Yoto. He uses his mini Yoto audio player every day, which is an excellent screen-free source of “edutainment”. He’s always ready to spout facts he’s learned from the many nonfiction cards he enjoys. (Some terms he’s learned and repeated: hominid, pyroclastic flow, and bioluminescence among others.) Current favorite cards on repeat these days include Volcanos, Creepy Crawlies, Ancient Egypt, and many more.
Prehistoric Planet. This Apple TV+ documentary series is just Planet Earth with dinosaurs (David Attenborough narration included), therefore it rules.
Floor Is Lava. Since he was really getting into volcanoes, we gave this Netflix game show a spin and found it to be goofy fun. He started making his own courses at home and implementing the rules and tropes from the show, like the teams cheering for themselves.
Paw Patrol. Welp, it finally happened. We’d avoided exposing him to this until he listened to a Paw Patrol Yoto card, and now he’s all about it—even sometimes above Bluey.
The Book with No Pictures by B.J. Novak. This isn’t a new one for him but we checked it out from the library recently and he’s fallen in love again.
Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood. Hilarious and insightful memoir/biography of Lockwood’s Catholic priest father and her experience living with her parents.
Blankets by Craig Thompson. A stunning graphic novel memoir about small-town life, religion, young love, winter, and so many more things.
The Climb. An excellent indie film told through episodic, slice-of-life sequences that add up to a deeply funny and humane portrait of male friendship.
Jurassic Park. Amazing just how leisurely this feels compared to modern action blockbusters, with its long shots and deliberate storytelling pace. Yet still thrilling and not a wasted minute. So refreshing!
Babylon. A great prequel to (and double feature with) The Fabelmans.
Arrival. Masterful work from Denis Villeneuve and Amy Adams, and an excellent metaphor for the creative life.
The Twilight World by Werner Herzog. Happened to stumble upon this bewitching creative-nonfiction novel on a Best Books of 2022 list. In my mind I read it in Herzog’s iconic voice, so that probably made it even better.
Yojimbo. Some incredible shots sprinkled throughout this 1961 Kurosawa classic. “Whether you kill one or one hundred, you only hang once.”
I realized this year that I’ve pretty much stopped watching traditional TV, i.e. shows with 22-ish episodes per season and an undetermined end date.
I’m much more interested in limited series and shows with short seasons—the key being intentional and self-contained ideas from the show and a predictable time commitment from me. Luckily that’s becoming the norm, as what defines a series, a movie, or something else entirely blurs with every new release.
The clear winner of my “television” watching in 2022 is HBO Max, which accounted for 5 out of my 7 picks. Given the corporate and creative upheaval happening there now I assume that won’t be the case moving forward, but I’m grateful for the shows it provided while it could.
That said, here are my favorite shows from 2022 (listed alphabetically):
Bluey (Disney+)
The Last Movie Stars(HBO Max)
Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power(Amazon Prime)
[CEO James Daunt] used the pandemic as an opportunity to “weed out the rubbish” in the stores. He asked employees in the outlets to take every book off the shelf, and re-evaluate whether it should stay. Every section of the store needed to be refreshed and made appealing.
As this example makes clear, Daunt started giving more power to the stores. But publishers complained bitterly. They now had to make more sales calls, and convince local bookbuyers—and that’s hard work. Even worse, when a new book doesn’t live up to expectations, the local workers see this immediately. Books are expected to appeal to readers—and just convincing a head buyer at headquarters was no longer enough.
Daunt also refused to dumb-down the store offerings. The key challenge, he claimed was to “create an environment that’s intellectually satisfying—and not in a snobbish way, but in the sense of feeding your mind.”
His crucial move was refusing to take promotional money from publishers in exchange for purchase commitments and prominent placement of only certain books:
[Daunt] refused to play this game. He wanted to put the best books in the window. He wanted to display the most exciting books by the front door. Even more amazing, he let the people working in the stores make these decisions.
This is James Daunt’s super power: He loves books.
