Is the Billy Eichner Movie 'Bros' Discourse Really Necessary? - The Daily Beast

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There are roughly 47,000—oh, wait, a new Netflix Original just dropped; make that 47,001—TV shows and movies coming out each week. At Obsessed, we consider it our imperative social duty to help you see the best and skip the rest.

We’ve already got a variety of in-depth, exclusive coverage on all of your streaming favorites and new releases, but sometimes what you’re looking for is a simple Do or Don’t. That’s why we created See/Skip, to tell you exactly what our writers think you should See and what you can Skip from the past week’s crowded entertainment landscape.

See: Bros

Bros is a heartfelt and hilarious new spin on the classic romantic comedy. Actually, it’s heartfelt, hilarious, and historic. And the marketing won’t let you forget it! Billy Eichner’s Twitter takes following the film’s disappointing box office may be heavy-handed and assumptive, but Bros is still definitely worth checking out to see whether or not it surprises you. As someone who falls into their own jaded, gay echo chamber, it’s coming up for air every now and again.

Here’s Nick Schager’s take:

“Bros is a landmark film. Not only for being the first gay rom-com produced and distributed by a major American studio (Universal), but for being a perfectly formulaic gay rom-com that starts with a bawdy bang and then becomes more standard-issue (and preachy) as it nears the finish line.

Bros walks its talk about wanting to celebrate the authentic realities of LGBTQ+ Americans in all their messy, contradictory glory, and though it does that with a few too many italicized speeches about its intentions, its sincerity ultimately wins out. Moreover, Eichner and Stoller’s decision to fashion their gay rom-com in a visually, narratively and thematically familiar mold has the effect of filtering the radical through the traditional.”

Read more.

Skip: The Good House

The Good House is an egregious misuse of Sigourney Weaver with the year’s wildest climax. A Massachusetts tale as bad as Dunkin’ coffee.

Michael Tompkins/Courtesy of Roadside / Lionsgate

Here’s Coleman Spilde’s take:

“The Good House bounces between genres at such a whiplash pace that its flightiness makes it difficult to enjoy, let alone nail down. Seeing a film that refuses to fall into the tropes of genre fare can sometimes be a pleasant surprise, but The Good House does a major disservice to the very real battles Hildy faces by struggling to decide what it wants to say. In turn, it makes what could be a well-drawn character into a silly caricature, and The Good House into a dull film.

Still, it’s hard not to take note of the film’s rarity. How often do women over the age of 65 get the chance to play complicated, hard-nosed characters like this? What’s more, how often does that same age bracket get to be unabashedly horny onscreen? With the great Nancy Meyers all but hanging up her hat, there’s been a dearth of these kinds of roles available for older actors. No matter how muddled a screenplay might be, it’s gratifying to see Hollywood remember that older people exist, and not just to play grandparents or politicians.”

Read more.

Skip: Amsterdam

Amsterdam is a star-studded, supermassive black hole of talent from one of the creepiest working directors. So, basically, it’s a movie made in Hollywood.

20th Century Studios

Here’s Nick Schager’s take:

“Answering the question, “How many movie stars can one film squander?”, Amsterdam boasts a laundry list of illustrious actors and actresses and finds not a single productive or entertaining use for them. The first feature from David O. Russell since 2015’s Joy, this madcap period piece is part murder mystery, part anti-fascist conspiracy thriller, and all-around disaster, devoid of tone, wit, or any semblance of rhythm. It’s akin to a screwball comedy played at half-speed, its jokey barbs and grave line readings indistinguishable from each other and uniformly falling flat on their face.

Amsterdam is loosely based on a true story, but Russell makes it neither farcical nor portentous. In the tale’s later passages, he resorts to hand-holding exposition, using Bale narration to spell out what is already explicitly evident—an apparent sign that even he’s uncertain about the film’s coherence. Moreover, he falls back on feel-good preaching about the values of democracy, the threats of domestic terrorism and authoritarianism, the brotherhood of man (no matter the color of one’s skin) and the peerless power of love.”

Read more.

See: Till

Till is a difficult exploration of trauma through the eyes of Mamie Till-Mabley, one that does the best it can with one of history’s most horrific stories.

Lynsey Weatherspoon / Orion Pictures

Here’s Kyndall Cunningham’s take:

“It’s easy to imagine a more conventional biopic zooming out of these heartfelt interactions and capturing the frenzy surrounding Emmett Till’s trial. An Aaron Sorkin—or Steven Speilberg—directed version of this story would inevitably feature activists passionately debating organizing strategies, while journalists scramble to relay the events of the trial over a rotary telephone. Of course, there’d be a dramatic appearance by Martin Luther King.

