The Long Road Out

I want to live and thrive in a diverse community.   That's one of the reasons I live in New York City.   Often, people comment that I'm in a "bubble" here--protected from the most overt forms of racism supposedly more common in most of the rest of the United States. Leaving aside the fact that New York City has its own versions of racial problems, I'm glad to be part of the bubble and wouldn't consider moving back to any other part of the country as my home.   Montreal, perhaps.   Or Paris.   But never elsewhere in the States. So I'm sad to report that the free-for-all released by the election of a pathological egotist by the part of our electorate he panders to has pierced the New York world--both in image and reality.   In the last two days: A Japanese theater acquaintance was called a "gook" as she walked down West 13th Street in the Village to her home.   She posted notes describing this pleasant exchange on Facebook. At the W 79th an...

I suspect 2016 will be remembered as a year of good indie films--there were a lot of them (here's my list of best films of 2016 ), thank goodness.   The blockbusters weren't spectacular--in fact, if LaLa Land wins, it will really be because most of the voters didn't bother to see Moonlight .  But this year did offer some truly awful films that came apart at the seams in ways that no one could predict.   Look at these disasters and steer very far away! Silence --you're kidding right?   Scorcesee's apologia for the Jesuits and the Pope?  Like we need this now?   I already knew that Buddhism isn't all incense and yogic charm.  But don't hide behind that to do a puff piece for Rome.  Apparently, 17th century Japanese citizens needed better dentists, or so we learn here.  Beyond that...damaging. A Bigger Splash -- Luca Guadagnino  cannot tell stories nor develop characters.   Why do people keep giving him money to make films...

Trump represents everything I hate about my country.   How bizarre that after all these years the pacifist left has to hold on to the slim hope that Trump is simply as inept as he's always been--a weak and failed business person, a morally confused human, and an intellect slowed by too many dumb companions. These are the things I hate about America: We are the world's worst bully .   You have to go a pretty long way to hit number 2, which is probably Israel, and then 3, which might be Russia?   It's a multi-country tie for fourth--and the list pretty much parallels the list of weapons exporters.  We continue to be the leading seller of lethal firepower into the world's murder zones.   We earn extra points from our history of diplomatic hanky-panky and the per cent of our GDP invested in covert militarism and surveillance.   We believe we're exceptional .   Dudes, we're not in the top 20 in ANY category normally identified as indicators of civiliz...

Two guys sitting behind me on the last PHX-JFK flight last night, four bourbons in, got into a heated discussion about whether “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” or “Sympathy for the Devil” was the greatest Stones song ever.    They were drunk and stupid (to give you an indication, at one point one guy said “how about this song?” and started humming what I think was Scarlet Begonia—which was confirmed when the other guy said “dude, that’s not the Stones.   That’s the Grateful Dead.”). But something about the conversation made me tear up…   Good thing I was flying by myself because my partner or my friends probably would have questioned why I was crying on American Airlines.