Hello, readers.
Some things for you, on this Tuesday, the first of March.
- The Colbert Show’s precise lampooning of Facebook’s Reactions. Far more precise, in particular, when compared to my earlier emoting.
- Anthony Lane writing of the Dali-esque Oscars, including this bit at the end on the matter of money and influence.
Take the combined global earnings of the ten films that starred the nominees for Best Actor and Best Actress in a Leading Role, all of whom are white, and you arrive at the rough sum of $1,316,000,000. Now put that next to the box-office takings of “Star Wars: the Force Awakens”—$2,048,000,000. That is quite a chasm, and it tells us that, if we lay aside for a moment the admittedly vexing question of prejudice in the awards system, and concentrate purely on the numbers, more people around the world went to see a movie that was fronted (at times, indeed, pretty much held together) by a young black man and a young woman, both hitherto unknown, than went to see all the films that were—with justice—lauded and garlanded last night. J. J. Abrams, the director of the new “Star Wars,” didn’t just think about diversity, or cry it up as a good thing; he put it into play. He realized, as George Lucas failed to do, that racial equality was not just an option but a laughably clear obligation in a galaxy far, far away
- Books are the only real magic. I have nearly finished She Came to Stay by Simone de Beavoir, and during one scene in a barn, I thought about how love can feel like you’re standing on the edge of a precipice and across from you, on the other side, there is the person you love, waiting for you. All you have to do is leap. But what if you fall?
- Sometimes it is scary how moody my moods can be. How my mind seems to have a mind of its own. It is also, of course, quite wonderful. This is how magic works, after all. Things appearing and disappearing by some mechanism cloaked from view. You know it’s a trick, but you enjoy pretending.
Happy Tuesday, readers.
ttfn.
the magnelephant review 