Chukwu, however, finds the compelling aspects in private, one-on-one moments. She even downplays what should be the most theatrical part of the film, the trial, to a degree, with the exception of Mamie’s moving testimony. The cruelty of the judge, defense attorneys, and even the prosecuting sheriff, who in another film would be a heroic ally, feel mundane.”

Read more.

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Opinion: No transparency in the toll lanes traffic modeling - Maryland Matters

Traffic on the Capital Beltway near the American Legion Bridge. WTOP News photo by Dave Dildine.

By Rodolfo Perez

The writer is a licensed professional engineer who served over two decades as Engineer Advisor to the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Transportation, and served pro bono in the Montgomery County Transportation Policy Task Force.

On Aug. 25, the Maryland State Highway Administration (SHA) announced the federal approval of the Toll Lanes Project for the Capital Beltway and Interstate 270, and stated that experts at the U.S. Department of Transportation found baseless the allegations of possible fraud in the traffic modeling calculations for the project. A close look at the federal approval documents, including what the experts found, tells a different story, however.

Only a memo to file, written by the Maryland Division of the Federal Highway Administration, claims that the experts did not find fraud in the toll lanes traffic model. None of the findings reported by the experts support that claim. The experts, who operate separately at the USDOT Volpe Center, did not draw any conclusions on the allegation against the integrity of the traffic calculations.

What the experts found is that they “could not assess the plausibility or the validity” of the adjustments that the state officials made in the traffic calculations. State officials made these adjustments in response to the many discrepancies and anomalies discovered in the traffic model results during the public review of the draft and final studies for the project.

Further, the experts found that it was unclear how the traffic results favoring the preferred toll lanes alternative were obtained, and suggested that whatever process generated the results in the draft traffic analysis, it was not revised as part of the final analysis. This finding raises the logical question of whether the discrepancies and anomalies discovered in the draft phase were rectified going into the final phase.

Further, the experts noted that the SHA should address two major points raised about the integrity the traffic modeling calculations. One point, for example, noted the unlikely reductions in travel time during the evening rush-hour (from the draft to the final analysis) for the eastbound Beltway traffic towards the I-95 junction, without a corresponding reduction in the traffic volumes on the ramp exiting to I-95. The evening rush-hour volumes for that ramp remained unchanged in the draft and final analysis.

The cursory response that SHA issued shortly after did not address that point. The SHA attributes the improved eastbound Beltway travel to reductions in the traffic volumes around the Greenbelt Metro Interchange area. According to the SHA, these reductions were made in the final analysis to better reflect the regional predictions for that area, which is located 2.5 miles east of the I-95 junction. The SHA contends that such adjustment eliminated the congestion around the Greenbelt Metro area from spilling into the Beltway, thereby making the Beltway eastbound traffic more fluid.

A close examination of the traffic volumes entering and exiting the Greenbelt Metro area contradicts the SHA response. Without the toll lanes, the volumes are identical for the draft and final analyses, and with the toll lanes, the volumes increased for the final analysis. Numbers at the Beltway corridor level also contradict what the SHA says. For example, the average daily traffic numbers for the I-95 to U.S. 50 segment (east of I-95) are identical for the draft and final analysis.

It is indefensible to proceed any further with a $5 billion investment without first addressing all the credible questions raised about the transparency of the traffic modeling used to justify this project.

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Hellenic American University Hosts Third 'Europe in Discourse' International Conference - The Pappas Post

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Hellenic American University Hosts Third 'Europe in Discourse' International Conference  The Pappas Post

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Opinion: The school nurse's office should never be empty - Maryland Matters

Photo by Jamie Grill/Getty Images.

By Christine Simon-Waterman

The writer is president of the Maryland Nurses Association.

Almost everyone remembers being in the school nurse’s office when growing up. School nurses were there to tend to the scrapes, stomach aches, and minor illnesses that are just part of childhood.

But policymakers know that school nurses do much more than that. School nurses are the backbone of the health care services that ensure students can stay in school and learn. When the Maryland General Assembly passed the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, funding was designated for health services with the highest priority placed on supporting more full-time school nurses in high-poverty schools.

The Maryland Nurses Association is concerned by recent reports that the Baltimore City Public Schools is not expanding its number of full-time school nurses with its Blueprint funding, and this problem could potentially be occurring in other jurisdictions. Students everywhere are increasingly facing health crises. One-fourth of children have a chronic disease, and the numbers are rising. More students are grappling with behavioral health challenges.

Between 2007 and 2018, youth suicide deaths rose by 21% in Maryland. Now in the aftermath of the pandemic, children are facing even greater risk for all types of health risks, which will compromise their ability to learn and thrive in school.

This past session, the Maryland Nurses Association supported legislation (HB 1004/SB 856) which would have ensured there would be a nurse in every school. And that goal was just a starting point.

Many schools need more than one nurse if the school is large or has a student body with a high rate of chronic diseases and other illnesses. The bill did not move forward, but it raised the visibility of the school nursing shortage.

