The World Beyond BetterMost > The Culture Tent
In the New Yorker...
southendmd:
Well, the walls of my bedroom aren't exactly shrouded with Anthony Lane posters, LOL. But his Contact snark was way before the McConaissance: it was 1997. Lane found casting MM as a philosopher/theologian rather laughable.
serious crayons:
--- Quote from: southendmd on January 18, 2014, 06:57:18 pm --- But his Contact snark was way before the McConaissance: it was 1997. Lane found casting MM as a philosopher/theologian rather laughable.
--- End quote ---
Right. But who's laughing all the way to the Oscars now?
I sometimes detect a bit of snark among straight male critics toward extremely good looking actors, a hint that the actors are lightweights whether or not their performance deserves it. Another example: Bradley Cooper has been good in every movie I've ever seen him in. But in reviews he's often sort of shrugged off or ignored, getting far less praise than his costars (e.g., Jennifer Lawrence).
That said, I myself get impatient when I see supermodelish starlets cast as geophysicists and the like. Maybe that's a similar reaction. Except that those starlets' main purpose for filling those roles seems to be eye candy, which wasn't really the function of MM in Contact, as I recall.
Jeff Wrangler:
I was reading Ben McGrath's article on soccer in Brazil (Jan. 13). I thought it would be interesting, and it was, to a point, but the article was just too long, and I gave up about five pages from the end.
"It has too many notes words. ..."
Jeff Wrangler:
I'm now reading David Remnick's article about the President (Jan. 27). I know this reveals my own shallowness, but I liked the description of the presidential limo, and the breakfast menu on Air Force One. ;D
On the other hand, as somebody who used to write history for a living, I'm tickled to learn that the President has dinners with historians. :D
And I loved what Robert Caro, the biographer of LBJ, had to say: "No matter what the problems with the rollout of Obamacare, it's a major advance in the history of social justice to provide access to health care for thirty-one million people."
Jeff Wrangler:
As soon as I saw an article by Patricia Marx about traveling on a cargo ship (Feb. 3) I sat right down and read it. :laugh:
It's ... OK. :-\ Turned out to be not as long or, frankly, as funny as I might have expected from Marx, but it's still ... OK. And interesting to me that she sailed from the port of Philadelphia instead of from somewhere in the New York region.
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