Harvey Weinstein sentenced to 23 years in prison for sexual assault

Posted on March 11, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

Earlier today, movie producer Harvey Weinstein was sentenced in New York to 23 years in prison for sexual assault and rape. Here’s an updated account of his victims’ search for justice and how this story played out in the news media.

Harvey Weinstein

Harvey Weinstein

During 2017, attention to the issue of sexual harassment and abuse, both sensational and serious, became the major cultural story for our media. As Secret 3 points out, the stories moved this issue from the margins of society to the center. While there are many points on the timeline we could highlight as the start of the media’s focus on sexual harassment and abuse, there is no doubt that it exploded when multitudes of women started coming forward and telling their stories of mistreatment at the hands of Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein.

On October 8, 2017, following the news that he had paid financial settlements to eight women to drop their claims, The Weinstein Company fired Weinstein from the movie production company he helped found. And while this may have been the point where most people started paying attention to the story, it certainly wasn’t the beginning. According to the New York Times, the accusations and rumors about Weinstein dated back for three decades. It wasn’t as though these stories weren’t known about by reporters; they simply weren’t reported.

In November 2017, the New York Times started keeping track of the number of men who have been fired or forced to resign over accusations of sexual misconduct since Weinstein was fired.  As of February 8, 2018, the Times count had reached seventy-one. The paper also had a second list of twenty-eight men who had faced charges of sexual misconduct but who had only been suspended or received similar lesser punishment. The list was a who’s who of the powerful behind and in front of the scenes in the entertainment business, industry, and politics. Among them were former Today Show host Matt Lauer and CBS CEO Les Moonves.

So, this leaves us with a question:

Why, after years of neglect, did the press, in all its varied forms, suddenly start paying attention to these accusations and the women making them?

While the story of women being sexually harassed and abused by powerful men had been slowly breaking further and further into the media for several years, the real explosion came when actress Ashley Judd went public with her story from two decades earlier.

Judd told the New York Times in early October 2017 that she went to what she thought was a breakfast meeting at a hotel. She was instead sent up to Weinstein’s room where he greeted her wearing a bathrobe and suggested either he give her a massage or she “watch him shower.”

It is at this point that we see the basic elements of the narrative coming through. Judd had to figure out how to get out of the room without alienating one of the most powerful producers in Hollywood.

The Times goes on to report that Weinstein reached “at least eight settlements with women,” paying them to drop their claims and keep their silence. When all of these stories started surfacing, Weinstein said in a statement to the Times:

I appreciate the way I’ve behaved with colleagues in the past has caused a lot of pain, and I sincerely apologize for it. Though I’m trying to do better, I know I have a long way to go.

Judd had previously talked about what had happened with Weinstein back in 2015 with Variety magazine, but she didn’t name him.

Judd told Variety she felt bad because she didn’t do anything about it at the time:

I beat myself up for a while. This is another part of the process. We internalize the shame. It really belongs to the person who is the aggressor. And so later, when I was able to see what happened, I thought: Oh god, that’s wrong. That’s sexual harassment. That’s illegal. I was really hard on myself because I didn’t get out of it by saying, “OK motherf—er, I’m calling the police.”

The common theme between Judd and the other women who say Weinstein abused or harassed them was that women didn’t speak out because they didn’t know each other; they didn’t live in the same cities. But while they didn’t talk about it publicly, they did talk about it among themselves.

So what kept these women’s stories from getting published?

  • Many of the women were embarrassed that this had happened to them and sometimes wondered whether they were responsible for it.
  • They still wanted to work where they worked. They wanted the access the abuser gave them.
  • They were afraid they would get blacklisted in some form if they spoke out (something that happened with several of Weinstein’s victims).
  • They were afraid they wouldn’t be believed.

On Monday, Feb. 24, 2020, Harvey Weinstein was found guilty in New York City of  two felony sex crimes: that he had forced oral sex on a a production assistant in 2006 and that he had raped a former actress in a hotel in 2013. He was acquitted of charges that he is a sexual predator.

