Monthly Archives: July 2024

General

I read the news today/yesterday, 7/23/24 edition…

So the last week we had Donald Trump almost being assassinated at a rally and I wrote about how the news seems to be on steroids of late, that it seems almost every day we’re hit with one “unprecedented” event after another to the point of being numb about the whole thing.

Case in point: The assassination attempt against Trump seems like distant, distant old news now and hasn’t seemed to alter the fabric of our body politic much at all.

To be clear, there are those Trump fans who did make something of what should have been a ground shattering event. They talked about how Trump was “invincible” or somehow “anointed”… in a religious sense. There were T-shirts showing the bloodied Trump being held by the Secret Service and… welp, I cannot deny his fans their moment of hero worship even if to me the whole thing was incredibly frightening.

Then the Republican Convention came. In short order Trump chooses author and very far right (and favorite of billionaires like Peter Thiel) J. D. Vance as his Vice President pick… and it doesn’t really do all that much to anyone outside the right wing sphere. In fact, many pundits wound up scratching their heads at the choice. Most of the time a VP pick is meant to shore up a Presidential Candidate’s weakness. Like getting a popular figure from a State that’s in play or choosing someone who will help you with some large segment of the population which may not view you in as positive a light. Vance didn’t seem to “help” Trump with broadening his base and came from a state that likely will go Republican already. An odd choice, for sure.

But even worse for Trump, the convention’s finale featured his acceptance speech and… it didn’t go all that well. To begin, it was the longest acceptance speech ever at 92 minutes and that wouldn’t have been an issue except that most viewed the speech as a too long and boring rambling affair. Even the audience seemed to want it to end and that’s hardly a ringing endorsement to the guy you want to lead not only your party but the nation itself.

And there’s more: Trump claimed he would offer a “unifying” speech and truthfully if there was a time to do something like that, after surviving an assassination attempt as he did, this would have been the time for a more humble Trump to come on stage and accept the nomination and ask those who are disinclined to voting for him to give him a chance. That he’s a changed man and would fight for all Americans rather than the hard right few.

Didn’t happen.

So Trump exits the Convention not looking particularly stronger than before he entered and that, in itself, should be looked upon as at best a missed opportunity and at worse a failure.

A few days later comes the (here’s that word again) unprecedented news that President Joe Biden has decided not to run for re-election. He formally endorses his V.P., Kamala Harris, to succeed him.

It’s a crisis point. Will the Democratic Party descend into chaos? Would several others try to claim the nomination from Biden/Harris?

Nope.

What happened was quite the opposite: It energized the Democratic Party. It led to an incredible monetary haul of donations, perhaps the biggest ever in a single day. And it excited many who may have been holding their breaths with a Biden candidacy.

I was one of those holding my breath, I have to admit.

Look, I don’t dislike Biden at all and I’d vote for him over Trump or pretty much any of the current batch of right wing Republicans out there.

But, let’s face it, at 81 years of age, he’s very old and as a potential voter, I couldn’t help but wonder day after day if we’d get the “good” Biden or the tired older Biden we saw in that first debate with Trump.

The idea of another Trump presidency was unimaginable to me but the reality was that I didn’t know if Biden, a mere three years older than Trump, could show more energy despite his age.

In one swoop, though, the tables turned completely. Suddenly the Democratic Party has a young, energetic, and smart woman looking like she will be the candidate and just as suddenly all the stuff that was being leveled against Biden -that he was too old and too tired looking- was wiped out and re-focused on… Trump.

It’s been a few days now since these events and it feels like the Democratic Party remains on a high while the Republican Party is struggling to find a new message. Worse, their biggest televised event, the Convention, came and went and did nothing to broaden Trump’s appeal while they spent all that time slamming Biden… who is no longer even the candidate they’re running against!

It’s a truly fascinating bit of political ju-jitsu by Biden.

He may be old and I feel he was smart to give up a re-election run. Yet he managed to do so in perhaps the best possible way to re-energize his party and focus a harsh light on the fact that all his problems… are present in spades in Trump.

But again… that’s today.

Let’s see what happens tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow…

General

I read the news today, oh boy…

I don’t know about you guys, but it seems like we have “unprecedented” things happening daily…

…and it’s freaking exhausting.

It seems each day’s news comes and attempts its best to outdo what happened the previous day to the point where it’s becoming mind-numbing.

I’m not saying the things that happened aren’t newsworthy… but the frequency they come, are digested, only to be supplanted by something even more disturbing or shocking the next day is (here’s that word again) exhausting.

To be very clear, the assassination attempt against Donald Trump yesterday is very much a news event… this is an obvious, shocking, and disgusting no-brainer.

While I have no love for Trump or his policies and absolutely will not vote for him nor do I want him anywhere near any real government power again, I want to be absolutely clear that I do not take any glee at all at the fact that someone -and likely we’ll come to find a very disturbed individual- took a shot at him.

Just as I wished those on the other side -including Trump himself- didn’t make stupid jokes and/or offer such “clever” sly innuendoes about the clearly deranged intruder who broke into Nancy Pelosi’s home and attacked her husband Paul with a hammer.

But the worst of it is that I’m left wondering what shocking news we’re going to get tomorrow.

Or the next day. Or the day after that.

I worry we’ll quickly forget about this shocking episode and move on to the next “unprecedented” event.

