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Commentaries

Blue Highways by William Least Heat Moon
Quite enjoyable, and led me to purchase Whitman's Leaves of Grass, which is liberally quoted throughout. America is full of interesting things and people, and Blue Highways is a sort of partial catalog of these. Particularly interesting as an exploration of race relations coming on the heels of the civil rights movement and as a microhistorical account of some of America's least significant and therefore usually ignored places.

Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
A collection of stories about Indians and Indian-Americans deserving of the widespread praise it received when it first came out. Lahiri has quite a knack for storytelling, so if you like a good narrative with a dash of cultural flavor, this book comes with my recommendation.

Checkpoint by Nicholson Baker
Basically what the reviews said: my longstanding favorite author, who created the character after whom kitten Nory is named, was very, very frustrated with the Bush administration and spewed forth Checkpoint, a novel composed entirely of dialogue between a restrained moderate liberal and his cracked buddy who wants to assassinate the President. It's interesting and full of pretty valid criticisms clothed in vitriole, but of questionable literary value.

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
Made me think of Faulkner with its eloquent narrative of three generations of inbreeding and American history. As if the story of a hermaphrodite raised a girl but living in adulthood a man weren't interesting enough on its own, Middlesex is sprinkled liberally with details of the silk trade in Greece, the Ford revolution in Detroit, the trials and triumphs of the American immigrant experience, the shame of illicit love, and smatterings of quite well-worded literary biology. This one's a top ten pick fo' sho'.

42nd Street *1/2
Not quite sure why this one's so well known. It all came together when the curtain came down on the play within the play, printed with the word ASBESTOS. Yep.

Cinderella Man ***
Not quite sure how this one worked as well as it did, but it toyed with my emotions like a pack of velociraptors with a cute little baby lamb. There's something about controlled violence, e.g. boxing, that acts as a channel for emotions, I guess, and the Depression setting just ups the current in the channel...well, you get the point. Renee, don't worry, that super-scary guy who plays Max Baer won't kill Russell! He can't, Russell's the hero! He's Cinderella!

The Ringer **1/2
I went into this one with very, very low expectations, but laughed plenty and had a good old time. I mean, it's a little cheesy (not what you'd expect from Johnny Knoxville), but it strikes a surprisingly good balance between being irreverantly funny and...err...increasing awareness of the differently abled. So anyway it actually gets over the two-star line, into the realm of the recommended.

The Gods Must Be Crazy **1/2
I just liked the bushman mostly.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith **
Also better than I expected, but that's not saying much. Lots of relationship humor interspersed among scenes of Brad and Angelina either killing people or making out, or sometimes both at once. The humor was more intelligent than I expected, and the action is pretty good, and the juxtaposition can be entertaining, but it's still pretty much your typical action-comedy with eye candy.

Brokeback Mountain ****
Yep, it's as good as everyone says.

Porco Rosso ***
Just took a hiatus from this post to see an old Miyazaki film which was quite good--not quite as good as Spirited Away or My Neighbor Totoro, but still very charming and much better than you'd think a movie about a pig who pilots seaplanes would be, fo' sho'. In Miyazaki films there aren't really good guys or bad guys, and it's always refreshing to see a movie where characters are consistent but still dynamic and not predictable.

Now off to prepare for the grandparental visit and whatever else the evening brings--there is much to see and do and not much time before I head back to the Isle of Rhode.