I had some kitchen tasks to do - preparing some meals, baking a bread - so I asked Netflix for music and they gave me tick tick Boom as the first choice. I loved it when I first watched it; enough to watch it again. And so I put it on a third time. It was still good. Though I'm tempted to blame me not paying enough attention to the bread and screwing it up.
So let me recommend it here for folks with Netflix.
It's musical written by Jonathon Larson, about Jonathan Larson writing an earlier musical that never got performed. It shows the artist with a vision in his head that's keeping him poor because it's taking him years to get it on paper. He lives in a 5th floor walkup apartment in New York with his long time school friend, an aspiring actor.
The movie switches back and forth from Jonathon talking to an audience about the story and the actual events he's telling the audience. Music is never more than a beat away.
Andrew Garfield is amazing as Larson.
But more. Jonathan Larson, if you don't know (I didn't) went on to write Rent next. So we are essentially seeing the story of his struggle to survive in New York writing his musicals, waiting tables at a diner, until he makes it. All the while he thinks in music and lyrics.
Inspiring for people who are feeling despair at today's political situation.
But the music and the story are also captivating. And the dancing.
If you need more convincing, the movie was directed by Lin-Manual Miranda, the genius behind Hamilton! Here's a trailer.
Here are the lyrics of the song at the end of the trailer.
[Guide to this post: This post reminds me of the rambling posts I used to do regularly. And it feels good, because the world is tangled up in complicated ways - there are few straight lines. This began as a post about the movie Sinners. But immediately got hijacked by some observations about movie theaters these days. There's a nod to Clarksdale, Mississippi. But then I switch quickly to what I think is a much more important movie - The Laundromat. But that too gets delayed as I talk about Lisa Murkowski's appearance today on Talk of Alaska and her interpretation of her recent "We're all afraid" comment. Which requires some background into what ecumenical means.
If you only want to read one part of this post, I recommend learning about The Laundromat. It's still available on Netflix if you have that. Skip down to that heading - bold and in capitals. Then skip past the part on Murkowski to learn about why I think the film is important.]
We haven't been out to see a movie very often lately. A couple of times while we were in Bainbridge - A Complete Unknown and The Brutalist. Two movies worth seeing.
I'd been hearing about Sinners on Spoutible and BlueSky. Not a lot, but that it was a sleeper big hit, it was a Black themed film. The parts that had me a bit skeptical mentioned horror elements.
Well Monday night is a discount night, as two seniors, we got in for a total of $14!! The tariffs haven't hit Anchorage theaters yet. But our choice of seats was front row or two separate single seats further back. We chose the later. Inside, it was actually pretty empty and we took one of our seats and I sat in the one next to it, my actual seat in the row ahead.
It did fill up a bit more, but no one claimed my seat.
When I say it was full, I probably have to remind folks that the theaters have all been remodeled. There are far fewer total seats, and the ones you get are lounge seats where the head tilts back and the feet up. So a full theater has a lot fewer viewers than in the past.
Later: I didn't finish this. Sinners is a forgettable movie. Except for the music. I don't know what the creators were thinking. We'll do some Black history, but that doesn't sell enough (a dubious premise) so we'll add some great blues music, and to catch today's audience, we'll add in a vampire massacre. And we'll locate it in Clarksdale, Mississippi - the Birthplace of the Blues. (We actually visited Clarksdale and the Blues Museum. Visiting Mississippi was sort of like visiting Albania or North Korea in my mind - a place forbidden and evil. It wasn't our destination, but it was between Chicago and New Orleans by car. But that's a story for another day.)
This feels like one of my old blogposts, that wandered and jumped, as life does and as thoughts do. So let's jump back into the present future.
Why do people say the Democratic party is not really any different from the Republican party? Because deep down, they are both corrupted by money and protection of the wealthy. The Republicans are a lot more open about that. They think rich people are the product of hard work and deserve all they get.
The Democrats are a little embarrassed by their dependence on the rich. They cover this addiction (well it's almost required if you want to have enough money to campaign, thanks to Citizens United) by trying to make the lives of those screwed over by the system a little more bearable. They try to spread a bit of equality to more people, but their hands are just as dirty with money, and they go to parties with lots of people whose wealth comes from less than pristine morals and behavior.
NO, NO, NO, I'm not saying they are the parties are the same, or that life under a Harris administration would have been no different from the disaster of the current Republican Administration. [Someone suggested online today, not to mention his name, but to say Republican Administration instead to make sure all the cowards in the House and Senate are fully implicated in what's going on. After all, they could end this non-violent coups if they chose to. What do you think?)
