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Aug. 20th, 2023 10:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. Discovered a cute little book shop on Courtyleou Road in Ditmas, Brooklyn yesterday. It's about a twenty-five to thirty minute walk, if that. (I tend to walk or take the train everywhere, as you all know, so thirty minute walks are nothing from my point of view. One of the lovely things about living in NYC is you can literally walk or take a train or a bus anywhere. You don't need a car to get anywhere in this city, at all. It's why many people don't drive or haven't bothered to learn.)
I was in the area to drop off the Talbots Return at UPS, and pick up groceries. It's small - so the collection isn't that wide, and mainly whatever they've decided to order. It has a good sci-fi collection by folks of color, and a decent non-fiction and fiction shelf. Plus a lot of indie comics, and a Batman graphic novel set, and a Catwoman volumn.
For once, I bought books in a shop. Usually, I just look and buy on Kindle. But my difficulty with the Kindle lately - is I can't find books that I bought on it. I've bought so many (or borrowed so many from Kindle Unlimited) that I have troubles locating them. This is the result of purchasing books on sale via Kindle Daily Deals, or being told of a sale by SmartBitches. So a book goes on sale for say .99 cents to $4.99, and I grab it. (When normally priced at $14.99- $20. ) As a result I have a lot of books, most of which I'd be hard-pressed to find in book stores in any event. This book shop didn't have anything by T. Kingfisher for example.
So, what did I get?
Bought Wales a Birthday gift. Her birthday's September 25, and I know she's into birding. And it occurred to me that I could maybe take this up and this is something healthy that we could pursue together. Also not that expensive. Birding is rather popular in Brooklyn - and we can do it at Greenwood Cemetery or the Parks.
Anyhow, I got her Sibling's Bird Guide, and Birding for Beginners, and a Bird Journal. (If she already has any of this, I'll keep it for myself and gift her something else.)
Also, bought Yellowface by R.F. Kuang - a satire of the NY Publishing Industry. (Everyone despises the NY Publishing Industry, including the NY Publishing Industry. So it is constantly being satirized.)
And Moon Witch, Spider King by Marlon James (#2 of the Dark Star Trilogy).. I've not read the first book, but guessing it's not required. I got it in paperback, Yellowface is in hardcover, because it's not available yet in paperback. Also I am considering given it to Wales soon after. Wales loves biting satire.
2. Been watching Dark Winds on AMC. It takes place in the 1970s, complete with the 70s cars and fashion. The 1970s had the worst cars (sorry, I despised them, you may love them. I just remember uncomfortable vinyl seats, tank volkswagons, gasguzzling Cadialliacs and Sedans. Cars didn't start to improve in design until the late 1980s and early 90s.
The show focuses on the characters of Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee in the Navajho Station Police Force, located on the Navajho reservation in Arizona. Robert Redford and GRR Martin are executive producers, but it is written, directed by, and stars Navajho. Since it's the 1970s, they refer to themselves as Indians.
The series is adapted from Tony Hillerman's mysteries.
3. As previously noted, finally saw Christopher Nolan's film Interstellar last night. I was surprised by it. The film is well done. I did, as in all Nolan films, struggle a bit with the gimmick.
He likes to play with time in all his films - however, I will state that the science behind time in each of them works far better than it does in other films and television series.
Interstellar, as in his other films, has a protagonist who sets out to be a hero or savior, but in reality struggles to save himself, and often needs to be saved (mainly from himself and his own ego or in one case the antagonist's. It's a nice twist that he doesn't win that fight, and has to be saved. In Nolan films, the protagonist often doesn't win the fight against the antagonist - if you are a fan of his films, you are more or less prepared for this - then if you well aren't?). It's a difficulty that I've noticed a lot of viewers have with his films. It was the main criticism that I saw on the Batman films (that Batman wasn't really a hero, and just as dark, and potentially dangerous as the villains - and often required saving from well, himself.) Chris Nolan likes weak protagonists, which is kind of interesting actually - and pushes forward an anti-ego or anti-savior view in the moral landscape of his film making.
The protagonist, aka Cooper as portrayed by Mathew McConaughy is a bad farmer, who dreams of being an astronaut and believes he was meant for grander things. His daughter, Murph Cooper is busy communicating with a rather intelligent ghost in her bedroom, who keeps knocking her books down - which she has a sizable collection. One day, her father actually listens to her about the ghost, and investigates. This is after a brutal dirt storm - the earth is plagued by blight and increasingly serious dirt or sand storms.
