the groundhog day project

Mr. Mom is a progressive film for 1983. Give us the typical American family with husband, wife, two and a half kids. Nice conservative vision to open up--the husband works, the wife stays home. But, then Jack (Michael Keaton) loses his job at the automotive factory and everything falls apart. Now, in addition to this being one of the films we watched a lot when I was a kid, this film has other connections, too. For example, the story went back when this movie came out, that my mother actually heard about an open casting call for the two boys. And she considered taking me to audition. I'm seven months younger than Alex (Frederick Koehler) and a year older than Kenny (Taliesin Jaffe). Now, I'm not saying I was a cute kid but from time to time I might imagine since then that she took me and I was cast and my life went in a completely different direction. Maybe I'd be playing on Critical Role tonight instead of sitting here watching it. Let me explain that fantasy for thos...

No childhood film today. Busy day of kitchen cleaning and map drawing. I did see a movie today-- Coco . Not sure if it was great. It was good, and definitely affecting. And it had an interesting message--combining both the idea that you should follow your dreams and family is important. In context, these feel like two different directions--SPOILERS--for a good portion of the film, but then they pull together and it all gets wrapped in a little bow. And, it got me thinking about family. Now, on the one hand, I haven't spent much time with most of my family in the past year. I'll be honest about that. The likelihood to get into a political argument has made hanging out with them less appealing. I'm talking about my parents, some of my sisters. But, it's worth noting that, for example, in many of the fictional stories I have written over the years, family was something constructed more than inherent. You choose family like you choose friends. Except you don't reall...

The thing about Murder by Death is that 1) it offers up a group of intelligent characters, capable of Sherlock Holmes-style deductions out of nowhere-- (For the record, even though I know better, when Dick Charleston asks about Marcel recovering from his accident, I assume he's talking about Marcel getting hit by the gargoyle that was pushed off the roof not ten screen minutes before. But, no, he's talking about some previous injury, and references the sound of Marcel's artificial hip, which WE CANNOT HEAR. Considering the Charlestons were also attacked with a gargoyle, it should be even more obvious that Marcel was injured. But, no, it's a previous "accident" with a car.) --but also just dumb (if that's the word) enough to be so wrong about their guesses about the larger situation, particularly those at the end of the film, after Twain has essentially tried to kill them all in their rooms. 2) They, Sam Diamond especially, are capable of being sexist ...

In 7th grade--can't remember if it was fall semester or spring semester, but 7th grade was '87 to '88--I was rereading Joe Dever's Lone Wolf books. Particularly, I was reading The Caverns of Kalte (that's the second book) again during a lull in math class... I had probably already finished my math work--I was amazing at math, would get a couple years ahead by the end of high school. And the assistant teacher, whose name was Mr. Mentell or some spelling--we called him Mr. Mental--happened to look over my shoulder when I'm at an image of a big tentacled monster. This one, I think. He asks to see my book, and doesn't give it back after class. That night, we get a call. The next day, my mother is in the principal's office with me and the vice principal... And I can't remember if Mr. Mental was in the room. But, long story short--the religious private school that this atheist attended kindergarten through twelfth grade decided that those books (which,...

I haven't watched many made-for-tv movies for this blog. ( 12:01 comes to mind as one I did watch, 12 Dates of Christmas another.), but they almost have an immediate excuse for their badness. The tv budget and, if the movie is old enough, the film quality just are not going to be anywhere near most films that were released into theaters. Mazes and Monsters has the added excuse of being based on a novel inspired by some bullshit paranoia--namely that playing Dungeons & Dragons can make you a) be a satanist, b) go crazy, c) kill yourself (or, per this movie, the worst possible option d) try LARPing). (I'll talk more about that paranoia tomorrow, maybe. Today I'm just going to enjoy the film.)           It's a bit simple (but not unrealistic) that Robbie (Tom Hanks) joins up with the Mazes and Monsters group because of the attractive girl Kate (Wendy Crewson). But, I like that immediately after playing with them the first time, we get a montage that...

Author's Note: Color me a hypocrite, but I don't follow much, if any, of the advice I am about to give. Here's the present: I'm sitting on a pew in a church building someplace in Long Beach, California. My daughter's got rehearsal for a play and we're far enough from home that I just hang out during, work on my blog, watch some tv, read, whatever. Only my third time tonight, so I couldn't say there's a pattern but for writing this blog. I've already seen two movies today-- Wish Upon and War for the Planet of the Apes --but I don't feel like writing about either of those. I'm stuck in a different mode. Stuck in a loop. I was listening to the soundtrack to the Groundhog Day musical on the drive here. Between Phil's being stuck in a pattern he needs to get out of, but not for the reason he thinks; Rita being stuck on imaginary knights in shining armor from childhood fairy tales, but knowing that's unrealistic and not worth waiting f...

Then again , who am I to tell anyone to shut up (not that what I did yesterday was that , exactly? And, who am I to preach about being creative when my only real creative outlet lately is this blog (with barely any audience) or Dungeons & Dragons , where my audience is a whole 6-9 players depending on the week? I had considered getting out a few of my unpublished manuscripts--the good ones--and re-editing them this summer to make available as ebooks, but then I got some summer classes to teach. Great news for the bank account but taking up a lot of my time for several weeks. Maybe I'll still get to the manuscripts. Knowing me, probably not. One little roadblock and I'll put it off, do something else. Story of my creative life. This blog--not strictly speaking an entirely creative exercise--is the one thing in recent years I have been able to stick with for a particularly long time. When I started actively trying to write fiction for the purpose of getting published--with ...

