Former Packers columnist Vic Ketchman likes to say “memories make us rich.”
I think about this a lot, but I gave it special consideration during this yearâs annual viewing of It’s A Wonderful Life when, at the very endâin arguably the filmâs best momentâHarry says, “A toast to my big brother, George, the richest man in town.”
Heâs rich because all of Bedford Falls is dumping a veritable fortune on his table. Heâs also richâricher, Iâd sayâbecause of who is doing the dumping and why theyâre doing it.
George had been offered a similar financial windfall earlier in the film when Potter tried to hire him, but he rebuffed it. Had he decided otherwise, he would have gained wealth of a kind, but also a kind of poverty that no amount of money could cure. He wouldnât have had the same relationships with all the friends and family and townsfolk who filled his house with a different kind of windfall.
George was rich in the end because he remembered. He remembered the barrenness of his ghostly alternate life where he was never born. And he rememberedâsuddenly, when he wanted to live againâthe meaning of all his family and friends and frustrating failures and small victories that had accumulated into something like a wonderful life.
Clarence Odbody (Angel Second Class) gets the last word in the movie with his book inspiration to George: âRemember, no man is a failure who has friends.â Remember these friends, heâs saying, not because theyâre currently making you rich, but because they already have.
Me and Little Man gathering snowballs, here at the end of all things 2020:
A lot of bad things happened in the world this year, but in my own little world there was mostly just good. Chiefly because Iâm blessed to have a COVID-proof job that has let me work from home since mid-March.
This has also meant doing lockdown and social distancing with a toddler, which was simultaneously easy (he doesnât know what COVID-19 is nor what heâs missing because of it) and challenging (*random shrieking and tantrums*).
Still, life continued to happen in spite of everything, as it is wont to do. Hereâs what that looked like for me:
Made several home improvements, including adding can lights, getting a new front door, remodeling our houseâs original 1956 kitchen (shout-out to soft-close cabinets and drawers!), and opening up a wall between the kitchen and living room
Became a person who listens to podcasts at 1.5x speed
Became a person who has a pre-lit, artificial Christmas tree
Refinanced our mortgage to jump on those sweet ‘n’ low interest rates
Hosted some out-of-town friends for a socially distant autumnal hangout in our garage, complete with space heater and hot cider
Learned my 3-year-old niece said this about me: âI love Chad because he holds me. Heâs the best Chad Iâve ever had.â
Explored the wilds of Pure Michigan during a weekend getaway, our only out-of-town excursion this year except for a surprise day trip to see family and say goodbye to my sisterâs dog (RIP Nox)
Said goodbye to my beloved iPhone SE and said hello to a new second-generation SE
Sold our Nissan Leaf to some friends and saw our electric bill drop by about 40%
Took a few much-needed and much-enjoyed solo bike rides to and through a nearby forest preserve
Got a new leaf blower with a gutter attachment, which is a game-changer
Finally got my garage workspace set up with some steel pegboards for tools and our old kitchenâs counter/cabinet as a workbench
Continued adding to my DVD collection, with new entrants including Out of the Past, Contact, Toy Story 3, Ikiru, and several library discards
Read 17 books and watched 78 movies
Watched lots of quality TV, including The Queenâs Gambit, The Great British Baking Show, Big Mouth, Love on the Spectrum, Queer Eye, and The Crown
Grumpy Old Men has become one of the few movies I return to every Christmastime, along with The Family Stone and Itâs A Wonderful Life. Though (or maybe because), like those other movies, itâs only partially about Christmas.
Itâs schmaltzy to a fault, but also an hilarious showcase for the legendary comedic chemistry between Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, forged over decades of working together.
Matthau was open about taking the role only for mercenary purposes. His co-star Kevin Pollak talked about chatting with Matthau on the set before their first scene together:
I said, âSo, Walter, scriptâs pretty good, huh?â And he said, âThe script sucks, kid. I owe my bookie $2 million.â
Youâd never know it though. Matthau and Lemmon fully commit to their acerbic, chops-busting banter, which is the core strength of the movie.
The movie also stumbles upon a few bits of wisdom that have stuck with me, most of which comes not from the titular men but from the people around them. Like Ariel, the free-spirited neighbor turned love interest played by Ann-Margret. Hereâs what she said to acknowledge the death of a mutual friend:
âWe can be thankful that we had the privilege of knowing him while he was still here.â
She also drops this doozy during an argument with Lemmonâs John Gustafson, whom she accuses of being too stuck in his ways:
âThe only things in life that you regret are the risks you donât take.â
Finally, Burgess Meredithâabsolutely slaying in a supporting role as Gustafsonâs horny, incorrigible fatherâlends this uncharacteristically reflective bit:
The first ninety years go by fast. Then one day you wake up and realize youâre not 81 anymore. You begin to count the minutes rather than the days. And you realize that pretty soon youâll be gone. And that all you have is the experiences. Thatâs all there is. Everything! The experiences!
The experience of watching the movieâs combination of sincerity, silliness, and un-Christmaslike shenanigans (along with its wondrously snowy northern Minnesota setting) is what keeps me coming back every year.
For Filmspotting’s latest poll, they ask which of the provided movie failures you are the biggest cheerleader for. The criteria: âThese are movie âfailuresâ that paired well-respected, âauteuristâ filmmakers with existing propertiesâand high expectationsâresulting in significant disappointments critically and (usually) at the box office.â
Check out the poll for all the options. Iâve only actually seen two of them, but there was only really one answer: Steven Spielbergâs Hook.
Sure, as a ’90s kid there was a little bit of nostalgia that influenced my vote. But it wasn’t nostalgia alone. I’ve rewatched it as an adult and found it to be a superbly directed, campy, and effervescent reimagining of a classic story, with a dynamic Robin Williams performance and jubilant John Williams score.
And as the father of a toddler, the part that really hit me on the rewatch was what Peter’s wife Moira said to him after he snaps at his kids:
Your children love you. They want to play with you. How long do you think that lasts? Soon Jack may not even want you to come to his games. We have a few special years with our children, when they’re the ones that want us around. After that you’ll be running after them for a bit of attention. It’s so fast, Peter. It’s a few years, then it’s over. And you are not being careful. And you are missing it.
An ongoing series on books, movies, and music Iâve encountered recently.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire. Fire!
Watchmen (TV show). This whole limited series is something special, but the three-episode stretch of “This Extraordinary Being”, “An Almost Religious Awe”, and “A God Walks Into Abar” is spectacular. I went into this basically as a Watchmen neophyte and came out a believer.
Breaking Bread with the Dead: A Reader’s Guide to a More Tranquil Mind by Alan Jacobs. âIf it is foolish to think that we can carry with us all the good things from the pastâfrom our personal past or that of our cultureâwhile leaving behind all the unwanted baggage, it is a counsel of despair and, I think, another kind of foolishness to think that if we leave behind the errors and miseries of the past, we must also leave behind everything that gave the world its savor.â
The Vast of Night. A fairly astounding debut feature. The Twilight Zone meets Pleasantville meets Super 8. Available on Amazon Prime, and I’d recommend learning as little as possible about it before watching.
Downhill. As a remake of the 2014 Swedish film Force Majeure (big fan), I was very curious how this version would adapt itself to American sensibilities. Pretty well, it turns out.
Hamilton: An American Musical. Duh.
1917. Still glad Parasite won Best Picture, but this deserved all the awards it got.
I don’t have to go looking for synchronicity because it always finds me. This time it was on Netflix.
The other day I watched Netflix’s new docu-drama The Social Dilemma (trailer) based on the recommendation from a friend and a lively text thread about its implications.
The film’s thesis is that social networks are engineered to hack human psychology and prey upon our attention as a means to serve advertisers, which is detrimental to humans specifically and society generally. We learn this from the talking heads of former Silicon Valley executives, whose firsthand experience with the dark side of social media have motivated them to speak out against their former employers and advocate for reform.
Interwoven with the talking heads is the drama part of the film, which depict a family wrestling with the many ways technology can negatively affect our lives: the son slowly being radicalized by extremist propaganda, the tween daughter tormented by insecurity and social media bullying, the mother witnessing the fraying of family cohesion.
Though the dramatized storyline sometimes felt a little “anti-smoking PSA” to me, as a morality tale it was an effective companion to the talking heads. (This interview with Tristan Harris, one of the subjects and co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, gives some needed context to his contributions.)
The documentary stimulated a valuable discussion between my wife and I about social mediaâs role in our family. But it wasnât until later that night when its lessons sank into my consciousness in a tangible way.
Diving into the divine milieu
Later that same night, I decided to watch My Octopus Teacher, another new Netflix documentary featuring freediver and filmmaker Craig Foster. The banal description (“A filmmaker forges an unusual friendship with an octopus living in a South African kelp forest, learning as the animal shares the mysteries of her world”) belies the transcendent richness of what we see develop on screenâboth between Foster and the octopus and between Foster and the underwater environment.
He describes how diving in the cold seawater makes you âcome alive to the worldâ and focuses your mind intently on your surroundings. Iâve written about freediving before, and how the âdivine milieuâ of the seaâor any uncivilized landscapeâcan open us to transformation.
Foster’s own transformation happens over the course of a year as he encounters and befriends a common octopus. And thanks to his abundant underwater footage, we get to witness a series of momentsâsurprises, scares, sorrows, and simplicitiesâthat teach so much about a reclusive and otherworldly creature. Due to Foster’s soothing narration, the gentle piano score, and the meditative quality of being immersed underwater, it’s a beautiful and emotional story that shows the stunning possibilities of what being present in nature can offer.
Being in nature, in silence, or at least away from screens allow for both of those things if you let it. And recently I did.
My toddler teacher
A few days after watching both of these films, for undetermined reasons Mr. 19 Months was refusing to fall asleep. I brought him out to his play area and he started tinkering with a wooden train set we recently put into toy circulation. He usually doesnât focus on one activity for very long, yet for at least 15 minutes he sat there quietly exploring and experimenting with this new contraption.
