The Horror Genre & Toni Morrison

As result of a workshop we’ll be going to soon, Brigid and I were recently talking about the horror genre, and some of the difficulties it has. Specifically, we were talking story structure, and how the key to the genre is handling the root of the terror–the “monster” as it were. I posited in that […]

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Life Itself

We went to go see “Life Itself,” the new documentary on Roger Ebert. It is a beautiful film, and both Lisa and I strongly recommend it. I think there are people in this world who are just remarkably different in ways that are hard to fully comprehend. Roger Ebert was one of those kinds of […]

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Ender’s Game: Meh-

Lisa and I saw Ender’s Game this afternoon, and unfortunately didn’t find it particularly worthy. This book is pretty much hallowed ground among both Lisa and I, but Lisa clearly vlaues it even more. She reads it fairly often, and had re-read it again last week just to prepare. For me, well, the word I […]

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Roger Would Have Loved It

“I forgot Roger Ebert died,” Lisa said Saturday night. “I think I’m going to cry.” We had just gotten back from seeing Gravity at the IMAX 3D theater up in Indy, and we were beginning our traditional pass at reading reviews–something we always do after seeing a film. It’s been quite a while since our […]

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My Thoughts on 42

Thursday Lisa and I went to see “42,” which is (as I told Lisa afterwards) probably the worst movie I’ve ever really enjoyed. What this means, I guess, is that the story of Jackie Robinson breaking baseball’s color barrier is so powerful on its own that you almost can’t make it uninteresting. But the story’s […]

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When I Miss Roger Ebert the Most

I’m pleased to note this morning that Interstellar Fiction has published my short story “Out of the Fire.” You can find the entire story free on their site. # I’m also pleased to note that yesterday I completed the first draft of the short story that had been eluding me for the past week or […]

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Gatsby

We went to see “The Great Gatsby” today. I thought it was an interesting film that was worth seeing despite the fact that it fell flat in a lot of ways. In other words, I can see why it’s drawn mixed reviews. What I liked: 1) The story is, of course, really solid. And, since […]

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Review: The Master

SPOILER ALERT – THIS POST CONTAINS STORYLINE INFORMATION ABOUT THE MOVIE “THE MASTER” … GO AWAY IF YOU DON’T WANT TO READ ABOUT IT, HENCE SPOIL YOUR EXPERIENCE … YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED ———————- I went into “The Master” thinking it was a thinly veiled story about L. Ron Hubbard. Having spent two weeks in […]

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Beasts of the Southern Wild

“I’m not sure what we just saw,” Lisa said as we walked out of the theater. We had just seen “Beasts of the Southern Wild.” I agreed with her completely. I’m not certain what it is, but I can say without reservation that it is one of the more remarkable pieces of work that I’ve […]

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Born of Hope

Yeah, I know this has been around for awhile, but I just today got around to actually watching it. If you enjoyed Lord of the Rings at all, Born of Hope is a pretty neat little piece that was done by an small, independent group of (essentially) volunteers. It looks, outstanding. Very slick. And the […]

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