And so on…

…and so on…

Movies

The Invisible Man (2020) a (Brutal Husbands, Part 2) Review

So I’m flying back home and, having seen Till Death (you can read my review of it here) on my way to my destination, I’m looking through what I’ve downloaded and decide to watch the 2020 Leigh Whannell written/directed film The Invisible Man on the way back. I enjoyed Mr. Whannell’s 2018 film Upgrade quite a bit and wanted to check out The Invisible Man for a while now and decided it was time.

What I didn’t realize is that Till Death and The Invisible Man are, thematically anyway, films that can be described as “the husband from hell and the harried wife who has to somehow survive them.“

Here’s the movie’s trailer and, like Till Death, it gives a taste of what you’re in for without giving away everything:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=dSBsNeYqh-k%3Fsi%3DCprUvownBxIqeD10

In The Invisible Man, we start off introduced to Cecilia Kass (Elisabeth Moss, quite good). She in bed next to her husband Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen, also quite good) but, we find, is in the process of escaping his high tech -and clearly very expensive- home.

She’s terrified of Adrian and the audience soon finds out why: In the process of escape, Adrian reveals himself to be prone to violence (I won’t get much more SPOILERY than this) and, even when she’s finally freed of him, Cecilia fears he will find her and enact his vengence on her.

I’m loathe to give too much more away. Going by the trailer, I will say this much: Adrian appears to have committed suicide and then things get stranger as Cecilia fears her ex has somehow figured out a way to make himself invisible and is now after her… and her friends.

As I said above, both Till Death and The Invisible Man are films that focus on a violent, devious, and dangerous husband who wants to “get” his wife and I was genuinely struck by how both films follow through on this premise quite well.

The Invisible Man, after a somewhat slow burn introduction (the only very big negative I would give to the film… maybe I’m getting impatient in my advanced years), takes off in delirious and interesting directions. Like Till Death, the film does feature several surprises and also some necessary suspension of disbelief (I’ll give one here as I did with Till Death: Didn’t Cecilia wonder why the dog was healthy when she saw him the second time?!).

Still the suspense is quite good and the story is meaty and treats the audience with respect without dipping into silliness.

If I have any real big negative, its only the fact that I somehow stumbled onto seeing these two films and wound up comparing them to each other because their initital premises are so very similar.

The Invisible Man is clearly the more fantastic of the two films and was also the one that featured a larger budget but Till Death gets points for knowing what it’s going for and getting there quick.

Still, you can’t miss with either film.

That is, if you want to see husbands from hell going after their wives… who turn out to be far more resourseful than the asshole husband thought they were!

Recommended.

Movies

Till Death (2021) a (Brutal Husbands, part 1) review

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A year or two ago, maybe a little more, I was looking through the VUDU (now Fandango) digital movie sales and found the 2021 Megan Fox movie Till Death listed among those available fairly cheap.

I must confess: I wasn’t necessarily interested in buying the film but, as I do, I checked out the reviews and… they were for the most part quite positive. Anyway, bottom line is the price was right and I figured “why not?” The film sounded interesting enough so I figured I’d give it a whirl…

…welp…

As with all entertainment things I buy, they get into a very long line before I finally have a chance (if ever!) to get to them. Long story short: I was taking a flight somewhere this past week, looked over the movies I had, downloaded several, and when the plane was taking off to my destination, I decided to give Till Death a whirl.

And I was glad I did.

First, though, here’s the movie’s trailer which, thankfully, doesn’t give everything away…

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Wfmb1-UEpW4%3Fsi%3D6pA1IdD06n4ul0cJ

Megan Fox is Emma, a woman who when we first meet in the opening minutes of the film is ending an affair she’s having. See, it is her anniversary and while she is clearly very unhappy in her marriage, she is also honorable enough to realize having an affair is no solution either and realizes it’s time to end things. Now, just to add a little more context and without getting too SPOILERY, it is revealed later in the film that Emma knows her husband Mark has been having affairs as well. Their marriage is truly on very shaky grounds.

Anyway, after this, the audience meets Mark (Eoin Macken, wonderfully creepy from his first scene on) who seems contrite and claims he wants this anniversary to be one where they finally put all the negatives from their marriage behind them and become a true couple.

And if you think these two one-time lovebirds do just that in the course of this film, then you haven’t been paying attention and you certainly haven’t seen the above trailer!

I’m loathe to give away too many of the movie’s story details, but suffice it to say that rather than taking Emma to an isolated romantic retreat where they can finally start the process of healing their relationship, Mark brought her to an isolated, diabolical death trap he has devised. And once the proverbial shit-hits-the-fan and the movie gets going, Emma quite literally is in a fight for her survival against seemingly impossible odds.

I’m certain there are many people who saw this film featured Megan Fox and were instantly turned off by the idea of watching her star in any film and therefore are unwilling to give Till Death a shot but… you’re missing out.

While the film isn’t “perfect” and there are a couple of moments where one has to use the proverbial suspension of disbelief (such as how Ms. Fox’s wonderful makeup stayed on so well through the whole ordeal…!), Till Death is a more than competently crafted thriller that delivers several surprises along with the life and death struggles of Emma.

As for Ms. Fox, she’s quite good as the harried leading lady who is quite literally fighting for her life from the fifteen-minute mark (or thereabouts) of the film until its end.

A stylish, suspenseful work that, at least for me, is an easy recommendation.