THE LAUNDROMAT
So, tonight after falling asleep listening to Lisa Murkowski on Talk of Alaska, in what seemed an attempt to clean up her confession to being afraid, that 'We are all afraid' by saying, "It was kind of an ecumenical 'we' . . . When I say Lisa Murkowski is afraid, it's not in a cowardly way." She's not, afraid of things like being primaried, she said. She's hearing from Alaskans who are losing their jobs, from Alaskans whose grant monies and contracts have been halted. "So when I say 'we' I have to include myself as an Alaskan. She also spoke of her oath to uphold the Constitution and her responsibilities under Article 1. "I'm seeing an erosion of the boundaries, if you will, between the Executive and the Legislative branch..." As I say I fell asleep during this and I'm resurrecting her words through the podcast up at Talk of Alaska. (The comments I'm referring to start around 6 minutes in.) And if you are a little confused by her reference to the 'ecumenical we' as I was, here's a little refresher. Maybe she didn't want to say the 'royal we' and 'ecumenical' was the only other 'we' she could think of. Maybe she thought it would imply some sort of bi-partisan message. Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, atheists and agnostics, not included I guess.
"The Ecumenical Movement is a key effort in the Christian faith. It works to bring different Christian groups around the world together. Its importance is seen in religious fellowship and the chase of shared goals. The word ‘ecumenical’ comes from ‘oikoumen?,’ the Greek word for “the inhabited world.” Over time, it has gained a special theological meaning. The word’s evolution shows a move from ordinary to sacred, going from a word about geography to a sign of hope to unite Christians.
"The Ecumenical Movement started as an answer to the need for unity in the Christian church. The church was split by arguments over belief and competitive missions. Through history, ecumenical councils played key roles. They helped form the faith’s theology and practices. This includes councils from the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church. These meetings show the ongoing effort to find what the Ecumenical Movement is today. This effort is helped by groups like the World Council of Churches and places like Taizé that focus on community spirituality." (From Faithonview.com)
But all th's Murkowski stuff slipped in because I got a bit of a nap this evening so I felt like I could partake in a bit of Netflix and while randomly exploring, found a movie called The Laundromat. It turns out I saw this already on Netflix.
It's an important film for USians to watch to understand why some people say there is no difference between the two political parties. The very rich invite politicians of both parties to their parties, and most politicians accept the invitations. (OK, I'm just saying that. I don't have statistics. But I'm pretty sure it's true in a general sort of way.)
It's not your run of the mill movie. It's a semi-fictional account of a woman whose husband dies in a freak boating accident and she learns that the boating company's insurance isn't going to pay. She is told about shell companies and holding companies and off shore accounts. We also meet a couple of wealthy men, business partners, Jürgen Mossack and Ramón Fonseca who tell us their side of the story.
Mossack and Fonseca. Is that ringing any bells? Remember the Panama Papers? When a law firm in Panama got hacked and all their clients and shell companies got exposed? That was Mossack and Fonseca.
It's essentially a movie that attempts to tell us in a down-to-earth way about how the world is rigged against most people by the very wealthy. Generally we just hear stuff that says we're screwed.
" 735 U.S. billionaires hold more wealth ($0.4 trillion more) than the bottom 50% of American households." (I picked this claim because this is from Snopes checking out a statement by Robert Reich, so it was fact checked somewhat.)
The movie tells us a little bit more about how it happens.
Wikipedia says the movie got mixed reviews. But I'm guessing because it's imaginative, clever, and takes a very dry and difficult subject and makes it relatable to the average person. And the only vampires are allegorical blood suckers.
Steven Soderbergh (a very inventive filmmaker) directed it and it stars Meryl Streep as an ordinary USian who wants to know who is screwing her over. Gary Oldman and Antonio Banderas play the two Panama lawyers who got hacked.
As Trump is leaning on Congress to pass a huge tax cut for the very rich, this film does give us a glimpse of how slimy it all is.
If you walk the path along Venice Beach, you'll come across the skateboard park.
Skateboards first appeared along the beaches of Southern California, particularly Venice. As a junior high student back then, I joined the others nailing half a roller skate to one end of a 2x4 and the other half to the other end. We didn't have a lot of control. My street was one of the better hills. One block to the south wasn't steep enough. One block to the north was too steep for most. I survived the steep one a couple of times. This was in the late 1950s and early 1960s. You can read more about the history of skateboards from the Hermoso Beach Museum site.
Skate boarding has come a long way since then as have the places people ride them.
Tuesday it got up to 75˚F and we spent a couple of hours at Venice Beach near the end of Rose Avenue.
Friday, when I biked down there, the fog blocked the view of the ocean from the bike trail.
We went to the LA County Museum of Art on Thursday. And passed this bit of graffiti on the way. We also passed an Indian grocery store.
This is just a part of the loooooooong spice shelf. One of the reasons that Indian food is so good - lots of spices and thousands of years experimenting how to prepare them.
We also passed Johnie's Coffee Shop. It's an example of Googie architecture - but I didn't know that when I took the picture or I would have taken a better picture of the whole place. My interest was that this coffee shop had been turned into Bernie's Coffee Shop. LAist has a January 31, 2019 story by Jessica P. Ogilvie about this transformation:
"Johnie's Coffee Shop was built in 1956 by architects Louis Armet and Eldon Davis, masters of the space-age Googie style. The restaurant came to be known for its striking design and by the 1980s, began making appearances in films like Miracle Mile, The Big Lebowski, American History X, Reservoir Dogs and City of Angels. In 1994, it was purchased by the Gold family, an entrepreneurial L.A. clan whose patriarch, David Gold, founded the 99 Cents Only Stores.
