Recent Recommendations

Not much has been going on here lately. Mainly, I’ve been sittin’ around working on my final project for my Masters degree. The result is that I haven’t had much to say (as if I ever do). I have taken a few small breaks, though, from my writing to watch a couple of movies. There have been some good ones.

In particular, I would recommend the movie A Very Long Engagement. It’s a foreign film that stars Audrey Tautou (the girl from Amelie, another good movie). She’s a woman who was engaged before the start of World War I, and her fiancé never came back. Everyone tells her that he was executed on the front lines for cowardice. Her instincts, however, continually tell her that he’s still alive, and she sets out to piece together the truth. The result is a surprisingly original and complex mystery/romance/war movie (you’d of thought the World War I love sage would have been done to death by now). I’d recommend this to just about anybody. There’s a nice mixture of romance, suspense, and (a little bit of) comedy that will please people of a lot of tastes. I found it really satisfying; I watched it twice. (And if you watch it and like it, I would recommend the classic novel Random Harvest by James Hilton.)

I’d also highly recommend Hotel Rwanda. Just about every blog that I read regularly had recommended this at one point or another, particularly for Christians to see, and I finally got around to watching it. The moviemaking was slightly flawed, but that couldn’t overcome the tremendous story that was being told. It’s about a man who saves hundreds of people during the Rwandan genocide. Everything about it was gut wrenching, particularly when you consider that the killing was done by Christians, that the west offered very little response it, that the west did nothing to prevent the genocide despite clear warning, and that the conditions that resulted in such bloodshed was largely brought about by western colonialism. This is really sort of a must-see for people in these times.

I’m also currently reading The Constant Gardener by John LeCarre. It’s another pretty chilling story set in Africa. So far, I’d recommend it highly, and considering the people who are involved in making the movie, I bet it’s good, too.