Book Review: The Cinematic Connery: The Films of Sean Connery by A.J. Black

A.J. Black, author of Myth-Building in Modern Media and Star Trek, History and Us, has written an engaging critical study on the life and career of Sean Connery in his latest book The Cinematic Connery. A presence in cinema for the entire second half of the 20th Century, Connery's work on the screen is a mirror into a large slice of film history. Readers will be treated to a perceptive account of Connery as one of the last movie stars who continues to captivate audiences.

The passing of Connery on October 31, 2020, felt like the end of an era despite his long absence from public view since his final film appearance in the 2003 comic book adaptation The League of Extraordinary Gentleman. Yet in another sense, he never left the public imagination. As the original actor to play James Bond, by far his most iconic role, his immortal status was assured.

As Black presents throughout, Connery was much more than Bond. Outside of the original run of five Bond films he made (Dr. No (1962), From Russia With Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), You Only Live Twice (1967), and brief reprises in 1971 (Diamonds Are Forever) and 1983 (Never Say Never Again), he left behind a wide and diverse body of work that explored many aspects of his persona. Whether it be the vengeful detective in the 1973 film The Offence, the cold-blooded manipulator in Marnie (1964), or the tough Chicago cop in Brian De Palma's 1987 film The Untouchables, he always showed an impressive range and a willingness to take chances. 

A proud native of Edinburgh, Scotland, Connery's working-class youth was marked by the Global Depression of the 1930s and the privations brought on by the Second World War. He pursued body building and football (soccer) but found his true calling in acting. He began performing on the stage, worked on television productions, all of which led to meaty roles in feature films. 

Fate and his own determination led Connery to starring in the first James Bond film Dr. No, the movie that made him an international star. Black traces Connery's early career in which he took on a variety of different guises on film from comedic sidekicks, small time hoods, and romantic leads. His work had caught the attention of producers Albert Broccoli and Harry Saltzman who were developing a feature film based on the spy novels of Ian Fleming. When they requested that Connery take a screen test for the part, he refused, his bull headedness convinced them he was their Bond.

Connery's newfound superstardom left him with a lifelong ambivalence about the role. In time he soured on the physical and psychological toll of the big budget productions, especially the loss of privacy that came along with it. He also got into public feuds with the producers over his salary. On a more positive note, playing Bond allowed Connery to raise his profile in the film industry. He actively sought to establish himself outside of the 007 genre, working with Alfred Hitchcock on Marnie and Sidney Lumet on the 1965 military prison drama The Hill, a movie he often declared his favorite:

Lumet's picture is the first film in Connery's resume which truly distinguishes him from the role of Bond. Despite how intense, loud and expressly colonial it frequently becomes, Lumet's picture is an exercised in contained tension, repression, fury, and failure. (59)

Connery made five films with Lumet, a director who tapped into the darker corners of his personality. 

As Black argues, the murky cultural milieu of the 1970s was mirrored in Connery's post-Bond roles such as the primitive future man in John Boorman's 1974 film Zardoz, an aging Robin Hood in Robin and Marian (1976), and even being game for the campy 1979 disaster movie Meteor. Some of his most popular work from the decade were old fashioned Kipling inspired colonial adventures like The Wind and the Lion and The Man Who Would Be King, both from 1975, films that would be received much differently today. 

In his early 50s, Connery reprised Bond for the 1983 film Never Say Never Again in a strategic choice to revive his career which was stagnating by the early 1980s. Although the film was a mixed bag (considered non-canon), the world welcomed Connery back as a more seasoned 007. Things picked up from then on, culminating with his Oscar winning performance in The Untouchables. His comedic turn as Dr. Henry Jones in Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade delighted audiences and introduced him to a new generation. 

Connery remained an A-lister through the 1990s, playing off his 007 persona in Michael Bay's 1996 blockbuster The Rock. He often took on the role of mentor in films like Finding Forrester (2000) and the two Highlander movies (1986,1991) in which he appeared. In 1990 he starred in two highly acclaimed films about the end of the Cold War: A defecting Soviet submarine commander in The Hunt for Red October and a dissident writer in The Russia House. In 1999, approaching 70, few batted an eye when Connery was paired with much younger female co-star Catherin Zeta-Jones in the heist film Entrapment.

Black avoids Connery's personal life for the most part because it's been covered elsewhere and primarily approaches him as a cultural figure. Neither does the book shy away from the darker aspects of Connery's personality such as problematic statements about women, including accusations of abusive behavior from female co-stars and former partners that would undoubtedly imperil his star status in the current climate. Black writes: 

something about Connery the actor and the man, appealed in an era just before the internet, of social media, of the rapid cultural and political change it would render, and the swift advance of gender identity and women's rights that were never going to square with Connery's image, singed into the minds of multiple generations since Dr. No, of powerful, unashamed alpha maleness (256).