In 2013, Johnie's was designated an historic cultural monument, and for a short while, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority debated turning it into a Metro stop for the purple line."
That Metro stop is still being built kitty-corner from Johnie's/Bernie's. The article goes on to tell the history of how it became Bernie's.
2 1/2 blocks from where I lived as a kid. Now it's the Academy of Motion Pictures Museum. Fortunately the kept the historic facade of the building. They used to have elaborate Christmas display windows right at that corner.
We ended up checking out the Motion Picture Museum, but passing for now. Instead we went to the Art Museum that is on the (now, there used to be a street between them) adjoining block. But I'll save the museum for another post.
Some of the apartment buildings on the street where I used to live. Ours didn't have such fancy entrances.
It was a hazy day which gave these buildings in Century City a surreal look as we drove home. (None of the pictures in this post were edited except cropping.)
And I'm adding on this picture (below) of the LA airport. I commented in an earlier post about the unsatisfactory taxi/Uber/Lyft parking lot that's a distance from the terminals. The whole terminal traffic situation is beyond awful. There are places where you can pick up arriving passengers. But during Christmas vacation the three to four lanes are jammed. You aren't supposed to be stopped unless you are actively picking up a passenger. But it's near impossible to time when the car gets to the terminal to match when the passenger gets to the curb. I pulled over at Terminal 5 with the expectation I'd move up to Terminal 6 when my daughter and family got out. If a cop told me to move on, I could stop again at Terminal 6. (I have been told to move on at LAX in the past, but no cops were sighted Saturday.) If I got told to move on at Terminal 6, I'd have to go around the whole airport again. I'm not sure what the solution is. They're building a skytrain (which i assume will be similar to what they have in San Francisco) to get passengers out of terminal area. I'm not sure it's just bad design. More, just that LA's population grew so much. They do have a target date to do something - the 2028 Olympics will be in LA. The Metro line is also supposed to be all the way out to the airport. The problem has been the taxis and other interests didn't want the Metro to get to the airport, I'm told.
The airport was much easier to navigate back in 1967 when I drove a Yellow Cab out of the airport for several months between graduating from UCLA and returning to the second summer of Peace Corps training. Those were good times - mornings at the beach playing volley ball and body surfing, evenings driving a cab. I learned a lot about LA. I'd never realized how many bars there were until I drove a cab.
To the left us at this spot is the Los Angeles Airport (LAX) 'theme building."
"To truly immerse oneself in the world of Googie, a visit to the "Theme Building" at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) is an absolute must. Completed in 1961, this architectural marvel resembles a futuristic flying saucer perched upon four curving legs. With its observation deck, it was once a popular spot for locals and travelers to admire the planes taking off and landing at LAX. The Theme Building perfectly encapsulates Googie's out-of-this-world charm and stands as a testament to an era when the skies were no longer the limit." from LA Explained Blog
I had a high school graduation dinner there with a dozen or more friends. The restaurant is long gone.
Garry Kaulitz was a long time University of Alaska Anchorage artist and professor. His works are still alive and available online. Here's the link. Worth a look.
A letter from the Rogers Park Community Council alerts neighbors of a Department of Transportation proposal to put a highway above Chester Creek. There's a meeting at the Senior Center - which would, if I read the map right, be under the viaduct.
This image is from the page labeled 'FILMS'. It keeps going well below this screenshot.
There are always great films as well as some that are not so great. But everyone has different tastes so there will be something for everyone. Films will mostly be at the Bear Tooth and the Museum.
There is also a change in the festival organizers this year. I described that a little bit back in September and you can see that post here.
I'll cover more about individual films soon.
There's a new tab up on top under the orange banner for AIFF2024. That will be an overview of the Festival and an index of my posts about the festival.
We saw the film about Roy Cohn yesterday afternoon. Of course, it also is about Donald Trump - the Apprentice in the film title.
Here's the LA Times review. It also tells the story of how it was feared the film would not be publicly shown before the election. But, alas, it appears it was in Anchorage - at just about every theater, all day, and now it's gone. It would serve the public much better to have it show at different theaters different weeks, so that word of mouth could get out. Since the Anchorage Daily News no longer lists or reviews movies, you pretty much have to go look on line and seek out movies, rather than get reminders while you're reading the newspaper.
I started posting about Roy Cohn back in 2016, and it wasn't flattering.
There really isn't much in the movie that adds to those eight year old posts.
But seeing it today, in hindsight, you recognize many characteristics of Trump.
Listen to any time he talks. He follows Cohn's rules. He attacks. He never admits anything. He denies everything. And he claims victory despite what really happened. (Did you know he totally defeated Harris in their debate?)
He doesn't answer questions that would reflect negatively on him. Instead he changes the subject and/or attacks one or more of his current perceived enemies. He lies about what they've done, and calls them demeaning names.
He never apologizes. Ever.
Listen for these three every time he talks.
What most struck me about the movie was, what I'll call grittiness. It's well edited, but it's often dark and there's a lot of hand held camera. But it moves right along.
