There has been an outpouring of commentary about the life and work of Nora Ephron. Let me add to this by providing the following examples of Nora Ephron at her best.
Mike Nichols Salute
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
Passing of our Greatest Female Filmmaker
Nora Ephron died yesterday at the age of 71 from complications from myelodysplasia, a form of leukemia with which she was diagnosed six years ago.
Ms. Ephron's career had its ups and downs, but she will likely be best remembered as the writer of When Harry Met Sally, arguably the best romantic comedy of the modern era and the film that made Meg Ryan a star. She worked with Ms. Ryan again in Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail. Ms Ephron wrote and directed both films. She also worked frequently with our greatest living actress, Meryl Streep, in Silkwood, Heartburn, and Julie and Julia.
To get a good sense of Ms. Ephron's wit and charm, see this very funny appearance at a 2004 AFI Life Achievement Award ceremony honoring Meryl Streep.
Ephron came from a family of writers and show business people, and she married two famous men. Her brief marriage to Carl Bernstein resulted in the novel and film Heartburn, with Streep playing the Ephron role and Jack Nicholson stepping in as the philandering Carl Bernstein, who Ephron once remarked was “capable of having sex with a Venetian blind.” She also married Nicolas Pileggi in 1987 who wrote GoodFellas and Casino, both memorably brought to the screen by Martin Scorsese.This marriage took, unlike her previous attempts.
Ephron was an intern in the Kennedy White House and often remarked on the fact that she was apparently the only woman on the White House staff to whom JFK didn't make a pass. She attributed the oversight to her Jewishness.
Ephron's style of film making embodied women-centered stories replete with witty and rapid-fire dialog. Just think of a female version of Aaron Sorkin and you get the idea.
Her best films are the Meg Ryan romantic comedy trilogy When Harry Met Sally (1989), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), and You've Got Mail (1998); and the three films she did with Meryl Streep Silkwood (1983), Heartburn (1986), and Julie and Julia (2009).
She will be missed.
Ms. Ephron's career had its ups and downs, but she will likely be best remembered as the writer of When Harry Met Sally, arguably the best romantic comedy of the modern era and the film that made Meg Ryan a star. She worked with Ms. Ryan again in Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail. Ms Ephron wrote and directed both films. She also worked frequently with our greatest living actress, Meryl Streep, in Silkwood, Heartburn, and Julie and Julia.
To get a good sense of Ms. Ephron's wit and charm, see this very funny appearance at a 2004 AFI Life Achievement Award ceremony honoring Meryl Streep.
Ephron came from a family of writers and show business people, and she married two famous men. Her brief marriage to Carl Bernstein resulted in the novel and film Heartburn, with Streep playing the Ephron role and Jack Nicholson stepping in as the philandering Carl Bernstein, who Ephron once remarked was “capable of having sex with a Venetian blind.” She also married Nicolas Pileggi in 1987 who wrote GoodFellas and Casino, both memorably brought to the screen by Martin Scorsese.This marriage took, unlike her previous attempts.
Ephron was an intern in the Kennedy White House and often remarked on the fact that she was apparently the only woman on the White House staff to whom JFK didn't make a pass. She attributed the oversight to her Jewishness.
Ephron's style of film making embodied women-centered stories replete with witty and rapid-fire dialog. Just think of a female version of Aaron Sorkin and you get the idea.
Her best films are the Meg Ryan romantic comedy trilogy When Harry Met Sally (1989), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), and You've Got Mail (1998); and the three films she did with Meryl Streep Silkwood (1983), Heartburn (1986), and Julie and Julia (2009).
She will be missed.
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Everything you Need to Know about the Politics of Obamacare
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Friday, June 15, 2012
David Brooks Can be Exasperating
I generally like David Brooks. I particularly enjoy his end-of-week political commentary on both NPR and PBS's Newshour. He is the kind of conservative liberals can live with because he is reasonable, moderate, and seemingly not afflicted by the fever that has swept the GOP since the financial crisis. For example, he described Jim DeMint's recovery plan to freeze government hiring in 2008 as "insane."
However, I am not a fan of his NY Times column. I say this for two, completely unrelated, reasons. First, his columns are often quite dull. Brooks is much more interested in sociological and psychological analysis than I am. Second, his column is very different in tone and emphasis than what you get from him when he wears his TV and radio talking head hat. Today's column is a good example of this. It is an attempt to describe, as favorably as possible, the recent rightward lurch of the GOP. He cites an article by Yuval Levin in the Weekly Standard as a good example of what he sees as the GOP's realization that "the the welfare-state model is in its death throes", and the old rules just don't apply anymore. So it is not that the GOP has gone bonkers; rather, they simply have a new point of view that requires the party to change its governing approach.