“Staff are now in control of their own shops,” he explained. “Hopefully they’re enjoying their work more. They’re creating something very different in each store.”
This cheered me to read, not only because of my interest in the success of bookstores but also because I worked at Barnes & Noble for about six months back in 2011.
Freshly stateside after months abroad, I was nearly broke and working at a grocery store when my friend Brian let me know he’d be leaving his job in the Music & Movies section at our local B&N store and would put in a good word for me if I applied. I did so immediately and got the job, which boosted my pay (from “enough to avoid destitution” to “meager”) along with my spirits.
It turned out to be one of the best jobs I’ve ever had, despite lasting only about six months before I got full-time work elsewhere.
Since whoever was working in the Music & Movies section couldn’t leave it unsupervised, I would be stationed there during my shifts no matter how busy it got elsewhere in the store. Some might have found that suffocating, but as a movie lover I relished being sequestered with thousands of Blu-rays, DVDs, and CDs to browse through and organize when I wasn’t helping customers.
Another big factor of my enjoyment of that job was the manager of the Music & Movies section, Joe. He was the most laidback of the store managers but also probably the most effective because, as my friend Brian said after I sent him the above article:
This strategy reminds me of how Joe would run the music section. He gave us a lot of power over the music that was on the shelves and it allowed us to sell CDs when the industry was in decline. Well done, Barnes.
I guess that’s the takeaway for Barnes and for all purveyors of the fine arts: Be like Joe.
Gotta be honest: 2022 wasn’t a great reading year for me. I read 22 books, which was much worse than 31 in 2021 and just barely better than the 18 in 2020.
A lot of my potential reading opportunities were either taken up by movie watching, Cinema Sugar, or other leisure activities. Not a bad thing, to be clear—just the result of the ongoing calculus I have to make with my limited free time.
But reading is about quality, not quantity. And because my quantity of titles released in 2022 doesn’t justify a top 10 list, I’m gonna try something different and just list the titles I did read this year according to the star rating I gave them out of 5.
There were no 5-star books for me this year (my main man Steven Johnson got the closest), but enough good reading to keep me turning pages. Enjoy!
4.5
Extra Life: A Short History of Living Longer by Steven Johnson (2021)
Haven by Emma Donoghue (2022)
4
Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road by Kyle Buchanan (2022)
Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín (2009)
How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America by Clint Smith (2021)
The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman (2022)
Office BFFs: Tales of The Office from Two Best Friends Who Were There by Jenna Fischer & Angela Kinsey (2022)
Salty: Lessons on Eating, Drinking, and Living from Revolutionary Women by Alissa Wilkinson (2022)
The Twilight World by Werner Herzog (2022)
Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life by Lulu Miller (2020)
A World Lit Only By Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance by William Manchester (1992)
The Writing of the Gods: The Race to Decode the Rosetta Stone by Edward Dolnick (2021)
3.5
Book Lovers by Emily Henry (2022)
The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School by Neil Postman (1995)
3
The Bowery: The Strange History of New York’s Oldest Street by Stephen Paul Devillo (2017)
Everyday Sisu: Tapping into Finnish Fortitude for a Happier, More Resilient Life by Katja Pantzar (2022)
Hero on a Mission: A Path to a Meaningful Life by Donald Miller (2022)
Index, A History of the: A Bookish Adventure from Medieval Manuscripts to the Digital Age by Dennis Duncan (2021)
The Story of You: An Enneagram Journey to Becoming Your True Self by Ian Morgan Cron (2021)
We Had A Little Real Estate Problem by Kliph Nesteroff (2021)
The World’s Worst Assistant by Sona Movsessian (2022)
2.5
American Buffalo: In Search of a Lost Icon by Steven Rinella (2008)
One of my Christmas presents was Bluey: The Album on vinyl. My wife got it as a joint present with my son since we’re both big Bluey fans.
The first song on it is an extended version of the theme song I’d never heard before called “Bluey Theme Tune (Instrument Parade)”:
After the standard opening, it continues the theme but gives solo breaks to the different component instruments: first violin, then trumpet, guitar, saxophone, and finally all of them back together before concluding with a reprise of the standard theme.
I love this on many levels. First, it’s just a great song. The part when all the elements recombine (“Everyone!”) is a joy explosion. Kudos to Joff Bush and the other composers involved for their high-level musicianship, which reminds me of Fred Rogers’ insistence on not just doing “kiddie” music for Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood because kids deserved great music too.
Second, it sneaks some music theory into a fun and danceable tune by breaking itself down, Song Exploder-style, to show how a song can be comprised of several different instruments.
Which, in a way, represents Bluey in musical miniature. By that I mean the show, like this particular song, isn’t meant to overtly teach anything: it’s just trying to convey the best version of itself and whatever idea it has in each episode. But along the way it manages to communicate sophisticated lessons and everyday truths, all wrapped up in small yet beautiful vessels.
As I’ve been going through my old journals and digitizing the entries—a tedious and time-consuming process that will eventually yield a much more accessible and searchable archive—it’s been fun and enlightening to rediscover things I was thinking about at any given time.
Like this entry from March 10, 2020:
A few pop culture references have come to mind as the coronavirus COVID-19 marches on:
the general escalation of uncanny surreality in Signs, as things progress and get ever close to home
Arrival and its shaky coalition of countries trying to understand an opaque, unsettling presence
Station Eleven [the book] and the global pandemic flu that paralyzes the world and makes humanity wonder what it is
Idiocracy with its president so not equipped for the moment
I hadn’t seen Contagion at that point, otherwise that would’ve been there too.
I love how I wrote “the coronavirus COVID-19” as if I’d possibly get it confused with another global contagion sometime in the future. But hey, I’m all about clarity.
“To be an artist, you don’t have to compose music or paint or be in the movies or write books. It’s just a way of living. It has to do with paying attention, remembering, filtering what you see and answering back, participating in life.” – Viggo Mortensen
“The modern dogma is comfort at any cost.” – Aldo Leopold
“Anybody who doesn’t change their mind a lot is dramatically underestimating the complexity of the world we live in.” – Jeff Bezos
“To be able to hold comfortably in one’s mind the validity and usefulness of two contradictory truths is the source of tolerance, openness, and, most important, a sense of humor, which is the greatest enemy of fanaticism.” – Neil Postman
“To know fully even one field or one land is a lifetime’s experience. In the world of poetic experience it is depth that counts, not width. A gap in a hedge, a smooth rock surfacing a narrow lane, a view of a woody meadow, the stream at the junction of four small fields—these are as much as a man can fully experience.” – Patrick Kavanagh
“One of the biggest problems with school is it teaches kids to assume that fun things are trivial and important things are boring.” – David Perell
(Not visible: the buffalo plaid pocket square accompanying the bowtie.)
The biggest thing that happened to my family this year was trying to have a second child. It was a long and demoralizing journey that ultimately ended successfully (due in late May), but it’ll take more than a bullet point to say why.