Again, because I researched Cohn back in 2016 and did those two posts listed above, there isn't much in the film I didn't know and a lot I knew that was slightly touched on in the movie. For instance, Cohen mentions (while telling Trump he's crazy to get married) that he almost got married to Barbara Walters until he realized she'd own half of what he owned. That marriage would only be a way to cover his homosexuality. But the movie doesn't tell you, Barbara Walters stayed loyal to him because he helped get a warrant for her father dismissed.
But what did strike me as I watched the movie, was how Cohn, in two instances, helps Trump by going through his vast collection of tapes (he recorded all the rooms in his house when he had parties), he was able to get two rulings against Trump changed, by black mailing the decision makers with his tapes.
I've speculated at times about Trump having dirt on most GOP members of Congress which keeps them supporting him, despite earlier denunciations of Trump. Think of Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio, just to name three. The movie reinforces that belief. I wouldn't even be surprised if Russian intelligence hasn't helped him gather such compromising evidence.
I was hoping to get this up to encourage folks to see the film. Unfortunately that doesn't see likely for folks in Anchorage, but I'd hope in other places the film will play longer.
I'd note that at the end of September, we let our Netflix subscription lapse. I was hoping that would give me more time to read and blog, but so far that hasn't happened that way. My daily hour at my local elementary school, and preparation for it, takes up a lot of time, but is very gratifying. The teacher said the other day that my guy is doing much better in class. I decided that I need to have him work on reading in Spanish. He can't do that fluently, but he can slowly, and with help, work out the words. And I can feel his sense of achievement when he gets the word. In English, he doesn't know enough words to get that satisfaction. And my hope is that when he can read more fluently in Spanish, English will be easier to tackle. But he does have a fair passive English vocabulary - that is, he understands things I ask him to do. And just hearing me repeat the same kinds of questions and instructions in English everyday drills those words and phrases in.
The Anchorage International Film Festival (AIFF) begins Friday, December 1, 2023 with a documentary about four time Iditarod winner, Lance Mackey. Based on the trailer below, this doesn't seem to sugar coat his troubled life.
The Festival runs Dec. 1 - 9 this year and you can see the program of all the coming films here.
You can see the schedule of all the films here. Above the calendar you can get different options. The default seems to be by week, and that only shows the first two days. Look above for the arrow to move to week two.
I'd note - as does the AIFF website - that MovieMaker magazine has listed the Anchorage International Film Festival in its list of 25 coolest festivals 2023. And no, they aren't all near the arctic. About AIFF, they say:
“This festival gave me the chance to explore all day and watch films all night — and night starts at 3 p.m., so that is a lot of films,” says Geoff Marslett. “I promise you will come back with stories from this adventure. If you’re lucky, you may even get to play bingo with the good people who run this one.”
You’ll have lots of fun if your bingo card includes a strong list of films from all over the world, with an emphasis on independent filmmaking in Alaska. We listed Anchorage as one of our 20 Great Film Festivals for First-Time Filmmakers last year not only because of its coolness, but also because of its supportive ratio of submitted-to-accepted films, which means you have a decent chance of getting in with a strong project."
So, if you live in Anchorage or nearby, you can save the cost of airfare and a hotel and enjoy one of the coolest film festivals in the world.
You can get passes for all the films Individual feature length films or programs of short films are $12 each. So if you're going to see 10 or more films, it's definitely worth it. And even if you won't see more than six, having a pass will save you some lines and buying individual tickets and add a little contribution to the Festival.
ALL FILMS Passes 2023
$110.00
Pass for all AIFF 2023 in-person screenings from Friday, December 1 through Saturday, December 9, including Opening Night and all other festival screenings at the Bear Tooth Theatrepub.
In the past I've posted "Questions and Answers People Should Be Asking About The Festival." Here's a link to the last one I did in 2019. Some specific things - like venues and free events change from festival to festival. But a lot of it might be useful for people not used to going to film festivals.
This year's venues include The Bear Tooth, Anchorage Museum, E Street Theater, and the Awards event will be at The Nave on Spenard. You can find all the details at the AIFF website.
I'll try to highlight some of the films that will be showing during the festival.
Monday morning I biked over to the Century theater to see Amsterdam. An odd hour to see a movie but that was the only time it was playing. I liked it, but it was a bit odd at times, which is probably why I liked it. It hasn't done well at the box office - it was a little too quirky I think and while it's message was a timely reminder of past attempts of Nazi's to take over the United States, it took too long to get there and then to spent too much time explaining itself.
It was chilly - mid 20s - but sunny. Even early afternoon, still just October, the sun doesn't get too high above the southern horizon these days. So I did some errands and then went a bit out of my way to catch the Campbell Creek trail back home
It seemed that all the geese still in Anchorage were using the south of Tudor soccer fields in the old Trent homestead as a grass station before heading south.
I used the pan feature on my phone since that was the only way I could get them all in. But now they're so small you probably can't see them. There's a mass in the middle to the left and more in front of the trees to the right.
