Welcome to WeeklyWilson.com, where author/film critic Connie (Corcoran) Wilson avoids totally losing her marbles in semi-retirement by writing about film (see the Chicago Film Festival reviews and SXSW), politics and books----her own books and those of other people. You'll also find her diverging frequently to share humorous (or not-so-humorous) anecdotes and concerns. Try it! You'll like it!
This category will, no doubt, be spending time reporting on the antics of the Trump Administration, but natural disasters and other such news will also qualify.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis speaks at the Republican Jewish Coalition Annual Leadership Meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada, on November 19, 2022. (Photo by Wade Vandervort / AFP) (Photo by WADE VANDERVORT/AFP via Getty Images)
There’s Iowa Nice, and then there’s Iowa Smart. Both were on display on Tuesday and Wednesday nights (12/12 and 12/13) on CNN at 8 p.m. (CDT).
After watching the GOP Town Hall Meetings on CNN with Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy I have to say that the people of my home state did Iowa proud. Their questions were so much better than any of those asked by the professional media people moderating the “real” debates recently that there really was no comparison.
Instead of dwelling on the issue of trans-gender sex change operations for youth—a topic that affected fewer than 1,200 people in 2019, the peak year for such surgeries—-these rank-and-file Iowans asked questions that matter to all of us, on the following topics:
U.S. Economic prosperity
Israel vs. Ukraine support from the U.S.
The border issue
Fentanyl
Social Security
Abortion (a notable exception during the GOP debate hosted by Megan Kelly)
Trade relations with China
Why DeSantis would be different/better than Trump as President
Nikki Haley’s support from big business
DeSantis’ position on fracking
Yes, there was a question on a purely Iowa issue, the Satanic Temple display at the State Capitol in Des Moines. And the Pork-on-a-stick at the Iowa State Fair was, perhaps, not a Biggie, but kudos, Iowans!
Vivek Ramaswamy on Dec. 13 during the CNN Town Hall in Des Moines, Iowa, at Grandview College.
When Vivek Ramaswamy graced the Grandview College stage on Wednesday night, December 12, 2023, the people of Iowa came through again, asking Vivek Ramaswamy how he would be different from Trump; the border; Vivek’s Hindu religion in a largely Christian state and nation; Putin’s response to Ramaswamy’s proposed Ukraine solution; inequity in wealth between the top 1% wealthiest Americans and the middle class; a president’s demeanor while serving as the nation’s leader; challenges he had experienced as a candidate because of his age and his position on diversity programs.
The questioning did go off the rails a bit when Ramaswamy (his own worst enemy) went on and on and on about various debunked conspiracy theories and what he had learned about Iowans, in general. (They don’t call it “Iowa Nice” for no reason.)
I’ll write more about their responses in the next few days, but…Damn! You did us proud, questioners. Give those Talking Heads some tips for future debates.
We received a phone call about 5 p.m. from our daughter, Stacey, in Madison, Tennessee, on December 10th; she was absolutely terrified. Her terror was justified. The EF-3 tornado that struck Nashville went right over/past her house. It was pitch black. She doesn’t really have a basement, but only a crawl space. She was huddled in the tub with the neighbor’s cat, whom she has dubbed “Squeaky.”
She sent the attached picture of the street next door (Nesbitt Lane) to her small home in Madison, TN, which she has only been in for a brief time. I’m not sure I’ve ever received a more stressful phone call. Three people died in Madison on Nesbitt Lane. When you get a phone call like that it’s like talking to someone on a plane that is crashing. We talked to her throughout the ordeal (no power for 3 days) and she says “it’s crazy here.”
Madison, TN, Dec. 10 Tornado
I had seen that this storm was (possibly) going to hit both Memphis and Nashville while doing my nightly Wordle, Spelling Bee, Connections and Quordle night time ritual, so I wrote her about the horrible weather that, it said, was going to start outside Houston and then cross the Midwest in a sort of diagonal before heading out East.
I always try to pass these nuggets along to her because she is always traveling for work as a flight attendant, and I am always trying to find out if the weather is likely to be a bad thing for her work day. They had predicted 40 million people would be affected by flooding in cities like New York and Philadelphia. So, I was not unaware of this Monster Storm (as they termed it on the late night news summary) but you never know if our children are paying as much attention to mundane stuff like weather as I am.
Tornado in Madison, Tennessee.
nyway, she was really upset, and with good cause. The air became pitch black and the wind did damage to her singles and her chimney.
Take a look at the street next door to her Heritage Drive location in Madison, TN, which is to the North and East of Nashville. (We visited herthere in September for the Nashville Film Festival.) Her house appears to have escaped serious damage, although the new grill we bought her when we were on Nashville was pushed all the way across her small deck and the umbrella fell on a potted plant and broke. Six people were killed in Madison.
Stacey says there are giant trees down everywhere and no access to the Interstate and her recycling bin went all the way to the end of the street and it was full of stuff. Stacey went to her friend Kayla’s house, which had power, and for whom she was cat-sitting. However, after arriving at Kayla’s house, Kayla’s house lost power. The street lights were all out. She said her house is like a dead zone: she cannot send calls. All regular cell towers must be down.
It rained there until 11 p.m. Sunday. Nesbitt Lane, near her house, is just rubble and the Home Depot that Stacey and Craig shopped at during our trip, for the grill (etc.) was hit hard.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis speaks at the Republican Jewish Coalition Annual Leadership Meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada, on November 19, 2022. (Photo by Wade Vandervort / AFP) (Photo by WADE VANDERVORT/AFP via Getty Images)
We watched the debate between Gavin Newsom, Governor of California, and Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida, and, the entire time, what was going through my mind was, “Why?”
