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If you’re a liberal-arts nerd like me who thinks about culture all the time, you have probably pondered this question: why do people remake movies, but not books? Yeah, I know. On the surface, this seems like a silly and even naive question. Movies, after all, are a popular medium. They belong primarily in the…
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I was surfing the YouTube this morning when I stumbled upon this really cool video essay about the (diminished) immersive experience of modern films as opposed to old, classic ones. The author echoes some of the ideas I sketched out in a similar post from a few years ago called Whatever Happened to Open-Form Films?…
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I must admit that I had never heard of Awolnation until a few years ago when my son played me a couple of their songs. This song, in particular, has a big, anthemic sound of the sort one doesn’t hear very often in alt-rock. I really like it. Even the soft parts sound really, really…
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Well, over a week has passed since Halloween, and I’m still working through the classic horror and sci-fi movies that I rewatch every year around this time. One of my favorites (heck, one of everybody’s favorites, as far as I can tell, assuming that everybody is a nerd of a certain age) is Roger Wise’s…
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A lady I follow on Twitter named @johnstonglenn posted earlier that on this day in 1925, the famous Welsh actor Richard Burton was born. Yes, this would have been the great man’s 100th birthday. I’ve written about Burton a lot on this blog (see links below), and so I thought I would share this bit…
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Author’s Note: There has a been a lot of really cool UFO news lately (especially this article), so I thought I would re-share an old post I wrote some years ago regarding a fine book on the subject. Enjoy! From 1989 to 1992 I went to graduate school at the University of Arizona. This was…
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Ever since the paperback edition of my mystery thriller book, Twice the Trouble, came out in August, the price of the hard-cover edition has dropped through the basement. That’s bad for me but good for you (assuming you like hard-cover mysteries). It’s currently on sale for $6.00. Yes, that’s six Ameroes. Cheap! It would make…
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There have been a lot of great rock duos over the years—Hall and Oates, Tears for Fears, The White Stripes, David and David—but there haven’t been that many hard rock duos. I’m guessing this because you typically need a minimum of three musicians to form a hard rock band: a drummer, a bassist, and a…
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Author’s Note: I first posted this essay a few years ago. I’ve decided to repost it now due to some recent interest. When I finally watched Todd Field’s 2022 movie Tár, starring Cate Blanchett. I really didn’t know much about the film, except that it had been well received (Blanchett received an Oscar nomination) and…
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