Beyond that, we just kept on livin’. Here’s what that looked like this year:
Got to see our cute, curious, cuddly, (sometimes) cantankerous 3 year old:
get familiar with the neighborhood birds, including hawks, cardinals, herons, woodpeckers, and blackbirds
get his second-ever haircut
get COVID (was basically fatigued for a day then back to his usual self)
take classes for t-ball, gymnastics, tap/ballet, and various other sports
giddily explore a few different children’s museums
Saw these movies in the theater: Barbarian, Nope, The Fabelmans, The Banshees of Inisherin, Avatar: The Way of Water, and Babylon
Added these cheap used DVDs/Blu-rays to my collection: The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Apartment, Arrival, Brick, Brooklyn, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Cast Away, Casino Royale, Do the Right Thing, Hell or High Water, High Noon, In the Heights, The Irishman, Looper, The Matrix, Ocean’s Twelve & Thirteen, Out of the Past, Paris Texas, Red River, Remember the Titans, Roma, Titanic, and The Usual Suspects
Added these (not cheap Christmas gifts) Criterion Blu-rays: 12 Angry Men, The Night of the Hunter, The Lady Eve, and WALL·E
A sunbeamed leaf as seen through our car windshield:
The yin and yang of a backyard bonfire remnant:
At work in his corner office:
Cloudy with a chance of a refill:
The bubbles are back, and they’re multiplying:
Mr. 3 Year Old is eager to shovel at the slightest dusting so we’re out there even while it’s still snowing. This results in what I call snombré (snow + ombré), where the freshly shoveled blends smoothly into the re-covered areas:
I finally listened to the original cast recording of Back to the Future: The Musical, which is making its Broadway debut in June 2023. I can’t say I loved every song, though the new showtuned rendition of “Power of Love” is most welcome:
It also reminded me that years ago I started making my own musical version of the trilogy. Well, it wasn’t a musical per se—more like an anthology of songs dedicated to various secondary characters.
Here are the more fully formed song ideas, which also have lyrics and a basic idea of the musical style:
“The Easy Way” — a doo-wop tune sung by Biff’s henchmen (inspired by Billy Zane’s line in this scene)
“I’m Jailbird Joey” — an outlaw country/blues song for Uncle Joey
“Raise a Glass for Red” — an Irish ballad campaign song for Mayor Red Thomas
“Can You Spare A Moment (For the Clocktower)” — a kind of military march for the “Save the Clocktower” woman
“Reese & Foley” — theme song for an ‘80s buddy cop TV show featuring the two cops who take Jennifer home in Part II
Other potential song subjects I sketched out: Chester the bartender, Terry the mechanic, Farmer Peabody, and Principal Strickland.
I’ve written a few times about the music I enjoy during Christmastime (see my Christmas music tag for all of them).
This time I wanted to list all of the albums I keep in rotation, both to provide some suggestions for fellow Yuletide tune jockeys and see for myself just how much I listen to throughout the month.
(Have your own suggestions? Let me know!)
Ingrid Michaelson, Songs for the Season
Over the Rhine, Blood Oranges in the Snow and Snow Angel
Rat Pack, Christmas With the Rat Pack
Phil Spector & Artists, A Christmas Gift for You
Future of Forestry, Advent Christmas EPs
James Taylor, At Christmas
Bing Crosby, Bing Crosby Sings Christmas Song
Vince Guaraldi Trio, A Charlie Brown Christmas
Sleeping At Last, Christmas Collection
Nat King Cole, Christmas Favorites
She & Him, Christmas Party and A Very She & Him Christmas
Marty Robbins, Christmas with Marty Robbins
Ella Fitzgerald, Ella Wishes You A Swinging Christmas
Frank Sinatra, A Jolly Christmas from Frank Sinatra
Relient K, Let It Snow Baby… Let It Reindeer
Emmylou Harris, Light of the Stable
Choir of King’s College, O Come All Ye Faithful: Favourite Christmas Carols
David Crowder Band, Oh for Joy
The Oh Hellos, The Oh Hellos’ Family Christmas Album
Willie Nelson, Pretty Paper
Raffi, Raffi’s Christmas Album
John Denver, Rocky Mountain Christmas
Perry Como, Season’s Greetings
Sufjan Stevens, Songs for Christmas
Beta Radio, The Songs the Season Brings
Good Lovelies, Under the Mistletoe
Justin Bieber, Under the Mistletoe
Rosie Thomas, A Very Rosie Christmas
Count Basie Orchestra, A Very Swingin’ Basie Christmas!
Wanted to spotlight something from A.O. Scott’s interview with Steven Spielberg, where he talks about collaborating with screenwriter Tony Kushner on The Fabelmans:
It’s hard to hold someone’s hand over Zoom, but Tony did a good job in giving me the kind of comfort I needed when we were tapping into moments in my life, secrets between myself and my mother that I was never ever, ever going to talk about. Neither in a written autobiography, which I’ve never done, or on film. But we got into those tender trenches.
