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The Holdovers directed by Alexander Payne
133 minutes
Comedy/Drama
5* out of 5
DVD and Blu-Ray
A cranky history teacher at a prep school is forced to remain on campus over the holidays with a grieving cook and a troubled student who has no place to go.
An elite East Coast boarding school during Christmas break should be an empty place. Paul, a cantankerous history teacher who has managed to piss off the administration, gets stuck with babysitting duty for any children who have been left behind. Joining him is a kitchen staff member who has recently lost a son in the Vietnam War. Five unfortunate students are left behind with nowhere to go, until one’s rich father arrives in a helicopter to take them all on a skiing vacation. All, that is, except for Angus Tully, whose mother and new husband are too busy to give consent for him to go on the trip.
What follows is an exploration of loneliness and despair, while three people without a family find what it means to make deep, meaningful connections. As they spend time with one another, it becomes increasingly difficult to hide their personal troubles.
The Holdovers is a masterclass in acting, and Wes Anderson is kicking himself for not making this movie first. It’s a long one but well worth your time.
-Justin
Sure, I'll join your cult : a memoir of mental illness and the quest to belong anywhere by Maria Bamford
272 pages
Biography/Inspirational Non-Fiction
4/5*
Formats available: Physical Book
Maria Bamford is a comedian’s comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong. From struggling with an eating disorder as a child of the 1980s, to navigating a career in the arts (and medical debt and psychiatric institutionalization), she has tried just about every method possible to not only be a part of the world, but to want to be a part of it.
In Bamford’s “trademark blend of disarming intimacy and dark whimsy” (Publishers Weekly), Sure, I’ll Join Your Cultbrings us on a quest to participate in something. With sincerity and transparency, she recounts every anonymous fellowship she has joined (including but not limited to: Debtors Anonymous, Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous, and Overeaters Anonymous), every hypomanic episode (from worrying about selling out under capitalism to enforcing union rules on her Netflix TV show set to protect her health), and every easy 1-to-3-step recipe for fudge in between.
Packed with “Bamford’s brilliance, relentless humor, and insatiable instinct for survival (Library Journal), this memoir explores what it means to keep going, and to be a member of society (or any group she’s invited to) despite not being very good at it. In turn, she hopes to transform isolating experiences into comedy that will make you feel less alone (without turning into a cult following).
In this funny and insightful book, Maria Bamford discusses her lifelong struggle with mental illness and her lifelong need for belonging, bringing the voice that made her famous into book form. The chapters are structured to include the “cults” that she has belonged to throughout her life, starting with the cult of family, various 12 step groups, comedy/fame, her husband, and so on. Group dynamics have always made sense to her due to her love of following rules. The way that she speaks about mental illness is remarkable; she is highly self-aware, yet lacking in self-pity. This includes her description of a mental breakdown she suffered while on the way to a gig in Chicago, resulting in her inability to work for two years.
She also rants eloquently about the challenges of in-patient hospitalizations, medication changes, and the numerous challenges that accompany mental illness. For those familiar with her standup comedy and Netflix series, Lady Dynamite, there is a lot of recycled material in this book. Reading her voice in print, however, packs a different punch. Though this book is filled with laughs, it also reveals a tender and caring side. This has been evidenced by her mental health advocacy work, which has been awarded the International OCD Foundations Illumination Award. Maria uses humor as a vehicle to generate understanding and empathy in world that desperately needs both.
Reference Librarian Matthew B
Past Lives directed by Celine Song
105 minutes
Drama/Romance
Korean and English
5* out of 5
Formats: Blu-Ray, DVD, streaming on Kanopy
Nora and Hae Sung, two deeply connected childhood friends, are wrest apart after Nora's family emigrates from South Korea. Two decades later, they are reunited in New York for one fateful week as they confront notions of destiny, love, and the choices that make a life, in this heartrending modern romance.
Past Lives is a quiet film. It’s a film that allows its characters to sit and process their emotions. The dialog is almost less important than the spaces between.
Told in three parts, Past Lives is the story of Hae Sung and Nora: first as children, then as young adults, and finally as more mature adults. Exploring the Korean idea of In-Yun, a concept which says our encounters with one another throughout all of our past lives builds layers of connections between two souls. We feel the connection between these two individuals that won’t allow them to separate from each other’s lives for very long. But there’s a few complications: Nora moved to the United States and marries Arthur while Hae Sung stays in Korea and studies to become an engineer.
But what is fascinating about this film is that there is no villain. While we see the In-Yun that connects Hae Sung and Nora, we don’t hate Arthur. He isn’t in the way; and it’s hard to root against him. The In-Yun between them is rich, but we ache for something different.
Past Lives is a beautiful film that is best enjoyed on a rainy day, with a warm cup of tea, and time to process the romance and melancholy of Hae Sung and Nora’s interconnectedness that transcends time and space.
