Quick Reviews and Stuff: February

Happy shortest month!

In honor of Leap Day, please have the most unhinged question on Ask A Manager from someone utterly convinced that they are not doing anything bizarre at all.

Books

• Electric Idol, Katee Robert —Second installment in the Dark Olympus series, the first of which I read in September. This one follows the married-under-duress-oops-we-caught-feelings relationship between Psyche and Eros. Once again, it’s a book that everything about it should annoy me. The plot here is flimsy beyond belief, the worldbuilding continues to be ????, it’s absolutely an instalove situation, the main Actual problem is that they’re both like “he/she could NEVER love me, I must keep my feelings to myself and not speak of them, this whole relationship is built on LIES anyway” which gets old when it happens a million times, and yet … I still ended up devouring this book. So many things I shouldn’t like, so easily readable and enjoyable anyway. I don’t know, man, no one’s reading these for the plot.

• Brooms, Jasmine Walls, Teo Duvall (Illustrator) — I saw some review of this stating something to the effect of “why does this exist” and like… idk man, how many other books about 1930s witches in Mississippi, with this amount of representation of marginalized peoples, have you read before? Huh? The defense rests. Anyway — like all graphic novels I think this was rushed a bit/didn’t have a great sense of time — there’s a time gap of about a week where one of the characters hadn’t been showing up and I didn’t even realize that much time had passed until someone was like “X hasn’t been here for a week”, for example. But the story is captivating, even if it could have been fleshed out a bit more. You get enough of a sense of the universe and the backgrounds of all of the characters, and I’d love to read more set in this universe. It would make a great transition to movie/TV/miniseries/etc., too. The art is appealing and expressive and you get attached to the diverse cast very quickly.

• The Reanimator’s Heart, Kara Jorgensen —Paranormal fantasy set in kind of old timey steampunk New York. I loved the relationship between Oliver (autistic necromancer who’s basically the coroner for the Paranormal Society) and Felipe (investigator who can heal himself). The way that they show they care for each other and the way that Felipe accepts Oliver the way he is, without questioning or pushing him to be different, is really great to read. Their quiet intimacy and the way that they slot into each others lives was so sweet to me. I also enjoyed the worldbuilding and alternate history angle that the story took. I’d love to learn more about magic/paranormal in this universe as it feels very rich with possibilities. The plot is a bit predictable, and while the ending is exciting, I also finished reading it without really clearly understanding what the Big Bad’s main goal actually was. While the relationship is the main draw of the book for me, I don’t think it’s too much to ask that everything actually wrap up in a way that was clear. Despite some issues, including spelling errors and grammar/stylistic choices that sometimes took me out of the flow of the book, I still found this to be a compelling read and I’m looking forward to reading the second book in the series.

• The Fiancée Farce, Alexandria Bellefleur — I have a hot-and-cold relationship with f/f fiction because so much of it is so bad, but I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed this one. Yes, it’s your standard “fake dating/relationship of convenience turns into actually having feelings” story, and the twists are largely predictable/the bad guys are over the top bad. But I really liked Tansy and Gemma and the way their relationship developed, as well as the ways that they supported one another and also actually talked through their problems, for the most part. (The Standard Third Act Breakup could have been avoided if they’d KEPT talking about their problems, but I digress.) It was so sweet to see their interactions, and I also really enjoyed that they each had their own distinct voices, too. Is the ending a little bit too easy/unbelievable? Sure! But I also absolutely started crying with like 30 pages left because I was experiencing feelings, so I don’t even care, man.

• A Pipe for February, Charles H. Red Corn — An excellent companion piece if you’ve seen Killers of the Flower Moon or read the non-fiction book which it’s drawn from. This book centers around John Greyeagle and his friends/relatives, who are basically the frog in the slowly boiling pot, not realizing the situation they’re in until it’s almost too late, and they all come to some important personal revelations along the way of what it means to be an Osage in this world. Charles Red Corn writes simply but evocatively, giving us the story of the Osage Reign of Terror from a perspective of an Osage. Red Corn’s writing feels almost like you’re reading an oral history, even though this is a fictionalized account of the events. It’s the type of story that feels like it should be read out loud to you, and I get that that may make his writing style off-putting to people, but it’s a very authentic voice that doesn’t try to fit white expectations of storytelling.

• Delicious in Dungeon (Dungeon Meshi) Vol. 1, Ryoko Kui, Sebastien Ludmann (translation) —Absolutely ridiculous manga about a group of adventurers who decide to start eating the monsters in a dungeon when they run out of food. (There is also apparently an anime on Netflix of this.) This was absolutely the kind of silly nonsense that I wanted to read right now. This is every D&D party that has had a dungeon crawl get derailed by the most absurd of incidents and also there’s at least one murder gremlin in your group. The art is cute, there’s some actual character growth, and most importantly I just had a lot of fun reading.