Early in France's Ha , France's quotes Sincerity and Authenticity by Lionel Trilling (1972): "To praise a work of literature by calling it sincere is now, at best, a way of saying that although it need be given no aesthetic or intellectual admiration..." and the sequence of France's and Sophie moves on to another interaction, part of a series that establishes a) their sisterly closeness--Frances compares them to a lesbian couple that no longer has sex--and b) their lack, of a sort, of real maturity. That line from Trilling continues: "it was at least conceived in innocent of heart." And, I think, sincerely, that the choice of this quotation by Baumbach was deliberate. See, in context (of Trilling, not the film, though I'll get to that), Trilling has gone over the origin (latin sincerus meaning "clean, or sound, or pure" and really meaning that whatever is being modified has "not been tampered with." He has covered a sort of his...

This entry should actually be short, partly because it has been a long day and I've got an early day tomorrow, and partly because I'm only watching a short film tonight. Aria by Pjotr Sapegin, a painful, beautiful little film that is all of ten minutes long. Today, as I arrived at Meltdown Comics in Hollywood to play Dungeons and Dragons , as I do every Sunday lately, I had to drive a different route than usual because of the Pride (and #Resist and #Equality) Parade. Friends of mine were out there marching. On a different day, I might have been out there. I marched on Inauguration Day, I marched the day after in the Women's March. And, I feel like I should be out there more, should be supporting those who need support, reinforcing those who need reinforcement, and renouncing those who need renouncing. On more than the Internet, I mean. Then again, as Ben Platt just said when he won for lead actor in a musical for Dear Evan Hansen , "don't waste any time trying t...

Permit a sidetrack. Not that there's a clear throughline driving me this month. I wanted to revive this thing and I did, and I've mostly just been winging it. One day at a time. Life is good that way. Make plans, sure. But, it's each day that matters. Do the useful things, the productive things, but also find time for the fun things. Save Buster from choking and light a woman's cigarette... Not that I want to get into Groundhog Day references right now. King Arthur is today's film. And, what TV Tropes calls "Cast Calculus" (or more specifically, depending on how this goes, "The Five Man Band" or The Magnificent Seven Samurai"), and The Encyclopedia of Fantasy labels simply as "Seven Samurai." Specifically, because lately I think about way too much in terms of Dungeons and Dragons references (because D&D takes up far too much of my spare time), I noticed as I watched King Arthur last night that Arthur and his Knights p...

I don't think that I will get to the second reason that I brought up the slinky mention from Obit. today. Instead, I have to take advantage of the film I had time to see today. See, today was a busy day, a Mother's Day thing at my sister's house, a few hours of D&D and then dinner and a movie with some of my D&D friends. Then home and it's after 10 o'clock already, and I've got a job interview in the morning and some driving to do, then the usual Monday stuff. But anyway... The film in question tonight: The Fifth Element . Twentieth anniversary screening. And, I remember well seeing it the first time in the theater two decades ago. Only movie I saw that weekend. Not the only movie I saw this weekend. (Saw the new King Arthur and Obit. of course.) And, honestly, there isn't much to say about The Fifth Element that hasn't likely been said many times before in the intervening twenty years. What is worth saying, in terms of recent points I...

The dog gets my favorite line in Beginners . The full subtitle (because, of course, the dog doesn't actually speak) is: "Tell her the darkness is about to drown us unless something drastic happens now." I've been there. Felt that drowning sensation, the darkness, and had drastic things happen. (By the way, I'm not actually watching Beginners tonight. My Netflix was having some issues, so I moved on. #FirstWorldProblems) I've been diagnosed with depression, been offered prescriptions for medication to deal with it. Mostly, I've learned to deal with it on my own. I've gotten good at compartmentalizing different parts of my life, and I've learned to take time to do fun things. For example, today I went to the Renaissance Faire with friends with whom I play D&D. I also (in case some future reader hasn't noticed the jump in dates or some past reader is confused) restarted this blog, ostensibly as if nothing had changed. I picked up the ...

I was going to rage tonight, get political, get advantage on ability checks. But, weirdly stressful midday and my students bugged me this evening and I'm in the mood for something simpler. This morning I watched Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and right now I'm watching Beginners again. And, I feel like some old fashioned Christ-Figuring. If you've been with this blog for a while, you know what that means. If you haven't, then maybe look back on the original Kozlovic Scale Christ-Figuring two-parter (Days 93 and 94 ) regarding Phil Connors in Groundhog Day or what I take as the inaugural Kozlovic-Black Scale*--when I Christ-Figured Rambo . * Yes, I gave myself partial naming rights. If Anton has a problem with that, he has yet to talk to me about it. Anton being Anton Karl Kozlovic, who published a few times on the subject of the cinematic Christ-Figure. And, I've done it several times here. Thing is, I'm going for a twofer tonight. I am going to Christ-Fi...