Justin
The library is a beautiful place full of books and people, and those people give amazing book recommendations. Here in library land, we call this book recommending phenomenon-Reader’s Advisory, or RA for short. Most of us here at the library are avid readers, and we are constantly bothering each other for new things to read; we have a lot of internal RA going on here in the group chat. If you ever asked someone for a book to read, you participated in the wild, wild world of RA! As Smokey the Bear would say, “you too can prevent reading boredom.” Well, he would say that if forest fires were books. Recently library employees were asked to participate in a Book Swap. (Participation was voluntary.) The deal was: fill out a form letting the proverbial them know what you like and dislike, and they give your info to a random employee. That random employee/book swap buddy will find a book to gift you based on the information you submitted. This is actually a treat and not work because books are still fun ladies and gentlemen. Big fun. The facts are I love a good challenge, and I love talking about books with people; hence my working at KHCPL. This is the golden opportunity to really go nuts for donuts or books, in this case. Herein lies the beauty of the book swap: learning more about the people around you. You may love horror but find out your book swap buddy loves romance. This is ample time to get to know themes you never pick up and break out of your comfort zone. Learning what a person loves to read gives a good tell about who they are and what they like, a glimpse of personality if you will; you can find things out about people through books that you wouldn’t in regular conversation. Importantly, you also learn about yourself: what you like, and maybe find a book to add to your own overflowing TBR pile. (I’m convinced adding to your TBR is a hobby too.) Little book-shaped parcels, as pictured above, started floating around and so did the smiles. My coworkers started opening up their recommendations and ran to tell everyone that they were bumping up their gifts to be read next. Another thing that makes the swap beautiful is that someone listens and they seek out something just for their buddy that they think would be loved. I’d call that a friend-building exercise. If you didn’t know reading was a communal sport, now you do. It’s much more fun to involve others in your reading. Try out book swapping, thrift some wallpaper from Goodwill, be whimsical and use it to wrap up your book recommendation, and hand it to your friends. After all that, talk about the books, share secrets, make clubs, and create obsessions! Give the gift of RA, just like us book nerds here in the library. I think you will be pleasantly surprised.
For more book recommendations, please tune in to Off the Books with B&S Podcast on any of your podcasting platforms; new episodes air every other Thursday.
Bethann
What have I been up to these past few weeks? Well buckle up my friends, and let me tell you! These past few weeks, I have been deep in a reread of Sarah J. Maas’s Crescent City: House of Earth and Blood and House of Sky and Breath in preparation for House of Flame and Shadow (SWOON). My first time reading these books, I basically skimmed through them to get to the good parts which had already been spoiled for me on TikTok and other social media. I wasn’t all that interested in them because I believed the world building was just too much for me, and they were so different from Maas’s other books. This time around, I read them slowly and made sure I paid attention to all the important little details. I was absolutely blown away at what I had missed the first time, and I found myself loving these even more than the A Court of Thorns and Roses series (shocker, I know).
Crescent City tells the story of a girl named Bryce Quinlan living her best life. That is until she finds all her closest friends and members of the wolf pack murdered by some sort of demon. Bryce puts her heart into investigating this horrific crime and bringing her friends’ murderer to justice. Along the way, she is partnered with the fallen angel, Hunt Athalar (watch out Rhysand), who has been promised a chance at freedom if he helps Bryce figure out who the murderer is. Together, Bryce and Hunt make discoveries that could change their world…only not for the better, and they must work together to stop the evil that is to come (and maybe there will be romance, who knows?).
Nothing could have prepared me for book three. House of Flame and Shadow was nothing but action, destruction, love, and heartbreak, and I could not put the book down once I picked it up. The character development from book one was insane. If you compared book one to book three you would be shocked at how some of the characters turned out, and you really didn’t know who to trust until book three. I can’t even talk much about the book because I will quite literally spoil it. Just trust me, ok? If you have not given Crescent City a shot, be sure to pick it up and tell me what you think!
For more book recommendations please tune in to Off the Books with B&S Podcast on any of your podcasting platforms; new episodes air every other Thursday.
-Samantha
What Happens Later
1 Hr. 44 Min.
Comedy/Romance
4/5*
Formats available: DVD, Blu-Ray
Ex-lovers reunite when they both become stranded in an airport overnight. They find themselves drawn together to revisit their past to discuss what could have been and what may happen in the future.
Back in the 80’s and 90’s, Romantic Comedies (also known as Rom Coms) were all the rage. I was, and still am, a huge Rom Com fan. The Queen of the Rom Coms was Meg Ryan. Meg starred in such classics ase When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, and You’ve Got Mail. Imagine my delight when I heard that Meg was returning to the Rom Com world with her new release What Happens Later.
What Happens Later, which Meg also directed, tells the story of Willa (played by Meg) and Bill (played by David Duchovny). The former couple gets stranded in an airport during a snowstorm. During their time there they rehash their relationship and come to terms with what happened and what might have become of their relationship.
I found this movie very charming. It gave me vibes of Nora Ephron movies. (Meg dedicated the movie to her.) I will warn you that there is a lot of talking between the two main characters so if you don’t like that sort of thing, you probably won’t like this movie. But if you are a Rom Com fan, this is the movie for you.
AV Librarian Tonya