The debate was staged by Fox News and Sean Hannity was the moderator, but the obvious take-away, up front, is that this thing is not going to be “fair and equal” because it is being run (some would say “rigged”) by Fox News.
After the debate was over there were charges that DeSantis had been fed the questions ahead of time, that he was talking with his “team” during the debate (accusations made of both), that a screen was slanted towards DeSantis and not towards Newsom. After the debate had lurched to a close, the moderator said the mismatched duo were going to stay on and continue.
Jennifer Siebel Newsom.
But that didn’t happen. There were reports that Newsom’s wife, Jennfer Seibel Newsom, marched onstage and barked “We’re done.” Some reports said that she was particularly ticked off that her father (Newsom’s father-in-law) was cited by DeSantis as having introduced himself to the Florida governor and endorsed Florida’s superiority to California as a state in which one wished to live, having just relocated from California to Florida himself.
I keep asking myself why Newsom would agree to participate in what was most certainly going to be a rigged presentation, with Fox News attempting to bolster DeSantis’ race for the White House and Newsom not even being a candidate this election cycle. Or is he?
DeSantis kept referencing Newsom’s “shadow campaign” for the White House, while each liberally insulted the other. Meanwhile Hannity threw up a variety of charts and graphs that favored Florida, as you just knew it would.
For this reason my spouse (who says he is Independent but is from good Republican stock) declared DeSantis to have been “the winner.” I felt that the statistics would favor Florida, everyone’s favorite retirement destination. However, I felt that the presentation and command of the stage and facts win went to Newsom.
I admit to being quite concerned about Newsom’s judgment when I think about the fact that he was once married to Kimberly Guilfoyle, now Donald Trump, Jr.’s main squeeze, but his new blonde wife looked like a massive step up. Wife #2 recognized that this debate would feel so good once it ended and helped facilitate that, which was probably smart.
One of the contentious things that came out of the debate was DeSantis holding up a picture of a graph he claimed represented the most heavily feced areas of San Francisco. Later, Newsom said this was a violation of the rules agreed upon beforehand. The placards and other such debate aids that Hannity put up onscreen were also being argued about, after the debate had concluded. Supposedly, they were not to be allowed, although Hannity disputed this contention. (Don’t they all?)
California Governor Gavin Newsom.
I just kept wondering, “What’s in this for Gavin Newsom? Who thought up this entire idea?”
One idea that did make sense was this one: If Biden were to pull out of the presidential race at the last minute for any reason, who would the Democrats belatedly run? Naturally, one thinks immediately of Vice President Kamala Harris, who is, if polls are right, is even less popular right now than Biden himself.
She is from California. So is Gavin Newsom. According to the 12th amendment to the Constitution, electors may not vote for presidential and vice-presidential candidates who both reside in the elector’s state—at least one of them must be an inhabitant of another state.
Is all of this part of some behind-the-scenes plan to hedge all bets and find a way to exclude the unpopular Harris? Who thought up the entire ordeal that Newsom just endured ?
We are a house divided and, while I agree that the placards carried the day for Florida over California, DeSantis’ sickly smile and poor debate skills couldn’t hold a candle to the much smoother Newsom. DeSantis kept trying to “diss” Newsom as “slick.” If you think back, that perjorative term was applied to Bill Clinton and, later, to Barack Obama. I’m perfectly fine with “slick” if it means competent, poised and articulate. The fact that Newsom is so poised is surprising considering his life-long history of dyslexia, which continues to the present.
Setting aside my reservations about Newsom’s poor judgment in selecting a Screaming Mimi as his first wife in 2001 and being married to her until 2005, there is also this. He had an ill-advised affair with Ruby Rippey-Tourk, the wife of his good friend and Chief of Staff, Alex Tourk, a woman who worked for him. Newsom met and married film-maker Jennifer Siebel in 2007 and the couple has four children.
Former New Jersey Governor and potential presidential hopeful (2024) Chris Christie.
The bench for successor to Biden is not currently very deep. The GOP party is a shadow of its former self and Nikki Haley is looking like a more viable candidate than DeSantis, while preliminary reports are that Chris Christie may not even make the ballot in one state. (Who knows if he’ll make another debate stage?)
Whatever Democratic strategist gave the go-ahead for Newsom to take a thrashing, factually, but prevail in the personality department should be brought forth to explain to the rest of us what is really going on here.
We spent it at the movies (“Napoleon”) but before I write that review for the film that opened wide on November 22nd, a little levity looking forward to the most commercial holiday of the season might be appropriate. And these dogs might be your choice for a forever friend. (Or not).
German Shepherd dog
In scanning the November 21st issue of the “Austin American Statesman” for potential topics, I was first attracted to this headline: “Husband Asks Spouse to Annoy His Parents to Motivate Them to Leave.”
That sounded promising, but, in my usual manner, I continued scanning the various articles and read this one, which had a much-less-amusing title: “Shelter Places Dogs Cut From TSA Training.”
It sounded like an informative straight-ahead news story, and I like dogs as well as the next man—err, woman—so I read on.
Apparently, there is a special animal shelter at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland that is used to house dogs rejected for government service, like the canines used to sniff out drugs by the TSA.
The purpose of the article seemed to be to find “forever homes” for these furry rejects for government service. The article even contained an e-mail address that applicants could use: [email protected]. The article went on to say that multiple visits to San Antonio might be required to meet the animal and make sure the prospective new owners would be a good fit for the animal(s). It was further advised that the prospective owners should arrive at the training center on adoption day with a leash, a collar, and appropriately-sized shipping crate. (Nothing like being prepared and explicit, I always say.)
So, what sorts of animals might we be competing to own?
Let’s just run through a few of the rejected animals awaiting our applications in San Antonio.