The Cinematic Connery is a valuable contribution to film and cultural studies. In crisp and engaging prose Black offers fresh insights on Connery's most famous roles, but also provides an equal amount of attention to the lesser-known parts and more obscure films. As a symbol of 20th Century masculinity with all its appeal and faults, Connery the movie star will forever be a lens through which to comprehend the era's cinema and culture. Black's thoughtful and well- balanced analysis of Connery will be an excellent resource for fans and film scholars alike. 

Link to the Publisher:

https://www.polarispublishing.com/book/the-cinematic-connery

Where is the Media Revolution Going?

The ways we interact with media has changed considerably the past 70 years and much of it depends on when we were born. Not an original insight, but it does raise a few questions on my mind lately. How do mediums influence the movies/television to come? How do mediums shape one's perception of a good movie or TV show?

Boomers had to work with slim pickings in comparison to the generations to come. Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, a trip to the theater was a major event. And for good reason, missing a theatrical run meant it could be several years before you got the chance to see the movie again. Boomers were also the first to be weaned and shaped by television shows. It was also where many came to know film. Late night broadcasts of classic films or the occasional airing of a classic like The Wizard of Oz on network television. 

While the theatrical experience remained sacrosanct and there were plenty of venues including drive-ins, repertory houses, second run theaters, and in urban centers an endless variety of theaters. Future directors like Spielberg, Lucas, Scorsese have all spoke of formative movie theater experiences and the influence of television on their approach to filmmaking. 

By the end of the 1970s, technology was starting to revolutionize home media viewing. As televisions and sound systems improved in quality, the home experience was enhanced. Betamax and VHS allowed boomers to revisit classics and keep up with the new releases. More importantly, their Gen X children had access to a gigantic slice of film history. Gen X got the best of both worlds: The age of the Blockbuster was in full force alongside malls and roller-skating rinks, while indulging in the VHS bonanza (although viewed in the inferior pan and scan.).

Quentin Tarantino was on the vanguard of the new generation of VHS obsessives working in the video stores with dreams of making movies of their own. On his new podcast The Video Archives he continues to champion the age of VHS by indulging in his eccentric taste in movies. Film twitter often likes to mock what Tarantino considers great cinema, but I think this could speak to age gaps more than anything else. Part of the appeal of VHS was having easy access to exploitation, cult classics, and adult films. The more obscure and strange - the better. That world has vanished. 

Home media innovation continued into the 1990s continues to enhance the home viewing experience. High quality Laserdiscs peaked and paved the way for DVDs, which were smaller and cheaper. The innovation of DVDs brought improved quality and seeing movies in their proper aspect ratio, including extra features like commentary tracks. The rise of the internet would bring with it a brave new world of interacting with media we're still trying to understand. 

You Tube launched in 2005 which made videos easy to access online, while Netflix began offering a streaming service in 2007. In a short time, streaming services branched into creating original programming of their own, ending the era of network programming for good. No longer must one be at home during a certain time to catch a show, empowering the consumer of media.

Having so much access to movies offered on streaming services can create the illusion of endless possibilities. But there is yet no "cloud" where "everything ever made" is available. Far from it. It is likely less films are available to see now than during the height of the VHS era. Movies come and go on streaming services, disappearing into the ether without warning. Consumers have no power on what stays and disappears. 

Another offshoot of streaming is the increasingly niche audience for movies. Any young cinephile can access the Criterion Channel and develop their appreciation of cinema (I once overheard High School kid at bookstore saying Criterion were the only films worth watching) As for myself, a VHS kid, to paraphrase podcaster Lex G, Die Hard and Lethal Weapon 2 were the height of cinema to 11-year old me. Today any 15-year old can be well versed in in Fellini and Bergman or foster any niche entertainment that suits them.

It's become a social media sport to needle boomers (I've done some myself I confess) for many things. Many around my age or younger will scoff at boomers for pushing their culture on the next generation - Rock and Roll is the usual culprit. I never felt that personally. Nostalgia for the '60s did hit a peak during the 1980s and 1990s. From epic and adoring documentaries on rock icons to Oliver Stone's amphetamine fueled historical screeds, the shadow of Vietnam and JFK continued to haunt the culture.

Part of boomer backlash is due to envy. Yes, boomers were born into a period of unprecedented prosperity, college was super cheap, and pandemics were the stuff of Sci-Fi. The sense of accomplishment that comes from a monolithic culture or at least the illusion of it, I think is something that left a void for future generations. Gen Xers could connect through schoolhouse rock references, while Millennials had Harry Potter. But the sense of collective accomplishment seemed elusive. 

Pop Culture is always wedged between embracing the future, while also trying to reclaim the past. Streaming allows anyone with access to create their own media ecosystem. If you wish it were still 1985, you can create the illusion of it. If you're excited about the prospect of a world dragons and fairies, you got it. Creating one's own media ecosystem, a process accelerated by the pandemic, is now a tangible reality. 

