By Myles Ludwig To coup or not to coup, that has been the question in Egypt. Lots of money rides on the answer. Billions, in fact. Up until the sad, chaotic violence of recent days there, the galumphing of government, citizenry and military has often seemed to me like a Facebook War. Semantic shots were being traded between opposing forces, both of which were claiming … [Read more...]
Archives for July 2013
The View From Home 50: An Asian crime saga, Hitchock redux, and a baffling Czech epic
For an Asian crime thriller, a continental genre rich with tough guys who know their way around firearms, it’s refreshing to watch a hero who is chaste, square and can’t throw a punch, let alone handle a gun. This is the case with Young-Jak (Kang-woo Kim), the errand-boy and unwitting protagonist of The Taste of Money (IFC, $22.48 DVD), the latest cult film from South Korea’s … [Read more...]
‘The Unwinding’: Tearing down the house that FDR built
In his ambitious new book, George Packer describes the rise of “organized money” in business and politics and the collapse, or unwinding, of “the Roosevelt Republic that had reined for almost half a century.” Packer’s nimble prose moves the story along, although the book suffers from disorganization and an odd mixture of short profiles of several celebrities and longer … [Read more...]
Sundays: Paula, Edward, Conrad, Twitter – and the theory that ties them all together
By Myles Ludwig Hey, hey, Paula, I wanna marry you. Hey, hey, Paula, no one else could ever do. I've waited so long for school to be through, Paula, I can't wait no more for you. My love, my love. When Texas college students Ray Hildebrand and Jill Jackson wrote those lyrics to their 2-million selling record in 1963 — and changed their names to Paul and … [Read more...]