Toby
First, there is Toby. Toby is a 10-year-old Labrador Retriever (the very dog I owned as a child). Toby was rejected for service because of situational anxiety causing him to suck in more air than necessary which made him become bloated. Like all the other animals on the list, Toby was described as highly active, untrained, and not housebroken, but, (said the article) “with proper training and care they can be a great addition to families.”
Second on the list was Lydka, a 3-year-old German Shepherd who actually made it into service as a bomb-sniffing dog. Unfortunately, Lydka was easily distracted by noise and people and didn’t do well under pressure. She was fired for her performance on the job and requires a more stress-free environment.
Third on the list was Tommy, a 3-year-old English Springer Spaniel, who was dismissed because he developed an upper airway obstruction.
Jack, a 2-year-old German Shepherd, never even made it into training because of suspected kidney disease.
Tommy
Most of the dogs have not been exposed to any animals other than other dogs and are not comfortable around small children. To be considered for selection as the adoptive owner, the prospective owner must have a fenced-in yard and no plans to move within 6 months of the adoption. Any other pets already in the home must be up to date on vaccination and preventative care. Of course, the prospective owner must also promise to provide appropriate medical care, exercise, training and companionship.
So, if you are available to adopt a non-housebroken, highly active, possibly sick canine that flunked out of TSA (or other) school, feel free to contact the San Antonio-Lackland Joint Base. Sounds like the perfect Christmas pet, doesn’t it?
May/December is a riff on the infamous Mary Kay Letourneau scandal of 1997, but that is where the similarities end. None of the information contained within this film can be taken as “true” in regards to the real couple who inspired the film. Todd Haynes directed and Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore star.
“May December” is a weird film. The tone is serio-comic, with vacillation between the two. “I’m Not There”—Haynes’ 2007 film with different actors playing Bob Dylan—was also weird. Last year, he made “The Velvet Underground,” a good straight-forward documentary. May/December is not a straight-forward anything and most definitely not a documentary.
One of the producers on this film was Will Ferrell. What does that tell you? The tone at times reminded me of Ferrell’s ice-skating movie “Blades of Glory,” except that “Blades of Glory” was actually amusing. This one, for me, was just campy, schmaltzy, and cringe-worthy.
The opening barbecue scene, where Gracie remarks “we’re going to need more hot dogs” comes off as funny only in a semi-sick way. The accompanying melodramatic music was part of the ill-advised plan to play half of this movie for laughs and half of it as serious. I hoped the film might provide insights into why something like this true life 1997 Mary Kay Letourneau incident might have occurred. The “framing device” for the film is that Natalie Portman as the character Elizabeth Berry has agreed to play Gracie (Julianne Moore) in a bio-pic; she is trying to “get inside” Gracie’s head and figure out what makes her tick.
NOT A DOCUMENTARY
The film is not a straightforward recitation (even with names changed to protect the guilty) of the infamous Mary Kay Letourneau case, involving a 34-year-old teacher who began a sexual affair with her middle school student. In real life, Mary Kay’s sixth grade student was just shy of thirteen when the two began having sex.
The story collaborators apparently thought this real-life soap opera drama would be “funny.” It didn’t seem “funny” at the time to the public. It certainly didn’t seem humorous to the families affected by that May/December coupling. It doesn’t seem funny when Gracie was Joe’s teacher. We exist in a time that has seen an increase in child pedophilia. Maybe it’s the fact that I come from a long line of teachers, but I did not find the underlying premise of the movie to be a fountain of comic moments.
Of course, the real-life couple staunchly maintained that they were merely star-crossed lovers for 20 years. It is only late in the plot that Joe begins to articulate some doubts about whether the couple love each other as much as they have claimed through those years. In one scene, Joe (Charles Melton) actually says, “I didn’t know what a big deal it was—having kids.” A strange statement from a young man whom Julianne Moore’s Gracie describes as having been “an old soul” long before she decided to hire him as her assistant at a pet shop and have her way with him in the storage room. (Not, by the way, based on the Letourneau reality.)
REAL LIFE
For those who don’t remember the Mary Kay Letourneau case, Mary Kay spent 1998 to 2004 in prison as a result of being convicted of felony second degree rape of a child. She was forever listed as a sex offender. The pair did not obey the judge’s order to have no further contact, conceived two children, and married in 2005, soon after Mary Kay was released from prison. (In real life, Mary Kay Letourneau had six children, four from her first marriage to Steve Letourneau and two with Vili Fualaau.) She and Vili remained married for 14 years, separating just one year before Mary Kay’s death at age 58 of stage four colon cancer on July 6, 2020.
Not surprisingly, Steve Letourneau, her first husband, moved to Alaska, remarried (and had morechildren) and refuses to even comment on Mary Kay. In this film, Steve Letourneau/Tom Atherton is well played by D.W. Moffett. The depiction of him is not favorable.
The letter that is read in the film by Natalie Portman (from Gracie to Joe) indicates that Gracie’s sex life in marriage number one left a lot to be desired. Once she tasted the forbidden fruit that Joe represented, she was loathe to go back to reality—or so the letter, read onscreen by Portman in a scene that made me cringe for her—seems to say.
The fact that the principals in this Romeo and Juliet doomed lovers set-up had a 22-year gap in age is not the reason for censure. There are marriages that feature couples with a large difference in age. Two very senior citizens on the Hollywood scene, major movie stars, have very recently had offspring with their much-younger paramours. Twenty-two years difference in age doesn’t even seem that large when measured against such realities.
So, the difference in age isn’t the issue. The issue is whether a minor (12 or 13) is really capable of making an informed decision when an authority figure in his or her life is suggesting a sexual relationship.Gracie/Mary Kay was put in a position of authority with her young charge and crossed the line, sexually.