What I found exasperating about Brook's column was an almost complete lack of analysis of the material he presents. Does he agree with this new GOP point of view, or not? He clearly used to think some of the positions advocated by the GOP after the financial crisis were "insane." Has he changed his mind? If so, why? You'll never found out by reading the column.
However, Brook's lack of analysis goes beyond a mere refusal to self-disclose. It is also remarkably passively uncritical. Assume, as I am willing to do, that his description of the current GOP "point of view" is accurate. Is there any reason to think that it is true, or even a reasonable approximation of reality?
What do we know in 2012 about the burdens of the welfare state that we didn't know in 2007? Nothing so far as I can tell. We have demographic problem in which fewer and fewer workers will be supporting more and more retiring baby-boomers. The places a burden on Social Security, but especially on Medicare that is quite serious unless something is done to reign in the inflation rate of medical care. Is there anything new about this? Public policy wonks have been talking about this for a couple of decades at least.
He also points to GOP concerns about lower growth rates since 1999. This is to be sure a real concern, but I am surprised that it is one that conservatives wish to highlight. The economics of the post-Clinton era is defined by large tax cuts for the wealthy, an unprecedented unwillingness to fund both wars and major entitlement expansions, and a crippling financial crisis brought on by spectacular failures of judgment and ethics in the private sector in general and by Wall Street in particular. These are all policies that the GOP either actively advanced or passively encouraged. The post-WWII era of prosperity and growth that Brooks looks back on with nostalgic affection were decades that witnessed both stronger regulation of business and much higher taxes on the wealthy. Just how does a conservative compare these two eras and conclude that what we need is less regulation of business and lower taxes on the wealthy? The ability of conservatives, as Brooks describes them, to hold both of these two clearly inconsistent positions simultaneously is as breathtaking as it is puzzling.
Finally, what in the world does the welfare state have to do with low levels of growth anyway? Consider the changes in GDP and unemployment from 2006-2011 for five countries.
What conclusions can we draw from this data? Well, of these countries the best GDP growth has been in Sweden, Denmark, and Canada. The U.S. performed somewhat worse, and Ireland brings up the rear. If we look at unemployment, again, Sweden, Denmark, and Canada have done the best. The U.S. falls behind and Ireland again sees the highest levels of unemployment.
Is there any correlation here between the size of the welfare state and economic performance? Yes, there is. However, it is exactly the opposite of the new conservative "point of view" that Brooks describes. I don't know, maybe it is me, but this seems as good a functional definition of crazy as you are likely to encounter.
However, I am not a fan of his NY Times column. I say this for two, completely unrelated, reasons. First, his columns are often quite dull. Brooks is much more interested in sociological and psychological analysis than I am. Second, his column is very different in tone and emphasis than what you get from him when he wears his TV and radio talking head hat. Today's column is a good example of this. It is an attempt to describe, as favorably as possible, the recent rightward lurch of the GOP. He cites an article by Yuval Levin in the Weekly Standard as a good example of what he sees as the GOP's realization that "the the welfare-state model is in its death throes", and the old rules just don't apply anymore. So it is not that the GOP has gone bonkers; rather, they simply have a new point of view that requires the party to change its governing approach.
What I found exasperating about Brook's column was an almost complete lack of analysis of the material he presents. Does he agree with this new GOP point of view, or not? He clearly used to think some of the positions advocated by the GOP after the financial crisis were "insane." Has he changed his mind? If so, why? You'll never found out by reading the column.
However, Brook's lack of analysis goes beyond a mere refusal to self-disclose. It is also remarkably passively uncritical. Assume, as I am willing to do, that his description of the current GOP "point of view" is accurate. Is there any reason to think that it is true, or even a reasonable approximation of reality?
What do we know in 2012 about the burdens of the welfare state that we didn't know in 2007? Nothing so far as I can tell. We have demographic problem in which fewer and fewer workers will be supporting more and more retiring baby-boomers. The places a burden on Social Security, but especially on Medicare that is quite serious unless something is done to reign in the inflation rate of medical care. Is there anything new about this? Public policy wonks have been talking about this for a couple of decades at least.
