Will Rogers on his craft
“I don’t make jokes. I just watch government and report the facts.”
Continue ReadingFahrenheit 9/11
Anyone who expects a documentary in the style of Ken Burns will be disappointed. There is no true analysis of why almost half of the electorate still seems to supporting Bush a few days before the election. Michael Moore has copied the methods of the Bush Whitehouse and engages in his own kind of propaganda. He turns the George Bush presidentcy into a farce. There are a few funny lines that will make you laugh unless you are George Bush. The first half of the film about the Saudi connection to Bin Laden and the Bushs is weaker than the second part where Moore turns the camera on the war in Iraq. He features a soldier who will rather go to jail than go back for a second tour in the Iraq war and a mother who lost her son in Iraq and is mad as hell. If Bush loses next week, the decision to invade Iraq will be the chief reason, giving Michael Moore a beautiful opening to help film him out of the office.
Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds
I discovered Harold Bloom last year and have become a big fan of his literary criticism. Even when he writes about authors I know quite well, he brings a fresh perspective on the material. Many of his 100 creative minds I have not had the chance to read in detail, but my appetitive for their works is enormously stimulated by Bloom’s deep knowledge of how they fit in the larger canvass of world literature. Bloom is a literary heavyweight. His language is a spectacle for the mind. I highly recommend this book. One does not have to read the book all at once but can read about one author a day, for example.
A Detour Before Dying
I hesitated to publish this story under the rubrik of humor; but there is something ‘awefully’ funny about it. The lesson seems loud and clear: When your doctor says you are terminally ill, do go and seek a second opinion 
By JIM MALONE AS TOLD TO PAIGE WILLIAMS
Nearly eight years ago, just after Christmas in 1996, I tested H.I.V.-positive while I was on vacation in Los Angeles. I had gone to the E.R. with chest pains. They did the regular blood work and asked if I minded an H.I.V. test. I didn’t expect it to come back positive, but it didn’t surprise me when it did. My partner had passed away from AIDS. Before that I had been partying for about—well, I’ll be 60 on the 4th of July, so you do the math. Still, I felt as if somebody had hit me in the head with a baseball bat. I took the test results back home to Hayward, Calif., and gave them to my doctor at the V.A. clinic. He treated me for H.I.V. for the next seven and a half years.
Continue ReadingBefore Sunrise
After watching its sequel Before Sunset, I wanted to see the first part of the story. A young American (Ethan Hawke) and a young French student (Julie Delpy) meet in a train. She decides not go on to Paris as planned but step out of the train with him in Vienna and spend the evening together before his plane takes off for America. Now we follow them on a romantic adventure through Vienna. Before Sunrise is both better and worse than its sequel, Before Sunset. It is better because the director paced the movie much more effectively and used the glorious architecture of Vienna to surround the narrative with a romantic canvass.
Spiderman 2
Peter Parker a.k.a. Spiderman once again finds himself with too many heroic acts on his daily calendar. This prevents him from excelling at his studies at Columbia University and making sufficient money to pay his rent. New York needs a fulltime Spiderman just to keep the city functioning. Again Spiderman battles a mad scientist who is about to kill millions of people. But Spiderman’s own heart is what almost makes him crash. He still loves the neighbour girl, Mary Jane Watson, who is now an actress in Manhattan. She also still loves him, but she seems to have given up on Peter and is now engaged to another man. Can they ever get together? I don’t agree with those who say that Spiderman 2 is even better than the first one. It is more of the same. There is no reason to see both films. If you want to know how the love story ends, see the second film.
Miami Beach, Florida
Miami Beach is so different from any other place I have been to in the U.S. It is Santa Monica, plus a tropical climate, plus a bit of southern Europe atmosphere sprinkled in, plus a large number of people from all over the world who have taken an oath to have fun every single day they are here, plus a large number of businesses that specialized in making sure that this oath is not broken easily. Only New Orleans can rival Miami in its dedication to providing people with a party 365 days a year.
I found a room in the art decco Park Central hotel right on Ocean Boulevard. For a couple of days, I followed a strict regiment: in the morning breaktfast at the wonderful News Cafe. Then a couple of hours of business. 
In the afternoon, exploring the neighborhoods (Lincoln Avenue is worth seeing as well as a little street called Espanola Way, which has many charming restaurants for evening dining). In late afternoon more business. Before sundown, jogging along the wonderful long beaches. Then at night, plunging into the party scene. I was literally blown away by the wind from the Ocean and the sassy music and dance that shouted out of the hundred nightclubs that lie next to one another on Ocean Boulevard. Everywhere you go Humphrey Bogart seems to be waiting for you. It is easy to imagine why Bogart loved this place so much.
News Cafe
History of Miami Beach
Photo Gallery
Historical Pictures
Continue Reading
Before Sunset
Do not read this review before reading my review of its predecessor film “Before Sunset.” Nine years ago two young people spent, we are told, an amazing night in Vienna togehter. To play with fortune they did not exchange phone numbers but promised each other to meet on a particular day six months later in Vienna. He goes to Vienna, but she does not show up. Later he feels compelled to write a book about this amazing evening they enjoyed in Vienna. Now he is on a tour promoting the book and the last stop in Europe is a reading in a small bookshop in Paris. At the end of his reading she is suddenly standing in the back of the audience. He only has a little bit of time before his limo is scheduled to take him to the airport. She agrees to his proposal to go to a cafe and catch up… Before Sunrise is almost perfect.
A History of Sex
From The Economist print edition, Sep 23rd 2004, p. 95
New Evidence that people have been promiscuous for a long time.
LOTHARIOS everywhere will be pleased to hear that monogamy does not appear to be a natural human state. That, at least, is the conclusion of a study conducted by Michael Hammer at the University of Arizona in Tucson, and just published in Nature Genetics. By examining the DNA of living people, Dr Hammer and his colleagues have found that far fewer men than women pass their genes on to subsequent generations. In short, a small number of men have been putting it about a lot, thus outcompeting their lesser rivals.
Continue ReadingFantastic New Series: Jack & Bobby
Last Sunday a fantastic new series started on the WB Channel. It follows how a teenage boy become president of the USA in 2040. The writing is clever and insightful. One has the feeling that Washington insiders have written the script. In the middle of a presidential campaign, it is all the more fun to watch such a drama. Here you find more information on the series: Jack&Bobby Website
© 2026 Peter Murmann. Powered by ExpressionEngine.
