Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
JANUARY 18, 2026 – Yesterday evening, we joined our friends Ann and Ravi at nearby Bolé, a gourmet Ethiopian restaurant. Parking was so bad that after letting Beth off at the entrance, I had to drive nearly halfway home to find a spot. The walk from the car back to the restaurant took time, given …
JANUARY 15, 2026 – I’ve said before in a post what bears repeating: “By its very nature, the beast of war brings out the very worst and the very best of humanity.” This evening I watched yet another (superb) Norwegian film (see last Monday’s post)—Into the White—that captures this axiom about as well as any …
JANUARY 12, 2026 – Yesterday evening I watched Betrayed, a Norwegian film about the flip side of the courageous Norwegian resistance during World War II, namely the round-up of Jews by Norwegian Quislings` doing the Nazis’ bidding. The film values alone—everything from casting to cinematography to screenplay writing to acting to directing—are topflight, a standard …
SEPTEMBER 22, 2025 – The film tells us little of Quisling’s ascendancy to power—as it were; he’s not depicted as a megalomaniac or Il Duce character, though as head of the Nordisk folkereisning i Norge, or “Nordic popular rising in Norway,” a political action group established in the early 1930s, Quisling was known as its fører—the …
SEPTEMBER 21, 2025 – (Cont.) The best stories are ones that tell us about ourselves, and Quisling: The Final Days, does just that. Not that we’re traitors. Few of us, in fact, would see anything of ourselves in the flawed eponymous character. Enter, however, Peder Olsen, a hospital chaplain assigned by the Right Reverend Eivind …
SEPTEMBER 20, 2025 – I can’t remember how old I was when I first heard the name, “Vidkun Quisling,” but it was my dad you said it. And you can bet that Dad used the word “traitor” to describe the Norwegian “Minister President” during the German occupation of Norway. So did everyone else who invoked …
AUGUST 18, 2025 – I wouldn’t have it any other way—a week-long visit by our out-of-town two-year-old grandson . . . and his parents. The little one was on hand for his second birthday, and every new word (e.g. “Gosh”) and attempt at a new phrase (e.g. “Geezlouise”) brought us one delight after another. Only …
MARCH 21, 2025 – I enjoy the work of good filmmakers as much as I delight in the oeuvres of accomplished writers. Though in each case my radar is honed on “the story,” I’ve learned that often what makes a book or movie especially memorable are all the elements that bring the tale to life. …
MARCH 15, 2025 – The older I grow, the less I know. Some of what I do know, however, I know better than ever. One example: knowing that I don’t understand war; never have, never will. It’s the epitome of irrationality. Another example of what I know better than ever is that war will never …
DECEMBER 28, 2024 – Late yesterday evening I stumbled across an extraordinary film, which I highly recommend to my readers. First are four things to know about it: FIRST: It’s among the sub-genre of World War II movies that doesn’t depict weapons of war (e.g. The Edge of War; The Wannsee Conference (see 12/26/22 post); …
DECEMBER 27, 2024 – This evening I finished watching Darkest Hour, directed by Joe Wright and featuring Gary Oldman in the role of Winston Churchill. Oldman won an Oscar for Best Actor for his extraordinary performance in this historical drama. I’d read quite a lot about Churchill—his harrowing experiences as a soldier and war correspondent …
OCTOBER 13, 2024 – Every good war movie—or just to be clear, “every war movie that’s a good movie”—winds up being an anti-war movie. Even a good movie about the “Good War” (WW II) is a reminder of the insanity and futility of war. By that I don’t mean that war is nugatory for the …
APRIL 4, 2024 – Okay, okay. Today I was determined as ever to write a political screed. I was all fired up after having digested a Times column about RFK, Jr. (Talk about setting your hair on fire!) Yet, two sentences in and I realized my opinion was of no greater worth than my description …
MARCH 26, 2024 – On the recommendation of two friends, this evening Beth and I watched The Last Repair Shop, which won the 2024 Academy Award for Best Documentary Short Film. It’s a beautiful little film featuring the musical instrument repair shop run for the benefit of student musicians of the Los Angeles public schools. …
DECEMBER 28, 2023 – In watching Maestro (Netflix) I was struck by the central question it raises about the “first internationally acclaimed American-born, American-trained conductor,” the irrepressible Leonard Bernstein: How in the world would you begin to make a film about such a larger-than-life conductor, composer, performer, entertainer, teacher, mentor, world ambassador, humanitarian, political activist, …
MAY 30, 2023 – (Cont.) Second: the plight of women. This is one of history’s great challenges. With some notable exceptions, women have shouldered burdens and abuse disproportionate to their 50% representation of humanity. (In the case of extremist Ukrainian atrocities against the Poles of Volhynia, women and children were a sizable majority of the …
MAY 30, 2023 – One evening recently I stumbled upon a Polish film entitled Wołyń (pronounced, VO-win), which is a region of Central-Eastern Europe fraught with history and bloodshed in a four-way tug-of-war among Poles, Jews, Ukrainians, Russians and Germans. Notice that I said “four-way” but named five “tribes.” That’s because historically, the Jewish population …
APRIL 17, 2023 – (Cont.) I hadn’t intended to watch the “making of” segment that automatically followed the final episode of Transatlantic, but after a couple of minutes’ worth, I was hooked. Having read a few books on filmmaking back when I naively thought (and did) write a screenplay, I had some inkling of a …
APRIL 16, 2023 – (Cont.) I was soon drawn into the series by the wits and courage of the protagonists. They were young and well-educated Americans who put grand-scale principles of personal gain, pleasure and safety. They exhibited unusual chutzpah and were leagues ahead of their government in understanding the full implications of the coming …
APRIL 15, 2023 – I’m amazed by what people do. I speak here not of the bad stuff, though granted, we do a lot of that too. No, I refer here to the extraordinary feats of creative, curious and determined minds that produce works of wonder. My astonishment exceeds ever so slightly my ignorance of …
JANUARY 8, 2023 – Movies, filled with dramatic distortions, embellishments and exaggerations, are often an unreliable source of historical information. Just as often, however, despite the lack of factual reliability, a film will stir the viewer’s curiosity and prompt further investigation of the historical record. That was the case when I stumbled across the 2014 …
DECEMBER 26, 2022 – I’m well into that paradoxical stage of life when the more I learn, the more I learn I haven’t. This is particularly true of my knowledge of history; not just what’s “fascinating” but what’s necessary for an understanding of the world and essential to counter repetition of its darkest moments. Some …
NOVEMBER 13, 2022 – Yesterday, heading out on my walk, I encountered our neighbors Kate and Dave across the alley. We hadn’t chatted in a while, so I stopped to talk. They’re smart, bright, articulate, well-informed and invariably have something worthwhile to hear. Among yesterday’s takes-away was a film recommendation: Don’t Look Up, on Netflix. …
JANUARY 17, 2022 – As a photography hobbyist, I target scenes. As a cancer patient, I’m targeted by new perspectives. On Saturday evening, the film, A Hidden Life, 2019 masterpiece by American filmmaker Terrance Malick (Amazon Prime)—struck the bull’s eye. It probes as deeply as a Mahler symphony and explores the soul as far as …
JANUARY 14, 2022 – Our DNA evolved to accommodate “fight” when our ancestors dropped from the trees of Africa. The word still describes a central element of our personalities—individual and societal. “Fight,” some argue, is as essential to our survival as is “flight.” I harbor hope, however, that we’ll evolve enough socially and emotionally to …