One of my favorites hymns is “Blessed Assurance,” the beloved tune from blind lyricist Franny Crosby and pianist Phoebe Knapp. They wrote the hymn in 1873. Knapp played the melody on the piano and asked Crosby what the melody “said,” and she said, “Blessed Assurance, Jesus is mine.” Thus, history was born.
I love playing this hymn, and had the opportunity to play it with our congregation this past Sunday. I decided to take a quick recording before service.
Before revealing our #1 picks on our respective lists, Ponty and I are offering some honorable mentions. These are films that, for various reasons, did not make our lists, but could have done so.
I think Ponty largely had his list worked out in advance, with tweaks and revisions along the way. My approach was far less organized, and other than a few specific films and their slots, I largely came up with my picks week-to-week. I stand by all of them, but I’d probably have put Krull (1983) in this honorable mentions post, if it showed up at all. I really like the movie, but there are far better contenders out there.
Inevitably, I simply forgot about films that I sincerely love, but whose existences bafflingly slipped my mind. I can only chalk it up to my own laziness and a lack of forethought and planning.
Of course, that is the peril of list-making of this sort: I imagine if Ponty and I made these lists ten different times, we’d come up with wildly different selections and orders each time—at least, I think I would. Sure, The Thing (1982) and Big Trouble in Little China (1986) would still be on the lists, as would some others, but who knows what might be floating through my mind a second, third, fourth, or tenth time around?
Have no fear, though—if the long list-making has been wearying t o you, Ponty and I have no plans to do more for awhile. He’s hoping to spend some time working on his novel, and there are tons of movies—good, bad, and trashy—that I’ve been sitting on for several months now, and I’m eager to get back to reviewing whatever random garbage I consumed that week.
Perhaps one day we’ll take another stab at it—or maybe Audre Myers will grace us with her Top Ten picks.
But enough of my endless yammering and boring speculations. On to the movies!
We’re nearly there! Tomorrow I’ll be featuring my Honorable Mention flicks, and Ponty’s Honourable Mentions after that (in a pared down two-parter, according to Ponty, as opposed to the possible three-parter he originally envisioned). Then it’s on to our #1 picks. What will they be?
Until we find out, here are Ponty’s picks for slots 4, 3, and 2, and they’re all quite good:
Happy Sunday!
—TPP
Other Lazy Sunday Installments:
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As my older brother and I enjoyed our visit to Arizona, a massive polar vortex was making its way ominously towards the United States. We had some cool weather in Arizona, but reports were coming from back East that temperatures were dangerously low. My brother and his wife live in Indianapolis, so they were facing subzero temperatures, but even back in South Carolina, family and friends were reporting busted pipes and bitterly cold conditions.
There was some discussion between us about whether or not we should extend our trip another day or two, but the lure of Christmas and family was strong. We decided to head to the airport as planned to take our chances.
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It’s a true Phone it in Friday today, as this post is (slightly) late, and I’m going to keep it brief due to time constraints.
Patrick J. Buchanan, the great writer and political analyst, officially retired from his decades-long career in journalism a few weeks ago. His influence in conservative politics is hard to overstate. Even though he spent much of his career since the 1990s as the alternative paleoconservative voice in an increasingly interventionist and neoliberal Republican Party, that disciplined commitment to his values and the original vision of the American Founding made him one of the most impactful political figures of our time.
I wrote more extensively about Buchanan’s legacy in a piece for American Patriot Radio entitled “Pat Buchanan’s America” back in 2017, in the early months of the Trump administration. Trump, in many ways, was the political apotheosis of Buchanan’s views on trade, immigration, and the culture wars. Put more simply: no Buchanan, no Trump.
Astute readers may have picked up on my love for little things: bric-a-brac, LEGOs, short piano pieces, etc. In that regard, I am like a little old lady with her Precious Moments or Hummel figurines.
To self-indulgently psychoanalyze myself, I think this love the miniature comes, in part, from my own girthful size. I’ve always been big (and, frequently and currently, fat), so there’s something appealing about disappearing into a tiny little world. My brothers know that I am exceptionally good at disappearing during family social functions—usually to read a book or to take a nap in some forgotten corner of whatever relative’s house we’re visiting.
