Paul Levinson's Blog: Levinson at Large, page 198

Knightfall 1.5: Shrewd De Nogaret

Actually, in Knightfall 1.5 last night, the King's adviser De Nogaret proved to be more than shrewd.  He's shaping up as a stone-cold genius in pulling the strings to get the King and France to do things his way.

As we previously saw, he was no fan of the Princess marrying the Catalonian Prince.  De Nogaret at very least sees his best future (and, at this point, I guess we can say that's also what he sees as best for France) as the Princess marrying English royalty.  So, what does he do about the French and Catalonian marriage, literally on the verge of happening?  He fakes his own near-death, and sets up the Catalonian to be killed by a female Mongolian ninja wielding Greek fire.

That's cool in all kinds of ways.  First, ninjas were Japanese men.  So a woman from Mongolia taking this assassin's role is a somewhat fantastical development - but also consistent with the mythological motif that runs through the Templars already.   And, although Greek fire was legendary, it was as real as death, and its development by the Eastern Roman Empire aka the Byzantines helped them keep off attackers of all sorts for a thousand years after the Western Roman Empire fell.

I'm also really liking the fine tuning of relationships among Landry, Gawain, and Tancrede.  Each Templar is different yet utterly devoted to the cause and convinced of the superiority of his own instincts and analyses.   This tripartite leadership makes for some riveting scenes, as when Landry and Gawain, after making Tancrede literally run the gauntlet, turn to him for help in identifying the assassin (unfortunately not in time to stop her).

Lots of good story ahead in this excellent series.

See also: Knightfall 1.1: Possibilities ... Knightfall 1.2: Grail and Tinder ... Knightfall 1.3: Baby ... Knightfall 1.4: Parentage


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Snowy Days and Libraries

looking out our front window a few minutes agoNew York City and points north, west, and south have "blizzard-like conditions" today.  I almost always like these days, because, hey, I'm a professor (at Fordham University in the Bronx) and we like the schools being closed every bit as much as do the students.  And with the Web, you have all the connectivity you need to the world, without going out of your house.   But it wasn't always that way ...

Back in the mid-1960s, I lived in the Bronx, was a student at CCNY around 137th Street in Manhattan, and I worked as a clerk at the George Bruce Branch Library on 125th Street in Harlem.  That was a trip in itself.  I often got lunch at a Chinese restaurant on Broadway, where 25 cents bought a big plate of chou mien, with tea, and an orange slice for dessert.  One of the librarians at the library was Ruth Delany.  When she discovered my love of science fiction - which I read every time I was on any kind of break - she told me about her son, Sam Delany, who was just starting out as a science fiction author.  Little did I know then he would be named Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America in 2013, and I would have the privilege of participating in his selection, since I was a former President of SFWA (1998-2001).

But back to the snow.  More than one blizzard hit the city in the mid-1960s, one of them on a day I was supposed to work at the George Bruce Branch.   CCNY was closed, but the trains were running on a limited schedule, and the library was open.  It had to be.  In those days, although we all had radio and television, a blizzard meant no newspaper delivery, and nothing to read unless it was already in your home.  I called the George Bruce Branch.  Mrs. Delany wasn't in, but the librarian I spoke to told me to go to my local branch - the New York Public Library had intelligently decided that the best way to keep all its branches up and running in the blizzard was have its personnel - librarians (ran the library), clerks (checked out books), and pages (shelved books) - report to work at whatever branch they could walk to.  That, for me, would be the Allerton Branch, about a 10-minute walk from where we lived on Bronx Park East, right around the corner from my Grandma Sarah (who had moved to our neighborhood after decades on the Grand Concourse), and around other corners from my friends Jordie Axelrad and Paul Gorman (Gorman was in several of my rock 'n' roll singing groups back then - here's a home recording of one of our groups, The Transits (which I named after the New York Transit Authority, which ran the trains in those days), singing I Only Want You).

I knew the Allerton Branch well, and loved it.  I used to take every book they had on dinosaurs out for as long as I could.  And when Mrs. Dayson, the librarian at my Junior High School 135, banned me from the school library because all I ever read was science fiction (more details about this here, I should also mention that I dedicated the Kindle edition of The Consciousness Plague to Mrs. Dayson), I brought my wonderful reading obsession to the Allerton Library, and read every science fiction book they had on their shelves.   Indeed, it was there that I first encountered Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy, to this day still my favorite science fiction on the page.  (I wrote to him with my analysis of the trilogy, and he sent me this postcard with his response.)