On March 11, 2020, Judge James Burke sentenced Weinstein to 23 years in prison sexually assaulting the two women. His sentence could have ranged from a minimum of five years up to 29 years. Weinstein is 67 years old and is reportedly in poor health.  His attorney used the argument that anything more than five years would be essentially a life sentence for the former movie producer.

Weinstein is still facing charges in Los Angeles for alleged assaults on an unnamed Italian actress and a model. Numerous other women have given their accounts of assaults from Weinstein, but in many cases the statute of limitations has expired on their charges.

He is also facing charges in Los Angeles for rape and assault.

You can read a more complete account of how sexual harassment and assault became the story of 2017-2018 here.

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Taking a look at the current textbook marketplace

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

Textbooks are different from other books in one major respect—the people who select the books aren’t the same as the end users, the people who must buy and pay for them. Students charge that, because of this disconnect, faculty members don’t take price sufficiently into account when picking books for their courses.

Estimates on how much students spend per year on textbooks vary widely. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests that students spend an average of $1,250 a year on books and supplies.  On the other hand, figures from the National Association of College Stores reports that student spending on course materials has dropped on average from $701 per year in 2007-08 to $415 in 2018-19.  Among the reasons for these possible price drops are the growth of book rentals, inclusive access plans, and electronic books.

The textbook industry is currently going through a big period of change, says John Fallon, CEO of education publishing giant Pearson. In an interview with tech journalist Kara Swisher, Fallon said that the era of the “$300 textbook” is over. Instead, students will be buying access to a host of electronic resources ranging from ebooks, to study sites, to mobile phone apps.Fallon told tech journalist Kara Swisher that revenues for the big publishers have been falling steadily, with Pearson’s dropping from $2 billion in 2013 to $1.3 billion for 2019. This change is being driven in large part by the fact that students can rent books from companies like Amazon or Chegg,

Under a rental plan, students pay a fee that is between two-thirds and one-half the cost of either a new or used book, then they turn the book back in to the bookstore at the end of the semester. In essence, it’s a guaranteed buyback plan.  A report from Orbis Research suggests that students are also saving money by renting e-textbooks rather than paper books at substantially lower costs.  The disadvantage of rentals, of course, is that after the semester is over, students no longer have the books to use as a reference.

While students like e-textbooks in principle, when forced to choose between a printed book and an e-book, most choose a printed textbook.  An informal survey of your author’s students showed that while students liked e-books for recreational reading, they much preferred paper editions for the textbooks. They do, however, like the lower prices of ebooks.

One of the major complaints students have had about textbook costs involve one-time purchase access codes. These codes sold by publishers can be for review and other study materials, but they can also be for homework systems required to complete the class. In addition to objecting the costs, students complain that unlike paper and electronic textbooks, homework accounts cannot be shared.

A radically different approach a few universities are taking are so-called inclusive access programs where schools license all of the assigned books electronically from a major publisher and make them available to students at either a discounted rate or no additional charge. In some cases, the e-books are integrated into the school’s course management system that delivers other class materials. Students are typically signed up for the rental automatically and then have a short period of time when they can opt out from using the book. The advantage for faculty is that all students will have access to their books on the first day of class rather than waiting till sometimes weeks into the semester to get their books..  McGraw-Hill, Cengage and Pearson have all found success with these programs.

There are also downsides to these inclusive access programs. In many cases, students only have access when they are online. If they want a downloadable version, there is often an extra fee. Another issue is that these contracts strongly push faculty to order their texts from a preferred company rather than from the publisher that has what they consider to be the best book. Nicole Allen, an advocate for research libraries and open access materials, told Inside Higher Ed these programs are “the opposite of inclusive, because it is premised on publishers controlling when, where and for how long students have access to their materials.”

As this period of transition in the textbook publishing progresses, it is possible that the already concentrated ownership of textbook publishers will get even more concentrated.  Currently four publishers control more than 80 percent of the higher-education marketplace: Pearson, Cengage Wiley and McGraw-Hill.(8e0102) As of this writing in the spring of 2020, McGraw-Hill Education and Cengage had announced plans to merge but were facing strong opposition from consumer groups, students, and college bookstores.  Critics worry that combining two of the top four educational publishers into an even larger company would continue to reduce competition in the marketplace and give the new company more control over prices.  The two companies claim the merger will let them be more efficient and lower costs.