Today I was shoveling the new snow from the driveway. I pulled out my phone to take a picture and noticed there was a voicemail message. It turned out that what I thought was my 11am meeting was at 9:15. I jumped in the car and wasn't too late and we had a good meeting. But ever since my computer upgraded to the next California location named version of IOS, my calendar has not been my friend. First it wiped out everything I'd had on my calendar. And today I realized it's not giving me the 24 hour notices it's supposed to give, so I don't get blindsided like I did today. I ended up taking this picture when I got back.
I left so fast for the meeting that I forgot to take our absentee ballots. I after I actually got the driveway cleared - not too long, only a couple of inches - I went to the Election office to drop off my ballots. I parked in front on the street behind this car.
I saved this at a higher resolution so you could click on it and enlarge it (like I should have done with the geese.) We were maybe 100 feet from the entrance to the Division of Elections. I did point out that he was parked there and they said they'd get right on it. But when I came out he was getting in the car and driving away.
There is a sign on the front door about not campaigning - including bumper stickers, buttons, T-shirts, etc. within 200 feet of a polling place entrance.
I do understand that if you have stickers on your car you need to park somewhere. I'd like to give this car the benefit of the doubt and he just forgot or didn't know the distance rule. But part of me thinks he enjoyed his little act of defiance. The stickers almost look like they're holding the vehicle together.
On April 27, 2007, the first paragraph of my post was:
"The book was calling to me from the cabinet in the big open breakfast room of the Chiengmai bed and breakfast. I opened the glass door and started reading the book with my breakfast. “It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured. I realized, somehow, through the screaming in my mind, that even in that shackled, bloody helplessness, I was still free: free to hate the men who were torturing me, or to forgive them.” After reading a few pages, I was done with breakfast and put it back into the glassed cabinet."
After a couple more breakfasts reading Shantaram, there was no way I could just put the book back
in the cabinet and wait until I could find my own copy. I think I left another book in its place and then I wrote
"I’ve been living in parallel worlds - my ostensibly 'real' life and Roberts' India - almost a month now. [It's over 900 pages.] Flying back to the US from Thailand got me a long way into Roberts' world. By the time I reached LA, I needed to look it up on the internet. Was this fiction or autobiography? The morning after seeing Mira Nair’s The Namesake, I discovered Shantaram was loosely autobiographical fiction, soon to be a movie directed by Mira Nair starring Johnny Depp."
Soon. I guess in movie making - especially big, sprawling films - 15 years is vaguely within the limits of 'soon.'
Because Sunday there was an article in the LA Times highlighting upcoming films and series. Shantaram was on the list.
[Coming] Oct. 14
‘Shantaram’
Hollywood has been trying to adapt “Shantaram,” Gregory David Roberts’ sprawling, quasi-autobiographical novel about a fugitive Australian bank robber on the lam in 1980s Mumbai, for nearly two decades. First there were scrapped film adaptations starting Johnny Depp and Joel Edgerton , then Apple revived the project for television. Now, after pandemic-related delays, a showrunner change and a production relocation, a 12-episode series with “Sons of Anarchy” star Charlie Hunnam in the lead is almost here. If the finished product is half as dramatic as the show’s backstory, viewers should be riveted. > Apple TV+
— Meredith Blake
So now I have to figure out how to watch an Apple TV series.
Usually Saturday is really busy during the festival with films starting as early as 9 am some years. But we've somehow gotten into a routine with Netflix that we never watch before it's dark. (Well, in the summer, before 8 or 9 pm anyway.) So it didn't seem right to start til late afternoon. We saw one documentary feature - Sapelo - one shorts program - The Best Ships Are Friendships - and one narrative feature - The Last Days of Capitalism.
Sapelo is a documentary about. . . well, that's a bit of a problem. It starts out, it seemed, to be about the Black people who have been living on the island, a ferry ride from mainland Georgia, for 200 years. There are lots of pauses to just look at beautiful vistas of the island. But it meanders into a story about two brothers, their grandmother. How old are the boys? Don't remember being told. I do remember that an older brother was 14, so I'm guessing these two were maybe between 9 and 11. The grandmother adopted the mother too. Some of it feels like a reality show. Some of it feels like an invasion of the kids' privacy, particularly as we watch one of the boys having anger management problems and there's talk of his medication. He's wearing an ankle bracelet for a while and in the end he's been sent to a detention center. By the end I felt like these boys were being exploited. They weren't capable of giving consent. Was it the grandmother who gave consent? What was she told they would be filming?
On the other hand, a unique way of life was being captured. Well, the end of a unique way of life. The boys may well treasure this intimate portrait of them when they are older. But making it public doesn't feel right to me.
What was the relationship between the Swiss filmmakers and the people on the island. We never see from or hear about the film makers except near the beginning when one of the boys looks up at the camera and apologizes for his language
The Last Days of Capitalism - Wow. Just picked this from the website knowing nothing about it and we were totally absorbed by two actors - Sarah Rose Harper and Mike Faiola. We had no idea where it was headed. This was not your ordinary movie fare. This is what I love about film festivals. Will I wake up in the morning and wonder what I was thinking? Not sure. I just know that we were hooked til the very end. Recommended. (Not saying much about the content. Just know that it is two people probing each other. Drugs and alcohol and a fair amount of money are involved.) My hat is off to writer/director Adam Mervis.
