Listening to President Obama's news conference right now. He teased me, a moment ago, with what was almost a science fiction reference.

The topic is health care reform, and he started the point by saying "If we have a red pill and a blue pill," and I was waiting for a reference to The Matrix's "show you the truth or let you continue living the lie", but he just dropped it, saying "and they do the same thing, but the red pill costs half as much as the blue one, why she wouldn't we have the red pill." (And no, I didn't notice if the cheaper pill was the movie's truth-giver or not.)

Back from the funeral (which, other than the reason for being there, was very nice: Kit's got some interesting and fun relatives), and I'm in-town for less than two days.

SFScope is back! We've got it migrated to the new host and working again (though we're still trying to figure out the problem with the banner ads, but all our advertisers will get all the impressions they've paid for), so I'm frantically trying to catch up on the news.

It's going to be a short day for me (contrary to the "I've got a week's worth of news to catch up on" problem), because I've been invited to the premiere of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince this evening (hoping it's a lot of fun, and that the movie's good). And then, bright and early tomorrow, I'm back on the road, this time to Readercon (see previous post).

Rush rush rush!

I was just taking a break, and saw the last two minutes of The Day the Earth Stood Still, which I haven't seen in a long time (the original; haven't seen the Keanu Reeves version). Basically, I heard the last half of Klaatu's final speech, when he says "…we live in peace, without arms or armies, secure in the knowledge that we are free from aggression and war. Free to pursue more profitable enterprises. Now, we do not pretend to have achieved perfection, but we do have a system, and it works. I came here to give you these facts. It is no concern of ours how you run your own planet, but if you threaten to extend your violence, this Earth of yours will be reduced to a burned-out cinder. Your choice is simple: join us and live in peace, or pursue your present course and face obliteration. We shall be waiting for your answer. The decision rests with you."

What really caught me this time was the "unlike you nasty apes, we live in peace and are good, happy people. So you learn to live in peace like us, or we'll kill you."

I know, I know, Kirk sounded pretty stupid in "Errand of Mercy" when he was angry at the Organians for keeping him from fighting with the Klingons, and in the case of this movie, it's the robots who will kill, not the people living in peace. But still, isn't there a better way to urge peace on people than to threaten them with death?

Finally back in New York, and, in case you couldn't guess, I'm well behind. Haven't hazarded a look at the friends page yet (sorry), but here I am.

In the movie reviews department: we saw a screening of New in Town tonight, and I wasn't really excited by it. It's a romantic comedy that did have some funny lines and moments, but the overall story arc was completely predictable from the second scene, and didn't do anything new with the trope. Upper crust, hard-nosed, no-nonsense executive Renée Zellweger and scruffy sweet Harry Connick, Jr. dislike each other, have to work together, and somehow fall for each other. That's not even a spoiler, because you could get that much from the title, poster, and names of the stars. What really struck me about the movie was how they could make two such attractive people look so unattractive: bad lighting, poor makeup, and several other technical mistakes, but neither one looked as good as they can (and usually do). Oh well; at least it was a date with Kit. And at this screening, they gave out cupcakes. Good cupcakes.

Let me tell you right off the top: I'm not a big fan of Woody Allen films. The last one I saw, Match Point, completely underwhelmed me. I was, however, quite pleasantly surprised by Vicky Christina Barcelona, which we saw last night (and which is scheduled to be released in mid-August). The title is a bit unwieldy (American friends Vicky and Christina are complete opposites, and they're spending the summer in Barcelona), but the storyline moves along nicely, smoothly.

Some of the publicity material pitched the movie as a "love triangle," and while it does have three-sided elements, that geometric shape isn't the real story. The real story is of proper, staid Vicky—who is getting married soon to an upstanding young man—and artsy, flighty, free-spirit, doesn't-really-know-what-she-wants Christina, who are off to spend a few months in Barcelona. The scenery is wonderful, the buildings and villages very enticing, Gaudi's architecture (which I love) is littered throughout the film, and the stars are easy on the eyes, too. I was also impressed that the non-character narrator had such a large role (increasingly, I find myself enjoying narrators in movies and television [see, for example, Big Fish and Pushing Daisies], although now I'm wondering if it's an off-shoot of reality tv, wherein you don't know what the characters are thinking/feeling until they look at the camera and tell you.