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Bob Iger, who grew Disney into world’s most powerful entertainment company, is stepping down

Posted on February 26, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

Disney has immensely transformed over the last 20 years. In the late twentieth century, the company was best known for children’s programming, theme parks, and cruise ships as well as owning the ABC television broadcast network and ESPN family of cable networks. But in the twenty-first century, it has been working hard at becoming the dominant force in the movie industry, buying up the Pixar animation studio from Apple founder Steve Jobs, Marvel Entertainment with the massive Marvel Cinematic Universe, LucasFilm and its family of Star Wars properties from George Lucas, and, most recently, the 21st Century Fox family of entertainment properties.

Just as Michael Eisner handled Disney transition into the 1980s and 90s media world with its revitalized animation studio, former ABC producer Bob Iger has been the CEO of “The Mouse” through its transition into a company for the new century. Iger has been the driving force behind the acquisitions of Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm, and Fox, as well as having continued Disney’s tradition of being a pioneer in new media. Walt Disney himself brought the company into the television industry; Iger has led the company into the online era.

But yesterday Iger announced abruptly that he was stepping down as CEO of Disney while remaining the company’s executive chairman (whatever that means) and director of creative endeavors. Bob Chapek, who has been the chair of Disney’s parks and experience programs, is the new CEO. While Disney watchers expected Iger to retire at some point in the next couple of years, no one saw this sudden retirement coming.  Iger said in an investor call shortly after the announcement that his step-down had been in the planning stage for some time and that the Disney board of directors knew about his plans.

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Questions Worth Asking (Maybe)

Posted on February 21, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

Why do we still care about radio in the age of online media?

Why is Facebook afraid of conservatives?

How many people have watched the 80s video of a-ha’s Take On Me on YouTube? 

Historically, how have we talked about sexual and gender identity? The OED knows.

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Cancer is one of those topics…

Posted on February 5, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

I discovered that today (Tuesday, Feb. 4th) is World Cancer Awareness Day from a Facebook post from a former student of mine whose wife has been been winning the battle against cancer for the last two years. Seeing that post got me checking on how long it had been since I was diagnosed with cancer.  At the time, you don’t think that you could ever reach that point where you don’t remember the year. But time heals many things. I will, however, always remember the moment the dermatologist discovered the spot of melanoma on my upper right arm. One of the scariest moments in my life.  But I’m very fortunate. My cancer was caught early and only required simple outpatient surgery.  That, and 17 years of followup visits to the skin doc.

But I honestly wasn’t sure of the year. As I was trying to dig up the date on my computer, I came across this blog post from 2006.  I thought I would share it with you today. 

Originally published October 2006

Cancer is one of those topics we just don’t want to talk about. We’ve all buried friends who have suffered from the Big C. It frightens us more than stroke or heart disease.

Nothing kills a conversation faster than someone asking, “How are you?” and you answer, “Fine, I just had cancer surgery.” That is inevitably followed by a long, awkward silence.

Unless you are my friend, Tim. When he asked about my arm being in a sling, I told him I had had a cancer removed. His response was, “Me, too!” While I just had a melanoma, Tim had colon cancer, which involved major surgery and months of chemo. But for the next several months we would go out to lunch regularly to talk about living with cancer. If he was in the midst of chemo on that day, he might take an egg salad sandwich with him to the restaurant, as that would be all he could tolerate eating. I sometimes felt like I’d had “cancer lite” since I didn’t have to have any of the icky treatments he was facing. (Four years later, Tim’s hair is thinner than it used to be, but otherwise he is well.) (Update – 14 years after I originally wrote this, Tim is still doing well.)

It rather stunned me a couple of years later when I got invited to a cancer survivors picnic at the local hospital. It’s funny, but I had never seen myself that way — as a cancer survivor, though I certainly am.