As far as I can tell “tender trenches” isn’t an existing idiom or common phrase, so I’m assuming that remarkably evocative phrase must have come from Spielberg himself.
Someone oughta use it in a song or poem or something…
The once and future king of Christmas movies. I could praise a lot of things: the cinematography, the supporting cast, the dramatic depth of Jimmy Stewart’s first postwar performance. But its magic ultimately comes down to Harry’s closing line—“A toast to my big brother, George, the richest man in town.” George was rich in the end because he remembered. He remembered the barrenness of the ghostly alternate timeline where he was never born. And he remembered the meaning of family and friends and frustrating failures and small victories, all of which had accumulated into something like a wonderful life. Hot dog!
2. The Family Stone
The Rotten Tomatoes consensus of The Family Stone is that “this family holiday dramedy features fine performances but awkward shifts of tone.” Which, yeah: That’s why it’s so good. Maybe your experience was different, but “awkward shifts of tone” could be the definition of family—especially during the holidays. The film depicts a particular kind of cozy, Hallmark-approved, New England-flavored Christmastime while also vividly capturing what it’s like to spend extended time with the people you love but who are also most adept at driving you crazy. I know I’m in the minority on this one, but, to paraphrase Meredith Morton, I don’t care whether you like it or not!
3. Die Hard
True story: several years ago my wife and I were at my parents’ house for Christmas and the family was debating which movie to watch. Soon Die Hard emerged as the consensus pick. My wife hadn’t seen it and knew nothing about it, but since we told her it was a Christmas movie she was game. Turned out she definitely was not game—its brutal violence, shoeless glass-walking, and other decidedly un-cozy elements so traumatized her that she has since refused to acknowledge it as a movie worth watching, let alone a Christmas movie. To which I say: “Yippie-ki-yay, Merry Christmas!”
4. Grumpy Old Men
This movie’s combination of silliness, sincerity, and wondrously snowy northern Minnesota setting has kept me coming back every Christmastime. It’s schmaltzy to a fault, but also a showcase for the legendary comedic chemistry between Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, forged over decades of working together. They fully commit to their acerbic, chops-busting banter, which is the core strength of the movie. That plus Burgess Meredith absolutely slaying as Lemmon’s horny, incorrigible father.
5. The Muppet Christmas Carol
I took an absurd amount of time trying to decide between this and Home Alone once it occurred to me that they’re pretty much the same movie. Both feature self-involved jerks who find themselves alone near Christmas and forced to endure challenging journeys of self-discovery after an encounter with Marleys—the ghosts of former business partners for Scrooge and a mysterious elderly neighbor for Kevin. Painful developments occur (spiritual/psychological for Scrooge, physical for the Wet Bandits) before concluding with joyous Christmas Day reunions and reconciliation. I ultimately went with the Muppets because they’re the freaking Muppets.
At best they’ll just show you stuff you probably knew anyway, or don’t need to know — who’s in the movie, what’s on the soundtrack, the basic plot setup. Maybe the look or the tone or the vibe. But trailers aren’t designed to give you a glimpse of the movie; they’re mini-movies, designed to sell tickets (or maybe subscriptions to a streamer). And they’re starting to feel increasingly divorced from their actual movies.
This has been a hobbyhorse of mine for a while, so I was delighted to be validated by a professional movie watcher (i.e. film critic).
I’m so serious about not watching trailers for movies I want to see that when I’m seeing a movie in the theater, I’ll close my eyes during the pre-show trailers (or just try to arrive after them). I’ll still hear them, but usually the audio and dialogue are abstracted enough from their use within the actual movie that it doesn’t spoil anything.
There’s certainly an art to a great movie trailer, both in its construction and purpose. One I think about a lot is Little Children, a movie I still haven’t seen.