So I was more than happy to go back to the Allerton Branch Library in that blizzard in the 1960s.  Looking back on that time now, it's clear that society had a sensitivity, or at the New York Public Library did, that may no longer be with us.  The idea of having workers report to the local branches during the blizzard was brilliant - it kept the libraries open to the public on a day when they were especially needed, and they allowed people who worked at the library not to miss a work day and the pay that it brought.

Here's a toast across time to whoever came up with that plan.  And for everyone else - enjoy the snow, whatever you may be reading, and wherever you may be reading it.




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Vikings 5.7: A Looming Trojan-War Battle, Vikings Style, and Two Beautiful Stories

The main part of Vikings 5.7 set the table for the battle that will tear the world of Ragnar apart - the battle between his sons, the battle that will pit his first wife against, in effect, Athelstan's successor, the battle whose outcome is still so difficult to predict.

And that's because, not only are the sides evenly matched, but there are betrayals and regrets under the surface in both camps.  Harald's queen, now that she's pregnant with his child, must be having second thoughts about getting word of his attack to Lagertha (unless she's unsure of the father, since she was repeatedly raped, in which case it's hard to fathom what she is feeling, except unhappiness at her pregnancy).  And back in Lagertha's camp, Ubbe's being politically propositioned by his lover to let Ivar kill Bjorn and Lagertha, because (somehow) that would result in Ubbe becoming King (but only if Ivar and Harald were also killed, so she wants just about all the major players killed).

It's good to see Bjorn back home, and his union with the Sami princess is welcome.  For that reason alone - it would good to see how their relationship develops - I'd hate to see Bjorn killed in this upcoming Achilles vs. Hector battle, where I can't say which of the Vikings are which Greek or Trojan.

And while this is going on, we get two beautiful stories away from home.  One is Floki and his followers - some who see the light, others who don't - in Iceland, where his talk of no king speaks to Iceland being the first country to have a political party created and completely led by women in our real history.  And in between Iceland and Norway, it was great to see Athestan's son, a prince, return to Lindisfarne.

And I'll return next week with a report on the great battle (which is what I said last week, I know, but there are only so many episodes left in this excellent season, so I'll have to be right sooner or later).

See also Vikings 5.1-2: Floki in Iceland ... Vikings 5.3: Laughing Ivar ...Vikings 5.4: Four of More Good Stories ... Vikings 5.5: Meet Lawrence of Arabia ... Vikings 5.6: Meanwhile, Back Home ...

And see also Vikings 4.1: I'll Still Take Paris ... Vikings 4.2: Sacred Texts ...Vikings 4.4: Speaking the Language ... Vikings 4.5: Knives ... Vikings 4.8: Ships Up Cliff ... Vikings 4.10: "God Bless Paris" ... Vikings 4.11: Ragnar's Sons ... Vikings 4.12: Two Expeditions ... Vikings 4.13: Family ... Vikings 4.14: Penultimate Ragnar? ... Vikings 4.15: Close of an Era ... Vikings 1.16: Musselman ... Vikings 1.17: Ivar's Wheels ...Vikings 1.18: The Beginning of Revenge ... Vikings 4.19: On the Verge of History ... Vikings 4.20: Ends and Starts

And see also Vikings 3.1. Fighting and Farming ... Vikings 3.2: Leonard Nimoy ...Vikings 3.3: We'll Always Have Paris ... Vikings 3.4: They Call Me the Wanderer ... Vikings 3.5: Massacre ... Vikings 3.6: Athelstan and Floki ...Vikings 3.7: At the Gates ... Vikings 3.8: Battle for Paris ... Vikings 3.9: The Conquered ... Vikings Season 3 Finale: Normandy

And see also Vikings 2.1-2: Upping the Ante of Conquest ... Vikings 2.4: Wise King ... Vikings 2.5: Caught in the Middle ... Vikings 2.6: The Guardians ...Vikings 2.7: Volatile Mix ... Vikings 2.8: Great Post-Apocalyptic Narrative ... Vikings Season 2 Finale: Satisfying, Surprising, Superb

And see also Vikings ... Vikings 1.2: Lindisfarne ... Vikings 1.3: The Priest ... Vikings 1.4:  Twist and Testudo ... Vikings 1.5: Freud and Family ... Vikings 1.7: Religion and Battle ... Vikings 1.8: Sacrifice
... Vikings Season 1 Finale: Below the Ash

 
historical science fiction - a little further back in time

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Major Crimes Comes To An End

Major Crimes comes to an end next week - on TNT television, that is, not in our world, which is why Major Crimes is in italics and initial caps, and why its passing is an occasion for regret not jubilation.

