The comedian Andy Kaufman refused to play somebody who was drunk or stoned, dismissing it is cheap way to get laughs. The Thin Man is a critically-revered film that I feel validates that belief. I was shocked I could feel anything less than love for a movie with this pedigree. The top-billed stars are William […]
Movie: Shazam! (2019)
My wife and I have a strong affinity with a small town in southern West Virginia named Hinton. The town has a vintage, single-screen movie theater which we always wanted to see a movie in, except it was never showing anything we wanted to see when we were visiting the town. Although we are not […]
Movie: Paper Moon (1973)
This movie should have been crap. Overwrought, sentimental, melodramatic crap. In the depression-era great plains, a con man and a nine-year-old girl he claims isn’t his daughter (but most certainly is) squabble and do various cons in an effort to get her to the girl’s only remaining known (emphasis on known) family in St. Joseph, […]
Movie: Train To Busan (2016) / Peninsula (2020)
I was so done with zombies. In the 90s, I found myself a little ahead of the curve when I decided to see Dawn Of The Dead, after reading intriguing stories about the production in journalist Chet Flipo’s Everybody Was Kung-Fu Dancing. Pretty soon, I was renting all kinds of tapes on the horror shelves […]
How to take a certification exam
Last year, I obtained a professional certification that is much desired in the industry in which I work. The certification itself doesn’t matter, and I am not going to name it here. Altogether, it took roughly a year to pass a series of exams that take most people two to five years to complete. This […]
Movie: How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying (1967)
Did you wistfully watch Mad Men, secretly longing for the days of long rows of desks on floor after floor of entirely glass-fronted skyscrapers in New York City? Does old advertising for, and items related to, Pan Am airlines have you despairing over the current state of air travel, which is basically a bus with […]
Movie: No Highway In The Sky (1951)
I’m trying to write this essay while still reeling from this movie. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it feels like I walked away from a plane crash but, well, I’m not sure what to say right now. I went into this with zero expectations. I didn’t even know what is was about. […]
Movie: 48 Hrs. (1982)
Isn’t it strange how there can be some wildly popular movies it just happens you have never seen? Movies you weren’t actively trying to avoid, but they somehow always remained on the periphery of potential films to watch. For me, one of those movies was 1982’s 48 Hrs. I was in elementary school when this […]
Music: Burning Bridges by Naked Eyes (1983)
Isn’t it strange that something from decades prior can seem to foretell the sound of some modern music when, in actuality, that contemporary music is a throwback to an earlier sound? As I write this, we are still deep in the throes of 80’s nostalgia. Having lived through that decade, I now understand why my […]
Book: Shit, Actually (Lindy West, 2010)
I am a huge fan of Rifftrax and Mystery Science Theatre 3000. One aspect of Rifftrax I especially like is they often have additional riffers beyond their legacy group of three guys formerly of MST3K. They don’t have many female riffers, but the ones they do use on a regular basis are phenomenal: Bridget Nelson, […]