Category: movies

Contagion (2011 film)

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Contagion is a 2011 American thriller film directed by Steven Soderbergh.

Its ensemble cast includes Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet, Bryan Cranston, …

Jude Law is the conspiracy theorist flogging a fake cure.

… The film has received renewed popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic.

There are many parallels between the fictitious MEV-1 and COVID-19. 

But MEV-1 is much more severe. More like the 1918 Flu.

In a flashback, a bulldozer razes palm trees while clearing a rainforest in China that disturbs the natural habitat of some bats. One bat finds shelter in a pig farm and drops an infected piece of banana, which is eaten by a pig. The pig is slaughtered and prepared by a chef in a Macau casino, who transmits the virus to Beth (Paltrow) in a handshake.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

One for the Money by Janet Evanovich

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One for the Money (1994) is the first novel by Janet Evanovich featuring the bounty hunter Stephanie Plum …

Before this novel, Evanovich was a Romance novelist.

There are parallels with her character Stephanie Plum, laid off from her job as a lingerie buyer for a Newark department store, who goes to work for her cousin Vinnie, a bail bondsman.

One for the Money is a light-weight easy read. Short and silly.

If you saw the 2012 movie, it’s true to the book.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

This mystery series had run for 24 books as of 2017.

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

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The Silent Patient has an interesting premise.

… a woman’s act of violence against her husband―and of the therapist obsessed with uncovering her motive.

It’s getting great reviews.

Brad Pitt’s company snapped up the film rights.

That alls said, I found it a bit slow.

Psychology has never been an interest of mine. Also, the surprising twists and turns simply seemed too unlikely for me.

Without Remorse by Tom Clancy (1993)

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Without Remorse is long. Stephen King long.

…  Kirkus Reviews gave it a mixed verdict, stating that it is “twice as long as the two rather creaky storylines can bear …”

The writing is not particularly skillful.

Chronologically it’s the first in the Jack Ryan universe.

But I’d never gotten much into the Jack Ryans: Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford, Ben Affleck, Chris Pine, and John Krasinski. 

Jack Ryan is not an important in Without Remorse. This book introduces a more interesting character, John Clark, portrayed by actors Willem Dafoe and Liev Schreiber over the years.

Published 1993, it’s dated. Every marijuana users is EVIL, for example. And likely to die.

That’s the bad news.

But, surprisingly, I made it through.

I enjoyed learning about John Clark (real name John Terence Kelly), the former Navy SEAL. His particular skills are fascinating.

His main talent is killing people. Vigilante justice.

In any case, I’ll give Red October a try. Second book chronologically in the series.

Blood Road – a cycling documentary

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Rebecca Rusch and Huyen Nguyen were first to pedal the entire length of the 1,800 km (1,200 mi) Ho Chi Minh Trail through Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

Blood Road, according to director Nicholas Schrunk, “set out to document an epic cycling expedition as well as Rebecca’s personal journey to visit the crash site [of her father], but we ended up uncovering something much deeper.

It’s a story about the scars, both physical and emotional, that war leaves on families, countries, and cultures, and how they still exist today.

Rebecca Rusch and Huyen Nguyen

Click PLAY or watch a trailer on YouTube.

Superb cinematography. Incredible drone footage.

I was reminded just how stupid and futile was the Vietnam War and all wars. What a waste.

Watch it FREE on Red Bull. (90min)

I learned of Rebecca Rusch from an excellent and inspiring interview on the Adventure Podcast.

What a badass. Mountain Bike Hall Of Fame. Mountain Biker of the Year, Endurance LIVE Awards. Adventure Sport Magazine “Queen of Pain” (2004)

Rebecca says she was never much of cyclist. Climbing was her thing. But she won a lot of races due to grit, determination and pain tolerance.

Says her toughest adventure was her first Iditarod Trail endurance bike race in winter.

Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews

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Red Sparrow (2013) is a novel written by Jason Matthews, a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operative …

Dominika Egorova, or “Red Sparrow”, is a former Russian ballerina who is forced by her uncle to undergo espionage training for the Russian government at the Sparrow School, where people are trained to seduce their targets.

Other key figures are Marble, a Russian double agent who provides intelligence to the CIA, and Nate Nash, a CIA internal-ops officer who recruits and handles intelligence assets for the agency. …

Most interesting to me was the depiction of surveillance and countersurveillance techniques, said to be quite accurate.

I enjoyed the recipes included at the end of each chapter.

To me it is a dumbed down John le Carré spy novel. Less confusing than Carré. Still enjoyable.

It was made into a 2018 film adaptation with Jennifer Lawrence and Joel Edgerton. Reviews were not good.

Click PLAY or watch a trailer on YouTube.

 

Bird Box – on Netflix

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I finally got around to watching this intense end-of-the-world film — while locked up for COVID-19.

Bird Box is a 2018 American post-apocalyptic thriller …

The film follows a woman, played by Sandra Bullock, as she tries to protect herself and two children from malevolent supernatural entities that make people who look at them go insane and commit suicide. …

On Rotten Tomatoes, an approval rating of 63% …

Sandra Bullock is always good.

And I found the film quite skillful, interweaving two story lines set 5 years apart.

Click PLAY or watch the trailer on YouTube.

Blow the Man Down – 2019 film

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Blow the Man Down is an 2019 American black comedy thriller …

It holds a 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes …

Some call it Fargo set in coastal Maine.

Quirky.  Original. Very believable characters.

Mary Beth (Morgan Saylor) and Pris (Sophie Lowe) Connolly are sisters who have been taking care of their ailing mother for a year. On the day of her funeral, Mary Beth, the younger of the two (she’s about 18), learns the grim news that the mother, who owned and ran a local fish store, has left them with nothing but debt.

The great Margo Martindale runs the town whorehouse.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Variety – Tribeca Film Review: ‘Blow the Man Down’

 

Dark Tower: The Gunslinger by Stephen King

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King is a superb story teller and writer. This is one of his classic tales.

That said — it doesn’t really work for me. I prefer plots that are less confusing. More logical. I probably won’t continue to book #2 in the series.

The Gunslinger was first published in 1982 as a fix-up novel, joining five short stories that had been published between 1978 and 1981. King substantially revised the novel in 2003 …

The story centers upon Roland Deschain, the last gunslinger, who has been chasing his adversary, “the man in black,” for many years. The novel fuses Western fiction with fantasy, science fiction, and horror …

King started writing this novel in 1970 on a ream of bright green paper that he found at the library …

The 2017 film was based loosely on King’s series of books. It got negative reviews despite starring Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey.

Click PLAY or watch a trailer on YouTube.

World War Z – the Book

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Did you see the 2013 Brad Pitt film World War Z?

The highest grossing zombie movie so far.

I liked it.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

The book is different. 

Smart. Original. International. Political.

I decide to reread it because of the current CORONAVIRUS scare.

 I’m hoping it will be contained before the Olympics. So far it seems much like SARS.

World War Z is more like what we’ll face when the BIG pandemic finally arrives. 

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War is a 2006 zombie apocalyptic horror novel written by American author Max Brooks.

The novel is a collection of individual accounts narrated by an agent of the United Nations Postwar Commission, following the devastating global conflict against the zombie plague. …

Brooks used World War Z to comment on government ineptitude and US isolationism, while also examining survivalism and uncertainty. …