It’s been an unlikely and really good series. Kyra Sedgwick was outstanding as the police head of her unit closer in The Closer . What were the chances that she could leave the show, be replaced by a character who started as her opponent, with the rest of the cast the same, and we get an equally impressive and different top-notch police show?
Mary McDonnell who replaced Sedgwick with her own power and charm equalized the odds, and the tightly plotted cases that followed were a treat for the intellect. In addition, evil masterminds like Stroh who strode across seasons tied the characters and episodes together.  G. W. Bailey’s Lt. Provenza and Tony Denison’s Lt. Flynn were even more impressive in the second series, and Raymond Cruz created a truly memorable character with his Detective then Sgt. Julio Sanchez, as did Michael Paul Chan as Det. Lt. Mike Tao.
They’ve been some real surprises in the past few hours and I don’t want to spoil any of that for you. So I’ll recommend Major Crimes for your viewing, and The Closer before that. Take your time, you’ll be in for a treat. And don’t miss the finale next Tuesday!


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Chance: Couch to Action

First television review of 2018:  What more could you ask for?  Hugh Laurie playing a specialized shrink, with a fondness for William James, a penchant for not just treating his patients' maladies but doing something about them in the real world - that is, punishing some of the people who are physically abusing his patients - and an accomplice who is at once street smart, enormously capable in the martial arts, and has the keenest sense of injustice and what to do about it you've ever seen on the screen.   Welcome to Chance - the shrink - and D (short for Darius) as his partner in righting wrongs.

But lest you think that Chance is some kind of super-hero show, it's also the furthest thing from it, as Chance and D ultimately have only their flawed and all-too-human strengths to rely upon.  They take chances all the time - which makes the series especially aptly named - and sometimes fail in their endeavors.

The acting by Laurie as Chance is superb - not surprising - and Ethan Suplee as D (first time I've seen this actor, or recall seeing him) was outstanding.  The supporting acting was great, too, with Clarke Peters, who was excellent in The Wire and everything since, putting in a fine performance as D's employer (an antique dealer), and Stefania LaVie Owen just right as Nicole Chance, who takes after her father in all kinds of ways.   On fathers and daughters, we've seen this before in many a television series - Lie to Me, Californication, and Bosch are three that come immediately to mind - but Chance and his daughter have the most riveting storyline.

The first two seasons are both entirely different yet deftly woven together.   Chance falls in love with a likely psycho - fetchingly played by Gretchen Mol - in the first season, and hunts a straight-up psycho with much more to his story in the second season.  Highly recommended for fans of detective, shrink, and Hugh Laurie shows - you won't be disappointed, and you'll be eagerly awaiting a third season on Hulu, as am I.

winner Locus Award for best first novel ... introducing Dr. Phil D'Amato
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Videos of My Music on YouTube

YouTube has more than 80 videos of my music - posted over the years by me and other people I know, don't know, and am getting to know.  Thought I'd start the New Year by posting each of them, one per day, on Twitter.  I'll likely discover more as the year progresses, and I'll post links to them, too.

This page will be a list, updated daily, of each video I post on your YouTube, for those who would like to keep track.  A more or less complete discography is here, and lyrics to some of my songs are here.

1. 1 January 2018: Today Is Just Like You, from my 1972 album Twice Upon a Rhyme, words and music by Paul Levinson, April 1969; also recorded by Sundial Symphony (Robbie Rist and Don Frankel) in 2015 (that video will be listed here, likely sometime in February 2018). Paul Levinson's books ... Paul Levinson's music

Review of Rob Sheffield's Dreaming the Beatles 20 of X: "All Things Must Pass"

What better way to conclude the year than with a review of the next section of Rob Sheffield's Dreaming the Beatles, which has accompanied me for more than half a year now, as I read the book bit by bit, with still more to follow, I'm glad to say, in 2018.  This is the case - what better way - even though we're knocking on the door of the saddest part of the story, and indeed are already there.

