BordoLines

Jan 02, 2024

At the Movies

My Weekend with "May December"

December 5, 2023

My husband isn’t a heavy-handed moralist, but he does have a tendency to go a little too “high” when I’m down on the ground with other earthly creatures of desire, pain, grief, and hunger. (He’s a reserved Presbyterian, descended from well-bred lawyers in Ithaca, New York, and I’m both a redhead and a Newark, New Jersey child of Russian/Polish Jewish im…

Deconstructing Elizabeth Zott: Part One

October 29, 2023

Queen Bees and Wannabes

December 20, 2023

“Mrs. Astor has taken my Duke of Buckingham!” I really needed “The Gilded Age” this week. For just an hour, no nausea-inducing political polls. No underground tunnels. No women fleeing Texas. For just an hour. And the finale gave me just what I needed: Dresses that either ruined ones posture or preserved it (hard to tell.) Great dangling bling. Men wit…

Looking Back on “And Just Like That…”

August 30, 2023

“And Just Like That….” has just concluded its second season and been renewed for a third. It’s irritating that a show like “Perry Mason” has been cancelled, while a series that has so clearly run (and seemingly gone beyond) its creative course is being preserved.

At the Movies

Greta Gerwig and Girl Culture, Part 1

July 23, 2023

“Barbie” and Feminism “It’s Greta Gerwig!” “It’s Margot Robbie!” “It’s Noah Baumbach!” “And Mattel gave them total artistic freedom!” I spent many hours arguing, needlessly driven—because “Barbie” had yet to open—with (some) feminists and (all) defenders of the brotocracy—who finally found something to agree on:

TV Watch: My Bests, Worsts and Mehs

July 14, 2023

Best Series: “The Bear” Before I watched the second season of “The Bear,” I would have put “Succession” in my top spot. But “The Bear” put into sharp focus what had been nagging me about “Succession” since the first season. Addictive as it was, with the exception of a couple of stand-out episodes—

At the Movies

Three Lolitas

July 7, 2023

To my delight (and amazement), I was elected this year to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Being elected was the biggest surprise, but second to that was the category I was elected to: “Literature and Literary Studies.” I actually don’t fall neatly within any disciplinary category but I’ve never been a professional literary scholar. My degree…

The Hidden Life of Pitbulls and Bears (A Review of “The Bear”)

June 26, 2023

The Hidden Life of Pitbulls and Bears (A Review of “The Bear”)

It’s Christmas Eve, and while noise of pots clattering and people shouting at each other fills the background soundtrack, Cousin Michelle Berzatto (Sarah Paulson ) is telling “Cousin” Richie Jerimovich (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) a story about a woman who told her about bears.

Missing “Succession”? Maybe It’s A Good Time to Revisit “Mad Men”

June 6, 2023

Missing “Succession”? Maybe It’s A Good Time to Revisit “Mad Men”

Fifties TV was full of fairy-tales and fantasies meant solely to entertain and soothe—and encourage viewers to buy commodities to furnish idealized suburban lives. June Cleaver boosted both the industries in female glamour and Westinghouse appliances by cooking her pies in pearls and heels. No one got cancer, Lassie always came home, and Father always k…

This Week on “Perry Mason”: Della’s Perry Mason Moment

April 12, 2023

This Week on “Perry Mason”: Della’s Perry Mason Moment

While watching “Perry Mason” this week, and especially during the scene with the seagulls and the oil-covered fruit, I kept thinking about that great 1974 neo-noir movie “Chinatown”—also set in Los Angeles in the 1930’s. In 2023, we think of California as a sunny haven of progressive politics, but movies like “Chinatown” and “Mulholland Drive”—and now, …

Feminism is For Everyone & Always

Goodbye, Postfeminism

February 17, 2023

1. Déjà vu “In the year after I arrived, the women described dreams they’d been having, and then eventually, as the pieces fell into place, they came to understand that they were collectively dreaming one dream, and that it wasn’t a dream at all.”

“Succession” Watch: Shiv Roy

April 22, 2023

1. Roy=Roi You first have to get the fact that Logan Roy is Henry VIII incarnate. He only seems like a modern-day tycoon. But his modus operandi is pure Tudor dynasty. Henry, like Logan, could be expansive, generous, fun to be around. But it only lasted so long as he felt assured of the admiration and allegiance of those around him. Thomas More (the her…

“Succession” and Reality

May 17, 2023

Sunday’s Succession episode, “America Decides,” marks an eerie full circle moment for the HBO series as it prepares to close its fourth and final season. Almost seven years ago the cast and crew had their pilot table read on Election Day 2016; that evening, many of the team members gathered at the home of series executive producer

Watching “1883” in 2023

January 29, 2023

1. Demons are Everywhere. After two days of an 1883 binge, I’ve been having a look at the reviews. None of them seem to connect emotionally with the series the way I did. The ones that like it praise the sweep, the landscapes, the acting. Those that don’t like it correct the historical blunders, criticize the fact that it’s yet again drama from the white…

BordoLines: The Oscars Edition

February 24, 2023

BordoLines is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. “At the movies, we want a different kind of truth, something that surprises us and registers with us as funny or accurate or maybe amazing, maybe even amazingly beautiful. We get little things even in mediocre and terrible…