Robert Grainier (Joel Edgerton) is born in the early 20th century somewhere in the woods of northern Washington State, not far from Spokane. In those years, before World War 1, Washington was frontier country. Robert does not know who his parents were, whether he is an orphan, or an abandoned child. He grows up to be a reflective boy, trying to understand the world around him from observing it.

As a young man, his life changes and becomes happier when he meets Gladys (Felicity Jones) in church. Soon they are inseparable, get married and have a child. They build a cabin on an acre of land in the woods, near a creek and they have a daughter.

Being a logger and a railroad builder are the only jobs Robert can find, and unfortunately the seasonal work separates him from his young family for months at a time. It makes for a stressful life for both of them. They dream of saving some money, starting a sawmill and grow vegetables for the market, which would enable the family to live together year-round.

But tragedy overwhelms the family when a wildfire sweeps through their area while Robert is not home.

Train Dreams is based on a Novella by Denis Johnson. Joel Edgerton delivers an Oscar-worthy performance and the cinematography is incredible. It is a quiet and very slow movie. There is little action, just lots of contemplation and observation. Once I realized this was a pensive film, I settled in and let it take me with it. A few tears rolled down my cheeks when I was overwhelmed by the hardness of life those frontier people had to endure, and the brutal realities that literally struck people dead in the middle of the day, completely unexpectedly. They were helpless. Somehow they had to survive. Somehow they had to live their lives, even if there was no joy other than knowing they were one with the world.

And thus Train Dreams follows the life of Robert Grainier from beginning to end. When the credits rolled, I just sat there, listening to the music, while my mind sorted out why life is beautiful even when it is sometimes really, really hard.

 

The Rocky Horror Picture Show was first released over 50 years ago in 1975. It first was a box office flop, but by 1977, alternative movie theaters started midnight showings and it quickly created a cult following. I am aging myself when I tell you that I must have seen the movie at least 20 times in the years of 1978 and 1979, always at midnight, in Phoenix, Arizona. It was a great event to bring our friends and guests to.

While visiting my son and his girlfriend for Thanksgiving, we looked for cult movies to watch, and we talked about The Room, which my son had made us watch ten years ago. I will reassert here that The Room is the worst movie all all time. But speaking of cult movies, I remembered The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and so we watched it together. For me it was the first time after many decades, and while I had remembered many vignettes, much of it I had forgotten about. For instance, the singing lips through the initial scrolling of the credits was such an iconic feature – how could I possibly forget it?

The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a rock musical that crossed many cultural threshold in its time. It was also one of the first audience participation movies. People came to the theater dressed up like the characters, they recited key lines of dialog before they came up in the movie, and there was much audience participation, like throwing rice during the wedding scene, throwing toast and lighting cigarette lighters (we didn’t have smartphones with flashlights then). Going to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show was much more than just going to a movie, it was an experience that you took your friends to.

The film opened up the world for the LGBTQ+ community. It celebrated gender fluidity, queerness, cross dressing, sexual liberation and bisexuality in an unapologetic manner at a time when such images or concepts were rarely dealt with in mainstream society or media. It provided visibility and a sense of community for people who had few opportunities for public expression of queerness.

The music is pop rock and original to the movie. The songs stayed with me over the decades. In particular the “let’s do the time warp again” song is the one I think about when I think about The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Susan Sarandon has a lead role as Janet, and it was one of her earlier movies at the beginning of her career. Also, notable is Meat Loaf’s role as Eddie in the film. Tim Curry, who plays the lead character of Dr. Frank-N-Furter, was already a Broadway actor when he appeared in the movie. He rose to prominence with this role.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show was a sanctuary where outsiders, misfits, and young people exploring identity could gather without judgment. I was proud to be part of that world as a 20-year-old, just coming of age and looking forward in wonder to the world awaiting me. Life was just getting started. “Don’t dream it—be it” became a catch-phrase for me, and I still fondly remember those days.

Watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show with my family felt a bit like passing a torch. It was nostalgia all the way.