Sheffield presents a grimmer than usual portrait of George Harrison in 1970s, after the Beatles disbanded.  He's dissolute, unable to hit his notes or remember his lyrics, verbally happy about the breakup but ravaged by cocaine and booze.  I knew none of this in the 70s.  I was beginning to pull away from music by the middle of the decade, and wouldn't regain my daily proximity until, well ... this very year, and the coming of the Beatles Channel on Sirius XM Radio (not just the music but priceless I-was-there commentary by Peter Asher on his "From Me To You" show) all stoked by Sheffield's book.

I'd heard "All Things Must Pass" in 1970s, but didn't recognize it for what it was until 2008, when I was finishing up the first edition of New New Media, and chose "All Things Must Pass" as, ironically, a perfect example of the immortality of music on YouTube, or of some great things never passing.

Sheffield cites someone who says "All Things Must Pass" is the "wisest" song the Beatles never included on album (they decided not include it on Let It Be).  He agrees, and judges it one of the very best of the Beatles songs released to the world after the group broke up.  I'd agree, and would go a little further.

First, along with "Taxman," I think "All the Things Must Pass" is among the best Beatle songs ever written by members of the group during and after they were together.  The lyric is in a class by itself, and couldn't have been written by Lennon or McCartney, or by Lennon and McCartney, either.  If Harrison was significantly responsible for the Beatles, in his way as much as Lennon or McCartney, "All Things Must Pass," with its wisdom, sensitivity, and cutting edge, tell us why.  It is at least as extraordinary as the closest Lennon and McCartney songs in theme, which I guess would be "Across the Universe," "Long and Winding Road," and "Two of Us".

Ironically but indicatively, the best performance of "All Things Must Pass" now on video is at the George 2002 memorial concert, and is sung just perfectly by Paul. (And, of course, I can't now find this video on YouTube - here it is on Vimeo.) (If your soul doesn't get choked up watching this video, you're not fully human.) The song indeed passed, but unto another Beatle, and therein the future at large, and humanity both here and now on Planet Earth and in the future in the stars.

Happy New Year everyone - I'll see you here next year, very soon, with more reviews of this superb book.

See also Review of Rob Sheffield's Dreaming the Beatles 1 of X: The Love Affair ... 2 of X: The Heroine with a Thousand Faces ... 3 of X: Dear Beatles ... 4 of X: Paradox George ... 5 of X: The Power of Yeah ... 6 of X: The Case for Ringo ... 7 of X: Anatomy of a Ride ... 8 of X: Rubber Soul on July 4 ... 9 of X: Covers ... 10 of X: I. A. Richards ... 11 of X: Underrated Revolver ... 12 of X: Sgt. Pepper ... 13 of X: Beatles vs. Stones ... 14 of X: Unending 60s ... 15 of x: Voting for McCartney, Again ... 16 of x: "I'm in Love, with Marsha Cup" ... 17 of X: The Split ... 18 of X: "Absolute Elsewhere" ... 19 of X: (Unnecessary but Brilliant) Defense of McCartney


 
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6 Years, 4 Months & 23 Days: Neat 14 Minutes

And my last review of a short film on Amazon Prime for the evening - not sure yet if it's for the year - this time of 6 Years, 4 Months & 23 Days.  First, as you may know, I tend to review mostly time travel, and if not time travel, some kind of science fiction when it comes to short films.  Because ... well, life's too short not to (and time travel has always been my favorite genre, with science in general my next).  But sometimes the title of a short film suggests that it could be about time travel.  So I watch it ... and if it turns out it isn't about time travel at all, but I enjoy it as much as I do a good little time travel story, then ... I give it a review.

That doesn't happen too often, but it did earlier today with The Weekend, a memorable vignette of a couple who connect over a weekend.  And lightning struck twice today, with my viewing of 6 Years, 4 Months & 23 Days a little while ago, a neat and expressive untangling of modern life that unfolds on the screen in just 14 minutes.

The time in the title is the amount of time that our hero, David (well played by John Mawson - who's been on Outlander! - and who also wrote this) has gone without sex - because his wife was in a coma and then died due to the car accident that David who had been drinking got them into.  The night before the short film begins, David's in a bar.  He puts on a hat which makes him look younger, and winds up in bed with a dancer half his age (good job by Augie Duke).  They wake up the next morning, she's shocked at his age, and that's when the complications and the fun ensues.

