Workshopping Humanity Weekly Newsletter: November 10th
Recapping my favorite stuff from this past week!
Another week, more stuff to discuss, let’s get into it!
Movies
- Poltergeist
“They’re hereee”
I hadn’t seen Poltergeist in years but remember being shocked by how scary it was for a PG movie when I watched it (which this was one of the early movies that helped create the PG-13 label, but I digress). There’s still a lot of horror movies to this day that take a lot of their hallmarks from this film and you can see why. This is just a fun time at the movies. There’s nothing truly innovative about the film, it’s just really good at what it does which is give you some fun scares and some good laughs at the absurdity of it all. Steven Spielberg and Tobe Hooper came together to make a great film to ease young horror fans into the genre.
- True Grit
I’ve been meaning to watch this one for years so I’m glad I finally got around to checking out True Grit. I knew once the Blank Check podcast had Starvos on as a guest to talk about the film I had to watch it - and this movie has not been overhyped! It’s really fun and the type of film only the Coens would be able to adapt in their own special way. I love the irreverent sense of humor the film has, all while telling a story that tackles deep understanding of grief, revenge and remorse. The final line of the film is one that will stay with me for a long time. Hailee Steinfeld in this film gives quite possibly the greatest child performance of all time, she’s unbelievable in this one.
- Predator: Badlands
I was excited to see what Youtube critic turned filmmaker Dan Trachtenberg would do with a 100 million dollar budget and a big property like Predator and after the likes of Prey and Predator Killer of Killers I think it’s cool one of these projects finally gets a big screen release. I’m a little conflicted about this movie, because I really like the direction they took with this franchise. I think it’s pretty bold to have our protagonist be one of the Yautja themselves, yet the film doesn’t play this like Maleficent where the villains have always been misunderstood. This species and their calling are evil, this one we follow just goes on a journey to discover what he has been taught his entire life has been wrong. This journey through the lens of one of the best looking blockbusters I’ve seen in recent memory with beautiful world building and immaculate creatures had me in awe. That’s why I wish narratively this had done more for me. If you know the heroes journey arc, you’ll know exactly how this film plays out after the first ten to fifteen minutes. I was just waiting for it to narratively do something new and it doesn’t. Overall, it’s a fun blockbuster spectacle but it could have been even more than that with another retooling of this very basic arc.
- Matilda
I had never seen Matilda until this week, which is kinda shocking because of my love for off kilter adaptations of children’s literature, but this one always just passed me by. Overall, while a little uneven I did really enjoy the film. I think this is an important movie for kids to see and could be a cathartic look at how you will one day find the peace and solidarity you seek for even when it feels like the world is against you, one day you won’t have to use your powers.
- Nashville
This movie is an all time favorite for me. This almost three hour sprawling hangout film from hometown filmmaking legend Robert Altman is one that feels so cozy every time I watch it. The gospel and country sensibilities are so in tune of my own coming of age (and Altman himself is from Missouri so he definitely has the sensibilities of someone who grew up in the Midwest, capturing so many personalities of people I grew up around) even if I didn’t grow up in Nashville itself, this movie still has so much Branson Missouri attached to it. This is weirdly a comfort movie for me- but that last thirty minutes is so devastating. I love that Altman doesn’t tell us why or how, just that one day we can be living the American dream and it can come to a halt because of the radicalization of culture. This movie is both of the moment and forty years ahead of its time, because it is able to capture so much of the human experience in just a little under three hours.
- La Haine
La Haine for the last few years has gained a massive cult following of people claiming it’s one of the best films ever made so I finally decided to check it out and honestly, I don’t see it. Hot take, but I didn’t love this movie. I think there’s a lot of admiration I have for it. The passage of time is well captured here, the mis en scene is gorgeous. The settings feel very lived in and the film is very well framed. The cinematography is gorgeous. I just think this concept would be so much powerful if the three men in this film were more interesting than they are. These guys to me felt like archetypes and their conversations throughout the movie were not interesting to me at all. I also don’t love the edit of this film, I found some of the choices here to be odd and while I admire the ambitions of trying something different, I think in execution the way this film is edited and paced too me out of the realism the film was trying to present. I know, it’s a scolding hot take and maybe it’ll be one I cringe looking back on in a few years but I have to be honest.
Television
Smiling Friends and The Chair Company continue to still delight. I have nothing else to report this week. I will be catching up with Pluribus, the new Vince Gilligan show sometime this week!
