Seth Harris

Comic Book Review – Parasocial

Parasocial (Image Comics)
Written by Alex de Campi
Art by Erica Henderson

The other day, I was looking over the upcoming DC Comics solicitations and realized something. I am old now. I just looked at the covers, the blurbs for stories they were announcing, the lead-ups & preludes to the next big event, and I thought, “Boy, am I tired.” I know part of this is that the writers that are up and coming in comics right now are, for the first time, my age or younger than I am. It was an inevitable point I would reach one day, but experiencing it is still strange. Having grown up reading comics written by mostly Baby Boomers, there’s a particular style & tone I’m used to. It’s not better than what is new; it is just different. When I read something like Parasocial, I have mixed feelings – I like a lot of the ideas, but the execution is not what I expected, so I’m left feeling ambivalent.

Movie Review – City Hall

City Hall (2020)
Directed by Frederick Wiseman

At age 94, Frederick Wiseman is still making documentaries. While elements of his style have changed over the decades, and he has very distinctive periods within his filmography, Wiseman has always retained sight of what is important to him in making docs. He believes presenting a moment as true to the heart of what was happening when the camera was rolling is more important than anything else. The process of making movies is inherently biased. There is no way to be objective in the editing bay; each cut is a subjective choice, and we can see that it feels different when someone re-edits a movie. Wiseman does not believe his films are THE final word on anything. They are simply the director and his camera being present in a moment and capturing what happened.

Movie Review – Public Housing

Public Housing (1997)
Directed by Frederick Wiseman

Frederick Wiseman didn’t slow down in the 1980s or 1990s. He continued to put out a film almost every other year about topics as varied as horse racing, a Neiman Marcus department store, Central Park, and a series of docs about people with disabilities. In 1997, he delivered this three-hour exploration of the politics that governed the Ida B. Wells public housing development in Chicago, Illinois. Much like Welfare, Wiseman is trying to capture the voices of the people in power within the institutions as well as the recipients (or people who should be getting, but often don’t get) these services.

Movie Review – Welfare

Welfare (1975)
Directed by Frederick Wiseman

Frederick Wiseman has made his career focusing on institutions, and while he has branched off in later years ever so slightly, the most significant change in his method of filmmaking is going from tight 90-minute movies to large sprawling epics. It makes sense; the topics of his work are vast & challenging to grasp. You need time to let them breathe and for narratives to emerge. Welfare clocks in at nearly three hours long. I argue passionately that not only is this Wiseman’s masterpiece, but it is also one of the greatest documentary films ever made. Within this relatively short time, the audience will experience every stage of life and almost every element that brings drama into our lives.

PopCult Podcast – Dune Part 2/Polytechnique

It’s all things Denis Villeneuve this week. We watched his latest, the second chapter in a legendary science fiction saga. Then we went back to see a film that garnered his first major attention.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Ironsworn: The City of Eternal Night Part Two

Check out Part One

(Undertake a Journey – Strong Hit)
(First waypoint: Oracle: Strange Hill)

Uram of the Greywolves stumbled upon a peculiar sight that halted him in his tracks—a towering hill crafted entirely from the bones of various creatures. As he stood in the heart of the dune valley, the bone structure loomed above him like a macabre monument, a testament to some prolific killer. Bones intermingled seamlessly, forming a mosaic of animals, orcs, and other poor creatures. The air around him tingled with an otherworldly energy, and an unsettling feeling gripped Uram’s heart. It was not the hand of humans that had brought demise to these creatures but something far more sinister and elusive.

PopCult Presents: Screenplay – Corp Borg Episode 1

The first of our next six-part Screenplay series is here!
And you can listen to it for FREE!

Comic Book Review – Monica

Monica (Fantagraphics)
Written & Illustrated by Daniel Clowes

When I think of the great indie comics creators from my younger days, I typically think of three names: Charles Burns (Black Hole), Chris Ware (Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth), and Daniel Clowes (Ghost World). Each artist has a distinct style, and their personality comes through in all their work. The common theme between them all is a bleak look at humanity. Clowes’ work, in particular, focused on the alienation of Generation X, whose identities were tied to ironic nostalgia and difficulty being vulnerable with others. But time has passed, and Clowes is no longer a young man. As good as his early work is, he’s matured into something incredible, and Monica is a perfect example of this sophistication.

Movie Review – Juvenile Court

Juvenile Court (1973)
Directed by Frederick Wiseman

Frederick Wiseman’s seventh film, Juvenile Court, came after producing at least one documentary a year from 1968. High School & Law and Order each contemplated how American institutions subjected people to forms of control. The former sees how we teach children as wrapped up in authoritarian ends, while the latter is about how authoritarianism is exercised in the community. It makes sense that Wiseman would make Juvenile Court as it is where these two paths converge, the place where young people are brutally institutionalized to “get them in line.” In a film that foresees Wiseman’s magnum opus, Welfare, he constructs tighter narratives, following a small number of young people and families through the court process.

Patron Pick – The Zone of Interest

This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month, those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Matt Harris.

The Zone of Interest (2023)
Written and directed by Jonathan Glazer

A droning echo from deep in the bowels of the underworld is the first thing you hear as the screen remains black. This is a descent into Hell. The music distorts and warps, communicating this mood of decay & rot. It is also a signal that this will not be a film about the spectacle of war or even the direct horrors of the Holocaust. Instead, this will be a story from right on the periphery. The title, The Zone of Interest, was a term Nazis used euphemistically to refer to the complex of over 40 death camps in Auschwitz, Poland. Filmmaker Jonathan Glazer uses his talents to deliver a story about genocide unlike any other I’ve seen. This is a film where the details are withheld, and it is through inference that the true horror emerges.