He also points to GOP concerns about lower growth rates since 1999. This is to be sure a real concern, but I am surprised that it is one that conservatives wish to highlight. The economics of the post-Clinton era is defined by large tax cuts for the wealthy, an unprecedented unwillingness to fund both wars and major entitlement expansions, and a crippling financial crisis brought on by spectacular failures of judgment and ethics in the private sector in general and by Wall Street in particular. These are all policies that the GOP either actively advanced or passively encouraged. The post-WWII era of prosperity and growth that Brooks looks back on with nostalgic affection were decades that witnessed both stronger regulation of business and much higher taxes on the wealthy. Just how does a conservative compare these two eras and conclude that what we need is less regulation of business and lower taxes on the wealthy? The ability of conservatives, as Brooks describes them, to hold both of these two clearly inconsistent positions simultaneously is as breathtaking as it is puzzling.
Finally, what in the world does the welfare state have to do with low levels of growth anyway? Consider the changes in GDP and unemployment from 2006-2011 for five countries.
What conclusions can we draw from this data? Well, of these countries the best GDP growth has been in Sweden, Denmark, and Canada. The U.S. performed somewhat worse, and Ireland brings up the rear. If we look at unemployment, again, Sweden, Denmark, and Canada have done the best. The U.S. falls behind and Ireland again sees the highest levels of unemployment.
Is there any correlation here between the size of the welfare state and economic performance? Yes, there is. However, it is exactly the opposite of the new conservative "point of view" that Brooks describes. I don't know, maybe it is me, but this seems as good a functional definition of crazy as you are likely to encounter.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Deciphering Prometheus
OK, Spoiler Alert. If you have not seen Prometheus and don't want major plot points revealed, then read no further. Come back after you have seen it. On the other hand, if you have already seen it, don't plan to see it, or plan to see it but don't care if I reveal the plot, then read on.
Apparently Ridley Scott started out with the idea that Prometheus would be a prequel to his 1979 classic Alien, a prequel that explained, among other things, the marooned ship with the weird-looking elephant man sitting at an enormous instrument panel and telescope who seemed to have exploded from the inside.
Having now seen Prometheus, here's what I can tell you. The alien creature was apparently engineered by the elephant man as a kind of weapon of mass destruction, and the creation turned on its maker.
The film is as gorgeously photographed as any I have seen. It was shot using the digital Red Epic camera, which is quickly becoming an industry standard. It was also shot in 3D, if you are in to that sort of thing. The performances by the major characters, Noomi Rapace, Michael Fasbinder, Charlize Theron, and Idris Elba (yea, Wire!) are all superb. However, though the story contains some intriguing and even thought-provoking ideas, the screenplay is something of a mess.
The largest source of irritation for me was the apparently intentional unwillingness of Scott and his screenwriters to explain several key events in story. Presumably, these will all be dealt with in a sequel, but this is a gip. Wasn't this supposed to be the film that answered unresolved questions from the previous films? Now we have to wait for yet another film to answer new questions raised in Prometheus! This is endless.
Here is my list of the mysterious, implausible, or just plain embarrassing plot points that Prometheus left us with.
Apparently Ridley Scott started out with the idea that Prometheus would be a prequel to his 1979 classic Alien, a prequel that explained, among other things, the marooned ship with the weird-looking elephant man sitting at an enormous instrument panel and telescope who seemed to have exploded from the inside.
Having now seen Prometheus, here's what I can tell you. The alien creature was apparently engineered by the elephant man as a kind of weapon of mass destruction, and the creation turned on its maker.
The film is as gorgeously photographed as any I have seen. It was shot using the digital Red Epic camera, which is quickly becoming an industry standard. It was also shot in 3D, if you are in to that sort of thing. The performances by the major characters, Noomi Rapace, Michael Fasbinder, Charlize Theron, and Idris Elba (yea, Wire!) are all superb. However, though the story contains some intriguing and even thought-provoking ideas, the screenplay is something of a mess.
The largest source of irritation for me was the apparently intentional unwillingness of Scott and his screenwriters to explain several key events in story. Presumably, these will all be dealt with in a sequel, but this is a gip. Wasn't this supposed to be the film that answered unresolved questions from the previous films? Now we have to wait for yet another film to answer new questions raised in Prometheus! This is endless.
Here is my list of the mysterious, implausible, or just plain embarrassing plot points that Prometheus left us with.
- What actually occurs in the opening sequence? Does the Engineer commit suicide or was his destruction after drinking the dark liquid an accident? Regardless of how you answer this question, why was he there (wherever "there" was) and what was he trying to accomplish?
