Tag: Covid-19

Movie Review – The Vast of Night

There’s something in the sky!

It’s been a while since I wrote a movie review and posted it on this blog. However since this is the time of riots in the streets and COVID-19 plus there’s no place to go, new movies seemed like a pretty safe subject.

Peter Travers, the movie reviewer for Rolling Stone magazine and the host of Popcorn on ABC TV, just presented a list of major motion pictures that were coming out this summer. And of course, most of them were not going to appear in movie theaters so the only place left for them to go were streaming services. And the very first one he mentioned was a very low budget film noir science fiction thriller that takes place in a little bitty town in New Mexico in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s. This movie is called The Vast of Night and it is a wonderful movie by first time feature director, Andrew Patterson. You can find this movie on Amazon Prime since it was produced by Amazon Studios, and it’s truly worth the search.

WOTW Radio Station where the mystery begins.

Basic story is a small town in the 1950s and a couple of teenage science nerds uncover a strange sound on the phone lines and then on the radio air waves. They spend the entire movie trying to track it down only to find it comes from above. In the meantime, during their search they run into interesting characters and scary stories of previous alien visitations and people being taken like in Close Encounter of the Third Kind. Oh, so you’ve all heard this movie plot before, right? Well not exactly, because this is told in a fresh new super interesting way unlike any science fiction movie I have ever seen or heard.

Changing camera styles like people change their socks you go from intense closeups that last for minutes at a time to tracking shots that follow our heroes wandering through their small town. Sometimes the lighting is moody and dark, other times it is bright and cheerful filled with color. How the director Andrew Patterson got this much movie from what is obviously a very limited budget is a work of genius.

Sierra McCormick as Fay as she discovers the sounds from Outer Spaces.

Patterson also allows his actors a lot of room to do their work and in the process gets some amazing performances. Especially an about 10 minutes sequence with no cuts where Sierra McComick from Supernatural, who plays the female lead Fay, sits at an old manual phone switchboard for a small town and connects the different people who call. Yet during this sequence the first hint of what is to come appear through the phone lines and you watch Fay’s growing concern as to is happening. She handles multiple calls and each one is different but also you see her increasing puzzlement and fascination as the mystery begins to unfold. Her performance by such a young actress is astonishing.

However, this not even the most outstanding performance in the movie. That belongs to Gail Cronauer as Mabel. Ms. Cronauer delivers a long, extended monologue that in lesser hands would have bored the short attention span of today’s audiences, but she is riveting. Even more amazing is there are no cutaways during her long scene as she is filmed from only one side of her face, yet she holds the screen totally.

Jack Horowitz as DJ Everett Sloan

Another shout out as well to Cinematographer M.I.Littin- Menz and his film/light crew for some really inventive shooting. There is one extended tracking sequence where the camera goes through the entire town including inside a high school basketball game which most of the small-town citizens are attending that I am not really sure how they accomplished it. At first, I thought is was a drone shot then a steady cam then…. However, they did it – it is a great sequence and the editing by Junius Tully is flawless.  

My only complement is it starts extremely slow. It is about 20 minutes before we get to anything that resembles a plot point. And that is the point because Patterson and his screenwriters James Montague and Craig W Sanger are purposely distancing you from the material. This is a movie where you have to come to it, it’s not going to come to you. Patterson is also making you pay attention to the small details that will become very important later on in the movie. Boring small town existence in the middle of nowhere, the 1950 switch board telephone system and reel to reel tape recorders which seem incredibly innocuous at first but later become very important as the movie progresses. But if you’re looking for a movie to jump at you from the 1st frame this is not the movie for you. This one takes some patience, but it’s worth it.

This movie season is going to be very different and most of it will be in your home or a drive-in. The is the first highly recommended movie of the summer and you should try to find in on Amazon Prime.

LA Under Curfew Over Protests of George Floyd’s Murder

I was in the midst of publishing a blog about Los Angeles’ uncertain opening following the COVID-19 lock down that has been part of daily life in Los Angeles since March 15th. Yet the death of George Floyd and the resulting public outcry across the country for justice, the protests in many cities and the looting that has followed those protests cause me to change my mind on what I wanted to talk about.