Cancer Stories book coverIn the years following my surgery, my former colleagues at WVU College of Media worked on a wonderful documentary film and book, Cancer Stories: Lessons In Love, Loss & Hope, that tells the story of how several patients and their families deal with cancer and its treatment. It doesn’t soft sell the pain and suffering (including death), but it also finds the humor and life in it as well. Best of all, it doesn’t sanitize the experience. Cancer Stories doesn’t paint a rosy picture, but it doesn’t make life seem hopeless, either. It shows that patients can get cranky during treatment and that they can crack jokes about it as well. I strongly recommend the book and documentary to everyone, but especially to those who are dealing with a diagnosis of cancer. When my colleagues were searching for a title for the book and film, my wife suggested “Cancer Sucks!” While everyone agreed the title was accurate, cooler heads prevailed in selecting a somewhat calmer title.

For myself, it’s always hard to hear another cancer story. I know that I was fortunate. I was referred to a dermatologist early enough that she was able to get all the cancer out, along with a sizable chunk of my upper arm.

Although I just passed the fourth anniversary of my surgery, I keep looking in the mirror after my shower, trying to decide if any of the hundreds of moles I have look somehow different. I’m not completely sure what I’m looking for, as the mole that was melanoma didn’t look any different to me. I will complain about having to go in for one more doctor’s appointment, and I’ll stress over the biopsy (should there be one) until the results get back.

I still have to go in for regular follow-up exams where every inch of my skin gets scrutinized. About half the time there’s a biopsy to go with the exam, when a mole doesn’t look quite right. You are supposed to get a postcard if everything is OK, and a phone call if there’s a problem. Inevitably I fall into a middle group – the tissue taken will be “atypical” but not cancerous. So it’s a phone call, but not the bad one. This time the biopsy wasn’t conclusive, so they’re going back in tomorrow for a bigger chunk of flesh off my back. Which requires me to tell my wife, “Listen to me, I don’t have cancer. They just want to take a second look at the spot on my back.” And of course, as soon as you say, “It’s not cancer,” the question comes back, “Then why do they want to look at it again?”

I am lucky. I’ve got good health insurance, good doctors, and a good family. I had treatable cancer that was caught early. I’m a cancer survivor.

It’s now 17 years since my diagnosis.  The skin doc continues to take my exams seriously, but they are now at nine month intervals for the first time since diagnosis, down from every four months and then six months. There is still a massive divot in my upper right arm where they took the melanoma out.

Earlier this week I read that radio talk host Rush Limbaugh announced he had advanced lung cancer. Many people who dislike Limbaugh’s politics have had unkind things to say about his diagnosis.  While I have no love for the man or his radio show, I agree with diabetes activist Mike Durbin who tweeted last night:

I agree with him 100 percent. I have lost friends and family to cancer. I have friends being treated for it now. No matter how you feel about someone, you never rejoice for cancer.

The following is a brilliant public service announcement called Dear 16-Year-Old Me.  I would urge all of you to watch it.

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Twitter and the Death of a Basketball Legend

Posted on January 28, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

As everyone knows, basketball legend Kobe Bryant and several others, including one of his daughters, died in a helicopter crash on Sunday. Without further comment, here’s a number of Tweets that have discussed the flow of news about this tragedy. Retweeting here on the blog is not an endorsement or condemnation of anything. It’s just showing some examples of how this unfolded on social media.

I may update with new tweets as appropriate.

(Updated 1/28/20)

 

 

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Ten Twitter Feeds Worth Following

Posted on January 20, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

The homework for my Commentary and Blogging class this week is for them to each make a blog post with ten interesting Twitter feeds to follow, along with a brief explanation of why each is worth paying attention to.  I thought I would do the assignment as well:

1. @jayrosen_nyu -Legendary NYU journalism professor

2. @timcarman – UNK grad and award-winning Washington Post food writer

3. @JeremyLittau – Journalism professor and Twitter public intellectual

4. @Keah_Maria – Keah Brown, author of The Cute One and creator of #DisabledAndCute hashtag

5. @ChrisDunkerLJS – Legislative & higher ed reporter for Lincoln Journal Star

6. @popmediaprof – Pop culture professor specializing in queer theory and LGBT studies

7. @DavidAFrench – Senior editor for The Dispatch and Iraq war veteran

8. @ElizKolbert – Author of The Sixth Extinction, New Yorker reporter on climate issues. If you talk about her ideas, people will not invite you back to parties.