- The Fassbinder character acts as though he is "in" on the whole biological-weapon-gone-bad story, but this is never explained. He apparently intentionally infects Holloway with the black liquid, and then when Holloway has sex with Rapace's Elizabeth Shaw, she becomes impregnated with one of the squid creatures. Fassbinder's David seems to understand all of this and brings it about on purpose, but to what end? Unlike in Aliens in which the evil corporation intended to impregnate Ripley and then bring the Alien back to earth to use for weapons research, in this film we are led to believe that the corporation's sole motive is that its on-death's-door CEO wishes to attain immortality. Anyway, how could robot David even know about these creatures? No one else from planet earth does.
- The scene where one of the crew members is startled by a snake-like alien that emerges from the black liquid and then goes to it, because. . . he wants to pet it or something, was just ridiculous. If you had watched me while I watched this scene I think you would have noticed that I literally rolled my eyes.
- When the Engineer is wakened from his stasis, he is apparently so enraged by the presence of the humans that he immediately starts trying to kill them all. Why is he a kill-crazy psycho? Even if he has some deep, philosophical reason for wanting to extinguish all of humanity, is the matter so pressing that he must immediately start killing everyone in site after being asleep for two centuries? Maybe have a cup of coffee and a danish first? You can always kill them after you have lulled them into complacency.
- The anthropology of the original Alien is now quite complicated. It all starts with black liquid that either:
- Dissolves your body
- Turns you into psychotic murdering mutant
- Spontaneously creates the snake creature. When the snake creature gets inside of you, it turns you into a mutant and also gives your sperm the ability to impregnate barren women with the squid creature.
The squid creature then enters another body and lays yet another kind of egg, and when this emerges rather spectacularly from the unfortunate host's abdominal cavity we finally get the Alien we first met in 1979. Got all that? Black Liquid-Mutant-Squid Creature-Alien, more or less in that order.
- When Theron reveals that the CEO of the Weyland Corporation is good ol' Dad (despite the fact that she clearly wants to throttle him), I rolled my eyes again. Jez, this was a direct lift from The Empire Strike Back where Luke learns that Darth Vader is his father.
- Since the Weyland CEO character is only played as a very old man, why in the world did Scott cast 45-year-old Guy Pearce in the role and then force him to spend hours every day in the make-up chair? Why not just hire an elderly actor?
- Finally, the biggest question of all--the question that Rapace asks directly as she leads us off to Sequel Land in the final scenes--is why did the Engineers go to all the trouble of genetically engineering the human race only to then decide to annihilate it? It sure seems like a lot of wasted effort.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
Alternate Realities
There is something strangely disorienting about the way Mitt Romney describes the economy and President Obama's economic policies. It is as though Romney lives in some alternate reality unaffected by and unrelated to the common experience of the vast majority of citizens.
For example, today it was reported that Romney said that in Obama's economy "There is nothing fair about a government that favors political connections over honest competition and takes away your right to earn your own success"; and "there is nothing morally right about trying to turn government dependence into a substitute for the dignity of work"; and Under Obama, the country was on the brink of a "government-led economy".
Let's take these one at a time.
Presumably, the comment about favoring "political connections over honest competition" refers to Solyndra. One does not have to believe that all elements of the Solyndra experience were uncontroversial to also believe that generally characterizing the Obama economic record as one that favors "political connections over honest competition" is absurd. The Solyndra loan was begun by the Bush administration. The loans in question had already been approved by non-political career employees at the Department of Energy before the administration seemed to rush final OMB approval. The Washington Post pointed out that "The Energy Department’s loan-guarantee program, enacted in 2005 with bipartisan support, has backed nearly $38 billion in loans for 40 projects around the country. Solyndra represents just 1.3 percent of that portfolio — and, as yet, it’s the only loan that has soured. " In fact, investigations have revealed no evidence that the decision to green-light Solyndra was payback to political supporters. In any case, the idea that $535 million worth of loan guarantees was payback for the $87,000 in contributions provided by Solyndra-related individuals is a little ridiculous. In a post Citizens United era that allows unlimited anonymous contributions to organizations committed to achieving partisan political outcomes, there are much easier ways to encourage contributions to political causes.
I have no idea what the part about taking "away your right to earn your own success" refers to. Whose right to success has been denied? This is just a fantasy.
One can only imagine that turning "government dependence into a substitute for the dignity of work" refers to the large increase in unemployment benefits, food stamps, and other automatic stabilizers that have kicked in as a response to the financial crisis. What makes this statement so weird is that it implies 1) that there is a large backlog of people who have chosen not to work, preferring instead of live off of government benefits; and, 2) had Romney gotten his way, social safety net programs would not be allowed to cushion the effect of the most profound economic downturn since the Great Depression.
