have much to say about this. Perhaps it was jealousy of the other woman's hair? Maybe the officer is just always that abusive? Or maybe it's just a bad person using bureaucracy to do wrong.  To some cops being arrested is not bad enough. They need to make sure that the citizen feels completely humiliated. I don't know. The good news is that Officer Najor no longer has the authority of the state to hide behind. Her boss fired her. Although unnecessarily removing someone's hair is not as bad as a beating I am sure the shock and humiliation are similar. And I get the feeling that the officer intended to send a message about who was in charge and who wasn't. So ladies, if you have extensions or weaves, be careful about getting arrested in Warren, Michigan. Because the police might try to cut your hair. Watch news story below the jump.

At many jails, prisoners are required to remove hair extensions that clip in because they could be used as a weapon or to commit suicide. But Charda Gregory didn’t have clip in extensions. She had a weave that was sewn right into her real hair. Charda Gregory is a young mother who loves her hair. And the 22-year-old hair dresser loves changing her style often by using weaves. But Gregory’s hair changed dramatically after an encounter with a Warren Police Officer. 

Even though there’s no audio on the video from inside the Warren Jail, you can see Gregory kick her legs and writhe in pain as the officer plunges scissors into her hair, hacking away at the weave that was sewn into braids on her scalp. “There’s a real simple thing: it’s called right and wrong. And to me this is something that I won’t tolerate, I don’t think the citizens of Warren will tolerate it,” said Warren Police Commissioner Jere Green. Green says Najor’s explanation that she had to remove Gregory’s weave because of alleged threats of suicide makes no sense.

“I don’t buy that’s the proper way to treat a human being.  I don’t think it’s decent, I don’t think there was any reason to do it, and when I look at it – that bothers me,” said Green. Green says as soon as he learned about the incident, he placed Najor on leave and she has since been fired.

Handymen and Stay at Home Mothers

Do you think that traditional gender roles still have meaning?

Recently on Facebook one of my younger female cousins posted that she and her unmarried friends were running into a lot of male poseurs who claimed to be looking for traditional women insofar as such things as cooking, cleaning, and possibly even who works and who stays at home. She found it a bit upsetting though that when she or her friends challenged these men on their proficiency at such traditional male responsibilities as fixing things around the house, repairing automobiles or other machinery and doing other unpleasant but old school male chores these men were either clueless about such jobs, had to pay other men to do them or claimed that in today's day and age such chores ought to be equally shared between men and women. Showing the somewhat "shady" humor which tends to run rampant in my family one of my male cousins pointed out that although he might not be able to fix a woman's car he was more than capable of unplugging her pipes. He even had references, heh-heh. When I liked my male cousin's post my female cousin goodnaturedly told both of us that we were on timeout. Snicker.

Anyway this got me thinking. My paternal grandfather was a general contractor. So many of his sons, both via knowledge passed down and their own curiosity gained a lot of my grandfather's do it yourself type skills. This included my father. It was a very rare day indeed that my father ever paid someone to do anything around our house or on his vehicles. He normally did it himself. Lots of people in his social peer group did the same both because that's just how they were raised and because they grew up in either extreme poverty or in lower middle class areas where money was very very tight. People were expected to make do with what they had or repair it until they could afford something new. I think that back in the day high schools had more shop classes. These have been stereotyped as holding rooms for people who aren't going to college but I think some people might be surprised at the number of college educated people who are still able to adequately perform some supposed blue-collar work. I don't seem to remember shop class in my high school but it's probably something I wish I could go back and take. Although sadly I have nothing near my father's mechanical skills and deeply regret not paying more attention back in the day I have still picked up some basic things over the years. I find a sense of accomplishment in being able to fix simple things around the house, change my home environment, save a few bucks here or there, or at least have a vague idea when a contractor is quoting me a ridiculous estimate. To me that is a critical streak of self-sufficiency that I think is important for both genders as adults but is 100% necessary for men. This could be why I'm not overly fond of asking for help when I think it's something I ought to be able to do on my own. Ironically I remember changing a flat on the expressway all by myself because that's what the Old Man would have done only to arrive home and be told to call AAA next time instead of taking such a stupid risk. HA! So it goes. Of course as my brother always says his idea of masculinity means that he makes enough money to PAY other people to do that kind of work. And so he does.



From the opposite perspective for whatever reason a woman named Amy Glass felt that she needed to ridicule not only stay-at-home mothers but also the very concept of congratulating people (women) for getting married and having children. She did so in what I considered to be a rather nasty way. 
LINK

Do people really think that a stay at home mom is really on equal footing with a woman who works and takes care of herself? There’s no way those two things are the same. It’s hard for me to believe it’s not just verbally placating these people so they don’t get in trouble with the mommy bloggers.

Having kids and getting married are considered life milestones. We have baby showers and wedding parties as if it’s a huge accomplishment and cause for celebration to be able to get knocked up or find someone to walk down the aisle with. These aren’t accomplishments, they are actually super easy tasks, literally anyone can do them. They are the most common thing, ever, in the history of the world. They are, by definition, average. And here’s the thing, why on earth are we settling for average?

If women can do anything, why are we still content with applauding them for doing nothing?

I want to have a shower for a woman when she backpacks on her own through Asia, gets a promotion, or lands a dream job not when she stays inside the box and does the house and kids thing which is the path of least resistance. The dominate cultural voice will tell you these are things you can do with a husband and kids, but as I’ve written before, that’s a lie. It’s just not reality.
You will never have the time, energy, freedom or mobility to be exceptional if you have a husband and kids.

I don't see anything wrong with congratulating people on getting married or having children. Although it might not be your cup of tea, that doesn't mean you need to knock it for someone else. Whatever happened to live and let live? Although it could certainly be considered oppressive to reduce every woman's worth to solely her reproductive and marital status I think it's just as wrong headed to assume that a woman's worth is only and should only be based on paid work outside the home. The unpaid work that mothers and fathers do can't be valued but is critical to raising healthy productive human beings. For me to congratulate someone else for getting married or having children is not saying anything negative about those who have chosen to walk a different path. Again, I think that some feminists are too quick to over glamorize what they see as the male role and eschew what they see as a female role. Ultimately I think this turns into internalized (and practiced) misogyny, ironically what feminists loudly and reflexively accuse everyone else of doing all the time. I can't speak to what Amy Glass experiences as a woman but I do happen to know and be related to and descended from women who are exceptional who are married and have kids. So I happen to think Glass is full of it on this instance. And as you might imagine plenty of other people did as well. Some of them were women, strangely enough. Go figure. I guess when you tell millions of women that they are just average and will never be exceptional a few of them are going to be upset enough to come at your neck. Who would have thought.

What do you think?

Are men under greater pressure (internal or external) to be self-sufficient?

Is there anything wrong with congratulating women for marrying and having children?

Are gender roles here to stay no matter what we do?