9. @Sulliview – Margaret Sullivan, media columnist for Washington Post

10. @seungminkim – White House reporter for Washington Post

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Dr. King urged us all to be extremists for love and justice, not for hate

Posted on January 20, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

One of the greatest honors of my life was being invited to speak at the Martin Luther King, Jr. candlelight vigil several years ago at the UNK student union, along with Kevin Chaney, who was then UNK’s women’s basketball coach. 

This year’s observance is Tuesday at 6 p.m. at the Ponderosa Room of the Nebraskan Student Union. Shavonne Washington Krauth, the Culture & Inclusion Manager at Children’s Hospital and Medical Center, will be the featured speaker with the topic “Embracing Multiple Truths and Authenticity to Cultivate Change.” If you are in the area, I urge you to attend as we honor Dr. King.

Here’s what I had to say about Dr. King when I spoke:

Visalli-11-10-13When we think of public relations, we think of a professional in a suit trying to persuade us about something related to a large corporation. But not all PR is practiced by big business.

Civil rights leader The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a brilliant understanding of public relations during the campaign to desegregate Birmingham, Alabama in 1963.

The goal of the campaign was to have non-violent demonstrations and resistance to force segregated businesses to open up to African Americans. What King, and the members of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, wanted to do was stage a highly visible demonstration that would not only force change in Birmingham, but also grab the attention of the entire American public.

King and his colleagues picked Birmingham because it was one of he most segregated cities in America and because it had Eugene “Bull” Conner as police commissioner.

Conner was a racist who could be counted on to attack the peaceful marchers. Birmingham was a city where black protestors were thrown in jail, and the racists were bombing homes and churches. There was a black neighborhood that had so many bombings it came to be known as Dynamite Hill.

Dr. King and his colleagues had planned demonstrations and boycotts in Birmingham, but held off with them in order to let the political system and negotiations work. But time passed, and nothing changed. Signs were still up at the lunch counters and water fountains, and protestors were still headed to jail.

King and the rest of the SCLC needed to get attention for the plight of African Americans in cities like Birmingham.

They needed to do more than fight back against the racism of segregation. They needed to get Americans of good will in all the churches and synagogues to hear their voices.

Starting in April of 1963, predominantly African American volunteers would march in the streets, hold sit-ins at segregated lunch counters, and boycott local businesses in Birmingham. As the protests started, so did the arrests.

On Good Friday, King and Abernathy joined in the marching so that they would be arrested. While King was in jail, he was given a copy of the Birmingham News, in which there was an article where white Alabama clergy urged the SCLC to stop the demonstrations and boycotts and allow the courts to solve the problem of segregation.

But King was tired of waiting, and so he wrote what would become one of the great statements of the civil rights cause. One that spoke to people who were fundamentally their friends, not their enemies. This came to be known as the “Letter from Birmingham Jail.”

Writing the letter was not easy. Dr. King wrote it in the margins of the newspaper. He wrote it on scraps of note paper. He wrote it on panels of toilet paper. (Think about what the toilet paper was like if Dr. King was able to write on it!)

The letter spoke to the moderates who were urging restraint. To them, he wrote:

“My Dear Fellow Clergymen:

While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities “unwise and untimely.” Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas…. But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.”

He went on the acknowledge that perhaps he was an extremist, but that he was an extremist for love, not for hate:

“But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label.

Was not Jesus an extremist for love: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”

Was not Amos an extremist for justice: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream.” …

Was not Martin Luther an extremist: “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.” …

And Abraham Lincoln: “This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.”

And Thomas Jefferson: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal . . .”

So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love?”

King’s jailhouse writings were smuggled out and published as a brochure. His eloquent words were given added force for being written in jail. As he says toward the end of his letter, it is very different to send a message from jail than from a hotel room:

“Never before have I written so long a letter. I’m afraid it is much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts and pray long prayers?”