All of the shorts were worth watching. Grab My Hand: A Letter to My Dad was the one that stands out as visually striking and clever and beautiful and it was the right length for the story. Nothing unnecessary. I just don't know why they didn't call it Gatecheck. Be sure to watch this one. Camrus Johnson, thanks for this film. Latchkeys was sweet - I mean that in the best way.
I'll try to keep this short. Trying to write on something a little lighter than the elections. Think of it as notes to readers about Netflix offerings they might want to watch or avoid.
BORGEN and AWAY
The ten year old Danish series BORGEN features a woman propelled into the position of prime minister of Denmark. The new Netflix series AWAY features a woman as the commander of a mission to Mars.
Both have to deal with sexism in the job (though not all that much) along with the work demands that make it hard to pay adequate attention to their children - each has a teenage daughter, the Danish prime minister also has a younger son.
Birgitte Nyborg's constant task is keeping together a coalition of parties with different priorities. Emma Green, Captain of the Atlas, has an astronaut from India, China (the other woman and mother), England/Ghana, and Russia to keep together. But there's also her former astronaut husband who has a stroke after liftoff and anxious daughter back on earth to distract her.
I was struck by how we were watching these two series at the same time and how each treated the difficulties of a married woman in a traditionally male position. BORGEN flows quickly from crisis to crisis fairly organically while with AWAY the crises - both technical and interpersonal - seem more contrived, and like Indiana Jones, Emma always seems to narrowly escape disaster.
BORGEN has three seasons and we're near the end of season two. I thought in the trip to negotiate between the northern Islamic area and the Christian south of a fictional African country, Brigitta's preparation for such a difficult diplomatic trip seemed woefully inadequate. We only saw the first part of this adventure and if the upcoming summit in Copenhagen falls apart, I won't be surprised. But the show has a way of giving Brigitta lots of narrow victories.
I think BORGAN is well worth watching. AWAY is certainly not must see tv, but not a total waste of time.
RATCHED
This Netflix series is like the most exquisite and decadent dessert in the bakery display case. The colors are rich, the costumes and sets delicious, the actors arch, and the camera makes love to it all. It's noir in technicolor with the appropriate campy creepy music. There's very little nutrition in this evil concoction. And there's lots of gratuitous gore. But it's visually pretty spectacular.
It's the back story of Nurse Ratchet from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (which Netflix is also pushing right now.)
That Cuckoo's Nest connection is probably what made me watch the first episode. I read Cuckoo's Nest at the end of my Peace Corps time in Thailand and was possessed with the question "Who wrote this? Why? How did he know all this stuff?" And soon after I was working at a Peace Corps training program in Hilo when a new trainee had the book Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. I read the blurb on the back that said it was about the author of Cuckoo's Nest. It's not cool to use your position to get favors, but I was so obsessed I asked the trainee if I could borrow the book right then. I consumed it that night and gave the book back the next day with my curiosity satisfied.
RACHED really has nothing to do with Cuckoo's Nest. It's just a gimmick to play off the name recognition of Nurse Rached to produce a highly stylized and visually beautiful, but empty, confection of a series. It's a wicked distraction from today's COVID and Trump nightmare.
The State of Alaska removed the bus where Chris McCandless died and that has become a mecca for those who connected with Chris through the book and movie Into The Wild. A number of his fans hiked cross country to reach the bus, braving river crossings that can at times be treacherous. The basic reason given for removing the bus was to save lives and reduce rescue costs.
Note: COVID tab above for daily
updates on state case counts
I've thought about it. Getting rid of the McCandless bus is a form of cultural discrimination. The justification is to protect people from danger and death and to reduce rescue costs.
But aside from cruise ships, Alaska tourism is all about attracting people to adventures in the wilderness - camping, kayaking, hunting. (And even cruise passengers die in flight seeing and other adventures sold on board.)
The epitome is climbing Denali. We love the idea of people overcoming obstacles to reach the peak of North America's highest mountain, even though people die every year trying and we spend tens of thousands of dollars or more in rescue efforts. It's just that McCandless wasn't the rugged adventurer type that Alaskans idealize and his followers are seen as sentimental and emotional about the wrong things. (After all climbing Denali is also an emotion driven pursuit.)
And probably most important, no one was making lots of money off the Bus pilgrims, like they do from hunters, fishers, mountain climbers, and other adventure travelers. No one set up a McCandless Bus guiding expedition. If they had, the bus would still be there.
"The removal of the bus comes in response to the public safety hazards caused by its presence and location, Department of Natural Resources spokesman Dan Saddler said.
Between 2009 and 2017, there were 15 bus-related search and rescue operations by the state, according to the natural resources department.
Saddler said he hoped its removal would 'reduce injuries, search and rescues, loss and even death that have occurred in connection with this bus.'”
But really, people die all the time in Alaska following their dreams.