Joe is constantly depicted as trying to please, placate, or serve Gracie. She is still in control. One line about Gracie, from a neighbor, is, “She always knows what she wants.” Gracie, as portrayed by Julianne Moore, has logical explanations for actions with her children, but those actions often seem very passive/aggressive. She seems very controlled and in command in the dinner parties and interactions depicted. But let some neighbors cancel their bakery order and Gracie descends into near-breakdown hysteria.
The real Mary Kay Letourneau was diagnosed with bipolar disease. She was told to take her medication and not see her young lover again. She obeyed neither of those orders from a judge, which is why she spent so long in prison. (She was sent back for disobeying the judge’s orders. Donald Trump: take note.”)
In this fictionalized case, the student is in 7th grade (not 6th) and is Korean, not Hawaiian. The pair does have children, who are about to graduate and go off to college. In real life, Mary Kay Letourneau and Vili Fualaau were married for 14 years, until they separated in 2019. They had only two children. In this film there are twins, a girl away at college, Mary at home, and what seems to be a large number of children, when her former offspring are factored in.
CAST
This film stars Julianne Moore, who won an Oscar in 2014 for playing a woman afflicted with Alzheimer’s disease, “Still Alice..” She has appeared in 107 films. She has made many, many wonderful films; the subject matter of many is often racy (“Boogie Nights” comes to mind.) I felt sorry that she had to appear in this one, which, for me, fell flat.
Similarly, Oscar-winner (“The Black Swan”) Natalie Portman appears as an actress named Elizabeth Berry, a celebrity with a TV show about animals called “Nora’s Ark”, who has been hired to portray Julianne’s character of Gracie in the upcoming bio-pic. She wants to get close to the real Gracie. Gracie and Joe allow her to come to their home. (And what a home it is, for a couple with a wife who only bakes for others and a husband who appears to perhaps be an X-ray technician. How do they afford this elegant home in Savannah, Georgia? How are they going to pay for at least four kids in college simultaneously?)
The young man who portrays Julianne’s young husband (22 years younger in the real Letourneaucase) is Charles Melton as Joe Yoo. He does what he can with this part, as do the two experienced actresses. Charles Melton is one of the few bright spots in the film, but he still provokes gales of laughter because the scripted things he is given to say are that bad.
MUSIC
From the moment we see a butterfly chrysalis onscreen (Joe is interested in helping re-populate theMonarch population) and the ponderous, schmaltzy music begins playing, you think, “What the f___?” Marcelo Zarvos wrote original music and adapted Michel LeGrand’s melodies from “The Go-Between.” The music is heavy-handed and melodramatic.
Later, in a café scene, we see one of Gracie’s children from her first marriage, Georgie (memorably played by CoryMichael Smith), singing. The lyrics “Oh, Baby, I love your ways” float over to us, before Georgie delivers the cringe-worthy line, “I’m a Phoenix rising from the ashes.” (Yikes! Who talks like that in real life?)
WORST SCENES
There are so many awkward, uncomfortable scenes that I hate to single out the back room of a pet shop, where the duo was supposedly caught in flagrante delecto, or the other questionable scenes, meant to be comic. Natalie Portman seemed to get more of the truly execrable scenes than Julianne, including one where she relives the storage room romance of the pet shop all by herself, writhing and moaning with wild bird noises in the background. And there’s the one where she faces the camera and has to deliver a bad monologue that was a letter Gracie wrote to Joe. There is also her inappropriate description of playing sex scenes, delivered to a high school class where Mary Atherton, Gracie’s daughter, is in the audience.
Nothing about the situation seemed “funny,” to me, especially since so many lives, including those of six children, were negatively impacted. There are actually two bad pet shop scenes, one involving a snake. Which is worse? You decide if you watch this on Netflix when it begins streaming on December 1st, or in a theater beginning November 17th.
BEST SCENES
One shot showed Joe looking through a wire fence at his graduating children. That one, with its symbolism, was interesting. But on the very day her children are graduating, we see Julianne Moore as Gracie, accompanied by two Russian wolfhounds, stalking the land while holding a rifle. (A WTF moment.) A fox is on one side of the field. Julianne and the fox exchange glances. Oh. My. God. (Just shoot me now, Julianne).
When Charles Melton asks his oldest son, Charlie Atherton-Yoo (Gabriel Chung), if he is sad that Charlie is soon going to be leaving for college, the young man says he is very happy to be leaving. [Can’t blame him there.]
The cinematography by Christopher Blauvelt (“Emma,” “Zodiac”) was good and the Savannah, Georgia area photographs beautifully. It is shot on 16-millimeter film. Haynes’ usual cinematographer is Ed Lachmann (“Far From Heaven,” 2002; “Carol,” 2015).
UNDERLYING POV
The opening scenes of the film seem to promote a picture of Gracie as loving and committed to her marriage to the much younger Joe. However, her abandoned son, Georgie (from her first marriage) tells Natalie Portman, “Lady, she’s messed up in the head.” He relates tales of early incest abuse by his mother’s older brothers, but we never know whether that is true or false.
Indeed, there is evidence that supports Gracie and Joe as loving parents, but the real Mary Kay Letourneau was diagnosed as bi-polar and essentially abandoned her husband four kids for a twelve-year-old. Not exactly comic fodder; who thought this would make for a good movie that is half comic and half serious?
GRACIE’S LESS MATERNAL MOMENTS
Mary Kay gifts her daughter who is going off to college with a scale. She implies to a younger sister Mary (Elizabeth Yu) that her arms are fat, as the daughter tries on dresses for graduation. Gracie also loses it over a canceled baking goods order. It seems that baking is what Gracie does well; Friends in the area order things from her out of good will. The comic/not that funny line is, “How many pineapple upside-down cakes can a family eat?”
