Categories
Archives
-
-
-
-
Recent Posts
- NYFCC essay: “My Undesirable Friends: Part I — Last Air in Moscow”
- December 2025 Viewing Diary
- Solidarity, or: The boy in the green bandana
- “Precision and accuracy are necessary for both white and black writers. ‘A black aesthetic’ should not be an excuse for sloppy writing.” — poet and publisher Dudley Randall
- “To me, survival is the game – that’s the hardest part. I just wanna play music.” — Dave Grohl
- “When I was discovered, everything happened like dominos. I don’t know how to talk about it now because it’s too mindblowing. It’s so unreal, and yet it’s real.” — Faye Dunaway
- “As long as they pay me my salary, they can give me a broom and I’ll sweep the stage. I don’t give a damn. I want the money.” – Kay Francis
- “I look back on my life and draw one great generalization: IT WAS MY REFUSAL TO TAKE CAUTIOUS ADVICE THAT MADE ME.” — Jack London
- “I can pick a good song, but I sure couldn’t pick a good man.” — Ruth Brown
- “I’ll stay and look you straight in the eyes like all these normal people when I scream for my rights.” — Taraneh Alidoosti
Recent Comments
- mutecypher on December 2025 Viewing Diary
- mutecypher on December 2025 Viewing Diary
- Norm Anderson on “Carelessness on the part of revolutionaries has always been the best aid the police have.” — Victor Serge
- mutecypher on Solidarity, or: The boy in the green bandana
- Gemstone on Solidarity, or: The boy in the green bandana
- sheila on “It’s a situation I’ve never been able to fathom. One minute, it seemed I had more movie offers than I could handle, the next — no one wanted me.” — Sal Mineo
- Gemstone on “It’s a situation I’ve never been able to fathom. One minute, it seemed I had more movie offers than I could handle, the next — no one wanted me.” — Sal Mineo
- sheila on Talking with Rachel Dratch: Frankenstein is woo-woo adjacent.
- sheila on Talking with Rachel Dratch: Frankenstein is woo-woo adjacent.
- Ian on Talking with Rachel Dratch: Frankenstein is woo-woo adjacent.
- Gemstone on “Well, if I can’t be happy, I can be useful, perhaps.” — Louisa May Alcott
- sheila on December 2025 Snapshots
- Gemstone on December 2025 Snapshots
- Regina Bartkoff on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- sheila on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- sheila on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- Regina Bartkoff on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- sheila on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- sheila on November 2023 Viewing Diary
- sheila on November 2023 Viewing Diary
-
Tag Archives: China
“People get surprised by my choices. But that comes from me looking for something new.” — Maggie Cheung
Maggie Cheung inspires a passionate – almost monastic – love and fascination in her devoted worldwide fanbase. Her fanbase has maintained itself for over three decades, even with her deciding not to work as much in the last 20 years. … Continue reading
It’s the birthday of “The Woman Who Wouldn’t Forget”: Iris Chang
Iris Chang’s research into the atrocities committed by the Japanese on the Chinese people – particularly Chinese women – during the “rape of Nanking” in 1937 – much of it dug out of buried archives and brought to light for … Continue reading
Posted in Books, On This Day, writers
Tagged China, Iris Chang, Japan, nonfiction, war, WWII
3 Comments
NYFCC 2022 Awards
If you’ve been reading entertainment news then you already know: Yesterday, all the members of the NYFCC met up at Lincoln Center to vote on this year’s awards. It was so good to see people – friends I rarely get … Continue reading
Posted in Movies
Tagged animation, Cate Blanchett, China, documentary, drama, India, Iran, Iranian film, Ireland, Poland, Scotland, South Korea, women directors
4 Comments
For Ebert: On Stanley Kwan’s 1991 masterpiece Center Stage
It’s Women Writers Week over on Ebert (Table of Contents), and I wrote about the biopic with which I measure all other biopics: Stanley Kwan’s Center Stage about the brief intense life of “the Chinese Greta Garbo,” silent film star … Continue reading
Posted in Movies
Tagged biopic, China, Hong Kong, Maggie Cheung, reviews, silent films
Leave a comment
On This Day, 1989
Once we stood in solidarity with that man and all others like him. I still stand in solidarity with him and all others like him, including my fellow citizens.
Recommended Books: Non-Fiction
I have been meaning to do a Part 2 to my Recommended Books: Fiction list – put together years ago. I wanted to recommend non-fiction, from history books to biographies to essays to whatever. Here is the Non-Fiction list. I’ve … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Founding Fathers, Theatre
Tagged Abraham Lincoln, Afghanistan, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Alexander Hamilton, Austria, Balkan Ghosts, Balkans, baseball, Belfast, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Catherine Drinker-Bowen, Central Asia, China, Crowds and Power, Dava Sobel, David McCullough, Edmund Burke, Edvard Radzinsky, Elias Canetti, Elvis Presley, England, Federalist Papers, Founding Brothers, France, Germany, Group Theatre, Gulag Archipelago, Hitler, Hunter S. Thompson, Imperium, Ireland, Iris Chang, Isaac Newton, James Madison, Janet Malcolm, Japan, Joseph Ellis, Michael Schmidt, Miracle at Philadelphia, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, Philip Gourevitch, poetry, Primo Levi, Rasputin, Rebecca West, Red Sox, Robert Conquest, Robert Kaplan, Roman empire, Russia, Rwanda, Ryszard Kapuściński, science, Serbia, Shakespeare, Stalin, The Great Terror, The Soccer War, Tom Wolfe, true crime, Ukraine, Vincent Bugliosi, WWI, WWII, Yugoslavia
19 Comments
Best Films of 2019: Film Comment
The results of the Film Comment poll are in: the best films of 2019. For someone who doesn’t like lists – (I still recognizes their value!) – I sure participate in a lot of them. If nothing else, lists points … Continue reading
Posted in Movies
Tagged Argentina, Bong Joon-Ho, China, Christian Petzold, drama, England, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Jean-Luc Godard, Joanna Hogg, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, South Korea, Spain, women directors
Leave a comment
November 2019 Viewing Diary
The Best of Everything (1959; d. Jean Negulesco) I love this movie so much. I read the book this year (for the first time). I highly recommend both. This is the wellspring from which Mad Men sprung. The Devil Next … Continue reading
Posted in Monthly Viewing Diary, Movies, Television
Tagged China, comedy, documentary, drama, England, France, hockey, Italy, Jennifer Aniston, Jodie Foster, romantic drama, sci-fi, Spain, Supernatural, women directors, Woody Allen
19 Comments
September 2019 Viewing Diary
Satanic Panic (2019; d. Chelsea Stardust) Rebecca Romijn is reason enough to see this. My review at Ebert. A Hidden Life (2019; d. Terrence Malick) The new Terrence Malick film, about WWII conscientious objector Franz Jägerstätter, a man from Austria, … Continue reading