Damsel (2018)

In the middle of the Utah desert, two men sat at a peculiarly situated stagecoach stop.  The younger man (David Zellner) said he was heading West to make a new start.  The older man, a preacher (Robert Forester), scoffed at that idea.  The West would be just as bad as where he had come from, though perhaps bad in a new way.  He had enough of the West and was returning to the East.  The old man grew impatient for the stagecoach.    Eventually, he stripped off most of his clothes, handed his tattered bible to the other man, and marched into the desert in his long johns.

At a barn dance, Samuel Alabaster (Robert Pattinson) and Penelope (Mia Wasikowska) were partners with wide grins.  The music was energetic and the dancers stamped the ground like an Irish river dance.

On a lonely northwestern shore, a man rowed a boat a shore.  He unloaded a crate that contained a miniature horse!  The man was Samuel and the horse was Butterscotch.  He made his way to a town and sought Parson Henry.  He found the drunken Parson Henry on the beach.  Notably, Parson Henry proved to be the younger man from the stagecoach stop and he wore the preacher's clothes and carried his tattered bible.  Samuel hired him via telegram for unspecified purposes.  After making Parson Henry presentable, the pair rode into the wilderness.  Samuel eventually explained that Penelope was kidnapped and he was on a rescue mission.  As soon as she was safe, he wanted Parson Henry to marry them.

Billed as a dark comedy, there is precious little comedy to be had.  Here is a collection of motley characters who, once you get to know them, are mostly dislikeable or bad.  Parson Henry, who links the tale together, is a coward who has no direction.  He wants to latch onto something or someone.  So, he's a parasite?  Samuel is an unreliable source, painting a picture that isn't accurate.  Props to Pattinson for taking such a role and doing a great job in it, but Samuel gets less and less likeable as time goes on.  Penelope is a sympathetic character but fails to be likeable; she's a very masculine character, destroying all the men she encounters.

What was the point of this story?  Parson Henry is unchanged from when met at the stagecoach stop.  The other characters have been dislodged from the lives they had, but the future is unknown.  It's like a story about a house that burned down that ends with the family staring at the ashes before walking away.  Uh, okay.  Throughout the movie, there are bits that ruin the setting.  That stagecoach stop in the middle of the desert was one such instance.  There is litterally nothing else in sight and it isn't a crossroad.  How would the potential rider get to the stop?  When leaving the town, Samuel had a chicken in a birdcage on top of Butterscotch.  What's that about?  On their first night out, they eat the chicken and the birdcage is not seen again.  Oh, okay.

Hard pass on this one.  Zellner made a much better movie: Kumiko the Treasure Hunter.  Watch that instead.

March or Die (1977)

Major William Sherman Foster (Gene Hackman) returned to Paris at the conclusion of the Great War.  Though an American, he was a member of the French Foreign Legion.  Clearly, he suffered PSTD from the experience.  Not long after the return, he was dispatched to Morocco.  Francois Marneau (Max von Sydow) wanted to resume digging at a ruin.  Foster warned against it, saying that El Krim (Ian Holm) would not take kindly to such activities.  Nonetheless, Foster and his legionnaires were sent.  Among the legionnaires were some new recruits: Marco Segrain (Terence Hill) the cat burglar, Top Hat the musician (he got his name on account of his headgear), Ivan the Russian (Jack O'Halloran), and Hastings the runaway Englishman who had never traveled less than first class before.  This clique provided a view of life in the legion.  There was also Simone Picard (Catherine Deneuve), whose father was a colleague of Marneau and last seen at the ruins.  The ship voyage to Morrocco saw the beginning of romance between Marco and Simone.  Marco is not the only one interested in Simone; she has several suitors.  Eventually, the legionnaire's travel to the ruins, Marneau begins excavating, and soldiers go missing.  El Krim is not pleased.  Conflict is imminent and Foster doesn't have enough men to hold the position.

The setting is interesting and has a Beau Geste or Alamo feel to it.  Terence Hill is much too lighthearted and comical for his role.  Yes, he is charming, but he lacks the dangerous edge that Marco needed.  Perhaps I have seen too many of his comedies to take him seriously here.  The arc of Foster is hard to discern.  On the one hand, he has this fatalistic air where he expects to die in the desert.  He waited almost too long to resist an attack.  When not being gloomy, he's an insufferable jerk.  Even as a bad guy, Hackman is usually likable, but here he isn't.

Mediocre.  Skip.

Moonlighting (1985)

Maddie Hayes (Cybill Shepherd) awakens to the sound of shattering glass.  Jumping out of bed, she finds that her personal chef is destroying her fine China and anything else breakable.  His paycheck bounced and he is furious.  Maddie soon discovered that her accounting firm had vanished along with all her money.  However, she still had some assets.  Of course, there was the house, cars, and so forth, but she also had a series of small businesses, all that existed to lose money for tax purposes.  One of those businesses was a detective agency headed by David Addison (Bruce Willis).  Though Maddie fired David and all the staff, he repeatedly pressed her to reconsider.  Like a bad penny, he kept turning up.  Then, a man fell dead at their feet.  Flung together in a case of Nazi diamonds, Maddie warms to the detective life despite - or maybe because of - the many dangers.