Anyway, back to the film. Summer vacation time is either interrupted or begins (depending on your point of view) when local bad-boy artist Juan Antonio shows up with his very European ways (propositioning both Vicky and Christina at once, hoping either or both will say yes). Vicky is immediately turned off; Christina is even more quickly intrigued. What will happen with them, to them, and between them, is the rest of the movie. Allen pulls it off with aplomb, giving us surprises that seem to flow naturally from the story, challenging our instantly formed preconceptions, and giving us a nice tale of what can happen when you aren't planning for it.

( spoilers behind the cut )

Had a really New York today (well, I guess technically it was yesterday, since it's after midnight, but I consider "today" as the time between "I wake up" and "I go to sleep". And why do we start the day at midnight, anyway? Wouldn't it be interesting if the day started at, like, 7:42 AM? ANYWAY...)...

Saw a couple of the waterfalls (which I've mentioned before) from the subway this morning, along with the Statue of Liberty and a bunch of water traffic on the East River. About noon, looking south from the 49th floor, I saw not one but two blimps floating northward above the East River. It almost looked like they were flying in formation. About an hour later, I saw them from the north side of the building: one out toward LaGuardia, the other flying south above the Hudson River. Later in the afternoon, I walked from the Plaza (at the southeast corner of Central Park) up to Tavern on the Green (on the west side of Central Park at 67th Street). I walked through the park, never more than a block or two from the surrounding streets, yet it was a walk in the country, through trees and grass and rock outcroppings (there's a massive outcrop by the Herkscher ballfields and playground called Umpire Rock, which is a massive bit of glacial leftover, really neat place to climb). I exited the Park past Tavern on the Green, where we ate once last Autumn, and where I attended a book launch party for the 40th anniversary of Isaac Asimov's Pebble in the Sky. Leaving the greenery of the park and the floral outbursts of the restaurant, I walked along 66th Street, past the apartment building where Isaac Asimov lived (I remembered dropping him off there after his last visit to the magazine's offices), and then joined Kit at the Lincoln Center Barnes and Noble for a talk/performance/signing by Charles Strouse (accompanied by Christine Ebersole). After Kit got her book signed, we walked uptown two blocks to the theatre for a screening of Swing Vote, which is scheduled to be released the first or second of August (review below). Then it was a quick stop at a pizza place for dinner, and back on the subway home. Riding along, I took out the galley of my book, just for a quick smile (I've been doing that a lot the last two days), and Kit struck up a conversation with the woman sitting next to her, telling her about my book. The woman was friendly (or polite) enough to be impressed that I'd written the book, and actually perused it. We chatted a bit, saw the half Moon hanging low in the sky from the Manhattan Bridge, as well as the Statue of Liberty again (they turn off the waterfalls for the night), and then home. A nice, full day of New York City.

Review of Swing Vote:

I don't think I'm giving anything away when I say this movie is a paean to the importance of voting. The story is what happens when the presidential election is so close that it all comes down to one man's unrecorded vote. Thus, he'll have to cast a new ballot, and the candidates, their staffs, and pretty much everyone else in the country has an opinion to share with him.

I liked the movie, though it felt like an updating of Isaac Asimov's "Franchise" (1955) [wow! three Isaac mentions in one post; guess it was an Isaac type of day], in which the vote of only one man is necessary for the election (ironically enough, the story is set in the year 2008). That isn't necessarily bad: I liked the ideas in the story, and the ideas in the movie. The movie version, however, is simply that everyone else has already voted.

The girl playing Kevin Costner (the voter)'s daughter, Madeline Carroll, is wonderful, and the film is chock-a-block with name actors, along with a raft of television and news personalities playing themselves

There were, however, some features of it I thought could have been better…

( Below here be spoilers. )

Monday night we saw Tell No One, which is the English-subtitled release of the Belgian film Ne le dis à personne. I'm not a big fan of straight mysteries, so I have far less experience with them. And this movie is a straight murder mystery, so some of my comments may seem a little naive.