Does anyone--including Mitt Romney--seriously believe either of these propositions? Did unemployment explode from 4% to 10% between 2007 and 2010 because millions of Americans suddenly decided to become welfare queens? The plain fact is that there are more people looking for work than there are jobs available.
Finally, it is not clear what he means when warning about a "government-led economy". Again, this is strangely unconnected with reality. The private sector has recovered from the recession much more robustly than has the public sector, which has been hemorrhaging jobs as state and local governments layoff teachers, firefighters, and cops. Perhaps this statement refers to health care reform, but Obamacare maintains the private insurance system. In fact, many on the Left were disappointed that health care reform did NOT provide a single-payer government solution, and was instead modeled after Romney's own private insurance approach he developed while governor of Massachusetts.
Actually, there is an important point in all of this. As David Frum points out in an excellent column, Republicans are weirdly stuck in a kind of time warp in which every event is understood in the context of the problems the country faced in 1979. However, the problems we face in 2012 are very different, and indeed as Frum points out, in many ways they are exactly the opposite of the era that ushered in the Reagan administration. Nonetheless, Republicans continue to evoke the image of welfare queens and government dependency.
This sort of nostalgic cheerleading is obviously popular among the GOP base. It will be interesting to see if it has any traction among the independents that will determine the election.
For example, today it was reported that Romney said that in Obama's economy "There is nothing fair about a government that favors political connections over honest competition and takes away your right to earn your own success"; and "there is nothing morally right about trying to turn government dependence into a substitute for the dignity of work"; and Under Obama, the country was on the brink of a "government-led economy".
Let's take these one at a time.
Presumably, the comment about favoring "political connections over honest competition" refers to Solyndra. One does not have to believe that all elements of the Solyndra experience were uncontroversial to also believe that generally characterizing the Obama economic record as one that favors "political connections over honest competition" is absurd. The Solyndra loan was begun by the Bush administration. The loans in question had already been approved by non-political career employees at the Department of Energy before the administration seemed to rush final OMB approval. The Washington Post pointed out that "The Energy Department’s loan-guarantee program, enacted in 2005 with bipartisan support, has backed nearly $38 billion in loans for 40 projects around the country. Solyndra represents just 1.3 percent of that portfolio — and, as yet, it’s the only loan that has soured. " In fact, investigations have revealed no evidence that the decision to green-light Solyndra was payback to political supporters. In any case, the idea that $535 million worth of loan guarantees was payback for the $87,000 in contributions provided by Solyndra-related individuals is a little ridiculous. In a post Citizens United era that allows unlimited anonymous contributions to organizations committed to achieving partisan political outcomes, there are much easier ways to encourage contributions to political causes.
I have no idea what the part about taking "away your right to earn your own success" refers to. Whose right to success has been denied? This is just a fantasy.
One can only imagine that turning "government dependence into a substitute for the dignity of work" refers to the large increase in unemployment benefits, food stamps, and other automatic stabilizers that have kicked in as a response to the financial crisis. What makes this statement so weird is that it implies 1) that there is a large backlog of people who have chosen not to work, preferring instead of live off of government benefits; and, 2) had Romney gotten his way, social safety net programs would not be allowed to cushion the effect of the most profound economic downturn since the Great Depression.
Does anyone--including Mitt Romney--seriously believe either of these propositions? Did unemployment explode from 4% to 10% between 2007 and 2010 because millions of Americans suddenly decided to become welfare queens? The plain fact is that there are more people looking for work than there are jobs available.
Finally, it is not clear what he means when warning about a "government-led economy". Again, this is strangely unconnected with reality. The private sector has recovered from the recession much more robustly than has the public sector, which has been hemorrhaging jobs as state and local governments layoff teachers, firefighters, and cops. Perhaps this statement refers to health care reform, but Obamacare maintains the private insurance system. In fact, many on the Left were disappointed that health care reform did NOT provide a single-payer government solution, and was instead modeled after Romney's own private insurance approach he developed while governor of Massachusetts.
Actually, there is an important point in all of this. As David Frum points out in an excellent column, Republicans are weirdly stuck in a kind of time warp in which every event is understood in the context of the problems the country faced in 1979. However, the problems we face in 2012 are very different, and indeed as Frum points out, in many ways they are exactly the opposite of the era that ushered in the Reagan administration. Nonetheless, Republicans continue to evoke the image of welfare queens and government dependency.
This sort of nostalgic cheerleading is obviously popular among the GOP base. It will be interesting to see if it has any traction among the independents that will determine the election.
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