This TV movie was the pilot for the successful goofball series that followed and launched Bruce Willis' career.  It does have quirky comedy though it is often slow.  The scenes where side characters are pursued last far too long.  Rather than building tension, it felt more like an effort to fill time.  The climactic scene where the villain follows Addison onto a precarious ladder was beyond belief.  In fact, much of the mystery remains unexplained at the end.  Who was Simon and how did he figure into the background?  Doesn't matter.  Why did Blond Mohawk (that is how he is listed in the credits) not have his gun, thus allowing himself to be an easy target later in the episode?  Of course, all the mystery stuff is just there to provide background for the comic interactions between Maddie and David.  Success.

Good popcorn fun.

It Takes Two to Tango

The big story is the fraud among Somalis in Minnesota.  There are countless daycare and health centers that have received millions to billions in government funding, yet they are shown to provide no services.  Clearly, this is bad.  Obviously, the Somalis receiving the money are aware that they are skirting the rules of the program.  Absolutely, they should be prosecuted and/or deported.  However, there is another facet to this.  Who approved all of these daycares and health centers?  Though the saying goes not to blame malice when incompetence could be to blame, that doesn't hold water here.  It's too big.  This level of incompetence is too obvious to continue long term.  Indeed, if some random YouTuber was able to uncover massive fraud in a couple of days, how did the agencies overseeing these programs not notice?  Some of those overseers need to be prosecuted too, if only to encourage other overseers to do the job.

On a related issue, many of these bogus daycares and health centers made political donations to... Democrats.  Huh.  Probably not a quid pro quo, right?  Blame aside, this is why government should be as limited as possible.  Larger government inevitably leads to greater corruption and waste.

The Long Good Friday (1980)

Colin (Paul Freeman) delivered a suitcase of money, but not before pocketing some of it.  Soon after, his driver and date are killed and left on the side of the road.  Harold Shand (Bob Hoskins) returned to London from the United States.  Harold is a gangster with a beautiful girlfriend (Helen Mirren), an extensive network of goons & thugs, a police chief on the dole, and even a councilman in his pocket.  His trip to America was to arrange a joint venture with the mafia.  Everything was going his way.  Then his Roll Royce exploded, killing the driver.  Colin turned up stabbed to death at a swimming pool.  Who was making a move against him?  His deal with the mafia was being threatened.  Strong measures were needed.  However, every effort came to naught.  No one knew from where the threat originated.  When the full story is finally revealed, many of the mysterious events become clear.  Even so, Harold thinks he can handle this threat the way he has handled other gangsters.  He cannot.  Of course, virtually everyone in the film is a criminal, a corrupt official, or a hapless victim.  Many of them get their just deserts.

Bob Hoskins is terrific as the gangster, a great performance.  Sure, he's clearly a bad guy but you can't help but root for him to come through this trial.  The rest of the cast is quite good, but this is Hoskin's movie and he carries it perfectly.  Paul Freeman had surprisingly high billing for someone with almost no lines who dies early in the film.  He followed this movie by playing the chief villain, Belloq, in Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Pierce Brosnan makes his movie debut as an IRA assassin, his only line being 'Hi' before stabbing Colin to death.  His IRA partner, Daragh O'Malley, would go on to play Sgt. Harper in the Sharpe series.

Terrific film that grows to a crescendo of an ending.  Highly recommended.

The Creator (2023)

In the near future, AI robots are everywhere.  The world is wonderful until a nuclear blast incinerates a million people in Los Angeles.  The United States and much of the world turns against AI in the wake of this and declare war on the regions that still allow AI.  Somewhere in Southeast Asia, Joshua (John David Washington) lives with his wife, Maya (Gemma Chan), and many AI robots.  Harun (Glen Watanabe) was the primary leader among the AI robots and held Joshua in high regard.  Then the American soldiers stormed the beach.  Breaking his cover, Joshua tried to call of the attack.  Instead, he only revealed his duplicity to Maya.  She fled without him and was presumed dead.

Several years later, Joshua worked as part of a cleanup crew in Los Angeles.  One of the duties was to recover robots and crush them.  The robots act like humans, showing emotions for those who died in the nuclear blast.  The military approached him and requested his return to service.  He's not interested.  Then he saw a video with Maya.  The AI was making a weapon that would destroy the NOMAD - a space-based weapon platform that was key to American combat ability.  If NOMAD was destroyed, the AI would win the war.

An insertion team led by Col. Howell (Allison Janney) landed in SE Asia.  Their goal was to locate the underground complex that housed the weapon and destroy it.  Joshua found an AI robot that looked like a 7-year-old girl; he called her Alphie (Madeleine Yuna Voyles).  She was the weapon.  Unable to kill her, he instead went on the run with her, hoping that she would guide him to Maya.  Not only must he avoid the AI police robots, he also had to keep ahead of Col. Howell.