It also brings up the valid question, “So, is the community generally supportive of Joe and Gracie, as with the ordering of baked goods, or does she receive more packages of canine feces than orders for baked goods?” It’s also valid to ask, “How do they afford this big house with the small pool and the ocean view and also sending multiple children off to college at the same time? Where is the money coming from?”
Early on, a neighbor tells Natalie Portman as Elizabeth to “be kind” in her portrayal of Gracie. The film doesn’t seem to have made up its mind about whether or not the mis-matched couple has really been accepted, since Elizabeth, upon arrival, brings a package she found outside the house containing dog feces, only to learn that it is a routine occurrence for such packages to be left there.
This didn’t seem all that humorous, or all that accepting or forgiving on the part of the community.
CONCLUSION
I felt embarrassed for two such fine actresses to be appearing in this movie. It has nothing to do with disapproval of the theme. One of Julianne Moore’s All Time Best roles was in “Boogie Nights,” a classic about the pornographic film industry.This film is not a classic and whoever had the idea to make it half-funny/half-serious should rethink that decision. The tone is all over the place. The only people who seemed to be enjoying it were mocking the many cringe-worthy scenes or statements.
The only way to think you haven’t wasted your time sitting through this is if you mock it. I didn’t want to mock it. I respect the actresses in the lead roles too much. I just wish they had had a better script or at least one that picked a consistent tone that came through clearly. Samy Burch and Alex Mechanik wrote the story and Samy Burch scripted. Shame on them
I was very disappointed by this movie. However, this line from the film applies, “Keep your expectations low and you’ll never be disappointed.”
Unfortunately for me, I had higher expectations for something that might give us a bit of an idea what the real life of Mary Kay Letourneau might have been like after crossing society’s boundaries in 1997. I just felt sorry that these two talented performers somehow ended up in this, after all their good work throughout the years. The film screened at the 59th Chicago International Film Festival on October 18, 2023.
The “best” part of the movie is the trailer. After that, it’s either laugh or cry.
A timely issue for our time is the use of deep-fake video. It was one of the sticking points during the recent 148-day Hollywood entertainment strike. It is bound to rear its ugly head again during the 2024 presidential race. Porno videos with famous people’s faces super-imposed on the bodies of others are out there. In this documentary, it is a college student who makes the discovery that there is “Another Body,” represented as hers, circulating on the Internet. The supreme irony is that, in able to testify to the damage being done to victims like the fictional Taylor Klein, she had to “deep fake” her own testimony, (which made it all the way to the White House.)
In the timely documentary “Another Body,” directed by Sophie Compton and Reuben Hamlyn (co-written by Isabel Freeman), a college student discovers deep fakes represented as being Taylor, circulating online. Using video diaries, synthetic media, and 2D and 3D animation, the documentary takes you behind the scenes: who did this and why and how can it be stopped and rectified? :”I kept asking myself who would do this and why would they want to do this? I worry that they are going to do something more drastic? I believe that, in his mind, he is getting back at us for rejecting him.”
THE GOOD
I marveled at the expertise that the filmmakers showed in presenting this complicated story to us, using dummy-like automatons to represent the fictional “Mike” (the perpetrator that Taylor and friends track down over time.) It was very impressive in regard to its technical achievements.Bravo!
I empathized with statements like, “I’ve had to deal with all the consequences that he should have had to deal with. I’ve had to leave the fun group, but he hasn’t.” 9,500 porno sites with 14 million hits a month sounds like the death throes of a decadent society. Are sites like PornHub that “normal” in this country’s incel culture that this sort of thing is doubling every six months, as the film says? Do those who use such sites routinely end up on a roof with a gun, shooting at spectators at a Fourth of July Parade in Illinois? What-the-heck is going on? Yes, Trump is the poster boy for such bad behavior, but…really?
I also recognized that the misogyny that today’s women of the MeToo movement are not willing to put up with has been going on for decades. DJT is a throwback to those decades when it truly was “a man’s world” and, as he bragged on video, if you were male you could get away with just about anything, because that is what women were told they had to put up with in order to be “good” female citizens. Women were not supposed to “take a man’s job” and we were supposed to stay barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, waiting on our man. R-i-i-i-g-h-t. So, I enjoyed seeing the new generation of women take on the male establishment. Maybe the good guys—err girls—will win, this time. I hope so. The request that she be respected for her professional achievements and viewed as “good” is not a pie-in-the-sky goal for the fictional Taylor of this tale; it is what women deserve, but have seldom achieved without a fight.
THE BAD
Like many other documentaries, this one could have been shorter. A half hour trim would not have taken away from the film, which became repetitive. Some of the interactions between Taylor and other victims could have been shortened.
Worst of all, the conclusion that Taylor draws near the end of the film is depressing: Sometimes the bad guys win.
I just watched the second GOP debate. I feel like I need a shower and a stiff drink. Maybe some ear plugs, too, since at least four of the seven candidates for the Republican nomination for president were usually talking at once.
We watched the debate on Fox “live,” as it was held from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California because I’m in Nashville for the film festival, which starts tomorrow, and the daughter’s set has mainly streaming services. We finally located it “live” on YouTube.
A British guy named Stuart Varney started this cluster-f*** off by totally mangling the name of his Hispanic co-host, Ilia Calderone of Noticias Univision. How Ms. Calderone got on this panel is a good question; she did bring some interesting questions to the candidates, including one on LGBQT people that saw Mike Pence move from a statement about protecting all Americans to one saying he would ban all transgender efforts in the United States. It’s quite a stretch from asking how you would protect LGBQT Americans, who, Ms. Calderone noted, are far more likely to be violently attacked, to vowing to attack them yourself using legal means. (Yikes!)
The three hosts were Ilia Calderone and Dana Perino and the British badly balding Stuart Varney. Not the “A” team.