Once King was released from jail eight days later, he and his followers raised the stakes. No longer would adults be marching and being arrested, children would become the vanguard. And as the children marched, photographers and reporters from around the world would document these young people being attacked by dogs, battered by water from fire hoses, and filling up the Birmingham jails.

King faced criticism for allowing the young people to face the dangers of marching in Birmingham. But he responded by criticizing the white press, asking the reporters where they had been “during the centuries when our segregated social system had been misusing and abusing Negro children.”

Although there was rioting in Birmingham, and King’s brother’s house was bombed, the campaign was ultimately successful. Business owners took down the signs that said “WHITE” and “COLORED” from the drinking fountains and bathrooms, and anyone was allowed to eat at the lunch counters. The successful protest in Birmingham set the stage for the March on Washington that would take place in August of 1963, where King would give his famous “I have a dream” speech.

We are now more than fifty years from King’s letter from Birmingham Jail. This letter was not one of his “feel good” speeches. It doesn’t raise the spirit the way his “I have a dream” speech did.

But it did give us a message that still matters more than ever today:

 “I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil-rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.”

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Guest Blog Post: Little Women Spoiler Alert

Posted on January 14, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

This guest blog post is from my Dear Wife, author Pam Andrews Hanson.  In the past she has blogged here and here. Needless to say, this guest blog post contains Little Women spoilers.

The March sisters from Greta Gerwig’s 2019 version of Little women.

Spoiler Alert: Beth dies in Little Women and women still face an uphill battle to make their voices heard.

In light of the Oscar snub of Little Women director Greta Gerwig, it feels anticlimactic to dwell on the death of fictional Beth. However, my well-read husband’s reaction to this March sister’s passing — as in he DID NOT KNOW — speaks volumes, literary and otherwise, about what we talk about when we talk about beloved books from our youth.

Or maybe don’t talk about?

I was dumbfounded when we left the movie theater after viewing this latest version of the Louisa May Alcott classic to learn the death of Beth came as a complete shock to my spouse. After all this this book is part of “literary canon.”  In all fairness, I had to confess I forgot the particulars of the affairs of the heart.

But the demise of Beth ranks right up there with monumental moments in great books. Or so I thought. The plot thickened when, after non-stop ribbing from me, Ralph posted on social media asking if he was the only one around who didn’t know Beth died.

This prompted a flurry of comments (with one aside about Beth in the Kiss song) from younger women who hadn’t read the book yet but were planning to and to see the movie. Our voracious reader daughter-in-law could not believe my husband, who goes to great lengths in person and on social media to avoid movie spoilers of any kind, was spouting a spoiler. She said her friends read Little Women but she hadn’t yet.

So down came the spoiler.

Lady BirdThen out come the Oscar nominees. Greta Gerwig (whose Lady Bird I adored) is nominated for a writing award and her movie is tabbed for Best Picture but no directing award for her?

In a sea of testosterone-laden 2019 (a couple of which my husband really liked, a couple he was indifferent to),  Ralph’s favorite movies this awards-eligible year were the documentary Apollo 11, the dramedy The Farewell and the sailing documentary Maiden, followed closely by Little Women.

I have stopped giving him grief for not being on top of 150+-year-old popular culture. And we had the continuation of a decades-long lively conversation about favorite books from our  younger days.

I loved Little Women, the Nancy Drew series, any biography of ‘famous’ women I could get my hands on (which was a pitiful few), The Witch of Blackbird Pond, on the list goes on and on. I didn’t read the Hardy Boys. Not my cuppa.

My mother-in-law read all the Little House books out loud to my husband and his siblings as they went on long car trips. They felt a particular connection to the stories as Ralph’s grandfather homesteaded out in North Dakota. My husband did confess his favorite of that series was Farmer Boy because it was all about the food. Ralph read endless pages of science fiction and fantasy. I couldn’t get enough of mysteries.

I would have devoured J.K. Rowling and Rick Riordan in my youth, (and  Ralph and I both did as adults).

Apparently during all these years of marriage and movie going and book reading, we never talked about the March sisters: Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy.

Someone needs to talk to the boys’ club in Hollywood about Greta, Lulu, and Marielle.

