PEORIA, IL -- If you're already sick of Christmas/holiday entertainment fare, and horrified by the news of Manchurian candidate Trump, friend (or 'useful idiot') of Russia and Putin, there's an alternative.
Two terrific literary films, one based on a novel by Philip Roth, are now available on Netflix. They have, naturally, not been widely publicized.
They are Indignation, staring Sarah Gadon and Logan Lerman, and Genius, about writer Thomas Wolfe (Look Homeward Angel).
The New York Times review of Indignation calls the film the best made of a Philip Roth novel. It offers "a precisely rendered and repressive 1950s America," the review's headline states.
Genius also got good, if obscure reviews. It shows the relationship between Thomas Wolfe and his editor, Max Perkins, in a fascinating film staring Colin Firth and Jude Law.
Both of these films are set in the past, the 1920s for Genius and the 1950s for Indignation. The now wired-in generations can take a look at the past, depicted with great accuracy in both films.
But the films are more than their settings. They're great human dramas, so superior to most film fare today. Definitely worth seeing.
-- Elaine Hopkins
Forget BDS, now it's Trump Derangement Syndrome.
Posted by: vonster | December 12, 2016 at 07:58 AM