Joining the Club

 There's the Circle of Excellence - that is, people I've dragged to CFL games, and that is 20 right-thinking individuals - and then there is the Inner Circle of Excellence - that is, people that I've dragged to multiple Canadian cities for CFL games, and that, until this summer, included only three people: Kevin (after this month, eight of nine possible sites), Sanford (two, almost three), and Andy (three). Now, however, the Inner Circle is expanding. Cyndi travelled with us on the first leg of the Manitoba/Saskatchewan Doubleheader of Excellence, and now she can claim two CFL cities (Montreal and Winnipeg). She'll be joined at the end of the month by Erik with two (Montreal and Ottawa).

Cyndi, of course, added her own energy to the trip, expanding Kevin and my usual routine of exploring every diner in the new city. Here she is dragging us to the Winnipeg Zoo, a brilliant idea on a 95 degree day, right before the Blue Bombers game (obviously, not concerned with her aged friend's failing legs). Sadly, she escaped from the dinosaur.

Movies in 2026 219

 

High Art (Lisa Cholodenko, 1998)

Last night I re-watched a movie I hadn't seen in around twenty-five years, which I guess I could say about a lot of movies since I'm an old man, but this one hit me because I can't believe it was made that long ago. It's Lisa Cholodenko's High Art, which, inexplicably, came out in 1998. It's Cholodenko's first film, and it launched an impressive career. It's sometimes reduced to "that movie that former Brat Packer Ally Sheedy did lesbian scenes," which is a crime because it's quite a good film. It's as much a critique of our relationship with high culture as it is a lesbian love story. Radha Mitchell (as Syd) is quite good as the aspiring editor who gets dragged into the circle of Sheedy (as Lucy Berliner), a damaged but talented photographer. Patricia Clarkson plays Greta, Lucy's girlfriend, is typically great, this time as a drugged out German actress (as I've often opined, nobody has better sense of a good script than Clarkson). The damages of drug use - and of failed aspirations - are huge parts of the story. Highly recommended.

Movies in 2026 218

 

Niagara (Henry Hathaway, 1953)

Henry Hathaway's Niagara showed up this month on the Criterion Channel, and since I don't have a DVD of it to fret over packing in my suitcase, I decided to take the opportunity and watch it again. I think it's clearly Marilyn Monroe's best movie. I know I'm supposed to say The Seven Year Itch or Some Like It Hot, but she aces the smoldering sexuality bit here brilliantly and provides a great femme fatale in this melodrama/film noir. Joseph Cotten is very good as a damaged war veteran, who gets pushed to murder by his cheating wife. Jean Peters is also pretty good as the bright wife (married to a dolt of a salesman) who is drawn into the adventure. I think the script must have been co-written with the Niagara tourist agency. Recommended.

Movies in 2026 217

 

The Prisoner (Patrick McGoohan, 1967-68)

Just when I think I can't love the Criterion Channel more than I do, they decide to include the entire series of Patrick McGoohan's groundbreaking The Prisoner. If you haven't seen it, shame on you, and take this opportunity to right the wrong and  address an egregious cultural gap. It's sort of Twin Peaks before Twin Peaks, that is, a TV show so utterly bizarre and different that it changed our understanding of the potential of the medium. Patrick McGoohan plays No. Six, who is sort of like the secret agent he played in his earlier TV series Danger Man, although there's some debate over whether he's supposed to be or not. He tries to quit his job as an agent, but is gassed, kidnapped, and dropped into a village where he can't escape. Whenever he tries to leave a giant floating ball swallows him and brings him back - he great memory from my childhood. Oddly, and sadly, the paranoia of the series seems more relavent every year. Required viewing.

"I will not make any deals with you. I've resigned. I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered. My life is my own!"

"I am not a number! I am a free man!"

Devil

 This last weekend Janet's great friend Erin paid us a visit, and she brought me this utterly epic gift. Janet patiently puts up with our mad discussion of our shared loved of horror movies and cryptozoology. This time Erin brought me a great Jersey Devil t-shirt, which is definitely making its way across the ocean.

Obviously, on one of my trips back to the US in the years to come I need to head down to the Pine Barrens in New Jersey.

Movies in 2026 216

 

The Odyssey (Christopher Nolan, 2026)

On Monday I was running errands in Burlington anyway, so I decided to catch Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey on the big screen. I'd like to say that I loved it, but, truthfully, I'm not really certain that I even liked it (and this has nothing to do with the $32 I spent for a movie ticket, a coke, and a popcorn - seriously, it's not simply the crappy movies coming to theaters, it's also the insane cost of snacks, that are keeping people away from seeing movies in the theater). I know everyone was madly/illogically complaining about the casting - and I had some issues with it (I counted at least eight actors who had appeared in the MCU or the DCU) - but I didn't have the usual idiotic complaints about Lupita Nyong'o or Elliot Page, both of whom were fine. I mean, Lupita Nyong'o is a very fine actress, and she's stunningly beautiful, so she's a great choice to play Helen. My problem is the dumb stuff that these characters, and, for that matter, all of the characters, had to say. I don't think there was even one line from Homer's Odyssey that appeared in Nolan's Odyssey. Granted, film is a visual medium, but would it have killed Nolan to have included some of the best lines from Homer (even considering that the Odyssey pales in comparison to the Iliad in regards to great passages)? There are so many great scenes that were just ignored (Odysseus meeting his mother, Achilles, and Ajax in the underworld) in favor of dumb scenes such as Odysseus explaining to Penelope that Agamemnon was starting the war to dominate trade in the Aegean. The attempts to deal with the patriarchal nature of a work created  twenty-five centuries ago were just clumsy, like implying that Odysseus didn't really cheat on Penelope, because he didn't sleep with Circe (a wasted Samantha Morton) and even if he slept with Calypso he didn't really sleep with her because she had him drugged to deal with his obvious PTSD. In the epic Odysseus wants to go home, but he doesn't feel any great existential remorse for his role in the Trojan War.  The attempt to foreground the female characters was noble, but it was also clumsily done, leaving them utterly one dimensional (and I would argue that they aren't in Homer's work). Essentially, it felt like an Odyssey made by a person unfamiliar with the Odyssey for an audience that would never read the Odyssey, which I guess is a good fit for this Trumpian post-literate age. Give it a pass. Instead, go back and watch Memento, the one truly great film that Christopher Nolan ever made.

Movies in 2026 215

 

Halloween III: Season of the Witch (Tommy Lee Wallace, 1982)

The Halloween theme continues to play itself out, although I suspect this will be the last one.  Janet's friend Erin and I got into a big discussion of Halloween III: Season of the Witch (apparently, Erin and I grew up together, we just didn't know it - or at least we watched all the same horror movies), which led us to watch the movie. The movie was not as bad as I remembered, and apparently it was the an attempt, unsuccessful, to start a rotating series of Halloween movies that were not simply about the Michael Myers characters. I'm amazing that Dan O'Herlihy was in both this film and also in John Huston's The Dead, although people have to pay the bills. Every time I watch this I think about the fact that it was Stacey Nelkin's relationship (when she was 17) with Woody Allen (when he was 42) that inspired his Manhattan, and then I feel that I should remember her for some other reason and it makes me feel bad. Halloween III, after some initial audience resistance, has picked up a bit of a cult following over the years. Give it a watch. 

"101 days left till Halloween, Halloween, Halloween. 101 days left till Halloween, Silver Shamrock!"