So this weekend I watched the old '80s miniseries Masada via Netflix. I remembered hearing about it back in the day but had never watched it. Have to say, it stands up pretty damn well. It is a little dated-feeling (feels very '80s and my GOD does Peter O'Toole camp it up--that EYELINER) but the story and the performances really hold up. I ( Read more... )

St. Patrick's Day coming up soon, yay! I am looking up Irish knitting patterns in honor of the season--I bought two Aran sweaters back in Dublin but you can never have too many Irish sweaters. I like this one.

Just finished (re)watching 2005's Kingdom of Heaven. Okay, the history is sort of crap--it really, really wasn't just Frankistani = bad ( Read more... )

I Netflixed Spike Lee's documentary 4 Little Girls; MAN.  It's not manipulative and there's not a strong POV in it; the camera just tells the stories.  There are extensive interviews, mainly with the remaining family members, but with other commentators as well, including Walter Cronkite and Bill Cosby.  And George Wallace.  Wallace is an ( Read more... )

I gotta say now, as in 21st century (at least the first ten years), is a GOOD time in which to become interested in classical history. Thanks to Gladiator, the sword-and-sandal genre has been revived, and I've been able to add tons of such movies and TV shows to my Netflix queue. In addition to

*Gladiator (which has the added bonus of being ( Read more... )

After visiting Ipswich, Mass. (which is near Salem) in July for my cousin Larson's wedding, I watched a terrific miniseries about the 1692 witch trials. And then this week I saw the 1996 movie adaptation of The Crucible. Miller wrote the screenplay, and he did a terrific job--as heavily stage-bound and unnaturalistic as the play is, he really ( Read more... )

So in the wake of my visit to the Cape Ann area (where the train paused in Salem), my imagination has been reawakened and I Netflixed some videos about the Witch Trials. This happens every few years, I get fascinated all over again by that story and have to read/study everything I can find about it. One time back in the early '90s I was watching ( Read more... )

I've been watching (in what very little free time I have right now--rehearsal for Ore has turned into a full-time job) the '70s BBC series The Six Wives of Henry VIII. I remember watching this as a child with my Mom when they reran it on PBS--the only scene that sticks in my head was Catherine Howard saying "Me? The King wants to see me?" The ( Read more... )

In my continuing obsession with West Side Story, I watched it again this weekend, and surprised myself by bursting into tears in the last scene. Natalie Wood brings it in that scene. (Richard Beymer kicks ass as well.) She is just barely holding herself together when she's pointing the gun at the rest of them--you can hear the tears in her voice ( Read more... )

Last week I Netflixed West Side Story (crappy DVD, BTW, no extras whatsoever). It's been a LONG time since I've watched the movie--not all the way through since I was a little kid. But I grew up knowing it intimately nonetheless--my brother and I knew the soundtrack by heart and acted out the dances. Bart especially loved staging the Dance at ( Read more... )

Inspired by the clips I saw on the Oscars, I Netflixed Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Holy crap, Clive Owen is WHITE hot in this movie. Damn. He is amazingly hot in this--I seriously want to have his children right now. I liked Closer a lot but never saw him as particularly attractive but the combination of his tan, his tight little doublets, his ( Read more... )