Music
- Liquorice: Hatchie
Only listened to one album in full this week, but Hatchie’s Liquorice is one of the years best albums. This dream pop album harkens to the likes of bands like The Sundays and The Cranberries, it feels like it could score your own coming of age fantasy. Hatchie’s album feels whimsical when it needs to and sludgy when it needs to, it perfectly captures the angst of growing up and the shining hope of a better future as well. Beautiful synths and amazing shoegazy guitar tones throughout. I’ve thought this year for film has been lackluster (which in all honesty I think can be seen through the awful Grammy nominations this year) so I’m glad this album came out when it did!
Culture
If you are someone who just wants America to stop being a clown show run by the worst people you know, this week was a breath of fresh air. Some hope came out of the recent elections, where Zohran Mamdani won the vote for New York mayor and every state had major wins for the Democratic Party. This was one of the first times in recent we’ve finally seen the American people say “STOP” to the MAGAfication of the country and the right wing shills are seething over it. Lies about the candidates are being spread as MAGA is finally starting to realize their empire is imploding. Soon, we will see a lot of these spineless shills start to backtrack on what they have been saying for years, disparaging minorities rights and supporting genocide. That is why we must not forget names like Ben Shapiro, Dave Rubin, Julian Michaels and Megan Kelly for continuing to be the worst and propagating for ideas that would make the lives of the working class worse so they can continue to milk their own greed through capitalistic structures they have built and continue to exploit. Megan Kelly has the absolute GALL to say on her show that “not a single working class person in New York voted for Mamdami”. I have news for you Megan, as someone who knows several people who are in the working class in New York, you couldn’t be more wrong. Continue to spread lies until everyone sees through your grift!
For our, “hey this person isn’t too bad” award for the week, we have to shout out Curtis Sliwa. He seems like a nice dude who actually wants to see the best in the working class of New York and had the backbone to wish Mamdani good luck because he doesn’t just care about his own self interest, but he cares about the people. Most Republicans now hope to see New York burn down, because that would support their own agenda against Mamdani’s politics. Sliwa however, one of the last true “Republicans” actually wants to see things get better for the working class, even if that is through policies he doesn’t align with. This is admirable and while I don’t agree with his politics and think his interviews have been incredibly goofy, I overall think Sliwa is a respectable guy in the same way John McCain or Mitt Romney were.
Another thing we are seeing in real time is a right wing civil war and it’s glorious to see. Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson are on an all out war as Shapiro claims Tucker is propositioning the alt right anti semetic rhetorics of commentators like self proclaimed neo nazi Nick Fuentes while Tucker Carlson shoots back that Ben is a shill to the Israel Government and is being bought out by them to push out his own agenda. Republican commentator Candace Owens even entered the picture, defending Tucker Carlson and landing the bombshell that Ben Shapiro is not liked in the conservative movement, and the late Charlie Kirk even believed Shapiro was a toxic figure. This revelation has came after weeks of Shapiro claiming his deep admiration and friendship with Kirk and practically begging Turning Points to let him be apart of their organization. The funny thing about this whole debate is that every single person involved is in the wrong. Tucker shouldn’t be interviewing and propositioning Fuentes on his show, he is a corrupt figure. Shapiro is not an honest actor. This entire controversy being played out feels like watching two trash bags fight each other in the wind and it’s glorious.
I guess I would be dismissed if I didn’t bring up that The Grammy nominations happened this week, since I brought them up earlier. Last year, The Grammy’s actually nominated some truly great and boundary pushing records for pop music (and then gave song of the year to the diss track Not Like Us by Kendrick Lamar which is barely even a song- but I digress) the line up last year gave me hope in the future of this awards body. Then, this line up came out, which is quite possibly the worst line up of albums I’ve ever seen nominated for album of the year. I believe this organization is no longer concerned at all for nominating the best of the year, just the ones that will give them the most ratings on their broadcast. It’s been a weak year for music anyways, but where are the actual albums being acclaimed by music critics? Where is Geese? Magdalena Bay? Quadeca? The artists that aren’t as popular as Taylor Swift per say but are actually pushing the art form forward in profound ways? I don’t get it. It’s like if The Oscar’s nominated movies like Jurassic World Rebirth for best picture because they made a ton of money over the summer and Johnathan Bailey is a superstar now. I don’t know, the legitimacy of this awards body is none- and we’ve all known this ever since The Weeknd controversy at The Grammy’s years ago. Look into that story if you would like, but that made it transparent that this origination is bought out and paid unlike any other. My choice for album of the year would easily be Chromokopia by Tyler the Creator who is easily one of the best R & B artists working today. I also thought Man’s Best Friend by Sabrina Carpenter was a really fun album that had some standout tracks on it. Overall, those are the only two albums I like on the list. It’s rough, here’s to hoping for a better line up next year.
That’s all I got! See you guys next week!