The National Park Service allows people to climb Denali every year (though COVID spared the mountain this year from all the garbage and waste climbers leave) despite deaths and many rescues.
The National Park Service has a series of reports on Denali from 1979 to 1989. Here are some excerpts from the 1989 report. Each paragraph is a separate incident.
On 2/16/89 a very experienced four person Japanese team flew into the SE Fork of the Kahiltna Glacier to attempt a winter ascent of the West Buttress. The leader, Noboru Yamada, was on a quest to become the first person to climb to the summit of the highest mountain on each of the seven continents in the winter. Teruo Saegusa, Kozo Komatsu and Shunzo Sato were the other team members. Sato became ill early in the climb and returned to base camp to wait for the others. The remaining three reached the 17,200' high camp on 2/20... the same day a team of Austrians returned to high camp from a successful summit bid. On 2/21, neither team could move because of severe weather. On 2/22 there was a short break in the weather and the Austrians began their descent. The Japanese team was still in their camp. They were not seen alive or heard from again. Weather soon deteriorated and an extremely severe wind storm enveloped the upper mountain. Wind speeds were estimated to be 200 mph and continued through 2/26. Winds then decreased somewhat to 60-90 mph through 3/9. On 3/10, search flights located what appeared to be three bodies below Denali Pass. Search efforts were terminated on 3/11. It is believed that the climbers tried for the summit during a brief lull in the severe wind storm and were caught near Denali Pass as the winds again increased. The bodies were recovered later in March by a 17 person team of Japanese climbers who came to Alaska for that purpose. The three men died from hypothermia.
. . .He placed an anchor, climbed about 40' above it, then encountered an ice window. He grabbed under the window then leaned out for a better look at his options. Suddenly the entire formation upon which he was climbing collapsed. Sweeney, and the 15'-wide, 35'- high and 6'-thick ice formation fell down the couloir. His anchor held, but his hip was fractured in the resulting 100' fall and avalanche. The events of the next seven days are too involved to detail here (CIR #890016) but proved to be a test of endurance and of their will to survive. During this time, either one or both of the men were hit by eight different avalanches. Weather deteriorated and prevented all access to the mountains by rescue teams. The two men were eventually rescued by a military helicopter on 4/26.
Early the next day, a National Park Service Mountaineering Ranger camped at the 14,200' basin on the West Buttress, noticed what appeared to be bodies at the base of the Orient Express, a couloir which cuts across the upper West Rib. The rescue team discovered all three of the Brits died in a fall. It appeared the men were probably descending the West Rib, roped together, in extremely poor weather, when one of them slipped and pulled the others down the couloir.
One especially violent gust tore one of the tents, with three occupants, from its anchors. The tent and occupants began a tumbling fall toward the Peter's Glacier. One occupant, John Richards, the assistant guide, was ejected early in the fall and came to rest 300' below the ridge campsite. The other two occupants, Jim Johnson and Howard Tuthill, fell 1,000' and came to rest on a small ledge dressed only in polypro underwear. All equipment and clothing were lost in the fall. The assistant guide was able to ascend to the camp and alert others of the accident. The chief guide, Dave Stahaeli, was able to descend and provide some survival equipment to Johnson and Tuthill. Others on the mountain, including the Denali Medical Project personnel and private mountaineers, organized a difficult and dangerous rescue effort, eventually stabilizing the two men who were flown off the mountain the following day via helicopter. Johnson suffered a compression fracture of a lumbar vertebrae and Tuthill frostbit his fingers. Both men were saved by the rescue efforts.
High Altitude Pulmonary Edema, ground evacuation:
A Genet Expedition trip led by Dave Stahaeli reached the 17,200' high camp on 6/21/89. There they waited three days for weather to improve. One of the clients, John Michel, had been feeling poorly earlier in the trip. At high camp, he lacked energy and spent most of the three days sleeping. It was decided he would not attempt the summit. On 6/24 all expedition members left for the summit except for Michel who remained in camp. No other parties were at high camp. Late that afternoon, another Genet team arrived at high camp and discovered Michel to be suffering from HAPE. They evacuated him to the 14,200' camp where Michel received treatment and recovered. There were other incidents of altitude illness and frostbite this season. Most of these were treated at the Denali Medical Project camp at the 14,200' basin on the West Buttress.
Surely rescuing people at Denali elevations and weather extremes is more costly and dangerous than where the McCandless bus was.
While Denali climbs involve complex preparations, lots of money, and registration, the cost of rescues is not covered by the person rescued.
At 20,320 feet, Mt. McKinley is the highest mountain in
North America. In 1998, 1,166 climbers from 38 countries
attempted to climb the mountain, an increase of 250 percent
since 1978. Largely because of bad weather, only 36 percent of
all climbers successfully reached the summit in 1998, down from
a historical average of about 50 percent.
The 1998 climbing season was typical in that it involved
climbing deaths and several life-saving rescue missions. The
policy of the National Park Service is to ``make reasonable
efforts to search for lost persons and to rescue sick, injured
or stranded persons.''
