Chris Barsanti's Blog, page 169

Reader’s Corner: When Faulkner Reviewed Hemingway

William Faulkner, 1954 (Library of Congress)

Ernest Hemingway had no problem withexpounding onhis talent, courage, or general manliness. To nobody’s surprise, this didn’t arise from a well of confidencebut rather one of rabid insecurity. Just see his rivalry with F. Scott Fitzgerald, and all those petty little put-downs inA Moveable Feast.

Papa Hemingway also scrapped (albeit in a mildly literary way) with the other big prize-winning author of his time, William Faulkner. They respected each oth...

New in Theaters: ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ Features Yet More Apes

Caesar leads his primate army in ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ (Twentieth Century Fox)

The ever-expanding world of sci-fi reboots gets another entry withDawn of the Planet of the Apes, which rejiggersthemes and even a few climactic scenes from the raggedy 1970s series (Conquest of…,Battle for…, etc.) only without much satirical intent.Like 2011′s admittedly lamerRise of the Planet of the Apes,none of it manages to stand out except, again, for Andy Serkis’ regal, affecting, and soulful perfo...

Department of Weekend Reading: July 11, 2014

So you can be homophobic to your workers, as long as your discrimination is religion-based.
The classic rock era defined: The Beatles to Nirvana, that’s it.
Libertarian magazine poll finds that Millennials are quitelibertarian, sorta.
Get yer freeNew Yorker articles here.
Goldman Sachs, less awesome at predicting football scores than might have been imagined.
Dr. Zhivago as Cold War pawn.
This time, regardingGaza, the world is too worn out to care.
Copy of Das Kapital sells for $40,000.
Todd Akin, no...

New in Theaters: ‘Boyhood’ is Magic

Ellar Coltrane in ‘Boyhood’ (IFC Films)

Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, theBefore trilogy) spent twelve years shooting a movieabout a boy growing up in Texas with divorced parents, filming the actors as they naturally aged. It’s an experiment, yes, following this kid from age six to his first day at college, but one that pays off rich dividendsmore often than not.

Boyhoodopens in limited release this weekand should creep into moretheaters around the country over the summer. My review is...

Reader’s Corner: The Headless Woman and Other Femme Cover Cliches

For the 50th anniversary of Sylvia Plath’s iconicThe Bell Jar, normally sane British publisher Faber & Faber decided to gussy up the thing with a cover that was thought to be more … ahem … marketable. The result was downright degrading, looking like some pandering chick-lit nonsense about shopping and getting the guy.

This isn’t a new thing, as any even casual peruser of bookstore stacks has come to know, and as Eugenia Williamson examines in a piece for the Boston Globe.Bookswith male authors...

Quote of the Day: FDR, American

Being the fourth of July, it seems appropriate to celebrate not just the country itself but one of its greatest leaders. Consider this quote from Franklin Delano Roosevelt, apparentlydelivered during his 1932 presidential campaign:

Judge me by the enemies I have made.

A full accountingof FDR’s enemies would take an encyclopedia, but here’s a brief one:

Huey Long — corrupt Louisiana governor
Father Charles Coughlin —anti-Semiticdemagogue
Charles Lindbergh— fasciststoogeand Nazi sympathizer
Right-win...

Department of Holiday Reading: July 3, 2014

“Facebook is using us as lab rats,” more than usual, at least.
Playing the room-escape game in Budapest.
So whenHarper’s playsThe Paris Review in softball, who wins?
This week in millennial news: “…[the midterm elections are]the World Cup for old Republicans.“
The mystery of Edinburgh’s seventeen tiny “fairy” coffins.
First, elect a socialist president; second, institute national healthcare; third, soccer.
Hey, Bill Kristol, why don’tyou join the Iraqi Army?
Part of the reason your rent is so damnhi...

Reader’s Corner: Wilfred Owen’s War Poetry

German soldiers on the Western Front lucky enough to have been taken prisoner (Library of Congress)

This Saturday June 28 marked one of the year’s uglier anniversaries: 100 years since the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was gunned down in Sarajevo, helping to topple that teetering Rube Goldberg contraption of treaties and animosities that started World War I.

More books will be written about the causes of the war, the way it was fought, the aftermath, and so on. Relatively fewof those books’pages wil...

New in Theaters: ‘The Internet’s Own Boy’ Probes Activist’s Suicide

Aaron Swartz: ‘The Internet’s Own Boy’ (Filmbuff)

Netzien Aaron Swartz’s suicide was a rallying cry for many in the tightly-wired community of online activists. The story ofthis 26-year-old’s short, dramatic, impassioned life makes up the new activist documentaryThe Internet’s Own Boy.

The Internet’s Own Boyis playing now in limited release. My review is atFilm Journal International:

Maybe it’s something about Boston. For the second time this summer we’re seeing a documentary hinging on bad beha...

Department of Weekend Reading: June 27, 2014

Kanye West’sDune? Never say never, especially after this.
This is how French nightclubs look during the day.
The late Tom Clancy “qualifies as a great writer in the same sense that Texas senator Ted Cruz qualifies as a great orator.”
End the , finally.
Facebook still the king of the teenage time-suck.
Thad “nicest guy in the Senate” Cochran, southern gentleman amid the braying demagogues.
New Pope, tryingto finally untangle the church and organized crime,excommunicates the Mafia.
Too...