Pondering what sorts of movies will come from the streaming generation has enormous potential and drawbacks. A climate of everything being niche may foster a debilitating fragmentation, or a niche movement could become something else entirely. After all, comics and Sci-Fi were viewed as fringe entertainment at one time, but now permeates the culture. Or will it lead to an exhaustion? A baroque parade of Xerox copies of everything that came before. 

Pop culture of the '90s foresaw a 21st Century of virtual reality/interactive media on shows like Wild Palms and movies like The Lawnmower Man. I think in some ways these predictions were not all wrong, we may be halfway there, and streaming has helped it along. Defying reality is a human need (and fatal flaw?), escapism allows the imagination to grow. Many would prefer to be in a different reality and new media experiences may be able to provide it. The social consequences beyond that point become even more speculative. 

Many have written lately about everything being boring - TV, pop music, movies, fashion, cars - something feels off. Coming out of the pandemic and facing a daunting future of political strife and global warming, looking ahead can induce a retreat to escapism for any thinking person. Yet during the Cold War and the threat of nuclear war, low and high art rose to the occasion, looking defiantly into the future in an existential fait accompli. 

One could pick any iconic artist from the cold war era, yes many were flush with privileges and money, unlike today's debt-ridden generation. That's a very real thing not to be dismissed. But neither were they doomscrolling all day or desperately trying to build an instagram following for profit. Social media and influencer culture is a climate ripe for scammers and charlatans, yet at the same time a new zone for creativity and innovation exists in the media landscape. So, the future is unwritten and even as possibilities and expectations feel limited, it's important not to act like it in a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

My Appearance On PARTISAN: Politics & History In Film To Discuss Steven Spielberg's 2005 Film Munich

Recently I appeared on the podcast Partisan: Politics & History in Film hosted by A.J. Black to discuss Steven Spielberg's 2005 film Munich. It was a wide ranging discussion on Spielberg and modern history. Hope you enjoy!

Book Review: Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump by Spencer Ackerman

Spencer Ackerman covered the War on Terror over the past 20 years for The Guardian and other outlets. In Reign of Terror, he argues the post 9/11 era accelerated America's descent into political chaos. The forces of xenophobia and white supremacy reared their head and were mainstreamed into the popular discourse. The aftermath of 9/11 fomented a blowback first felt though interventions abroad and eventually into a deeper reckoning on the home front (or "homeland" to cite the era's rhetorical changes). Reign of Terror is consistently grim but well argued.

The narrative begins with the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, the day a white supremacist blew up the city's Federal Building with a truck bomb. In the immediate aftermath the media suspected Middle Eastern terrorists, but when the bomber turned out to be an average looking white guy Gulf War veteran with ties to the militia movements, indicating dark forces alive and well in the heartland. White supremacy fueled the militia movement, and the bombing was an attempt to make their fantasy of igniting a civil war come to pass. The bomber was allowed to stand trial and enjoy his time in prison with full privileges. Non-white terror suspects would receive far different treatment from the authorities (with the exception of Obama era whistle blower Chelsea Manning)

In the post-9/11 era suspected terrorists were rounded up and sent to Guantanamo Bay, held as enemy combatants, and often denied basic human rights. Torture became standard policy and Ackmerman describes in graphic detail the methods pursued by the CIA and the military. While President Bush was careful (except for a few thinking out loud moments) not to implicate all Muslims as jihadists, the era fueled anti-Islamic attitudes of an increasingly xenophobic voting bloc already enraged over the Mexican border and changing demographics in America. Islamophobia would manifest itself in accusations President Obama was an imposter born in Kenya.

No one gets off free. Conservatives quickly figured out how the war could be used to further their political agendas. Liberals barely put up a defense to the new militarism. Out of fear from looking weak in the face of existential threats, most Democrats supported the Iraq War. The author also criticizes President Obama for missing valuable opportunities to reshape foreign policy and end the War on Terror, but the machinery set by the Bush administration was too entrenched for substantial change. Instead, Obama streamlined and widened the war by stepping up surveillance and the use of drones.

In 2016, candidate Trump condemned America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, even prompting some gullible pundits to declare him the "peace candidate" opposite Hillary Clinton (generally considered a hawkish liberal). Trump reveled in violent rhetoric and implied the War on Terror needed to be waged with no constraints whatsoever. He spoke of "secret plans" to defeat Isis and labeled all Muslims as the enemy by calling for a ban on all from entering the country. Even more predictable and disturbing was the new populist talking point: liberals must be considered just as dangerous as Isis, or even worse. 

I recall the unrest in 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri in response to the police killing Michael Brown. It was an early example of a militarized police force being unleashed on protestors who were demanding racial justice. It was the first sign the War on Terror tactics would be waged on American citizens. During the 2020 protests after of George Floyd's murder, Trump and many Republicans wanted to use the military to jail and brutalize protestors. Homeland Security and ICE agents made their presence known and showed little restraint despite being filmed on I-Phones. Meanwhile, the War on Terror rolled on endlessly.

