Screening Log

This new site feature is a collective effort to summarize our viewing habits. Occasionally, you will find titles here that are coming to a theater near you, in addition to films viewed on television, and even films viewed in piecemeal. The screening log is archived each month; to view past entries select a month in the menu below.


July 2006 activity

Total Log Entries: 71

Total Comments: 23


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The Squid and the Whale / USA / 2005

I find it more than casually offensive that the principle cast (interviewed in supplementary footage on the DVD) laud Noah Baumbauch’s script for its comedy. There is much in the film that may, perhaps too easily be construed as comedy: picking his youngest of two sons up from tennis practice one afternoon, Bernard challenges his tutor to a quick game in an effort to demonstrate the nuanced art of a one-handed backhand. It’s Goliath attempting futilely to impose his prowess upon those who should naturally respect him. (As the film casually disputes, a PhD should be an engenderer of respect in one’s elders.) Seeing Jeff Daniels sputter around his half of the court, taking his shots only as well as he can properly align his body for them, is funny because he’s doing this in a pair of jeans and a shirt that he’s probably had for a decade. But this action – and many others in the film – is a father’s fear of losing his sons’ admiration. He begins to pontificate that such admiration is not innate in his offspring, but earned. He has spent so much of his life cultivating his knowledge of ethereal subjects, that his capability in sustaining the most important relationships in his life is irreversibly compromised.

Full review.

by Rumsey Taylor | Source: Sony Pictures DVD
03 Jul 2006 10:40 AM | Submit Comment


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