Penguins must be good teachers. When watching The Penguin Lessons I immediately thought of My Penguin Friend, a movie I watched last year.

It’s a very similar story. Through sheer coincidence, a penguin attaches itself to a human who is not necessarily interested in the bird, but over time taking care of it, falls in love with the animal. In this case, the human is an English teacher at an Argentinian prep school during the mid 1970-ies, when Argentina was taken over by a military coup which installed a fascist government. 30,000 Argentinian citizens “disappeared” during those years, never to be heard from again. This is the backdrop to the simple lives of a few teachers and school staff who support them. The penguin, seemingly one person at a time, befriends everyone at the school, and all lives are improved. The students pay attention to their studies, the teachers enjoy healthy relationships with the students and each other, and the staff serving them come to know them and include them in their lives.

How does a simple, single penguin accomplish all that?

It happens in My Penguin Friend, and it happens here, in The Penguin Lessons.

Watching this movie in 2025, when activities like those in Argentina in 1976 are occurring in our country today, all I can say is that we could use some penguins just about now.

On a quiet, almost dreamy Sunday morning in Kahului, Maui, my wife and I walked into the Regal theater in the downtown mall to watch One Battle After Another. We would not have been interested in this movie just from watching the trailers. It looks like a bang bang shoot me up action thriller that we’re usually not interested in. But we had a trusted recommendation that it was one of the best movies in a long time, so we decided to give it a chance.

The Regal in Maui has a weird setup with huge screens and, in this case, only less than 30 seats in three rows. The back row was taken, so we sat in the middle row, where we literally had to recline the seats all the way back and look up at a 45 degree angle to the huge screen looming over us. Not a comfortable way to watch a movie, and I would not want to go back to that theater.

The weird surroundings and the strange seating position were both jarring, so when the movie started with its first act, its extremely fast-paced opening, the rapid-fire succession of many scenes, the relentless and very loud music, it just helped transport both of us into another world, not one we particularly liked. I had my doubts at that time.

But minute after minute built the story, and once the second act came along, the deep suspense and the gripping story just took over.

America is more divided now than it ever was in my lifetime in this country. Today our ideological differences are huge, we have camps where immigrants are detained without due process, we are watching a militarization of our cities, and outright physical aggression is commonplace, at least if we can trust what our media feeds us. This is the backdrop for this story, and I have to refrain from taking sides and making any political statements or voice opinions. The timing of this film is impeccable, and it will make millions of us think about what we’re doing to our country.

The story starts when we are introduced to the French 75, a fictional radical left-wing terrorist group that frees detained immigrants with force, blows up military installations, robs banks, all as part of a left-wing ideology.  They wage One Battle After Another in their war against the government. The first act of the movie tells a story of radical politics, violence, repression and generational legacy.

There is Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio), which is not his real name, who is a bomb expert and there is Perfidia (Teyana Taylor), a black firebrand who clearly gets off sexually on physical violence and a mission of revolution. The two are a couple within the larger terrorist group, doing battle, until their child is born and they have to take very different turns in life. This is where the bang bang first act stops and the second act begins, following the life of Bob raising his daughter as a single parent in a makeshift, quiet life.

One of their military nemesis, Col. Steven Lockjaw, decides to come after them 16 years later with the full force of the US government to settle old scores. He hunts them down, and in a flurry of escapes, father and daughter are separated. Lockjaw is a ferocious soldier with a twisted, sick psyche who will stop at nothing to get his way.

Here is the strange part: Lockjaw is played masterfully by Sean Penn. For the first half of the movie I didn’t even realize it was Sean Penn. I had to look it up online during the movie and then I saw this character in a whole different light. Both DiCaprio and Penn are playing their roles like absolute professionals. They carry the movie. The sound track, if you call it that, is intense. Heavy piano scores speed the action and somehow my heartrate went along with it.

At the end of the 2 hour and 42 minute movie I sat there spent. It was difficult to watch. It made me think. Going back out into the afternoon Maui sunshine seemed surreal. It has made me think all day.

I am still thinking.