Reign of Terror is bleak, but well-argued and impassioned. The key to Ackerman's main argument goes back to Susan Sontag's reflection on 9/11 that was published in the New Yorker the week after. Instead of calling for retribution and offering banal statements about American perseverance during challenging times, she called out the country's foreign policy in the Middle East as the main cause of the attacks. Pundits on the left and right denounced Sontag. The Bush administration, with bi-partisan and popular support, chose to pursue vengeance and conflict on the Middle East. Any hint of soul searching or a reconsideration of America's relationship with the world that Sontag advocated for were either ignored or silenced. 

Ackerman offers no alternate paths or solutions, and while I try to avoid criticizing a book for what it's not, considering alternate paths or counterfactuals have their use. No one escapes unscathed. Dissenters to the War on Terror are portrayed as ineffectual. The acidic critique of Obama may be warranted at times, but the political realities the administration faced in 2009 made a total halt to all conflicts untenable. As Obama advisor Ben Rhodes pointed out to Ackerman, what if Obama had ended the War on Terror and it was followed by a cataclysmic terror attack - and then what?

Ackerman's also in the complicated place of being critical towards the National Security State and the populist forces Trump unleashed, who see themselves in opposition to the nefarious "deep state."  The subtext was they wished to take over the deep state and install their own loyalists - and according to a recent article they have a plan in place. The distinction should be spelled out more clearly: one is a dangerous, violent, antidemocratic political movement - the other needs institutional reform and more accountability. 

Ultimately, Reign of Terror provides a coherent and passionate perspective on how the War on Terror damaged the world. The level of destruction wrought by American military power wrought on Asia and Africa left a trail of death and suffering in the millions. The militarization of the police and armed insurgency movements pose serious existential threats to democracy's survival. I would recommend Reign of Terror as a must read for some critical insight on the past 20 years. 

Book Review: Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet by James Mann

The tragic consequences of post-9/11 foreign policy on American institutions and international relations that came in the wake of the attacks continues to loom as an indicator of what led to the current moment. Rise of the Vulcans, published in 2004, tells the origin story of how post- 9/11 foreign policy was shaped and articulated by its framers long before the event that spurred it. The author James Mann was a longtime foreign correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and later a Senior Fellow at the School of Advanced General Studies at Johns Hopkins. Mann's engaging writing style deals eloquently with the biographical details of the key figures and the ideological battles within the foreign policy establishment, making it an essential read dealing with recent history.

The central figures in the book are Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Armitage, and Condoleezza Rice. Powell and Armitage were both Vietnam veterans and career military men in charge of the State Department during the first Bush administration. Cheney and Rumsfeld were two professional politicians with lifelong ambitions for the presidency who built their reputations during the Nixon-Ford years. Rice and Wolfowitz were both academics, intellectual advocates of American hegemony across the globe. All came together during the 2000 Bush campaign, jokingly and eventually with seriousness referred themselves as Vulcans in honor of the Roman god of fire, in honor of the sense of "toughness" and "durability" it conveyed. Mann summarized their approach to foreign policy as such: 

The vision was that of an unchallengeable America, a United States whose military power was so awesome that it no longer needed to make compromises or accommodations (unless it chose to do so) with any other nation or groups of countries (xii).

Mann also contends that there's far more overlap between cold war and post-cold war history. The "end of history" narrative that took hold after 1989-1991 was wishful thinking above at best. In fact, it was Cold War triumphalism and the rhetoric of victory surrounding it that led to the disasters to come in the 21st Century. Colin Powell was an outlier, his experiences in Vietnam led him to believe military force should only be used when absolutely necessary, and if used, with overwhelming magnitude to ensure a quick conflict (The Powell Doctrine). His experience as Head of the Joint Chiefs during the First Persian Gulf War (and the December 1989 invasion of Panama) vindicated his defense philosophy, but others thought differently. 

Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz developed their philosophy during the debates over détente during the 1970s. Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger pursued a lessening of tensions with the Soviet Union and China in pursuit of a balance of power to stabilize foreign relations after the Vietnam War. While Kissinger remains a pariah, despised by the political left for his disregard of human rights and by the right who viewed détente as weak, emboldening the USSR. Cheney (Chief of Staff) and Rumsfeld (Defense Secretary) both rose quickly in the Ford administration and worked to undercut Kissinger's realist approach. They pushed for more military spending and aggressive defense postures, both anti-communist and willing to ally with authoritarians when it served their purposes. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the Vulcans were against the so called "peace dividend" of lower defense spending/more social services spending and envisioned a newer and sleeker military no power on the planet would ever consider challenging (once again a misreading of history on their part). 

Only the last 50 or 60 pages is devoted to the response to 9/11, which the Vulcans used to reconfigure foreign policy in their own image. As time would tell the new approach would entail pre-emptive wars, small scale interventions in various hotspots, and eventually torture and violating international law and norms. Neoconservatives like Wolfowitz (liberals who were hawkish on defense) viewed the military as instrument to spread democracy even if it met partnering with tyrannical regimes, a dilemma that confronted policymakers during and after the Cold War.