Though visually impressive, the story is inexplicable.  As shown, AI is nothing more than human-like robots.  The Americans don't seem to worry about their technology being taken over by the AI, only being turned off.  The robots come in a variety of designs.  There are those that look entirely robotic, with blocky heads, metal limbs, and garbled voices, then there are the ones that could pass for human but for the missing parts around the ears and neck.  The hole through the head around ear-level was a curious design choice.  The Americans are not entirely opposed to robots.  There was once action sequence where ambulatory bombs - kind of a barrel with arms and legs - would charge at the enemy line and then detonate.  That's odd.  Why not a mortar or an RPG?

The AI countries are inept.  One would think that a society that had robots on every corner would basically have a near perfect system for following a pair of fugitives through a big city.  No, it proves incredibly easy for Joshua to sneak among robots without being noticed.  Robots have a sleep mode, don't you know.  Worse, Col. Howell is able to chase Joshua and Alphie through AI countries, also doing so without too much trouble.  And these incompetent AIs are viewed as a threat?

Humanity - at least that portion opposed to AI Robots (i.e., the Americans) - is the bad guy.  Yes, it is left to Joshua and Alphie to win the fight for freedom and equality.  Robots are people too.  Humanity proves to be just as incompetent as AI.  Somehow, despite being in a military convoy, Joshua and Alphie escape, flee ahead of all the soldiers, somehow get to LAX, board a ship headed to the moon, hijack the ship to reroute to NOMAD, and are allowed to dock with humanity's only defense against AI victory.  Seriously?

The makers do not understand technology.  There is no exploration of the true threat of AI.  The only thing that NOMAD did was serves as an orbital missile platform, which hardly seemed an improvement over modern cruise missiles.  The robots only communicated with each other through speech, not bluetooth or Wi-Fi.  What's the point of that?  When it does come to a toe-to-toe fight, the Americans so outclass the AI forces that one wonders why they didn't just march across the AI territory and blast every underground bunker they found.

Mediocre.  Skip.

The Crossing (2000)

Early December, 1776.  With his army retreating from the British, General Washington (Jeff Daniels) is forced to steal boats to get across the river to the comparative safety of Pennsylvania. In the 6 months since the Declaration of Independence, Washington had suffered defeat after defeat.  His army has shrunk to 2000 men, many of whom would go home when their service concluded at the end of the month.  Then there was news from the Continental Congress; they have retreated to Baltimore since Philadelphia was now undefended.  General Gates suggested surrender.  It was indeed bleak.  However, intelligence arrived that 1200 Hessians were stationed at Trenton, just across the Delaware River.  Washington proposed a plan that most of his staff viewed as lunatic.  Hessians were the best troops in Europe while Washington had volunteer farmers.  Nonetheless, he pressed forward with his plan.  If he didn't do something, the revolution was indeed over.

Daniels is good as Washington.  In his hands, Washington comes to life as a real person rather than a mythic figure.  The only quibble would be his comment about Henry Knox's balls.  Beyond Washington, this is the tale of Colonel John Glover (Sebastian Roche), who managed the boats.  This may be Glover's first appearance on film.  Among Washington's officers are Lt. Alexander Hamilton, General Hugh Mercer, General William 'Lord' Stirling, and General Nathaniel Greene, most of whom became major figures of the revolution or the early republic.  There are a couple of details left out of the movie.  First, the Hessian commander had an unopened letter that revealed Washington's impending attack.  Second, James Monroe, future president, was part of the attack.  He was seriously wounded in the action.  However, he was not party of the Crossing, as he was already in New Jersey.

This is a terrific movie and a great glimpse at a pivotal point in the revolution.  Highly recommended.

Amazon's James Bond

Since Amazon bought the rights to James Bond, there has been much speculation on where the franchise would go.  Will Bond become a social justice warrior?  Maybe Bond will be a black man - Idris Elba was once suggested - or even a woman.  Heck, Lashana Lynch could just resume her position as Agent 007 from No Time to Die (2021).  An online creator suggested that Pierce Brosnan resume the role as Old Man Bond, something along the lines of Logan (2017).  Then there is the idea of having Young Bond.  This could be like Batman Begins (2005), exploring Bond's final days in the Royal Navy and joining MI-6.  A series of 9 novels have been written about Young Bond.  Another suggestion, and one which appeals to me, is to do the literary Bond.

Ian Fleming set the books in his present, which was the 1950s and early 1960s.  Amazon could do for James Bond what Granada Television did for Sherlock Holmes.  Jeremy Brett played the most faithful adaptation of Sherlock Holmes.  It was an outstanding series.  Eventually, the literary Bond will be made.  Will it take almost a century as it did with Holmes or will Amazon take the leap?

