Chris Barsanti's Blog, page 12
September 1, 2024
Screening Room: ‘Punishment Park’
I took a look back at the little-seen 1971 documentary Punishment Park in Eyes Wide Open: In this faux documentary — imagined as the footage of a British news crew — the U.S. has created a network of internment centers called Punishment Parks to deal with prison overcrowding and help train law enforcement… Here’s the …
Writer’s Desk: Work to Create
In the 1970s, Philip Glass had become an American composer to watch. Celebrated and also vilified, his minimalist work got attention. But it didn’t pay the bills. In fact, Glass lost money pretty much every time he took his ensemble on tour. So how did he get by? The son of Baltimore immigrants, Glass did …
August 31, 2024
Screening Room: ‘Apocalypse in the Tropics’
My review of the new documentary Apocalypse in the Tropics (which just screened at both Venice and Telluride film festivals), was published in The Playlist: It might be challenging for some viewers to take activists seriously when they are speaking in tongues. But that is exactly what Petra Costa does in her edgy yet empathetic documentary ‘Apocalypse in …
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August 24, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Writing Solves Problems
When she was a teenager, Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickel and Dimed) started journaling, as many of us do. After penning the usual things (what was happening in her life, thoughts about books she was reading), she realized there was a purpose for the journal. It was a tool. As she wrote in Granta: I had discovered …
August 19, 2024
Screening Room: ‘Between the Temples’
The new comedy Between the Temples opens later this week in limited release. Find it if you can. My review is at PopMatters: There is an honesty to Nathan Silver’s Between the Temples which belies the stylistic flourishes and alt-comedy sensibility. Moment after moment provides grist for some great epiphany or cute punchline that never quite comes. …
August 18, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Keep Things Vague
In 1972, Jorge Luis Borges was a sage of literature. Seventy years old, blind, and feted around the world for his delicately phantasmagoric fiction, he was visited by Fernando Sorrentino, a dedicated fan. They talked for a week. Here’s a piece of advice Borges gave Sorrentino, noted by Faena Aleph: I believe that a writer …
August 11, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Don’t Be Afraid of the Fear
At some point it gets easier. Eventually you have written enough that the panic and indecision just disappears. At that point, the words flow like fine wine. Isn’t that how it works? Not necessarily. Consider Rita Dove. A Pulitzer-winning poet and recipient of the National Humanities Medal, she was also the U.S. Poet Laureate from …
August 8, 2024
Shameless Self-Promotion: ‘The Writer’s Year 2025’ on Sale Now
As mentioned a few weeks back, I decided it was time to put all these writing tips and quotes into printed form. Fortunately, the good folks at Workman Publishing agreed. That is why as of this week, you can now get your very own copy of The Writer’s Year: 365 Days of Inspiration, Prompts, and …
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August 4, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Love, Luck, and Endurance
James Baldwin’s one hundredth birthday was this week. Here is what Baldwin said about what makes a writer successful: Talent is insignificant. I know a lot of talented ruins. So what does it take? Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance.
July 28, 2024
Writer’s Desk: How Do Ordinary Humans Sound?
Dorothy L. Sayers, one of the great crime writers, was once asked by a man how she wrote such realistic dialogue between male characters. Did she have a big family or a lot of male friends? Her answer was to the point: I replied that I had coped with this difficult problem by making my …
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