They do this - after attending a baseball game, which is interrupted by said dirt storm, which in turn was an award Coop gave his kid in response to well, dealing with an idiotic teacher who was teaching pupils that the Apollo missions to the moon was just propaganda feed to Russia to get them to waste money on the space program. And we'd all be better off teacher folks to farm. Cooper - who is an engineer, and pilot, who trained to be an astronaught, is understandably furious. (This is also a common thread in Nolan's films - someone with no science background who attempts to debunk science.)
Anyhow, Cooper figures out that the message from the alleged ghost - is coordinates. And the coordinates lead him to the Brand Foundation - or NASA, who has come up with a way to save everyone - send scouting parties to inhabit other planets through a wormhole they discovered outside of Saturn that can send them through space in a millisecond. And they talk Cooper into leading the mission.
The film jumps back and forth from Murph and Cooper, and they are in a way the twin protagonists, although Cooper is in the lead for the most part, it is in both points of view. The mystery is who the ghost is - and how the human race survives - since we have interviews from old people filtered throughout. Also, whether Cooper can ever return to see his daughter. While he loves his son - it's clear - his main relationship is with his daughter, which is cut short. (He's a single father, his wife died of a brain tumor years prior.)
The movie sets us up to see Cooper as the hero, the protagonist - but Nolan, like in all of his films undercuts it - not entirely, but enough, to realize Cooper isn't the hero in this film, at all.
That's why I kind of love Nolan's films that continuous undercut of the male protagonist. I didn't quite realize it was the case until I saw Oppenheimer and then Insterstella directly afterwards - and thinking back, realized it's the case with the Dark Knight films as well - as Snyder's Justice League. The hero in each film isn't who we suspect, and often the clear protagonist is undercut, or if not, the hero is an anti-hero character who falls into the abyss of his own ego.
The other bit worth noting in the film is the science, which is also a constant in Nolan's films. Here it is the quantum mechanics of time or how time functions. The goal isn't to travel backwards, but to provide information within the fifth dimension - time - in order to give humanity the tools to save itself. That's the bit that I found confusing and a bit convoluted, and why the film doesn't quite hit all the buttons for me. The science doesn't quite work or rather the explanation doesn't.
3. Making my way through the audio book - Killers of the Flower Moon: the Osage County Murders and the start of the FBI - white people do not come out well in this book. (Which is hardly surprising). The murders are kind of gruesome and painful though. What happened, near as I can figure, is the Osage Tribe got rich off land that contained oil. The White People felt they should have gotten that land not the Osage Tribe and benefited from it. Also they viewed the Osage Tribe as out of control and uncivilized. (eyeroll)
4. It's a pretty day - barely a cloud in the sky. I should go frolic in it. But I also need to robot vacuum.
I was in the area to drop off the Talbots Return at UPS, and pick up groceries. It's small - so the collection isn't that wide, and mainly whatever they've decided to order. It has a good sci-fi collection by folks of color, and a decent non-fiction and fiction shelf. Plus a lot of indie comics, and a Batman graphic novel set, and a Catwoman volumn.
For once, I bought books in a shop. Usually, I just look and buy on Kindle. But my difficulty with the Kindle lately - is I can't find books that I bought on it. I've bought so many (or borrowed so many from Kindle Unlimited) that I have troubles locating them. This is the result of purchasing books on sale via Kindle Daily Deals, or being told of a sale by SmartBitches. So a book goes on sale for say .99 cents to $4.99, and I grab it. (When normally priced at $14.99- $20. ) As a result I have a lot of books, most of which I'd be hard-pressed to find in book stores in any event. This book shop didn't have anything by T. Kingfisher for example.
So, what did I get?
Bought Wales a Birthday gift. Her birthday's September 25, and I know she's into birding. And it occurred to me that I could maybe take this up and this is something healthy that we could pursue together. Also not that expensive. Birding is rather popular in Brooklyn - and we can do it at Greenwood Cemetery or the Parks.
Anyhow, I got her Sibling's Bird Guide, and Birding for Beginners, and a Bird Journal. (If she already has any of this, I'll keep it for myself and gift her something else.)
Also, bought Yellowface by R.F. Kuang - a satire of the NY Publishing Industry. (Everyone despises the NY Publishing Industry, including the NY Publishing Industry. So it is constantly being satirized.)
And Moon Witch, Spider King by Marlon James (#2 of the Dark Star Trilogy).. I've not read the first book, but guessing it's not required. I got it in paperback, Yellowface is in hardcover, because it's not available yet in paperback. Also I am considering given it to Wales soon after. Wales loves biting satire.
2. Been watching Dark Winds on AMC. It takes place in the 1970s, complete with the 70s cars and fashion. The 1970s had the worst cars (sorry, I despised them, you may love them. I just remember uncomfortable vinyl seats, tank volkswagons, gasguzzling Cadialliacs and Sedans. Cars didn't start to improve in design until the late 1980s and early 90s.