The Race Tightens

Five years after the fact, Trump is on the brink of winning the 2020 election.  Fulton County, Georgia, has admitted that 315,000 ballots were unlawfully certified.  Joe Biden carried the county by a 73% to 26% margin, so most of those votes went into his column.  The margin of victory for the state of George was just shy of 12,000 votes.  Removing the invalid ballots would flip the state to Trump.  It has already been determined that Pennsylvania's new voting law was unconstitutional.  Nixing those invalid ballots would likewise flip that state.  Georgia is worth 16 electoral votes and Pennsylvania is worth 20.  That 36-point shift would drop Biden from 306 to 270 and raise Trump from 232 to 268.  The race is getting close!

Next, it might be time to take a closer look at Maricopa County in Arizona.  Here is a county that has voted Republican in every election since 1952 with the exception of 2020.  That is odd.  Biden carried the state by only 10,500 votes, but the typically Republican County by 45,000 votes.  Perhaps investigate the surge of absentee votes after midnight from Milwaukee in Wisconsin.  Biden carried Wisconsin by only 21,000 votes.  If either of these have issues like Georgia or Pennsylvania, the 2020 election flips.

Does it matter at this point?  Yes.  If our elections are tending toward becoming mere shows, like those in China, North Korea, Russia, and so on, then the country is over.  Once the Deep State can consistently choose the winner (or even just the party nominees), the country is at an end.

Sons of Liberty (2015)

Samuel Adams (Ben Barnes) is a widower.  Sometime before the story begins, he was appointed as a tax collector.  However, he has done a poor job of it, being 8,000 pounds in arrears.  Governor Hutchinson (Sean Gilder) ordered his arrest, which led to a chase through the dark and gloomy streets of Boston.  Unable to catch Adams, those who failed to pay taxes to Adams are instead arrested.  Riots followed and Adams was viewed as the leader of these 'Sons of Liberty.'  Hutchinson called upon John Hancock (Rafe Spall) to deal with Adams.  Hancock paid off Adams' debts and resolved his legal problems.  Hutchinson was not amused.  Tensions in Boston grew until, in 1770, the Boston Massacre tipped the balance to the Sons of Liberty.  Soon followed the Boston Tea Party (1773), The Quartering Act (1774), the Battles of Lexington & Concord (1775), Bunker Hill (1775), and the Declaration of Independence (1776).

The casting is questionable.  Paul Revere (Michael Raymond-James) is elevated to command Bunker Hill when he was not even present.  However, it was easier to expand his role than add more characters to an already full cast.  Sam Adams was 43 years-old in 1765 and 54 when the miniseries concludes.  By contrast, Ben Barnes was only 34.  He is a young hot head with no impulse control and a rage that bubbles just beneath the surface in many scenes.  Though he is shown as a widower, he has no kids.  In fact, Adams had 2 children, Sam Jr (who would have been 14 in the opening and 25 at the conclusion), and Hannah (9 to 20).  John Adams (Henry Thomas) comes across as the older and wiser cousin despite being 13 years younger than Sam.  Margaret Kemble Gage (Emily Berrington) was 40 when she arrived in Boston, a decade older than the actress.  Committing treason against her husband has been suggested; she was born and raised in New Jersey.  John Hancock comes across as an effete snob with all the passion of a wet towel.  He is so wishy-washy and indecisive that one would expect his signature to be a meek scrawl, not the dominant Alpha signature of history.  General Gage (Marton Csokas) is painted as evil incarnate, a man who did everything he could to alienate the colonists.  In truth, many accused him of being too lenient.  Gage was in a difficult position, having to implement unpopular laws while having limited forces.  

Many of the incidents are turned up to 11 to add some excitement.  During the Boston Tea Party, Sam Adams stands in full view and defiantly stares down a score of redcoats while tea is hurled over the side.  Revere takes down British soldiers during his ride in feats of fisticuffs and gunplay.  Joseph Warren leapt over the redoubt of Bunker Hill and charged down the hill to fight hand to hand with red coats and even General Gage.  Not only is Margaret's role as Warren's intelligence source included, she becomes his lover.  Yes, changes have been made to spice up the narrative, but it gets the gist correct.

Just okay.

Hands of a Murderer (1990)

It is 1900 and Professor James Moriarty (Anthony Andrews) is led to the gallows.  The crowd cheered and Inspector Lestrade looked on with approval.  Suddenly, smoke bombs exploded and the hangman fainted on the scaffold.  When the smoke cleared, Moriarty was gone!  Sherlock Holmes (Edward Woodward) blamed Lestrade for the escape.  Now Holmes would have to track down the villain again.  Before he could do so, he and Watson (John Hillerman) were summoned to the Diogenese Club to see Holmes' brother, Mycroft.  Sensitive information was being leaked from Mycroft's office and he wanted Sherlock to find the leaker.  Sherlock declined, stating that his efforts to find Moriarty were more important.  Of course, the two cases proved to be the same case.