As a general rule, the National Park Service does not
recover search and rescue costs. When individual search and
rescue incidents cost more than $500, they are paid from a
central account
Q: Do I have to pay anything at the time of registration?
A: Yes, climbers are required to pay the full permit fee when they submit the registration form. The cost of a mountaineering permit for the 2020 season (October 1, 2019 through September 30, 2020) is $375 US currency. Climbers who are 24 years old or younger at the time their expedition begins are eligible for a $275 youth fee. Note that each year the mountaineering special use fee is subject to increase based on Consumer Price Index changes.
It is also important to be aware that when you arrive to check in for your climb, a park entrance fee of $15 per person will be due. Interagency passes are accepted in lieu of the entrance fee. Passes must be presented at the time of check in along with identification.
Cultural bias comes in many different colors. Methinks the dreamy, listless image of McCandless and his fans clashes with the rugged, macho adventurer image Alaska likes to promote. And that's why the bus was removed. After all, adventure and risk is part of the Last Frontier image.
Some thoughts raised by things I've recently read. But first a note on paywalls.
I understand that newspapers want online readers to spend some money for the privilege of reading. Newspapers are struggling to stay alive. Many have not survived.
Early on - maybe ten years or more ago - there was a proposal for newspapers to have a collective fee, so that people didn't have to pay every time they visited an online newspaper. You could buy a pass for a group of them and they could figure out how to divide the money based on hits from subscribers. That doesn't seem to have happened. I have an online subscription to the LA Times and the Anchorage Daily News. I rarely read anything any more in the NY Times or the Washington Post.
This is problematic particularly for journalists and researchers who need to look at lots of things. This was noted on Recall Elections Blog as a problem in tracking the various recalls around the country.
I say all this because a number of links here go to the LA Times and many of you may not be able to get direct access to the articles. I'd note you can probably get there via your public library or find a reprint somewhere online. Try different browsers, try private browsing, remove media cookies from your computer.
Article says nearly $1billion has gone to Alabama companies with dubious claims to Native heritage.
Alaska Native corporations have done well with these contracts. However, I would like to see more investigation on the structure of some of these. Are they simply ways for larger white owned companies to buy Native participation so they can get the contracts?
"WWII films tend to be stories of victory, BUT WWI movies SHOW the horrors OF A SEEMINGLY SENSELESS FIGHT."
Their list of notable realistic WWI movies turns out to include nearly all non-Hollywood films. Would the misery of actual warfare on screen discourage potential enlistees? Probably not those 17 and 18 year olds who are desperate to get out of the house and out of school and be heroes.
Or maybe all 17 year old boys should get school assignments to visit vets with various long term war related illnesses to find out what war does and what the Department of Veterans Affairs doesn't do to help.
"And, ultimately, my deep love and admiration for these two very flawed and extremely human characters never failed to pull me through. And I think it’s because for me Queen and Slim aren’t just characters in a movie, they’re two fictitious people that represent all of us."
One of the tropes that dominate how we see the world is the notion of right and wrong. The American justice system is based on finding out whether someone is guilty or not guilty. The Republican response to the impeachment of Trump has been to point out other people as guilty - most notably Hunter Biden, but many others as well.
But this quote adds nuance to the idea. These two people have killed a cop in self defense. But being black, the fear they won't be believed. So now they actually break the law by fleeing. And presumably, as the movie progressive, we learn more about their flaws. We all have flaws. We're all guilty of something. Christianity has based a whole religion on that notion.
This quote reminds us that even though they are flawed, they need to be judged by their actions, not their flaws. It also reminds me that privilege (whether it's white privilege or any other privilege) means that you're more likely to be forgiven for your flaws. We know, for instance, that young people of color are more likely to be sent to a detention center than white kids. It's the difference between 'kids will be kids' so call their parents to pick them up, and assuming they're just no good.
"Of course 2016 showed that we need to look beyond the national polls and focus on the swing states. But there too the news is encouraging. In Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, since Trump took office, his net approval ratings, which started out on the plus side, have fallen — disastrously. In Pennsylvania they decreased by 17 points, in Wisconsin by 20 points, in Michigan by 22 points. In the midterm voting, those three swing states all elected Democrats in 2018. Wisconsin elected a Democratic governor to replace a Republican and reelected a Democratic senator; Pennsylvania reelected a Democratic governor, and Democrats there took three House seats away from Republican incumbents. In Michigan, which the Democrats lost to Trump by 11,000 votes, the Democrats had a huge victory in 2018, sweeping the elections for governor and senator and flipping two House seats. Voters also banned gerrymandering and created automatic voter registration, which together will bear fruit in 2020. All this explains why I’m quite certain we’ll be free at last from Donald Trump on Jan. 20, 2021."
But the author acknowledges he also wrote about why Trump couldn't win in 2016. I'm convinced in a free and fair vote, Trump will lose. But with voter suppression, voter disinformation campaigns, and potential cyber attacks on voting machines I'm less confident.
We went to the LA County Museum of Art on Thursday. And passed this bit of graffiti on the way. We also passed an Indian grocery store. 