The invasion of Afghanistan in October of 2001 shortly after the 9/11 attacks overthrew the Taliban by December but failed to capture Osama Bin Laden who escaped into the mountains of Pakistan until his demise in 2011. Instead, the U.S. stumbled into a 20-year occupation, maintaining control of the major cities but facing relentless guerilla war in the countryside and eventual retreat in 2021.

Saddam Hussein was viewed as a longtime nemesis by the Vulcans for many reasons. Even though Iraq had nothing to so with 9/11, Bush's war cabinet used the attacks as pretext to overthrow the regime. Powell convinced the President Bush (41) to end the first Persian Gulf War after four days of ground combat, allowing Hussein to remain in power, the reasoning being an American occupation of Iraq would be too costly and disruptive to the region. Cheney and Rumsfeld saw it differently, they were concerned about Iraq obtaining nuclear weapons and in a grand strategic sense believed a democracy taking root in Iraq would spread throughout the region. Of course, access to oil figured greatly into the calculation. Mann makes clear that losing access to Persian Gulf oil reserves terrified the defense establishment and dominated their thinking.  

The character sketches are astute. Rice grew up in segregated Alabama and went to college on a music scholarship and was welcomed into the foreign policy establishment. A Russian specialist, Ms. Rice became Bush's most trusted adviser, often serving as a mediator between warring factions in his administration. Cheney was a ruthless bureaucrat able to neutralize anyone who crossed him, a believer in a strong Presidency and using the military as a blunt instrument (he got five deferments during the Vietnam era draft earning him the "chickenhawk" sobriquet). The book reveals Cheney oversaw "continuity of power" exercises as a Congressional representative during the 1980s, managing nuclear attack drills with the purpose of saving the government's leadership, a fact he never mentioned while he was Vice President (he famously took over the government on 9/11 for at least a few hours).

Rumsfeld also mastered bureaucratic warfare and was mentored by Nixon. As Secretary of Defense for Bush Jr. he was a media darling for a time due to his pithy press conferences (later tarnished over his torture memos). Wolfowitz, an academic well versed on nuclear and energy policy, became the face of pre-emptive war as a legit policy. During the 1970s he was ahead of the curve, writing academic papers arguing the Persian Gulf should have priority over Western Europe because oil was the key to global dominance (the not so hidden agenda of the Bush years.) Armitage and Powell were both ambivalent about preemptive war, they pushed for a diplomatic solution with Iraq but were undercut by Cheney, Powell would later disgrace himself at the United Nations for his mawkish plea to invade Iraq on faulty evidence. 

The post 9/11 foreign policies relied less on alliances and diplomacy and more on a misguided and tragic belief that America was best to go it alone. As the Iraq War turned into a bloody insurgency, hubris became the most used word to describe the Bush administration. Decisions to wield the full force of the surveillance state in the name of preventing terrorist attacks, detain suspected terrorists without regard for basic human rights, and encourage American citizens to keep shopping as an act of patriotism while requiring members of the armed services to serve endless tours overseas did not leave these leaders in good stead. Rise of the Vulcans does an excellent job of telling the why and how, ultimately becoming a story of how entrenched beliefs serve as limitation rather than a strength, especially with individuals in charge of national security.

I next plan to review Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 era Destabilized America and Produced Trump by journalist Spencer Ackerman. Ackerman spent 20 years covering the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Reign of Terror looks at how Bush era policies mutated domestic politics, the "War on Terror" rhetoric would be weaponized by the Trump movement against fellow Americans they came to view as the real enemy. 

Mann, James. Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet. New York: Penguin, 2004.

On Boomer Gatekeeping

Today I tried to engage with someone (a baby boomer) expressing their annoyance with Progressives criticizing them for using the "ok boomer" line (a phrase I never use here or in RL). When pointing out some reasons on why the anger exists, I was told to "stop generalizing" and that I didn't know what I was talking about and then unfollowed. This was by someone always posting about how "liberal" they supposedly are. I was only trying to discuss the issue (hoarding wealth, electing Reagan, Trump etc . .) Many people I admire and been inspired by are part of the b generation. Many fought the good fight, but why not discuss where things went wrong instead of taking the criticism personally? The generations to follow will face austerity, fascism and living under threats of militarized violence, nuclear proliferation, climate disaster, deadly new viruses, and god knows what else. Not sure there's a point to any of this. My aim was simply to engage and point out why the anger exists and maybe encourage some introspection, but instead got a dismissive attitude. The young have strong reason to be angry and terrified about what's to come.

A few useful articles on the subject:

https://www.nbcnews.com/better/lifestyle/ok-boomer-diving-generation-what-does-it-mean-ncna1077261

https://www.salon.com/2020/08/25/ok-boomer-millennial-economy-jill-filipovic-salon-talk/

Is the Internet like a dying star?