Edward Woodward is passable as Holmes, though he is too old.  Holmes should be around 45 in 1900 whereas Woodward was 60.  Hillerman is a standard Watson.  He's not an oaf like Nigel Bruce but he's not much help either.  Anthony Edwards is much too young to be Moriarty, nearly 20 years Woodward's junior.  He oozes villainy in every scene.  He is oh so villainous.  Ugh.  Maybe dial that back a bit.  The rest of the cast is serviceable, but unremarkable.

It is merely okay.  Not bad but not good either.  Skip.

Tripoli (1950)

During the Tripolitan War, Marine Lt. Presley O'Bannon (John Payne) of the USS Essex volunteered for a mission against the city of Derna.  Together with General William Eaton (Herbert Heyes), O'Bannon, Navy Lt. Tripp, and 8 Marines traveled to Minya on the Nile.  There, they met the exiled Pasha Hamet Karamanly (Phillip Reed), the rightful ruler of Tripoli who was usurped by his brother.  Eaton arranged a treaty with Hamet that would put him back on the throne.  Hamet signed.  With agreement in hand, Eaton and O'Bannon planned a rendezvous on the coast near Derna.  Eaton left to join the fleet while O'Bannon marched across the desert with his handful of Marines, Hamet's Arab soldiers, and Captain Demetrious' Greek Mercenaries.  Can O'Bannon get this ragtag army to the shores of Tripoli despite sandstorms, ruined waterholes, mutiny, intrigue, and Countess Sheila D'Arneau (Maureen O'Hara)?

Payne is quite good as a wisecracking, supremely confident O'Bannon.  His clashes with the countess cannot help but lead to a growing attachment between the two.  Of course, the countess's goal was to marry Hamet, who was immensely wealthy despite his exile.  However, this handsome and manly Marine is hard to resist.  As the director, Will Price, was married to Maureen O'Hara during filming, the love scenes between Payne and O'Hara must have been particularly awkward.  Howard Da Silva is a scene-stealer as Captain Demetrious.  His good-natured demeanor and witty commentary are great fun.  Though he is supposed to be Greek, he felt like the most pro-American character in the film.

The movie is generally correct about the history, but changes have been made.  In fact, William Eaton was in charge of the march.  Though played by 60-year-old Hayes, Eaton was only 40 at the time.  Why not have Eaton as the main character and O'Bannon take over for the fictional Lt. Tripp?  Tripp is a stand-in for Eaton, who was a Navy Lieutenant at the time.  Eaton had an impressive career starting in the US Army before becoming a consul, then General and Commander in Chief of the Derna Campaign.  He was more accomplished than O'Bannon, whose only claim to fame is Derna.  However, it was O'Bannon who charged into the fray at Derna and raised the American flag on foreign soil during wartime for the first time in the nation's history.  The movie proposes that Hamet plotted to betray the Americans when it was the other way around.  The US negotiated a treaty with Hamet's brother and no longer needed him.  Eaton was quite upset at that turn of events.  US forces withdrew from Derna and left the city to the mercy of the Tripolitans.

Good popcorn fun.  Recommended.

The Phoenician Scheme (2025)

It is 1950.  Zsa-zsa Korda (Benicio Del Toro) is a wealthy businessman who has concocted the most extraordinary venture that will be hugely profitable.  However, there are those who want him to fail.  Thus, a bomb blasts a hole in the side of his plane.  Even so, he survives the crash.  This is the 5th or 6th plane crash he has survived.  Mostly.  He briefly visits the afterlife each time.  Determined to have his plan carried out in the event of his death, he summoned his daughter from a nunnery.  Liesl (Mia Threapleton) is not interested in being the heir but accepts the post temporarily.  Korda is a man of learning and hires a tutor for his kids - he has 9 sons in addition to Liesl.  Bjorn (Michael Cera) is a mousy fellow with a Swedish accent.  Korda also assigns Bjorn to be his administrative secretary when they travel.  And so begins the travels.  The deal is not yet complete.  There is a gap in the funding.  At each stop, Korda attempts to fill the gap, but it instead grows bigger.

Like all Wes Anderson films, it is quirky.  All the lines are delivered in monotone.  The camera moves in very specific ways and the scenes are meticulously formatted.  This man loves his blocking.  However, the story just isn't there.  Is this a story about a father reconnecting with his daughter?  Probably.  Is this a mystery in which a murderer is uncovered?  Not really.  Is Korda out to find the person or persons who have been trying to assassinate him?  Not intentionally.  Is this a story of how a rich businessman is going to get even richer?  Not at all.  Is this just a random series of events where quirky lines can be delivered by famous actors?  Yes.

It is an all-star cast.  Everyone wants to be in a Wes Anderson film and many of these actors have become Anderson regulars.  Tom Hanks, Willem Dafoe, F. Murray Abraham, Billy Murray, Bryan Cranston, Scarlett Johansson, and Benedict Cumberbatch each have small roles.  Cumberbatch looks ridiculous as the Rasputin-like Uncle Nubar.

