Unorthodox (TV 2020)

Rotten Tomatoes

Unorthodox (TV 2020): Young wife flees her Hasidic community in NY. Her husband tracks her to Berlin where she's hoping to make a new life in music. Powerful portrayal of feeling trapped by people who love you, even if they don't try to understand you. Unhappiness all around. B+

The Cruelty is the Point

I saw the Twitter thread of police violence. I saw the old guy with the cane getting shoved down. I saw the old guy without a cane getting shoved down. I saw too many young people getting shoved down, maced and gassed, beaten with batons, shot with "non-lethal" bullets and beaten when on the ground.

Black Lives Matter

The coronavirus is still out there. I've been quarantined for almost three months, leaving the house only for trips to the grocery store and walks in my neighborhood. Marching in a crowd is crazy risky, given my at-risk demographic. Yet three words made me feel that it was my civic duty to march. Black Lives Matter. Those three words brought out about 750 other people to a march and rally at Richardson City Hall Saturday. I strapped on my face mask and marched with them. Because Black Lives Matter.

Babylon Berlin - Season 1 (TV 2018)

IMDB

Babylon Berlin - Season 1 (TV 2018): German. Berlin 1929 is gritty, decadent, corrupt. Socialists, Fascists, WWI vets, vice squad and homicide. A policeman from Cologne gets drawn into several convoluted plotlines. Weimar noir. An early long musical club scene is mesmerizing. B+

Say His Name. Which One?

I haven't protested since Nixon and the Vietnam War. That was fifty years ago this fall. Trump's war on protesters was the thing to finally get me up off my couch and back into the streets. I attended Wednesday's rally and march for justice for George Floyd at Berkner Park in Richardson organized by Berkner High School students. I was with about 500 others. Most attendees looked to be students or recent graduates. There were a number of young parents from the neighborhood with toddlers in strollers or wagons. And then there were three or four geezers like me. Reporters from Community Impact newspaper were there. I saw a van from CBS 11 but didn't see if they were taking video.

White Privilege

Of course I know I'm a beneficiary of white privilege. Of course. But it's so ingrained that I'm not aware of it every moment of every day. That itself is a benefit of white privilege.

Occasionally I come across an example of how I benefit, an example I was only dimly aware of. Like this offhand remark in Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "The Nickel Boys." An African-American goes into a restaurant and the hostess doesn't seat him immediately. Whitehead writes, "She pretended not to see him and he started up a round of 'Racism or Bad Service?'"

I suspect that's a game played every day by people of color. Not only haven't I ever had to play myself, I had never even heard of the game. That's white privilege. So of course I'm a beneficiary.

Becoming (2020)

Rotten Tomatoes

Becoming (2020): Michelle Obama's book. Flattering documentary offers a bit of biography and a lot of book tour, with packed arenas with sit-down interviews with celebrity moderators. Best part is inspiring, smaller Q&As with young people. Not a campaign ad but just as slick. C+