Short Takes
June 16, 2010
Escapes: There’s Even Popcorn & Air-Conditioning
Summer. Brain rot rules the sixplex. Is there any movie worth seeing? Two. First up: "Winter’s Bone," my favorite movie of the year. (To read my rave and find a theater, click here.)
And not to overlook: "The Secret in Their Eyes." From Argentina. It won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Playing in cities now. Like "Winter’s Bone," well worth a car trip, if necessary.
June 14, 2010
“Don’t Stop Believing”
Jonathan Alter writes: “Obama had just gotten back from Asia, and he said that he had just spoken with the President of South Korea who had told him that his biggest problem that he was facing domestically that the parents were very concerned that their kids were only learning English starting in 2nd grade and not in 1st grade and he was under pressure to import thousands of new English teachers. And Obama says, ‘This is what we’re up against in international competition.’ And then he left that session and did interviews with the American press and all they wanted to know was: ‘Had he read Sarah Palin’s book?’ And then he shook his head and, I’ll never forget that, he shook his head in dismay and kind of muttering said, ‘True story. True story.’”When I read that, I thought there must be thousands of stories with the same punch line: The American Empire just loves quicksand. And then I see something like this — kids at Ohio State creating a flash mob as they perform a neatly choreographed version of “Don’t Stop Believing” — and I think, “How great, how fun.” (Thanks, Linda.)June 14, 2010
George Steinbrenner: Bullyball
I reviewed "Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball" for Bloomberg Business Week. It was a splendid opportunity to be kind to the failing 80-year-old majority owner of the New York Yankees. I didn’t take it. Read it here.
June 7, 2010
When Daddy Fails: ‘The Unavailable Father’
Sarah Simms Rosenthal’s father could be witty and warm. But she always had to tiptoe around him; when he was in a bad mood, his rage filled the room, and, more often than not, it was directed against her. Their “broken” father-daughter relationship cost her plenty — a predictably heavy loss of security and love. So it was probably inevitable that she grew up to earn a PhD. in social work and gravitate to patients who shared her issue. Now she’s written "The Unavailable Father" (published as a paperback and in a Kindle edition). It’s a straightforward self-help book — Rosenthal identifies six flavors of absentee fathers (disapproving, mentally ill, substance-abusing, unreliable, abusive and absent), presents case histories and suggests paths to recovery — that should kickstart healing for confused and damaged women. For an overview, visit her web site.
June 6, 2010
Stieg Larsson’s Last Interview
Three weeks before he died — and long before The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was published — the then-unknown novelist spoke with a journalist. Among the revelations Stieg Larsson shared: “I thought of Pippi Longstocking.”