 

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My Year In Movies – Some Thoughts on the Oscars

Posted on January 13, 2020 by Ralph Hanson

I didn’t get My Year in Movies blog post up yet, and the Oscar nominations just got announced this morning, so I guess I will combine the two into a single commentary.

When I saw the list of Oscar nominations this morning, my first thought was, “If you want Oscar nominations, make a manly film about manly men. Don’t even think about making a film about womenfolk…”

I mean, Joker, which tells the story of a comic book villain’s descent into madness gets 11 nominations; Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time in Hollywood, a tribute to a fictionalized 1960s got 10, as did Martin Scorsese’s epic mob drama The Irishman, and the creatively shot WW I film 1917. Now I’m not dissing all of these films by any means.  Once Upon A Time was one of my favorite films of the year, and I’m looking forward to seeing 1917here in Kearney later this week. But the one thing these movies all have in common is a massive overdose of testosterone.

I have no particular objection to manly films.  I agree whole heartedly with Alyssa Rosenberg’s discussion of the virtues of Ford vs. Ferrari, a rather masculine film that I loved. It’s one of my favorite racing films that told a great story of the battle of car builder Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon) and driver Ken Miles (Christian Bale) who have a problematic relationship and yet are united in trying to beat the Italian Ferrari. The film also has a surprising nuanced relationship between Miles and his wife, played by Irish actress Caitriona Balfe.

But, let’s look at some of my other favorite movies of the year.

I thought Little Women was one of the most enjoyable and interesting movies I saw all year.  And I say this as someone who had never read Little Women, nor did I know its most famous plot point. While much of the acting in it was spot on (especially from Florence Pugh who plays the difficult sister, Amy), this is clearly a film that belongs to director/screenwriter Greta Gerwig.  She got a well deserved best adapted screenplay nomination, but no nod for best director. She tells the story assuredly with a current and historic timeline that brought a new storytelling convention to a 150-year-old story.

Singer/songwriter Amy Speace, writing on Facebook today, had this to say about Gerwig’s work on Little Women:

I mean: talk about a tall mountain to climb. And she did it with originality and it was gorgeously shot which means gorgeously directed and there were GREAT performances which means she was an amazing director AND the screenplay?? I mean: what’s a freaking woman gotta do? Personally, I thought it was a way better film than “Hollywood”. And I liked Joker a lot but not as much as Little Women…

Even more unforgivable was the complete neglect of nominations for the Chinese/American film The Farewell that tells a starkly original story of an immigrant family in the US having to deal with a pending death back in China. The family goes home to China to visit grandma, but they are not allowed to tell Grandma she is dying. Actress/comedian Awkwafina displays enormous depth as the granddaughter of the apparently dying grandmother.  There was also no Oscar love for writer/director Lulu Wang who based the film on her own family’s experience. And how can you resist a movie with the tag line “Based on a true lie”?

I cannot understand how Apollo 11 did not get a nomination for best documentary.  Released on the 50th anniversary year of the first moon landing, it tells the story of the Apollo 11 flight with all period footage, much of from previously unseen 70mm film footage.  Telling the story with nothing but sound and images from the time made it fascinating, telling it with large amounts of new footage and sound made it fantastic. Here’s a link to the review I wrote when the movie first came out.

Another documentary featuring “found footage” that I really enjoyed was Maiden, the story of the first all-female crew to enter the Whitbread Cup round-the-world sailing race. The boat’s name was Maiden, and the film features a wide collection of footage shot at the time of the 1989 race. Captain Tracy Edwards was in her 20s and had only been a cook in a previous running of the race. Unlike Apollo 11, Maiden was not a big commercial success, but it was a great story of adventure on the high seas.

Finally, I really enjoyed Blinded By The Light, a movie about the universality of the appeal and meaning of Bruce Springsteen’s music; based on the real-life experience a Pakistani young man growing up in Britain.

Not showing up on my list are Avengers: Endgame, Captain Marvel, or Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and the like.  I enjoyed them all.  But truth be told, as much as I love science fiction and adventure films, I’m getting a little tired of overly long, overly produced event movies.

I have yet to see 1917, Ready or Not, and Parasite, two of which I’m planning to see this week.

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