• Orange World and Other Stories, Karen Russell — Delightfully weird collection of short stories. There’s a definite theme here of monstrous transformation, whatever that means to you. Russell’s writing is witty and engaging and each short story has its own distinct voice, which you don’t always see in short story collections. My favorites were The Prospectors (girls looking to survive in a run down town), The Bad Graft (girl gets real close with a tree), The Tornado Auction (guy raises a storm), and Orange World (girl makes a deal). Several of these stories were previously published online (The New Yorker had several of them) so you can search around if you want a preview.

• Herc, Phoenicia Rogerson —Billed as a queer, feminist retelling of Hercules, which, okay, I guess. It takes the familiar characters who populate the Hercules myth and tells the story through their eyes, not Hercules’s, and it also keeps things set in their standard time period but uses very current/modern language. I can see why this book is pretty divisive, but it was ultimately an engaging read for me. I assume I would feel differently if I had more than a basic knowledge of mythology, but I don’t and therefore don’t care about anything that was changed to suit the purposes of this book, and honestly, like, what is even the point of mythology if it doesn’t get twisted and altered as the years go on? This was obviously a much different view of Hercules than we are used to from media, and he’s so much more of an unreliable narrator here, and very difficult to like. It’s interesting, the choice to make your main character somewhat of a villain. The modern language can get a bit cheesy at times, although I didn’t completely hate it. It made things far more readable than if the book had tried to stick to a more traditional style.

Movies

• Polite Society — Teen girl finds her older sister’s arranged marriage to be suspicious and acts accordingly. This is a good amount of fun, and just the right length for the amount of plot. I wish it either leaned more into the absurd send-up of spy/thriller/action movies, or played it straight, as straddling the two worlds felt a bit bit tonally confusing. Still an entertaining way to spend the evening though.

• Anselm — The film is part documentary, part archival footage, part historical reenactment, part fantasy, which makes for a somewhat muddled narrative. But there’s enough there to pique the interest in artist Anselm Kiefer and what he is conveying through his art, particularly given that Kiefer came of age in a Germany that would/could not reflect back on WWII. I don’t know that everything here worked per se, at least for me as a viewer outside this film’s target audience, but visually it’s splendid and I’d like to learn more about Kiefer. The sheer size and scale of Anselm Kiefer’s art makes this something worth seeing on a big screen.

• Next Goal Wins —Based on the true story of the American Samoa soccer team. This movie had all the pieces to be way funnier than it was, but the sum of its parts was just okay. I loved having a film put the spotlight on a part of the world that most people couldn’t even find on the map, and it was clearly made with great affection, but a lot of it just fell flat. Kaimana is great in her debut as Jaiyah (the first openly non-binary and trans woman athlete to play in a FIFA World Cup qualifier match), and Current Era Michael Fassbender really does “weary and over this shit” very well. Taika Waititi’s schtick, particularly the whole “insert yourself as a weird character to narrate the movie” thing, just didn’t really work here for me.

• 2024 Oscar Nominated Shorts, Live Actiona. The After —Emotionally manipulative British short that opens on a dad and his cute daughter and quickly changes gears entirely. A knife attack happens, and the aesthetically jarring look of the assailant — like some sort of sci fi ninja looking dude — made me think we’d been suddenly dropped into a genre film — sci fi, thriller, whatever. But instead it’s just another story that literally yeets its women in order to show a man processing grief. David Oyelowo is good but I’m just so tired, man.b. Red, White and Blue — Woman in Arkansas has to scrape together the funds to travel out of state for an abortion. This movie won’t change anyone’s minds about the topic, and I hate that we live in a country where you just know that even though this is fiction, well, it really isn’t. There’s a plot twist that hits you like an absolute gut punch — one of those moments where there’s an audible gasp in the audience. The ending felt a bit too heavy handed (the speech given by little Maddy felt far too “I Am A Serious Child Actress” for me) but so much of Rachel’s struggles felt so real and lived in. c. Knight of Fortune — Danish short about a man preparing for a viewing for his deceased wife. An excellent balance of emotion, drama, humor, absurdity. One of my favorites of this year’s short film nominees. A story about grief, and not being ready to deal with your loss, and the sometimes chaotic ways people reach out for help.d. Invincible —French-Canadian short about a troubled teenager and his inevitable flight from the juvenile detention center he’s at. Your heart absolutely breaks for Marc, even more so when you realize this is based on a true story. The young actor playing Marc is so good here, showcasing the turmoil that comes with being a troubled teen. We don’t know what landed Marc in the juvenile facility, but you can see him constantly at war with himself.e. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar — Wes Anderson at his Wes Andersoniest. Absolutely delightful performances from the star-studded cast, but what really won me over was the astounding sets, visual effects/illusions, and — no joke — the sound design. You just don’t see enough movies playing with sound these days — shifting to the left when a character moves offscreen to the left, muffled when a character goes behind something. For as enjoyable as I thought this short film was, I was constantly mesmerized by the creative use of sound.

