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Month: January 2012

‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”–Not Enough Tinkering for My Taste

This cinematic remake of the landmark mini-TV series from 1980, starring Alec Guiness, is updated with Gary Oldman in the starring role that Guiness made so famous. Based upon the John le Carré espionage thriller,  “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” dramatizes British secret intelligence–nicknamed “The Circus” –during the early 1970s Cold War. Control (John Hurt), the chief intelligence operative, is forced into retirement because a covert operation failed to identify a double agent or “mole”. Forced into retirement along with Control, Smiley (Gary Oldman)...

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“The Iron Lady” — Meryl Streep Nails It

 Winner of the best actor 2012 Golden Globe for her stunning performance in “The Iron Lady”, Meryl Streep plays Margaret Thatcher, the iconic Prime Minister second only to Winston Churchill in power and impact on Great Britain. “The Iron Lady” is, at times, an exceptional meditation on old age and it is, once more, a virtuoso performance by the genius that is Meryl Streep. First and foremost, however, “The Iron Lady” is a portrait of Thatcher as a woman whose tremendous sacrifices to family and identity were viewed, both by her and by her advisors, as necessary in order...

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“Letting Go”–A short story published in “Blood and Thunder”

In the fall issue 2011 of Blood and Thunder, a literary journal published by the University of Oklahoma Medical School, my short story “Letting Go” appears, exploring the theme of the ill and dying.  Blood and Thunder does not publish issues online and I could not scan the published version for my blog. Consequently, click on the cover image above and you will be taken to the fourteen-page document published in its entirety in the current issue.  A version of this short story is being included in the final draft of my novel, Unhealed Wound.  I would be very, very interested in receiving...

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“Butter”– A Soft Pat for the Audience

With the Iowa primary just ending, I was reminded of the movie “Butter” which I saw at the Napa Valley Film Festival in mid-November. “Butter” zooms in on the butter-carving contest made famous at the annual Iowa State fair. Butter sculpting is a very popular and competitive art in places like Iowa (with butter statues of Elvis Presley, Tiger Woods, The Last Supper, Superman, and Harry Potter), 

 and the movie contains some really amazing butter statues including Newt Gingrich. “Butter” will be released on March 16. “Butter” opens as a quirky...

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Happy New Year! –The Year of the Dragon

Happy New Year, everyone, and may some fire be breathed into your lives with good fortune, excitement, and the acceptance of transition and change! I always like to look up the feng-shui and Chinese New Year after toasting with champagne a few days earlier.  I found out that 2012 is the first black water dragon year in 60 years.  (The other dragon years were not water dragon years.) The dragon is considered unpredictable and untouchable.  Its mystery is never completely known.  People cannot see its head and tail at the same time. The dragon is the most powerful, revered symbol in ancient Chinese...

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