Usually my phone is with me in our living room post-bedtime, but it wasn’t that night. I could have retrieved it, but I didnât want to break this spell as I knew he’d either want to follow me or jump to another activity. I soon realized that if I did have my phone, I would have missed so much.
I would have missed his subtle gestures as he figured out how to put the cylindrical blocks into their corresponding holes in the train car.
I would have missed trying to decipher his thought process of how to slot the various discs onto their poles.
I would have missed out on pondering how toddlers can be ferocious one moment and beautifully serene the nextânot unlike octopuses.
Similarly, Fosterâs unique story wouldnât have happened if he didnât dedicate himself to visiting the kelp forest every day, and if he hadnât noticed the octopus beneath its camouflaged hideout, and if he didnât intentionally seek to cultivate trust with a marvelous and mysterious creature.
My own marvelous and mysterious creature has taught me a lot in his short time on Earth. (See his tag for the continuing journey.) Just by living out his full selfâand toddlers can’t do anything elseâhe demonstrates the rewards of using your attention wisely, whether it’s for a glowing screen or a wooden train set or an inquisitive toddler or a reclusive cephalopod.
You don’t have to choose one, but you do have to choose.
One of my favorite books of all time is Walter Lordâs A Night to Remember, a retelling of the Titanicâs demise. I finally got around to watching Roy Ward Bakerâs 1958 film adaptation of the book on a beautiful Criterion Blu-ray from the library, and it got me wondering: what about the iceberg?
In both the 1958 film and James Cameronâs mega-blockbuster, we get some ominous shots of the iceberg as the ship tries to avoid it, and then some ice chunks sliding across the deck. But after that, the iceberg disappears. For how much we know about the Titanic and its passengers, there’s far less out there about what turned the Titanic story into legend.
I love this article from Gizmodo that charts the icebergâs incredible journey, beginning as âsnowfall on the western coast of Greenland somewhere around 1,000 BCEâ and ending when it âlikely broke off from Greenland in 1910 or 1911 and was gone forever by the end of 1912 or sometime in 1913.â In all likelihood, “the iceberg that sank the Titanic didn’t even endure to the outbreak of World War I, a lost splash of freshwater mixed in imperceptibly with the rest of the North Atlantic.â
Despite that, we have pictures of it! Not an easy feat in 1912:
In the parlance of The Rewatchables podcast, this may be one of the greatest heat-check performances by a natural formation in history. Basically comes out of nowhere, ventures far beyond where it should be, gets suddenly and violently rammed in the middle of the night by an enormous ship, then melts away within the year.
Such an improbable journey dovetails with the fate of the Titanic itself, as Lord wrote in the original book:
What troubled people especially was not just the tragedyâor even its needlessnessâbut the element of fate in it all. If the Titanic had heeded any of the six ice messages on Sunday . . . if ice conditions had been normal . . . if the night had been rough or moonlit . . . if she had seen the berg fifteen seconds soonerâor fifteen seconds later . . . if she had hit the ice any other way . . . if her watertight bulkheads had been one deck higher . . . if she had carried enough boats . . . if the Californian [just ten miles away] had only come. Had any one of these ifs turned out right, every life might have been saved. But they all went against herâa classic Greek tragedy.
I recently rewatched The Patriot for the first time in a long while. I was big into this movie as a lad, so rewatching it as a thirtysomething dad was something of an experiment to see how my adolescent tastes hold up.
There’s good (John Williams’ score, Mel Gibson as likeable movie star) and bad (how benign slavery is depicted in colonial South Carolina, a lot of the writing and acting to be honest).
But there was one aspect of The Patriot I appreciated completely differently than before, and that’s the depiction of fatherhood. I also noticed just how much the movie shares in common in that regard with an entirely different movie: Christopher Nolanâs 2014 sci-fi epic Interstellar.
(Here be spoilers.)
There were two moments in The Patriot that kinda breezed past me before but totally annihilated me this time around.
“We named him Gabriel”
The first act finds Gibson’s Benjamin Martin as a kindly if emotionally distant father butting heads with his oldest son Gabriel (Heath Ledger), who joins the Continental Army against Benjamin’s wishes, and his second-oldest, Thomas, who’s eager to join once he’s old enough.
When the British kill Thomas and capture Gabriel, Benjamin enlists the younger sons, Nathan and Samuel, to ambush the British unit and rescue Gabriel. All three sons survive but then witness, a bit stunned, their father’s repressed brutality unleashed in a fit of rage and grief for Thomas.
Benjamin and his sons respond to this differently. Gabriel rejoins the war effort. Nathan expresses pride in the ambush. The younger Samuel withdraws into a post-traumatic cocoon. And Benjamin succumbs to shame: for failing to protect Gabriel and Thomas, for subjecting the younger boys to the terrors of war, and for letting his violent past overcome him.