The best line in the movie is repeated several times by Korda: "Myself, I feel very safe."  This became funnier with repetition.  Michael Cera's transformation from bookish Professor Bjorn to American spy was also quite funny.  Even with the cigarette and mustache, he still looks unimposing.

It has its moments, but it is a below average Wes Anderson film.  Obviously a must watch for his fans but I'd go with Moonrise Kingdom or The Life Aquatic instead.

Gentlemen Broncos (2009)

Ben Purvis (Michael Angarano) is an awkward young man who likes to write science fiction stories.  He has recently completed Yeast Lords: The Bronco Years.  His mother, Judith (Jennifer Coolidge), rushed him out the door and drove him to catch a bus.  He was headed to a young writers' camp which was hosting Ronald Chevalier (Jermaine Clement), a giant of science fiction.  In addition to meeting Chevalier, he befriends Lonnie and Tabatha, more socially awkward people.  Though Chevalier has been successful, he is currently in a rut.  His publisher is threatening to dump him and has refused his latest work.  Desperate, he modified Yeast Lords and submitted it to his publisher.

The movie occasionally flashes to the world of the Yeast Lords.  Bronco (Sam Rockwell) is the last of the yeast lords and in the hands of his enemies.  He escapes to join with an awkward brother and sister who assist him in raiding a yeast factory, overcoming cyclopses, turrets, and surveillance does.  Depending on who is reading the material and editorial decisions, the appearance of the world and characters change.  Funny.

There are some directors where the look and feel of a film marks them.  Wes Anderson is the most recognizable of these, but Jared Hess falls in there too.  This has a look and feel like Napoleon Dynamite.  It is a world where everyone is awkward, even the cool kids.  There is always a desire to look away so as not to witness the characters' embarrassment.  Either that or laugh at them.

Just okay.

Landman

Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton) managed a small oil company in the Permian Basin of West Texas.  He was a landman, which is another title for an oilman.  The series opened with an unpleasant interaction with drug runners.  Such was just part of the job in the modern world.  His daughter, Ainsley, came to stay with him during Spring Break.  She brought a handsome football player with her, much to Tommy's consternation.  Tommy's son, Cooper, just dropped out of college to work as a "worm" on a crew of four men. A worm was just the new guy.  On Cooper's second day, a derrick exploded from a gas leak, killing the rest of his crew and putting him in the hospital.  So it was that Angela (Ali Larter), Tommy's ex-wife, came to Midland.  Angela decided to stay, which further complicated Tommy's already hectic life.  Monty (Jon Hamm) owned M-Tex Oil and kept in frequent contact with Tommy.  Tommy's housemates, Dale and Nathan, were none too keen on Angela and Ainsley moving into the house.  To make matters worse, Rebecca Falcone (Kayla Wallace) was hired to resolve legal issues.  She and Tommy quickly clashed.

This is a standard drama with all the standard dramatic twists and turns.  What makes it special is that it defends the way the world works.  Where most shows offer lip service or even encourage green energy, this hammers the point that oil runs the world and it isn't changing any time soon.  Tommy's monologues regarding this are the magic ingredient that makes this show fun.  This is the anti-woke show.  Tommy speaks his mind, damn the consequences.  Who else would threaten a cartel thug while bound to a chair with a gun to his head?  This is a man who has no Fs to give.  Let's hope season 2 can keep this up.

Highly recommended.

Tecumseh: The Last Warrior (1995)

October 1813, Canada. Tecumseh's band treks away from Detroit.  The situation is bleak but Tecumseh (Jesse Borego) is confident that they will defeat the Long Knives (Americans) tomorrow.  His sister, Starwatcher, is less confident.  She soon recollects what had brought them to this place.

March 1768, Ohio.  Tecumseh was born as a star streaked across the sky.  This was a great omen and his father named him for the Panther in the Sky.  All agreed he had a great future as a warrior.

October 1774, Ohio.  Tecumseh's father has gone to fight the Long Knives in Virginia.  While his father is away, Tecumseh has a nightmare/vision in which his father is killed.  He sees the face of his father's killer and it stays with him.

Some years later, Tecumseh's mother departs to the west, leaving her children.  Tecumseh will not go, as his father told him never to surrender land to the Long Knives.  In time, he is old enough to go to war with his older brother, Chiksika.  Though he fled in fear from his first battle, Tecumseh proved to be a natural warrior in his next.  As the years progress, Tecumseh becomes a respected warrior who fights beside Chiksika and Blue Jacket (Holt McCallany), a white man who didn't want to live among the whites.  They fight on the side of the British during the American Revolution

1794, The Battle of Fallen Timbers.  Before the battle, Tecumseh viewed General Wayne through a looking glass.  They would shoot this general during the battle.  However, he also saw another man who had the face of his father's killer.  The night before the battle, Chiksika declares that he will be killed and Tecumseh should carry on.  As prophesized, Chiksika died.  Worse, Blue Jacket signed the Treaty of Greenville.

