Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.

MOVIE REVIEW: Dallas Buyers Club

Ron Woodroof goes to the the hospital and meets Rayon, who is an HIV-positive transgender woman. Mutual disdain occurs.

Dallas_Buyers_Club_10Here is why Dallas Buyers Club is getting all those awards and nominations: it’s a basically true story of a Texas cowboy and electrician named Ron Woodroof who is a homophobic, womanizing, substance-abusing schmuck who discovers he has AIDS, and apparently, just thirty days to live. The viewer goes from repulsion at his antics to admiration and affection for his intelligence and even compassion.

Ron is portrayed by Matthew McConaughey, an actor I had always associated with romantic comedies I didn’t bother to see, until this decade, when he has been doing more substantial work. I really liked him as the district attorney in Bernie (2011).

Ron goes to the hospital and meets Rayon (played by Jared Leto, also worthily Oscar-nominated) who is an HIV-positive transgender woman. Mutual disdain occurs. When Ron’s health worsens, he drives to Mexico to get more AZT, after a batch he had purloined ran out. He meets Dr. Vass (Griffin Dunne) an American with his medical license revoked, who tells Ron that AZT is “poisonous”, and prescribes proteins and vitamins, which end up improving Ron’s health.

Three months later, Ron finds his health much improved. It occurs to him that he could make money by importing the drugs and selling them to other HIV-positive patients… Meanwhile, Dr. Eve Saks [Jennifer Garner] also begins to notice the negative effects of AZT, but is told by her supervisor Dr. Sevard (Denis O’Hare) that [the medical trial] cannot be discontinued.

And Ron and Rayon become unlikely business partners.

I didn’t even get into the physical transformation of McConaughey, in which he lost 47 pounds in four months. You may enjoy reading a brief story of the real Ron Woodroof (not Woodruff, as written here). And read some stellar reviews of the movie in Rotten Tomatoes, 93% positive as of this writing.

Of course, I saw this at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany, unfortunately alone because we couldn’t get a child sitter.

When the Beatles Hit America

I did make sure I watched the Beatles’ subsequent appearances on Sullivan and elsewhere, usually in video promo clips that predated MTV by a decade and a half.

Yes, of course, I watched the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964, along with 73 million other people. I might have even enjoyed it if it weren’t for that incessant screaming.

I’d like to say that I was an instant Beatles convert. I’d LIKE to say that, but it’d be a lie. They were all right, I guess, but being an almost 10-year-old boy, I was annoyed by Beatlemania, and therefore, somewhat, by the Beatles themselves. Indeed, it was Constitutionally mandated in those days that prepubescent boys hate anything that prepubescent girls liked, and vice versa.

But here’s the clever thing. From the Wikipedia: Sullivan “initially offered Beatles manager Brian Epstein top dollar for a single show but the Beatles manager had a better idea—he wanted exposure for his clients: the Beatles would instead appear three times on the show, at bottom dollar, but receive top billing and two spots (opening and closing) on each show… Their first appearance on February 9 is considered a milestone in American pop culture and the beginning of the British Invasion in music… The following week’s show was broadcast from Miami Beach… They were shown on tape February 23 (this appearance had been taped earlier in the day on February 9 before their first live appearance).”

By their third appearance in three weeks, I developed a grudging respect for them. I started differentiating them, with no small bit of Help! from my sister Leslie, who found Paul, a lefty like herself, particularly dreamy.

I never bought a Beatles album or single until the following year, when with the money from my paper route, I could join the Capitol Record Club, though I did make sure I watched their subsequent appearances on Sullivan and elsewhere, usually in video promo clips that predated MTV by a decade and a half.

But before that, my father, like many parents at the time, bought us – more for Leslie – this album:

Leslie was disappointed. I was more horrified that he had made what I thought was such an obvious error.

Now, of course, I have many iterations of Beatle albums, from both the UK and the US, and even one from Italy, plus singles from Japan.
***
Review of the Beatles at Carnegie Hall, February 1964.

The Bible-minded Capital district

The concept of the Bible’s “accuracy” is a rather muddled notion to me.

Jesus.poorThere have been a couple of polls recently that suggest that the Albany-Schenectady-Troy, NY area is more godless or less godly, than most parts of the country if you read the headlines:

These Are The Most Godless Cities In America. The subtitle reads: “A new survey ranks U.S. cities in terms of ‘bible-mindedness'”By ‘bible-mindedness’, the study means “a combination of how often respondents read the Bible and how accurate they think the Bible is.” As bible-minded, we’re #99, or second from the bottom.

The TIME poll seems too simplistic. I’ve read the Bible over time, though not as often recently as some think I ought to. But the concept of the Bible’s “accuracy” is a rather muddled notion to me. If it’s that it’s “true”, that there are fundamental truths to be found therein, I tend to believe that. If the question is whether it is literally, six days from ignition to humans, historically accurate, then I’d suggest that it was never meant to be regarded that way.

I submit that that the press seems to see religion as an either/or. EITHER one believes that every single word of the Bible was handed down by God as history and theology (a tricky thing, that) OR one is an atheist, who would hate God if he or she believed god existed. And press coverage of the so-called evangelical movement, especially by ABC News, seemed to solidify this simplistic duality.