Yet the ambush earns him a serendipitous (for my purposes) nickname: the Ghost. Itâs fitting for his subsequent militia fighting style, with its emphasis on guerrilla tactics and ability to evade capture. But it also signifies his presenceâor lack thereofâin his childrenâs lives.
He carries all of this and more into the climactic battle, where he finally avenges the deaths of Gabriel and Thomas at the hands of the ruthless Colonel Tavington. Before heading home, Benjamin says goodbye to his friend and fellow soldier General Burwell (Chris Cooper), who tells him that his wife recently gave birth to a son.
“We named him Gabriel,” he says. It’s such a simple moment, elegantly delivered by Cooper, that manages to avoid mawkishness and serve as an emotional capstone to Benjamin’s long journey, which included losing two sons and his home.
“Papa, don’t go!”
Back on the daughter side of the Martin family, Susan is the youngest child and most distant to Benjamin. She refuses to speak to him, whether due to her still grieving the loss of her mother or being resentful of Benjamin’s long absences. Even after he visits the family while on furlough, she continues to stonewall him.
But when he sets off yet again, she finally lets go:
Papa! Papa, please don’t go. I’ll say anything. Just tell me what you want me to say and I’ll say it.
Reader, I cried. Itâs a wrenching moment of a father and child equally longing for connection before yet another separation. I couldnât bear to consider such a moment ever befalling me and my sonânow a rascally and wondrous 18 month old.
It didn’t matter to Susan that Benjamin was riding off to avenge his sons and fight for a political cause. Her Ghost was disappearing again, and she finally had something to say about it.
And this is where Interstellar comes in.
(Again I warn of spoilers.)
“Ghost of your children’s future”
A key motif in Christopher Nolan’s near-future, time-bending space drama (a recent subject on Filmspotting’s Oeuvreview, a series I helped coin) is the âghostâ that young Murphy claims is haunting her room and sending her messages in Morse code. Her pilot father, Matthew McConaughey’s Cooper, is leaving on a mission that will take him decades in Earth-time to complete, but the despondent Murph insists the ghost’s message is telling him to stay.
In a heartbreaking scene, Cooper comes to her room to say goodbye and offers a bittersweet reflection on parenting:
After you kids came along, your mother said something to me I never quite understood. She said, ‘Now we’re just here to be memories for our kids.’ And I think that now I understand what she meant. Once you’re a parent, you’re the ghost of your children’s future.
Cooper’s prophecy comes true when he completes his mission and then, in another heartbreaking scene, watches years’ worth of messages from his kids, who bitterly rue his absence:
We also discover that the ghost in Murph’s room was actually Cooper himself, trying to communicate with Murph from across spacetime.
And that’s where Benjamin and Cooperâan 18th-century soldier and a 21st-century astronautâalso have now magically linked across spacetime: as fathers desperate to return to their children, and not merely as phantoms of themselves. They even share their goodbyes:
Benjamin to Susan: “I promise I’ll come back.”
Cooper to Murph: “I love you forever, and I’m coming back.”
Perhaps that’s the benefit of rewatching movies at different life stages. As Roger Ebert wrote about why he loved La Dolce Vita so much: “Movies do not change, but their viewers do. The movie has meant different things to me at different stages in my life… It wonât grow stale, because I havenât finished changing.”
Having been working from home since mid-March, I’m incredibly lucky to have had more time with my son that I would have otherwise spent away at work or on my commute. “Kids spell love T-I-M-E,” my own dad has said. It’s an insight that The Patriot and Interstellar have made ever more resonant.
A friend of mine recently posted: “Let’s stir up some controversy: What are your thoughts on The Lion King?” I replied that a certain song on that soundtrack was a top-5 Disney song, and it wasn’t “Circle of Life” or “Hakuna Matata”.
That inspired me to consider how I would actually rank the best Disney songs. My needlessly arbitrary rules:
only one song per movie (live-action or animated)
from a movie that’s actually a musical where characters sing songs, not just a movie with a lot of original songs (sorry Tarzan)
judging the song itself, not the movie it’s from
Let’s get to it.