Tecumseh had lived long enough to see the way of things.  Each time the Indians signed a treaty for peace, it promised only a few such years before more encroachments led to further treaties that surrendered more land.  The Long Knives played the tribes against each other.  He must unite the tribes to resist further encroachment.  It would require years.  His younger brother, Tenskwatawa, had become a prophet and drew others to him.  Here was the glue that might bind the tribes into a great confederacy.

William Henry Harrison (David Clennon) saw the threat of Tecumseh's plan.  To him, America must expand and Tecumseh was an obstacle to be overcome.  When the two met, Tecumseh saw the face of his father's killer in person.  Though the two conversed and nearly came to blows, they could resolve nothing.  A war was the only path forward.

The movie is surprisingly faithful to history.  The dates and events are generally correct.  Chiksika died two years before Fallen Timbers.  Harrison was indeed an aide to General Wayne during the Fallen Timbers campaign but was only an infant when Tecumseh's father was killed.  Clearly, this was just a vision to tie the long running conflict together at the end.  The man who claimed to have killed Tecumseh, Richard Johnson, gets a brief cameo.  The movie shows that only Tecumseh's band faced the American army at the Battle of the Thames.  In fact, 700 British troops were also present, though the red coats and the Indians formed up separate from each other.  Tecumseh's forces were stationed in marshy woods, not open fields.  As shown, dragoons and mounted riflemen would have trampled the Indians.

Too much time is covered in the film, giving only brief glimpses of his life as the years pass.  This covers a 45-year period!  How about starting with the meeting of Tecumseh and Harrison in 1810 and concluding with the Battle of Thames in 1813.  Yeah, that compresses things nicely and shows Tecumseh at his peak.

Entertaining and educational.  Recommended.

Archibald Gillespie, USMC

In Dream West, Marine Lieutenant Archibald Gillespie arrived at John C. Fremont's camp in Oregon to relay verbal orders from the president.  Moments later, he was killed in an Indian attack.  This is a rewrite of history.

Gillespie was born in New York in 1812 and joined the Marines in 1832.  In October 1845, President Polk provided him with secret messages for Commodore Sloat of the Pacific Squadron, US Consul Thomas O. Larkin (based in Monterrey, California), and John C. Fremont.  He sailed to Vera Cruz, arriving on December 10th.  His efforts to cross the country were hindered by the latest uprising.  However, he crossed the country and arrived in Mazatlán.  In late February, he was picked up by an American ship on the west coast of Mexico and made his way to Monterrey, California.  Having delivered his messages to both Sloat and Larkin, he then went in search of Fremont.

Fremont had been ejected from California by General Castro and was near Kamath Lake in Oregon, which is where Gillespie found him.  No sooner had Gillespie arrived with his secret message than Fremont marched back into California.  Little did they know, the war had begun with the Thornton Affair almost 2 weeks earlier.  The Bear Flag Revolt took place on June 14th and Commodore Robert "Fighting Bob" Stockton raised the US flag on July 18.  Los Angeles surrendered on August 13th, thus concluding the initial conquest of California.

Captain Gillespie was named military commandant of the southern district.  He had 48 men to hold Los Angeles.  This might have been fine if he had not imposed martial law.  The locals soon rose in rebellion.  The American forces were soon under siege at Fort Moore Hill.  By the end of September, Gillespie surrendered and marched to the coast, leaving Los Angeles to the Californios.  An initial effort to retake the city with the help of the US Navy failed.  The Navy transported Gillespie and his men to San Diego.

In early December, news arrived that General Kearny was nearby.  Stockton sent a detachment under Gillespie to escort him the rest of the way to San Diego.  Gillespie arrived with 40 men and a field gun.  After his long march, Kearny was itching for a fight.  He had traveled from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas to California without a shot fired.  So it was that the weary Dragoons charged to battle against fresh Californio lancers who knew the terrain much better and whose lances were not rendered useless by the rain.  The Californios recognized Gillespie from his tyrannical rule in Los Angeles and targeted him.  He was lanced in the chest, puncturing a lung.

Despite the disastrous battle, the column arrived in San Diego on December 12th.  Despite his injuries, Gillespie was well-enough to ride north the following month.  He was again wounded during the battle to retake Los Angeles.  On January 10, 1847, Gillespie was called upon to raise the US Flag, the very one he had hauled down in September.

Gillespie remained with the Marines until 1854.  He died in San Francisco in 1873.

Though most of this falls outside the story that Dream West tells, Gillespie should not have been killed off.  Though Fremont's party was attacked by Indians and also 'got even' with them soon after, Gillespie was not one of the fatalities.  Gillespie should have been yet another cameo, like Jim Bridger or Tom Fitzpatrick.