• 2024 Oscar Nominated Shorts, Animateda. Letter to a Pig —French/Israeli short about an elderly man talking to a group of children about his experience during the Holocaust. The ending/overall message sort of lost me a little bit at the end, but the animation style is an absolutely fascinating mixture of drawings and live-action footage. Visually very interesting to look at, although whoever decided on white subtitles with a subtle grey shadow in a movie where the screen the majority of the time is white, I’d just like to have a word with them.b. Ninety-Five Senses —Elderly man shares experiences that relate to each of the standard senses we experience as humans. Absolutely loved the wide variety of animation styles used here. Poignant, funny, with a plot twist that I absolutely did not see coming, and which kills the laughs immediately as you suddenly put all of the pieces together. Accomplishes a lot in just 13 minutes.c. Our Uniform —Uniquely designed Iranian film told from the perspective of a young girl. If you like any sort of fiber arts, you will love this one. The animation is done so creatively, and in just a short amount of time gives you a look at life for young women in Iran, albeit a somewhat simplistic approach.d. Pachyderm —Dreamy/ethereal French short, also told from the perspective of a young girl. Halfway through I was like, oh, this is a story about trauma. Very subtle at first but drops enough hints that you realize fairly quickly it’s not just a cute story about a little girl on vacation, it’s actually really sad and harrowing. Interesting animation style, reminded me of a children’s picture book.e. WAR IS OVER! Inspired by the Music of John and Yoko — yes the title is officially in all caps, yes the title officially includes the ‘inspired by’ tag. I have never been more actively angry at something that is only 11 minutes long, and it’s almost entirely due to the character design. With all of the other shorts, I was thinking about how visually interesting they are, how the character design covers the full spectrum from realism to typical cartoon, and then these little-eyed-bulbous-nosed-Shrek-looking soldier men come up on screen and I’m like, absolutely not, sir. The animation style itself was interesting — it used a video game engine for the animation — but the character design, please, no, I am so tired of this style of character design. I can’t even bring myself to have thoughts about the plot, aside from the entirely too on-the-nose use of the titular song, because I’m so mad at how this LOOKED. If I gave stars for movie ratings, my stars would ONLY be for the pigeon.f. I’m Hip —An honorary mention/highly commended/whatever animated music video about a very hip orange cat. I loved seeing something that used hand-drawn animation, in a world where that hardly even exists anymore. I would give this many stars solely because it’s about an orange cat.g. Wild Summon —Another honorary mention, this one puts a uhhhh more human face on the plight of salmon. If this is trying to make people not want to eat salmon anymore, I think it might have a few success stories

• All the Right Moves — This is very much An Eighties Movie (not affectionate) but it nails the feeling of growing up in a small, dying town and knowing you have to get out. This was filmed about an hour away from where I grew up, and not much changed between the early 80s when this is presumably set, and the late 90s when I was in high school. Like the characters here, if you wanted to leave, going to college was really the only ticket out other than joining the military. If you also have your origins in the 1970s-80s Rust Belt, and particularly western Pennsylvania, there’s going to be a lot of your life reflected back at you here.

• Hell or High Seas — Documentary following the efforts of Navy veteran Taylor Grieger as he tries to sail from Florida to Cape Horn. Grieger, like many of our veterans, had a hard time adjusting to civilian life, and came up with this trip as a way to challenge himself and to inspire and help other veterans who are struggling. As an adventure documentary and as a biography, this works. As a vehicle to showcase how this trip was supposed to inspire veterans, I think I wanted a little bit more — the snippets showing social media interactions while the men were sailing was good, and the second half of their trip, which they got media exposure to fundraise for, made more sense in that regards, too, but I wish there was more conversation in the lead-up to the trip of how exactly this would be helping a very worthy cause. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the film and think that what this trip went on to inspire Grieger to do — Skeleton Crew Sailing continues to expand and offer opportunities to veterans to learn to sail — is amazing, but I think what I really want is Part 2 of this documentary, showing how that impact has rippled out beyond just Grieger and his friends.

Other Stuff

• Hi, please see my new favorite Twitter account (if you are ever struggling for a gift for me, literally anything Jellycat makes will do the trick):

• My foster cats Jackson and Petra are still getting in tip-top shape to be ready to be available for adoption, no complaints here though because I love having these temporary friends hanging out in my house. Petra in particular has had some unexpected medical challenges, which, if you’ve ever had pets, you’ll know that’s got a price tag. If you have a few extra dollars sitting around, One Tail at a Time can always use your support to make sure that Petra and animals just like her are taken care of.

What’s Next

• I had to postpone a planned trip to New York in February, and instead am going for a quick weekend in March to cram in several shows. Expect a full Ani DiFranco-in-Hadestown review next month.

• I’m doing a bookstagram (I know, I hate it too) reading challenge this year, the theme of which is “24 books that have been lingering on your to-read pile”. March’s challenge is “the 13th book on your list”, which for me is Leviathan Wakes, by James S.A. Corey, the first book of the series that the TV show The Expanse is based on. I’m excited to finally read it but man, why wasn’t book #13 a much shorter book?

• March includes the Cinema Morricone series at the Music Box, featuring a selection of movies scored by Ennio Morricone. I don’t often delve back into Classic Cinema much but I’m excited to spend many hours watching some classic Westerns and also The Thing.

• What about you? What are you up to?

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