Just missed the cut
“The Bare Necessities” – The Jungle Book (1967), “Under The Sea” – The Little Mermaid (1989), “Not in Nottingham” – Robin Hood (1973), “Love Is An Open Door” – Frozen (2013)
I must admit that seeing the superior Broadway stage version has made me partial to that version of the soundtrack (both of which were composed by Disney music maven Alan Mencken). But for the purposes of this list I have to go with the opening number, which ably and jauntily establishes the setting and characters in under five minutes. (Runner-up: “Seize the Day”)
To be honest I barely remember Mulan and most of its songs, so the fact that this one stands out so much is a testament to its enduring appeal. The a cappella chorus towards the end is a nice touch. (Runner-up: None)
Happy to show some love for Randy Newman since his Toy Story work is ineligible. The soundtrack as a whole (which I have a history with) is a great showcase for jazz, zydeco, gospel, and bluesâand this song is probably the most danceable on this list. (Runner-up: “Almost There”)
Nothing but respect for âThe Rainbow Connectionâ from the original Muppet Movie, but this reboot and its music by Flight of the Conchords alum Bret McKenzie really surpassed (at least my) expectations. I favor the finale version of this song, which includes the entire ensemble. (Runner-up: “Pictures In My Head”)
For a long time this was my stock answer for best Disney song. It’s an Alan Mencken joint, after all, and I’m a sucker for a soaring strings-melody combo. (Also Jasmine is the most attractive Disney princess.) But it just kept getting pushed down the list as I considered other songs. (Runner-up: None)
This whole soundtrack is up there in terms of all-around quality. No surprise since it’s another Alan Mencken production. Just an explosion of gospel/soul ebullience. I went with this song over the runner-up because it sticks with one tempo and, as the finale, brings some extra zest. (Runner-up: “Zero to Hero”)
Guess who again? I swear I wasn’t tracking the composers when making this list, though I could have told you beforehand that Mencken would dominate. Anyway, this song rules. (Runner-up: “Happy Working Song”)
Like Hercules, this is one of the stronger soundtracks top to bottom. Even the villain song isn’t terrible. This particular trackâwhile not the best sung given Lin-Manuel Miranda’s less-than-professional voiceâis propulsive and buoyant like an ocean wave. Of the two iterations I’d have to pick the first, but the finale version provides a nice punch. (Runner-up: “Where You Are”)
(Spoiler warning on that link as this song ends the movie.) To date, this is the only Disney song that has given me goosebumps and tears at the same time. I now watch Coco every Dia de Los Muertos while thinking of my ancestors, and this song is a hell of a climax for such a tradition. (Runner-up: “Un Poco Loco”)
I think I’m as surprised as you are. As I mentioned above, “A Whole New World” was my #1 for a long time. But listening to this one recently, I was struck by an epiphany that it’s really just an amazing bubblegum pop song. Goofy, sure, but with a killer guitar/flute (?) hook, colorful bass lines, and an inspired chord progression. I once played a stripped-down acoustic guitar cover of it at an open mic and still worked brilliantly. Think I’m getting wildly out of wing? Nahâthis is my finest fling! (Runner-up: “Circle of Life”)
An ongoing series on books, movies, and music Iâve encountered recently.
Songs for Singin’ by the Okee Dokee Brothers. My eager anticipation was rewarded with this double-album’s worth of characteristically clever, catchy, and joyful tunes. I may have teared up during âJubilationâ.
The Last Temptation of Christ. Sure, there are few regrettably ’80s moments and music cues, but itâs nevertheless one of the most effective and creative reimaginings of the Jesus story Iâve encountered. (See also: Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore.)
Da 5 Bloods. Itâs simultaneously: a long movie that flew by, an epic that felt intimate, a didactic history lesson that felt urgent, a legendary filmmakerâs 24th feature that felt fresh, and a movie meant for theaters that still works on Netflix.
Enemy of All Mankind: A True Story of Piracy, Power, and History’s First Global Manhuntby Steven Johnson. My reading was already in a slowdown before COVID-19, and then it got worse. But I blew through this one, which is yet another Johnson gem and changes everything you think you know about pirates.
A Hidden Life. Back on the Terrence Malick train, baby, which I think has been wayward since 2012’s To The Wonder. Malick exhibits some uncharacteristic but welcome restraint with the camerawork and narrative structure (i.e. actually having one). Gorgeous Austrian countryside setting and soundtrack by James Newton Howard too.
Triple Frontier. Makes an accidental but fun double feature with fellow Netflix jungle action buddy drama Da 5 Bloods.
In an email thread about the controversies surrounding the removal of statues, I suggested we relocate all statues to museums and use the space for parks and Little Free Libraries.
But that’s destroying history! First Amendment!
Statues aren’t history, as this Twitter thread by Elle Maruska articulates well:
Statues are mythology. Statues are hagiography. If you care about history as a discipline, as a way of analyzing the past, tear down every single statue.
Somehow, the history of Nazi Germany is available without statues of Hitler in every German square.
We can somehow still access the history of Mussolini’s rule without having statues of him in Rome.
We know about CeauÈescu without his stone visage glaring out over Bucharest.
Statues tell us about how we understand the present, not the reality of the past. Statues teach us nothing but who we find worth elevating into godhood. Statues are about the lies with think are worth believing in. Statues aren’t history.
The recent spate of statue removals run the gamut from coordinated (Theodore Roosevelt’s) to chaotic (Madison’s). But all of them share the same underlying sentiment, as articulated by Kylo Ren in The Last Jedi (the only good Star Wars movie):
Let the past die. Kill it if you have to. That’s the only way to become what you were meant to be.
The irony of this sentiment is Kylo spends the entire movie trying to actually kill connections to his past but still can’t fully shake them. (After all, the past isn’t past.) As James Whitbrook writes:
So maybe âLet the past dieâ needs to be paired with another great quote about legacies from The Last Jediâsomething Yoda says to Luke, as they watch the glowing embers of the burning tree on Ahch-To: âWe are what they grow beyond.â
Just as Rey learns and grows beyond what Luke and his failures can teach herâjust as she steals away those ancient Jedi texts before they can be destroyed forever, to potentially build upon their ideas herselfâso must Star Wars as a franchise if itâs going to keep adding more and more stories to its ever-growing saga. Respect its past, learn from it, and let it go and move on.