( Cut for space and, since it's a mystery, spoiler space. )

We saw Mongol about three weeks ago, but I'm only now getting around to writing a review. That delay is not a comment on the movie; merely a comment on life. (Of course, four posts in one day makes it seem the pendulum has swung all the way the other way; it hasn't. Today is just an aberration.)

This was another of those movies set in the out-of-doors, with wonderful scenery, interesting terrain, and very few buildings (thus, one assumes, really cheap in terms of set design and construction). Subtitled in English, the movie is the story of Temudjin, and how he grew to become Genghis Khan. It's a great study of how this boy developed the personality that enabled him to become one of history's great leaders. From his young life on the steppes, choosing his bride (which angered a neighboring tribe, but showed his fierce independence), watching his father be a great leader (rather than a cautious one, though it cost him his life), surviving as an orphan, a slave, an outlaw, and knowing all along that he was destined to be who he became.

Thinking back on the movie now, Temudjin exhibits honor such that he might be a forebear of the Klingons in Star Trek (not the original series, but the society that was built starting with TNG): honorable warriors, fierce in battle but loyal and decent, larger than life and loving it. As brutal and violent as Temudjin is in the movie, he's also a sympathetic character.

My one big problem with the film was how it started: in the middle. It starts a low point in Temudjin's life, in between successes, currently suffering from a bitter defeat. And then it jumps back to Temudjin at the age of 9. I could see no reason for that starting point: the viewer who knows anything about Genghis Khan knows this isn't the end of his life, and the viewer who doesn't probably won't have the viewing experience enhanced to see this scene first, so I disagree with the film-maker's choice. Other than that, though, the story is told in a decently linear fashion, with occasional necessary jumps in time, and I found it quite engrossing.

The movie is Russian, but was filmed in Mongolian. Some of the "foreign" sensibilities come through clearly, but in some cases, it's simply part of the legend of Genghis Khan. There are, for example, a few scenes where something truly mystical, otherworldly, or magical happens. Viewing the film as a realistic history will leave one scratching the head saying "but how did that happen?" It is jarring if you're expecting a documentary. But just let it flow, tell yourself it's part of the myth, and it all works out.

Saw 21 last night. As with lots of movies, the less you know about it going in, the better you'll like it. In this case, I haven't yet read the book it's based on (Bringing Down the House),but I do know enough about it and the backstory to realize that this movie is a very different adaptation. In the same vein, I know enough about how the Las Vegas casinos operate to know that there were some liberties taken with their reality in the movie (not enough that the average person would find them disconcerting). And I recognized far too readily Boston University's Towers dormitory and Bay State Road as our hero's MIT dorm room.

But leaving aside all those little details which must be changed to make a good movie, I enjoyed this one. It moves very quickly (it definitely didn't feel like the 123 minutes IMDB claims it runs). Graduating MIT senior Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess) has his whole life working out just as he's planned it, except for the looming inability to pay for Harvard Medical School, to which he's been accepted. Campbell is a genius, on several levels, and displays his mathematical talents in a class, which brings him to the attention of his professor, Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey). Rosa invites Campbell to join his team…his blackjack team. And from there we're off and running.

Rosa has assembled a team of students who are adept at the simple—but incredibly rapid—mathematics needed to gain the edge in blackjack from the house. "This is a business," he repeats, "we're not gambling." And the numbers prove him out. The blackjack team has been making good money for quite a while. But there's an opening on the team, and comparing what they can make on a weekend Las Vegas junket to Campbell's $8 an hour in a clothing store, it doesn't take a math whiz to figure out how to spend his time. Of course, nothing is ever simple in the land of Hollywood (or Las Vegas, or pretty much anywhere else), and after Campbell's first $20,000-weekend trip, he's in for setbacks and confusion. But they're all part of the story, and help him to grow into the person he needs to be.

