Books and Films
« Previous EntriesRay of Hope
Monday, August 2nd, 2010In the 1970s, I picked up a paperback collection of Ray Bradbury’s short stories. I was immediately transported. Bradbury is the kind of writer who can offer up poetry disguised as prose. I lost that first collection, but I still have my high school copy of Fahrenheit 451 and a half-dozen or so other Bradbury […]
Slow Reading
Friday, July 9th, 2010Malcolm Jones, in his article “Slow Notion” in the July 12 issue of Newsweek, takes a look at a habit often discouraged in education circles: “Slow reading has always gotten a bad rap. Slow readers in school were the bad students. No one ever got a blue ribbon or a good grade for plodding. So […]
Forgiveness
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010Forgiveness is one of those warm and fuzzy subjects with a thorny underside. Warm and fuzzy when we remember being forgiven or are hoping for forgiveness. Thorny when we have been hurt and are called to forgive. I recently caught a lesson on forgiveness from a surprising source.
On a recent father/daughter date with Lindsay to […]
Lost
Wednesday, May 26th, 2010After six years, Lost has wrapped, and millions of fans around the world must do without its groundbreaking blend of sci-fi, mystery, action, drama, philosophy and… yes… religion.
The deeply spiritual nature of the show caught my attention when Rose prayed with Charlie in the first season. In Season 2, there was Eko’s brother Yemi, a […]
The Greatest Generation
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009Tom Brokaw’s 1998 best-seller, The Greatest Generation, looked back to the generation of Americans who came through World War II victoriously. The past few weeks I’ve been reading E.B. Sledge’s With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa (1980, Presidio Press), a first-person narrative of two WWII […]
The End Is Near… Again
Monday, October 5th, 2009Another disaster movie is scheduled for release — of all times, right around Thanksgiving. 2012 offers up scenes of worldwide destruction tied to some cataclysm apparently predicted by the Mayans centuries ago. I guess the Thanksgiving season release makes […]
‘ABC,’ Kung Fu, Charlie’s Angels and The Tonight Show
Friday, June 26th, 2009Obits hit the headlines constantly, some making a bigger splash than others. But the recent loss of David Carradine, Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson feel linked, and their combined weight transcends whatever individual ripples they create in the international media pool.
It’s almost as if 1970s television has died too. Jackson’s shrill rendition of […]
Tales From the Judges’ Crypt
Thursday, February 26th, 2009In the early 1950s, few comic books offered more thrills than Tales From the Crypt. The series’ horror stories eventually came under attack from parents, clergy, schoolteachers and others concerned for children’s spiritual and emotional welfare. Congressional subcommittee hearings in 1954 led to the establishment of a national Comics Code. The original Crypt issues are […]
The ‘Alan Smithee’ Option
Tuesday, February 17th, 2009From 1969 to 2000, if you were a Hollywood director who believed the creative control of your film had been wrested from your creative little hands, you could beg the Directors Guild of America to replace your name with a pseudonym. If the guild agreed, “Alan Smithee” was the allowed name.
“Smithee” was first applied to […]
Long in the Tooth
Tuesday, November 25th, 2008Perhaps you’ve heard the old expression for old age. “Long in the tooth” generally means old or worn out. The saying probably connects with our gums’ tendency to recede from our teeth and make them appear longer in our later years. Teeth, however, are actually ground down and get shorter with advanced age. Maybe the […]
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