As a long-running franchise and “ever-growing saga” itself, America needs to take the best of its past and let go of the rest.
Which isn’t the same as forgetting or destroying it. To me it means severing ties from two contrasting yet equally toxic and “bitter clinging” impulses: nostalgia, which insists the past was better than the present, and resentment, which only finds fault with it.
It’s good to know that even in quarantine, my old friend synchronicity can still visit me.
I watched the Netflix miniseries Unorthodox after reading the review from Vox‘s Alissa Wilkinson and am so glad I did. Based on the true story of a young ultra-Orthodox Jewish woman fleeing her community in Williamsburg, it’s just four episodes but packs a powerful punch.
(Spoilers ahead. Just go watch Unorthodox.)
Esty, the young woman, is 19 and married to Yanky, an equally young ultra-orthodox Jew whoâs serious and withdrawn. When they donât immediately conceive a childâas is the expectation in their religious and cultural milieuâtheir marriage strains to the point where Esty begins secretly orchestrating an escape.
One of the leitmotifs in the series is Estyâs relationship with music. Since in her community it’s considered immodest for women to perform in public, she hasnât been able to live out her passion for music except through the memory of listening to her grandmotherâs favorite choral music, and then only through taking piano lessons in secret with a neighbor.
When she does get the chance to perform later in the series, at an audition for a music academy, she first sings a Schubert piece that was a favorite of her grandmother. When asked to sing another, she digs for something even more personal. In The Thrillist, Esther Zuckerman describes this powerful moment:
In a strong chest voice, she starts to sing in Hebrew. The tune, which is never identified by name, is “Mi Bon Siach,” heard at weddings when the bride and groom are under the chuppah. It’s a melody that played when Esty and Yanky were getting married in the second episode, and Esty’s choice of it resonates with both rebellion and irony. It’s a song that should signify her bond to a man, but she’s turning it into something that can extricate her from that bond, using a voice that she wouldn’t have been able to use in her former world where women’s singing is prohibited.
And this is where synchronicity arrives. The day before starting Unorthodox I read the article âContrapuntal Order: Music Illuminates Social Harmonyâ by John Ahern in First Things. A doctoral candidate in musicology at Princeton, Ahern writes about how the musical concepts of counterpoint and harmony relate to marriage and relationships. Counterpoint, he writes,
is the accumulation of multiple melodies. It is like Louis Armstrong playing an improvised tune on his trumpet at the same time as Ella ÂFitzgerald sings âLa Vie en Roseââtwo different melodies simultaneously. Neither is subordinate to the other, or, if there is subordination (perhaps we listen a little more to Ellaâs voice than the trumpet), they are both melodies, a status that the piano, plunking out chords in the background, does not share. In true counterpoint, all the sound created is produced by people singing or playing melodies. If we lived several hundred years ago, we would say that âharmonyâ is what joins and holds together those melodies, their counterpoint, in a pleasing fashion.
Iâve always loved counterpoints in music. Theyâre a great way to juice up a final chorus, like in the climax of âNon-Stopâ from Hamilton. [Update: turns out the official term for this is quodlibet!] And they are the perfect metaphor for the relationship between Esty and Yanky, and between the competing âmelodiesâ within Esty during her time of personal and spiritual upheaval.
As Ahern writes, “when two melodies coexist, the glory is their coexistence. But there is no harmony among things that are too dissimilar. The melodies must have an awareness of and reliance on each other in order to live in concord.” However, “if the two melodies resemble each other too closely, they lose their identity. The glory of harmony, of concord, is that the elements are different.”
Having grown up in the same cloistered culture with a shared worldview, Esty and Yanky were arguably too similar to inhabit true harmony. Especially since as a woman in a severely conservative milieu, Esty had no true autonomy and no identity outside of being a baby-maker (which she says explicit in the show).
Unorthodox is the story of how that changes. Esty’s journey from passivity to powerâparalleled by Yanky’s own existential awakeningâmirrors the counterpoint view of marriage, which creates harmony in its original sense by allowing and even demanding coexistent voices. This contrasts with the more conservative “complementarian” model of marriage, with one spouse (usually the wife) filling in around whatever space the other (husband) inhabits. In the older sense of harmony, writes Ahern:
one person singing is no threat at all to another person singing. Sounds are not quantities or physical objects; for one to exist in the same space as one another is not only possible but desirable. The challenge is to get them to sound good together. This requires some chronological hierarchyâone party needs to lead and the other followâbut this, as we discovered above, does not mean that one party will sacrifice more autonomy than another. Both must sacrifice independence for the sake of symmetry.