Not only did Varney basically mutilate Ms. Calderone’s name in a fashion that we hadn’t heard since John Travolta mispronounced Idina Menzel’s name as Adele Dazeem at the 2014 Oscars, but Varney had absolutely no control over the combatants, although he kicked off the evening by saying, “Keep it civilized.” (Ha!)
I switched between a YouTube Live showing of the contestants and what we used to call Twitter (now “X”). Several “X” users had posted pictures of Vivek Ramaswamy’s mile-high hair next to pictures of Beavis or Butthead. (I can never tell them apart; not a regular fan.) One other “X” user had posted a picture of Vivek’s mile-high hair next to an Afro wearer, mentioning that Ramaswamy was really trying hard to get the Black vote tonight.
One analyst commented on Tim Scott’s dumb take on the UAW strike, saying something to the effect that they (the auto workers) should get fired like the air traffic controllers were fired under Reagan. Citing $86 billion in aid for union pensions, (which Scott claimed was “the1 st bill under Joe Biden,”) Scott criticized the auto workers desire for shorter work week but more pay and added, “Joe Biden shouldn’t be on the picket line. He should be on the Southern border.” Apparently Tim Scott has missed out on hearing about the phenomenal salaries that the Big Three CEO’s are pulling down, while, because of the financial crisis in 2008/2009, auto workers gave up many perks of their jobs at that time to help save the car companies and now would like a fair share of the record profits they are raking in. The GOP haranguing against unions is nothing new, however. I was surprised that they didn’t attempt to drag teachers’ unions through the mud with mis-statements, once again.
As the MSNBC analysts pointed out, to hear these candidates tonight, the very worst thing that Donald J. Trump has done is to not show up for the GOP debate. No mention of his planning and executing a coup. No mention of his recent suggestion that General Mark Milley be executed or his willingness to let his VP be hanged on January 6th. This ignoring the elephant in the room seems to be the norm of the new Republican party. Tonight Trump took heat from several of the candidates, including Ron DeSantis, who had meticulously avoided criticizing Trump by name until tonight, but only for his failure to appear to shout over the others. No harsh words for the man about his 91 criminal indictments or how he was recently found guilty of decades of fraud in his business practices, other than wondering why he couldn’t be here this night to join in the general chaos and talk over the other candidates, which he most certainly would have done. (My daughter wanted to know when civility and behaving in a polite fashion while debating went out of style, and my answer was, “When the GOP elevated a con-man like Donald Trump to the top spot in their party.” Which, by the way, he still occupies, even if his hold on the party is tenuous as the charges against him mount.
IMHO, it was very difficult to understand Ilia Calderon. And Stuart Varney just seemed out of his element. Dana Perino seemed to perform the best of the three moderators, but all were underwhelming.
There was a lot of criticism of the failure to control immigration at the border, with very little acknowledgement of how longstanding a problem this is. It is not just Joe Biden who has dropped the ball on immigration reform. The system is broken and Congress needs to act to fix it, but never let the truth get in the way of a good debate.
Both Mike Pence and others threw shade at Ramaswamy for doing business with China as an entrepreneur. If I heard correctly, Ramaswamyy had done business with the same organization that Hunter Biden is accused of doing business with. Pence, mentioning that Ramaswamy had withdrawn from the business deal with China in 2018, asked if that was the year Vivek began voting for president. Ramaswamy took a lot of incoming; he seemed in high spirits throughout. Ramaswamy and Chris Christie laughed at the chaos unleashed by the complete disregard for civility that these debates seem to have devolved into, with Christie literally lounging against the lectern with a big smile on his face when things were going down the tubes.
Most of the specific mentions of policies were one candidate attacking another, as when Haley attacked DeSantis or Scott attacked Haley over a gas tax. (I liked Nikki Haley’s remark of “Bring it” and how hard she worked to correct the misinformation about a gas tax in her state.)
Some mentioned that the Hispanic moderator brought up some facts that Fox viewers do not normally get to hear, like the fact that 90% of illegal drugs are sought by purchasers in the U.S. and are caught at the border (so much for the tough talk on how tough each would be on the drug cartels) or how LGBQT people are more likely to become victims of vicious attacks.
One of my favorite moments was when Chris Christie looked directly into the camera, saying that he knew DJT would be watching, and then said, of Donald J. Trump, “He’s divided people all over this country. He needs to be voted off the island and be voted out of this process.”
Neither Christie nor Burgum got much of a chance to contribute, tonight, even when the topic was something that Burgum of North Dakota claimed expertise in, energy security. This despite the fact that Nikki Haley said, “Energy security is national security.” Pence, who looked extremely tired this evening, noted that, during his stint as Vice President under the man who plotted to overthrow our national election, we (the U.S.) became a national exporter of energy for “the first time in 75 years.” Pence did not seem to give much credence to the fact that our dependence on fossil fuels has contributed to the wacky weather that we have all experienced this past year, (including the hottest day on the planet in July). The Biden administration’s attempts to move us off fossil fuels and onto other alternatives, plus the efforts to get the United States car manufacturers making electric vehicles (which China is way ahead of us on doing) is directly linked to the global warming that human mistreatment of the planet, including using coal and oil instead of wind or nuclear or solar power], has created.
I hope that someone more dedicated than me investigates whether Floridians did or did not get to vote on fracking before DeSantis’s actions on fracking and drilling. There was a heated debate between Nikki Haley and DeSantis on that very point; she seemed to be winning. DeSantis, in the manner of politicians from forever, fielded a question about the cost of college by pivoting to his own educational achievements and his military record (“I’ll be the first person since 1988 who has also served.”) It was absolutely not answering the question asked and smacked of a self-serving stroll down memory lane
I wish that Cassidy Hutchison’s insights into the January 6th riots had been viewed by as many people as viewed tonight’s so-called “debate” because they were far more relevant to selecting the right people to run our country in 2024.