It’s fine that most trailers aren’t high art, but it’s not fine when they spoil what they’re supposed to be promoting. Alissa:
It’s surprising how many movie trailers just mess up the viewing experience for someone who wants to see the film. I watched both The Lost City (very funny) and Ticket to Paradise (intermittently funny) before I saw their trailers. Why, oh why, would you put all of your film’s best jokes in the trailer? Does that not telegraph immense insecurity on the studio’s part? I guess once they get you in the door, they’ve got your money?
Her advice, which I co-sign:
Pick a few critics, maybe three, who you like, and rely on their writing to help you decide what to watch. Or, Google a movie to see who’s in it, who directed it, who wrote it, and what their previous work is, and make a judgment based on that. Or, even better, just watch a movie with little to no idea what it is and see if it surprises you — one of the best experiences you could ever have.
This is pretty much all I do, a recent example being The Banshees of Inishiern. A new movie reuniting the In Bruges crew of Martin McDonagh, Colin Farrell, and Brendan Gleeson? Sold. I’m in. I deliberately avoided all information about it and went in fresh. Even though I liked-it-not-loved-it, it was fully worth the experience of encountering a movie without any preconceived notions beyond an earned trust in the artists to deliver something worth seeing.
These are dark times. It’s tempting to feel that it’s never been darker, that the weight of our modern struggles is unprecedented.
But I take comfort in knowing that film noir—a genre that has existed for almost 100 years—has been there before. It’s seen some shit. To show this, I’ve picked a few timeless, hard-won lessons and two noirs that illustrate them: one classic and one modern.
So let’s light up some cigarettes, pour a round, and stare down this cruel world together.
1. Crime Doesn’t Pay
The plan is always simple at the beginning. Maybe you want to knock off an old rich guy for the insurance payout (Double Indemnity) or stage a kidnapping for ransom money (Fargo). Doesn’t matter, because it’s not going to work and you’re going to pay hard—with your dignity, livelihood, or worse.
2. Beware Who You Marry
Do you really know your spouse? Can you ever be sure they won’t plot your grisly demise with clockwork precision, only to have the act go awry and ruin your life (Dial M for Murder) or morph into twisted mind games (Gone Girl)? Think really hard about whom you’ll commit yourself ‘til death do you part.
3. Fame is Dangerous
The greatest illusion of showbiz isn’t what we see on the screen but how it hides everything sacrificed to get it there. We don’t see the screenwriter of Sunset Blvd face down in a pool and shot in the back by a jealous actress, or the darkly absurd lives of aspiring actors in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. The cost of a movie ticket is a lot cheaper.
4. Sometimes the Bad Guys Win
For every evildoer held accountable there are several more who get away with it, whether it’s an abuser engaging in real estate fraud (Chinatown) or a real-life serial killer eluding capture (Zodiac). You can drive yourself mad trying to seek justice in an unjust world.
5. Nothing Is Real
Go ahead, chase all the shadows you want through the tunnels of Vienna (The Third Man). Follow all the mangled clues to your mystery woman (Under the Silver Lake). In this world, what you seek isn’t always what you get. Whether that be love, justice or the cold hard, bloody truth—reality is a moving target.
6. The Media is Manufactured
Sometimes it really is #fakenews. The movies about righteous, crusading reporters taking down a big bad villain may win Oscars, but they usually don’t show the full story behind how the news gets made, whether it’s a journalist prolonging a crisis for personal gain (Ace in the Hole) or hunting for voyeuristic crime footage (Nightcrawler). (Mis)trust, but verify.
7. You Can’t Escape Yourself
Try as you might, you’ll always come back to yourself. You can work hard to project an image of normalcy to others, but your shadow self will eventually reveal itself: while you stalk a creepy motel (Psycho), attempt to solve a mystery (Memento), or otherwise attempt in vain to beat back the darkness.
When in chaperone mode, if I’m lucky I can wrangle the three year old for just long enough to let me quickly browse the new movies and grab a book if I know what I’m looking for. After that, he’s off to the kids area and entirely unconcerned about how I’d like to use the library.
