Many relationships and marriages work out, sometimes for decades. They survive as long as the candle burns, fate warrants and patience persists; others wind down after four or five years. Or sooner. And that’s fine.
No, I’m not about to air some dirty Jeff-and-Tatiana laundry. It would be extremely gauche to do that. Neither Tatiana nor I are perfect, but our private stuff is not column fodder. Because I will not be that middle-aged married woman drunkenly hissing at her husband and angrily exposing her breasts during a party scene in John Schlesinger‘s Sunday Bloody Sunday (’71).
Over the past several weeks, however, I’ve been wincing over Tatiana’s respect and allegiance for Vladimir Putin, and especially her views about the ongoing Russian terror and genocide in Ukraine (which Vladimir Zelensky will discuss on 60 Minutes two days hence). I’ve kept my distance for the most part. It’s her deal, her background (born and raised in Edinet), her culture, her convictions.
Given these recent opinions, Tatiana is a serious fan of Oliver Stone. His 2017 Putin interviews rang her bell and then some. Two days ago he achieved the same by posting a Facebook essay that that was highly skeptical of all the Russia-and-Putin bashing in the media.
Stone’s end quote: “All this anti-Russian propaganda, sweeping in its Western unity, smells bad — literally like Orwell’s ‘1984.’”
Tatiana loved Stone’s essay, and so she tapped out a cheering response to that effect. This led to thoughts about luck, love and the ways of surprising discoveries. If only she and Stone had somehow managed to meet a few years ago, and had kept in occasional touch and perhaps had gradually formed a bond that was about something more than just social-media rapport. I’m not saying what I seem to be saying. I’m saying Tatiana and Oliver almost seem, right now, like two peas in a pod — coming from a very similar place in terms of Ukraine-related perceptions and convictions.
Who develops admiration and affection for someone based on their cultural and political views? Well, all relationships start somewhere. And so much in life is about luck, timing and kismet. I do think Tatiana, whose views about the Ukraine War have drawn a lot of flak on this site, would feel more “heard” and respected right now if things had worked out for her in a different way. I for one would be fine with that. I am also cool — accepting — about our five years together, and in many some ways I am thankful. I’m committed to living in the now.
Whoever cut this 26-second clip needs to be canned. Too blunt, for one thing. No warm-up, no lead-in, no integrity, no intrigue…edited with an axe. Yes, that’s Nicole Kidman‘s Queen Gudrun telling the bad guys to kill Alexander Skarsgård‘s Amleth, the “Viking warrior prince”…her son. So seven or eight guys come at him with axes and he slays them all because he’s so much faster and stronger and angrier…because righteous vengeance has tipped the scales? Oh, wait, he only kills one guy and then the clip ends.
A short clip from #TheNorthman featuring Alexander Skarsgård, Anya Taylor-Joy and Nicole Kidman has been released. pic.twitter.com/FratexwrQ3
— Film Updates (@FilmUpdates) April 8, 2022
But the Sean Penn discussion, which happened three days ago, is worth a listen.
Jurors in the Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping case today acquitted two militant rightwing Michigan bumblefucks — Brandon Caserta and Daniel Harris — and said they were deadlocked on charges against two others, Barry Croft and Adam Fox.
The jurors seemed to be saying that these low-rent assholes were just rattling their online sabres, and that they didn’t actually intend to kidnap Whitmer. Not really.
All four had been accused of plotting to snatch Whitmer, Michigan’s Democratic governor, from her vacation home in 2020. You could also presume that the jurors felt a greater cultural kinship with these four louts than with Whitmer.
The bottom line, I suspect, is that the jurors knew these guys were (a) fairly serious about wanting to kidnap Whitmer, however half-assed and goon squad their plans and strategies might have been, and (b) that they’re definitely sociopaths — the same kind of rightwing animals who stormed the U.S. Capitol on 1.6.21.
And so, naturally, the jurors had problems with finding them guilty.
Thoughts?
From Barton Swaim‘s “David Mamet Is a Defiant Scribe in the Age of Conformity,” a 4.8.22 Wall Street Journal interview:
“Do people in the entertainment industry censor themselves? ‘They do not walk around saying things that are dangerous to express, no,’ Mamet says. ‘People whisper out here. They have to. To say, ‘Well maybe Trump did some good things’…you can’t do that. You’d risk your home, your job, your family, your friends.”
“Mr. Mamet is convinced that the ‘woke agenda’ is basically an act, so in some ways it works well in Hollywood. ‘Nobody really believes it,’ he says. ‘Nobody really believes boys turn into girls and girls turn into boys…no one does. But it’s put into a different category, so that it becomes dangerous to question it. If you question it, you’re out.’
“Are the young buying [the woke thing]? My own observation suggests some substantial minority do not. Academics and college students I’ve spoken to since 2017 indicate that social pressure to signal assent to a rotating series of orthodoxies, from public health to race and gender theories, has sparked a quiet revolt. Post a black square on Instagram to show that America is systemically racist, even if you don’t think that’s true; wear a mask even though you know it doesn’t work and you’re 20 and vaccinated; share your pronouns whether you accept or reject gender ideology — a reaction seems almost guaranteed.