There's a heart-warming quality to this narrative, and a mix of humor and profundity that reminds me of Neil Simon, though I'm so old myself that I can't recall the last time I saw one his plays (definitely more than 6 years ago).  In any case, one of the benefits of the Internet, and of Amazon Prime in particular, is you don't have to go to Broadway to see the story, and in fact you can see it on your screen, for free, any time night or day.

So don't wait 6 years or even 23 days to see this.  And if you wake up on New Year's Day with someone half your age in bed, someone you met just the night before - well, this movie is especially just the thing for you to see.

 

It started in the hot summer of 1960, when Marilyn Monroe walked off the set of The Misfits and began to hear a haunting song in her head, "Goodbye Norma Jean" ...



 
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The Weekend: Ala McLuhan

Hey, The Weekend (a 20-minute short from 2016 on Amazon Prime) isn't about time travel - though it is reminiscent in more than the title of the 1945 classic The Lost Weekend (which actually isn't about a time travel either, though its title is suggestive) - and it's not even science fiction.  But The Weekend is nonetheless sensitive, well written and portrayed, and definitely worth watching.

It tells the story of a guy, recently jilted, who takes in a woman he meets on a walkway by a beach. She offers him French fries, he declines, but changes his mind, and off we go.

I won't tell you any more of the story, so you can enjoy seeing it yourself.  I will say that, except for one big thing, the story is about nothing - other than two souls brushing against each other, somehow finding a few days of peace in the noise and craziness of the real world all around us, and that's everything.

A short like this - the epitome of McLuhan's cool, because it bids you, the viewer, to fill so much of it in with your own thoughts and feelings (see McLuhan in an Age of Social Media for more) - is absolutely dependent on the acting. Danielle Guldin is quietly outstanding as Chloe, the bearer of the French fries, and Taso Mikroulis is just right as the guy.

The Weekend takes place in New York City.  The shore and the apartment could be anywhere, and there's just one small shopping-for-groceries scene where the street is clearly in the city, but somehow New York City is very much a part of this short film, which somehow also gives it a kinship in my mind to some of the work of Woody Allen.  All of which is to say that Dennis Cahlo, who wrote, directed, and has a cameo in The Weekend, did a fine job indeed with this movie.


 

It started in the hot summer of 1960, when Marilyn Monroe walked off the set of The Misfits and began to hear a haunting song in her head, "Goodbye Norma Jean" ...



 
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Chronological Order: Door to the Past, Literally

Chronological Order, the 2010 feature-length movie I just saw on Amazon Prime, certainly deserves an award, which would be for the most unlikely time-travel device I've ever come across on page or screen.  That would be a door that our protagonist, a guy by the name of Guy, finds floating in the ocean.  He and we soon learn that when he stands it up and walks through it, he walks a little or longer into the past.

That's a great set-up for a time-travel story in the science fantasy genre.  But the execution and development leaves a lot to be desired.  I'm always up for a low-key, slice-of-life presentation.  But Chronological Order is so low-key as to seem desultory, and although this reflects the persona and the predicament on the protagonist, it also makes it difficult for the viewer to keep focus or even, in my case, continuing interest.

Nonetheless, Chronological Order does have something, in its unusual set-up and even its meandering pace.  Lurking behind everything Guy does is the question of free will, which comes up whenever the time traveler in the present sees himself in the future, or when the unknowing time traveler in the past (before his present self has traveled to the past) sees his present self in the past for the first time.  If I'm wearing a blue shirt today, and I travel to the past to yesterday, where I see myself wearing that blue shirt, does that mean I in yesterday will have no choice but to put on that blue shirt when I get dressed today?  If the answer is yes, that negates or erases my free will to put on whatever shirt I please.

Guy wears lots of shirts in Chronological Order, and grapples with rather than explicates the inherent problem of free will in this story.  Just to be clear: I'm a firm believer in free will.  I don't believe it's a necessary illusion of intelligent life.  And it's one reason (in addition to the grandfather paradox, which can only be solved by the multiple-universe hypothesis, even more incredible than time travel) that I think time travel is impossible, whether low-key and unfocused or keenly drawn on a razor's edge.  Though, I've always admired a point that Chance (played by Hugh Laurie) made in the first season of that series on Hulu last year, "Someone once asked William James if he believed in Free Will. 'Of course,' James replied. 'What choice do I have?'"


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