Snowpocalypse Now

© Danielle Scruggs

Thanks to the few feet of snow that have been dumped on D.C. (with more on the way soon, apparently), I've spent the past four days watching several movies, cooking, baking, reading books, and spending too much time here and here. Oh, and taking photos as well.

Movies
+ Doubt (There were pockets of good acting in this showdown between Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman as a nun and priest, with Streep's character convinced that Hoffman's character is unsavory but my suspension of disbelief never quite kicked in. I just found it to be too over-the-top to be fully engaging. Viola Davis definitely earned that Oscar nomination however.)

+Miles Davis: Cool Jazz Sound (An amazing 1959 TV performance by Miles Davis and his quintet (John Coltrane, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, Jimmy Cobb) as well as the Gil Evans orchestra performing songs from Kind of Blue and Miles Ahead. Tremendous.)

+Iris (I usually like Kate Winslet but I couldn't really engage with this movie about a writer who succumbs to Alzheimer's. It had a pretentious, paint-by-the-numbers biopic feel to me. Maybe I just need to watch it again.)

+An American Affair (Gretchen Mol stars as a mysterious artist involved in a clandestine affair with John F. Kennedy. She is also the object of obsession of her teenage neighbor, played by Cameron Bright [of Birth fame/infamy]. Some of the cinematography was gorgeous but for the most part I didn't like this movie all that much either. Most of the acting was very stilted. It looks like they shot the bulk of it in Baltimore as a stand-in for 1960s D.C. so I appreciated seeing some of my old stomping grounds on celluloid.)

+A Good Day to Be Black and Sexy (I didn't quite expect this movie--a collection of vignettes set during one day in Los Angeles--to have so much, um, sex in it. But the acting and cinematography were great and the director had an interesting point of view on what makes relationships work as well as what makes them fall apart.)

+Sex and the Single Girl (It was a real treat seeing Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood cut it up in this romantic comedy from 1964. Its views on gender roles are eye-roll inducing but hey, it was made in 1964. Another bonus: Count Basie and his Orchestra helmed the soundtrack.)

+Soul Train: The Hippest Trip in America (Documentary on the history and rise of Soul Train, one of the Greatest Shows to Ever Air in the History of Television. It aired on VH1 over the weekend and made me ridiculously happy. Vintage clips of my favorite artists abounded---Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, The Jackson 5, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight and the Pips. Since it's VH1, it will more than likely run ad infinitum, so if you missed the initial run, you'll be able to catch it again.)

Books:

I'm still working my way through Going to Meet the Man by James Baldwin. I know it's a bit of a cliché to be Black, nerdy, intelligent and be a little in love with Baldwin but he is one of my favorite writers. He was adept at making quietly devastating observations on life--what motivates us to love, and to hate. I also recently finished The Way Home by George Pelecanos. It was my first time reading one of his novels and now I need to find more, especially since he wrote for The Wire, another one of the Greatest Shows in the History of Television.