IT WAS HARD TO TELL from the title what this movie might be about, though as more was revealed, the title derived from one character’s description of the fight against tyranny and aptly so. The movie is satirical, and more impactful for it. Like any film I enjoy, the acting rises to Art. In this case, although it’s understood to be a quantum amount tongue-in-cheek, everyone plays it straight and well. The cast is A-list stuff. Paul Thomas Anderson (director and nominated for a Golden Globe) doesn’t make bad movies. Leonardo was good, and occasionally comically so. I was impressed with Perfidia, played by Tayana Taylor (nominated for a Golden Globe), and also by Sean Penn (also nominated for a Golden Globe), who was stellar

UNFORTUNATELY, I went to this movie because of all the hype, and because I’ve enjoyed Timothée Chalamet‘s work in past films. After about 15 minutes, the popcorn didn’t taste good anymore because the protagonist was so distasteful to me. I asked myself a simple question: am I curious enough about what happens next to watch this jerk for another 90 minutes? It wasn’t the actor’s fault that he was able to make this person believable, I just wonder why anyone would accept such a role in the first place. Anyone who wants to learn about the antics of people with no ethics beyond what’s in it for them has plenty of stories in the daily headlines to choose from. I shouldn’t go on but I

  THE US STOCK MARKET is still expensive. The valuations today exceed those of all except the most exuberant conditions in the last quarter century. While we’ve seen what appear to be corrections in specific stocks or specific market sectors, money is generally not leaving the market yet. In a more professional parlance, the market is undergoing “rotation.” Money comes out of tech and goes into blue chips, or it flows out of blue chips, and into small caps. In less professional parlance, the money is “barhopping.” Despite the improved labor picture from Friday– which lessens the chances of more than one or two small rate cuts this year— the market pundits provide new narratives to justify paying the higher multiples for stocks. “Productivity is

  A Token of the Holly King By William Hecht Weekday afternoons at two o’clock, he began to look for her. Each time the little bell sounded to announce that the door to Ye Olde Coffee and Tea Shop had been opened, he would turn his head. As three o’clock grew near and brought with it the possibility that she wouldn’t arrive that day, he began to resent the other customers who instead appeared in the door at the sound of the bell. He imagined that she must have begun working at one of the neighborhood shops in mid-November, and that she probably arrived at work in late morning and took a break in the afternoons. Though it was nearly Christmas and she visited most

THIS DOCUMENTARY might be your most important film experience in decades; I haven’t even seen it. This site holds at least one post about George Orwell written years ago. (https://www.moviesmarketsandmore.com/orwells-1984-is-the-book-of-our-time-a-canticle-for-eric-blair/). His novel “1984” posited a future world he projected to arrive about forty years earlier, but history seldom happens on time. Disclaimer:  From what I understand, this is bold and provocative piece. I will include a review in the next couple weeks after I view it and then I review a number of new films.   WRH  

    [This piece, taken from the writing collection of the same title, is re-posted as an anniversary tribute. Dad died on August 12, 2013. ]       The Eighth Day by Thornton Wilder is my favorite book. It is probably also the most underrated novel of the last century. I never merely re-read it; every few years it summons me, and like a somnambulist I turn to the bookshelf and reach for my copy. A novel such as that is a conjurer’s orb: your hands surround and caress it, your eyes peer into its depths and… a voice sounds. The voice wields the kind of authority that dismisses fiction. The images, the characters—the story chronicles a series of events so rife with Truth

THIS MOVIE CAME CLOSE to doing something very special. It almost outdid all prior versions in this nth remake. Guillermo Del Toro (director) stylized the film to bring newness to one of the oldest classics tales and films that, like the monster itself, just can’t seem to die. He started by showing loyalty to Mary Shelly’s 1818 version where most of the movie is a backstory. Having never read the original story, I was unprepared for some aspects of the plot. I will say that I was captivated until those plot points interfered and “broke the dream” for me. I won’t say that it’s not worth watching, however – especially if you’re familiar with the original storyline. It will probably rank very high as a

I REVIEWED—and since watched all seasons of—Slow Horses, the series based on novels by Mick Herron. It turns out that he wrote the novel that this new series was born of. Herron and Emma Thompson – a star or costar – were producers. This one appears to deviate from the intelligence community theme, because Emma Thompson plays a private detective. And she gets some very saucy dialogue to work with. I’ll say already that I think she’ll get nominated for an Oscar But as the story evolves, Thompson and her costar (Ruth Wilson), are drawn into something bigger than the stuff of private investigation. Like Slow Horses, the dialogue gives complex plot designs the perfect sauce to keep you following along. I’ve always enjoyed Emma

ONCE AGAIN, I’m back into the intelligence theme – it’s been on fire in the last couple years. This one is special because it takes place in Alaska. A Federal Marshall (Jason Clarke) in a remote area of Alaska gets a cataclysm of events dropped into his lap. The plot thickens and the northernmost reaches of the United States are plunged into chaos and intrigue when a plane carrying a large number of federal prisoners – and one special one – crash-lands leaving survivors to be rescued or hunted down. Some good acting all around, and a new face popped up for me who I predict just launched her career to a new level. Haley Bennett plays a CIA agent who flies several thousand miles

IT WAS MY FAVORITE JOB. I only got work five or six times a year, but it paid well. Having taken economics and finance in graduate school, I later taught both subjects as adjunct faculty for a couple small private universities. I had also spent 30 years in the financial services space holding several FINRA licenses. A friend of mine was the office manager for Strategic Economic Decisions. The president was a top economist named Dr. Horace Brock. He went by “Woody.” He lives north of Boston and had attended Harvard and Princeton, receiving many degrees and studying under recipients of the Nobel Prize for economics. He was even invited to the Nobel ceremony in Stockholm in the 1990s as a guest of one of