the small internet

Hey guys,

Some new things:

1. How stunt performers pull off dangerous falls.
   

2. Catfish taste with their whole bodies
   

3. You have to dig, but there is a message in Nope: we are a species that thrives on creating showmanship and spectacle, and the more you chase it, the more you feed a beast that just can't be tamed.
   
   The way to stop it is to go back to the basics, to the first cameras, to the initial impetus and the history of cinema (and to reclaim the forgotten role a black person played in it -- did the movie really have to go there? -- kudos to Jordan Peele for otherwise being more universal than his previous social thriller films...). I only wish this theme could've been followed through with more directness. Peele's a really talented filmmaker, and in this case his aims are almost Kubrickian, but you often get the feeling not every scene or interaction furthers or questions his thesis. He's too focused on simply being visceral or having fun -- Keke Palmer is especially great. Awesome cast.
   
   It feels like ages since I actually saw Nope, even though it was only about 6 weeks ago. Not sure if that says something about entertainment trends -- the commodity is talked about for a week, then fades -- or just that my head's been pulled onto many things since, like learning from Jim Kwik... Lots of memory tips and tricks from this renowned guy. One of the last lessons being how to turn numbers into words.
   

4. Here's one that's probably faded faster than Nope, and unfortunately so, as it's a riot.
   

5. Sneaking under the radar of It was this arguably better Stephen King adaptation, which I've come across 5 years later. Better because of what it pulls off in minimal settings, with theater-level sophistication to its writing, and with clever shot planning to show Jessie's interactions with her husband and herself, and because it still goes super grisly in one particular scene. From director Mike Flanagan, who recently did this, and this.
   

6. It just may be John Williams' final film...so we get a debut of a new theme half a year early.
   

7. Ethan Hawke on his doc, The Last Movie Stars, a noble and thorough catalogue of the 2 titans that reaches, in the final episode, some poignant personal thoughts.
   

8. Maybe one day Hollywood -- or its celebrity representatives -- will get with the times and be better informed, but today is not that day. 
   

9. You may not have watched Better Call Saul, but the words on its ending reveal its intelligence.
   

10. The internet has become a small, small, small place. A poetic way to describe it:
    
    "It’s gone so far we can hardly be called users at all – more like passengers on a rollercoaster train at the carnival of the damned. Browsing these services is to look upon a Potemkin Pyongyang storefront, with guards twitching to accuse you of being a counter-revolutionary if a subversive thought can be read on your lips – or your clicks."
    
    Your voice is being weened off of every single "town forum." And Amazon's temporary ban on user reviews for its Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is the latest example of this.
    
    This was their attempt to hide the low ratings that supposedly came from "trolls"... but something tells me that's not the full story. The series actually is a big shrug, and often kind of silly. Silly like a local stage play, or bad TV -- a bunch of modern people playing dress-up and make-believe for something that almost looks more 1800s... sometimes like Wuthering Heights.
    
    A world meant to work an ancient mythology of Europe -- when cultures were more segmented and homogenous -- loses authenticity when today's mixed-racial look is applied to it. It's not just color. It's everything down to the haircuts and makeup and postures. Creative anachronisms have worked, usually when done knowingly or ironically. They don't in this series, because of how sincere it strives to be.
    
    The reason certain artistic worlds stand the test of time is because they're rooted in socio-cultural patterns that we recognize. Here, the creators were perhaps consumed by blind idealism. The result is something less believable and less grounded. It also just doesn't look as distinct as the definitive films.
    

11. Taron Egerton doesn't totally fit in Black Bird, at least at first, and some of the supporting players are totally stiff. But Paul Walster Hauser really does something memorable, apart from just the weight improvement.
    

12. Orson Welles on how he made Citizen Kane.

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Chris