I submit that there’s a great middle who find inspiration in some parts of the Bible, who believe that other sections were meant for a different, earlier audience and that that’s OK.

Seen another way, in a different poll by Barna, the Capital District is #1 in Post-Christian Metrics.

The Barna scale was more interesting:

1. do not believe in God
2. identify as atheist or agnostic
3. disagree that faith is important in their lives
4. have not prayed to God (in the last year)
5. have never made a commitment to Jesus
6. disagree the Bible is accurate
7. have not donated money to a church (in the last year)
8. have not attended a Christian church (in the last year)
9. agree that Jesus committed sins
10. do not feel a responsibility to “share their faith”
11. have not read the Bible (in the last week)
12. have not volunteered at church (in the last week)
13. have not attended Sunday school (in the last week)
14. have not attended a religious small group (in the last week)
15. do not participate in a house church (in the last year)

#6 is as problematic for me as it was in the TIME poll. #10 I feel that the way I live my life is sharing my faith, so wouldn’t know how to answer that one. I don’t attend Sunday school because it clashes with the church choir.

Bottom line: I reject the notion that if one does not take the Bible literally, one is godless, whatever THAT means. But, at some fundamental level, I appreciate the glee our high (or low) ranking has generated; I DO get it.

MOVIE REVIEW: Her

In the movie Her, Theodore seems no more adrift than any number of other people populating the film,

Her.After trying to work out a chance to see a film with The Wife, I end up going alone to see Her, written and directed by Spike Jonze, which is supposed to be a story set in the near future. The annoying thing, not about the movie, but rather what people ASSUME about the movie, is that any guy who falls in love with his computer’s operating system must be a dismal loser. In fact, Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix) is rather well-respected in his job writing personal letters for people who have difficulties creating messages themselves.

He IS unhappy because he’s on the verge of divorcing his childhood sweetheart Catherine (Rooney Mara), and stalls in signing the papers.
Theodore’s purchase of a talking OS with artificial intelligence ends up fascinating him. The OS names herself “Samantha” (voiced by Scarlett Johansson), and she can learn both intellectually and psychologically, as they discuss all elements of life.

Maybe I’m cynical, but Theodore seems no more adrift than any number of other people populating the film, including his coworkers, his old friend Amy (Amy Adams – much less glamorous than in American Hustle), and his fix-up date (Olivia Wilde). Indeed, he seems a little different from many folks I see in real life, more engaged with their electronic devices than the people around them.

In fact, Theodore, in his conversation with Samantha, is quite observant. (Possibly my favorite name of a character, in the end credits, is based on Theodore’s sharp-eyed comment: “New Sweet Boyfriend of Mother Who Dated Pricks.”)

I enjoyed Her quite a bit, as an absurd love story, and I understand its Golden Globe win for Best Screenplay and Oscar nomination for Best Picture. Hmm, I did not actually notice that Shanghai, China was used for a lot of the exterior settings until I read the end credits.

What now for the Negro?

If we want young black men to keep their pants up, we can’t then have them arrested for purchasing a belt.


It seems that, in the past few years, the narrative I’ve been hearing in certain circles that we no longer need Black History Month, because we’ve finally “made it.” Thus, being anti-racism means being anti-white. This past year in particular has been the greatest negation of that message, unfortunately.

There’s stop and frisk. Great video on this from The Daily Show laying out the issue. A pair of different comedy routines that I saw suggest that if those folks on Wall Street with their [shudder] briefcases were stopped and frisked to see if they were planning some economic crime, especially in the demeaning way it takes place – think the airport TSA, on steroids, only more rude – the policy would be off the books next week.

Reading the Floyd decision, “it seems clear that it was the stories of how Stop and Frisk and TAP operated on the ground to keep Black and Latino people under siege in their own homes, not the battle of the experts via statistics, that ultimately persuaded Judge Scheindlin about the complete irrationality of Stop and Frisk as implemented, and about the utter inability of the psyche of the NYPD to voluntarily accept its own racism, such that Stop and Frisk could be operated in a truly race-neutral fashion.”

Of course, it’s not just the state acting badly: The New York state attorney general is investigating Macy’s Inc. and Barneys New York Inc. after complaints from black customers who were stopped by police after making luxury purchases. As Larry Wilmore, the senior black correspondent for The Daily Show, noted, if we want young black men to keep their pants up, we can’t then have them arrested for purchasing a belt.

And one of my favorite examples, a restaurant asks 25 black people to leave because one white person felt “threatened“.

Sometimes, it’s not the big stuff, it’s the little irritants that get under one’s skin. Gee, you don’t sound black on the radio by Ken Screven, former local news reporter. I’ve not been on the radio, but I have spent time on the phone a lot at FantaCo and now at the SBDC and I have seen that response when meeting people in person for the first time.

I picked that vintage cover to illustrate a greater point: it can’t just be black people concerned about black people’s issues. We all need to be conscious of discrimination where we find it, whether it be discrimination by race, gender or sexual orientation. And it’s even more effective when white people speak out against racism when they see it – like here, men confront sexism, and straights openly reject homophobia. It can’t just be THEIR problem, it must be OUR problem.
***
Great reads for the month from Departing the Text.

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