This is a sequel to the book, The Talisman, penned all those years ago by the same two authors and good friends. It is not necessary to have read The Talisman in order to enjoy Black House.The Talisman was, briefly, a story of a 12 year old boy who has to travel to an alternate reality in order to obtain the titular object, a source of immense magical power, and also save his dying mother. This reality, which the boy, Jack Sawyer, calls The Territories is similar to our own except that magic works and the world is smaller. Time and distance are also somewhat warped so that travel in The Territories doesn't match up exactly with travel in our world. Most people in our world have an alternate self or "twinner" in The Territories. These alternate selves are not necessarily aware of each other but usually have the same desires and goals. They are also linked. What happens good or bad to one version of a person usually happens, albeit in a different way to the other version. Jack is unique or at least rare in that he doesn't have a twinner. He survived his twinner's murder. He can thus physically flip between the two worlds (most people can't do that). Ultimately Jack is able, after much heartache and loss of life, to save his mother, prevent his murdered father's partner Morgan and Morgan's twinner from obtaining The Talisman or stealing his father's company, and save the life of the Queen of The Territories (his mother's twinner).
But similar to how C.S. Lewis detailed the Narnia series, children grow up and unlearn the wisdom of their youth. A little over two decades after the events in The Talisman, Jack is a thirty something retired LAPD officer who had been on the fast track to Chief of Detectives and likely even Chief of Police. He has no memory of The Territories, the heroic role he played there or friends and enemies made in that realm. The only qualities he's retained from his time there are a very reliable intuition, an ability to quickly read people and an ever so slight foresight. These, along with a rock-solid moral sense and disdain for bullies help his meteoric rise in his chosen profession. But when a case in LA unknowingly reminded Jack of things he had forgotten, he abruptly decided to walk away from his career and retire to French Landing, Wisconsin. He assisted on a case there once and immediately made a friend for life in the decent but overwhelmed Police Chief, Dale Gilbertson. But there's no rest for the weary. There is a killer loose in French Landing. The worst kind of killer is roaming free, one who kills children. This man models himself after the serial killer Albert Fish and is thus known as The Fisherman. Dale begs for Jack's help, recognizing that whatever is going on is beyond his ability to prevent or solve. Jack initially refuses. But Jack is having dreams, both when he's asleep and when he's awake. He can't understand them or explain them. Ultimately the man who first summoned Jack to the Territories, Speedy Parker (a blues musician in our world and a relentless gunslinger/marshal in The Territories) is able to break the wall in Jack's mind and restore his memory and ability to flip between the two worlds. And Jack finally learns what King/Straub reveal almost immediately to the reader, that these killings are not the work of a human, or at least not something that is completely human. There has been some slippage between our world and The Territories. Battle is joined.
This is very hardcore horror so if that is not your thing ordinarily I'd advise those not so inclined to pass on this book. But the writing is so sublime that even if you're not into horror it would be a mistake for you to skip this book. Of course I am a fan of horror and King and Straub so take that recommendation with a rock of salt. It is interesting to read this and try to pick out which parts were written by King and which were written by Straub. They usually have pretty distinct voices but here they seem to have melded into one super-writer. There aren't any jarring discontinuities. Straub is from Wisconsin. I think he provided a lot of the descriptions of that area. I would also bet that Straub wrote most of the jazz stuff (much of the action takes place in a senior home where blind DJ Henry Leydeen plays jazz and pop music for the residents) as Straub is known to be a jazz aficionado but other than that it's anybody's guess. The book is seamless and quite rewarding. The story has been retrofitted to include references to King's Dark Tower series. As is usual in most of King's work, the everyday and prosaic is so very well depicted that when the supernatural appears you are so invested in the tale that you have no choice but to believe it. Ricochet by Ovid Demaris
Some gangsters like Carlo Gambino, Meyer Lansky, and Sidney Korshak generally stayed in the shadows. These men were either lucky enough or smart enough to avoid imprisonment or murder and die of natural causes as free men. Other gangsters like John Gotti, Albert Anastasia or Bugsy Siegel disdained living quietly and so aroused the ire of law enforcement or their fellow mobsters. These men often died in prison or were removed from the planet in a much more abrupt manner. Nicky Scarfo, former boss of the Philadelphia Mafia Family, belonged in the second category. He became boss after a period of internal and external strife in and around the Philadelphia organization. Philadelphia mobsters hoped that Scarfo would return the group to its days of quiet profit under the late Angelo Bruno. Well that didn't happen. Scarfo was, like Gotti, a loud brash man who loved killing and public recognition. He even ordered the murder of a judge who had doublecrossed him. Ultimately Scarfo's violent reckless nature -- he enjoyed being present at actual murders ---a no no for a boss, caught up with him. Scarfo's preferred solution to problems was to kill people. People inside the family started worrying they would be next, especially after, (shades of The Red Wedding) Scarfo murdered the Family's putative heir because the man backed out of an arranged wedding with the daughter of a Scarfo ally. Informants proliferated. Scarfo received multiple sentences for murder, extortion and RICO. Ricochet fictionalized Scarfo as Tony Allio. Tony Allio is a short quick tempered patricidal mob boss who is good with a knife. He's a bully and a thug. He's got his little fingers in prostitution, narcotics, extortion, and everything else that goes on in the Philadelphia/South Jersey area. Tony seeks revenge on the book's protagonist, one Frank Conti. Frank and Tony have known each other since childhood and never liked each other. In high school, Tony already had a dangerous reputation and his own group of budding mafia wannabees. Frank stepped in to protect his girlfriend when Tony's friends attempted to molest her. Tony and company beat him to within an inch of his life. Frank ignored his policeman's father's pleas to either let it go or let the police handle it. Frank recovered and bided his time until he got Tony alone and returned the favor in spades, afterwards fleeing into the Army and the Vietnam War. Now Frank is back in South Philly, a decorated vet and former Green Beret who's a rising corporate banker. But Tony Allio didn't mind waiting decades for payback. He has plans for Frank. He intends to hurt Frank and his family thru Frank's wife Nancy. Nancy has a gambling problem. And Tony is all too happy to indulge her. But Tony forgets that pushing the buttons of a Green Beret isn't smart. There is an interesting subplot with Joey Bucci and his girlfriend Joyce. They are mob hangers on who get close to Allio and find themselves getting in too deep. You won't feel sorry for Joey although you might empathize with Joyce. Joey is a walking example of how one bad decision leads to many more until you're at a kill or be killed crossroads. Demaris was a detective novelist and reporter who had written multiple investigative exposes on organized crime. So he knew his stuff. His storytelling skills were not to the level of King or Straub. This book was a little less than 300 pages but was a very quick read.