Campbell is an engaging character, and the other members of the team are also fully fleshed-out, fully realized people (I was very impressed with the entire cast). We see Campbell mature from being "just" a hyper-smart nerd to being a worldly young man with a lot of experience earned through some hard knocks and some easy gifts. The hard work is glossed over (this is, after all, a movie), but we know it was there.

The year in which the movie takes place isn't made explicit, in part to appeal to a present-day audience (the book was written five years ago about events that were ten years in the past then), so there are some asynchronicities having to do with the changing world and new technologies, but again, they can be safely ignored to enjoy the movie.

Don't bother looking for a sequel: you can safely feel that the story is complete in this one movie. But do look for it: it's a good movie.

Saw The Other Boelyn Girl last night. It's a very good movie; not great, but very good. I was definitely captivated while I was watching it—and not just because Natalie Portman stars in it—I was caught up in the story (even though I knew how it had to end), the scenery, the costumes, and the performances. It was almost all great. But thinking about it after the credits rolled…

( Here there be spoilers... )

A quick check elsewhere tells me that Anne did indeed have a brother and sister (I wasn't sure how much of the movie was fictionalized, how much historic, because I'm not a scholar of the period), but there was definitely some fictionalization in the movie (which sister was older, for instance).

Reading that other data a little more tells me a knowledge of the real history will probably get in the way of enjoying the movie, so be warned on that account (although I'll have to put some reading into the period on my "to read" list—it looks interesting).

At any rate, it was a gorgeous movie, and while I was watching it, I was caught up in it. And there were little frissons of "I know what's going to happen," and "Do you realize who that character is going to become?" that added to my enjoyment. For instance, seeing Anne's disappointment that her child is a daughter, but knowing who that daughter is going to become.

I recommend it.

Saw Charlie Bartlett last night (first movie I've been to in a while). This was an odd one for me, because I went in knowing absolutely nothing about it (including the title: it was a screening, but I've been too swamped with work to even read the press release before we went. Kit just told me when and where to be).

Going into it with that tabula rasa was probably an advantage, as I had no preconceptions to overcome. The movie starts out with raucous noise and close-ups of someone getting dressed in a suit and sneakers. I at first thought it was an AC/DC concert (oh how wrong I was). It turns out this is a dream sequence (and weren't we just complaining about starting a program with a dream sequence in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles? [Well, maybe it was just me complaining.]). Anyway, the dream sequence is okay; it's a good bit of characterization, and then we get on to the movie.

The eponymous character is cloistered, rich, high-school boy, getting kicked out of his last private school, and finding himself surfing the rough waves of his completely unprepared public high school initiation. But Charlie is something else: he wants to succeed, and more importantly, he wants to be liked. And he's going to get there. He has the cliched meetings with the popular girl, the bully, and the nerd, and they all bring just a little twist to the stereotypes. It's Charlie's interactions with them that make this movie special. And you just know that if Charlie were real, he'd be able to do everything he does on the movie screen.

It's strange to say that a movie—the main themes of which are drug use, alcoholism, dysfunctional families, teen angst, and suicide—is funny and enjoyable, but in this case, it all works. You just know Charlie is going to succeed because that's who he is; he can't help but win through. In this way, I liken him to Ferris Bueller; there's no way he can fail, but he's a lot of fun to watch, and you definitely want to be him when you go back to high school. Unlike Ferris, however, Charlie is flawed; he doesn't always win (in the short term), does make mistakes, and does get caught. But in these flaws lie his success: he can learn from his mistakes and still succeed, getting the girl, the good life, and spreading around enough happiness and satisfaction for everyone else, too. And in his almost naive worldliness (it sounds oxymoronic, but watch the movie), he can help everyone around him to find their own healing, their own redemption.