The Chicago International Film Festival’s 59th iteration will screen at 8 locations in Chicago commencing October 11th. In a preview of the full range of offerings on September 18th at the AMC Newcity Theatres on North Clyburn Avenue.
Other venues where films will be screened this year include the historic Music Box Theater, the Chicago History Museum, the Gene Siskel Film Center, the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago, and some other pop-up venues on the South and West sides of the city.
In other years, nearly all films have been shown at a central location, the AMC Theater on Illinois. I learned that I could make it from my condo to the venue in about fifteen minutes, but the cost of parking has exceeded the cost of tickets in recent years. It appears that the large AMC Theater may have priced itself out of the market. I was also told that they are renovating the theater (and removing many seats), which had been all the buzz before the pandemic hit, i.e., will the AMC go belly-up as a result of their ambitious upgrading plans and the costs of same at a bad time, historically. I was told that the AMC New City Theater had previously existed under a different owner and was snapped up by AMC.
While it took me over an hour to drive from the Field Museum to the North Clyburn Avenue location for a 6:30 p.m. meeting (i.e., during Rush Hour), I was able to park for free on the street and there are restaurants within the New City complex that could make killing time between films much easier. There weren’t many good places near the large AMC complex, and the good ones like P.J. O’Rourkes often closed.
I went back to the beginning of my Weekly Wilson blog and found reviews from 2007 on. I think I actually reviewed cinema offerings earlier than that, but not on my own blog. Now, of course, I publish here and on The Movie Blog.
Director Mimi Plauche and Sir Henry Branagh at the Music Box Theater on Opening Night of his film “Belfast.”
This year, the panels picking what we will be able to see reviewed 7,500 films before boiling it down to 57 offerings. There were 5,500 short films that were viewed to narrow the offering to 99 shorts. The films came in from 123 countries and the Opening Night film will be “We Grown Now,” directed by Minhal Baig and starring Jurnee Smollett as Dolores, the mother of a young Black boy in the Cabrini-Green Housing Project who must decide whether to stay or move away.
Tickets this year run $35 for Opening/Closing Nights, and $23 for Special Presentations. A general screening, if you are a member of Cinema Chicago, is $18 and $22 if you are not a Cinema Chicago member.
It is my fervent hope that the parking this year will be cheaper, as it had really gotten out of hand last year.
Nashville Film Festival September 28th through October 4th, 2023.
The Nashville Film Festival commences September 28th, and I will be there, in person, covering it. It runs from September 28th until October 4th. The Nashville Film Festival presents more than 125 film screenings, a selection of post-film Q&As and in-depth discussions with attending filmmakers.
NashFilm hosts events and programs that highlight the many aspects of filmmaking, including: a Screenwriting Competition (September 28-October 4); a Music Supervisors Program; the Creators Conference (film and music industry panels; and live music performances and new artist showcases throughout the week.
The festival opens with the documentary “I Will Survive,” from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Belcourt Theatre in Nashville. It is the story of the career and resurgence of Gloria Gaynor and Gaynor, plus director Betsy Schechter will be present at the post-party afterwards at Anzie Blue.
On Friday, in addition to composer Mark Isham (“Crash”) in conference, the short “The Hit Man” (18 minutes) with Richard Kind and Peter Riegert and Nancy Allen screens at the Rothschild Black Box Theatre. Later that night, “Another Body,” about a coed who finds fake nude photos of herself online, will show at the same theater.
Saturday, 9/30, a Joan Baez documentary (“I Am A Noise”) is up, along with a documentary entitled “The Disappearance of Sheri Hite.” (Sheri Hite wrote a groundbreaking book on female sexuality and then largely disappeared from public view.)
Sunday, October 1st, I am looking forward to some documentary shorts, as well as David Straithorn in “Remember This.” David Strathairn portrays Jan Karski in this genre-defying true story of a reluctant World War II hero and Holocaust witness. After surviving the devastation of the Blitzkrieg, Karski swears allegiance to the Polish Underground and risks his life to carry the first eyewitness reports of war-torn Poland to the Western world, and ultimately, the Oval Office. Escaping a Gestapo prison, bearing witness to the despair of the Warsaw ghetto and confronted by the inhumanity of a death camp, Karski endures unspeakable mental anguish and physical torture to stand tall in the halls of power and speak the truth.
Monday, October 2nd, brings a Minnie Pearl documentary, “Facing the Laughter” and a documentary entitled “The Tuba Thieves,” about real-life thefts of that instrument in California.
Tuesday, October 3rd, is a day to do some streaming, with many options there.
Wednesday, October 4th is closing night at the Belcourt, featuring the film “Foe” with Saiorse Ronan, with a closing night party at Exit/In. Earlier, there is a documentary entitled “Silver Dollar Road,” also at the Belcourt, From Academy-Award Nominee Raoul Peck, Silver Dollar Road follows the story of the Reels family as told by the matriarch Mamie Reels Ellison and her niece Kim Renee Duhon, two fierce and clear-eyed women bending to safeguard valiantly their ancestors’ land and their brothers and uncles Melvin and Licurtis, who were wrongfully imprisoned for eight years – the longest sentence for civil contempt in North Carolina history.
After much vacillating, I committed to spending my entire Sunday, September 10th, in the streets of Chicago selling books at Printers’ Row.
I have done Printers’ Row with the Illinois Presswomen group for years, but last year, when I selected Sunday, it rained buckets. I took one look out the window and realized that we would not be journeying to Printers’ Row that day.
So, scratch Printers’ Row, 2022.
