Liars and Saints

  One of my favorite movies this year was "Wake Up Dead Man"; it's exuberant and inventive. It borrows from P.D. James--with the writer having recognized that a "faith community" is an ideal setting for a murder story. It reimagines Donald Trump as a hate-filled minister; Steve Bannon becomes a young man (Cy) with an interest in TikTok and a lust for power. "Dead Man" also allows Glenn Close to have fun. She throws tantrums. She has long passages of breathy voice-over narration. She is even a part of a "dick joke." The reason I *really* love Rian Johnson is that I share his interest in subtext. Again and again, he is focused on all that goes unsaid. In a brilliant early scene, the Trumpian priest, Monsignor Wicks, asks to have his confession heard. But--really--he wants to intimidate the young man who is under his thumb. "I masturbated four times this week....once, in the shower, standing up....Once, I was unprepared, so I had to finish ...

 My kids have a sitter who is more than a sitter--part-sitter, part-nanny. A nanster. Google says that you shouldn't ask a teen sitter to handle more than four or five hours of waking time with small children; my kids' nanster is not a teen, so I can go over "the five-hour limit." Her name is Rutendo, and she traveled here from Zimbabwe; she is studying to join one ministry or another. (I should know the name of the ministry.) Her program works with students who hop on airplanes and dramatically change many aspects of their lives. Rutendo is tough; when she visited Montreal at Christmas, she said, dryly, "I may or may not be back. It depends on how Trump's America chooses to treat me at the customs booth. I'll text you with an update." Her tone was what you might use if you were describing a mildly annoying trip to the dentist. My husband is much more of a conversationalist than I am--and so I learn tidbits through him. Rutendo's current placemen...

  In an Anne Fadiman essay, you get (1) a perfect title, (2) an arresting intro, and (3) details. I'll show you what I mean. Fadiman wrote about switching to Zoom for class instruction during Covid, and she called the essay "Screen Share." It's an essay about sharing one's screen--but it's also an act of sharing- about- screens. Perfect title. To write about oneself, one must be able to *mock* oneself. Fadiman demonstrates this with her intro: ON THE FOURTH  day of spring break, our university’s president announces that no one is to return to campus. Two cases of Covid-19 have been reported in our state. All classes will be moving online. Soon afterward, the members of the humanities faculty receive an email from our dean telling us that “the development of a quality online course takes at least two years.” We have 12 days. I feel like a runner with decent times in the 800 meters whose coach says,  You still get to go to the track meet, but we’ve switched you ...

 The thing that makes Michael Connelly special is his interest in "the real world."  Before switching to fiction, Connelly was s journalist; his novels continue to show his fascination with choices that actual people make within an actual flawed system. For example, in one of the "Bosch" novels, a major clue involves the misuse of municipal property. A night stalker is tampering with various street lights--to make his "project" easier. In another novel, there is a brief interlude that is centered on victims and names. Some cops are using a victim's real name, whereas others are using a racist nickname--"Burrito Girl" (or something like this). The detail seems ripped from the headlines--and it makes a world of difference. People reveal themselves through (allegedly) small choices. "The Lincoln Lawyer" series nicely blends Connelly's knowledge with David E. Kelley's knowledge. Like Connelly, David E. Kelley did challenging wor...

 Sometimes, a facile narrative quickly gains steam. There is an idea that Alysa Liu has rewritten the rules; before Liu, figure skating was joyless, and now all is changed. But there was joy pre-Liu. Tara Lipinski's Olympics programs were joyful; also, Yuna Kim, channeling James Bond, was joyful. But I get the point. It's a treat to see young kids inspired by a brilliant performance. Both my daughter and my grade-eight student have commented on Alysa Liu. A weird experience I have is thinking about the writer Elizabeth McCracken. While watching Liu (which I do often), I remember McCracken's advice to artists: "Subject doesn't matter. Topicality doesn't matter. What matters is the link *between* the writer *and* the subject. If the writer cares passionately about her pet frog, she can write something unforgettable about her pet frog." That's what Liu does. She uses an ostensibly silly number--a number that she loves. She seems to care deeply about each ...

If ever there were a documentary that feels like a PD James murder mystery, it's "Natchez."  The setup is almost too good to be true. In Natchez, Mississippi, there are eccentric boomers who belong to a "Garden Club"; each boomer leads tours through his or her own haunted mansion. Tension arises because a Black woman joins the Garden Club, and the Black woman wants her white colleagues to begin to wrestle both with slavery and with the *legacy* of slavery. The ensuing "community meeting"--with deep sighs, half-ironic statements, and the frequent clearing of throats--is a wonderfully passive-aggressive disaster. It is miraculous that someone agreed to have a camera present for this event. That's frequently the case throughout the movie--people say terrible things. People say these things on camera! The filmmaker must have counted her lucky stars night after night after night. (It's unfortunately a cliche of documentary filmmaking that the final ...