Godfather in the White House

As a rather notorious Godfather freak, and one who believes the classic film from 1972 can be viewed as a Bible for life, I've watched with great interest to the cavalcade of references to it politically of late. To wit:

• "Fredo" — the name of the traitorous brother to Michael Corleone has been applied alternately to Jared Kushner and Donald Trump's sons.
• "Consigliere" — Anthony Scaramucci looked like Trump's new family advisor when he arrived at the White House; many quickly recognized that he might make a better "wartime consigliere" given all the ongoing war with the media and Deep State.
• "Sonny" — Scaramucci tweeted (or did he?) that when he finds the leakers he's going to make Sonny's assassination on the causeway look like a party.

Stay tuned for more references to this great Italian gangster film (that's obviously so much more).

"Obsessed With Superhero Myths"

“It’s like the last town on earth where the men are powerful and the women are beautiful. Hollywood is choking on all these outdated myths. Not just the one that 15-year-old boys are driving the market, but all the other myths—that women can’t handle a $100 million budget, that they can’t direct. They’re obsessed with superhero myths, but they have this other series of myths they can’t let go.”

Maureen Dowd

"All the Predators Come In"

“L.A. seems to be a place where a guy can say he’s a ‘life-coach-channeller-masseur’. It just seems to be ripe with all these frontier crazies. People are looking to turn their pain into beautiful art, but they also want to be famous. And there’s so much money — so of course all the predators come in.”

John Cusack

"Up On Brokeback Mountain"

The soundtrack to the recent movie BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN is certainly ample and compelling, perhaps most notably Willie Nelson's rendition of Bob Dylan's "He Was a Friend of Mine".

That shouldn't keep me from adding my own lyric to the canon: "Up On Brokeback Mountain".

I wrote that after reading Annie Proulx's short story and seeing the film a second time.

It's that good . .