The subject on everyone’s mind is the heinous murder of George Floyd that everyone in America has seen. While I know nothing of the city of Minneapolis or its police force or its racial history just watching a white man kneel on the neck of a black man for 12 minutes until he died tells me a lot. One of the other officers who was involved and fired is an Asian American. He is a person of color, yet he did nothing. It seems that the bond between police officers to back each other up outweighed their duty to protect the public at least in this case.  

(Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Los Angeles my home city is under curfew tonight. The entire city from Downtown Los Angeles all the way to Santa Monica is closed. The curfew started at 8:00 PM and will last until 5:30 AM on Sunday morning. There were fires at the Grove, a popular high-end shopping mal,l and looting and burning along famous shopping district of Melrose Ave. There were also reports of fires in Beverly Hills and in other parts of the city.  When the curfew started at 8:00 PM and for the next 2 hours you could hear police sirens going off in all directions and for some unknown reason also a tremendous amount of fireworks.

What follows are two completely different views of what happened at a protest rally at Pan Pacific Park near the Grove and the historic Farmers Market on Fairfax Ave between Beverly and 3rd. This is an old historical area that is going through many changes and now it’s a very upscale shopping area. Today it was the scene of a clash between police and protesters that ended up in police cars being set on fire and certain buildings being looted or also set on fire. At one time the police shot rounds of rubber bullets into the crowd to make them disperse.

The first voice you’re going to hear is from Godfrey Santos Plata, a Democrat running for the California State Assembly, District 53 in the general election this coming November 3rd. He was at the protest at Pan Pacific Park to be there in support of the protesters who he claims were incredibly well organized and peaceful until the police showed up. In a series of tweets on his site @godfreyplata, he wanted to talk about a few things that the public was not being shown by the mainstream media about what really happened at Pan Pacific/Fairfax rally. First that multiple families of murdered black folks were present, and the leaders of the protest did a roll call. And that #BlackLivesMatter co-founder Patrice Cullors gave a rousing and moving speech that was in no way inciting the crowd to violence.

Protest Downtown LA

Also, Plata pointed out that there were multiple groups of volunteers who were passing out free water to the demonstrators, and folks were reminding other people to continue to wear their masks. He further remarked that most of the homeowners in that area are white and they came out to honk their horns or pump their fists and to show support for the demonstrators.  There were many remarks online about the mayhem that was taking place in the intersection of Fairfax and 3rd where motorists seemed trapped in their cars. Plata states that the mayhem was actually demonstrators trying to direct the traffic where to go.

Finally it is Mr. Plata’s assertion that when the police began to shoot rubber bullets into the crowd, a cry went up from the demonstrators for all the white people in the group to come to the forefront to help protect the people of color behind them. And he says this actually happened. He goes on further to say that for all the anger and rage that the crowd was feeling, they basically had come there to support the other demonstrations that were going on in other cities and demand that killer cops be prosecuted and to defund the Los Angeles Police Department. In the Mayor’s newest budget, it has seen an extraordinary increase in the amount of funding that LAPD is to receive while the city is cutting back on housing and workforce development and education.

Again, this is all according to Mr. Plata who was running for political office In Los Angeles

Mayor Eric Garcetti setting curfew in place

Yet after four days of continuing violence and protests about George Floyd’s death, Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti had reached his limit. He requested that Governor Gavin Newsom send in the National Guard to help LAPD which had repeated clashes with protesters as they pillaged businesses and torched police vehicles.

The Mayor was quoted as saying, “The California National Guard is being deployed to Los Angeles overnight to support our local response to maintain peace and safety on the streets of our city.” The mayor had ordered a rare citywide curfew until Sunday morning.

(Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

According to NBC Channel 4, referencing the same area that Mr. Plata was in as one of the hardest hit areas. The Grove which sits next to Pan Pacific Park is where hundreds of protesters swarmed the area and showered the police with rocks and other objects and vandalized stores. The mostly peaceful demonstration devolved when protesters set several Police Department cars on fire, broke store windows and climbed on top of a bus. Police used batons to move protesters back and shot rubber bullets to scatter the crowd.

The scale of the damage in Los Angeles has been compared to the 1992 Rodney King riots when over 1 billion dollars in property damage was done. Currently there’s no estimate about how many businesses have suffered damage during the protests but it’s clearly extensive.

On Friday night protesters rampaged through downtown late at night smashing windows and robbing jewelry and other stores and the police ended up arresting 533 people.

Mayor Garcetti initially imposed a curfew for downtown but then quickly expanded it to cover the entire city as the violence seemed to be expanding everywhere. The curfew is to last from 8:00 PM on Saturday night till 5:30 AM on Sunday morning.

Mandatory Credit: Photo by ETIENNE LAURENT/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

NBC Channel Four also reported that a large group of demonstrators actually entered the city of Beverly Hills and held a protest on Rodeo Dr, one of the most famous shopping streets in the world. Channel 4 says they were mostly peaceful and as you can tell from the photograph of the Beverly Hills protest, it seems quiet and respectful. Yet, in spite of that, social media has posted lots of video posts showing marchers chanting ‘Eat the Rich’ while a crowd broke into the high-end stores and fled with merchandise

As in Minnesota where the governor has accused out of state right wing extremists as the cause for the looting and violence in Minneapolis, California’s governor said that authorities were closely monitoring organized violent extremist groups who may be trying to use the protests for their own agenda.

“When the violence escalates, no one wins,” Garcetti stated. “I’m asking all of Los Angeles to take a deep breath and to step back.”

Let us all hope we do!

Los Angeles Is Closed

Living During Covid-19

Los Angeles is closed.

The mayor of Los Angeles closed down the city on March 15th, 2020. The governor followed the next day shutting down the entire state on March 16th, 2020, with a “shelter in place “order. Since that time all schools, restaurants and bars, churches, parks have been closed. The beaches are closed. Our famous hiking trails throughout Los Angeles are closed. All movie theaters, museums, any place where people would gather are closed. This is what it’s like living in Los Angeles, California, in the time of plague.  

When I first came to Los Angeles in 1984, it was already an overpopulated city. There were too many people, traffic jams, incredible air pollution, a growing homeless problem, and you had to add 20 minutes to any trip that you were going to take anywhere in the city just to be on there on time. But it was also the capital of filmmaking in the entire world and I wanted to be in the entertainment business, plus it had great beaches, incredible sunsets and that incomparably great weather.

Thirty-eight years later, it’s even more crowded. The traffic jams are even worse. You have to add 45 minutes to any trip that you’re going to take now. The pollution is a lot better, but our homeless problem has grown to such proportions that by itself is larger than most mid-sized cities in the United States. It’s still the movie capital of the world but there’s now five world class museums, two sports teams in every major category: baseball, football, basketball, hockey and soccer. And still we have those incredible beaches and sunsets, and still enjoy the best weather in America.

But Los Angeles is closed.

I’ve been sheltering in place since March 16th. On the 15th, two days before Saint Patrick’s Day, I went out to an Irish bar and had a Guinness while sitting in the most distant corner of the bar to keep social distance between myself and others. Other than going to a grocery store or a pharmacy that’s the only human interaction I’ve had since March 16th. I have a roommate, so I have someone to talk to. But I can’t imagine what it’s like for people who lived by themselves and can’t venture out. Humans are made and programmed to be around other humans and to not have any human contact is almost inconceivable.

Few days ago, I was allowed the opportunity to take a Corona virus test. The week before I had reached out online to the testing authority here in Los Angeles to see if I had symptoms of the virus, and I was told that I didn’t and stay home. But then I was contacted by them because I fit into a certain age category and have an underlying health condition. They allowed me to come be tested. It was very strange as the photographs show. It took place in a large parking lot of a church. Everyone was dressed in hazmat suits and you were told to roll down your window just a little bit so they could slip you a test kit. No one personally tested me. Those photographs or videos that you see on the television or online of someone sticking a swab up another person’s nose didn’t happen for me. What happened was they gave me a plastic bag with a swab inside of it, a small vial filled with a toxic liquid, a list of instructions and two smaller plastic bags. The man who handed it to me at the side of my car told me what I needed to do. Then he asked me to repeat it back to him, and then he told me the instructions one more time. At that point, I was supposed to pull off to the side in the parking space and perform the test myself.