In an article I recently I stumbled upon, ironically through twitter, from a Newsletter by technology writer Charlie Warzel at The Atlantic on the stultifying nature of social media. Warzel interviewed technology theorist LM Sarcasas who believes social media contributes to our collective feeling of being stuck in an endless loop of devastating news:

“There’s a well-ordered way of relating to time—how much attention you give to the past, present, and future,” he said. “I don’t mean to suggest that one way is the good way or the bad way, but it seems as if most of us are disproportionately focused on what has already happened. Not just the events themselves, but the layers of commentary atop of them.”

Not to summarize the entire article, but it describes in a concise way the extent to which social media keeps us chained to the past, caught in a never-ending loop of hopelessness. He compares the social media experience to staring at a star that appears to be alive and bright when in reality it's dying (because of light years). A mass shooting or an international crisis proceeds on twitter like a liturgical set of events: initial shock, outrage, despair, and eventual vertigo/amnesia at the end of the cycle. Repeat the next day.

Furthermore, there’s the dance of everyone commenting on everyone else and not the actual event. Having so many reactions and viewpoints assaulting our brains abstracts everything, possibly akin to living in a hive mind, reminding us hell is other people. It all leads to a stasis and all the negative byproducts: inaction, despair, depression, hopelessness. Morbidity is endemic on twitter.

As a thought experiment, I imagined if something like twitter had existed during The Second World War. All the dark days in the early years of the conflict: the fall of Poland and France, Dunkirk, or Pearl Harbor The famous photograph of Hitler in Paris or of a bombed-out London, would've led to a collective despair that defeating Fascism was impossible. After the destruction of the fleet at Pearl Harbor or the fall of the Philippines, I see think pieces from The Atlantic and twitter threads of doom and gloom of how crossing the English Channel to liberate Europe was impossible.

The main point is that social media traps us in the past like ants in amber, always in reaction mode. To quote Warzel: 

Constantly absorbing and commenting on things that have just happened sounds to me like a recipe for feeling powerless. Online, I frequently feel both stuck in the past but presented with a grim projection of the future. There is very little focus on the present, which is a place where we derive agency. We can act now.

The article presents no options for finding our way out of this conundrum. We've seen how influencers monetize their influence after a tragedy or even a celebrity scandal, they are like the folks who built an amusement park near a dying man trapped in a hole in Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole. A new crop of politicians is more concerned with their tweets stirring disgust than actual policymaking. The influencer impulse is everywhere - digital carnival barkers.

Simply walking away won't work. Could there be counter type of influencing of a more positive variety? Could Utopian ideas catch hold? Messianic figures are dangerous by trade and there are way too many pretenders who imagine themselves as such on twitter. These questions lead to deeper historical questions of what or who serves as a catalyst for futuristic thinking. But technology is still simply a tool, and we can learn how to live with it. It's a crucial question, and while looking to science fiction or visionary biographies are important and have their place, it will come down to more people making decisions towards something better. It will take creativity, historical knowledge, and transcendence. 

A link to the article: https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/galaxy-brain/629ec16551acba002091af11/internet-social-media-reactionary-doom-loop/

Synching Movies with Albums

The practice of synching rock albums with movies came to popular attention when people started playing Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon with The Wizard of Oz. Fans noted the uncanny connections between the lyrics on the album with what's going in the film. Ever since there's been a small community seeking out the perfect synch - there are a few interesting websites. It's been pointed out by many that putting any piece music against any visual media and they will start to synch. There's something mysterious about it. Recently, I experimented a little on my own. An important approach is to find an album and a film with similar themes. So play any Radiohead or Pink Floyd album against a dystopian Sci-Fi and you'll start to see connections. Ideally, the synch will reveal multiple layers of meaning within the film and the music. Here are some of the ones I tried.

 (12 Monkeys - Radiohead: Ok Computer) - Terry Gilliam's 1995 dystopia dealing with time travel, deadly viruses, secret societies, and madness may be his best film. Bruce Willis stars as a confused and weary man sent back from the future to stop a deadly plague from decimating humanity. Radiohead released Ok Computer in 1997, one of the epochal albums of the decade. Thom Yorke's lyrics are filled apocalyptical imagery and rock/electronica music mimicking how a machine might compose music goes along quite well with the film. Bruce Willis wondering through a desolate landscape as "Exit Music (for a film)" plays captures the wide eyed melancholy of the movie. 

(The Matrix - Radiohead: Kid A) There are many albums to play alongside The Matrix, ranging from heavy metal to prog rock. Radiohead's Kid A perfectly synchs with Neo, Morpheus, and Trinity, the first line of the film "Is Everything in Place" practically introduces the opening track "Everything In It's Right Place." Placing together two important pieces of art at the dawn of the Millennium hits all the right notes as they move between themes of despair and personal liberation. 