Perhaps you can see now why this article spoke (or sang) to me while watching Unorthodox. Competing melodies in music and marriage can work only if they are composed with intention and care within a shared song. How Estyâs melodies do or do not harmonize within herself and with Yanky are what make Unorthodox so compelling, and I encourage you to seek it out.
(I also recommend reading Ahern’s article in full for a much richer explication of the counterpoint theory.)
I took the Statistical “Which Character” Personality Quiz from the Open-Source Psychometrics Project, which they describe as a âslightly more scientific but still sillyâ version of those Buzzfeed âWhich Character Are You?â tests I mostly avoid.
Here are my top five results, with the percentage of overlap in perceived personality traits:
Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars (87%)
Daniel Jackson, Stargate SG-1 (86%)
Lester Freamon, The Wire (85%)
Bruce Banner, Marvel Cinematic Universe (84%)
Derrial Book, Firefly and Serenity (84%)
And I donât even like Star Wars. Havenât seen Serenity/Firefly or Stargate SG-1, but Iâll take Lester Freamon and Bruce Banner any day. (Maybe not The Hulk though.)
A while back I started keeping a list of things I’ve learned from movies. Not grand philosophical lessons about life and love and all that, but practical, everyday stuff. Stuff I’ve integrated into my life specifically because I saw it in a movie. I thought I should share what I’ve accumulated thus far, assuming that I will continue adding to it.
I’m borderline religious about this now. Whether during meal prep or cleanup, I try to keep things moving quickly through the process so I’m not left with a mound of work at the end.
All of the rules from this movie and its pretty decent sequel are tongue-in-cheek, of course, but also sound about right for surviving a zombie-infested world.
Julianne Moore’s character continues: “That âeeeeeeeeeeâ? Thatâs the sound of the ear cells dying, like their swan song. Once itâs gone youâll never hear that frequency again. Enjoy it while it lasts.â Now every time I hear that eeeeeeeeee, I give a silent goodbye to that particular note.
Since becoming a patron of Filmspotting on Patreon, Iâve really enjoyed getting ad-free episodes and participating in the production-related chatter.
Recently they were looking for a clever title for a new segment that would be a chronological retrospective of a filmmakerâs work, in anticipation of revisiting Christopher Nolanâs work before Tenet debuts in July. (Assuming, I guess, that we all wonât still be quarantined.)
A few suggestions popped up: Filmography-spotting, Grand Tour, Box Set. Then I added my own: The Oeuvre-view.
I thought that name would have several merits: it’d be fun to listen to Adam and Josh try to pronounce it each time, âviewâ is related to âspottingâ, and its double entendre covers the purpose of the project, which is to provide an overview of a filmmaker’s oeuvre.
Cut to yesterday as I listened to the latest episode and heard my name mentioned, along with the fact that Oeuvre-view was the chosen one!
Adam wondered if the title was meant as a joke, but let me reassure you that I consider thinking up punny titles for things my solemn duty. Regardless, Iâm honored it was selected and excited for the segment in general.
If you donât already listen to Filmspotting, get on that. Itâs great for both hardcore cinephiles and casual viewers looking for a deeper appreciation of movies old and new.
My now one-year-old and I have slowly been going through the episodes of Mister Rogersâ Neighborhood available on Amazon Prime. Heâs generally not interested in extended screen time at this point, but Mister Rogers is one of the few figures he recognizes and enjoys. (Along with Alex Trebek. #proudpapa)
Thereâs not much I can say about Fred Rogers that hasnât already been said. The man was a genius. And the show, which I hadn’t seen since I was a kid, remains both ahead of its time and outside of it. Its deliberately unhurried pace, humanist ethos, and intellectual respect for its young audience make it almost anti-TV, something I couldn’t have realized as a kid.
Now being on the other side of parenthood, I find watching it a delightful and enriching experience for me and for my son. Rogersâ short bits of wisdom sprinkled throughout the episodes in word and song are deceptively simple, poetic, and actionable. He had such a unique way of communicating that it has its own name: Freddish.
At first I skipped the parts in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe because they’re kinda cheesy. I much prefer Fred hanging around his house doing crafts, singing, and breakdancing. But I’ve come to appreciate how those make-believe times blend the show’s “real” people and plots with the imaginary King Friday XIII and crew.
That kind of magical realism was at the forefront of Marielle Heller’s film A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, which is based on the making of Tom Junod’s 1998 Esquire article about Rogers called “Can You Say…Hero?” The movie plays out as one long episode of the show, the main difference being that Lloyd, the Junod stand-in played by Matthew Rhys, finds himself becoming involved in the show. Picture Picture turns into a flashback from Lloyd’s life, and Tom Hanks’ Rogers displays a photo board of characters from the show (which happened on a real episode I watched not long before seeing the movie), one of which ends up being Lloyd.
This blurring of fact and fiction works on two different levels. First, it honors the show’s commitment to showcase real-world experiences alongside its pretend adventuresâa dynamic that mirrors the way young children actually experience the world.