Stephen Watts Kearny

In Dream West (1986), Brigadier General Stephen Watts Kearny is cast as the villain.  In the first episode of the miniseries, an animus is established between Kearny and Fremont.  Fremont requested a cannon for his expedition, which Kearny reluctantly provided.  In conversation, Kearny asked what year Fremont graduated West Point.  Fremont did not attend West Point.  Kearny clearly looks down on him for this failing.  That is peculiar since Kearny was not a West Point graduate either.  In fact, though both had attended college, neither managed to complete their degrees.  In the second episode, Kearny and Fremont clash about who is in charge in California.  In the final episode, Kearny is a witness at Fremont's court martial, a court martial instigated by Kearny.  His final appearance in the series is to plead for forgiveness from Jessie Benton Fremont before he died from Yellow Fever.  Kearny deserved better.

Stephen Watts Kearny was born in 1794.  He dropped out of Columbia to join the Army when the War of 1812 began.  He was captured at the Battle of Queenstown.  His bravery at that battle earned him the rank of Captain.  After the war, Kearny stayed with the army and was posted on the frontier.

In 1819, he was part of the Yellowstone Expedition.  The expedition failed spectacularly, getting bogged down in Council Bluffs, Iowa.  The following year, he was part of another expedition, this one exploring and mapping the territory between Council Bluffs and Fort Snelling (Minneapolis, MN).

In 1825, Major Kearny was part of General Atkinson's Rocky Mountain Expedition.  Nearly 500 troops traveled from Fort Atkinson (Omaha, NE) up the Missouri River, replicating Lewis and Clark's travels.

The following year, he supervised the building of Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis, Missouri, where none other than William Clark lived.  Kearny courted and married William Clark's step-daughter, Mary Radford.

In 1833, Lt. Colonel Kearny was made second in command of the newly formed 1st Dragoon Regiment, based in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  In 1836, he rose to Colonel and became the commander of the 1st Dragoons.

With all this western experience, it is unsurprising that Brigadier General Kearny was made commander of the Army of the West when the Mexican-American War was declared.  His westward march was surprisingly uneventful.  He captured Santa Fe, New Mexico without firing a shot.  He then set out for California, unaware that Commodore Stockton and Lt. Col. Fremont had already captured it.  He learned of those events when he met Kit Carson on the road.  Based on Carson's reports, Kearny sent two-thirds of his men back to Santa Fe and continued to California.  By the time he arrived, the state was in rebellion.

The Battle of San Pasqual

Having learned of a band of Californios in the area, Kearny decided to attack.  However, his men were poorly mounted; they had just suffered a trek across the southwestern deserts.  The rain made the gunpowder damp and surprise had been lost.  The Dragoons charged in a ragged line.  By contrast, the Californios had excellent horses and were armed with lances.  The Dragoons were no match and only the presence of a cannon saved them.

Kearny thus arrived in San Diego with a pitiful and beaten force.  Compared to Fremont's California Battalion and Stockton's sailors and marines, Kearny was all bark and no bite.  He conceded command to Stockton and joined in the retaking of Los Angeles.  When Stockton sailed away and Commodore Shubrick took over the Pacific fleet, Kearny made his move for command.  The Mormon Battalion and New York volunteers arrived to give him the biggest army in California.  He had been sent to take California and he outranked Fremont.  Fremont continued to balk and earned himself a court martial.

Fremont's court martial lasted 3 months, concluding in February 1848.  Afterwards, Kearny was sent to Mexico as military governor of Vera Cruz and then Mexico City.  He contracted Yellow Fever and was sent home.  He died in St. Louis in October, 1848.

Fremont put Kearny in an impossible situation.  Should he have just endured insubordination?  Certainly not.  In the best of times, Kearny was known to be difficult.  He was a harsh man who made few friends.  This is not the sort of soldier to forgive and forget.  On the other hand, Fremont was a national hero.  President Polk attempted to split the difference by nixing the punishment while affirming the verdict.

Hyphenated Americans

"There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans. Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad. But a hyphenated American is not an American at all.

"This is just as true of the man who puts "native" before the hyphen as of the man who puts German or Irish or English or French before the hyphen. Americanism is a matter of the spirit and of the soul. Our allegiance must be purely to the United States. We must unsparingly condemn any man who holds any other allegiance.

"But if he is heartily and singly loyal to this Republic, then no matter where he was born, he is just as good an American as anyone else." "The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English-Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian-Americans, or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality than with the other citizens of the American Republic.

"The men who do not become Americans and nothing else are hyphenated Americans; and there ought to be no room for them in this country. The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land, plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic. He has no place here; and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart-allegiance, the better it will be for every good American."

Theodore Roosevelt

Address to the Knights of Columbus

New York City- October 12th, 1915

"I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God."

Naturalization Oath of Allegiance

How many Americans who are foreign born actually meant it when they took the oath of citizenship?  When you see 'Americans' protesting while flying foreign flags, it gives one pause.  How many committed perjury when they took the oath?