Even in fantasy roleplaying games (RPGs for my n00b friends), I like to play small rogues—halfling thieves, Wood Elf bards, etc. That stealthy, crafty quality appeals to me, especially in a compact package.
Regardless of why I like small things, I do. That is certainly the case with the arts; besides piano miniatures, I like short stories, and blogging is, in many ways, short-form essay writing.
That extends to painting, too, and a collection of small canvasses that I slowly turned into a substantial body of amateurish works.
With that, here is 22 February 2022’s “Little Paintings“:
Some of my favorite guest posts on this blog are those from our dear Audre Myers, who always brings a certain wide-eyed innocence coupled with the wisdom of experience. It’s a curious combination, and one that I respect when it exists, as it is rare. I admire Audre’s ability to remain excited about learning and the world around her, while still staying rooted in Reality.
But my favorite posts from Audre are the ones she writes about Bigfoot. I am agnostic on the existence of our hairy friend, but as I tell Audre, “I want to believe.”
One of my major critiques is that, with all the alleged Bigfoot footage (Bigfootage?) out there, we still haven’t gotten a good look at the big lug. In our age of hyper-documentation of every bit of life’s minutiae, how have we not caught this beast on camera in glorious hi-def video? Surely some eccentric, Elon Muskian billionaire could pepper the forests of the world with high-end recording equipment or even non-lethal traps and bag a Bigfoot.
But so far, we just have grainy photos. Even the Bigfoot YouTubers don’t do themselves any favors, padding out their videos with lots of long, boring shots of their own backyards, pointing to broken twigs as some meaningful sign of a disturbance. No way it could be a wild cat, or a bear, or a stray dog; nope, it’s gotta be Bigfoot.
Yet we’re constantly dredging up horrid monstrosities from the depths of the ocean, the kinds of creatures that we thought only existed in science-fiction stories or in prehistoric times. The woods are quite as impenetrable as the blackest depths of the murky deep, but there are plenty of forests and hills and dales in the world that are impenetrable to humans. Perhaps Bigfoot has retreated to his natural, dwindling habitat in these still-inaccessible regions of the globe.
Audre mentioned some Bigfoot books, and I hope she will share some reviews of them in future posts (more homework for her, mwahahahaha!).
With that, here is Audre telling us all about her very large friend:
On Valentine’s Day I took a few moments from a morning planning period to do a cheeky cover of Styx’s “Come Sail Away.” My High School Music Ensemble students are performing it as one of the selections for our big Spring Concert (coming in March!), and I thought it would be a fun tune to play for Open Mic Adventures.
I often perform it live, and usually sing it in a higher register, slipping into my falsetto when necessary. The song is in C major, which I find is a key that easy to play (no sharps or flats!) but sometimes difficult to sing due to my vocal range (I’m more comfortable around A major).
Due to a bit of congestion, I decided to try singing it in a much lower baritone-bass register, and I’m pleased with the results. It’s not quite as powerful as Dennis DeYoung’s nasally, stratospheric, Broadway-influenced vocals, but I think it came out pretty well.
Ponty picked an impressive film for his #2 slot, one that I wish had made it onto my list (it may end up as an honorable mention!). The Truman Show (1998) is a powerful, surprisingly dark comedy about materialism, consumerism, and mass media, exploring what happens when we take reality television to its logical extreme. What’s fascinating is that this film largely predates reality television, outside of the trash that aired on MTV at the time.
I won’t spoil Ponty’s review (he considerately offers a spoiler alert, but if you haven’t managed to see this flick in the twenty-five years since its release, you’re way outside of the “no spoilers!” statute of limitations), but he touches upon many of the troubling implications of enslaving an unwitting human in an artificial world and broadcasting the results of this forbidden experiment to the world. I, too, wonder how Truman would live outside of the show; a part of me suspects he might go back to the only world he’s ever known, though I hope he never did.
With that, here is Ponty’s review of 1998’s The Truman Show:
The Portly Politico 