Our hope is that the Blueprint funding for school health will be utilized for its intended purpose of keeping students healthy. The funding is there to make real progress. As a state, we collectively can work together to support the implementation of the school health funding in every jurisdiction. The school nurse’s office should never be empty for any student, particularly for those living in communities facing the challenges created by poverty.

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Xi propagates “new era” discourse to strengthen his personal power - ThePrint

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Beijing [China], October 3 (ANI): Ahead of the 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), President Xi Jinping is pushing for a “new era” discourse to strengthen his personal power.

Hugo Jones, writing in The Diplomat said that the “new era” – connoting a fundamental historical shift – has been systematically fused with the persona of Xi in Chinese official discourse.

Significantly, Xi calls Mao Zedong’s time the ‘revolution period,’ Deng Xiaoping’s the ‘building period,’ Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao’s the ‘reform period’ while calling his term a ‘whole new era.’

For the past five years, the term “new era” has appeared with increasing frequency in China’s white papers, propaganda, official speeches, and public diplomacy.

From early on in his premiership, it was clear that Xi Jinping sought historical significance greater than that of his two immediate predecessors, Hu Jintao and Jiang Zemin. This was also encouraged by growing Chinese nationalism, which predates Xi, reported The Diplomat.

For Xi, while the “new era” is scalable from the local to the international context, it is ultimately all about China, “It will be an era that sees China moving closer to center stage and making greater contributions to mankind.”

The discourse of a “new era” serves three functions. First, it bolsters the CCP’s legitimacy in a domestic context. The “new era” is also used to provide the context for sensitive issues such as Tibet, Xinjiang, and Taiwan, said Jones.

Second, the discourse of a “new era” is used to empower the CCP and challenge norms internationally. The strongest example was on February 4, when Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin released a joint statement on “International Relations Entering a New Era,” a major foreign policy declaration that aligned China with Russia weeks before the invasion of Ukraine.

The discourse of a “new era” is also used to challenge the US, NATO, and Western countries that belong to the “old,” unipolar era of global politics. The “new era” is presented by China as the just temporality of a multipolar, post-imperial world.

Third, the discourse of a “new era” serves to reinforce the idea that the government of China, and the governance of Xi, are always thinking in the long term, operating on fundamentally different time scales to the Western world. This reinforces certain orientalist tropes that China is inherently “better” at grand strategy, reported The Diplomat.

However, despite its popularity, this narrative disguises the reality that Xi and the CCP are often as short-sighted as other regimes – the chaotic “zero-COVID” policy is just one example. This reminds us that we should take the narrative of a “new era” with a fair degree of skepticism, said Jones. (ANI)

This report is auto-generated from ANI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.

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Enough with trying to cancel Columbus (opinion) - SILive.com

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – The weather is getting chillier. Leaves are falling from the trees. The footballs are flying and post-season baseball is just around the corner.

It’s that time of year again.

No, not autumn. Time for Democrats to try and knock Christopher Columbus off his pedestal.

The latest salvo comes from Assemblywoman Marcela Mitaynes (D-Bklyn.), whose legislation would change the Columbus Day designation in the state’s executive law, transportation law, vehicle and traffic law, town law, county law, general construction law and personal property law.

As reported by the Advance, the summary of the bill states, “Christopher Columbus did not discover America. Indigenous People’s Day reimagines Columbus Day and changes a celebration of colonialism into an opportunity to reveal historical truths about the genocide and oppression of indigenous people in the Americas, to organize against current injustices and to celebrate indigenous resistance.”

State Sen. Jessica Ramos (D-Queens) introduced a version of the bill in 2021. It went nowhere, as the new bill likely will as well.

Both lawmakers ignore the fact that Columbus Day isn’t about navigational feats and world exploration. It’s about those of Italian descent taking pride in their heritage.

But we can’t have that, according to some Dem lawmakers. Columbus was a colonizer and an exploiter. He has to be erased from the history books. Statues that celebrate him have to be torn down. His holiday belongs in the dustbin of history.

Woke lawmakers also ignore the fact that there are still a lot of powerful Italian-Americans in New York State, including elected officials and political donors.

We’re truly not celebrating colonialism, genocide and oppression when we take part in a Columbus Day Parade.

How ridiculous has cancel culture gotten? Some thought fascists have called for Abraham Lincoln to be canceled because he was racist.

Yes, that Lincoln. The one who authored the Emancipation Proclamation and fought to pass the 13th Amendment, which outlawed slavery in the United States. The same Lincoln who was murdered in part for those efforts.

Lincoln early in his life and career was far from perfect when it came to the question of slavery. But to cancel him is ludicrous.

And canceling Columbus is too. But that’s what totalitarian types look to do: They erase history, instead of debating it and learning from it, and replace it with their own state-approved version. It’s not just historical figures who get canceled. It’s free thought, dissent and debate as well.