(American Graffiti - Paul McCartney and Wings: Red Rose Speedway) A perfect synch. Paul McCartney's slightly retro 1973 album is romantic and nostalgic, going for the energy of the early Beatles records and their epic sounding latter albums. Tracks like "Get on the Right Thing "and "When the Night" are ideal with the neon/nighttime energy of the film. Even Paul's maligned hit single "My Love" works well.

(Three Days of the Condor - The Alan Parson Project: Eye in the Sky) - Maybe the most enlightening synch, adding much to the experience of the album and the film with paranoia and surveillance being at the center of both works. "Sirius" is often used by sports teams to pump up the crowd before a game, here as the opening credits roll it has the feel of encroaching doom. Condor plays less as a post-Watergate paranoid thriller and more as a European art film with a Sci-Fi bent when played with Eye in the Sky, especially in the scenes between Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway. 

(The Shining - The Beatles: The White Album) - My own concoction, an attempt mash up Kubrick with the Beatles, who have a slight historical connection. Kubrick made his home outside of London while the Beatles were in their heyday, they even approached him about directing their adaptation of Lord of the Rings that never went beyond the talking stage. So, the Beatles with Kubrick makes for funky concoction. As the iconic opening credits roll, McCartney sings about about "snow peaked mountains way down south) on "Back in the USSR," while "Dear Prudence" takes on a more menacing tone as Jack enters the Overlook. John's satiric "Glass Onion" plays during the interview scene and on and on. The synch makes both works stranger and more mysterious.

To sum up, synching albums with movies is fun and makes you see both from a new angle. Perhaps our brains are designed to find patterns, the synch approach to media helps us become aware of this. 

Book Review: What Were We Thinking: A Brief Intellectual History of the Trump Era by Carlos Lozada

What Were We Thinking is a work of synthesis by Washington Post book critic Carlos Lozada - and a valuable one. One of the great ironies of the Trump years were the sheer volume of books (in addition to thousands of think pieces) written about a President who made his functional illiteracy a big selling point with his base. Lozada presents a critical account of much of the writing about this time in American history, leaving one with no doubt its been a transformational era into uncharted territory. Here's a rundown:

1) Understanding the Trump Voter: After election night 2016 mainstream media outlets hit readers hard with searching stories of how Trump won and why. Most of these books were torn on whether it was economic or racial grievance that drove these voters. The answer is somewhere in between - according to the books.  These works range from soul searching memoirs from those who came of age in the heartland, famously J.D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy and Heartland by Sarah Smarsh, told from opposing ideologies. Vance blames laziness among working class whites and has since become a radical authoritarian subservient to Trump. Smarsh focuses on the damage of tricke down politics in white rural America, a sense of inferiority of being unable to attain financial independence. Academics and journalists took jaunts into Trump country and tried to understand what was going on in works of sociological analysis. Elements of race and economic anxiety play a role. Yet all these books tend to reinforce a stereotype: either a bitter a resentful and ignorant bigot or the folksy helpless victim of bad policy and misleading propaganda. Many of these books also write of rural America as a monolith of whiteness and decline, when in fact they are becoming more diverse and becoming more reliant on immigrant labor. 

2) Resistance Literature: #Resistance became a staple of Twitter after Trump assumed power, unleashing an all hands-on deck mindset to save democracy. Timothy Snyder's slim volume On Tyranny offered grounded advice on how to oppose creeping authoritarianism based on lessons from the 20th Century. Lozada found much of the resistance genre to be insufficient, too focused on deepening the divide and dunking on Trump and his followers instead of rejecting the polarized mindset itself.

3) Conservatives and Trump: The rise of Trump led to a schism within the Conservative Movement and one that's undergone many phases. A flurry of mea culpa memoirs emerged by ex-conservatives despairing over Trump stomping on many conservative principals, leading to their divorce from the GOP. Lozada sees an insincerity at the heart of these volumes in not coming to terms with how their tactics created the climate for a Trump to rise. Then there are Trumpists writing books heaping praise on their leader as a misunderstood president who wants to save America from "the ruling classes. "Trumpist intellectuals" began to build an argument for Trump, based at the radical right Claremont Institute, branding themselves as ultra-nationalists who believe all Americans who voted for Biden should have their citizenship revoked! Lately, as told in a Vanity Fair article, these "rebels" have found allies in the Tech industry and are attempting to market their brand of reactionary-cultural politics into a viable stance that's extremely authoritarian. 

4) Immigration: Perhaps the most painful part of the Trump years were the agonizing debates on immigration, a leader taking a complicated and sensitive issue and pouring gallons of gasoline into an already raging fire. Lozada read books dealing with new approaches to border policy, memoirs written by immigrants and from those who live on the border. A recurring theme are the contradiction America's high demand for immigrant labor and the hostility of Americans towards people willing to the do work. 