Shortly after Mary Barra became the new GM CEO and the first person with two X chromosomes to hold that title the usual suspects promptly came out of the woodwork to charge GM with the crime of paying Ms. Barra less than her male predecessor and of doing so because she was a woman. This accusation was duly repeated as if it were fact, not just by bloggers but also by reporters for sites supposedly a fair bit more reputable than a run of the mill blog operated by unpaid people in their spare time. There were numerous blog posts and news stories bemoaning the fact that Barra was making less money than the man she replaced. People's jowls were quivering in outrage that this particular millionaire CEO wasn't going to earn as much money as another millionaire CEO.As Nora Caplan-Bricker wrote in The New Republic "In the past few days, Mary Barra, the new CEO of General Motors and the first ever female CEO of a major car company, has morphed from a symbol of success to an embodiment of the fact no amount of ambition and labor guarantees a woman equal treatment. It's hard to muster too much sympathy for a woman pulling in $4 million a year. But, in at least a general sense, Barra's problem is every American woman's problem—magnified by a larger sum." Strong stuff! From reading this purple prose I honestly expected that Barra would be opening her first leadership meeting by singing this song. I mean she's got it hard! The world is a ghetto! It's another attack in the War on Women! To the barricades comrades!!!!
Well not so fast. As it turns out all of the outraged news stories and blog posts were based on incomplete and thus fundamentally inaccurate information. Actually Ms. Barra stands to earn 60% more in her first year on the job than former CEO Daniel Akerson earned on his final year on the job. That's right, MORE.
Mary T. Barra, chief executive of General Motors, will earn as much as $14.4 million in compensation during her first year on the job, the company said on Monday. The amount of compensation revealed in January — $1.6 million in salary and $2.8 million as part of the company’s short-term incentive plan — will most likely be a small part of Ms. Barra’s earnings, but it was used by media outlets as a baseline comparison to the about $9 million Mr. Akerson earned in compensation last year. The total package Ms. Barra stands to receive in her first year as chief executive represents a 60 percent increase over what Mr. Akerson earned in his final year on the job. “As a new C.E.O., Mary’s total compensation is in line with her peer group and properly weighted so that most is at-risk,” G.M.’s chairman, Theodore M. Solso, said in a statement on Monday. “The company’s performance will ultimately determine how much she is paid.” LINK
So I fully expect that the folks who were hooting and hollering about unfair gender bias against women because they thought that a woman wasn't making as much money as a man certainly now will start flapping their gums about unfair gender bias against men because a woman is making a lot more than a man. I mean we know that gender chauvinism fairness and equality is all such people are concerned about. That's what they constantly tell us and surely they are the best judges of their intentions. I know that the people who jumped the gun and made false claims, incorrect insinuations, and bad assumptions will all ruefully admit they were as wrong as two left shoes and publicly promise to do better next time. I have belief in the goodness of people. Yes I do. And if a sample size of one was enough to indicate unfairness towards women surely the reverse is true about unfairness towards men. Right? Right??? Ha! Or maybe, just maybe, there might have been non gender related reasons for Barra's and Akerson's compensation packages. Hmm. You know, reasons like that federal auto bailout, capped compensation and market share thingy. The purely ideological are rarely swayed by evidence and likely won't be in this case either. However this non-story should remind the rest of us living in the reality based community to at least try to take the time to find out what's going on first before we go off the deep end and start making assertions or jumping to conclusions. And the media failed in that job here. It makes you wonder what else they get wrong. After all, as Mark Twain may have said, " A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes".
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.
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.
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.
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!!!!!!
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.
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 actressKelly 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. TRAILER
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. TRAILER
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. TRAILER
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. TRAILER