On the rare occasions I’m able to go on my own, it’s an luxurious experience: slowly scanning the new books and movies and CDs for anything eye-catching, venturing into the book sale room. It can help sand off the jagged edges of the day and become therapeutic for an introverted library lover like me.
Which made me think: libraries + therapy = librerapy. Don’t know if anyone has capitalized on this concept yet, but it’s just sitting there…
Athena. Come for the gangbusters opening 10 minutes—stay for the tense, heart-pounding drama of Children of Men-meets-The Battle of Algiers in a French apartment complex. (Streaming on Netflix.)
The End of Education by Neil Postman. My third Postman book after Amusing Ourselves to Deathand Technopoly. Would probably rank it below those two but still a barnburner.
The Writing of the Gods: The Race to Decode the Rosetta Stone by Edward Dolnick. The story of discovering the Rosetta Stone (thanks Napoleon!) and the decades it took to decipher it, thus unlocking the secrets of ancient Egypt to modernity.
The Hunt for Red October. Finally got around to see this. Enjoyed it but still have to give the ’90s submarine action thriller edge to Crimson Tide.
Kiki’s Delivery Service. Been going through the Miyazaki oeuvre with the 3 year old and some, like this one, are first watches for both of us. Love being able to show him animated movies with a completely different pace and style than what he’s used to with Bluey/Curious George/Disney, etc.
The World’s Worst Assistant by Sona Movsessian. Sona is a key part of the success of Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast so I’m glad she’s able to cash in on it.
Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Story of Life by Lulu Miller. A remarkable memoir/biography hybrid that reminded me of The Feather Thief with its nature/animals obsessives at the center and the ethical dilemmas they encounter (and create).
I just finished a rewatch of the Lord of the Rings trilogy extended editions, something I was saving for after I finished season one of The Rings of Power. And I’m glad I did because I was able to appreciate the trilogy that much more, with the events of Middle-earth’s earlier age as captured in the series adding an extra weight and significance to what happens in the movies.
Some stray thoughts on each movie as I went through them…
Fellowship of the Ring
This film is so indelibly etched into my being, not to mention my favorite films of 2001 and of all time. There’s so much I could say about it—so many memories it created for me—but just one is that one of my first dates with the woman who’d become my wife was an all-day marathon of all three Extended Editions during a blizzard worthy of the Caradhras Pass.
Ok, one more: our wedding processional was a combination of “Concerning Hobbits” and “The Breaking of the Fellowship” from Howard Shore’s magisterial score.
I’ve bounced back and forth about whether this one or Return of the King is my favorite of the trilogy, but I’ve landed back on this one.
The Two Towers:
While some of the extended footage that didn’t make the theatrical version made sense as cuts, dropping Faramir’s flashback absolutely didn’t. It provided useful context for both his relationship with Boromir and his father, added color to Boromir’s character, illustrated Faramir’s motivations, and helped set the stage for the Denethor drama to come. I get that it was a long-ish scene, but they could have easily trimmed several minutes from the battle of Helm’s Deep if we’re being honest.
This remains my third-favorite of the trilogy despite having some great moments.
The Return of the King
Listening to Annie Lennox’s “Into the West” as the credits rolled provoked a deep sense memory of sitting in the theater seeing this for the first time. In a stunned stillness I attempted to absorb the enormity of the epic journey that had just concluded.
This time around I was able to better appreciate:
just how long and exhausting the journey was for Frodo and Sam
the ring as a metaphor for addiction (Gollum as a troubled addict, Frodo slowly getting hooked, Sam as conflicted loved one)
the full evolution of Aragorn’s arc from reluctant ranger to confident king (also as a model “warrior poet” a la William Wallace in Braveheart, though for some reason much more appealing???)
the courage of Merry and Pippin as they faced constant peril and/or underestimation
Gandalf’s struggle with leading and inspiring others while harboring his own doubts and guilt about sending Frodo to his likely demise