You’d think Dems would have learned this lesson by now.

The city Department of Education in 2021 summarily changed the Columbus Day school holiday to Indigenous Peoples Day. The DOE acted without notice and without public input.

Mayor Bill de Blasio smartly walked that back but then proceeded to trip over his own feet by making Oct. 11 a joint Italian Heritage Day/Indigenous Peoples Day.

It only added insult to injury. And not just because Columbus’ name was erased but because the city didn’t think enough of indigenous peoples to give them their own separate holiday.

If you want to honor indigenous people, and we should, then do it right. Don’t make it part of an effort to denigrate someone else.

Is Columbus problematic? Sure. Many, many figures in history are. And if Columbus is canceled, what’s to stop the woke types from going after others, like Giovanni da Verrazzano or Amerigo Vespucci?

Those explorers of the New World are in the same historical soup as Columbus. They likely wouldn’t pass muster with the history erasers.

And how would it be if they wanted to rename the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge?

One thing we know: Once you start down this road of erasing history, there’s no end to it. So let’s stop it now: Leave Columbus alone.

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Opinion: Noticing nearby nature - Concord Monitor

Parker Potter is a former archaeologist and historian, and retired lawyer. He is currently a semi-professional dog walker who lives and works in Contoocook.

One of the great joys of my daily walks through Contoocook is getting the chance to observe the natural world up close. Because I walk my loop four times a day, every day, I get to see sights that, as a motorist, I didn’t ever see or just took for granted.

Spring flowers are always a delight, and I have become much more attuned to the order in which they pop up. I love crocuses, and there are several patches of them on my route. When I see them here, they always remind me of a spot on the lawn between the house I grew up in and the neighbors’ house.

Every spring, before the snow had completely melted away, a half dozen brave little purple and gold naturalizing crocuses came up through the grass, foreshadowing the arrival of more spring flowers, warmer weather, and pick-up baseball games in the front yard.

There are loads of daffodils along my route. They come up and then bloom over the course of three or four weeks, but not all at once. The fact that some come up so much earlier than others makes me think of sun and shade, proximity to a warm foundation, and all the other factors that work together to tell daffodils that it is time to do their spring thing.

There aren’t many peonies along my route, but there are some. When I see peonies here, I always think of the first ones I ever saw, the richly ant-covered peonies that grew in a backyard garden two houses down from the house I grew up in. I am particularly interested in peonies because of their prominence in Chinese visual art and literature. When I first saw Contoocook peonies blooming on one of my walks, the blossoms reminded me of fireworks, which made me wonder whether peonies might have been a part of the inspiration for the invention of fireworks in China.

Something that first struck me on my walks this year is the varying durability of different kinds of flower blossoms. The bulb flowers seem to come and go relatively quickly, but I got to watch a big patch of rogue daisies growing in the middle of a lawn that seemed to stay fresh looking for weeks on end, dare I say fresh as a daisy. And even when they withered and went to seed, I found a certain beauty in them. Call it the promise of next year’s daisies.

I have also come to love the trees I walk by, going so far as to name one magnificent oak “the monarch.” I’ve started referring to another tree as “the one with the mullet” because of the funky way it has been pruned to protect the power lines that run beside it. As with the flowers, I’ve become increasingly aware of nature’s chronology for putting leaves on the trees in the spring and taking them off in the fall, maples first, then the oaks. Because I walk all year round, I see the trees bare naked, all dressed up with leaves, and at every stage in between. I appreciate the contrasts, and it’s been interesting to discover which seasons suit which trees best.

In the spring, my fun with trees is all about timing. I particularly enjoy that one magical week that comes along every year when all the maple trees leaf out, seemingly overnight, covering themselves with the tenderest imaginable shades of green.

Another thing I see up close is the incredible range of reproductive parts that appear on the trees and shrubs I pass, delicate little buds and fronds and pods and tendrils. Speaking of tree reproduction, I’ll never forget the day when the monarch and some of its oak-tree friends decided to drop hundreds of acorns, all at once, right on my head. It sounded like a hailstorm. As a daily walker, I often find myself in the right place at the right time for that kind of special show from Mother Nature.

I’ve also had maple trees spontaneously drop a bushel of yellow leaves on me as I’ve passed by. Crunchy autumn leaves underfoot, and their distinctive aroma always sends me back to the Friday nights of my youth when I walked through piles of fallen leaves on my way to watch the high school football team play.

Finally, while the flowers and trees I see on my walks are glorious, I think the bits of nature I love the best are the volunteers, all the determined little plants that shouldn’t be there, but are, growing against all odds in sidewalk cracks, storm drains, and lawns into which they have escaped from a flower bed. I admire their persistence and dedication to life.

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