What I'm Watching

This is a monthly post wherein I list the movies I’ve watched, the TV I’m watching and the music I’m listening to.

Movies I’ve Watched:

• And Then There Were None (1945): And enjoyable Agatha Christie.

• Blithe Spirit (1945): A mildly amusing supernatural comedy. Somehow we watched the remake first.

• Bullets Over Broadway (1994): One of three films I re-watched this month because Jenn hadn’t seen them.

• Design for Living (1933): Like Blithe Spirit, written by Noel Coward. And, at this point, I was Cowarded out.

• Driving with Selvi (2015): A documentary ostensibly about “southern India’s first female taxi driver” but I have my doubts.

• Él (1953): I admire this film about a woman terrorized by her husband but I think it has a rather fatal flaw.

• Gilda (1946): I re-watched this for the first time in decades. Less a proper noir than I remembered it being.

• Hell Comes to Frogtown (1988): Annoyingly mediocre.

• Jean de Florette and Manon des sources (1986): A two part tragicomedy about farmers in a small town trying to fuck over outsiders. I really enjoyed the first film and aspects of the second.

• The Lady Eve (1941): I re-watched this as well. This is funnier than I remembered being but the plot remains pretty unbelievable.

• The Little Foxes (1941): I mostly quite enjoyed this southern melodrama that is substantially more subtle than a Tennessee Williams.

• The Odyssey (2026): The Odyssey is not one of my sacred cows. I had no feelings going in. I was…whelmed. By all means, see it in theatres if you must see it. But I general feeling is meh.

• Sliding Doors (1998): Now I’ve finally seen the film that inspired the saying.

TV I’m Watching:

• Archer (2009): I finally finished it.

• Baseball: We’ve done a better job watching the Jays this year, hopefully just in time for their playoff run.

• The Hollow Crown (2012): At some point, probably while watching The Wire or Deadwood the first time, I had an idea: Somebody should take Shakespeare’s Wars of the Roses plays and turn them into a TV series. Every once in a while I would think about it and wonder why nobody would. And then one day, many years later, and certainly after 2012, I heard about The Hollow Crown. Somebody, it seems, had the same idea. And would and could actually do something about it.

• Taskmaster Australia: The current season we’re watching I’m enjoying more than normal. I’ve always found the host of this version to be a little too much of a dick. (Unlike the host of the main show who is just performatively dickish.) But maybe I’m getting used to him. Anyway, I found this season the most enjoyable of this version of the show.

• Unbelievable (2019): A miniseries about a rapist. I just started it.

What I’m Listening to:

• Angine de Poitrine: I think the hype is ridiculous but they’re good at what they do.

  • Vol. 1 (2024): Math rock, but the microtonal guitar and the live looping are both twists on the formula.

  • Vol. II (2026): I think this is mostly an improvement on the first album.

• D’Angelo and and the Vanguard: Black Messiah (2014): D’Angelo’s final album is up to his standard.

• Bob Dylan: The Basement Tapes Complete (2014): You do not need to listen to this.

• Kandy and the Amazing Pop Machine: “King of Kung Fu”: Rebecca De Mornay co-wrote this when she was 16. (I am not making this up!) It’s terrible, but none of us co-wrote a Bruce Lee movie theme song at that age. I think she needs a Netflix/Prime documentary so we can learn what other weird shit she’s done.

• Pergolesi: Stabat Mater (1736): Not my thing.

• Rachmaninoff:

  • Les Études-Tableaux (1911, 1916): Technically impressive and catchy piano pieces.

  • Symphony No. 2 (1907): I really didn’t like this. I mean, it’s very catchy but it’s so conservative.

• Shostakovitch:

  • Piano Quintet in G minor, Op. 57 (1940): Though, at times, it feels somewhat conservative - okay, it’s fairly conservative - I still find this pretty and engaging.

  • Symphonies: I am very slowly making my way through his 15 (15!!!) symphonies.

• Sibelius: Karelia Suite (1893): I had heard this many years ago and reviewed it but apparently forgot.

• Strauss: Salome (1905): One of the great operas of the 20th century.

• Tanya Tagaq: S.A.P.U.T.J.I.J.I. (2026): It took me over 20 years to listen to her.

• And of course, there are the usual covers. Also, I’ve updated by My Greatest Covers of All Time list, adding some startling omissions (and for me) and one I just discovered. If you have YouTube music, the playlist is here.