The show focuses on the characters of Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee in the Navajho Station Police Force, located on the Navajho reservation in Arizona. Robert Redford and GRR Martin are executive producers, but it is written, directed by, and stars Navajho. Since it's the 1970s, they refer to themselves as Indians.
The series is adapted from Tony Hillerman's mysteries.
3. As previously noted, finally saw Christopher Nolan's film Interstellar last night. I was surprised by it. The film is well done. I did, as in all Nolan films, struggle a bit with the gimmick.
He likes to play with time in all his films - however, I will state that the science behind time in each of them works far better than it does in other films and television series.
Interstellar, as in his other films, has a protagonist who sets out to be a hero or savior, but in reality struggles to save himself, and often needs to be saved (mainly from himself and his own ego or in one case the antagonist's. It's a nice twist that he doesn't win that fight, and has to be saved. In Nolan films, the protagonist often doesn't win the fight against the antagonist - if you are a fan of his films, you are more or less prepared for this - then if you well aren't?). It's a difficulty that I've noticed a lot of viewers have with his films. It was the main criticism that I saw on the Batman films (that Batman wasn't really a hero, and just as dark, and potentially dangerous as the villains - and often required saving from well, himself.) Chris Nolan likes weak protagonists, which is kind of interesting actually - and pushes forward an anti-ego or anti-savior view in the moral landscape of his film making.
The protagonist, aka Cooper as portrayed by Mathew McConaughy is a bad farmer, who dreams of being an astronaut and believes he was meant for grander things. His daughter, Murph Cooper is busy communicating with a rather intelligent ghost in her bedroom, who keeps knocking her books down - which she has a sizable collection. One day, her father actually listens to her about the ghost, and investigates. This is after a brutal dirt storm - the earth is plagued by blight and increasingly serious dirt or sand storms.
They do this - after attending a baseball game, which is interrupted by said dirt storm, which in turn was an award Coop gave his kid in response to well, dealing with an idiotic teacher who was teaching pupils that the Apollo missions to the moon was just propaganda feed to Russia to get them to waste money on the space program. And we'd all be better off teacher folks to farm. Cooper - who is an engineer, and pilot, who trained to be an astronaught, is understandably furious. (This is also a common thread in Nolan's films - someone with no science background who attempts to debunk science.)
Anyhow, Cooper figures out that the message from the alleged ghost - is coordinates. And the coordinates lead him to the Brand Foundation - or NASA, who has come up with a way to save everyone - send scouting parties to inhabit other planets through a wormhole they discovered outside of Saturn that can send them through space in a millisecond. And they talk Cooper into leading the mission.
The film jumps back and forth from Murph and Cooper, and they are in a way the twin protagonists, although Cooper is in the lead for the most part, it is in both points of view. The mystery is who the ghost is - and how the human race survives - since we have interviews from old people filtered throughout. Also, whether Cooper can ever return to see his daughter. While he loves his son - it's clear - his main relationship is with his daughter, which is cut short. (He's a single father, his wife died of a brain tumor years prior.)
The movie sets us up to see Cooper as the hero, the protagonist - but Nolan, like in all of his films undercuts it - not entirely, but enough, to realize Cooper isn't the hero in this film, at all.
That's why I kind of love Nolan's films that continuous undercut of the male protagonist. I didn't quite realize it was the case until I saw Oppenheimer and then Insterstella directly afterwards - and thinking back, realized it's the case with the Dark Knight films as well - as Snyder's Justice League. The hero in each film isn't who we suspect, and often the clear protagonist is undercut, or if not, the hero is an anti-hero character who falls into the abyss of his own ego.
The other bit worth noting in the film is the science, which is also a constant in Nolan's films. Here it is the quantum mechanics of time or how time functions. The goal isn't to travel backwards, but to provide information within the fifth dimension - time - in order to give humanity the tools to save itself. That's the bit that I found confusing and a bit convoluted, and why the film doesn't quite hit all the buttons for me. The science doesn't quite work or rather the explanation doesn't.
3. Making my way through the audio book - Killers of the Flower Moon: the Osage County Murders and the start of the FBI - white people do not come out well in this book. (Which is hardly surprising). The murders are kind of gruesome and painful though. What happened, near as I can figure, is the Osage Tribe got rich off land that contained oil. The White People felt they should have gotten that land not the Osage Tribe and benefited from it. Also they viewed the Osage Tribe as out of control and uncivilized. (eyeroll)
4. It's a pretty day - barely a cloud in the sky. I should go frolic in it. But I also need to robot vacuum.