5) Assault on Truth: The chaos of the current media landscape is covered in this chapter from historical explanations by academics to memoirs by journalists on the front lines. Questions are raised like. How do we live in a time when everyone lives in their own truth bubble? There's the sheer spectacle of watching government officials lying for their leader despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Orwell's 1984 is often a starting for a long list of academic studies on the decline of an objective truth. 

6) Race in the Trump Era: Lozada looks at the number of books on identity politics, whiteness, and racial identity in modern America. Discourse on racism, anti-racism, and many memoirs on racial identity in 21st Century America are all covered in this chapter. The murder of George Floyd led to a racial reckoning during the summer of 2020 - and a predictable backlash of white resentment. 

7) #MeToo and Gender Politics: Revelations and reflections on the sexual violence perpetuated by men in positions of power occupied much of the discourse during the Trump era. With multiple allegations against Trump himself and the reveal of Harvey Weinstein's many crimes against women, gender dynamics at home and in the workplace underwent substantial reassessment. From Hillary Clinton's memoir What Happened? on facing misogyny as a presidential candidate to confessional memoirs written by women about the abuse they endured in the workplace to suspenseful journalistic accounts such as She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey.

8) White House Chaos, Russia, future of democracy: The last three chapters look at the plethora of accounts from insiders and journalists on the day to day chaos of Trump. Lozada admits these books make for compelling reading, but all fall into a similar trap: They seem too enthused on just reporting on the chaos without much insight into the larger significance. Books on Trump and his Russian connections also became a cottage industry of varying accounts. Books on American history and its meaning were also topped the bestseller lists.  

What We Were Thinking is a useful read on the state of the American psyche during Trump and where it might be going. Lozada shies away from pushing a thesis or agenda, more of a commentary track searching for meaning through a challenging time in history. An extensive bibliography is also included. 

Book Review: The Nolan Variations: The Movies, Mysteries, and Marvels of Christopher Nolan by Tom Shone

In one of the first book length studies of Christopher Nolan's films, author Tom Shone presents his subject as something of an enigma. In an age when many are writing obituaries for cinema and lamenting the glut of comic book movies or the rise of streaming - a new Nolan film is considered something of an event. While he built his reputation by revitalizing the Batman franchise, the three films he made (Batman Begins (2005); The Dark Knight (2008); The Dark Knight Rises (2012) exist in their own universe and stand on their own. They're more a part of Nolan's own mythology, rather than Batman lore. So, we have a rarity: an auteur who makes big budget movies during a time it's considered a passé. Nolan revels in being both anachronistic and futuristic simultaneously. To quote the author:

His films are deeply personal fantasies lent urgency and conviction by their maker's need to view fantasy not as some second rate version of reality but its equal, as vital as oxygen. He dreams with his eyes open and asks that we do the same. (15)

Shone conducted a series of interviews with Nolan over the past 20 years, their first meeting during the promotion of Nolan's 2000 film Memento. Despite the generous access Nolan provided Shone on his creative process and views on everything from philosophy and art to his youth spent shuttling between America and the England, Shone finds Nolan to be an enigma, often inscrutable. It would be easy to compare Nolan to Stanley Kubrick since both were directors who managed to construct their own worlds and follow their own artistic preoccupations. But Nolan is far more outgoing with the public than Kubrick despite his mysterious reputation. Highly secretive about his projects, Nolan views cinema as a means to explore a myriad of philosophical, scientific, and historical possibilities. The book is especially useful for insight on Nolan's influences for each film ranging from the paintings of Francis Bacon, the stories of Jorge Luis Borges, and Victorian ideas of time.

Time and its many forms border on obsession in Nolan's filmography, as well as connections between perception and space. Whether it be the backwards narrative in Memento or the disorienting levels of dreamscape in his 2008 film Inception or the bending of spacetime in his 2014 film Interstellar. Packaging these weighty themes into blockbusters goes back to Nolan's fascination cinema history and the filmmakers who pushed the medium forward under the guise of being a mainstream filmmaker whether it be Spielberg or Lean. By this point in his career, Nolanesque has become its own adjective for a specific type of high concept film. 

A chapter is devoted to each film, Shone including details on the production and the genesis of each project. The James Bond franchise, in particular Thunderball and You Only Live Twice, influenced all the Batman movies. Crime films and noir influenced The Dark Knight, while the Charles Dickens classic A Tale of Two Cities played into the The Dark Knight Rises. Nolan avoids explaining his films, sheepishly claiming his first objective is to entertain, and shrugs off the idea his movies are intricate puzzles designed for endless Reddit discussions. 

The book includes photographs and illustrations to along with the text. The author's professional relationship with Nolan provides an inside view of Nolan who keeps living a low key lifestyle with his wife Emma Thomas (and producing partner) and four children (and continues collaborating with his brother Jonathan Nolan on scripts.) There's a lot of fascinating background on his working relationship with the film composer Hans Zimmer. I would highly recommend to any film devotee, even those who are not fans of Nolan who will gain insight from it. 

Marching with The Doors