OK Go!

I'm just about fully recovered! I've come a long way, baby...

Last night I feasted on swordfish and capers with Fernando at Cola's, a charming Chelsea Italian eatery with great ambiance - candlelight goes a long way to helping one forget couples at adjacent tables.

It was a nice moment, as we're both having a crazy busy January at work.

Stay Tuned Here: We have two weeks of double cartoon days ahead, all of them very funny.

Q: What Becomes A Literary Classic Most?
A: Immediacy and Passion....

Last week my mother and I saw 'Atonement,' the superb adaptation of Ian McEwan's unforgettable novel.

You need not fear 'Masterpiece Theater' syndrome - this film is certainly as lovingly composed, but searing, passionate performances and unusual psychological territory make 'Atonement' compelling, not soporific...

1. Four Words That Encapsule: ‘Can Cruelty Be Absolved?’

2. Haiku (5/7/5):
‘In moment of hurt,
young girl’s deed will ruin lives;
dark shadows endure’

3. Oblique Comment(s): a) James MacAvoy is my new heart-throb, and he makes the most of his first real ‘lead’ role, in a riveting, versatile performance; I thought he was under-appreciated last year as the naif of ‘Last King of Scotland.’ Keira Knightly is by turns delicate, wiry, resolute, and game. Briony, the doer of the bad deed, is adeptly played by three different actresses as a misguided tweenager, a repentent young war-time nurse, and a dying veteran novelist; b) It’s a rare pleasure for me to read a novel and then see its film adaptation. My pleasure reading time is limited, and mostly involves audiobooks in foreign languages. I ‘read’ McEwan’s masterwork in its German unabridged audio version, and I understood about 95% of it. c) Notice the classic 'star-crossed lovers' poster of the two leads gazing in opposite directions - this was used in both Titanic and Brokeback Mountain...

4. Insight: Joe Wright triumphs by succeeding in the difficult task of filming a psychological novel. He compliments his impressive settings and set pieces with perfect casting, taut acting and pacing. The result is more kinetic than, say, ‘English Patient,’ and ‘Atonement’ makes love, sex, jealousy, lies, betrayal, and remorse far more universal. It does have plot twists as remarkable as those of ‘Patient.’ And the set pieces! A lavish country house simmering with passion on the year’s hottest day, the sad massive 1940 British retreat through Belgium and evacuation at Dunkirk, the grim, gory reality of a wartime army hospital, all brought astonishingly to life.


5. Link: Metacritic reviews summary. 85 average by 36 reviewers - this is between 'B+' and 'A-,' I'd give it a 90.


And here’s a film clip/trailer:





Cartoon du Jour: