In the Heights (2021)

Rotten Tomatoes

In the Heights (2021): Caribbean-American musical. The block is gentrifying. Neighbors are being priced out or moving to follow their dreams. Yet, the neighborhood holds together. Cast and plot are a little crowded, but the joy and message of "Paciencia y Fe" come through. A-

Review: The Ministry for the Future

From The Ministry for the Future, by Kim Stanley Robinson:

Everything was tan and beige and a brilliant, unbearable white. Ordinary town in Uttar Pradesh, 6 AM. He looked at his phone: 38 degrees. In Fahrenheit that was— he tapped— 103 degrees. Humidity about 35 percent. The combination was the thing. A few years ago it would have been among the hottest wet-bulb temperatures ever recorded. Now just a Wednesday morning.
	Amazon

This is speculative fiction from the near future, when the world can no longer ignore global warming. Lots of things touched on here, from science to economics to government to terrorism, sometimes dramatized, sometimes just straight talk.

Halston (2019)

Rotten Tomatoes

Halston (2019): Documentary about the fashion designer who was a demanding, demeaning coke addict. He is treated more favorably than in the 2021 TV series, maybe because there is no video to show of his private excesses. There's more focus on his successes than his failures. C+

#VeryTardyReview

Compare with the 2021 5-part Netflix drama.

Halston (TV 2021)

Rotten Tomatoes

Halston (TV 2021): Dramatization of life of Halston, a talented fashion designer who was an egotistical coke addict who drove away those around him until he crashed his business and his life. If there's anything below the surface to the man, this movie doesn't bring it out. C-

The Underground Railroad (TV 2021)

Rotten Tomatoes

The Underground Railroad (TV 2021): Cora's flight joins Odysseus and Gulliver's travels among fiction's all-time great journeys. She's always fleeing from horror, not running to freedom. Harsh backlit look and haunting sounds accentuate the horrors of the Black experience. A-

Read my review of the novel it is based on. This is one of the rare cases where the movie lives up to the book. Both are excellent.

Analysis of Local Election Runoffs

The City of Richardson's City Council elections are now completely over. The Richardson ISD school board elections are, too. Congratulations to Arefin Shamsul, new Richardson City Council Person for District 6. Congratulations to Chris Poteet, new Richardson ISD Trustee for Place 7. Both runoff elections were effectively over with the announcement of the early vote when polls closed at 7pm on June 5. Neither runoff upset the results of the May 1 general election. Both candidates who led then went on to win the runoff, by about the same amounts.

Cruella (2021)

Rotten Tomatoes

Cruella (2021): Backstory for an all-time great villain. Writers succeed in balancing her evil (or madness) with sympathy for how she got that way. Movie is slow getting going, but once the two Emmas take over, the fireworks are worth watching. More fun than I expected. B+