The original midcentury musical had its own problems, but this updated plete with untranslated Spanish, only makes things unintelligible and unintentionally funny. Read More… Steven Spielberg has recently made a number of movies nostalgic for midcentury liberalism, Bridge of Spies and The Post, especially, very mediocre stories that won him Oscar nominations and praise in the mainstream press at the price of the popularity he once enjoyed. Indeed, he has sacrificed his place as America’s most important director in pursuit...

This year we celebrate the centenary of the birth of one of the most popular American novelists of the 20th century. Does a documentary shot by a friend do the author of Slaughterhouse-Five justice? Read More… What would Kurt Vonnegut have made of the accordion-style cycle of lockdowns and other restraints imposed on us by the seemingly permanent American sanitary dictatorship devoted to the religion of health in this the centenary year of his birth? Would he have joined the...

Filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson has managed the impossible: a love story wise as serpents but innocent as doves. And no sex! Read More… My series on cinematic nostalgia continues—after Wes Anderson’s Francophilia, Ridley Scott’s Italian farce, and Spielberg’s Puerto Rican fiasco, here’s a California story: Paul Thomas Anderson’s ninth feature film, Licorice Pizza, the only Hollywood movie made last year with some reason to be remembered. It’s a story about the ’70s, Hollywood, and the confusion of love in post-’60s...

A recent Twitter engagement on the subject of Christian women and modesty is the perfect jumping off point for a larger discussion of what it means to be modest, and obsessed. Read More… For those of us who have dealt pulsive behavior or addiction in our families or our own lives, there are clues—perhaps too seemingly unrelated for some to notice—that tip us off that someone might be engaged in an internal battle. Everyone remembers the Jimmy Swaggart saga. Once...

The 74-year-old former National Lampooner and conservative humorist has died and left behind a wealth of mentary and good feeling, even among those who did not share his politics. No small legacy. Read More… So by now you’ve heard that P.J. O’Rourke, journalist, essayist, and, of course, humorist, has died at the age of 74. Those who knew him and those who read him have been pouring out ia like so much best-for-last wine. John Podhoretz shared a lovely personal...

Whether by toppling statues or neglecting the study of his life, we’ve been trying to cancel the Father of Our Nation for some time now. But it can’t be done. Some people are just too awesome. Read More… Cancel—as in noisily toppling George Washington’s statue and striking his name off of buildings? In 2020, one group demanded the removal of his statue from the campus of the University of Washington. Another outfit called for displacing, renaming, or “recontextualizing” the Washington...

When citizens’ right to peaceful protest and redress of grievances is treated as the equivalent of war by their government, everyone should be terrified. Read More… The mask has been torn off. If anyone had any doubts that some governments will do literally anything to suppress anyone who protests what they regard as unreasonable measures by the state to address the COVID pandemic, events in Canada has surely disabused them of such illusions. In times of war, we generally allow...

What may seem a bizarre polarity—terrorism and dating—actually speaks to the calculations we all make when investing not just our money but our very selves into any activity. Read More… Economics is the study of human action; it’s the study of individuals making choices. As a result, we can use the “economic way of thinking” to understand the decisions people make when es to all types of behavior, including dating and marriage, Spring break and Vegas vacations, and, yes, even...

This year we celebrate the centennial birthday of the creator of the Peanuts gang, which has endured as a ic strip since its debut in 1950, not least because it tackled the most enduring of Western maladies: loneliness. Read More… Charles Schulz believed that life was hard and lonesome. That is why he believed that life was best experienced with others. Only through the sharing of burdens and triumphs and fears and joys could a person navigate the immense challenges...

The gains made in fort by modernity still leave room for ancient wisdom and ancient law. In fact, they demand them. Read More… “All human societies face about the same problems,” claim David Friedman, Peter Leeson, and David Skarbek in their fascinating and peculiar book Legal Systems Very Different from Ours. “They deal with them in an interesting variety of different ways. All of them are grownups—there is little reason to believe that the people who created the legal systems...