I had selected Sunday because it was $10 cheaper than Saturday, which was also true this year; it cost $130 to be present at the booth from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. My Presswomen group does not allow you to purchase half of the 8 hour time, which is unfortunate. I am good for 4 hours. In other years, have split up the time from 10 to 2 and 2 to 6, with me taking the late time. The plan was to pay me for ½ of the $130 fee when I showed up to relieve the first author in the morning slot.
This worked out well until the year before the downpour, when people who had said they would show up and man the booth from 10 to 2 bailed at the last minute. It was too late for me to secure another partner. This left me holding the bag
Ellie the Elephant and Elena Ashley.
for the entire day, which is exactly what happened this year. If I am “out” $65, I have a good chance of breaking even. Not so at $130.
I got up at 9 a.m. and was at the booth by 10 a.m.
By 2 p.m. I was ready to quit, but I continued until 5:05 p.m.
Considering that I am only able to stay awake for about four hours, this 9-hour shift pretty much wiped me out. I am not up to full strength after 33 radiation sessions for cancer. The Tamoxifen I have most recently been taking has a known side effect of extreme exhaustion. I just had blood work done on August 30th to determine why I am only really “alert” for 4 hours.
My spot at the table was between a fun African American group selling books for $10 (like me) with a “one book for $5” offer and the words “gasp” frequently repeated, and a woman with a large stuffed elephant, who gave me a handout that said her name was Dr. Elena Ashley. I asked the author to my left if she had ever taught school about three times. I never really received a response that pinned that down, although Ms. Ashley has written “A Teaching Guide for Educators and Parents.” The characters in her books are apparently named Splunkkunio Splunkey, Detective and Peacemaker and Big Bully Holly Howler, in addition to Ellie the Elephant.
The stuffed elephant was quite large and Dr. Ashley kept speaking in a high voice to simulate “Ellie the Elephant.” As someone who used to travel with a costumed Cat in the Hat, I understand the desire to attract children with such ploys (although, in my own case, it caused very small children to run screaming from the library!), but listening to someone talk in a high falsetto voice for 6 straight hours can really be a trial. I may have been heard to mutter “Just shoot me now” after five hours of Ellie the Elephant.
I didn’t have as much table space as the elephant lady, because she had gotten there first. At various times she had her husband and a young African American child pulled up to the table on chairs. I felt like you do on a crowded airplane flight when you have nowhere to put your feet, because you have stuffed your purse under the seat in front of you and other stuff under the middle seat. In my own case, I had a large yellow bag with prop-up things for my books and table cloths and change boxes and my charged Square device. All had to be stuffed under the table, because of the 3 occupied chairs to my left and behind me.
Most of the people in my vicinity complained that the price of parking their car had escalated dramatically from $20 to $80. My spouse dropped me off and picked me back up; that went well, saving us $80. I also took my own lunch, which probably saved me a large amount, also. As usual, Art Brauer, our President, had done a great job setting up the booth and providing water and chips. (Thanks, Art.)
I never anticipate making any money at Printers’ Row. My goal is always to break even and to participate. I can’t make many of the Presswomen meetings, so this is something I can and should do.
I met a lovely woman from LeClaire, who had actually read all 3 of my “The Color of Evil” novels and talked about her plans to open a bookstore/tequila bar in LeClaire once she retires from her duties teaching at Pleasant Valley High School. I also met a political science professor, who said he was considering using my “Obama’s Odyssey: The 2008 Race for the White House” (Vols. I & II) as a text in his classes. Both of these were nice developments, but, if you want to measure my day in dollars earned, I made $65, having spent $130. However, as mentioned, if this had been a “normal” year, my investment would have been ½ of the time, or $65, and that means I broke even, like most years.
A lot of work to just “break even” but I’m told I need to “get out there” more.
I also picked up about 10 new names for the mailing list, which is now topping 6,000 names.
I just watched the second GOP debate. I feel like I need a shower and a stiff drink. Maybe some ear plugs, too, since at least four of the seven candidates for the Republican nomination for president were usually talking at once.
As the MSNBC analysts pointed out, to hear these candidates tonight, the very worst thing that Donald J. Trump has done is to not show up for the GOP debate. No mention of his planning and executing a coup. No mention of his recent suggestion that General Mark Milley be executed or his willingness to let his VP be hanged on January 6th. This ignoring the elephant in the room seems to be the norm of the new Republican party. Tonight Trump took heat from several of the candidates, including Ron DeSantis, who had meticulously avoided criticizing Trump by name until tonight, but only for his failure to appear to shout over the others. No harsh words for the man about his 91 criminal indictments or how he was recently found guilty of decades of fraud in his business practices, other than wondering why he couldn’t be here this night to join in the general chaos and talk over the other candidates, which he most certainly would have done. (My daughter wanted to know when civility and behaving in a polite fashion while debating went out of style, and my answer was, “When the GOP elevated a con-man like Donald Trump to the top spot in their party.” Which, by the way, he still occupies, even if his hold on the party is tenuous as the charges against him mount.
While it took me over an hour to drive from the Field Museum to the North Clyburn Avenue location for a 6:30 p.m. meeting (i.e., during Rush Hour), I was able to park for free on the street and there are restaurants within the New City complex that could make killing time between films much easier. There weren’t many good places near the large AMC complex, and the good ones like P.J. O’Rourkes often closed.
The stuffed elephant was quite large and Dr. Ashley kept speaking in a high voice to simulate “Ellie the Elephant.” As someone who used to travel with a costumed Cat in the Hat, I understand the desire to attract children with such ploys (although, in my own case, it caused very small children to run screaming from the library!), but listening to someone talk in a high falsetto voice for 6 straight hours can really be a trial. I may have been heard to mutter “Just shoot me now” after five hours of Ellie the Elephant.