Media Markt
Up until the train wreck that was Friday night's Something's Gotta Give, I was having an unusually good run of luck with my media consumption. These are few and far between and therefore I feel obligated to share (or brag, depending on your perspective). In order of completion, then:
- After almost two months, I finished The Seven Storey Mountain this past week. For the first 200 pages or so I couldn't help the feeling that Merton was indulging a little too much in the unimportant details of his life. Perhaps my lack of experience with autobiographies can be blamed. He spent over 100 pages describing his pre-teen life. He talked about going to the dentist no less than three times. Luckily the final 200 pages improved dramatically and by the end I couldn't put it down, further solidifying my opinion of Merton as one of the best contemporary religious writers.
- I have been a Brando fan since I first saw him in The Godfather. My local Blockbuster doesn't carry many of the classics but our recent subscription to Netflix has allowed me to catch up on his earlier work. Last Friday, I watched A Streetcar Named Desire and was mightily impressed by his nuanced portrayal of Stanley Kowalski. Having grown up a few generations of cinema later, it's difficult for me to recognize exactly how influential this film was but there's no denying the brilliance of Brando.
- I wanted to see Amores Perros when it came out in 2001 but put it off for fear of its reported grittiness and realism. As it turns out I had nothing to fear. In parts it is hard to watch but the director puts the emotional power of the violence to good use in making his points about love and humanity. Plus I'm a sucker for the intersecting stories/multiple viewpoints-type films (Magnolia, Traffic, etc.) and it is well done here.
On the movie front, I have also added an exciting new feature to the Souzek Republic main page. If you scroll down past the Briefs and About sections on the left, you will notice a section entitled Now Playing with a few movies below. Through the wonder of the Movable Type Netflix Suite plug-in, I am able to display the movies I currently have checked out from Netflix. Now you can instantly know what I am watching on any given day, which is information I'm sure you were dying to have at your fingertips.
On deck:
- Pnin: my first Nabokov
- The Office, Series 2: I'm enjoying the anticipation now because I know that once we start watching we won't be able to stop.
- 21 Grams: Alejandro González Iñárritu's second film (after Amores Perros) with a strangely similar plot.