I recognized only one of the actors in the film: Robert Downey, Jr. as the principal, and assumed it was a low-budget pic with a cast of unknowns, but a cursory look at IMDB shows that these are not first-timers. Indeed, the appealingly soft-spoken Charlie (Anton Yelchin) has two dozen film and tv roles to his credit, and is apparently to be Pavel Chekov in the upcoming Star Trek movie; his ethereal mother (Hope Davis) has been on the big screen since 1990; and the Liv Tyler-esque girlfriend (Kat Dennings) has a resume almost as long as Yelchin's. I guess this means none of them come across as simply going through the motions: they were putting on a performance, and doing a good job of it. Oh, and enjoy the silent chauffeur, whose name I didn't catch, but whose deadpan presence every time he's on screen is a joy.

Recommended.

Keep forgetting to write this up. Early last week, we saw a screening of Lars and the Real Girl, a cute experiment in surrealism. Lars, a lonely fellow living in his ancestral garage (his brother and sister-in-law live in the house), one day shows up with his new girlfriend, but everyone else thinks his woman is actually a life-sized rubber doll. Lars talks with her, enjoys her company, and makes something of a life with her. And in time, the community comes to accept her, too (of course, remember that this is fiction, so acceptance of the outre isn't necessarily difficult).

At first, it's insane; then it's sweet; and finally, it's kind of moving, as Lars and Bianca's relationship progresses. I don't know that it's a blockbuster you have to run right out to see, but I did enjoy it.

The following night, we saw Gone Baby Gone, a police procedural/private eye flick with enough twists and turns for the twistiest mind, but I can't really recommend it. I just didn't enjoy it; didn't feel it was terribly believable. That makes two Casey Affleck films in a row that were too long and tedious and didn't grab me. In each case, he seemed to do a very good job with the character he was given, but the film was just no good. Poor guy.

Saw Elizabeth: The Golden Age last night. It's a good movie. They're not calling it Elizabeth part II because, well, that might be silly or confusing. And this movie certainly doesn't require the audience to have seen that first movie (which came out nine years ago).

The movie opens in the year 1585. Elizabeth has been queen of England for a quarter of a century, and is having trouble with those pesky Catholics, both at home and abroad (though she seems remarkably self-possessed and in control of nearly every situation that comes her way). She's also unmarried with no heir, which means her cousin, Mary Queen of Scots, is her heir. Mary, however, is imprisoned (because she's Catholic, and advocating Elizabeth's overthrow). And sadly for Elizabeth, she's a woman, which means that, even though she's Queen, there are many things she can't do.

Walter Raleigh returns from the New World, and charms his queen, who is suffering a steady stream of suitors. Of course their relationships can't go anywhere, but they do become friends. The Spanish, meanwhile, have been champing at the bit for quite a while, wanting to invade England (either to free it for the Catholics, or to put the Spanish infanta on the throne; doesn't really matter which). And thus, the intrigues are set.

The filmmakers played a little fast and loose with history, pushing Sir Raleigh's affair with Elizabeth's lady in waiting Bess into the period just before the arrival of the Spanish Armada, rather than five years later. And the Armada becomes a single event, rather than the two attempted invasions and the one counter-invasion. And Elizabeth arrives on the field of battle to spur her army on wearing some kickin' armor, which wasn't historical, but looked really good. But it's all okay. They've made a really good movie.

The Armada itself is wonderful: lots of gorgeous wooden sailing ships. And the architecture grabbed my attention every time there was a wonderful shot of something. For those into the costuming, there was a lot of Elizabethan garb running around. And like the first movie, there are a few uncomfortably bloody scenes of torture, but that's what happened.

I recommend this movie for those into historical fiction or historical films or any of that stuff. I enjoyed it.

Saw Dan in Real Life Monday night. It was a very nice movie. A widowed father (Steve Carell) with three daughters goes away to his family's annual get-together at his parents' home, and it's a big family (in this, the movie is quite similar to The Family Stone). And like that movie, one man's girlfriend may or may not become his brother's.

It's a very nice movie: nothing wonderful or amazing, but well written, fun, and enjoyable. Good, big-family interactions, nice scenery; you could do worse than spending a few enjoyable hours with this movie.

