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Chris Cornell is dead at 52.

Goodbye to my youth, and the perpetual ringing in my ears, and looking for open restaurants at 3am (There were no BPOs then), and feeling very close to people I just met two seconds ago whose names I didn’t hear, and laughing at the idiotic things friends did because we were all young enough to get over them. And being happy listening to very loud, gloomy songs. Those were good times. In the bad times we has Chris Cornell’s music to see us through like a solid, indomitable brother.

His cameo in Singles.

Colossal’s premise is weird: a woman’s anxieties are manifested as a monster stomping a city on the other side of the world. But Nacho Vigalondo’s movie aims for more than that Wii connection. It takes Godzilla-like monsters and giant robots, the staples of our protracted adolescence, and uses them to make its protagonist confront the uglier parts of her personality. Are the problems of one person so important that the people of Seoul have to suffer for them? Is this not wish fulfillment for the super self-absorbed (the ultimate making-this-about-me)? Then again, when we have personal problems our sense of proportion is the first faculty that gets vaporized.

So it’s an extended metaphor about facing the monster inside you, but it’s funny, unsettling, and comfortable in its absurdity. Also I didn’t feel like watching Guy Ritchie’s King Arthur without a row of friends to elbow and make snide remarks to. Anne Hathaway is terrific in Colossal—I’ve forgotten why everyone turned on her. Jason Sudeikis is funny with an edge of malice, and Dan Stevens seems to be in every movie these days.

Penguin Bespoke Editions: Bruce Chatwin’s works wearing Burberry

Book covers looked very different a decade ago when the appearance of e-readers seemed to flummox a publishing industry reeling from the financial crisis and Amazon’s rampant colonisation of the market. Publishers responded to the threat of digitisation by making physical books that were as grey and forgettable as ebooks. It was an era of flimsy paperbacks and Photoshop covers, the publishers’ lack of confidence manifest in the shonkiness of the objects they were producing.

But after reaching a peak in 2014, sales of e-readers and ebooks have slowed and hardback sales have surged. The latest figures from the Publishing Association showed ebook sales falling 17% in 2016, with an 8% rise in their physical counterparts. At the same time, publishers’ production values have soared and bookshops have begun to fill up with books with covers of jewel-like beauty, often with gorgeously textured pages. As the great American cover designer Peter Mendelsund put it to me, books have “more cloth, more foil, more embossing, page staining, sewn bindings, deckled edges”.

Read the full article in The Guardian.

I prefer printed books because I like the smell of ink and paper, and because if I don’t like what I’m reading, I can throw it across the room with great force.

Week 14

Book: A Venetian Affair by Andrea di Robilant. A packet of old love letters is the entry point to a fascinating history of 18th century Venice, full of scheming politicians and courtesans, grand palaces, masked balls and intrigue. A true story. Recommended for readers who like Venice, history, and tales of forbidden love.

Movie: Toni Erdmann. A careerist’s overscheduled life is shaken up by the arrival of her father, who likes putting on false teeth and playing practical jokes. Maren Ade’s low-key comedy topped the Sight & Sound critics’ poll last year. It’s less funny-ha ha than oddly touching, especially when it evokes the loneliness of our supposedly connected world. Recommended for viewers who live in fear that their parents will embarrass them in front of their colleagues. Like, everyone.
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Michael Fassbender does the uncanny valley.

In the not-so-distant future, assuming the species survives its current stupidity, humans might colonize other planets. Before they do I hope they see the Alien movies (and its ripoffs) and think hard about security protocols, especially those concerning contamination. And that they develop powerful portable floodlights because so much mayhem could be avoided if people could see where they were walking.

But back into the murky, slimy dark we go, and once again our guide is Ridley Scott. The movie opens with a flashback to events before Prometheus. Critics didn’t love that movie, either, but I enjoyed it a lot: it raised questions that prompted other questions that got weirder and weirder. In this prologue, the synthetic David (Michael Fassbender) has a discussion with his creator, Weyland (Guy Pearce). David, you will recall, modelled himself on David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia, down to the hairstyle of that glamorous imperialist. David is disappointed in his creator and his puny species—he, the creature, is obviously the superior being. Here’s where the Alien movies merge with Blade Runner (which Denis Villeneuve is resurrecting): they are the descendants of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein’s monster. Later David even quotes a poem by Mary’s husband, which any Breaking Bad fan should be able to identify.
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Fine, you are superior.

I was going to post the scene from Casablanca again (must be plenty of people doing that today) but remembered a similar scene from perhaps a greater film, Renoir’s Grand Illusion. In a German camp, the French prisoners of war are putting on a show when they get news of a French victory.

It’s a beautiful anthem, the model for the Philippine, never mind the stuff about bathing in the blood of enemies.

We still have Paris.
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