I was supposed to open the kit and take out the swab. Then I was to swab the inside of my mouth three times. Then I was to break the swab in half so it would fit into the small vial with the toxic liquid and close it. I was warned several times not to let this liquid spill on me. Then I was to take that vial and put it in the smallest plastic bag and seal it. Then place that bag in the next size bag and seal that one. And finally put that bag in the bag that the test kit came in and seal it. I was then to drive to the exit of the parking lot and throw the bag in a large container that had all the other test kits that had been used. That was 10 days ago. I still don’t have my test results. And I have my doubts that that is the most effective way to test people for coronavirus. What if they don’t understand the instructions? What if they get confused? What if they don’t do the test in the correct way? Don’t think that’s the most effective way to do it.  No human interaction whatsoever. Self-testing seems like it leaves a lot of room for confusion and improper testing.

Three days ago, I was so stir crazy that I decided to drive down to Santa Monica. Just to see what there was to see. Nothing. Empty streets. Closed stores. Hardly anyone on the street at all. The 3rd Street Promenade and Santa Monica Pier were completely closed and empty of anyone. Standing on the cliffs overlooking Santa Monica beaches, they were completely empty.

There was a movie that came out in 1959 or 1960, that I remember seeing as I was growing up. It starred Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner and Fred Astaire. It was called On The Beach. It was based on a controversial book that had come out in the late 50’s about a possible nuclear war that happens between the Soviet Union and the United States. The war happens and the fallout from the radiation kills everyone on the planet. Gregory Peck is the commander of a submarine that was at sea when the attacks happen and, they survive. The eerie scene of the submarine sailing into San Francisco Bay to find nothing. The city wasn’t blown up, it was just empty of people. No one there. Empty streets, empty buildings, just empty. And that’s what Santa Monica reminded me of. It was very spooky and eerie and unsettling.

What will life look like on the other side of this plague. Will we remember to be nicer to each other as we are now? Will we maintain the slow pace of life that we have managed to accomplish now? Will the pollution continue to get better because there are less cars and less movement on the streets now? Or will it return to the way that it was before with overcrowded freeways, and the hustle and bustle of a massive city.

Life will begin to return to normal. Movie theaters will open, churches will open, schools will open, restaurants and bars will open, and life will begin to return to something that resembles normal. The beaches will open. The parks will open. And there’s still the incredible sunsets and the beautiful weather. Right now that’s in the future and no one knows when that will happen.

Los Angeles lives one day at a time. Some people still go to work but many people have lost their jobs because film production is stopped, and the service industry of bars and restaurants have shut down. And the ripple effect has affected almost everyone that I know. Whether they are renters or homeowners or landlords or just regular business owners because all nonessential businesses have closed as well. Los Angeles is closed. And we don’t know when it’s going to reopen.

When it does, those of us that live here hope you come back because our city exists on tourism as a major source of our income. But will you want to come here? Will you trust that you can fly in a plane and not catch the virus? Will you want to be on the Hollywood Walk of fame with hundreds of other people, will you want to go to our fabulous beaches with hundreds of other people, or want to go to our museums, the 3rd St promenade, and the Santa Monica pier?

Los Angeles is closed. And the Los Angeles we used to know will be very different than the one that arrives when they finally lift the shelter in place order. And I wonder what that will be like?

We should be thankful all across the country for the men and women who work as doctors, nurses, EMT’s, grocery store clerks, people that restock stores, pharmacists and their colleagues in drug stores, Amazon drivers and UPS drivers, and the growing business of food delivery. All those people risk their lives every day being confronted with the possibility Covis-19. I don’t know that I could do their job. Yes, they’re making a living because they have to but they’re also brave. I really don’t know if I could stand behind a cash register as hundreds of people walked by me maybe with the disease or maybe not. The odds of not getting it are not Vegas odds, but they’re still not good.

In the meantime, please stay inside, when you go out wear a mask and remember social distancing. The reason that California, the most populous state in the United States, has some of the lowest Corona virus numbers is because our mayor and our governor got out in front of this and our curve is a lot lower than other places especially New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Louisiana.

Be careful, be safe and stay healthy.