Finally saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix last night. I was impressed. This is probably the first of the five movies that I was able to walk out of saying "That was a very good abridgment of the story." Every other one struck me as either trying to shoehorn too much into the allotted film, or simply hacking and slashing out pieces to get down to the right time. This one hung together well; they excised story lines and characters, and moved some lines and actions to other characters, times, and places, but it worked. It's a good movie. Sure, the book is much richer, but this movie works. Bravo. (And no, I still haven't read the seventh book, though I'm hoping to receive a hand-me-down copy any day now.)

Since we were paying last night, we made it a double feature, and after Harry, went in to see The Bourne Ultimatum. I haven't seen the first two movies in this series, and haven't read any of the books, but as a stand-alone movie, this one did a pretty good job of telling the story it wanted to. For those wanting deeply involving movies, however, this one isn't it. It's an action/chase film, and as such, a nice representative of the genre. However, the cameraman has severe palsy.… I know, I know, not really; it's actually a film-making choice, but it was a friggin' terrible choice. The camera couldn't hold still for more than a few seconds, shaking every which way as if the cameraman couldn't hold it when taking close-ups of faces. And during the chases and fights? Well, you know what's supposed to be happening, but there was no damn way to actually see anything clearly. I thought it sucked. And there was no reason for it; the story they had was sufficient for the film, the characters were interesting and involving and well fleshed out, and the settings were interesting and enjoyable to look at. Bad filmmakers!

Last night we saw 3:10 to Yuma, a western starring Christian Bale and Rusell Crowe. It's scheduled to be released the first week of September. This one is a remake of the 1957 film 3:10 to Yuma, a western starring Glenn Ford and Van Heflin. I'm not an aficianado of westerns, but I think this is a pretty good film. There's action, suspense, character growth, a little mystery, some good chases, a decent shoot-out or two… lots of things to recommend the movie. But if you're a bit squeamish, you won't like the blood, the shooting, or the surgery scene.

Story: the down-on-his-luck rancher is in imminent danger of losing his land to the wealthy land speculator who wants to turn around and sell it to the railroad for a lot more. The cattle are dying, there's been no rain, and the river's been dammed. The bad guys come to town, action takes place, and the rancher winds up part of the posse that's taking the head bad guy in. But his gang has other ideas. That's all the set-up you really need. If you're any sort of movie fan, you can probably write the interaction between the rancher and the bad guy yourself, but it's done well here.

Let's see, what haven't I posted that I should have?

Yesterday, 20 July 2007, was the 38th anniversary of Neil and Buzz's walk where no one had ever walked before. It was a short walk, and some things didn't work out the way they'd hoped. But it was a wonderful walk. Ten more guys walked there over the next two and a half years, and no one has been back since. That's kind of disappointed. Check out the Artemis Project if you want to work on going back.

Monday last we saw a screening of Becoming Jane, which I found remarkably reminiscent of Pride & Prejudice, although I suppose that the former is the movie of how the author of latter came to be the author she was. At any rate, Becoming Jane is the story of the young Jane Austen, the trials and tribulations she went through as an eligible maiden who didn't get married, and how she came to write some of the classics of English literature. Gorgeous scenery and sets, wonderful costuming, good actors, and a somewhat sad, though triumphal, story. Not a "rush right out; you have to see it now" movie, but definitely a good one.

Yesterday I spent at Harry Potter Place (see my article on SFScope) and last night we went to Coney Island for the fireworks. While there, I discovered yet another entry in my "Sometimes I Just Don't Get People" series. In this case, we were a group of six, with beach chairs and blankets, sitting in a circle chatting, but quite obviously there for the fireworks, which were to start in an hour or so. Most of us were angled toward the launching point a little way down the beach. And the beach was crowded; lots of people sitting on blankets or chairs, waiting for the fireworks. About an hour before show time, an extended family of eight or ten came along and found a clear spot directly between us and the launching point. And they stood. Now of course fireworks go up, and when they burst at height, are visible for some distance. But part of the thrill of sitting relatively near the launch point is seeing the launches and the lower bursts. And there was an equally clear spot, with no group of people in line, six feet to the left of where these people stood. So why did they feel the need to stand directly in front of our line of sight? Because they couldn't be bothered to see if there were other people around. Sometimes, I just don't get people.

