It’s impossible to put Harry Potter out of your mind when you pick up Cuckoo’s Calling, J.K. Rowling’s newest novel. And because it’s impossible to shut out the splendor of the wizarding world, it’s difficult not to hope for the same, whether in Rowling’s depiction of London or her chronicling of the mystery of a … Read more
Cory Monteith’s most lasting contribution was his courage. On the loss of any young Hollywood actor, it is tempting to say that we are losing a great talent. Yet as Woody Allen once phrased it, “Talent is luck. The important thing in life is courage.” What made Cory Monteith’s brief career spectacular was not his … Read more
Truth is, if you have read a Dan Brown novel, you have read them all. To a lot of readers, Dan Brown’s newest installment in the adventures of the fabled Harvard professor of symbology Robert Langdon will feel and read like a deja vu. The adventure, the mystery and the pretty girl is a formula … Read more
May is a month to celebrate the history, culture and accomplishments of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. In 1978, the U.S. government proclaimed the seven-day period starting on May 4 as “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week,” in honor of two historic events that occurred during this time: the arrival of the first Japanese immigrants to the … Read more
“What do you think?” he asks, nodding at the book across my lap. I look up, startled. We have been sitting side-by-side in row 27, seats A and B for two hours now and this is our first time making eye contact. As the pilot announces our final descent into Boston Logan airport, my seatmate … Read more
As the first widely-released feature film to dramatize the natural gas boom in small-town America, Promised Land is one of the most interesting and relevant films to be released in the past year. Co-written by Matt Damon and John Krasinski and directed by Good Will Hunting’s Gus Van Sant, the film is superficially a well-acted … Read more
Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty is not a war story in the traditional sense. There are no speeches to rally the troops, and, in fact, there are no troops to rally. Instead of examining the ethics or ideals behind our war on terror, the film gives us a detailed look at the strategies and intelligence … Read more
In April 2012, Michael Sandel released his latest book “What Money Can’t Buy: the Moral Limits of Markets.” Recently, he supplemented his book with an article on the topic, and recently gave a speech at the Harvard Law School re-emphasizing his point of view. The crux of his argument is simple: markets do not take … Read more
Silver Linings Playbook won’t win the Academy Award for Best Picture. Maybe the award goes to Lincoln—the iconic cinematic masterpiece of noted method-acting savant Daniel-Day Lewis and brilliant director Steven Spielberg. Maybe it goes to Django Unchained, the latest in Quentin Tarantino’s perverse attempts to rewrite history and empower historical minorities in vigilante crusades against … Read more
Though ten films may be nominated for the Best Picture Oscar, there are only nine nominees this year: Amour, Argo, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Django Unchained, Les Misérables, Life of Pi, Lincoln, Silver Linings Playbook, and Zero Dark Thirty. These films are all excellent (I’m especially partial to Lincoln, Django, and Zero Dark Thirty), but the final … Read more