In the Economics and Finance classes I teach, the most stimulating class session covers the topic of money. Students express a curious confusion when I introduce a specific riddle, a koan for them to mediate upon. I ask them to explain the statement: “The prices of food, oil, gold, and property often don’t rise at all.” [pullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”One year, for example, the price of gold is 1200 dollars per ounce,” I suggest. “And one year later gold is 1300 dollars per ounce.  If I tell you that gold did not go up, what else could possibly have happened?”[/pullquote] They wonder if I am joking and prepare to rebut my assertion with evidence of consistent increases in the prices of just about

It was only coincidence, but I happened to watch the 2003 classic School of Rock on cable Friday night. That movie—which launched Jack Black’s career and held a box office record for the genre until 2015, was about kids whose lives were transformed by creating a good band. They get some mentoring of course, and viewers have to accept that they had more than a little studio help with regard to the quality of the sound, but the theme works–probably because we want so badly for it to work. [pullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]For the price of admission, you get an extra pair of tickets: one to Dublin and another back in time to the era of Boy George, big hair, and Duran

This little indie gem popped up out of nowhere; I didn’t even have it on my radar as I usually do from previews or the NYT movie reviews I get every week. Based on real events, Papa Hemingway in Cuba depicts a few years in the late 1950s when Ernest Hemingway lived in Havana with his wife Mary. These were no ordinary years. The Miami Globe reporter Ed Myers  meets and befriends the man who is his  idol as well as America’s most famous author.  There’s no lack of drama in this one. The events leading up to the Castro Revolution in Cuba, Hemingway’s battles (both internal and external), and the personal and professional adventures of a young journalist make this film compelling and dramatic.

“Miles Ahead” is Poignant, Timely, and Oscar Bound I would bet anyone that this film gets nominated for a few Oscars in December. Don Cheadle is almost certainly a Best Actor contender for his portrayal of Miles Davis. Sadly, part of my reaction is due to the political reaction during awards season over the paucity of nominations and roles for African American actors. In other words, the film and the acting are deserving of praise, but because this film (without presuming to) responds to the controversy, it draws even more energy than it might have on its own merits. [pullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Cheadle plays a man whose muse is at once his savior and slaver: in one frame his eyes flash fear