And finally (at least for the moment), this lj is a Harry Potter-free zone for one very important reason: I don't have a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. If you've got an extra, or have already finished yours, and want to pass it along (either for keeps or for a loan), I'm interested in seeing how J.K. Rowling thought it should come out.

Thanks for reading.

We saw a screening last night of Molière, a French film with English subtitles, that will have a limited US release on 27 July. It was gorgeous. Another period film, with wonderful costumes, sets, scenery, and shots.

The story is that of... well, easiest to just quote the press release:

Paris—1644, 22-year-old Jean-Baptist Poquelin, also known as Molière is not yet the writer that history recognizes as the father and true master of comic satire, author of The Misanthrope and Tartuffe, and a dramatist to rank alongside Shakespeare and Sophocles. Far from it. He is in fact, a failed actor.

His Illustrious Theatre Troupe, founded the previous year, is bankrupt. Hounded by creditors, Molière is thrown into jail, released, and then swiftly imprisoned again. When the jailors finally let him go, he disappears. The combined efforts of historians have unearthed no trace of him before his reappearance, several months later, when his troupe begins touring the provinces—a tour that will last for thirteen years, and culminate in Molière's triumphant return to Paris in 1658.

But what happened to Molière during these mysterious lost months?

The film, obviously, tells that story. I'm not going to tell what happens, because that would be giving away the story. And (Philistine warning: I've never read Molière, so I'm not sure), the movie struck me as a "this is the real-life inspiration for the classic story" thing like Shakespeare in Love was for Romeo and Juliet (admittedly, with a few other plays thrown into the mix). I gather this is the story of Tartuffe, though I could be mistaken. But it is a wonderful period piece: the rich and the poor in mid-1600s France. The interplay of the aristocracy, the merchant class, and the lower classes. It is a comedy of errors and mistakes, with both comic and tragic situations. I truly enjoyed the movie, and it made me want to go out and read some Molière. If you can handle subtitled movies (or if you speak French [I do, a little, but in most places, they were talking way too fast for me to keep up]), look for this one.

As you may have guessed, it's been a really busy week for me. Check the time-stamp to see that I've just gotten home from Friday night of I-Con. Soon to bed for a few hours sleep, and then Kit and I head back to the convention in the morning for my two Saturday panels (the previously listed schedule is slightly updated: I'm on the "Space Opera/Soap Opera" panel at 2PM, not the "Mars or Bust" panel). Then commute home, and back out there for Sunday (the 10PM panel is actually at 10AM Sunday).

I'm hoping things will calm down a little next week. But for now, there are several things I haven't had a chance to post here. Last Thursday we saw a screening of The Last Mimzy, which I wrote a review of for SFScope.com. Short form: it's a good movie, feel free to take the kids.

Last weekend was Lunacon, for which, again, I wrote a review at SFScope.com. Read it there, if you're interested. There's no long list of the all the cool lj people I saw there, because that would be inappropriate for the venue, but I did appreciate my conversations with all of you, and enjoyed seeing those of you I didn't get a chance to spend more time with.

I've saved links to several articles I wanted to write about, but again, there hasn't been enough time. There were several articles in The New York Times about a case the Supreme Court heard regarding freedom of speech and a school's right to limit the speech of a student. An earlier article there commented on the interesting combination of groups arguing each side of the issue. And later, there were several letters published about it. (I didn't get a chance to write a letter in time.) I think this is a very important case, and I'll be watching for a decision this summer. I kind of think the Court will opt to rule very narrowly on the specific case, rather than issue a much broader ruling, but I could be wrong. Anyway, it should be interesting.

Later, I was pleased by this CNN.com article, in which Senior U.S. District Judge Lowell Reed Jr. ruled that it's a parent's responsibility to police his child's internet surfing, rather than a burden on companies to make certain children visiting their sites can't see what they shouldn't. Hurrah for rationality. The New York Times also had a piece on this.

Now, to sleep. And then early, back to I-Con.