Second, it abides by Rogers’ expressed intention to act on the show as if he were speaking to one specific child rather than an audience of millions. He really, truly believed that one personâLloyd in the movie’s caseâwas special and deserved his full attention and love. (Aren’t they the same thing?)
That’s the genius of Fred Rogers: he was real, but he seemed magical. He wasn’t a saint, as his wife Joanne explains in the movie. He had to work at being good and getting better just like anyone else. But that’s the kind of neighbor we all should want and aspire to be.
Having already conquered my list of favorite films of the 2010s, I found this list much easier to assemble. I knew my movie watching would take a hit when my son was born last February, and it did, though not as much as I expected. My logbook tells me I watched 63 films in 2019, which is only 10 fewer than 2018. Turned out my 9pm-12am baby shift was perfect for catching up on titles old and new (though I canât say I was always fully awake for all of them). Props to Netflix, Amazon Prime, Kanopy, and my library card for making that happen.
10. Ad Astra. Apocalypse Now meets Gravity. Canât say I endorse the use of narration, but Brad Pitt plus a lunar car chase plus a personal/cosmic quest more than made up for it.
8. Toy Story 4. What do you do when your worldview crumbles?
7. The Irishman. One day I’ll have time to rewatch this straight through rather than broken up over several days. I suspect I’ll appreciate it even more then.
6. Avengers: Endgame. There was a 1 in 14,000,605 chance this MCU saga ended well, and they nailed it.
5. Apollo 11. A fresh, intimate, and riveting perspective of a world-famous event.
4. Parasite. Had I made this list immediately after seeing this, it would have been lower. But I haven’t stopped thinking about it.
3. The Lighthouse. I watched this alone since I knew my wife wouldnât enjoy it, but I showed her the first meal scene just so she could behold Willem Dafoe.
2. Knives Out. Rian Johnson knows how to make a movie. A little goofy at times, but the scenery-chewing fun and all-time ending made for an exhilarating ride.
Honorable mentions: Zombieland: Double Tap, The Farewell, Us, El Camino, Knock Down the House, Once Upon A Time… in Hollywood, Hustlers, The Report, Marriage Story, High Flying Bird
My initial list for this endeavor had 77 movies. After I barely managed to winnow it down to 50, I just couldn’t figure out how I’d get to that arbitrary yet appealing round number of 10.
But once I realized most of the movies could be grouped pretty cleanly into 10 different categories (some of which I devised myself), that allowed me to compare movies of the same genre or subgenre to each other rather than to movies doing something completely different. Using that system, my top picks of each slot fell almost immediately into place.
Note that the list ranks the movies, not the categories they represent. The categories made picking the top 10 easier, but the finalists in each oneâconsider them my honorable mentionsâwouldn’t have necessarily ended up in the same ranking and often could fit in several of the categories.
As with all best-of lists, I strove to use an alchemy of my head and my heart to make the final determinations, consulting my yearly best-of lists and trusty logbook to make sure I didn’t miss anything. It was at once overwhelming and rewarding to consider all I’ve seen and decide both what has stuck with me the most and what best represents a decade in cinema.
Here’s what I got.
10. This Is Martin Bonner
A serene and sure-handed film about two men with a faith problem, which inspired one of my favorite blog posts.
Category: Quiet Drama
Finalists: Moonlight, The Rider, Paterson, Ida, Columbus, A Ghost Story
9. Arrival
How could I not love a movie exploring the intersection of language and love across the space-time continuum?
Category: Sci-Fi/Dystopian
Finalists: Interstellar, Edge of Tomorrow, Looper, Snowpiercer, The Lobster
8. Minding the Gap
A stunning documentary about teen skateboarders that’s about one thing before it becomes about many others.
Category: Documentary
Finalists: Nostalgia for the Light, Tower, These Birds Walk, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, California Typewriter
7. The LEGO Movie
What should have been just a brainless cash-grab brand-stravaganza was also a surprisingly rich, hilarious, sunnily dystopian meditation on creativity and existence.
Category: Comedy
Finalists: Coco, Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, They Came Together, The Muppets, Midnight in Paris
An electric, vivid, and original vision that I hope instigates a sea change in film animation and superhero movies.
Category: Superhero
Finalists: Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, Wonder Woman
2. Lincoln
A biopic done right: not as a shallow, decades-spanning survey treated like a greatest hitsalbum (coughJersey Boys) with bad aging makeup(coughJ. Edgar), but as a focused, intentionally contained story that captures its subject and his times with an appropriate mix of reverence and rigor.
Category: Historical Drama
Finalists: Selma, Brooklyn, Inside Llewyn Davis, Roma
1. Hell or High Water
But me, Iâm still on the road Headinâ for another joint We always did feel the same We just saw it from a different point of view Tangled up in blue
âBob Dylan, “Tangled Up in Blue”
Lots getting tangled up in this steely, ruggedly graceful, no-bullshit modern western: family, friendship, the past, the future, tragedy, redemption. A dangerous momentum drives the two bank-robbing brothers and the lawmen hunting them through a dust-choked Texas toward their fates. All we can do is buckle up and hold on.