“’People of that generation,’ Mr. Mamet agrees, ‘a lot of them just aren’t scared anymore.'”
This polyamorous genderfluid witch is a preschool teacher in Florida. She’s so proud of herself that she discusses her gender and sexuality with 4 year olds pic.twitter.com/XOuuX6by4w
— Libs of Tik Tok (@libsoftiktok) April 7, 2022
HE question: Are those tiny metal studs or moles below the two corners of her bottom lip? The green hair is okay and she seems relatively mold-mannered, but those mole studs….good God.
The Motion Picture Academy announced today (Friday) that as punishment for slapping Chris Rock during the recent Oscar telecast, Will Smith is banned from attending all Academy events and particularly the Oscars, for the next 10 years.
Login with Patreon to view this post
I was sorry to read the Daily Beast‘s 4.8.22 story about Ezra Miller’s erratic and disturbing behavior. Not just because Miller’s career may be in serious jeopardy, but because of the following sentence:
Login with Patreon to view this post
…in Silver Linings Playbook is perfectly captured by this hand-smothering, squashed-face sculpture. Truth be told, it’s what I feel like half the time. At times I’m the hand; other times I’m the face. I know it sounds fucked up, but what do you want me to do, lie?
Two tech crises in rapid succession have disrupted the HE force field.
The day before yesterday HE’s Sonos player went awry. You don’t want to know the particulars but it took two longish tech-support phone calls over the course of 24 hours to fix the damn thing. The first tech person was an idiot; the second was smart and enterprising.
Shortly after the Sonos issue was resolved the whole wifi system went belly up. After all kinds of Spectrum tech-support agony by way of trial-and-error, it became clear that the Spectrum-provided router (five or six years old) had suddenly refused to sync. These things happen — sometimes a device just gets tired and weary and stops working properly. You just have to man up turn the other cheek.
I was told that the fastest remedy would be to go down to the WeHo Spectrum office and switch-out the malfunctioning router for a newbie. I was given an appointment time (11 am) and an appointment code. When I got there I punched in the code on the welcome screen, and of course they had no record of my having any such appointment. (The Spectrum phone-tech guy had dropped the ball.)
At first the in-store Spectrum guy (Asian, glasses, chubby) said they couldn’t help me unless my name was “in the system.” But I was told I had an appointment at 11am, I said. In any event I’m here, I pleaded, and I have the broken router. There are only four or five customers waiting right now — can’t you just slip me in when there’s an opening? Chubby spectacles shrugged his shoulders, repeated the line about “the system” blah blah.
I went to a nearby Jamba Juice and asked Spectrum tech support for advice, and they said “oh, the chubby bespectacled guy can help you…just sign in as a guest.” Which I did. I was given a new router (more Star Trek-y than the old one). I brought it home, powered it up and plugged in two identical yellow ethernet cables into two receptacles, one marked “ethernet” and the other marked “internet.”
Of course nothing has changed — the wifi is still on the fritz.
I have, however, arranged for a Spectrum engineer to visit tomorrow morning (Friday, 4.8). He/she will presumably fix the whole situation.
Oh, and by the way: The L.A. Water and Power guys turned the water off for eight hours today. That helped.
Friday, 4.8 update (6:10 am): HE is further perplexed by the strange inability of my iPhone 12 Max Pro to load web pages solely on the strength of AT&T’s normal WeHo air. (My usual home-generated wifi signal will be flat until the Spectrum repair guy arrives later this morning.) We all understand that individual carrier connectivity is always a bit slower than home or business-generated wifi, but right now HE’s AT&T signal (three bars) is anemic — it’s like being in the middle of the Sonoran desert.
<div style="background:#fff;padding:7px;"><a href="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/category/reviews/"><img src=
"https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/reviews.jpg"></a></div>
- Really Nice Ride
To my great surprise and delight, Christy Hall‘s Daddio, which I was remiss in not seeing during last year’s Telluride...
More » - Live-Blogging “Bad Boys: Ride or Die”
7:45 pm: Okay, the initial light-hearted section (repartee, wedding, hospital, afterlife Joey Pants, healthy diet) was enjoyable, but Jesus, when...
More » - One of the Better Apes Franchise Flicks
It took me a full month to see Wes Ball and Josh Friedman‘s Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes...
More »
<div style="background:#fff;padding:7px;"><a href="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/category/classic/"><img src="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/heclassic-1-e1492633312403.jpg"></div>
- The Pull of Exceptional History
The Kamala surge is, I believe, mainly about two things — (a) people feeling lit up or joyful about being...
More » - If I Was Costner, I’d Probably Throw In The Towel
Unless Part Two of Kevin Costner‘s Horizon (Warner Bros., 8.16) somehow improves upon the sluggish initial installment and delivers something...
More » - Delicious, Demonic Otto Gross
For me, A Dangerous Method (2011) is David Cronenberg‘s tastiest and wickedest film — intense, sexually upfront and occasionally arousing...
More »