June 12
Call of the Wild 3D
Youssou N'Dour: I Bring What I Love
June 16
June 19
Dead Snow
Whatever Works
June 24
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
June 26
Cheri
Fireflies in the Garden
July 1
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
July 3
The Girl from Monaco
I Hate Valentine's Day
July 10
July 15
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
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July 24
All Good Things
The Answer Man
In the Loop
July 29
July 31
The Cove
August 7
When in Rome
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A Perfect Getaway
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The Goods: The Don Ready Story
Ponyo
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Spread
The Time Traveler's Wife
August 21
Five Minutes of Heaven
Goose on the Loose!
It Might Get Loud
World's Greatest Dad
August 28
The Boat that Rocked
September 4
Amreeka
Carriers
Citizen Game
Shanghai
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The Red Canvas
Tyler Perrys: I Can Do It All Myself
September 17
The Burning Plain
September 18
Brand New Day
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Jennifer's Body
Splice
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A Serious Man
Toy Story/Toy Story 2
Alexander Solzhenitsyn had 89 tough, proud years on this planet, and surely knew before his death earlier today that his legacy as one of the great all-time ballsy writers of the 20th Century was unassailable. The 1973 publication of The Gulag Archipelago, a scalding account of Soviet prison camps, led to the Soviet Union giving him the boot the following year. This eventually led to a decampment in Vermont and an 18-year period as a Russian expat. His BBC obit notes that "while living [in Vermont] as a recluse, he railed against what he saw as the moral corruption of the west"...hah! A malcontent and a truth-teller wherever he hung his hat.
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on August 3, 2008 at 5:10 PM
comment #1
Mgmax says ...
A giant of a level of courage most of us cannot imagine.
Posted by Mgmax at August 3, 2008 5:28 PM
comment #2
EOTW says ...
Doubt he owned an IPhone, Wells.
Posted by EOTW at August 3, 2008 7:37 PM
comment #3
slothroplt says ...
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich was the first Russian work I ever read. If not for that great novella, I may never have found my way to Bulgakov, Zamyatin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Turgenev, Chekhov or even --dare i imagine-- Dostoevsky, and his great prison novel, The House of the Dead.
I owe him much and I pay my respects.
Posted by slothroplt at August 3, 2008 7:41 PM
comment #4
Edward says ...
Спасибо за ваше обслуживание(службу) к человечеству (Thank you for your service to mankind).
Posted by Edward at August 3, 2008 8:50 PM
comment #5
George Prager says ...
So weird that he made this appearance as one of the celebrity panelists on Match Game '73:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ED36PtHbRY
Posted by George Prager at August 4, 2008 5:38 AM
comment #6
SpinDozer says ...
Interesting interview on NPR from this ayem:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93250786
I disagree somewhat with MGMax, I think anyone who has read Ivan or Gulag will be fully capable of imagining the courage of Solzhenitsyn, and be awed by it. There aren't too many biographies of literary figures from the last century that would tempt me, but I I look forward to the one that explains this man.
Posted by SpinDozer at August 4, 2008 3:52 PM
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